Premonitions

think he meant what he said.

Welll I don't know how you can try not to be snarky when you ARE :P
but yeah, I've had friends who've done this exact same thing for me, which gave me the idea to do it for others in a tight spot regarding costumes.

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1:A
The "Armored" or "fake" hp mechanic would basically be a different color over your regular HP Bar, Imagine your XP bar with debt or Patrol XP.
Mentioned Here
edit:
Ooooh, Further idea, the first four powers are the armor toggles, the rest are powers that keep hte toggles running, or boost them in some way!
2: Q
2: A
I'd imagine that would scale with your character's level,staying somewhat equivalent to your "real" HP, what I like about this is it has a kind of "soft Rez" built in to it, your enemies have to essentially kill you twice, but since there are quite a few holes in the protection armor provides(Certain very common damage types, no hold or slow resistance and very little(just the one) debuff resistance, the armor mechanic itself) some damage would still get through to your "real" Hp, meaning when they finally whittle your armor down, you're probably exhausted, and not at FULL Hp, meaning it's not a "Automatic and Free" ressurect power.

3: Q
3 A
Put simply, these are Basic toggles, like any other, and act as such for the most part, the only thing is they connect to the "Fake/Armor" hp mechanic as opposed to your character directly
to go into more detail:


3a: Q
A

The peices/toggles would be represented on the "fake' health bar according to the percentage of health perscribed to them. Nothing would attack the peices directly, as they're really just regular armor toggles with a unique mechanic attached to them.

Enemies would instead do damage to your "fake HP" as a whole. When your fake HP dropped below a certain percentage, the corresponding
Toggle/peice would be "destroyed"

X peice would represent the first 15 % and would "Go" first, e.t.c. So, the armors would all work as one peice when all active, but be "destroyed" seperately based on the percentage of "armored" HP still in the bar.

So basically: peice one would add 40% To your "fake/armored" health bar, and it wouldn't be just any fourty percent, but the last fourty percent, and when that fourty percent is gone, so too goes the toggle. Peice 2 would add 15, peice three 30, and peice four 15.

It would go, First 15% takes it's piece/toggle with it, then the next 30%, then the next 15%, then after the last 40% goes, you're naked.

3b: Q

The pieces/toggles would, together, represent an overal bonus to your "fake/armored" HP with their individual defenses and resistances. They wouldn't affect each other, which is why they all do completely different things. Remember, these are really just regular armor toggles, but they affect the Hypothetical "Fake" HP as opposed to your character directly.

So, If your character had, Say, Helmet, and Grieves on, they'd have 45%(30% From Helmet, 15% from grieves) of their fake HP,Psionic Resistance, Stun/Confuse resistance, AoE defense,and Knockback resistance. If they de-toggled Helmet, They'd lose 30% of their "Fake" health, and the Psionic and Stun/Confuse resistances as well, But retain the AoE Defense, Knocback resistance, and the 15% fake health

4: Q
A
No idea, maybe? hopefully? who knows? not me, someone more informed, I suppose.

In my mind, toggling the power on and off would work normally, but having your "Fake/Armored" hp drop below the threshold for the toggle it applies to would trigger a Power that would severely debuff the recharge of the toggle specifically.

Could that work? See my first response.
5: Q
A
No idea, attach a debilitating penalty? what do you suggest?

Remember this thread is
6: Q
A
Honestly, That was a fleeting thought I had when pondering whether this idea was at all possible, and working out some of the concepts really does make it feel like it is, so ehhhhhh, remember:
so tell me what YOU suggest for these problems?

Both of you are viewing armor as only a preventative thing.
a "Before I go into battle, I put my Armor on" kind of thing.

I honestly first devised this set explicitly as a "Power" instead of an "equipment" set, and Called it "Armor Generation" I.e. Your character created armor on the fly, but I just felt that was

A: kinda annoyingly specific, and
B: Just didn't "pop" for me.

Being armored in a way that's not currently in the game is a power used by characters like Colussus of the X-men, The Guyver, and Iron Man in current books. I call this set "Armor" because I felt that it would serve the most concepts without getting too specific. I made comparisons to shields in this regard, where does the shield come from? What is it made of? How do you pull it out of nowhere?(Though, In saying my set serves people who use armor NOT as a power, and more like you two are thinking, I pretty much use the same policy usually applied to the weapon sets in this game I.E. "I Don't Know" :P) By just calling the set "armor" and Allowing for a wide array of customization, I leave those specifics up to the player, while occupying a niche currently not filled.

Speaking of

Yeah, that's actually kind of a problem.

When you Create an "X-Y" set, you're gonna run up against deciding whether to focus more on "X" or more on "Y".

This is most signifigant with "armor" sets. Armor means you are coated in something protective. But add "Stone" in front of it, and now you're coated in protective Rock. Now, Make me ten forms of that. If my focus was more on "armor", creating a protective surface that is worn, it would be a very daunting task, but if my focus was on "Stone" I have leeway to make powers like Rooted, Minerals, Mud Pots, and Earth's Embrace,things that are less explicitly armor, and more specifically stone.

An "Armor" set is one with it's focus firmly in Protective gear, Like Shield Defense is focused firmly In a Protective object, Leaving what that object is made of or how it works up to the player. Imagine if there were five or so "Elemental" shield powersets, and no "Shield" power set, and every single one was very, very specific in it's nature, so it couldn't really be played as a shield that granted no extra powers, because "Fire Shield" makes your shield Shoot fire as a taunt aura, and "Electric Shield" Had Power Surge.

Anyways, Going back to my concept, I've come up with a few powers, Still operating under the "Fake Health" premise, though the pet suggestions have opened up some new ideas, for more strategy, more on that later. All of tis is just preliminary, mind, and very open to change.

Armor:

The set would be built around the four primary toggles, with the remaining five powers(the Tier 9 is a bit different) focusing on enhancing their effect. each Toggle has it's own resistances or Defenses, and would take a sizeable chunk of damage done to your character for them (not ALL of the damage, but most of it),

Power 1:

Represents 40 Percent of your "Fake Health"(or 20 if They all had to be equal, which They would with the pet premise, more later,) and would be the last piece of armor to be "Destroyed" due to being the final fourty percent

Chest plate:

Toggle Power, This power would have a high resistance to Smashing and Lethal damage.

Endurance cost: Very low
Recharge:near Instant when de-toggled, either by choice, or by Runing out of Endurance Very, Very long if "destroyed"

Visual Effect:
This Would Activate an Overlay effect of the players choice over the torso area, and/or the shoulders if the armor type they selected had shoulder pads.

Power 2:

Represents 15 percent of your "fake health" and would be the first to go, being the first 15 percent

Gauntlets:

Toggle power:

Has medium Defense against ranged and Melee offensive attacks(The premise being you're actively blocking with them, also the reason they go first, as they're the "first line" of defense, being used in a reactive manner instead of pasive like the others) also has a minor resistance to -damage( they can make you weaker, but you're still wearing hard gloves to hit them with/put your weight behind)

Endurance cost: Very low
Recharge:near Instant when de-toggled, either by choice, or by Runing out of Endurance Very, Very long if "destroyed"

Visual effect: Overlay over the forearms/and or the full upper and lower arms, depending on which armor type is selected for this power.

Power 3:
Represents 30% of your "fake Health", and is the third armor piece to go.
Helmet:
Toggle Power:
Has medium Resistance Against Psionic attacks (It's a Helmet) and a
Resistance to Confuse and stun

Endurance cost: Very low
Recharge:near Instant when de-toggled, either by choice, or by Runing out of Endurance Very, Very long if "destroyed"

Power 4:
Represents 15% of your health and is the second piece to be destroyed

Grieves:

Toggle
Stablized feet give you Defense against AoE as well as Knockback, Down, and Up
Endurance cost: Very low
Recharge:near Instant when de-toggled, either by choice, or by Runing out of Endurance Very, Very long if "destroyed"

Power 5: Repair

Click: Heals damage done to your "false" health
Endurance: High
Recharge:Very Long

Power Six: Fire Proofing/Insulation/ Grounding/Hermetic seal( Gotta pick one)
Auto:
Grants an added resistance to either fire, cold,Toxic, or electric (Haven't decided, possibly a combination of the two, and call it Undercoat) whenever your toggles are active

Power Seven: Reinforce

Click
Endurance: Very High
Recharge: Very Long

Effect:

Boosts the resistances/defenses of your currently active toggles, doesn't effect Armor-set toggles not active when the power is used, doesn't effect toggles from other sets, Effect doesn't work for powers if they were active when the power was used, then deactivated either through being destroyed, being purposefully deactivated, or running out of endurance, then activated again.

Power Eight: Restore
Click:
Endurance high
Recharge: Very Long
Instantly recharges one of your armor toggles

Power Nine: Full Coverage

Toggle
effect:
Summons a full Suit of armor, It has very high Defense against melee, ranged, and AoE, but none of the resistances of the other sets.
Endurance: High
Recharge: Very Long

Going over this preliminary set, It really just occured to me that the toggles could just as easily just increase your max HP, and have the same sort of effect