Padding
Armor that provides greater-than-normal protection against some form of attack is called padded; a padding merchant is one of the more highly sought after types.
Different types of padding affect different combat results:
Critical (or Crit)
Will reduce the severity of the wound/effect of the wound caused by a damage source. Each critical hit in GemStone has certain effects associated with it, including a wide range of additional points of damage, any of three degrees of injury (from minor scratch to some degree of bleeding to severed limbs), and possible additional effects such as being knocked prone, or stunned and thus unable to act.
Crit padding can not reduce a critical that would have been rank 1 or higher to a rank 0. Characters have natural crit padding derived from CON bonus. GILCHRISTR's research indicates that 1 potential phantom damage is removed for each 4 bonus.
Damage
Will reduce the raw damage points inflicted by a damage source, but will not reduce the other non-damaging effects of that source (e.g. scratches/bleeding/severed body parts, stuns, or knockdowns).
Elemental
This can reduce damage taken from an elemental source, either from creatures that use fire/cold (these are the most commonly seen elemental creatures, but there can be others) in their attacks or from a hot/cold environment such as Pinefar and Aenatumgana and the Glacier on the cold side, or the Lava Flows on Teras Isle on the hot side.
Probably the most common elemental padding is a Bard making use of Sonic Armor (1014); this magical armor inherently has cold, heat, and lightning padding. Another source of elemental padding that has recently become available is from the Ranger spell, Resist Nature (620).
Natural
This is another facet of padding available through the Ranger spell, Resist Nature (620).
Critical & Damage Padding Chart
| Name | Rating |
|---|---|
| Lightly | 1-2 |
| Fairly | 3-4 |
| Somewhat | 5-6 |
| Decent | 7-8 |
| Heavy | 9-11 |
| Very Heavy | 12-14 |
| Exceptional | 15-19 |
| Masterful | 20-24 |
| Incredible | 25+ |