After grinding away at some mobs for a little bit (and having 2-3 of them attacking me at any given time) I noticed that I didn't see any of the buffs the ceremonial chest scale gives.
I logged the biped, who has the old ceremonial shield - not exchanged yet for the techable one - and after a couple seconds running around some mobs, he got the buffs. It seems the ceremonial scale doesn't give the buffs when hit anymore.