Armor sets and upgrades that stay useful all game
How Mytheria designs armor sets: one defence curve for every set, nine set bonuses to choose between, and honing that keeps a favourite set useful.
On this page
In many games with armor, every new region brings better armor, so you throw away what you wore before, and there's little reason to care which set you pick. In Mytheria, our pixel-art co-op game, every armor set follows the same defence curve, the difference between sets is what their bonuses do, and you can hone a set you love so it keeps up all the way to the end.
The stills below were taken in the game for this post.
How do you make armor sets stay useful?
Keep protection and play style apart. Put every set on one shared defence curve, so no set is simply stronger than another, and let upgrades move any set up that curve. Then give each set bonuses that change how you play, such as more damage from afar or healing on kills. Players then pick a set for its bonuses and upgrade it instead of replacing it.
The short answer
How Mytheria's armor works:
- There are nine sets, each a head, a body and a charm.
- Every set follows one defence curve, so its defence depends on how far it's been upgraded, whichever set it is.
- Each set has two bonuses: one for wearing two pieces, and a bigger one for all three.
- Three hones take a set from one region's grade to the next.
- Defence works as a percentage: damage is multiplied by 100 / (100 + defence), so it never reaches zero.
- Sets come from the anvil, chests, keepers' caches and the deepest mine caches.
One curve for every set
Every set's defence comes from one curve: 10 for a fresh Woodland set, 50 for Copper Bloom, 140 for Glimmerfen, 350 for Frostspire and 723 for the Hollow Heart. The body piece carries half of it, the head and charm a quarter each. Here are three different sets, each honed three times:
Step through the sets, or use the arrow keys
Duellist's Regalia: 51 defence. Close blows deal 20 % more damage; with all three pieces, blows that land while a creature winds up deal 60 % more.
With defence equal, the choice is about how you want to play. A Duellist wants to fight up close and punish wind-ups. Heartroot rewards staying aggressive while hurt. Farstrider kites with a bow.
How does armor defence work?
Defence reduces damage as a percentage: a blow is multiplied by 100 / (100 + defence). With 51 defence, like the three sets above, every blow does 34 % less, and with 100 it does half. Damage keeps falling as defence rises but never reaches zero, so no armor makes you untouchable, and every bit of defence matters about as much as the last.
Hone the set you love
A set's hone level moves it along the curve. Three hones take it exactly from one region's grade to the next, so a Woodland set honed three times equals a fresh Copper Bloom set, and twelve hones reach the Hollow Heart's grade. Try it:
Pick where the set was forged, then hone it
Honing a set up a whole grade costs about the same as forging a new one there, paid in that region's materials. So there's no penalty for keeping your favourite: you can wear the first set you found all the way to the end. How those prices are set is in game economy design.
Make bonuses change how you play
Each bonus is one clear rule that changes how you decide what to do. In a fight, close blows hit harder with the Duellist set and blows from afar with Farstrider. Stalker makes opening blows on an unhurt creature hit much harder, and Bulwark reduces harm while you stand still and hits back hard at whoever strikes you.
Mistwalker gives an extra dash charge, and dashing through a creature cuts it, while Farstrider also makes you walk faster. Heartroot heals you on every kill, and Lanternkeeper gives a light in the dark and less harm from the night fog. Forager pulls drops to you from further away and finds extra materials, and Runeweaver gets more runes from offerings.
The two-piece bonus is worth roughly 12 % in its own area, and the full set about 30 % in all, so wearing a full set is a real commitment but mixing two pieces of one set with a piece of another still pays. Some bonuses have caps for comfort: walking speed never rises more than 12 %, because faster than that feels slippery. The same measuring approach balances the weapons; see how to balance weapons with a damage budget.
Spread sets across the world
Only five sets are forged at the anvil or a settlement's workshop. The others are found: the Lanternkeeper's Mantle in Woodland and Copper Bloom chests, the Mistwalker's Veil in Glimmerfen and Frostspire chests, Heartroot Mail in the keepers' caches, and the Stalker's Trappings in the deepest mine caches. A found piece arrives at its region's grade, and in co-op every player present who doesn't have it gets one.
A checklist for armor sets
- Put every set on one defence curve.
- Make defence a percentage that never reaches 100.
- Let upgrades move any set to any region's grade.
- Price upgrading about the same as replacing.
- Give each set bonuses that change how you play.
- Reward the full set, but let mixed sets work.
- Cap bonuses that hurt comfort, like speed.
- Hide some sets in the world to find.
Further reading
- Game economy design: setting prices with a curveHow we balance Mytheria's game economy: target curves for enemies and income, a model that sets every price, and play tests that check the model.
- How to balance weapons with a damage budgetHow we balance Mytheria's nine weapons: a damage budget per tier, every move costed in seconds of budget, with all 108 combinations measured in play.
- MytheriaBuild your own set yourself: a pixel-art co-op adventure for one to four players.
Wishlist Mytheria
Mytheria is a pixel-art co-op adventure for one to four players, coming to Steam for Windows, macOS and Steam Deck. A wishlist is the best way to follow it and to help us.