[Tomsdad]

You can get some military limb armour (the DAP and ballistic leggings in HT) its just you don't tend to see it very often, it mainly being used in specific situations like close up assaults and stuff (I'm guessing SWAT teams are fans of it as well). I'm guessing up armoured elbow pads and are likely a thing to. I'd also recommend Pyramid 3-57 "gunplay" if you don't already have it, it talks about modern load outs a bit.

Contrast that to TL9 combat load outs in Pyramid 3-55, the cutting edge article is straddling these and even with a TL there is development etc.


However in terms of what your talking about I think it's ultimately a combination of

1). limb armour is tricky and fiddly to get right and keep mobility and use of the limbs.

2). Torso armour compared to limb armour saves your life (and while RPGs obsess about DR and exact reductions in damage, in RL "does this save you life" is really the key criteria in most trade offs). Which is why even torso armour didnt become a widespread thing again until it could reliably stop an assault rifle.

3). Those lovely new materials that make high DR limb armour more likely are just that new. Military procurement is slow. Give it 10-20 years and yep maybe high DR flexible limb armour will be ubiquitous for armies with the money to armour their troops full stop.

4). Armour in general is coming back on the scene after a period of it widely being seen as "not worth it" (not worth it being a combination of several factors some of which are not just about protection). Again these new materials may change that expanding its role and with that acceptable options

5). Load outs are constantly increasing, there a huge amount of time and resources being devoted to finding anyway of bringing it down, so any extra weight is a problem.


6). Kevlar Limb armour does exist, it just you see it more in riot police etc who are more likely to get into hand to hand combat, and less likely to be facing high velocity rounds. Or carrying around a full pack).