Guaranteed to protect you against the sun, the cold and random assassins in speedos.
"you must be safe from iron, from cold, from spite. you must be quiet. you must be light. you must move softly in the night. you must be quick and unafraid. this means I must make you a shaed."
— Felurian, The Wise Man's Fear
Capes or cloaks in fiction are a good way to make your character look imposing, threatening, or regal. Some media give them a more practical purpose by having them be used as a defense against attacks. This clothing will usually be made of a particularly durable (often fictional) material, be doused in a certain chemical, or have some kind of enchantment that grants it protection.
This trope also applies to outerwear worn around the upper torso and over shirts such as robes, jackets, coats, shawls, and mantles.
Even in a non-magical setting, a sturdy cloak or heavy leather buff coat offers some protection against blades and a heavy vest with 20 layers of quilted fabric (a gambeson) may offer protection against blades or modestly-powered firearm projectiles.
This trope is Truth in Television: many styles of fighting and hunting across History have wrapping a cloak on one's bare hand as way of self-defense in the lack of a shield. In European fencing, for example, a cloak-wrapped arm could be used in two ways: to pin the enemy's stationary blade in place, restricting its movement and creating an opening for an attack, or to parry the enemy's thrust off-line from the side, like an arm shield. The 'fall' (the end of the cloak hanging below the arm) could also provide protection for the rest of the body, as free-floating fabric is quite difficult to thrust through. And finally, a cloak could also serve as a distraction for your opponent, thrown to obstruct their vision or weapon. Keep in mind, however, that a direct blown against a cloak will still cut it and harm the fencer's hands, so even fencing said that the safest options for defense would be a buckler or, in the lack of one, even a dagger.
Compare Invisibility Cloak and Armor of Invincibility. Sub-Trope of Arsenal Attire. May be the reason why Superheroes Wear Capes. Is often a Badass Cape. Can sometimes overlap with Cloth Fu.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Digimon:
- Digimon Adventure: Myotismon can use his cape to shield himself from his enemy's attacks.
- Digimon Adventure 02: The Digimon Emperor once used his cape to deflect one of Pegasusmon's attacks.
- Digimon Adventure: (2020): Omegamon uses his cape to create a Deflector Shield to defend against Nidhoggmon's attacks.
- Frieren: Beyond Journey's End: The first-class mage Burg specialized in defensive magic and used it to create the Immovable Cloak, his signature outfit which granted him Nigh-Invulnerability. He was confident enough in the protection that he proctored a mage exam where candidates would pass if they managed to make him take a step back, only to be killed when Übel bypassed the defenses entirely.
- Inuyasha: Inuyasha's red robe is made from the fur of a rat Yōkai that was Immune to Fire. The robe retains the Youkai's fire immunity and grants this protection to anyone who wears it.
- Mega Man X1: In the manga adaptation of the game, Sigma's cape is given the ability to protect him from enemy attacks. This becomes essential to X surviving the destruction of Sigma's fortress when he uses the discarded cape to protect himself during the descent.
- Mobile Suit Crossbone Gundam The Crossbone Gundams have anti-beam coated mantles, which provide protection against five or so beam rifle shots. They're basically extra defense with no energy requirements and are used in a number of clever improvisations throughout the series. The fact that they're dark also makes them appear to be practically invisible at longer distances, as enemies can only see their heads. One of which is black itself.
- Averted by the Vake Zam, which wears a very large cape draped over its left half to cover up the near-85 years-worth of deterioration in its armor; even still, its missing right foot is clearly exposed. The use of the cape at all is also an exploitation of both this trope and Rule of Cool, as it's not meant for direct combat and relies purely on intimidation to do most of the heavy lifting in keeping trespassers out of Gryps.
- One Piece:
- In his fight against Hotori and Kotori, Gan Fall uses his cape to protect himself when one of them emits methane gas with a Flavour Dial (Gan Fall thought it was a Fire Dial).
- Diamante's cape is actually a block of high-grade steel. He uses his Devil Fruit, the Ripple-Ripple Fruit, to make it flat and malleable, flowing like cloth when not using it as a shield.
- Sailor Moon: Tuxedo Mask often uses his cape to shield himself, Usagi, Chibi-Usa or anyone he cares about from the monsters/villains' attacks.
Comic Books
- Batman:
- Bruce's cape is resistant to fire and bullets. It also obscures his silhouette, making it harder to target him.
- Azrael's cape can defend against small firearms.
- Robin (1993): Tim's cape is resistant to fire and slashing damage. However, its most impressive customization is his ability to detach it and run an electric current through it that makes it wrap tightly around whomever has grabbed it.
- The Invaders (Marvel Comics): The Spirit of '76 (originally a member of the Crusaders and who would later take on the identity of Captain America) wore a cloak that was made of an unknown material that was both bulletproof and flameproof.
- Spawn can manipulate his cape for offense and defense. He once used it as a shield against Overtkill's laser
.
- In some continuities the cape that Superman wears is as invulnerable as he is due to being made of Kryptonian materials. It's usually fashioned from the blanket he was swaddled in on his rocket ride to Earth by Martha Kent.
- Trese: Alexandra wears the Cloak of Takipilsm/Cloak of Twilight, a magic cloak that protects her from harm. It can take the form of any type of clothing, usually a Badass Longcoat.
Fan Works
- The Apprentice, the Student, and the Charlatan: The Night Apprentice, Faithful Student, Night Master, and Prime Magus each had cloaks that served symbols of their station and carried a number of useful enchantments, such as invisibility or teleportation. Given the in-universe First Fundamental Law of Magic that magic cannot pierce magic, no matter how powerful one Source is compared to the other, this makes magically-impregnated clothing defensive against magical attacks by default, something Nova Shine uses on several occasions.
- Harry Potter and the Death Note: Harry's fourth courtship gift to Draco is a clock made of unicorn hair that has the ability to deflect most curses.
- Here Comes the New Boss: Not many capes actually wear capes, apart from Alexandria, but after half-jokingly suggesting it, Elpis is persuaded to add one to her armour — spider silk over an interior of braided steel cables, capable of becoming rigid and stopping most bullets. Since it has no weapons, she treats it as a symbol of her desire to be a hero, a knight in shining armour, instead of falling into the characteristic violence of the Butchers.
I was already in motion, whipping my cape off my back and snapping it into shield mode. The shotgun blast slammed into the shield and stopped there.
I tossed the shield behind me to Parian. "Protect yourself!" - The Mountain and the Wolf: During a battle with dark elf raiders, Akkarulf finds that one elf's dragonskin cloak makes her impervious to sword strikes. So he Shield Bashes her in the chin instead.
Films — Animated
- How to Train Your Dragon 2: Drago Bludvist wears a fire-proof cloak made of dragon scales.
Films — Live-Action
- Batman Forever: During one of his battles with Two-Face, Batman uses his cape to shield himself from an explosion caused by the villain.
- Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Jade Fox uses a cloak in her first fight, primarily as a distraction to conceal her movement. It is also lined with sharpened coins.
- John Wick: From the second film onward, Wick frequently uses his armored suit as a shield in combat by raising up one of the flaps and ducking behind it as he moves.
- Marvel Cinematic Universe:
- Doctor Strange (2016): The Cloak of Levitation comes to Strange's defense and fights off Lucian Aster, one of the Zealots, when he tries to kill the doctor. After this, the Cloak chooses Strange as its owner.
- Black Panther (2018): The Wakandan army wears capes with built-in Deflector Shields. These capes are used again during the battle against Thanos's army in Avengers: Infinity War.
- Sky High (2005): The film's alternate opening has the Commander using his cape to shield himself from the Pacifier's explosion.
Literature
- The Bee Dungeon: Pixies are too small for metal armor to be anything other than decorative, so instead they use cloaks and accessories enchanted to take damage for the wearer. Which happen to be the right size for soldier bees...
- Bookbound Bunny: Nebula Veil, an Astral spell that conjures a cloak around its user that resembles a starry sky. Not only is it aesthetically pleasing, it's highly effective at protecting against magical attacks (though it's a bit weaker against physical blows above a certain weight). When Lily first casts it, she can only conjure a handkerchief's worth of material, but she soon develops the full cloak after a lot of dedicated practice, with the goal of making it one of her signature spells. Outside of battle, the Nebula Veil is most often used as an example of Lily's "star bloodline", as it's visually striking and distinct from other types of magic.
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: One of the products the Weasley twins sell through their company is a Shield Cloak. As the name implies, it is a cloak enchanted with a Shield Charm that makes the wearer immune to jinxes and hexes of weak to moderate strength.
- Incarnations of Immortality: The Grim Reaper's cloak and mask render the wearer completely invulnerable. It is later revealed to be partly a Magic Feather - whoever holds the office of Death is immortal when they want to be, but they can also loan out the cloak.
- The Kingkiller Chronicle: A powerful fae weaves shadows and moonlight into a shaed cloak for Kvothe. It grants him camouflage in darkness and dampens incoming blows, making it a cross between this trope and Invisibility Cloak.
- The Lord of the Rings: The Elven cloaks given to the Fellowship in Lothlorien. While they don't protect against weapons or physical blows, they help to camouflage the wearer and prevent "unfriendly eyes" from spotting them.
- Old Kingdom: The old Abhorsens protected themselves from dangerous Free Magic with specially enchanted robes, masks, and gauntlets. They don't last long once activated — Clariel steals a set when she needs to use Free Magic spirits for a task, and the robes disintegrate within days.
- Rebuild World: Akira's third and fourth sets of Powered Armor come with a cloak that has Deflector Shields. This has a separate power source from his suits, which comes in handy when the suit needs taken offline for reprogramming by his Virtual Sidekick mid-battle.
- Re:Zero: When she was hired by Roswaal L. Mathers, the assassin Elsa Granheirt was given an enchanted cloak that could protect its wearer from any offensive magical attack. However, the cloak had two drawbacks; Firstly, it only worked once and would dissipate after negating an attack; secondly, it only worked against spells intended to harm her physically and could be bypassed by indirect Shamak magic.
- The Tin Man: The Tin Man suit has a bulletproof cape made from similar material to Batman's cape in The Dark Knight Trilogy.
Live-Action TV
- Kamen Rider:
- Kamen Rider Ryuki: Ren Akiyama/Kamen Rider Knight's Guard Vent summons Wingwall, a cape that protects him from attacks.
- Due to being an adaptation of Ryuki, Kamen Rider Dragon Knight's Len/Kamen Rider Wing Knight can also utilize this.
- Moon Knight (2022): In the third episode, Moon Knight uses his cloak to protect Layla from a barrage of gunfire. He then uses it to launch the bullets right back at their attackers.
- Stargirl (2020): In "The Monsters", Beth activates her suit's defense features when fighting against Cameron's grandparents. Said features include a cape that acts as a shield.
Mythology and Religion
- Classical Mythology:
- Some depictions of Heracles have him wearing the Nemean Lion pelt as a cloak instead of as full leather armor.
- Although it could also be described as a shield, the Aegis was a magical item most commonly portrayed as a shawl or cloak worn by Athena, made out of the skin of the goat who suckled Zeus in his infancy. The shawl was covered in serpent scales and was a symbol of protection, being shown draped across Athena's arm like an arm shield in some depictions.
Tabletop Games
- Dungeons & Dragons: The game has numerous cloaks, robes, mantles, and capes which provide certain types of defense and protection. These include:
- The Cloak of Protection, a standard magic item that grants the wearer a +1 bonus to armor class and any saving throws they make to avoid harmful effects.
- The Cloak of Arachnida gives its wearer properties of a spider, including resistance to poison damage and immunity to being trapped in any kind of webbing.
- The Cloak of Displacement makes the wearer harder to hit by generating an illusion of them standing a short distance from where they actually are.
- The Firebane Cloak gives a +3 bonus to saving throws against fire attacks and reduces damage from such attacks.
- 7th Sea: The Robertson and Torres schools of fighting are both based on rapier and cloak, with the latter putting more focus on defense.
- Several Shadowrun books have stats for discreetly armored clothing, including a line of greatcoats and cloaks that provide different kinds of specialized protection (against acid, cold, fire, etc).
- Warhammer:
- Warhammer Fantasy Battle: The Dark Elf Corsairs wear cloaks made of Sea Dragon skin while the Chrace High Elves of the White Lions regiment wear pelts from the beasts that give them their name. Both have varying effects depending on the rulebook edition but always provide good protection.
- Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay:
- Elven cloaks are enchanted to camouflage the wearer and reduce the accuracy of incoming ranged attacks.
- White Wolf Cloaks render the wearer immune to natural and magical cold. As their creation requires a High Priest of Ulric to kill a white wolf bare-handed in single combat, they are a rare privilege.
- Warhammer: The Old World:
- Cecil Gastonne's dragonhide cloak reduces the damage done by non-magical weapons, makes him immune to the Killing Blow and Multiple Wounds special rules, and gives him a defensive bonus against flaming attacks.
- Ogdruz Swampdigga's trollhide cloak gives him a slight armour bonus and regeneration. It's downplayed though, since it also makes him weak to fire.
Video Games
- Angband: There is a cloak with an unnaturally high enchantment and immunity to elemental-based attacks. It is also made of an exceptionally thick and durable material, which protects the wearer from blasts of crystal shards.
- Baldur's Gate III: The Cloak of Protection increases the wearer's armor class and all saving throw bonuses by 1, making them harder to hit and more likely to mitigate the effects of area of effect or status-inflicting attacks, respectively.
- Darkstalkers: Dimitri uses his cape to guard against attacks.
- Darkwing Duck (Capcom): The player can have Darkwing use his cape to deflect enemy fire by pressing "Up" on the D-Pad.
- Divinity: Original Sin II: Robes are a type of armor with high defense against magical attacks but minimal protection from physical damage. They're preferred by magic users and often have an Intelligence prerequisite to wear.
- Dungeon Crawl: Cloaks can be equipped by most races on top of their armor. Although they provide little in the way of armor (base 1, upgradable to 3), their real utility is in the variety of defensive magical enhancements they can have. These include improving stealth and improving resistance to magical attacks.
- Final Fantasy:
- Final Fantasy I: The Protect Cloak is worn in the shield slot, and is the only shield in the original version that White Mages or Black Mages can equip. Later versions added the Zephyr Cloak and the Elven Cloak.
- Final Fantasy IV: Rubicante is weak to Ice and Water attacks, but wears a cloak that heals him if he is hit by those elements while it is raised.
- Final Fantasy V: The Elven Cloak is worn as an accessory, but otherwise behaves exactly like a shield by stopping physical attacks when it activates.
- Helherron: Various cloaks and capes increase protection, defense, or both.
- Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft: The "Robe of Protection" card grants all minions on its side of the board the effect "Can't be targeted by spells or hero powers" while it remains in play. However, this is a downplayed version of this trope; the card doesn't make minions immune to spells and they can still be affected by spells that hit everyone.
- Heroes of Might and Magic V: A hero wearing the Cloak of Sylanna can reduce the damage earth spells cause to their army by 50%.
- Kirby:
- Kirby's Adventure: Nightmare, the Final Boss of the game, wears a cloak that protects his tornado-like core from damage. The only way to hurt Nightmare is to strike his core when he reveals it from under his cloak when attacking.
- Kirby & The Amazing Mirror: Similar to Nightmare, Dark Mind wears a cloak that protects his eye-like core when he performs his Badass Arm-Fold. When he attacks, he drops the arm-fold, leaving his core unprotected and open for attack.
- In The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Ganondorf uses his cape to deflect his own magic when Link tries to make it rebound on him.
- Medabots: As his name implies, Redmatador is a defense-focused Medabot modeled after a matador. He uses his cape as a shield against attacks.
- NiGHTS into Dreams…: Jackle's mantle keeps him from taking damage while he flies backward and tosses cards. It has to be removed with one attack for him to become vulnerable; one of the reasons that his fight is infamously difficult is that if you allow him to, he can recover his mantle to go back into attack mode.
- Project M: As a nod to his boss battle in Ocarina of Time, Ganondorf's Neutral Special attack, if performed on the ground, will cause him to swing his cape in front of him, reflecting projectiles back at his opponents.
- Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne: The Matador boss has a unique skill called Red Capote, in which he uses his cape to buff his evasion stat to its highest possible value.
- You must find and equip a cloak in Shadowgate to protect against the intense heat in a particularly fiery room.
- Super Smash Bros.: Mario can deflect projectiles by pulling out a cape. Dr. Mario has a similar move done with a sheet.
- Terranigma: Elle makes Ark a special cloak that allows him to guard against enemy attacks. This allows him to survive an upcoming boss's otherwise devastating attack, reducing it to mere Scratch Damage.
Western Animation
- The Mechanical Monsters: The villain tips a huge vat of molten steel onto Superman and Lois Lane. Superman spreads his cape into a makeshift barrier that withstands the molten metal. Even Convection, Schmonvection can't hurt Lois Lane despite being closely surrounded by the stuff.
- The Owl House: In "Agony of a Witch", Eda makes Luz a cloak made out of "witch's wool", a material that deflects powerful spells.
- Samurai Jack: The Princess and the Bounty Hunters" has The Gentleman, a Bounty Hunter and Professional Killer who throws his cloak at his opponent to blind and distract them long enough to throw his knives through the cloak at them. Princess Mira warns him that Jack is far too quick and disciplined to fall for such a tactic, and even when attacked by the coordinated efforts of Mira, The Gentleman, and four other bounty hunters Jack effortlessly parries the knives and cuts down The Gentleman in a single slash.
- Super Friends: In the episode ''The Lord of Middle Earth", Batman applies a chemical mixture to his cape rendering it impervious to any form of energy or radiation (which comes in very useful during their subsequent adventure).
- The Secret Saturdays: Argost is able to use his cloak to protect himself from Doyle's explosives and Drew's heat beam.
Argost: Megatooth shark skin! And so stylish!
- Teen Titans (2003): Robin's cape is made of a special polymer ten times stronger than steel. He sometimes uses it to shield himself against enemy attacks. In "Winner Take All", it proved strong enough to protect Robin from Hot Spot's fire blasts.
- Zorro: Generation Z: Zorro's cape is resistant to gunfire.
Real Life
- European fencing styles from 16th and 17th Centuries used the cloak to deflect enemy attacks in a duel. They can also be used as distraction, for feints, and to conceal the shape of your body.
- In Spanish bullfighting, the various capes used by the matador are designed to confuse the bull into charging the cape rather than the matador's body.
- Note that while using a cloak as a parrying device in Real Life fencing worked, actually wearing a cloak in combat is a very bad idea. It's all too easy for an opponent to grab hold of it and strangle you with it, entangle you in it, or pull you to the floor using it. Thus it was important to practice not only fighting effectively with a cloak but also quickly removing it for use.