Assessing Armor: Warlord (Lion Knight Hybrid) (Patreon)

We're continuing our roll of great armor sets with one of my two personal favourites, it's the Warlord armor. One of a few overt 'weapon specific' armours we have in the game right now. This one is for axes, which aren't cool until they're in the hands of a warlord.

The Warlord armor seems to be a rough and rustic version of the armor worn by the Warlords (here and here) who themselves seem to be a currently vaporware class for Kingdom Death: Labyrinth. So this armor may well be a small peak into the lore and it suggests that the Lion Knight's three hybrid armor sets are references to classes from Labyrinth themselves. The Dancer for example has heavy savior based elements in its design.

Still, Warlord Armor is absolutely one of the mid/late armor sets we have available right now, boasting a respectable 5 armor on all locations and using parts of the Leather, Screaming, Phoenix and Lantern armor to complete its build. It also has two configurations, depending on what you want to get active. This is the most commonly used one.

The alternative loadout moves the Plackart and Greaves to the left, relocates the lantern mail and then uses a left facing red affinity to activate the Greaves for a total of 7 movement on the average survivor (10 on a Harvestman). It's not as powerful as the active Plackart DPS/bruiser build, but it is something to remember.

So, lets get into the bits!

Screaming Horns

Resource Cost: 1x Spiral Horn, 1x Scrap

Assessment

Efficiency: If you didn't think it was possible for the Screaming Horns to get better you were sorely mistaken. This version of the horns is better than the original version as it's tougher and has more powerful synergies.

S++

Defense: The horns gets a boost in defenses over the Screaming Armor version because the down blue affinity and the insanity gains have additional defensive power due to their synergy with the Phoenix Plackart. Not only do the Screaming Horns help protect you from brain damage, but they also help keep the 'best ability in the game' online.

As mentioned before, due to the odd wording on the Screaming Horns, deaf survivors benefit from potentially unlimited insanity gains. So your Warlord survivor would ideally be deaf. This potential to have as much insanity as you want pushes the Screaming Horns into the top ends of the S tier with ease.

S++

Abilities: So at a minimum the Screaming Horns allow you to keep yourself insane so the Phoenix Plackart activates every turn you are hit. This however costs an activation, so it can feel expensive. But that's a better version of Block 1 - every turn. So I can't criticize it at all and neither should you.  However, when combined with a deaf survivor and any kind of monster does nothing loop - such as Hiccup, Butcher/King's Man vs. Fecal Salves, Ground Fighting, Cocoon, Lick Wounds, Screaming Antelope Instinct (just don't go above 19 insanity there, you'll regret it) etc etc you can get yourself a huge amount of insanity to fuel the armor "forever".

S++

Affinities: In 1.31 the Screaming Horns used to have a down green half-affinity, they were switched to a down blue, which made them worse with the Leather Shield, but stronger with both the Warlord and Screaming Sets. I can't rave about the affinity as being the best thing ever as it's just a single affinity, but it is a significant buff to Warlord Armor's overall slotting efficiency.

A+

Score: The Screaming Horns remains one of the strongest pieces of head gear in the game and it's only made stronger by its inclusion with the Warlord Armor set.

S++

Phoenix Plackart

Resource Cost: 1x Iron, 1x Leather, 1x Tail Feather, 1x Bone

Assessment

Efficiency: This piece of gear is expensive, but it's priced correctly for what you get, which is a good slice of armor and a phenomenal ability. I do not mind expensive armor if you get your money's worth, and I feel you get that here.

S

Defense: I've mentioned before many times that I personally feel that the Phoenix Plackart is one of the most powerful pieces of gear in the game. As long as you can sustain your insanity (which this armor set can do, as per the Helm above); then you've got a permanent 'ignore one hit' that stacks with block/deflect - you can even run a DPS build that uses the Plackart as a safety net if you want.

S++

Abilities: One of the best abilities in the game. See above and the Phoenix article for more discussion on why I rate this so much. It's even better here because the armor supports the Plackart strongly.

S++

Affinities: Up Blue, left green and right red half-affinities - that's a solid set of affinities. As I've mentioned before I do expect my high level body armor sets to have 4 affinities not 3, this piece would be strongly improved with a down blue, but you cannot get everything you want, sometimes however, you get what you need.

S  

Score: Elegant, powerful, exciting. The Phoenix Plackart is one of the cornerstones of good gear design. 

S++

Leather Bracers

Resource Cost: 1x Leather, 1x Hide

Assessment

Efficiency: While I mentioned during the leather article that the Leather Bracers were not the most efficient part of the armor set, this changes when you hit Warlord armor because the increase in armor points makes a significant difference.

S

Defense: 5 Armor and +2 survival when departing is solid, plus it has a hanging green right affinity, which as you should all know by now is one of the best wild affinities to have out there. 

A

Abilities: A simple survival gain, nothing more, nothing less. Not very powerful at the stage you get this armor set together, but helpful.

C+

Affinities: Just one affinity, but it's a very significant one. The Leather Bracers provide one of two right facing green half-affinities for the armor set. The first of these completes the activation requirements for the Phoenix Plackart, while the second

Score: Solid, cheap, but uninspiring. This gets stronger if you can find another whole green affinity + monster grease. But because it is part of a duo that make each other redundant on the affinity front, it is not as impressive as it could be elsewhere. 

C

Lantern Mail

Resource Cost: 1x Iron, 5x Organ 

Assessment

Efficiency: Very, very expensive for what  you get. This is one useful affinity (that the set doesn't super need, but appreciates) and some armor. This is the weakest part of the Warlord set and it shows.

C-

Defense: 5 armor, that's your lot. It's decent, but it's not even as good as the piece is in Lantern Armor (where it has 8 armor). So I can't really go praising the defense you get for the price you pay.

C

Abilities: N/A

Affinities: One single right green half-affinity, it's useful and the best overall location for that affinity (outside of left and right together), due to its combination with Monster Grease and the Phoenix Plackart but it really could have done with an up or down affinity of some kind. 

C

Score: The worst part of this armor set by a long margin  (and the worst part of Lantern Armor as well). There's little that's exciting about this piece of gear, it's just an expensive necessity you have to get in order to enjoy everything else.  This is an expensive way to get a green half affinity for your Plackart.  

C-

Lantern Greaves

Resource Cost:  1x Iron 5 x Leather 

Assessment

Efficiency: Like all Lantern Armor pieces, the Greaves are prohibitively expensive to an obscene level. However, unlike Lantern Armor, the Warlord edition of the Greaves loses out because it has less overall armor (Lantern Armor hits 8 base because of how the body piece works). Also, a lot of the time you're not activating this piece so you end up with just a very expensive 5 armor and left red half-affinity - almost exactly like the lantern mail above.

C+

Defense: Solid, and can become quite potent if you're going to activate the ability and use Warlord to "dash-cancel" (negate all the monster's attacks by dashing out of range) - especially when combined with other movement buffs. 

A-

Abilities: Either this piece has no abilities at all, or you're exchanging away the Phoenix Plackart

B-

Affinities: The most useful affinity this piece has is the red left half-affinity. That completes the Plackart. You don't really need the up blue or the right red, (mostly because what you need are left and right greens or blues and an up or down green) but they are there as options.

B+ 

Score: While this piece could have been very interesting if it was on a different armor set, the lack of synergy with the extra movement and the awkwardness of it's failure to combine with the Phoenix Plackart because it wants the same slot limits it. So this one usually ends up being an expensive 5 armor + red affinity.

B+

Warlord Armor Full Set

Resource Cost:  3x Iron 6 x Leather, 5x Organ, 1x Hide, 1x Tail Feather, 1x Bone  1x Spiral Horn, 1x Scrap   

Assessment

Set Bonus: The set bonus is really what you're all about when you build Warlord armor, there's no reason to build this armor set if you're not looking to use axes because there are better choices for all other weapons out there. This armor set is great, but it's very, very focused.

The main thing you care about here (apart from the 5 armor) is the +luck and the critical wound ability that really turbo charges the rest of your hunt party (another reference to the lore of Warlords). The speed is (as always) a bit of a double-edged sword (or should that be axe?) However, most axes are 2 speed, so going to 3 speed isn't a deal breaker.

It's also worth noting that it can be hard to get a Lucky Charm active on this build and also axes with Deadly are not that common (Greater Gaxe is one of the few). However, this set has massive synergy with the Xmaxe promo gear.

A

Efficiency: Oooof, this is one expensive set because of the inclusion of not one, but two parts of Lantern armor. They cost a total of 12 resources by themselves alone. However, outside of the high costs and iron requirements, there are only 2 monster specific resources in the set; the tail feather and spiral horn. So while this costs a lot, it's relatively straight forward to save for and construct.  

You also get a lot of power and durability for the price you pay.

B+

Defense: This armor set has one of the best defenses in the game, it's got 5 armor in all locations, self generation of insanity and the Phoenix plackart. I think only Rolling Armor surpasses Warlord defensively if you want to build in that manner. It is a really powerful defensive set and you can either build on that further with shields and monster grease or you can use it 'as is' and flex onto damage with axes. It is impressive that this armor set allows for tanking, brusing, straight DPS or even dual wielding DPS - all because the defensive package is so well contained and effective in a wide range of circumstances.

S+

Abilities: +1 survival when departing, ignore 1 hit when insane in exchange for brain damage or +2 movement, axe bonuses (luck/speed), survival gains for the rest of the hunt party, strength boosts to the rest of the party and close to unlimited insanity gains which get super powerful if you are deaf or convert to temporary extra movement for kiting. There's a lot here packed into this armor set and it's really great that it has two modes of use - tanking and kiting.

S-

Affinities: There is absolutely nothing to complain about with the affinities, they allow you to easily set up three green affinities and an active Phoenix Plackart if you want them and they give you ample room to do the alternative +movement kiting build if that's what you prefer. The only real issue is the fact that the Lantern Greaves and the Plackart both want to sit in the same place on the gear grid (Square 8 or C2 if you prefer) which limits you from activating both of them in the same build.

A+

Score: I can't put Warlord into the S tier of armors because it is held back by the affinity limitations, cost and narrow focus of the weapon category. This isn't a broad, fits all situations armor type like Rolling, Cycloid Scale, Leather, Rawhide or Dancer armor - it's more limited. However, it is the single best loading platform for carrying the Phoenix Plackart and as such it's certainly the highest scoring A tier armor in the game. It isn't in the big boys club, but it gets invited along as a guest very often.

A+