Hello everybody I was just wondering if anyone knows what the armor and weapon cap is. I have read that the armor cap is close to 560 but I have never seen one for weapons and don't want to waste my last 5 perks to make my bow better if it wont do any more damage in the game.

Armor is capped at 567. Weapons are not.

Are you sure about weapons? My daedric bow was on 194 damage and then I put 5 skill points into enchanting and then I put enchantments on my helmet and gauntlets and it went to over 300 but it still took 7 daedric arrows to kill an ancient dragon.

That's about right. Ancient dragons have ~3000 health.

Well, seeing how an Ancient Dragon has 3071 HPs. And that you can increase damage to insane levels from potions, enchantments and smithing...Hell there are people that made bows do 1,000,000 damage.

So...yes...I am quite sure.

Also, there are many videos showing people one-shot ancient dragons, so it certainly is possible.

Oh ok thank you for the reply's.

You are quite welcome. Good luck with the newly powerful bow.

Armour doesn't cap at 567, that's the highest that's worthwhile with 4 pieces equipped. You get 25 extra for each piece. Armour rating is (total of pieces as in inventory + 25 per piece) x 0.12, and caps at 80%. (567 +100) x 0.12 = 80.04% damage reduction. You could exploit glitches and get cap level armour from three pieces with an inventory value of 592.

You are talking about the "hidden" bonuses. If your display reads 567 and you are covered from head to toe...your AR is capped.

EDIT : "capped" meaning that anything more is not doing you any good. So there fore AR is capped at 567.

Well... Zen is right. The cap is indeed 80% (667 AR) and it might be important to remember. Many people choose not to wear helmet, so they won't get the hidden +25 - their "armor cap" will therefore be 592.

I don't see why anyone would decide not to wear boots or gauntlets, let alone armor, but if they do, they need to aim for slightly higher AR to get maximum damage reduction.

Well my armor rating is on 850 on my Orc and it is 1017 on my Wood Elf. My bow sits on 194 without any potions or buffs to smithing so when I get a few things to increase my smithing items I will re-smith one and then put 5 perks into enchanting and add some archery enchantments.

You are preaching to the quire, Jr. No body is saying that he/she is wrong. As far as I'm concerned you are comparing apples to oranges. The complete formula is displayed on the UESP. Splitting hairs over it does not change anything. If you want to run with a 600 + AR and feel good about, knock yourself out. I think the OP is well covered. Don't you?

I personally don't get any where near that high of an AR anymore. In fact I quit putting any perks in Heavy or Lt. By the the time you get to high levels, your health is / should be high enough to cover it.

Sure. OP definitely has no problem with his AR, and I'm well aware that you know how damage reduction works in Skyrim. I just thought Zen's decision to remind about the hidden bonus was a good one - there are people who like to know such details, maybe the OP is one of them. Probably not, but you never know.

Then again, I never bothered to reach the armor cap with any of my characters, so what do I know?

For my character it was 951.

I didn't mean to sound harsh. That was not my intentions, I assure you. If that was the case however, I do apologize.

There is something else too. I exploited Daedric guantlets to 800 armor rating, so I had 800 armor while only wearing gauntlets, the rest of me naked. But when I took damage it was as if I had hardly any armor at all. Which realistically makes since, but I don't know how that fits into the calculation.