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NAM Hard Ballistics Vest

The NAM Hard Ballistics Vest is a widely used plate carrier designed and developed by Nepleslian Arms and Munitions that has undergone multiple design changes and updates in its time, with the latest version being released in mid to late YE 41 though older models with slightly more outdated designs can still be found around the place.

Pricing:

Damage Rating: Tier 3, Heavy Personnel

While the vest by itself could not stop bullets it is typically a lot more stab and slash resistant than most vests due to the polymers woven into it, able to stop traditional knives from piercing the material though there are still open gaps near the armpits and neck that a determined-enough attacker might go for that are exposed and vulnerable to attacks.

The lower-profile version of this is the NAM Soft Ballistics Vest

History

The plate carrier is a rather iconic piece of fashion usually associated with the Democratic Imperium of Nepleslia or Independent guns for hire that has been around for as long as most can remember, though materials and methods may change over time in essence it is still something soft and tough holding something hard and tough that is designed to stop bullets from piercing your torso, though expect bruises and fractured ribs along the way.

Design

The NAM Hard Ballistics Vest is comprised of two main parts, the vest itself and the armored inserts.

The vest is primarily made from polymer-woven para-aramid fabrics that have been treated to be heat-resistant and fire-retardant2), they can come in a few typical styles of webbing depending on what the customer is looking for but the method used to construct the durable webbing is the same regardless of layout, rows of heavy-duty nylon stitched onto the vest in a way that allows pouches and equipment to easily be mounted to the vest. Plates are loaded into the vest through a hook-and-loop fastened seam that won’t come open even with the most rigorous of movements, the sides of the vest are similarly hoo-with the shoulder straps of the vest being adjustable to ensure a correct fitting – finally the inside of the vest is padded with impact-absorbing foam-filled honeycomb structure that takes some of the force out of bullets impacting with the vest thought not enough to keep getting shot from being an unpleasant experience.

Compared to the vest the armored insert has a rather primal and basic yet effective design, it is a thick Durandium Alloy plate wedged between two thin tungsten sheets, with the intention being that the more brittle tungsten helps break up the bullet for the Durandium Alloy beneath to stop.

The vests and plates come in a few different sizes from kids up to something that could fit a part-SOL though pricing remains the same due to the mass-produced nature of it all – it is available in the usual wide variety of colours and camouflage patterns, with plain black being the most common.

Older vests are made more or less the same though lacking the impact-reducing honeycomb structure and sometimes made out of leather depending on how archaic they are, with simpler single-metal inserts.

Nepleslian Milspec versions of this vest use Duremium Alloy in place of the vest's Durandium Alloy and incorporates Stone Thread into its para-aramid exterior.

Usage

Armored inserts are loaded into the vest through a hook-and-loop fastened multi-flap opening at the bottom of the front and back of the vest, it can hold one plate over the front of the torso and one over the backside of the torso at a time – being worn by the user slipping their head through the space between the shoulder straps and then sealing up the hook-and-loop sections on the side panels, though typically the shoulder straps have been adjusted prior and only one side is left open to speed up the process.

It is worn over most tops though can sometimes be concealed by looser jackets and similar clothing, with great weight distribution to decrease fatigue when wearing the vest for long periods.

OOC Notes

SirSkully created this article on 2019/09/09 07:48.

This article as approved by Andrew in the NTSE on 01/26/2020, see the forum thread.

1)
Priced per plate
2)
a big issue with older vests is that energy-based weapons can cause them to ignite