Armor & Hit Locations
Armor in Metanoia is worn per hit location. When you take Strain from a physical attack, the armor covering that location absorbs some or all of it before it reaches your Strain pool.
Hit Locations
Section titled “Hit Locations”There are four hit locations:
| Location | Coverage |
|---|---|
| Head | Helm, hood, etc. |
| Arms | Pauldrons, vambraces, bracers |
| Legs | Greaves, boots, sabatons |
| Center | Chest, torso |
Center is the most common hit location because three out of eight possible base d8 results land there.
Determining Hit Location
Section titled “Determining Hit Location”The base d8 in every dice pool determines where a hit lands, using the following mapping:
| d8 Result | Location |
|---|---|
| 1 | Head |
| 2, 3 | Arms |
| 4, 5 | Legs |
| 6, 7, 8 | Center |
This uses the mandatory base d8, not the full pool.
The Targeted Hit boon overrides this. If you spend a Targeted Hit boon, you choose the location instead of the die determining it.
Armor Strain (AS)
Section titled “Armor Strain (AS)”Each piece of armor has an Armor Strain value that absorbs incoming physical Strain on a 1:1 basis. Strain absorbed by armor does not reduce your Strain pool.
| Material | AS |
|---|---|
| Cloth | 0 |
| Leather | 1 |
| Amalgam | 2 |
| Half | 3 |
| Scale | 4 |
| Splint | 5 |
| Plate | 6 |
Breaking Armor
Section titled “Breaking Armor”When the total Strain a piece of armor has absorbed equals its maximum AS, it breaks. Broken armor provides no protection until repaired.
Tracking absorbed Strain per piece is necessary during extended combat. Repairing broken armor requires downtime and appropriate materials.
Environmental Protection
Section titled “Environmental Protection”Armor also protects against harsh environmental Strain conditions. A character wearing at least Cloth coverage on a location is protected from:
- Heat (extreme temperatures, fire environments)
- Cold (freezing environments, blizzards)
Without appropriate clothing or armor on the affected location, the GM may apply environmental Strain directly to that location or to the Strain pool.
Higher-AS materials do not increase environmental protection beyond what Cloth provides. The protection is binary: covered or not.
Cover is not tracked as a separate object with its own statblock. Because characters reposition freely, cover is treated as a condition of the fiction rather than a persistent thing to damage.
When a piece of cover lies between a defender and an attacker, the defender gains 1 boon on any defensive action they take against that attacker. The GM is the final arbiter of whether cover applies based on the geometry of the scene and the nature of the attack: a stone column provides defense against a bullet, a chain-link fence does not.
Cover is not separately tracked for concealment. If a creature is out of sight, it cannot be targeted; that rule flows from perception, not from the cover itself.