ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

basically, i think that putting resall on robes was a bad design choice
what should've been done instead was making fatigue be more meaningful and be found in different amounts on chest armors; im under the assumption that the developers desire that archmages and solipsists and anorithils and doomed and etc. all wear robes instead of massive plate armor, and such and whatnot

ways to make fatigue be more meaningful include making fatigue not only increase resource costs, but also dividing resource gains by 1/fatigue and diving maximum resources by 1/fatigue

though, at this point, you may as well also add differentiation between stuff like drakeskin/voratun boots and hats that have literally the same base stats, and add t2/4 versions of items slots that don't have any

I don't feel like writing a rant about it, but imagine this:

right now, at 30% fatigue, an archmage with 1000 mana would still have 1000 mana, but his spells would cost 30% more mana
however, with these changes, an archmage with 1000 mana would be changed by having 30% fatigue by having his mana reduced to 769, having his spells cost 30% more mana, and having his mana regeneration/gains be reduced by ~23%, which would make wearing robes seem alot more appealing than it is now

also, idk if light armor training is more beneficial for leather than for robes, but it probably should be

In 1.5, there was almost no reason for anyone to ever wear light armor or robes unless their skills specifically forced them to, like brawlers. The additions of Light Armor Training, res all to robes, and IMO most significantly the Ethereal Form prodigy make light armor/robes viable for many more classes. For example, I won insane/RL in 1.6 with solipsist, TW, and AM using robes, where I would have chosen heavy armor in 1.5 for all of these.

Even if fatigue is more punishing, there are so many ways around it that people will just go for those instead. For example AM is going to want Feather Wind for the stun and pin resistance anyway, and that plus one piece of equipment with a fatigue reducing ego is over 20% fatigue gone right there. That's easily enough to wear heavy armor and whatever gloves, helmet, and boots you feel like with minimal fatigue. And any class that wants ICCTW ends up with 0 fatigue no matter what.

I do agree with you when you say that your actual armor and defense don't actually depend that much on what kind of armor you wear. Egos/random properties are way more important than base type for anything other than body armor, where heavy/massive armors have more and heftier +armor egos. It's not uncommon to find a pink T1 leather cap with like 17 armor on it. Heavy armor's main draws are the higher hardiness and the crit shrug, while robes have the all res. Light armor offers a bit more defense, but since that can easily be made up with a few pieces of gear elsewhere, heavy armor or robes are almost always more appealing. It's harder to find other sources to boost hardiness, crit shrug, and all res. Making Light Armor Training do more for leather than robes could be a nice way to make it more competitive.

It would be a major rework, but instead of giving a fatigue penalty items could reduce your stamina every turn while in combat with obviously heavy items draining quicker. Maybe also have a mechanic where you get % attack speed increase and dodge chance when at high stamina and a penalty when its low. That would encourage melee characters to actually pay attention to this.

you raise some good points whitelion
part of that rework, should it be done, should include the removal or limiting of fatigue reduction effects

I still think it would be better to make changes that entice some classes to use light armor rather than just punish everyone more for heavy armor, especially if doing so requires a complicated overhaul of a base mechanic like fatigue. It's not like heavy armor is broken and needs to be nerfed. I think as you suggested giving Light Armor Training something extra for leather armor over robes is a nice idea. And I think adding res all to robes was a good thing, as it does exactly that: give one more reason to consider robes.

I mean the main issue with fatigue having little impact is that there are certain things that affect fatigue... and it really doesn't matter much, at all. Especially with weatherwind reducing fatigue for no reason at all xD