And I personally don't like the armored vest. But I have not rolled a face character, and if I did I would either use an armored jacket or many of the armors from Run N' Gun. But this is due to personal preference and liking an armor value of around 12 before mods. But generally the best armor depends on where you are and what you expected to be the common weapons used by the opposition. Light pistols and clubs (no ap) lighter armors like the armored vests or urban explorer are fine. Heavy pistols, sub machine guns, low ap melee weapons, armored jacket should be good. High AP melee weapons, such as combat knife, katana, combat axe, or claymore and heavy hitting (and decent to high ap) range weapons, such as assault rifles, shotguns, and sniper rifles bring the heaviest legal armor you have. High end military grade weapons equate to similar levels of armor. Adding APDS only helps reinforce the idea of heavier armors.
Ruthureum Polymer Coating at a decent rating is also helpful in hiding (but extremely expensive). Part of the draw for Sleeping Tiger is it comes with RPC at Rating 3.
As for hiding your face well there are two options: Caster via mask spells (physical mask is better) or disguise skill. An adept has extra option to bring to the basic disguise skill, but still needs it (if you are worried about your face going all over the matrix).