Armor Upgrades on the New Arena Vehicles

[BanaD6666 12]

I noticed the new vehicles for the arena don't have an option to upgrade armor where as normal vehicles/planes do. I attached images. I also play in PC so maybe it's a PC bug. I contacted R* support, but it seems that I'm getting the same response ("Thank you for feedback" from the support rep). Does anyone know if this intentional or if it's actually something missing by mistake?

 

Normal Vehicle:

https://i.imgur.com/D0VgNLT.png

 

Arena Vehicle:

https://i.imgur.com/hgDlIMO.png

[Gaffa 6,978]

Much the same as the Insurgent / Insurgent Pick-Up Custom not having an armour option - they already have that applied / when you choose the upgrade option they get it applied automatically. All vehicles I checked had the 100% armour upgrade. I'm not sure however, if this is dependent on rank (as you'd only unlock the 100% armour upgrade at rank 100(?)). 

[oli_152 52]

To be honest : I was able to destroy my ZR380 like a normal car... They didnt seemed like having 100% Armor. 

 

For the Insurgent : with a little manipulation with Ifruit and a PC, you can apply the 100% Armor on it, which it can resist to one more rocket (Normal : 4, +Armor : 5) 

 

Since the Arena War Vehicle and/or any vehicle stored in the newest garage don't appear in Ifruit (Or newly bought cars) : you can't really add options on them (Unless knowing their ID and being able to modify the message Ifruit send to the game)

[No Use For A Name 6,644]

I bought another Gargoyle and didn’t mod it before upgrading. Good god, this thing starts smoking so easily. It’s already blown up on me twice just from crashing a few times. My other deathbike doesn’t do this, but it was already fully modded with 100% armor before upgrading. Wonder if that has anything to do with it

[BanaD6666 12]

I tested the different vehicles. There seems to be an armor stat in the game for those vehicles.

 

The ones you can upgrades to "arena-ready" like the impaler or dominator, you can modify them before you convert them to arena cars. If mod their armor before converting them, they actually are stronger (i.e. takes more bullets and damage) than if you just convert them stock. 

[Gaffa 6,978]

5 hours ago, BanaD6666 said:

I tested the different vehicles. There seems to be an armor stat in the game for those vehicles.

 

The ones you can upgrades to "arena-ready" like the impaler or dominator, you can modify them before you convert them to arena cars. If mod their armor before converting them, they actually are stronger (i.e. takes more bullets and damage) than if you just convert them stock. 

How exactly are you testing them? 

[SummerFreeze 1,323]

I just did some quick tests with a friend, who bought the Sasquatch applying 100% armor beforehand. I did NOT.

 

The test consisted of firing at the same spot in the front of the Sasquatch with the minigun until it blows up, then counting the bullets.

 

I shot each car three times and here are the results.

 

My friend's blew up in: 557, 440, 529 rounds.

Mine blew up in: 352, 344, 354 rounds.

 

Since it looks like I will have to replace my Sasquatch at least, I'm going to buy a new one and do some more tests.

Addendum: Neither Sasquatch had armor plating.

[Gaffa 6,978]

^ Interesting. I don't really test guns and if I do, they're always being aimed directly at the engine bay. 

 

The only thing I've noticed is that 'armour percentage' (0 to 100) depends on your armour plating option from the 'Bodywork > Armor Plating' upgrades. 
'Light Armor' = 60% Armor. 
'Reinforced Armor' = 80% Armor.
'Heavy Armor' = 100% Armor. 

So essentially I've had to put Heavy Armor on everything despite it ruining the look of some vehicles. 

[SummerFreeze 1,323]

7 hours ago, Gaffa said:

^ Interesting. I don't really test guns and if I do, they're always being aimed directly at the engine bay. 

 

The only thing I've noticed is that 'armour percentage' (0 to 100) depends on your armour plating option from the 'Bodywork > Armor Plating' upgrades. 
'Light Armor' = 60% Armor. 
'Reinforced Armor' = 80% Armor.
'Heavy Armor' = 100% Armor. 

So essentially I've had to put Heavy Armor on everything despite it ruining the look of some vehicles. 

Ah, that's good to know. I thought I had to test next if armor plating increases armor percentage somehow.

 

How do you look up how much armor percentage a vehicle has?

 

Do you know if the percentage decreases when switching from heavy to light armor?

[Gaffa 6,978]

3 hours ago, SummerFreeze said:

How do you look up how much armor percentage a vehicle has?

 

Do you know if the percentage decreases when switching from heavy to light armor?

PC mods. 

If memory serves me correctly, yeah the equivalent armour percentage does decrease if you remove or decrease the Armor Plating option on Arena War vehicles. It's worthy of note, that this tiered armour level that comes with Armor Plating is only relevant to the AW vehicles - an interesting touch from Rockstar. Previous vehicles in the game with an 'Armor Plating' option (like the After Hours delivery vehicles and some Gunrunning et al stuff) don't have any bearing on the equivalent armour percentage. 

[SummerFreeze 1,323]

I've done some more testing now; this time with the ZR380.

 

Same set-up: Firing the minigun at the same spot in the front of the car until it blows up, then count the rounds.

 

1. Without armor: 98, 110, 130, 135, 170

2. With heavy armor plating: 184, 187, 196, 209, 218

3. With light armor plating (after purchasing the heavy): 134, 136, 141, 149, 203

 

Median number in bold. There's probably a testing error of at least +/- 20 rounds.

 

- - -

 

As I said earlier, I'm going to buy a Sasquatch with 100% armor applied before the conversion, and do some more testing against my Sasquatch with 0% armor.

 

So far it seem like if you want maximum durability, you have to either buy the heavy armor plating, or in case of upgradeable vehicles, purchase the 100% armor before conversion and then leave off armor plating altogether.

[SummerFreeze 1,323]

Finally got around to testing the Sasquatches as mentioned...

 

New method of testing: This time I stood on the back of the truck and fired the minigun into the supercharger, which is exposed regardless of armor plating. Also I counted the rounds until the vehicle was considered destroyed by the game, not until it blew up.

 

Sasquatch with 100% armor (before conversion): 204, 205, 206 rounds

Sasquatch with heavy armor plating (0% armor before conversion): 405, 406, 409 rounds

Sasquatch with 100% armor (before conversion) and heavy armor plating: 405, 406, 408 rounds

[Thehunteroftruth 461]

17 minutes ago, SummerFreeze said:

Finally got around to testing the Sasquatches as mentioned...

 

New method of testing: This time I stood on the back of the truck and fired the minigun into the supercharger, which is exposed regardless of armor plating. Also I counted the rounds until the vehicle was considered destroyed by the game, not until it blew up.

 

Sasquatch with 100% armor (before conversion): 204, 205, 206 rounds

Sasquatch with heavy armor plating (0% armor before conversion): 405, 406, 409 rounds

Sasquatch with 100% armor (before conversion) and heavy armor plating: 405, 406, 408 rounds

thanks for testing this up, i was really interested in knowing the info. Tough it sucks that you basically are forced to upgrade and the armor you applied before is wasted cash :x

[SummerFreeze 1,323]

8 minutes ago, Thehunteroftruth said:

thanks for testing this up, i was really interested in knowing the info. Tough it sucks that you basically are forced to upgrade and the armor you applied before is wasted cash :x

You're welcome.

 

Gaffa provided the relevant info that heavy armor plating indirectly sets armor to 100%. So there couldn't be a difference whether armor was applied before the conversion or not.

 

What I wanted to know in addition to that is if a vehicle with 100% armor but no armor plating could stand up to a vehicle with armor plating in damage resistance. Unfortunately it does not. So you have to buy heavy armor plating for maximum resistance, which doesn't look very good on some vehicles.

 

For example, I now have two Deathbikes: an Apocalypse one with boost, jump, large diameter back wheel, and light armor plating for freemode travel (managed to reach 301 kph with it during the max speed challenge), and a Future Shock one with all the upgrades including weapons for the arena.

[Gaffa 6,978]

Yeah it's a difficult one to explain. 

My Future Shock Impaler doesn't have any armour on, but when I'm testing it's resistance out (against explosives etc) I'm using PC mods to set the 100% armour level, not touching the armour plating, and in doing so, the vehicle has the same (correct) resistance as the Arena War Dominator, Imperator, Issi and ZR380. 

 

So ideally if Rockstar gave us back the option to put armour on separately, it'd work whilst still retaining the looks of the vehicle. I believe they opted for a slightly more realistic approach though (a vehicle more heavily plated should theoretically be more armoured). 
Not only that, but with many of the results I've been getting from just the Up-N-Atomizer and the EMP Mine, I'm really thinking that Rockstar are definitely trying to balance stuff out, making an effort to get things right. Hence why the Chernobog and RCV (and others) have decent armour against those two weapons but not anything else, and why the latest aircraft addition (B-11 Strikeforce) is the only one with limited homing missiles. 

[SummerFreeze 1,323]

I want to add that I've since tested two Issis with 100% and 0% armor before conversion, and they ended up taking the exact same amount of bullets before registering as destroyed. I used FMJ heavy revolver, FMJ combat MG, and the minigun, firing into the left headlight from the same distance, but I've deleted the test numbers unfortunately.

Edited March 21 by SummerFreeze