I started skilling armour with 1.4, and have yet to see any overall benefit to reactive plates. I find the ferroscales lacking too, but I'll leave that for now.

Here's the challenge:

I want to you good folks to present me with any combination of reactive plates only.

My job will be to try and match, or best your setup using any combination of plates & reppers.


Conditions:

Setups must have a minimum limit of 2modules, and a maximum limit of 5.
I have to match or best your setup using the same or fewer modules.

You have to post the total stats of your setup. That's Isk, CPU, PG, movement penalty, HP and HP/s. I'm not doing your maths.
All the above stats will be considered in comparing setups.

Passive skill bonuses will be counted. Lvl5 for everything.

I will give out 100,000isk for every original setup I cannot match or best.
I will give out 500,000isk to any original setup good enough for me to steal.

The final decision on who wins rests with the community and my debate skills, but if I get trolled then scrooge here will take his Isk elsewhere.
If I don't pay out for a winning fit, you reserve the right to call me all sorts of names.

If I can't be beat, I'm going to start calling for a reactive plate buff.

should be

STD: 1 hp
ADV: 2 hp
PRO: 3 hp


Also your armor repair skills should enhance it as well.

Thats what I said, at the moment its
Std: 1
Adv: 1
Proto: 2

I thought it already counted re skill

should be

STD: 1 hp
ADV: 2 hp
PRO: 3 hp


Also your armor repair skills should enhance it as well.

If they were outright superior to combinations of plates & reps, but required equal skill in both, they'd be the go-to plates, especially for Gallente. Right now, as this thread suggests, there's just no place for them.

They aren't meant to be superior, like I said youre missing the point, you get a plate that does a little of both, its not a buy 1 get 1 free kinda plate!!

alright il give you my setup... message in game or post it here?
were we talking dropsuits or vehicles?

What is the point of the plates then??? If their only worth is in being used one at a time, they're probably the most useless mods in the game.

Because it supplements you plates or reps.

You see I run 1 plate, 1 reactive plate on a minisuit for about 260 armour and 2hp/s
Now at the moment 40hp isnt worth loosing the extra 2hp/s of a repper, but I'd trade 1hp/s for it!!

Heres the way I see them as useful:

If you are a sniper or forge sniper (or any other long distance fit for that matter)
having ANYTHING that repairs your armor passively is a necessity.
In this case you could pick one of those plates since they give you a reping ability,
but you also get a bonus to your armor overall amount which you would otherwise lack / adds suitability.
The key to this is if there is no threat to you for hiding behind cover and leting your armor recharge 1-2 hp/s

This tactic would not be as useful in an upfront assault fit, where the speed armor repair matters more.

But a combo of reps & plates would do the job better. And on a heavy you've got enough base armour to forego extra hp for full reps.

yo, i beat you, hand over them ISK.

I started skilling armour with 1.4, and have yet to see any overall benefit to reactive plates. I find the ferroscales lacking too, but I'll leave that for now.

Here's the challenge:

I want to you good folks to present me with any combination of reactive plates only.

My job will be to try and match, or best your setup using any combination of plates & reppers.


Conditions:

Setups must have a minimum limit of 2modules, and a maximum limit of 5.
I have to match or best your setup using the same or fewer modules.

You have to post the total stats of your setup. That's Isk, CPU, PG, movement penalty, HP and HP/s. I'm not doing your maths.
All the above stats will be considered in comparing setups.

Passive skill bonuses will be counted. Lvl5 for everything.

I will give out 100,000isk for every original setup I cannot match or best.
I will give out 500,000isk to any original setup good enough for me to steal.

The final decision on who wins rests with the community and my debate skills, but if I get trolled then scrooge here will take his Isk elsewhere.
If I don't pay out for a winning fit, you reserve the right to call me all sorts of names.

If I can't be beat, I'm going to start calling for a reactive plate buff.

Wait, a fit using only reactive plates?

Amarr Med Basic Frame.

X1 Mil Shield recharger
X1 Standard Shield Extender

X1 Complex Reactives

ADV AScR
Scrambler Pistol

Bam. That's my current fit.

It's pretty comparable to my other reg plates fit, only that it has armor rep too.

Reactive plates are great on suits with only one low, so they infill that niche very nicely.

Ferros plates are great for characters that want their speed, but also put SP in plates.

See.

While those who can fit a plate and a repper are well off, many suits have a slim slot allocation.

Only change to Reactives, lessen the fit requirements a little.

Those things can really put a damper on a otherwise solid fit.

They aren't meant to be superior, like I said youre missing the point, you get a plate that does a little of both, its not a buy 1 get 1 free kinda plate!!

I know someone that has more than 700 armor on a Gallente Scout suit. Try and top that.

Hey, what about Me!!!

Logistics mk.0
4 complex reactive plates

Armor: 444
Armor Repair: 13.00
Movement Speed: 4.87
Sprint Speed: 7.08
CPU: 144/512
PG: 64/102

Best me in speed, I dare you.
_______________________

The best solution I can find was:

Logistics mk.0
1 complex armor plate
1 enhanced armor plate
2 complex armor repairers

Armor: 449
Armor Repair: 17.5
Movement speed: 4.64
Sprint speed: 6.75
CPU: 140/512
PG: 40/102

Reactive plates just suck in general. I would never use this fitting as I'd rather be slower with more armor repair, or less armor repair and a TON more health.

The only real advantage to using them in mass quantities is the amount of health they provide while not slowing you down a ton. The problem with it, is that you end up using a huge amount of fitting space just to be slightly faster. Of course, using ferroscale would be better at having more health, and even faster speed, but you wouldn't have much armor repair at all.

Impossible challenge, any combination of plates and repairers will always be more efficient and cheaper to fit.

Thanks for making a legitimate attempt. You're the first.
Since I have the suit you've used, I'll edit this post to meet the challenge some time after the server is back up.

Edit: For beating your speed, the best I managed was 3complex ferroscale and a complex rep.
+ 18 CPU
-11 PG
+0.2 sprint speed
-16hp
-2hp/s
The biggest pro would be the PG reduction.
The biggest con is the repair speed.

But like you said, that speed bonus is minimal when you compare the potential bonuses elsewhere:
Two plates & two reps =
+6 CPU
-18 PG
-0.47 sprint speed
+32hp
+3.5hp/s

The only real con here is movement speed. With the exception of that, a reactive fitting is beaten in all areas bar the negligible 6CPU.
These stats were also calculated at lvl3 skills. If they were done at lvl5 the reactives would fare even worse.

BUFF REACTIVE PLATES!!!!!!!!!

Hey now, you said you could use basic plates and reps...not ferroscale :/

Man, I thought I actually had a chance there...

I'd also like to add that simply buffing reactive plates to be competitive with plate/rep combos isn't adequate.

Reactive plates and plate/reps affect the same attributes in very similar ways. Without a fundamental redesign, one will always be overshadowed by the other or be redundant.

4 plates.
Done.
Next.

Why make this thread? Reactives suck, they aren't worth using. You get more armor and more rep amount using any combination of reps and normal plates. /thread

That's exactly why I made this thread. This is an issue that needs highlighting. I just tried to make it a little more interesting than QQing over my armour tanking dilemmas.