Hi all, I've now released major update v0.50.  Now is a good time to try it out, and let me know your feedback on the changes so far, especially the chainmail rework.

The biggest change in v0.5 is the addition of a strength requirement to almost all heavy gear (plate, mail, and large shields).  Varying from trivial to onerous, this should add a lot more flavour to the game and prevent the acquisition of gamebreaking power too early.

Chest Armor tweaks:

• Nerfed exterior jackets (combat jacket/jupon etc) as these were as good as, or better than gambesons at half to three quarters of the weight.  Reduced their stats from 4/7/12 to a max of 2/4/7 and reduced weight and noise slightly to compensate.  Added minor differences in weight, noise and protection based on whether it’s a vest (sleeveless) or short/long sleeved.
  

• Reweighted plate armours so there’s now a clear progression from short light brigandine to light brigandine, to brigandine.  Plate coat armours overall got 1-2 units heavier, and the plate armour jack gained slash defence at the expense of thrust defence, reflecting its design.
  

• Slightly tweaked cuirass stats to better reflect their designs (e.g. made the decorated cuirass more conspicuous, made the shortened Milanese lighter than the Milanese).  Cuirasses are now mostly lighter than brigandines and provide more interesting tradeoffs.  I'd like to do another pass on these to somehow further differentiate the cloth vs no cloth design (e.g. brigandine vs cuirass) but I'm not sure how to do it without unfairly disadvantaging one type or the other.
  

• Strengthened leather jerkins and made them quieter, better reflecting the design and also making it more viable for unarmored/stealth builds as an early cuirass.  There's been a real shortage of light cuirass options; in between these and the cuman harness, light armor players should now have a lot more choice.
  

• Did a once-over on all the Warhorse DLC gear.  These have all been tweaked in some way to accentuate their uniqueness.  Pieces that were not close to the best in class, now have other advantages (e.g. lighter, durability).  Additionally, all of these have a value now.  In the base game they have 1 value (presumably so the player can’t get a lot of free money), but this means they are also almost free to repair, which breaks the economy in other ways.  I’ve decided it’s best for them to have a normal level of value and to cost money in repairs.
  

• Reduced leather and hunters gloves sale value as these were way too high.  Even a commoner should be able to afford these.
  

• All gloves/gauntlets lost -1 defence point.  With 11 defence, these were too strong relative to armguards (10-20) given how little of the arm they cover.  This has been offset by +1 defence to all full-arm armpieces.
• Spread out the gauntlets a little more, so there’s clearer progression from leather-> hunters->riveted->composite-> plate
  

• Added a minimum strength requirement to all cuirasses (5), brigandines/jacks (6) and chainmail (varies, but around 8-14 for most).   Arguably these requirements should be a little higher, but this is a good starting point that prevents game breaking power too early and shouldn’t result in any enemies going unarmoured. Notably, to wear full armour now you’ll need to be quite strong.
• Almost all gauntlets (7-9 strength).  Arms tire very quickly with extra weight on them, even as little as a 16oz boxing glove (0.45kg).  Plate gauntlets and forearms would require significant extra strength to be used when swinging weapons and holding a shield. 
• All plate armpieces (7-12 strength) except for the vambraces you get during archery training.
• Larger shields (7-12 strength)
  

• Slightly weakened the padded chausses against stab damage.  Tweaked mail chausses stats and description to better reflect that it’s mail overlaid on top of padded chausses (which is why it has unusually high smash resistance for a mail item). Essentially the mail chausses are padded chausses with +3 blunt, +6 stab, and +9 slash resistance due to also having mail on top.
• Given how rarely/borderline impossible it is to take leg damage, I doubt there will be any changes made to leg plate items.
• Some minor tweaks to better differentiate the silent and quiet shoes as well as the dark riding boots.  Generally stealth gear has taken a charisma debuff, so you'll need to dress up in something else if you want to rely on charisma during conversations.
• Tweaked coif names to better delineate between types.  The toughest coifs are now called “Gambeson Coifs”.  Renamed the black coif to padded coif, and renamed the actual black coif to Black Coif.
• (WIP/partially implemented) The best stealth items are now slightly weaker at defence, with slightly lower visibility and higher conspic.  Generally they should be harder to see and less protective in combat, but also enemies should become alerted faster once they spot you.  Grey/brown/green items offer the lowest average visibility & conspic, but are often slightly noisier and more protective than purpose-made stealth gear. 
  

• Buffed Tusk longsword and added a strength requirement.  Tweaked Queen of Sheba & St George sword so these 3 should now have relatively steady progression (Sheba -> Tusk -> St George) with 12, 13, 15 strength required.  Added blunt damage to Tusk – I’m not sure how this will play out in practice, whether it only applies on hilt attacks or to every strike.  Test it and let me know. 
• Rebalanced some shields.  Cuman shields generally have slightly lower defence, in return for lower weight & strength requirements (metal) or drastically lower weight and durability (wooden).  There’s more work to be done but I’ve generally inverted the order of shields, with less defensive shields being lighter and more defensive being heavier.