I've been in several fights where I found afterwards I forgot to change back to battle wear from formal wear (to boost Charisma) when visiting the trader. On all those occasions I found I didn't get hurt much because I was inside my power suit.

So does body armor actually make a difference and should I invest in them? Or did I just get lucky and they do make a difference?

Well when the PA armour gets blown of its good to have something under. Plus those times you dont use it of course.

Good question... just from my subjective experience, it seems like you either use power armor... or you just do without armor. I've not noticed a significant reduction in damage whether I was in a suit or combat armor. Of course, I'm playing on easy, so that surely has an effect.. but I can't imagine that anything other than power armor much matters on higher level difficulties, the damage is just too great.

On Survival it does, atleast. Tried running naked into combat, even with a decent build and i will get decimated compared to when i am wearing my full combat armor.

The damage resistance can have a significant effect when fighting harder enemies. Keep in mind too that your armor may NOT be doing anything if it doesn't have resistance to the damage type the enemy is using, either Ballistic, Energy, etc.

With some armour perks and a full set of upgraded synth/combat armour, the difference is very important. I'm currently completing a mission in a radiated area and the hazmat suit is keeping the radiation down but I am dying a lot otherwise from critters and gunfire.

Certainly, any type of armor helps. Though how much it helps is dependent on the type and class of armor you're using. As said before, Combat and Synth armor absolutely lovely when fully upgraded--great damage mitigation. Personal armor does not stack with Power Armor, however. So even though your body armor is still equipped when you enter Power Armor, you don't receive its damage mitigation effects--only the Power Armor's damage mitigation, which is already pretty great.

That's a strange question considering you were wearing power armour. Try to fight in you fancy charisma+ suit without power armour and watch if you will see difference.

Btw.: when you are wearing power armour, any other piece of dress is ignored for all purposes (including skill checks).

Here is explanation of effect of armour on damage. Scroll to part about Fallout 4: http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Damage_Resistance

Hm... i play without power armor, survival.

Usuall body armor and i normaly engage head-on but with a stealth equipment setup. What can't be beaten with my rifle gets to be killed sneaky. :3

Wasn't a weird question. Maybe I worded wrongly, my question was if the personal armor and power armor stacked. Someone just said it didn't, and that's what I was looking for.

So if I'm always in power suit, then doesn't that make investing in personal armor irrelevant if my power armor doesn't get knocked off?

It makes a big difference to have the armor extras for sure. Having deep pockets or ultralight or leaded or combat armor with shadowed makes a big difference.

I'm pretty sure it's percentage based though which makes it feel weird. Early game when you are reducing 5-35% of the damage dealt it won't feel that different but eventually when the reduction is like 80% or so of the damage dealt it feels like a big difference.

I'd like the numbers to it. it's probably a dimishing returns system to take in the difference between early armor, ballistic weave layered with upgraded combat armor and x-01 power armor mk iv (1850 physical armor).

I'm sure we will have the formula for certain after we get a toolkit. It can't be the same as skyrim (the last beth game so I thought maybe the math was similar) because skyrim capped at 80% with 547 armor and that would make most final power armors the same.

Ya thats right... another part why i don't like power armor.

Loosing out on the movementspeed buff, chameleon and roughly about 7 special points just doesn't feel very good for what i'd get. :S

Depends. With a sneak build, not much. If you start getting hit something's gone seriously wrong.

I usually just wear something like military fatigues and cap unless its obvious I can't avoid getting hit when I add the other armour bits. I have this superstition that I am easer to detect if I wear all the armour bits.

Power armor completely disables anything you wear under it, no stat bonus, no additional protection, nothing. I wear full +cha set to get out of PA and do talking\trading stuff.

when driving your PA around the armor you character is wearing doesn't count. The bonus from my Army fatigues and deep pocked leather armor is taken away when I climb into my t-45 PA.

wrong

muffled and shadowed extremely nice when sneaking and that comes from your armor.

You can make muffled legs and you may be able to find muffled on arms from raiders in combat armor and then you are good.

So I play at a modified damage rate of -25% me and +200% enemies (They do 3X damage) so I can die easily with a well placed shot from a good gun, but in most cases the armor I'm wearing saves my life, it gives you one and a half second more (someone here calculated that on survival I think), which is the difference between life and death some times.
You are not supposed to be a complete tank without the Power Armor I think, PA can take a lot of punishment though.

Then I misunderstood you.

Power armour does not stack with any other dress so yes, it's irrelevant. Just don't forget to get off your power armour when you want to pass those charisma checks because power armour cancels also any bonuses your cloths can have. It's as if you would be naked inside for purpose of any effects.

True statement. Makes the difference between being one-shotted or three-shotted. Three shot at least gives you the breathing room to eliminate the adversary or stagger him.

My question is this. If you wear body armor inside of a suit of Power Armor, are you getting protection from both? If so that could be why some people (Not me) are complaining about being invincible in power armor. (Of course you should be invincible in power armor, it's POWER ARMOR! Your basically wearing a tank.)

So let me get this straight. If power armor is so good and personal body armor isn't important. What's the point in me making money to buy stuff to buy good personal armor or to craft good personal armor?

You might not want to use the power armor. Maybe you don't use it for exploring, or maybe you are the stealthy kind who hasn't gotten to the point of installing a stealth boy yet.

But yeah, you got a point. The really sad thing is that legendary armor abilities are inactive in power armor, and that seems to be the majority of legendary loot in my experience.

Absolutely the key w/ it is modding and the type of armor you have I have found it's far better to have all of one type leather , combat Etc. all w/ the same mods for each piece also the vault suit when fully upgraded does make a difference the one piece covers all armors seem to be very lacking except 1 or 2 that become available at the end of the main quest and even those are no where as good as a set of fully modded set of separate piece armor