Currently a theoretical question as I already splatted the last one I tried.
I know ranged weapons get a higher penalty from armor than other weapons, but where does that leave my big strong ant that mostly pumped Dex? Should he grab some plate or settle for something lighter?
If you are using ranged I’d go for something like troll leather armour or swamp/acid dragon scales. A robe or leather armour of resistance might spawn in your game too and those can be useful! Since the correct answer largely depends on the exact stats of the chars I suggest trying on any armour you consider good and seeing how bad your attack speed is with @
I wouldn’t wear anything heavier than swamp dragon scales.
Slow weapons are less impacted by a flat speed penalty than a fast weapon. If you wanted to try to take advantage of a formicid’s armor aptitude and innate strength to see if you can make a heavier armor work, hopefully you find a nice big crossbow!
As always, it depends 
but here’s an illustration of how:
Looking through 0.30 fohu wins, it’s definitely not the common choice, but maybe sometimes it’s still the best choice for your circumstances, depending on what the dungeon gives you. Look at these games that used plate or heavier armor:
witwit: hand xbow, golden dragon scales, ended with 19str/26dex
Skill XL: | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 |
Armour | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 10 11 12 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 23 27 | 27.0
Action | 1- 3 | 4- 6 | 7- 9 | 10-12 | 13-15 | 16-18 | 19-21 | 22-24 | 25-27 || total
Fire dragon scale | | | | | | 132 | 57 | 166 | 40 || 395
Plate armour | | | | | | 17 | | | || 17
Gold dragon scale | | | | | | | | | 883 || 883
It looks like this person might have tried out plate around XL17 but then went with something lighter, until finally using gold dragon scales for most of XL25-27. Armor investment was extreme.
klekle: speed longbow, Harm Regen+ plate, ended with 24str/38dex
Skill XL: | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 |
Armour | 1 2 3 4 6 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 17 18 19 21 24 | 24.0
Action | 1- 3 | 4- 6 | 7- 9 | 10-12 | 13-15 | 16-18 | 19-21 | 22-24 | 25-27 || total
Leather armour | 8 | 39 | 59 | | | | | | || 106
Acid dragon scale | | | | 95 | 79 | | | | || 174
Robe | | | | 6 | | | | | || 6
Troll leather arm | | | | | 19 | 157 | 63 | 159 | || 398
Quicksilver drago | | | | | | | | 3 | 29 || 32
Ring mail | | | | | | | | | 22 || 22
Plate armour | | | | | | | | | 98 || 98
It looks like this person mostly used lighter armor, but couldn’t refuse that amazing Harm Regen+ plate that was found in V:5.
gengaozo: +9 arblest w/ penet., ended with 15str/27dex
Skill XL: | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 |
Armour | 1 5 6 11 14 17 23 24 | 24.1
Action | 1- 3 | 4- 6 | 7- 9 | 10-12 | 13-15 | 16-18 | 19-21 | 22-24 | 25-27 || total
Leather armour | 4 | 12 | 2 | | | | | | || 18
Skin | | | 1 | | | | | | || 1
Steam dragon scal | | | 9 | 38 | | | | | || 47
Troll leather arm | | | | 19 | 19 | 40 | 2 | | || 80
Plate armour | | | | | | | 203 | 197 | 385 || 785
This person put plate armor on at XL19 and never took it off. They started training armor at about the same time. I wonder if it was already worth it at XL19 with the delay, but then they trained until the delay was (more or less) eliminated at level 24?
Dani: heavy triple xbow, artif pearl scales, ended with 10str/30dex
Skill XL: | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 |
Armour | 4 6 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 | 20.9
Action | 1- 3 | 4- 6 | 7- 9 | 10-12 | 13-15 | 16-18 | 19-21 | 22-24 | 25-27 || total
Leather armour | 2 | 23 | 69 | | | | | | || 94
Steam dragon scal | | | 4 | 64 | | | | | || 68
Pearl dragon scal | | | | 82 | 195 | 221 | 332 | 249 | 427 || 1506
It looks like this person might’ve not trained armor until finding those artifact pearl dragon scales, but actually it was just great timing:
9098 | Gauntlet | Reached skill level 6 in Armour
9310 | Gauntlet | Identified the +8 pearl dragon scales of Supple Strength
| {rN+ rCorr Dex+3}
I bet they still had a delay due to the lower str, but can you even feel it with a heavy triple xbow?
Looks like for the most part these games were just responding to what the dungeon gave them, and not specifically going for this kind of build. You can still win making plenty of bad strategic decisions if you’re a careful player (so one win isn’t an endorsement of a strategy), but I think it still shows that it can work if your luck pushes you that way.
I think that training helps with armour encumbrance penalties so it depends on that and your Str.
I’ve been running hunters in lighter armour in general, at least until ranged accuracy penalty is attenuate at least. If you invest enough, I’d imagine that ring mail would be doable before making the jump to FDA or IDA.
An impressively thorough answer, thank you!