[Natty Bumppo@frontier.net]

And if you miss the trauma plate and hit the meat elsewhere the rioter isn’t going anywhere.

Lesson learned from the breakup of Yugoslavia: A shot in the pelvis is a mobility kill.

Absent advanced trauma medical treatment it is probably lethal within 30 minutes.

And it doesn't take too many pelvic casualties to completely overwhelm the enemy's medical system.

[Spktyr]

There is an armor-side solution to that - because of course the protection guys weren’t going to ignore it. Back the soft armor with something like D3O non-Newtonian impact protection foam used in modern motorcycle armor. Stuff is uncanny, but it protects against impact kinetic energy like nothing else. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D3o

The most you’ll get with a pelvic hit against someone so protected is knocking them down - which is no small advantage for you - but they’ll quickly get back up and won’t need medical attention.

There still isn’t any solution for whiplashing someone’s brain with a non-penetrating hit to the head or visor.