Armor/Shield display numbers

[Aeonic]

Given the new information provided for armor and shields, how they provide difference degrees of protection from different forms of damage, wouldn't it make more sense to display armor and shield information as percentages instead of numbers? I mean, the numbers don't really mean anything. For example, looking at some Blast Plate, I see:

571 / 571 / 215 / 133 / 100 / 80

But if I have it installed, I'd see something like 60 displayed on my HUD. The 60 does nothing to tell me that I can actually absorb 571 points of laser damage. (Incidentally, holy cow, that's a lot of damage absorption! I never realized levels boosted defenses that much.)

Now, since the 60 displayed on my HUD really doesn't really have any meaning in light of the actual amounts of damage that the armor can absorb, all it really does is tell me that I have 60 out of 60 armor points. Except that I'm not always going to know what the max value is if I end up with an oddball value like 82.

Now, if these were all changed to percentages so that everything always displayed 100% when undamaged, then I'd know exactly how my armor was holding up when it read 82%. I realize that its considered fun to watch the numbers increase as you progress, but showing percentages is more informative given how inaccurate the numbers that we see now are.

Same for shields.

The only issue after that is knowing how much damage you'd take from anything that isn't specified in the inventory screen. Perhaps an icon for "every other form of damage" could be included along with the others.

[digdug]

hi Aeonic,
we just resolved how to calculate the values thanks to George:
http://www.neurohack.com/transcendence/ ... php?t=2431

[Aeonic]

I've read that thread already, but, I wasn't talking about how to calculate the values.

[digdug]

ah, yes the HUD displays the base amount of hp of the armor without any modifier.

At this point, in order to not make confusion, maybe the HUD can be changed to display a percentage of the damage of the armor layer, instead of the actual value.

[Atarlost]

I'd allmost rather have a numbere there and percantages instead of numbers in the armor descriptions. You don't allways have uniform armor.
It's good to have a constant reminder that you only found three pieces of orthosteel and your tail is still light.

[Aeonic]

It's good to have a constant reminder that you only found three pieces of orthosteel and your tail is still light.

That's why it displays the names of the armor on the HUD.

Perhaps a display toggle somewhere would let you switch between values and percentages. Its just a thought, but I'd rather use percentages.