Literal Breast Plates And Other Armour Reviews 

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Girl, your opinions aren't vaguely entertaining, they're extremely entertaining

'Eh' tier was definitely needed, sometimes things that aren't great deserve to be damned with faint praise rather than outright condemned.

I laughed out loud at your confusion about Aloy’s (Horizon) headpiece, because it was ceremonial and when the NPCs gave it to her, she was like, “Thank you for this… What do I do with it?” There are so many different armours in those games, ranging from light cloth to scary-helmed metal, that if you did a lightning-round style video spending no more than 10 seconds on each, I actually don’t know how long it would take, because I’m still discovering new armours and I’ve only played one of those games.

4:45 that is Aloy's special armor that projects forcefields to protect her before attacks hit. She gets it more from "lost" technology than being made by the blacksmiths

Appart of the age considerations, NO ONE is allowed to wear metal over bare skin except Sigvald the Magnificent

Aloy's necklaces would also rattle a LOT. Making hiding & sneaking form robot animals that wanna kill us nearly impossible.

I’m an artist and a client asked me to draw one of their fictional characters during a particular scene when they were in full fantasy armor. I had your voice in my head the whole time and thinking of all the ways I could avoid the “just stab me now” category 😂 I find your reviews very helpful and informative when designing armor-clad characters. Thank you for the awesome content presented in an entertaining way

The Dune comment was (perhaps unintentionally) insightful, because they are the "goodies" as much as anyone in the story is buut.. the whole subtext of the story is about colonialism and "stern uncompromising and ruthless" people trodding over everyone. So the protagonists are held out as the heroes but you are meant to get a kind of off vibe about them and not be 100% comfortable rooting for them. I think the armor is sending the exact messages it should be for the story!

You'll be pleased to hear that it's canonical (it's in the book) that the Dune stillsuits smell bad

4:32 This outfit first appears in _Horizon Zero Dawn_ as the "ShieldWeaver". It was made by Aloy repurposing military armour from the 21st Century, and casts a forcefield across her body that protects against both missile and blunt force impacts. Also, it leaves her armpits exposed, which I guess is good for breathing, and is worth the vulnerability is you've got a forcefield. There were blue lights across the ShieldWeaver which seemed to act like motion-capture balls, spreading the forcefield across her limbs and head. Some of these lights were on the ShieldWeaver's tiara. By the time of _Horizon Forbidden West,_ the forcefield has either broken or run out of power, though the armpits are still exposed. Also, it's now called the "Nora Annointed", referencing a title given to Aloy in _Zero Dawn._ Aloy starts _Forbidden West_ without the tiara, having lost or discarded it, but is soon gifted the white/gold tiara by a monarch whose city she saved in _Zero Dawn._ So, no, the tiara in the screenshots is purely ceremonial. It might help to distinguish her, like a medal, but given that people have apparently never seen another ginger person, she stands out enough. Also, I'm thrilled to see _Horizon_ getting coverage on this channel, and I'm glad that you were shown *multiple* outfits, not just one of the *few* that exposes Aloy's abdomen. I'd love to see your thoughts on other outfits from those games, whether or not they're Aloy's. *TL;DR The tiara is useless*

Oh, man, the take on Dune armor. The funniest part to me is that those characters are supposed to be the good guys, but they're also a house attempting to project strength in a situation where they know they've been set up to fall. So, you're pretty much spot on with everything.

Medieval plate armour plus concrete sounds like an aesthetic that could be made to work tbh.

Aloy's Carja Armour, the 'Just Stab Me Now' costume with the exposed midriff, is designed to look flashy and not actually be all that functional as armour. It's worn by high ranking members of the Hunting Lodge, whom are more akin to celebrities.

03:18 See, THAT'S how we can be sure you're a professional 'Tuber; you managed to pronounce Aloy correctly, even though you've never played the game.

As a Fire Emblem fan, it pains me to say that Edelgard is one of very FEW female characters that could even get to the ‘Eh’ category. Almost all of them, even the theoretically heavily armored ones, have the bare thighs aesthetic that will immediately drop them into ‘Just Stab Me Now’. Fun seeing her on this channel, though. :)

7:04 Oh, let's just say the movie is _well_ aware of the messages it's sending. Part of the reason the Dune books are so popular is that they really go _in depth_ on the idea of 'goodies' and 'baddies'.

As someone studying at the University of Warwick, right next to the Engineering building, I can only describe modern day meets brutalist architecture.

To be fair to Edelgard, at one point she had a full helmet and no weird armor cutouts. Presumably somewhere in the five year time skip, she decided it wasn't worth it and she wanted to go for the full aesthetic. I believe the overly large skirt and cape are meant to make her seem larger and more intimidating, which is probably for plot related reasons. She's also the emperor of a nation at war, her hair is distinctive for the same plot reasons as the big skirt and cape, and there may or may not be body snatchers out there. And for anyone who doesn't care about story spoilers, the reason is human experimentation as a small child, which turned her hair white and shortened her lifespan. She watched as all her other siblings died via these experiments, and has a whole boatload of trauma about it. Her failing health is presumably the reason for all the layers, with the big skirts and capes helping to hide how gaunt she really is. Lysithea, another young woman in Three Houses, had similar experiments done to her. She has less trauma about it, but has the same white hair and shortened lifespan. But she's a mage so she doesn't really wear armor.

With the outfits from Vikings you actually kind of got lucky with those particular examples. For a lot of the series, the viking characters wear a lot of haphazardly cobbled together dark leather and tiny metal stud nonsense, to the point that the show is sometimes referred to as "Bikings". :P

Brotherhood of the Wolf is one of my favorite movies and I love it aesthetically. That high-collared coat is commonly called a "Highwayman's Coat". Consequently the movie is about an incident involving something called The Beast of Gevudon, now believed to be a hunt for one of the last European Dire Wolves.

The first image from Vikings also have a helmet based on a burgonet. A helmet that didn’t come into fashion until over 500 years later.

While I'd be too scared to wear anything that said, "Just stab me now," given how many folks might be tempted already, that "Not actually armor" hoodie rocks. Keep it up.

The Tribe was amazing. It was weird but in a good way and so many people still keep the dream alive. My guess is: Jill was in love with Jack... because... who wouldn't :D

I would absolutely love to have her do in entire video about the outfits in just Horizon Zero Dawn, or Forbidden West, because some of those outfits can get downright absurd!

Your opinions are interesting and well explained, but the real reason we want these videos is how you express your opinions. You are powerful and funny. We will always be here for that.

If I remember correctly, the last one of the horizon armour sets generates some kind of protective barrier around the user, which is why it looks the way it does.

'Uncompromising' is certainly what I think House Atreides (from Dune) is meant to be going for, but they are in fact the good guys - or at least they're the people our protagonist is from. They also have bagpipes!

You nailed house Atreidies portrayal and characterization basically perfectly, not blatantly bad or good but definitely stern and imposing

On the matter of the _Horizon Zero Dawn_ series - whilst there are various metalworking societies in that series (the Oseram particularly), much of their armour (and adornments) comes from downed robots Also, there are various helmets (the Carja wear helmets, for instance, as do various Banuk) - IIRC some of Aloy's armour options are supposed to be fancy or ceremonial in nature

This is so much fun, I had no idea I would find you opinions so entertaining either but here we are 😀

5:10 It's called a Highwayman's Coat (named for those poor souls who spent a lot of time riding/driving along the high ways), and is historically accurate as "Not actually armor." The slit in the back is, as you surmised, designed to accommodate riding a horse. The collar is designed to hide your face _and_ protect your neck: hide it from and protect it against inclement weather. Buttoned up so, it protected your face and neck from the wind, and it being so high means that there was much less chance of precipitation finding its way between your hat and collar, where it would be cold and damp _under_ your coat. And, of course, criminals loved the fact that that offered them a legitimate reason to have an article of clothing that can be used to conceal their identity. If you've ever seen a long coat with what looks like a double mantle, but with button holes on the over-mantle? Yeah, that's a highwayman's coat with the collar down.

She definitely uses her headpiece to Commune with the bees

Alloy's armor is actually designed to protect her from various types of damage. The one you put in "just stab me now" is a set that is supposed to provide minimal physical protection, but instead help with fire and heat dispersion. The "beehive armor" (🤣) is supposed to be a set of fastly fashioned together sci-fy bits of armor on top of her own materials that generate a shield to negate some damage entirely. These armors are also representative of different in-game cultures, which is also nice.

Yes!! The Tribe!! I thought I'd imagined it. So wish I'd had the confidence to have that hair 🤣

Yeah, I'm not going to pretend that Maple's character design wasn't deliberately leaning hard into the 'sexy schoolgirl' aesthetic. It's a trend that's not going away, almost 'scène à faire' for anime and manga that feature teens. It's a big part of why a lot of people aren't inclined to watch some of their anime in public, even if it's one where the only sexualization is in the character designs.

7:11 The entire aesthetic of this movie was very brutalist. Also also, I think people may have wanted you to review the Sardaukar armour. These guys you did were House Atreides. And yes, they're the good guys.

We can see the shape of rings under the leather on the blonde Viking lady's chain, so it's looking like leather applied to the outside for pretty. (Or, more practically, to accent the figure of the actress)

A "not actually armour" hoodie lined with maille would be perfect!

I'm pretty sure the Judoon (Space Rhinos) are wearing boots from New Rock. A brand I really appreciate. And it's kinda funny that New Rock apparently ships to Judoonia.

Strictly speaking, Aloy’s first outfit; the Stab Me one, is the outfit for the desert area/tribe and the goal is to be comfortable in rathe high temperatures. The outfits aren’t so much armour as more slightly protective but still environmentally suitable clothes with some fighting protection kinda as a bonus.

You are an absolute delight. Keep up the good work.

I did not expect to hear about the Tribe on your channel but I'm here for it!! For me the crush was always between Lex, Slade and Jack. :D

4:55 As for Alloy’s armour, the metallic one, if I recall correctly that is the shield armour, which projects a protective shield. And her people, the Nora, can not shape metal, they scavenge metal off of the machines they kill and use their parts cobbled together for armour. Including, in this case, Shield generators.

8:06 OK, I'm laughing. I know *exactly* what those are supposed to be. Someone learned armor craft from Dungeons and Dragons. That's Studded Leather armor.

Your "stage" presence makes this more amusing, looking forward for seeing what is 'eh?'

Oh my gosh the Tribe! Everytime I see these futuristic fashions mixed with Y2K gear my brain yells "oh no, this does not end well..." I always crushed on Jack, but I think you're more of a Bray kind of girl.

Brotherhood of the Wolf was a well made period piece based on the story of Gevaudan. It's a very fun watch, with some bits a little unexpected. Definitely more fiction than historical, but enjoyable.

Yeah more Jill!!! I will always take all the Jill I can get.

I resent that comparison of the glorious Sontaran race to potatoes! They are clearly humanoid thumbs.

Great take on picking up the conflicting messaging of the armor in Dune. As those characters are initially to the audience supposed to be the good guys until context changes to show that they are also pretty bad.

I enjoy your videos. Random weird fact of the day; the "sexy school girl thing" you referred to for Maple has a name: Zettai Ryouiki or 絶対領域 (literal translation "Absolute Territory"). It's a design/style that is common in Japanese anime.

In answer to the Horizon queries, the little head piece is a gift from a King as a symbol of authority basically. Regarding shaping metal yes and no. The Oseram are blacksmiths and their armour is made of regular metal, most other armour is salvaged machine parts and that armour they can't really shape. The armour you liked in zero dawn actually had a shield generator in it, by Forbidden West its run out of power.

So just to clarify on the Dune look, I'm going to do my best to give a little context. So, that armor is actually for the good guys. However the good guys and the bad guys in the Dune universe are really only differentiated by the restrictions that the good guys place upon themselves to be better than the bad guys. And plenty of people would argue that the theme of the entire series is the fact that you can't trust those in-power to begin with. So I would say you hit the nail on the head with regard to the look of the armor being stern and uncompromising. That is somewhat the MO for those characters, even though they are the good guys.

A fun note about Edelgard that you wouldn't really get from her official artwork in isolation is that she's one of the shortest members of the cast. Idr the exact numbers, but she only grows about an inch between her days in the Officer's Academy (read: highschool) and when you see her as Emperor in that armor. That axe looks insanely large and impractical, but most of that is because she's just that tiny; several other characters could probably wield that without looking (too) out of place.

This is some great insight on character design. I absolutely despise designing armor since I feel like I never can figure out where to start but this has been a great place to start.

Allow me to baffle you further - you're one of the most deliberately amusing RU-vidrs to whom I subscribe, while also being admirably informative. Thank you. Can't help you with your fictional childhood crushes though, never heard of 'the tribe' until now.

Armor reviews are awesome. Your delivery is entertaining and informative. Uoure honest but still respectful of the context of the pieces you review. Always a good watch!

I love your opinion on these because you are the perfect balance between informed criticism and letting people have their fun! Really these are such fun videos

Literally binge watched all of your armor tier lists yesterday because I'm designing medieval ocs, really happy to receive a new video

The armour pieces in Horizon Zero Dawn (and Forbidden West) are whatever they can find, stuck together with pieces of leather or fabric. A lot of the headgear (and some other pieces) is probably more ritualistic than meant as armour. My guess is the main character's gear options are also mostly created on those lines. Most of her options are clearly more geared towards protection against the elements (while still being sexy and highly mobile) than as protection against impact from anything (not surprising, given the kind of hazards she has to face, stealth and cunning are better protection against those than any armour an effectively stone age society with some access to pieces of metal and other ballistic plate material can put together). Dune universe, the armour's a mix of ballistic protection against guns and protection against knives.

Thanks for covering Aloy and a small variety of her outfits! She has so many that it would be a shame to just hit on one! Would love to see you cover them all one day. Others have covered the lore pretty well, but my headcannon is that Aloy is a fashionista as much as anything else, which is why she loves the tiaras and almost-fascinator-level helmets she sometimes wears. A lot of people in the world aren't super armored in the games, the outfits are more representative of cultures and dealing with the conditions in various parts of the world!

Thank you for referencing The Tribe!! I remember seeing just a couple of episodes on Swedish television as a child and have not been able to find what it was named after. No one I know has seen it so I was almost starting to think it was all just a fever dream!

Thank you for reminding me of The Tribe, I loved that show to bits as a kid but had forgotten all about it

OMG I thought “The Tribe” was a fever dream I had when I visited the UK in middle school!! I could never find anything about it afterwards. Thank you for validating that I wasn’t hallucinating 😂❤

I love the Eh classification. Many things in this world generate an eh reaction, so it's a needed tier!

I rewarded myself with a nice cup of Jill. I now have a smile on my face a metre wide, and my dog is looking at me like I’m some kind of lunatic. Me falling out of the chair laughing had him worried! Thank you Jill! Thank you very much!

Always enjoy your tiers. I learn something new and I’m getting better and guessing where the armour will land.

Actually, helmets would have been by far the most common form of metal armour in the viking age. Mostly because the old noggin is pretty damn sensitive and very exposed. It's also not a very big body part, so it doesn't take a huge amount of metal to cover.

Don't worry. Maple is so absurdly busted and overpowered that enemies die from hitting her weak points. It is actually a better idea to hit her armour. In the show (I'm not sure which episode) a big burly man sneaks up on her and swings a morning star straight down on her exposed head and he was instantly vaporized. She didn't even feel it.

Omg I love this channel!~ Recently discovered it and just, *chefs kiss*

Love what you've done with your hair in this one. It looks great.

Was honestly about to suggest Edelgard when she showed up. Honestly there are a lot of characters who go with the sort of armored ball gown look like Saber from Fate/Stay Night who I think popularized the style though I feel Edelgard has one of the cooler takes on it and she’s my favorite lord option for the whole fire emblem franchise

Good to see you are feeling better. And Eh is a good addition.

I just found your channel and I'm loving these videos. I appreciate your more flexible approach to the medium. Your consideration for the diegetic vs non-diegetic elements, the ease of putting it on and comfort of the actor, budgeting, outfitting multiple people and so much more that is often ignored on the more historic-fashiony side of youtube. I understand that an inaccurate portrayal of something you specialize in can be frustrating, but sometimes it can be acknowledged that even a getup that would be nonsensical in real life actually looks pretty cool in a movie, and that's most of its job.

I just randomly stumbled onto your channel and started watching a few videos. I'm loving the commentary/tier list. Only thing I wish was added was some kind of overview at the end just to see where they all landed visually on the list. Great fun though, keep it up!

I'm not 100% sure, but those helmets in the Vikings picture look like they're about 5 centuries off, which makes the whole look even more baffling.

I loved "The Tribe" it was a pretty good show that explored more than surface issues. Random crazy fact, the actor who played Lex, turned up in a wildlife docco. He now lives in Northern Alaska and works to preserve the Husky sled dog breed. With the Vikings series, it might have meant to be a coat of plates, which predated the brigadine.

I absolutely love your armor reviews, please do so many more!

Wow, blast from the past with the tribe! Thank you for reminding me of the name I couldn't remember for years

Warwick, yeah sort of concrete but it's no University of East Anglia. Even the student paper is called Concrete

It was fun to discover that you know a fair amount about Doctor Who! I enjoy your videos very much!

04:38 worth noting, this armour also projects a full-body forcefield, at least in the first game, in the second game it's run out of power but she's still wearing it when the game starts. Also, the 'thing' on her head is a ceremonial thing given as a gift, it's meant to look nice not protect her.

I love how your hair looks perfect in the review and when we fast forward to the hot beverage you've got some loose strands! Definitely can tell some time has passed.

The studded armor from the Viking show might have been someone taking a page out of DnD's studded leather armor.

Immensely thrown by the mention of Warwick university..... but reduced to giggles immediately afterwards, that *is* a pretty apt description!

Ohmygoodness I thought The Tribe was a fever dream! I remembered it super vaguely, but not enough to actually look into it! Thank you!

So, to my knowledge, in Aloy's world there ARE tribes that can shape metal but the endgame armors that you're seeing are made from scavenged machine parts which contain futuristic alloys that they'd have no way of recreating so they instead incorporate them into a sort of splint maille type armor.

*7:48**...either you were rich, a professional viking combat/berserker enthusiast or just really lucky at looting corpses*

You're videos are highly informative and entertaining, and can you also analyze the armours and sword fighting in the kingdom of heaven, please.

Jimmy over on Welsh Viking has a good historical... Analysis of the outfits in Vikings and other viking shows. Absolutely love these armor videos.

Oh my god, I thought I was the only human on the planet who remembered The Tribe! You have no idea how happy it makes me to see someone bring it up! Every time I bring it up all I get is a live recreation of "Jesse, what the fuck are you talking about?"

to fill in the Dune armor: the occasion in question was "new ruling family arriving to the planet expecting galactic baddies to do a sneak attack" in a universe where personal shields make standard projectile weapons useless so everybody has devolved to sneaky knife fighting.

The first ones might have some active temperature/moisture control if they're space suits. "Neckless" helmets like these seem underused in fiction, they could be very protective and simple. (I remember The Tribe but only barely. Haven't watched it much) I like your braid, looks structurally robust.

OH MY GOD I LOVED "THE TRIBE". no one i ever talked about it knew it, so over the years i started to think i hat mandela-effectively hallucinated it. Thanks for bringing it up!!

Just ordered a sweatshirt as a gift to myself. So excited!

There are no straight up good guys in Dune but the guys you reviewed are as close as we get. Their family will eventually lead to A LOT of innocent people dying.

Edelgard!!!!! I have been hoping to see you review her armor!!! This armor was adopted after she was going for more inspire the troops than be on the frontlines. Also most FireEmblem main characters don’t have helmets. In Fire Emblem helmets are for nooks and redshirts. She does have another armor set called The Flame Emperor which did have a full helmet (To hide her identity) that seemed to me more practical. Fire Emblem is very erratic on the realism of its armor. If you want one of the best examples of stab me know look up Camilla from Fire Emblem Fates. (If you look up her intro video it gives you a good look at it and all it’s ridiculous glory, I have two words for you Battle Panties😂)

I think this might the first reference to The Tribe I've seen since it aired. Talk about a deep cut.

I quite enjoyed today's video. But then I enjoy pretty much all of your videos. Also, the "Eh" tier is exactly what was missing from my life. ☺