Oct
12th
2020
Armor Is Useless Trope · 10:37am Oct 12th, 2020
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ArmorIsUseless
Is there any book/movie/show etc where armor is actually useful? Because we keep seeing guys dying even if they are wearing full plate armor by little more than a wooden stick poking their chest, figuratively speaking. Not a spear, a wooden stick.
The armor we see in entertainment seems to be made of butter rather than steel it seems. Why would you even bother wearing it? Granted in video games, it seems to work.
There was that scene in the Lord of the Rings where Frodo got stabbed by a spear and was simply bruised badly cause he had a Mithril shirt.
...That's the only instance I can think of off the top of my head.
Game of Thrones S1. I don't recall all the names, so please give me some leeway.
When Khal Drogo is dying from infection and the one guy uses the curved blade against the guy in full plate, confirming something that he had explained earlier about a curved sword being suitable for horseback, but a weapon needing a pointed tip if it was going to get through the armour.
Star Wars episode VIIi: the Last Jedi.
Captain Phasma's Chromium-plated armour reflecting a round from a First Order Officer's Blaster Pistol.
Lord of the ring: fellowship of ring. Frodo survived stab in a chest because of mithril(not sure how it spelled) chain mail.
As you said, video games in general tend to have equipment actually matter.
Star Wars episode IV: a New Hope. (Official Book to the movie [pre-Disney])
Most Storm Troopers that were downed in the bottleneck in the opening scene were dragged away to regain consciousness.
(Official canon is that Early Clone Trooper Armour was designed to break apart and fall away upon taking [standard] blaster fire, but the impact often left them unconscious and they still recieved internal injuries. Later versions would still break apart, but was less likely to leave the clones KO'd and had almost entirely mitigated internal trauma. Imperial Storm Trooper armour was upgraded to no longer break apart, spreading the impact of the blast across a much larger area, preventing internal injuries, but would almost certainly leave the trooper knocked out. Of course there were exceptions for anything that was concentrated or powerful enough that it just went clean through, such as Mandalorian blasters, Super Battle Droid weapons, Wookie Bowcasters, Death Trooper blasters, anything that was illegally modified[e.g. Han Solo's blaster pistol, Boba Fett's blaster] and anything intended for destroying Speeders, Transports and Starfighters.)
In saving private ryan in the beach scene a soldier get shot on his helmet which saves his life. He then removes it and get shot in the head. Something like that also happen in starship trooper when one of the soldier removes his helmet during training.
Also, here’s another example of armor being useful.
V for Vendetta, V wears a (presumably) steel cuirass for the fight scene at the end of the movie. It blocked a number of shots and reduced the kinetic energy on the rest, although he still died from the wounds taken in that fight.
Two years late, but I have been neglecting my feed. That said, armor is very useful in Goblin Slayer both in the Anime adaptation, but even more so in the light novels.
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Frodo Baggins' mitral armour saved him. Is another one.