Gripe about Armor in D&D post 2nd edition.

[ngilop]

SO, it just occured to me today that the best armor in the game is the chain shirt.


what? but you can get that at 1st level one might say

but with every armor in the 3rd ed player's handook giving a total ac of +7 - +9 (couting both armor AC and max dex allowed) +1 chain shirt comes out 100 gold less that platemail...

Is this supposed to be some form of (imagined and 100% completely missplaced idea of) balance? becuase seriously.. its far from it. people actually think that platemail protected somebody worse than a chain shirt did? {{scrubbed}}

so really why would anybody ever EVER buy anything except the many diffferent forms of a chain shirt?

so my question becomes an answer and that is simply " the people who made the armor and weapon section of the 3rd ed+PhB was completely and utterly ignorant of what armor and weapons were."

{{scrubbed}}
I am just going to bypass actually making armor worth it. and instead add a new subsytem well the idea of a new subsytem. Here. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=12803503#post12803503)

[Drelua]

The thing is, most people don't have near super-human levels of agility. A chain shirt, if you have 18 DEX, grants a total of 8, whereas full-plate grants a total of 9 while slowing you way down and making you a lot worse at a bunch of skills, so overall the chain shirt is better, but not in terms of AC. I'd say the best armour in the game is mithral full plate, for a total of 11 without being so dependent on a high DEX. However, your average person is 40% less likely to get hit when wearing full plate as opposed to no armour at all, which is pretty low, especially since it's only 20% less likely when compared to a chain shirt. That is pretty ridiculously low. Pathfinder at least widened the gap a bit, but I don't think it was enough from a realistic point of view. Basically, full-plate is actually better than a chain shirt for the vast majority of people, but nearly as much so as is realistic.

[Gavinfoxx]

If you want realism, why are you playing D&D?

Seriously. It's TERRIBLE for realism.

Though I suppose an E6 game of Codex Martialis, where you are limited to Rogue / Fighter / Expert / Aristocrat, would be somewhat realistic, and use mostly D&D rules.

Here's Codex Martialis:

http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=65250

If you want something that feels kind of like D&D, but is actually realistic, buy this set!

[Agent 451]

You should also take a look at the weapon and armour rules from the Conan d20 rpg.

[Gavinfoxx]

You should also take a look at the weapon and armour rules from the Conan d20 rpg.

Or Codex Martialis. Which is better for a realism standpoint. Yes I have looked at both! Conan D20 is okay, but doesn't go far enough. ;)

[Agent 451]

Didn't actually see your post before I posted. Followed the link though, and it looks interesting! What exactly is E6 though?

[Gavinfoxx]

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?352719-necro-goodness-E6-The-Game-Inside-D-amp-D

E6!

[ngilop]

i am not talking about having D&D be a total simulation and realism based game, but that some armors should undoubtedly be superior to others.

a +1 difference between a chain shirt and platemail is crazy platemail being the better (or best IMO) armor should be completely obvious from the get go, if I wanted realism i would say to completely redo the 'max dex' bullcrap that they thought up as well as other things they left our and should have included.

[Gavinfoxx]

Well, there are three armors for people with money in D&D:

Mithral Chain Shirt
Mithral Breastplate
Mithral Full Plate

And that's about it. If you are a Druid, you go splatbook searching for the wooden version of one of the above (Duskwood or Darkleaf), and place a Wilding Clasp on it. If you are a Wizard, you get a Twilight, nimbleness, feycraft, githcraft, thistledown, etc. of one of the above (generally Chain Shirt, but sometimes Breastplate with enough funky things to put on it to get everything down to 0). Those are the only three armors that matter, really.

Really, the number of armors is mostly for corner cases (extremely dex focused builds might want some exotic armor from somewhere, perhaps), or people who can't pay for the good stuff.

[Eisenfavl]

Well, there are three armors for people with money in D&D:

Mithral Chain Shirt
Mithral Breastplate
Mithral Full Plate

And that's about it. If you are a Druid, you go splatbook searching for the wooden version of one of the above (Duskwood or Darkleaf), and place a Wilding Clasp on it. Those are the only three armors that matter, really.

Fullplate, as opposed to Thaluud Stone Armour?
Fullplate is 8/+1. Thaluud is 12/+0. That's 3 points better AC.
Breastplate is 5/+3. Chain is 6/+4. Chain is directly better.
Chariana + Dastana are both in Oriental Adventures, and I think one is in arms and equipment guide.

[Gavinfoxx]

Mithral Full plate is MEDIUM ARMOR.

Think about that for a moment. It's a +8 armor class, +3 max dex, -4 acp armor, and is medium armor in every way. The extra mobility afforded to this (including for movement or speed purposes) generally gets it better than most of the other obscure armors. Plus it's relatively light, for encumbrance issues, and it gives you a bit of a zone where you can have your dex buffed and have it still be useful for giving you armor class. Really, it's the best thing for, say, a Warblade... and that's really all that matters...

Sure, you could spend a feat on Interlocking Plate, Battle Plate, Mountain Plate, etc., but why would you? Even Heavy Plate is generally much worse than Full Plate... compare the weight and armor check penalty! That stuff is CRAZY.

Also, Thaluud stone is from the most obscure BOOK EVER. Anauroch the Empire of Shade. AND IT WEIGHS 180 POUNDS.

And the fact that the two stone armors (of which the Thaluud armor is one) can't be made of Mithral... seeing as how they are made of stone... hmmm...

Also the fact that the Oriental Adventures stuff is REALLY hard to get approved in most games...

[Tengu_temp]

Just how often do you see heavy armor users with 18 or more dexterity anyway? Because if you have less, than mithral full plate is the superior armor choice, way better than anything lighter.

[ngilop]

{{scrubbed}}

[Eisenfavl]

Also, Thaluud stone is from the most obscure BOOK EVER. Anauroch the Empire of Shade. AND IT WEIGHS 180 POUNDS.

And the fact that the two stone armors (of which the Thaluud armor is one) can't be made of Mithral... seeing as how they are made of stone... hmmm...


Actually, it specifies that the majority of the undercoat and all the hinges, joints, etc which normally determine Max AC form dex are made of metal.
You CAN make Thaluud Stone Armour out of mithral, unless it specifically states you can't.
I see no special material that it HAS o be made out of.

Plus, if we are talking armour OP how can we not mention that Mastercrafting Dragonmagazine? +1 AC and Max Dex is always nice.

[Gavinfoxx]

its that fighter with 12 dex and mithral full plate has the same AC as fighter with 18 dex and mithral chain shirt....

Whatever is wrong with that?

22 Dex + Mithral Chain Shirt = 20 AC
20 Dex + Mithral Breastplate = 20 AC
16 Dex + Mithral Full Plate = 21 AC

Is this supposed to be a problem?? Is this bad somehow??

[JellyPooga]

@OP: Something you should bear in mind about armour in d&d is that HP are not a direct measurement of health and injury and AC does not directly represent the ability of the armour to protect the wearer from a single given blow.

When you consider that HP are an abstraction of health/injury, fatigue, skill and plain dumb-luck and that AC is something that protects you from the deleterious effects of an "attack", which itself is not a single blow but a series of maneuvers, strikes and parries, the concept that "heavier armour = better protection" starts to waver.

Stand a guy in a Chain Shirt next to a guy (of similar build) in Full Plate and hit them both with a sword and yes, the Chain Shirt guy will suffer a great deal more than Full Plate guy. Give the pair of them a sword each and tell them to have a rumble and the result becomes a little more hazy.
- If both those guys are average, the Plate guy will probably have the edge because the Chain guy isn't quick enough to make up for the lack of physical protection; one hit and he's down, whilst blows bounce off Plate guy.
- If, on the other hand, the Chain guy has crazy-good reflexes though, he'll literally be running rings around Plate guy, wearing him down and taking advantage of every opening and slow strike he makes; whilst Chain guy is just getting warmed up, Plate guy is feeling the strain of being encased in a steel suit and trying to exert himself against a faster opponent. Full Plate is heavy.

This is the sort of effect the Armour in D&D is trying to simulate. When you consider that the game is pegged at the "classic d&d dungeon crawl", you have to ask yourself (if you were the one going on the adventure) what would you prefer to wear; the lightest and least encumbering armour you can or the heaviest and most uncomfortable? Lighter armour has the advantage of being more comfortable, less restrictive, (typically) less noisy and generally easier to use. The "typical" adventurer is expected to be travelling across a wilderness, delving into dark, dank caverns and generally doing things that aren't that comfortable. In older editions of D&D, aside from class restrictions, heavier armour was always better. You'd never see a Fighter wearing Leather armour if he could afford Chain mail. In 3ed, the HP/AC abstraction makes a little more sense because characters have the option of taking the lighter armour option and still be viable.

[Telonius]

ist not whether fighter with 12 dex and mithral full plate as the same AC as fighter with 18 dex and mithral full plate

its that fighter with 12 dex and mithral full plate has the same AC as fighter with 18 dex and mithral chain shirt....

There's your problem - Fighter with 18 Dex. Why on earth would somebody with 18 Dex be a Fighter? When you get a Dex that high, they're almost certainly going to be some sort of a more rogue-ish character (which doesn't get proficiency in Heavy armor anyway). If he's got a Dex that high, how high is the strength going to be? If he's using a standard 28 point buy, he really couldn't get more than 16 to start, and that's if he dumps everything else and ses Con at 10. (Unless he's a Half-Orc, which means Int and Cha would be a whopping 6). He'd only be using his second-best stat for attack rolls, unless he also wants to spend a Feat on Weapon Finesse. (Even then, he'd do less damage, since he can't get the extra damage with his rapier). He would always be using his second-best stat for damage rolls. That sort of stat arrangement also means no Feats in the Combat Expertise line; low Int would disqualify him.

What you're really looking at is two separate sets of skills - like swinging a zweihander versus being a master fencer. The Fighter class best supports the former concept; Rogue best supports the latter. A guy who's decently agile, but strong enough to wear 58 pounds of gear (regular fullplate plus a Greatsword); versus some nimble little pain in the butt who's expertly trained in tumbling acrobatics, dodging out of the way, and sticking people in precise locations. I have no problem whatsoever with those two character concepts being approximately as hard-to-hit as each other; especially since the higher hit point total of the Fighter class means that nimble is a much more dangerous proposition than armored on the battlefield. (When you get hit, you get hit harder; the same blow would take a greater percentage of the Rogue's hit point total than the Fighter's).

[Mystify]

I have 0 problem with high dex being a better protection than clumsy armor. However, the amount of dex required for that is highly impressive, and only the most dexterous specimens can properly take advantage of that. I probably have a dex of 6, and so full plate will protect me much better than anything else. If I was a highly dexterous person, I wouldn't want anything that would slow me down. Of course, that type of person is much more likely to be a rogue-type, not a fighter.
D&D has many problems, but I don't think this is one of them.

[Person_Man]

Dexterity, like all attributes, is a character resource. Players gain benefits for having or allocating that resource. If a player has higher Dexterity, then he can and should have a higher AC. And if you're using a point buy system, choosing a higher Dexterity means that you're giving up some other benefit (more hit points, more Skill points, a higher damage bonus, etc). And since attribute points are scarcer then then mundane equipment, the benefits provided by attributes should be greater then the benefits provided by mundane equipment. So I really don't see what the issue is. Yes, someone wearing cheap armor with a high Dexterity is harder to hit then someone wearing slightly more expensive armor with a lower Dexterity. That's the way it should be, because Dexterity is a scarce resource, and armor is a cheap resource.

[gbprime]

So I really don't see what the issue is. Yes, someone wearing cheap armor with a high Dexterity is harder to hit then someone wearing slightly more expensive armor with a lower Dexterity. That's the way it should be, because Dexterity is a scarce resource, and armor is a cheap resource.

Especially in a point-buy world. You're playing a fighter type with all his emphasis on strength, DEX is a secondary concern. At 1st level, you scribble down a 12 DEX and grab some chain mail. Then you upgrade to Banded Mail or Full Plate when you can. At high levels, you have a +4 DEX item which goes perfect with the Mithril Full Plate you now own.

Yes, a little bit of armor plus "getting out of the way" can be as effective as a lot of armor. No surprise there. But most melee combatants don't have the luxury of tons of DEX.

[prufock]

If you want your armor to mean more, why not convert it to some form of the damage reduction variant rules (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/armorAsDamageReduction.htm)?

Drelua pretty much has the right of it - you aren't making a fair comparison. It would be like complaining that "a dagger in the hands of a person with 18 strength does just as much damage on average as a bastard sword in the hands of a person with 12 strength."

[Swooper]

Well, there are three armors for people with money in D&D:

Mithral Chain Shirt
Mithral Breastplate
Mithral Full Plate
This is the part that annoys me about D&D armour... Nobody that has a choice uses chainmail, leather armour or half-plate. No diversity.

4E sort of solved that issue afaik, by making each armour type a distinct proficiency so you generally wear the heaviest armour you can spare a feat on. Not really a feasible solution in 3.x where feats are not trivial things you waste on +1 AC, sadly. Do either the Conan d20 or Codex Martialis rules solve this?

[Tengu_temp]

Tengu_temp has completely missed the point. and my prediction has started to come true already mere hours after I first made it.


ist not whether fighter with 12 dex and mithral full plate as the same AC as fighter with 18 dex and mithral full plate


its that fighter with 12 dex and mithral full plate has the same AC as fighter with 18 dex and mithral chain shirt....

And that's a problem... how? Have you considered that all those people are "talking down to you" because they want to show that the point you're trying to make makes no sense?

[Hiro Protagonest]

Tengu_temp has completely missed the point. and my prediction has started to come true already mere hours after I first made it.


ist not whether fighter with 12 dex and mithral full plate as the same AC as fighter with 18 dex and mithral full plate


its that fighter with 12 dex and mithral full plate has the same AC as fighter with 18 dex and mithral chain shirt....

And therein lies your fallacy.

Boosting dex from 12 to 18 is 10 or 12 points in point buy. That's far more valuable than 1400 gp, which is worth less than a +1 weapon.

[Person_Man]

Oh, and for the record, I think that the best mundane armor which doesn't rely on Dexterity is Mechanus Gear, which is heavy armor from the Planar Handbook that provides +10 AC with a max Dex bonus of 0 for a reasonable cost of 1750gp. The only down side is that the Armor Check penalty is -10 and your land speed is reduced to 15 ft (unless you're a Dwarf!).

[JellyPooga]

This is the part that annoys me about D&D armour... Nobody that has a choice uses chainmail, leather armour or half-plate. No diversity.

This, if anything, is also my biggest gripe about D&D armour. When you don't have cash to spare, you sometimes see Leather or Studded Leather to avoid ACP, but apart from that and placed loot I don't think I've ever seen someone choose anything other than the "optimal" three armours.

Bring back Type-based AC, I say...Chain Shirts should give naff-all AC against Bludgeoning, for example.

[Tyndmyr]

Fullplate, as opposed to Thaluud Stone Armour?
Fullplate is 8/+1. Thaluud is 12/+0. That's 3 points better AC.
Breastplate is 5/+3. Chain is 6/+4. Chain is directly better.
Chariana + Dastana are both in Oriental Adventures, and I think one is in arms and equipment guide.

Dastana is in Arms and Equipment, yes. Note that it limits what armors can be comboed with it, so you certainly can't combo it with fullplate or similar.

I see nothing wrong with the dex system. It's a bit abstract and imperfect, sure, but it means that the guy in leather who relies on avoiding being hit is still a viable archtype.

Comparing the fighter with 12 dex to the guy with 18 dex is just unfair. Extra dex points do not come for free.

[Swooper]

Using Armour as Damage Reduction (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/armorAsDamageReduction.htm) or Grim'n'Gritty Advanced Armour (http://riivo.planc.ee/dnd/grim-n-gritty/GrimNGrittyAdvancedArmorRules1.3.pdf) variant rules changes the armour paradigm in such a way that the OP's gripe is no longer a problem. More realistic, if that's what you're after. The latter also includes different DR by damage type, as JellyPooga mentioned.

[Telonius]

This, if anything, is also my biggest gripe about D&D armour. When you don't have cash to spare, you sometimes see Leather or Studded Leather to avoid ACP, but apart from that and placed loot I don't think I've ever seen someone choose anything other than the "optimal" three armours.

Well, there are Druids, but I think that's the exception that proves the rule.

[ngilop]

{{scrubbed}}

[Gavinfoxx]

Well, there are Druids, but I think that's the exception that proves the rule.

Remember in my post about the three armors, that smart Druids seek out their equivalent for one of those three armors as much as possible...

[Doug Lampert]

This is the part that annoys me about D&D armour... Nobody that has a choice uses chainmail, leather armour or half-plate. No diversity.

4E sort of solved that issue afaik, by making each armour type a distinct proficiency so you generally wear the heaviest armour you can spare a feat on. Not really a feasible solution in 3.x where feats are not trivial things you waste on +1 AC, sadly. Do either the Conan d20 or Codex Martialis rules solve this?

That's semi-realistic except that it sould either all be chain or all be plate. Pretty much every period has had one dominant tech for personal body armor. The differences are in how much of it you wear, not in the fundamentals of how its made.

Once decent manufacturing methods were worked out plate was cheaper to make, lighter to wear (especially after taking padding into account), and better protection than chain. It displaced chain as fast as plate armor could be manufactured, and within a century or two plate armor (mostly what D&D would call a breastplate) was far more common than chain had ever been, because it was far more affordable than chain had ever been.

Similarly, cultures able to make chain in large quantities didn't use anything less capable except for the very poor unable to afford chain.

The D&D armor mix is like having us today use plate, and flac jackets, and kevlar vests, and kevlar vests with armored insets, and futuristic force-fields all at once! It's nonsensical.


Using Armour as Damage Reduction (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/armorAsDamageReduction.htm) or Grim'n'Gritty Advanced Armour (http://riivo.planc.ee/dnd/grim-n-gritty/GrimNGrittyAdvancedArmorRules1.3.pdf) variant rules changes the armour paradigm in such a way that the OP's gripe is no longer a problem. More realistic, if that's what you're after. The latter also includes different DR by damage type, as JellyPooga mentioned.

Armor as DR does not work even vaguely realistically with D&D weapons.

Seriously, a full extention lunge with a dagger or small sword is deadlier than any standard blow people actually trained to use a greatsword with. You've got your full wieght and speed behind the blow, and it's concentrated on a sharp, double edged, point. It doesn't get any better than that for muscle powered weapons weilded at combat speed.

People with greatswords specifically carried daggers as a method of finishing off people in armor that the greatsword couldn't actually kill.

You need to rework combat so reach gives a much larger advantage, and the weapon damages are much closer to flat for anything less than a mounted lance prior to armor as DR to produce realistic results, you probably also need rules to distinguish "bludgeoned into temporary submission despite the armor" from "cut to shreads". Without such comprehensive rules changes armor as DR tends to achieve the mildly amazing feat of managing to be LESS realistic than D&D combat.

And that's not an easy thing to do. Don't do that in the name or "realism".

DougL

[Mystify]

actually nobody is even trying to see my point in the least sense of the words of 'getting it'

what I was trying to get across but failed miserably with my example of fighter+fighter blah blah dex blah was why am I Penalized for being a fighter with a higher dex?

and now peopel want to toss up how chainmail is more maneuverable and less cumbersome that plate? Liek seriously do you want me to spend the next several post pulling the numerous time that fallacy has been proven wrong time and time again? BUT that is the max dex arguent that i am pretty sure I specifically stated i was going to ignore in this post.

you can move better and have a greater range of motion in platemail thna you do in chainmail, sorry that is a fact, not just personal opinion there.

What my main point that everybody in this thread so far has managed to gloss over and ignore was that the supieror armors represented in this game advantages are hardly noticable. next time you happen to have a set of mail ( the actual mail not the more modern mail that most people think of when they hear mail) and a set of plate you'll see there is a bigger difference than what the +1 in D&D stands for. or for a much better example (as admittedly mail is pretty impervious to most weapons you are going to toss it's way) take a set of studded leather and compare it to half-plate? in D&D studded>half-plate.

I am not saying that i want D&D to be 100% real life ( if i did i would be posting threads about how D&D needs to kill composite longbows and name their damn weapons correctly and at least come across some sort of make soem damn sense-isms with the damage weapons deal)

I do want people to look at the armors and from teh get go say "wow PWAP! is good armor look at the total amount of defense I get from it"
not, well if I want the best AC in the game i have to point buy dex sacrifice my other stats and buy mithrial brast plate" when really? justa fregging breastplate is the best?

RARG!**&#^*(#&^ and this is whay i wish i could lsap those 3 D&D 3rd ed designers across the face.
Can you provide any evidence to back up your claim that plate should have more dex than chainmail? They aren't that different in D&D, just a 1 dex difference.

And the superior armors difference is highly noticeable. The effect of being highly agile is also highly noticable. If you want to tell me that highly agile characters shouldn't have have high defenses then I will have to respectively disagree. I don't care if there isn't even a drop of realism in it, I want agile characters to be hard to hit. As far as I can tell, you are raging because dex is an important part of defense. Am I wrong about that?

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

I think the OP is trying (I repeat: trying) to communicate two ideas:

1. D&D underplays the benefits of full plate.
2. If you want to max your (regular) AC, you should be able to do so in full plate.

I could see increasing all the heavy armor max dex bonuses by one or two without causing much of an issue; I think that solves 1.

As far as 2 goes, play a cleric. Get mithral full plate and a heavy steel shield. Slap a jacked-cl Magic Vestments on both. Use Law Devotion, (Mass) Shield of Faith and other AC-boosting spells. Boom, you now have high AC in full plate, and you're only truly dependent on your casting stat.

[Tyndmyr]

Can you provide any evidence to back up your claim that plate should have more dex than chainmail? They aren't that different in D&D, just a 1 dex difference.


That claim is correct. Chain is much less tightly coupled to your body, and the inertia of it inherently makes you less precise and agile.

Given that I've actually made a wide variety of armor, including rather a lot of chain, and used it extensively(including swimming in chain), Id fully agree that plate normally would have more dex if you wanted it to be realistic.

[Narren]

actually nobody is even trying to see my point in the least sense of the words of 'getting it'

what I was trying to get across but failed miserably with my example of fighter+fighter blah blah dex blah was why am I Penalized for being a fighter with a higher dex?


Arguments about realism aside, how are you being penalized for having a higher dex? Now you can wear cheaper armor with less weight and ACP.

[ngilop]

That claim is correct. Chain is much less tightly coupled to your body, and the inertia of it inherently makes you less precise and agile.

Given that I've actually made a wide variety of armor, including rather a lot of chain, and used it extensively(including swimming in chain), Id fully agree that plate normally would have more dex if you wanted it to be realistic.

just wanted to add that this sole post made me /heart tyndmyr.

actually, to get a bit off topic here, what I would hazard a guess that most people think of when imagining plate armor and it being bulky and very obtrusive for one's movemnets is in actuality jousting armro that weigh 90-100 pounds ( double what actual plate armor weighed) and was not intended on use in an actual combat setting. anywyas I think that is jousting armor that is what leads most people to believe that plate made one slow and hapharzard in their movements.


EDIT:: just want to add that although I do not make armor ( i tried once i took me like half a year to make a mail glove ( riveted that is. i am sure welded would have been much faster.. FYI the butted mail you see now a day are NOT what you should compare mail to as it is only for ren faires, or SCA combat not actual deadly weapon protection, nor is it even histroically accurate) I do Own actual armor as well as weapons. I weigh my set of platemail a few years ago, everything comes to 47 pounds ( circa earlr 1500s), and i think the modern american marine fullquipped gear weighs around 120-140 ish though those last numbers could be incorrect

[Tengu_temp]

I like how one can demand more realism from DND armor and with one breath assume that all combatants have such ridiculously huge dexterity that they reach the cap no matter what kind of armor they wear.

Also, proper spelling, grammar and punctuation are your friends. Seriously.

[Morty]

Soooo... armor in D&D doesn't work right and makes little sense. That's not exactly a new development.

[Mystify]

If you want a realistic simulation of medieval armors and weapons, D&D is not the right system. And I've done a bit of research into how you would do such a system, and the one thing I learned is that nobody really agrees on anything. You have people claiming to spar with replica weapons(jn a variety of ways), people claiming to study that era of history, and there is little consensus. Claims of how which armors do what to your combat style , the relative effectiveness of various weapons, and there is just a mess of contradiction. The main thing people do agree on is that it doesn't work in the way most people think.

[mikau013]

Not to mention all the different techniques we have now for making armour and they must have with magic being quite common. I don't mean magical armour, but using magic to forge regular armour as well.

[Rejusu]

There are two ways to prevent damage:
Avoidance - Dodging or parrying the attack.
And
Mitigation - Using armour or a shield to deflect the attack.

"Armour" class is a misnomer because it doesn't really have anything to do with armour. Really it's just a measure of how hard you are to hit. The AC bonus/max dex bonus system was designed to represent this. Heavier armour gives you greater protection but limits mobility and lighter armour gives less protection but lets you dodge more easily.

Now whether or not chainmail is actually more restrictive than full plate in terms of mobility is irrelevant. That's a different matter, and frankly realism is something that can be excused in a world with dragons in it.

But it's ridiculous to say that a chain shirt is the best armour. Why would anyone buy anything other than it? Because maybe they don't want to make a DEX focused character? I mean to get the same AC bonus as full plate while wearing a +1 chain shirt you'd need a Dex of 16-18. Now if you had a dex of 16 you'd probably be better off with a breastplate anyway as your modifer is only +3 which is the same as the breastplates max dex and it also adds one more to AC than the chain shirt and is only 100GP more expensive.

Either way though a 16-18 is still a heavy stat investment and unless you're doing a dexterity based character build it's just not worthwhile at all. The Psychic warrior I just made needs his best stat in strength, at least a 16 in Wisdom and a 13 in Int (for combat expertise) as well as a good Con score for HP, concentration and fort saves. There's just not much room to put much into Dex, especially since my race gives -2 to it. So I ended up with a +1 modifer. So with +1 Dex how do you justify a chain shirt being better than full plate for this character?

Banded Mail was his best choice as it's not too expensive and gives him a good AC bonus and lets him retain his +1 Dex. Really the best armour for your character is what offers you the most protection. Whether that's from avoidance through Dex or mitigation through armour.

[KutuluKultist]

The main thing people do agree on is that it doesn't work in the way most people think.

This is the single most common and annoying trope out there. People who have put a bit of attention towards a subject immediate turn around to the people who (they think) haven't and loudly proclaim: "You're all wrong, silly people. I now have the truth!"

It's just part of how people want to be made special by what they do.

[Mystify]

This is the single most common and annoying trope out there. People who have put a bit of attention towards a subject immediate turn around to the people who (they think) haven't and loudly proclaim: "You're all wrong, silly people. I now have the truth!"

It's just part of how people want to be made special by what they do.
I'm pretty sure that the popular images of medieval combat don't hold up. Even my college courses on the subject agree on that. The popular view of many things is strangely divorced from reality. I blame hollywood. Take hacking, as an example. Hollywood creates a popular view of hacking that has absolutely nothing to do with real hacking, but it is what people will think of. It doesn't take much computer knowledge to know that is is complete BS, but depending on how much knowledge you actually possess, how you think it works will vary. And to some degree, a lot of those semi-educated perceptions will be right, sometimes, in certain cases. So while "I now have the truth" is often premature, "You're all wrong, silly people" is often quite justified.

[ngilop]

I like how one can demand more realism from DND armor and with one breath assume that all combatants have such ridiculously huge dexterity that they reach the cap no matter what kind of armor they wear.

Also, proper spelling, grammar and punctuation are your friends. Seriously.

yes because having an 18 dex is so incredibly impossible to ever acquire for any character ever in the entire history and existence of D&D . Oh wait its not…. Seriously you actually believe that nobody can ever acquire an 18 dex in their course of leveling short of starting with an 18?

How can people with a 12 Con end up with a 18-22 con by the time they are level 20? Much the same can be said of having a high dex.

And when Did I demand more realism? I just wondered why the armor worked like this ‘ your Armor bonus goes up by 1 every time but your max dex goes down by 1 every time', so in effect no matter what armor you have on, you get the same net total bonus to your AC. This makes no sense to me

And if You want to get started on me about spelling, grammar, and such maybe you should check yourself as well, hmm? Normally I refrain from such sophomoric behaviors but, for some reason your post just rubbed me the wrong way. maybe it is just my pet peeve when people yell/make fun of/blarggle people about things they are doing the same, maybe its just that you keep completely glossing over all the valid points i make and just stick to your one particular song and dance every time ( the whole nobody ever has an 18 dex argument you keep having). also, it is the internet and I fully expect most people to have a basic grasp on what ever word it is I wrote. ya know that one thing where as long as the letters are there your brain can read it?

And to answer another question, one is penalized for having a high dex because what should be the best armor in the game actually penalizes you for having any sort of dex over a 13.

Is there a weapon in the game that penalizes you for having a high stats that is not strength? No in fact there are weapon that you can instead replace your str mod with your dex mod with the investment of a feat.

This blows my mind that people out there actually think that nobody can ever get an 18 dex (or higher) without first already having an 18 dex to start.

Again my gripe is not about realism in the least though I see a few have tried to put those words in my mouth, though likely due to my using of real world examples of certain armors being superior to others. Sorry for trying to include facts in my posts to support my stance that 3rd ed armor is doing it wrong.

There needs to be a greater divide between some armors, studded leather should never EVER EVER be anywhere close to half plate in the terms of total AC it can give you. I am not asking for that max dex bullcrap to be changed, what I am looking for is a way to increase the actual AC the armor gives you maybe somebody can give out the number of how much FPS it takes to pierce authentic studded leather vs. authentic full plate and do some math that a way to get a ratio on what the armor bonus should be for differing armor, but then they are probably going to be yelled at for using real world facts and trying to make D&D about the real world.

Its not the real world by any means ( i mean you have guys slicing thorugh mountains and shooting firebeams form their eyes, etc etc), all I wanted from this gripe was that Armor bonuses in D&D make no sense. Armor should be a higher difference than a +1 here but a -1 there., I mean I think the general consensus is dodge is a wasted feat because +1 don’t really mean anything. The same can be said in regards to full plate vs. a chain shirt. A +1 overall bonus to Mithral full plate vs. mithral chain shirt is laughable, the disparity between those 2 armors should be larger than that.

EDIT: this gripe is NOT i repeat NOT about ow D*D completely and utterly fails at even coming to a semblance of what anything was like in the real world, OR that max dex allowed is a dumb and arbitrary way to make fighters suck even more than they already do.


SUPER MEGA EDIT OF ALL TIME!!!
morty got the whole point of my entire thread! thank creation that at leats one person understand what I am griping about. I love you morty!

[Hiro Protagonest]

yes because having an 18 dex is so incredibly impossible to ever acquire for any character ever in the entire history and existence of D&D . Oh wait its not…. Seriously you actually believe that nobody can ever acquire an 18 dex in their course of leveling short of starting with an 18?

You seriously expect me to believe they can afford two 18s and a 16, every single time? Because that's what it would take to get 18 in dex and not suck. Strength is much more important, and you want a 16 in con before even thinking of raising dex above 14. A dex boosting item is money, and money is resources, resources better spent increasing attack, damage, saving throws, hit points, AC, miss chance...

[JellyPooga]

There needs to be a greater divide between some armors

I agree...


studded leather should never EVER EVER be anywhere close to half plate in the terms of total AC it can give you.

...but here I don't. Armour Class is not a direct representation of the protective value of the materials shielding you from direct physical harm. A dude in Studded Leather could quite easily be just as hard to hit as a dude in Full Plate and that's what the armour system in 3ed is trying to simulate. If you've got high Dex, then you're just as hard to hit wearing Leather armour as someone wearing Plate armour, regardless of Dex. The ability of the armour to shield you from harm is only one aspect of Armour Class, not the entirety of it.

edit: In short, AC is weird and doesn't make that much sense. Suspend some disbelief.

[Tengu_temp]

stuff

Okay, the only reasonable point I can see you making is that you want characters with very high dexterity to have a reason to wear full plate. And my answer is: why? 90% of characters with dexterity at 18 or more will be rogues, archers, swashbucklers, monks and similar characters. You know, characters for whom wearing light armor makes sense, and who often don't even have heavy armor proficiency to begin with.


SUPER MEGA EDIT OF ALL TIME!!! got the whole point of my entire thread! thank creation that at leats one person understand what I am griping about. I love you morty!

You do realize he's snarking at you, right?

[ngilop]

{{scrubbed}}

[Tengu_temp]

1. You do realize that fullplate wearers tend to be the ones with highest AC around already, right?
2. The differences between different kinds of armor are small for balance and variety reasons. If you make fullplate that much better than anything else, then everyone who can will wear it. Is that what you want?

[onemorelurker]

2. The differences between different kinds of armor are small for balance and variety reasons. If you make fullplate that much better than anything else, then everyone who can will wear it. Is that what you want?

Well, why not? As others have pointed out, there are pretty much only three armors that anyone wears in D&D anyhow. Since fullplate is really the only heavy armor that matters (as are breastplates for medium armor and chain shirts for light armor), I don't see how making it better would change the way anyone bought armor.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Er, guys in mithral full plate can benefit from a dex of up to 16. They have a reason to want a dex higher than 10.

[ngilop]

1. You do realize that fullplate wearers tend to be the ones with highest AC around already, right?
2. The differences between different kinds of armor are small for balance and variety reasons. If you make fullplate that much better than anything else, then everyone who can will wear it. Is that what you want?

1) clerics with fullplate is a more correct defintion of highest ac full plate wearers

2) Yes, if anybody can wear THE EPTIOME of protection why wouldn't they?

your question is akint o say ' so you made a car that runs off cold fusion, now everybody is going to want to buy it, is that what you want?"


why take sirloin then Filet is the same price?

why A when A+1 exists?

so you don't think that people should get the best equipent that they can for their charatcer

[Hiro Protagonest]

2) Yes, if anybody can wear THE EPTIOME of protection why wouldn't they?

your question is akint o say ' so you made a car that runs off cold fusion, now everybody is going to want to buy it, is that what you want?"


why take sirloin then Filet is the same price?

why A when A+1 exists?

so you don't think that people should get the best equipent that they can for their charatcer

By this logic, everyone should switch to only playing tier 1s, if not Pun-Pun.

I hate this logic.

[Tengu_temp]

1. Even without spells, usually the only characters who can have more AC than heavily-armored ones are monks, swashbucklers and other people who just don't wear any armor.
2. I like variety. I'd rather have three viable types of armor than just one. And it makes sense that some characters go with lighter armor, in a fantasy context if not exactly a realistic one.

[ngilop]

and where did I ever say at any point that the only armor anybody could ever wear was heavy armor?

I was just saying that for classes that can wear heavier armor, that said heavier armor and especially fullplate should be much more of an attractive choice that a mail shirt.

1 point fo total armor for me is not anywhere nearly justifed as haivng 'higher armor' than light armor wearers.

i mena lets take the standrad rouge lvl 20 vs stadr fighter lvl 20

they both have mithril spiked armor fo defelction +5 +5

really, who has the betetr armor? the fighter might if he has a sheild but its pretty damn equal otherwise.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

Since we're assuming everyone has high dex anyway, raising the max dex bonus for heavy armors will effectively increase the AC bonuses they provide. It, ahem, increases the effective gap between full plate and a chain shirt. So why gripe about that suggestion?

[Hiro Protagonest]

and where did I ever say at any point that the only armor anybody could ever wear was heavy armor?

I was just saying that for classes that can wear heavier armor, that said heavier armor and especially fullplate should be much more of an attractive choice that a mail shirt.

1 point fo total armor for me is not anywhere nearly justifed as haivng 'higher armor' than light armor wearers.

i mena lets take the standrad rouge lvl 20 vs stadr fighter lvl 20

they both have mithril spiked armor fo defelction +5 +5

really, who has the betetr armor? the fighter might if he has a sheild but its pretty damn equal otherwise.

1 point? A fighter with 18 dex and a mithral chain shirt has 2 less AC than a 16 dex guy in mithral full plate, and the full plate guy can put points in strength for an extra +1 to hit and damage or constitution for +1 HP/level and +1 fort saves.

[Tengu_temp]

I was just saying that for classes that can wear heavier armor, that said heavier armor and especially fullplate should be much more of an attractive choice that a mail shirt.

Well, you're in luck, because it is a much more attractive option already. Unless you play with houserules that give everyone such ridiculously high stats that classes who really should focus on strength can afford to his the dex cap no matter wht armor they wear, which I slowly suspect to be the case here.

[Voyager_I]

and where did I ever say at any point that the only armor anybody could ever wear was heavy armor?

I was just saying that for classes that can wear heavier armor, that said heavier armor and especially fullplate should be much more of an attractive choice that a mail shirt.

1 point fo total armor for me is not anywhere nearly justifed as haivng 'higher armor' than light armor wearers.

i mena lets take the standrad rouge lvl 20 vs stadr fighter lvl 20

they both have mithril spiked armor fo defelction +5 +5

really, who has the betetr armor? the fighter might if he has a sheild but its pretty damn equal otherwise.

The difference between the two is that the Fighter who didn't have to put points in Dexterity (he just gets 13 to qualify for feats and finishes it off with a +Dex item later) has a dramatically higher Strength score and can use Power Attack, translating into gobs of damage that don't require a flatfooted target. This is what makes heavy armor desirable; it lets you survive while focusing on dealing damage. Light armor forces you to put many of your character's ability points into Dexterity to stay alive, which doesn't actually help you kill things.

And, again, AC =/= Armor, AC is a vague amalgamation of how hard it is to hit you. I agree that D&D is at best loosely representative of reality, but it still creates a workable system and if you wanted to poke holes at it there are plenty of other places to start.


I'm glad you know stuff about armor, but the priority of D&D was not historical accuracy.

[Gavinfoxx]

Guys guys. Remember. This has all been solved! Codex Martialis Armor goes by era of armor, and has rules for things like damage resistance for piercing, slashing, and cutting, armor penetration, armor bypass rules and how difficult it is to bypass armor with what weapon, rules for what reduces speed by what, max dex, armor check penalty, hardness, minimum strength to use armor, etc. etc.

Really. Go buy the three Codex Martialis books, they are awesome!

[Gavinfoxx]

Guys guys. Remember. This has all been solved! Codex Martialis Armor goes by era of armor, and has rules for things like damage resistance for piercing, slashing, and cutting, armor penetration, armor bypass rules and how difficult it is to bypass armor with what weapon, rules for what reduces speed by what, max dex, armor check penalty, hardness, minimum strength to use armor, etc. etc. I especially like how the heaviest armor in the entire book is 60 lbs. Take that 180 lbs D&D armors!

Really. Go buy the three Codex Martialis books, they are completely awesome!

[Mystify]

You are really complaining because dexterity is a major part of AC. If full plate is always better at AC, period, then everyone would wear full plate. That is a rather bland system. Why have a dozen types of armor if everyone is in full plate? By making dex and armor complimentary, you have high dex characters in light armor, medium dex characters in medium armor, and low dex characters in heave armor. Different types play to different builds. That is a good thing. You can have the character that is hard to hit due to dexterity, and it is a viable concept. It doesn't match up to the guy in full plate; agile mithiril full plate can accomadate any dex a fighter will reasonably acheive; The mithril part is not important till later in the game, at which point you should have armor made out of a special material. With a dex mod of 1, full plate is agile enough to let most people move in it unhampered. You can even be somewhat spry and still take advantage of it. But it is still not suited for high agility dodging.
If full plate is going to be the best armor, period, then what factors would you propose to balance it and make it so people will wear other things?

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

I wonder if the OP would like all the martial classes who start with heavy armor proficiency to benefit from something like the vanilla PF fighter's Armor Training (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/fighter#TOC-Armor-Training-Ex-) feature? It definitely makes heavy armor a competitive option for more builds, and it's not exactly going to break anything.

[Cwymbran-San]

And just to add my two cents to this, remember that the AC derived from high DEX can be stripped of a character by a lot of means. Web-spells and feinting come to mind at first.
So, with an 18 DEX and a botched Sense Motive, you lose your 4 points of AC while wearing a chain shirt. That is a move the platemail guy does not have to worry about, he cares about fast moving targets.

And why build a fighter with an 18 DEX? Hmm, maybe he's an archer, or a dual-wielder with double scimitars. Optimized? No. But it could still be fun :smallbiggrin:

[Rejusu]

I was just saying that for classes that can wear heavier armor, that said heavier armor and especially fullplate should be much more of an attractive choice that a mail shirt.

It is an attractive choice. The problem with your entire argument is it hinges on the fallacious premise that absolutely everyone has enough in dexterity to match the AC bonus that Full plate offers. You also talk about it as if it's only level 20 that matters and ignore the fact there's 19 levels that precede that. Yes there's more ways to get an 18 in Dex than to start with it, but what if you don't start with it? There's no way for you to get the same AC as full plate without actually... y'know... wearing full plate.

Also even after 20 levels not every character can expect to have a massive bonus to Dex. It all comes down to resources. Attribute scores are resources, attribute increases are resources, gold is resources, feats are resources, equipment slots are resources. Now a well optimised character results from properly allocating those resources. Between level 1 and 20 you only get five ability score increases. That means you can raise one modifier by +2/3 (depending if the score starts out odd or even) and that's if you invest ALL of them into it.

Now say you start off with 12/13 Dex because it's not a primary ability for your class. Investing all your five increases to it between levels 1-20 will give you a dex modifer of +3/4 at level 20. Which is enough to just about gain an EQUAL AC bonus to a suit of full plate with a dex modifer of +1 (from a score of 12-13). So you've wasted ALL your attribute increases just to get the SAME benefit that a 1,500GP suit of full-plate would have given you at first level to get it out of a chain shirt at level 20.

Yes there are other ways to raise your Dex, magic items for instance. But magic items take up slots and generally cost gold. And remember resources are limited. Depending on your DM gold and magic items might be plentiful but you've still only got so many slots you can wear them in. Why waste slots and gold improving an attribute that doesn't do that much for you when you can simply buy some heavy armour instead?

Your argument is kind of ridiculous because for it to be valid everyone has to invest into Dex. Even when it doesn't benefit their build in the slightest.

Also you ignore that in 3.0ed up there's TWO other types of AC:
Flat-footed and Touch.

The former is based on your mitigation (ie armour) and the latter on your avoidance (ie dexterity) which are then combined to form your overall AC. Which again is just a measure of how hard you are to hit, not really to do with your actual armour.

It's worth noting that a full plate wearer will have a much better flat-footed AC than a character that relies on Dex for AC and a Dex reliant character will have a better touch AC.

[Gwendol]

I think armors and shields could be done a lot better. First off: stratified AC depending on damage type, since that would make the choice of weapon a lot less straight forward, at least at low levels. Heck, it can even make archery a viable strategy for puncturing armor more easily.
This will automatically diversify the various types of armors.

Second up is shields; the unwanted step child of armor. That shields don't protect against touch attacks is... well, not exactly straightforward. The armor bonus for using a shield is ridiculously low, and upping it significantly would do two things: one is that sundering is suddenly interesting, the other is that touch attacks (especially spells) now will be reserved for characters not wielding shields. Carrying a shield should be equal to wearing medium-light armor, unless you are flatfooted (should give no or little bonus then).

[Tyndmyr]

just wanted to add that this sole post made me /heart tyndmyr.

Well, thanks. =)


actually, to get a bit off topic here, what I would hazard a guess that most people think of when imagining plate armor and it being bulky and very obtrusive for one's movemnets is in actuality jousting armro that weigh 90-100 pounds ( double what actual plate armor weighed) and was not intended on use in an actual combat setting. anywyas I think that is jousting armor that is what leads most people to believe that plate made one slow and hapharzard in their movements.

That's probably the case...much like leather armor was not typically actually a big deal for combatants and was mostly worn for fashion(especially everyone's favorite, black leather). Our modern image of fantasy is not completely realistic...that's not necessarily a bad thing, but if you want perfect realism, D&D is definitely not it. You're probably not going to get it from D&D, either...there's too many things that are only very rough approximations at best.


EDIT:: just want to add that although I do not make armor ( i tried once i took me like half a year to make a mail glove ( riveted that is. i am sure welded would have been much faster.. FYI the butted mail you see now a day are NOT what you should compare mail to as it is only for ren faires, or SCA combat not actual deadly weapon protection, nor is it even histroically accurate) I do Own actual armor as well as weapons. I weigh my set of platemail a few years ago, everything comes to 47 pounds ( circa earlr 1500s), and i think the modern american marine fullquipped gear weighs around 120-140 ish though those last numbers could be incorrect

Yeah, we did some practice with a blunted dagger and a butted mail shirt I made, and it tore it up pretty bad. I mean, it provided some protection against initial hits, but the mail took damage very rapidly. It looked pretty cool, and was a LOT faster to make(I admit that I tended strongly toward butted solely for this reason), but the actual armor value was fairly minimal. I can only imagine that with larger real weapons, it would have been even less effective.

I'd peg average combat loads at around 80-100, but there's some notable variance on there. I was not deployed myself, but my last job did require I be issued body armor, gas gear, etc, and it is both fairly heavy and bulky. I find that gaming with military people, they tend to have a somewhat more inclusive idea of how much gear you can carry and still fight effectively.


You seriously expect me to believe they can afford two 18s and a 16, every single time? Because that's what it would take to get 18 in dex and not suck. Strength is much more important, and you want a 16 in con before even thinking of raising dex above 14. A dex boosting item is money, and money is resources, resources better spent increasing attack, damage, saving throws, hit points, AC, miss chance...

Well...it's possible, at 20. You've got a +5 from leveling alone, and 18/16 is affordable on most point buys. Toss in enhancement bonuses and inherent bonuses, and you're there easily. That said, an 18 dex isn't optimal for a lot of melee chars, who would rather just pump strength up to nice, happy numbers. So, even at level 20, there will be some guys who are perfectly happy with plate because they never really had much dex to start with.

I admit though, I am a bit dissapointed by how half-plate is represented. In practice, it basically never ends up being used. Also, the dex bonus on half plate is a bit silly compared to the dex bonus of full plate. It's an area with questionable realism AND poor for gameplay options.

I don't mind dex being a major component of AC, though. Realistically, avoiding hits is something that some fighters are MUCH better at than others(typically comes with experience, but hey).

[Mystify]

Second up is shields; the unwanted step child of armor. That shields don't protect against touch attacks is... well, not exactly straightforward. The armor bonus for using a shield is ridiculously low, and upping it significantly would do two things: one is that sundering is suddenly interesting, the other is that touch attacks (especially spells) now will be reserved for characters not wielding shields. Carrying a shield should be equal to wearing medium-light armor, unless you are flatfooted (should give no or little bonus then).
The armor bonus for sheilds is fine, esp. when it operates as an extra slot for enchanting AC. Early game, stacked on full plate, that +2 can raise your AC from 19 to 21, significantly reducing the number of attacks that can hit. If you have a +3 bonus at level 1, it takes you from needing to roll a 16, to needing to roll an 18. That is 4/20 attacks that hit to 2/20, doubling the survivability. The band of attacks that will hit at that level is low enough that +2 can significantly improve it. A tower sheild would be enough to completely stop them on anything other than a 20.
After that point, its an extra enchant slot, and a cheap one at that. The more individual bonuses to AC you have, the better. A +4 full plate costs an extra 16k. A +1 ring of protection, +1 amulet of natural armor, +1 full plate, +1 shield is 6k. Fully enchanted, the shield is providing a +7 AC over someone who lacks a shield, which is clearly significant. Of course, by that point you can have an animated shield, so actually wielding it is kinda pointless, but shields do offer significant improvements to your defenses.

[JadePhoenix]

That claim is correct. Chain is much less tightly coupled to your body, and the inertia of it inherently makes you less precise and agile.

Given that I've actually made a wide variety of armor, including rather a lot of chain, and used it extensively(including swimming in chain), Id fully agree that plate normally would have more dex if you wanted it to be realistic.

Aren't you supposed to wear chain under plate? :smallconfused:

[Gwendol]

Fully enchanted, the shield is providing a +7 AC over someone who lacks a shield, which is clearly significant. Of course, by that point you can have an animated shield, so actually wielding it is kinda pointless, but shields do offer significant improvements to your defenses.

In relation to what? Fully enchanted the shield offers less protection than un-enchanted heavy armor. I mean, the idea of the shield is that as long as you carry it and can wield it, you are very, very, hard to hit. And if you stand next to a buddy, you can make him hard to hit as well. The whole point of carrying a shield is completely lost in D&D, unless you start bashing with it, but that carries its own set of issues. That shields and armor are so sloppily designed are part of the core problems of D&D in general and of fighters, and fighter-like classes in particular.

[Aeryr]

Just my 2 coppers: I prefer 10ft than 5 Armor AC even as a melee fighter, even as a tank fighter.

[Gwendol]

Aren't you supposed to wear chain under plate? :smallconfused:

No. Although padding was common.

[Mystify]

In relation to what? Fully enchanted the shield offers less protection than un-enchanted heavy armor. I mean, the idea of the shield is that as long as you carry it and can wield it, you are very, very, hard to hit. And if you stand next to a buddy, you can make him hard to hit as well. The whole point of carrying a shield is completely lost in D&D, unless you start bashing with it, but that carries its own set of issues. That shields and armor are so sloppily designed are part of the core problems of D&D in general and of fighters, and fighter-like classes in particular.
If you look at how much damage they are effectively blocking, they function perfectly fine. If you made a sheild a +6 bonus or somehting large like that it would make a shield and board fighter in full plate invulnerable. Its not even hard to acheive said invulnerability as it is. A character with a sheild is already very, very hard to hit.
Unless you really want the mechanics to delve into "we stand here rolling dice at each other in the hopes of getting 20s", making all combat last 10 years. That is not good gameplay. Armor and sheilds, in relation to AC, are not a problem. I've seen a half dozen sword and board characters in full plate wandering around nigh invulnerable with amazing AC. The problem is more the number of things that can completely ignore the AC, not how shields and armor works.

[Tyndmyr]

Aren't you supposed to wear chain under plate? :smallconfused:

Nah. Usually you wear cloth padding. That said, chain did see some use in conjunction with partial plate. Some areas, like neck, chain offers fairly good protection that you can add on to your existing armor that doesn't cover it.

Plate over chain usually wouldn't offer much but extra weight.


If you look at how much damage they are effectively blocking, they function perfectly fine. If you made a sheild a +6 bonus or somehting large like that it would make a shield and board fighter in full plate invulnerable. Its not even hard to acheive said invulnerability as it is. A character with a sheild is already very, very hard to hit.
Unless you really want the mechanics to delve into "we stand here rolling dice at each other in the hopes of getting 20s", making all combat last 10 years. That is not good gameplay. Armor and sheilds, in relation to AC, are not a problem. I've seen a half dozen sword and board characters in full plate wandering around nigh invulnerable with amazing AC. The problem is more the number of things that can completely ignore the AC, not how shields and armor works.

I'd be pretty comfortable with just doubling armor values from shields.

I also don't consider a decent AC to be "nigh invulnerable", though.

[Mystify]

I'd be pretty comfortable with just doubling armor values from shields.

I also don't consider a decent AC to be "nigh invulnerable", though.
It is fairly easy to have an AC that will block everything aimed at AC. There is no need to boost the shields, they function perfectly fine. The only problem is that using a single 1-handed weapon gimps your offense to the point where enemies ignore you.

[Spiryt]

There are very many examples of something that pretty much seems like solid, if short, mail hauberk under breastplate, tassets and so on.

Particularly in the very late 14th century breastplate, pauldrons, faulds were still pretty much covering the mail beneath it.

Pretty soon full mail started to be replaced by jsut voiders covering joints, armpits etc. But AFAIR even at the second half of the 15th century hauberk under breastplate wasn't that uncommon.

Most probably those were way less substantial than stand alone mail, though.

[Gwendol]

Funny. In many discussions it is pointed out that sword and board is subpar and that AC doesn't matter... Well, at least it's refreshing with a different kind of discussion! I agree with Tyndmyr on the shield AC; doubling it would go a long way. Also it should be active defence and count towards touch AC.

[rrgg]

As far as realism goes, the problem is that armor's protection generally has more to do with the construction than the "type." In practice a mail shirt is likely to be extremely similar in protection and weight to a solid breastplate/backplate. Heck, if you wanted to take metal entirely out of the equation then the middle ages saw padded jacks made 30 layers thick in which "never have been seen half a dozen men killed by sword thrusts or arrow wounds."

[Seerow]

Re: Shields


Personally I think shields are fine in terms of how much AC they grant, the problem is with the existence of animated shields, and the fact that AC does not exist on the same RNG as attack rolls for the majority of the game that makes them seem useless. Remove animated shields as a thing, or make it a rare artifact or something, rather than something everyone'e expected to have, and things are better. Balance AC so it is on a set RNG, and a shield pushing that 10-30% is a pretty big deal.


Figure if you have an enemy with 1 primary attack, and 4 secondary attacks, who hits a normal person on a 5 with his primary, and on a 10 with his secondaries, he will score 2.75 hits per round on average. Add +5 shield AC to that, and that drops all the way down to 1.5 per round. That's a pretty big difference.

[Rejusu]

Second up is shields; the unwanted step child of armor. That shields don't protect against touch attacks is... well, not exactly straightforward.

I disagree. It's pretty straightforward if you break things down. Going back to the descriptions of Touch and Flat-footed AC's I posted above:

Flat-footed represents how difficult it is to damage you when you can't dodge. It's how well you can mitigate an attack.

Touch represents how difficult it is to well... touch you. A touch attack is the kind of attack that you can only avoid by dodging it. Hence why you only get your Dex bonus.

For example a trip attack is a touch attack. It's something you have to dodge, a shield isn't going to help if someone is trying to trip you up. Neither is armour. Similarly spells that rely on touch attacks, they don't need to get through your armour they simply need to make physical contact.

Simply Flat-footed represents your mitigation, Touch represents your avoidance and armour class represents how easily you can stop attacks overall.


Carrying a shield should be equal to wearing medium-light armor, unless you are flatfooted (should give no or little bonus then).

It should still provide a bonus when flat-footed because flat-footed is simply being unable to dodge.

[Gwendol]

How do you trip someone shoving a large sheet of metal in between himself and you? How do you get close enough to touch (and grab). Sure, you can grab hold of the shield, but that's not the same thing. The shield prevents you from getting close, and thus negates (especially) trip attacks.

As I said earlier, D&D fails miserably at representing shields and armor even on the basic level, and especially so shields.

Armor is passive defence, shields is active.

[Spiryt]

For example a trip attack is a touch attack. It's something you have to dodge, a shield isn't going to help if someone is trying to trip you up. Neither is armour. Similarly spells that rely on touch attacks, they don't need to get through your armour they simply need to make physical contact.



Shield is absolutely going to help against trip, as it can help you prevent someone from grabbing your leg, waist, getting close to you etc.

Armor can help too, in less "direct" way though.

So all in all, seeing that a lot of melee archetypes don't really need anymore nerfing, I can't see the point in applying 'limited' realism feel to it.

[Tyndmyr]

It is fairly easy to have an AC that will block everything aimed at AC. There is no need to boost the shields, they function perfectly fine. The only problem is that using a single 1-handed weapon gimps your offense to the point where enemies ignore you.

The ways to get AC that block everything aimed at AC generally revolve around magical buffs more than "pick up a shield".

A sword and board fighter is not particularly broken, and shields doubling in armor value does not change this. The additional defensive value gives a reasonable tradeoff for the sacrifice of damage, which is what you'd expect selecting a shield instead of 2h/2weap to do.

[Mystify]

The ways to get AC that block everything aimed at AC generally revolve around magical buffs more than "pick up a shield".

A sword and board fighter is not particularly broken, and shields doubling in armor value does not change this. The additional defensive value gives a reasonable tradeoff for the sacrifice of damage, which is what you'd expect selecting a shield instead of 2h/2weap to do.

The practical difference between a sheild and no sheild can be quite distinct. The problem is more that enemies start to ignore you because you are hard to hit and don't pose a huge threat. The problem is not that it doesn't increase your defenses adequately, its that it lowers your offense too much and your defenses becomes irrelevant.

[Tyndmyr]

The practical difference between a sheild and no sheild can be quite distinct. The problem is more that enemies start to ignore you because you are hard to hit and don't pose a huge threat. The problem is not that it doesn't increase your defenses adequately, its that it lowers your offense too much and your defenses becomes irrelevant.

Really?

A buckler is on par with dodge. It's a situational +1 to AC. It's...pretty marginal.

Light shields? Also 1. Weee. Mostly pointless.

Heavy shields. All the way up to +2. Additional -2 armor check penalty, and you gave up a two handed weapon for this. Among other things, this means that your ranged options are basically Javelin or Javelin.

Tower shields. Wee, +4 AC. Awesome! Oh wait, no, it gives us -2 to attack in addition to -Fail to armor check penalty. This is not a great trade-off.

So yeah, your basic core shields are pretty weak. You have to go diving to make them at all tolerable.

From a realism standpoint, having a solid shield is also...incredibly helpful for avoiding hits.

[Mystify]

Really?

A buckler is on par with dodge. It's a situational +1 to AC. It's...pretty marginal.

Light shields? Also 1. Weee. Mostly pointless.

Heavy shields. All the way up to +2. Additional -2 armor check penalty, and you gave up a two handed weapon for this. Among other things, this means that your ranged options are basically Javelin or Javelin.

Tower shields. Wee, +4 AC. Awesome! Oh wait, no, it gives us -2 to attack in addition to -Fail to armor check penalty. This is not a great trade-off.

So yeah, your basic core shields are pretty weak. You have to go diving to make them at all tolerable.

From a realism standpoint, having a solid shield is also...incredibly helpful for avoiding hits.
And stacked on top of armor, it provides a very significant reduction in damage taken. Its use as an extra enchant slot allows its difference to remain relevant throughout the game.

ACs value is not really linear. A +8 may be amazignly useful, but you don't need an additional +8 to be worth a large boost past that. An additional 1 or 2 at that point provide huge returns in protection. Sure, a +1 only blocks 5% of the attacks thrown at you. But that could be 25% of the attacks that would have hit, meaning you are only taking 75% of the damage you would otherwise.

[Talakeal]

You know, armor is kind of dumb in third ed. The maximum Dex isn't really necessary, the feat requirement, class restrictions, speed reduction, ASF, and armor check penalty should have been enough to discourage everyone from wearing full plate. The max Dex thing seems really pointless and inelegant to me, in plate mail there is NO DIFFERENCE between a Dex of twelve and twelve hundred?

Also, the different armor stats in each category are lame, as there is clearly a best armor in every group. They should have just had every armor type in a category have identical stats and then left the variations within a category up to cosmetics and fluff.

[Mystify]

The max Dex thing seems really pointless and inelegant to me, in plate mail there is NO DIFFERENCE between a Dex of twelve and twelve hundred?
It may not be perfect, but it is not pointless, and reletively elegant. If dex, as your ability to dodge, is part of your AC, then heavier armors should lessen that impact. If you simply do a penalty to dex, then you might as well just lower the armors AC. If you penalize it, with a minimum allowed, you effectively have the max Dex system, but extremely high dex bleeds through, which is more complex than is really worthwhile. If you scale dex, then dex would not be worth trying to use as a significnt factor in AC, and the short range of Dex in low levels renders it pointless as a factor in AC.
If you don't do anything with dex, then you are claiming that a world clsas acrobat who is great at dodging will receive just as much benefit from coating themseves in metal as a guy who is a couch potato and couldn't dodge to save his life(literally). If you can't get out of the way of the blows normally, then armor helps alot. If you can, then not hindering that should be more relevant.
It would also destroy all elements of wearing a variety of armor. If you care about the land speed and ACP, you wear light armor. Otherwise, plate. That is boring.

[Person_Man]

Also, from a purely crunch perspective (ignoring the fluff/simulation contradictions) Max Dex Bonus is required to prevent Dex based characters from dominating combat early in the game.

If a player with 18 or 20 Dex wears (relatively cheap) half plate with no Max Dex Bonus and uses a large shield, then can easily get an AC of 23ish at level 2 for minimal investment. Most standard CR 2ish monsters have around +3ish to hit on their attacks, which means that they will generally only hit this player on a natural 20.

Later in the game when multiple feats and items and spells and whatnot start stacking up then it's not that big of a deal. But early in the game having high Dex and heavy armor with no Max Dex Bonus makes could severely unbalance combat.

[Talakeal]

If you don't do anything with dex, then you are claiming that a world clsas acrobat who is great at dodging will receive just as much benefit from coating themseves in metal as a guy who is a couch potato and couldn't dodge to save his life(literally). If you can't get out of the way of the blows normally, then armor helps alot. If you can, then not hindering that should be more relevant.
It would also destroy all elements of wearing a variety of armor. If you care about the land speed and ACP, you wear light armor. Otherwise, plate. That is boring.

From a realism perspective neither idea is perfect. Either dex above 12 does nothing, or everyone receives the same benefit from armor. From a game balance and a simplicity perspective I would have prefered they had gone with the latter however.

They have already destroyed all elements of wearing a variety of armor, I don't think I have ever seen someone wear anything but a chain shirt or full plate (maybe a breast plate if you can't yet afford mithril full plate).
Off the top of my head I can't think of class which wears medium armor, or that wears heavy armor other than full plate. Of the other classes everyone else wears either chain shirts or no armor at all, save druids and rogues. At least in core.

[Rejusu]

How do you trip someone shoving a large sheet of metal in between himself and you? How do you get close enough to touch (and grab). Sure, you can grab hold of the shield, but that's not the same thing. The shield prevents you from getting close, and thus negates (especially) trip attacks.

As I said earlier, D&D fails miserably at representing shields and armor even on the basic level, and especially so shields.

Armor is passive defence, shields is active.

Tripping someone is just about catching someone off balance. There's a number of different ways to do this. Remember that while mechanically combat works on a turn by turn basis it's meant to represent a flowing fight. It's not just going to be you standing there with your shield in front of you and someone trying to grab you.

Think of it this way, two characters locked in combat. One attempts to make an unarmed trip attack, the other is defending with a shield. If the attacker was a strong man he might just grab the shield and push you to the floor. If he was an agile fighter he might feint and then slide round to grab your shield arm when you reposition to defend and use your own momentum to try and flip you.

In neither of those situations would a shield or armour help, in fact having the extra weight on your arm would probably help unbalance you. And what about bypassing the shield altogether? Unless you're using a tower shield a sweeping kick could just as easily trip you up. If they're tripping with a weapon they could do a similar sweep attack with a Guisarme or throw their spiked chain over your shield and then simply pull your feet out from under you.


Shield is absolutely going to help against trip, as it can help you prevent someone from grabbing your leg, waist, getting close to you etc.

Still can't defend your ankles.


You know, armor is kind of dumb in third ed. The maximum Dex isn't really necessary, the feat requirement, class restrictions, speed reduction, ASF, and armor check penalty should have been enough to discourage everyone from wearing full plate. The max Dex thing seems really pointless and inelegant to me, in plate mail there is NO DIFFERENCE between a Dex of twelve and twelve hundred?

Also, the different armor stats in each category are lame, as there is clearly a best armor in every group. They should have just had every armor type in a category have identical stats and then left the variations within a category up to cosmetics and fluff.

It's not as if costing a feat is much of a deterrent though and you can always do some clever multiclassing to gain proficiencies. If you're not a caster then ASF is irrelevant and armour check penalty isn't relevant to a lot of characters either. I mean the variety may be forced but it is either that or everyone wearing full plate.

It's also to balance things as has been mentioned.

[Spiryt]

Tripping someone is just about catching someone off balance. There's a number of different ways to do this. Remember that while mechanically combat works on a turn by turn basis it's meant to represent a flowing fight. It's not just going to be you standing there with your shield in front of you and someone trying to grab you.
Think of it this way, two characters locked in combat. One attempts to make an unarmed trip attack, the other is defending with a shield. If the attacker was a strong man he might just grab the shield and push you to the floor. If he was an agile fighter he might feint and then slide round to grab your shield arm when you reposition to defend and use your own momentum to try and flip you.
In neither of those situations would a shield or armour help, in fact having the extra weight on your arm would probably help unbalance you. And what about bypassing the shield altogether? Unless you're using a tower shield a sweeping kick could just as easily trip you up. If they're tripping with a weapon they could do a similar sweep attack with a Guisarme or throw their spiked chain over your shield and then simply pull your feet out from under you.

Still can't defend your ankles.


Yes, it can defend your ankles, and all other stuff as well.

Your examples are weird - yes if opponent is strong etc. he can do this and that - but shield bearer can be strong and agile as well, and counter appropriately.

Shields of different kind can be all about cover and intercepting attacks etc.

If someone dives for ankle pick with bold move, but his head/arm movement is blocked by shield, it's going to fail, obviously.

And so on.

[Seerow]

From a realism perspective neither idea is perfect. Either dex above 12 does nothing, or everyone receives the same benefit from armor. From a game balance and a simplicity perspective I would have prefered they had gone with the latter however.

They have already destroyed all elements of wearing a variety of armor, I don't think I have ever seen someone wear anything but a chain shirt or full plate (maybe a breast plate if you can't yet afford mithril full plate).
Off the top of my head I can't think of class which wears medium armor, or that wears heavy armor other than full plate. Of the other classes everyone else wears either chain shirts or no armor at all, save druids and rogues. At least in core.

From a realism perspective, the vast majority of people will have around 12 dex. 18-19 dex is about the limit for a normal human. This means for everyone, almost all Medium and Heavy Armors are superior protection, as we expect.

Once you get into superhuman dexterity levels that make light armors viable, you're out of the realms of anything we can relate to, so realism doesn't apply.


Now from a game perspective, it is a tossup. It depends on if you think that high dexterity should be rewarded. If you do, the current system is fine: Pretty much everyone has the same end AC, but high dex characters get rewarded with better mobility, lower skill check penalties, and lower ASF (if applicable).

Personally I do think the value of heavy armor should be higher. After all, heavy armor proficiency requires both light and medium proficiency. Mechanically it is treated similar to Martial or Exotic weapon proficiency to use, but doesn't have the penalty to go along with it. Instead you get all of these penalties to go alongside your same AC and higher proficiency, which is kind of crap.



I've actually invested a fair bit of time into working out the kinks of armor, and have some working rules substitutions I currently use to alter it in my games. The first is the codifying of all armor into a slots system, where weapons and armor may be upgraded appropriately. As a part of this, each category of armor gets extra slots that the previous category does not. Second, each category can willingly accept flaws into their armor, such as armor check penalties or increased weight, to gain more slots to upgrade the armor in other areas, and the heavier armors can take more penalties than lighter armors, so a heavy armor is more likely to have a high ACP or the like, but is rewarded for that. Finally, movement speed gets restricted only by encumbrance, so a really strong characters can wear full plate without being slowed down, but the vast majority of normal people and even PCs will be at least at medium encumbrance.

The other rules modification I use is a variant take on Armor as DR, where instead of DR, the armor gets a refreshing pool of temporary HP. Every round you get your armor value in temporary HP, this gets multiplied by the number of attacks granted by BAB. So a 1st level Warrior in Scale has 4 temporary HP each round from his armor, making him sturdier, but is bypassed by a strong opponent, or a few weak opponents. A 20th level Fighter in +5 Full Plate would have 52 temporary HP each round, a good number and a decent protection, but can be knocked out or ignored trivially by any level appropriate encounter.

[Tyndmyr]

And stacked on top of armor, it provides a very significant reduction in damage taken. Its use as an extra enchant slot allows its difference to remain relevant throughout the game.

ACs value is not really linear. A +8 may be amazignly useful, but you don't need an additional +8 to be worth a large boost past that. An additional 1 or 2 at that point provide huge returns in protection. Sure, a +1 only blocks 5% of the attacks thrown at you. But that could be 25% of the attacks that would have hit, meaning you are only taking 75% of the damage you would otherwise.

By that logic, Dodge is sometimes a good feat.

However, that +1 really is not considered as such.

[ngilop]

the last couple of pages have been a great read, and has made me have a high opinion of tyndmyr.

The fighters armor mastery or what its called form pathfinder does a good job of getting at what I would like. as it was said previosuly a fighter SHOULD be better able to avoid attacks as well. its in the guys class name LOL.

I have decided to try out my (now changed to ) 1/2 level ( or maybe 1/2 BAB..?) application to armor bonus form armor as instead of a already there given for armor instead to a feat at the end of a feat tree, im thinking 3 or 4 feats long like armor focus, armor spcilization armor master, armor supremacy? follow teh weapon focus line in naming of course LOL.

I want fighters to be able to get these rather easily while other classes have to make a rather heavy investment, something finally fighters can get that some others just do not have the resoruces for, though I might be worng and will have to prob change it 6 or 7 feats due to just about every gaming group getting 2 free feats via flaws now a days.

[Seerow]

the last couple of pages have been a great read, and has made me have a high opinion of tyndmyr.

The fighters armor mastery or what its called form pathfinder does a good job of getting at what I would like. as it was said previosuly a fighter SHOULD be better able to avoid attacks as well. its in the guys class name LOL.

I have decided to try out my (now changed to ) 1/2 level ( or maybe 1/2 BAB..?) application to armor bonus form armor as instead of a already there given for armor instead to a feat at the end of a feat tree, im thinking 3 or 4 feats long like armor focus, armor spcilization armor master, armor supremacy? follow teh weapon focus line in naming of course LOL.

I want fighters to be able to get these rather easily while other classes have to make a rather heavy investment, something finally fighters can get that some others just do not have the resoruces for, though I might be worng and will have to prob change it 6 or 7 feats due to just about every gaming group getting 2 free feats via flaws now a days.

Making it a 3-4 feat chain is a really bad idea. If you want it to be a fighter only thing, make it a bonus class feature for fighters that kicks in on odd levels starting around 3 or 5, and ending around level 9 or 11.


Alternatively you can check my stuff I mentioned above. Links here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=202722) and here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=228380)

[Spiryt]

Once you get into superhuman dexterity levels that make light armors viable, you're out of the realms of anything we can relate to, so realism doesn't apply.



Once you get into superhuman levels of strength, dexterity, constitution, you can have viable dude who moves around in really cumbrous mail/scale/plate but his endurance, vitality and muscles are so insane that he prances around like in winter jacket and doesn't get tired at all, against all probability.

So it all work both ways.

[Mystify]

By that logic, Dodge is sometimes a good feat.

However, that +1 really is not considered as such.

But dodge does not scale. At level 20, its still a +1 AC, against 1 opponent, among a huge myriad of other bonuses being tossed around, and the range of attacks and ACs wash out a +1.
But at that level, the sheild is providing a +7, along with special properties, and hence remains relevant. It also works against every opponent, not just 1.
Dodge can be a good feat at really low levels. Just like toughness actually matters at 1st level. You put on heavy armor and a sheild and take dodge, and you can laugh at most nearly everything at those levels.

[Tyndmyr]

But dodge does not scale. At level 20, its still a +1 AC, against 1 opponent, among a huge myriad of other bonuses being tossed around, and the range of attacks and ACs wash out a +1.
But at that level, the sheild is providing a +7, along with special properties, and hence remains relevant. It also works against every opponent, not just 1.
Dodge can be a good feat at really low levels. Just like toughness actually matters at 1st level. You put on heavy armor and a sheild and take dodge, and you can laugh at most nearly everything at those levels.

No. The shield is still providing +1 or +2. Magic is providing the rest. Expensive magic.

Just use a Dastana instead, and not care. It's a +1 shield bonus, you can enchant the hell out of it, same as a shield, and it doesn't interfere with your ability to two-hand.

So, in return for swapping down to a 1 handed weapon from a 2 handed, I am gaining a whopping +1 ac in total. This gets washed out and becomes mostly irrelevant exactly like Dodge does.

[Mystify]

[QUOTE=Tyndmyr;12813756]No. The shield is still providing +1 or +2. Magic is providing the rest. Expensive magic.
[QUOTE]
Magic that you couldn't use without a shield, and its cheap magic. Its the same pricing as magic armor, which is half as much as magic weapons, or other AC bonuses. A +5 shield only costs 25k. Thats pretty cheap.

[Tyndmyr]

No. The shield is still providing +1 or +2. Magic is providing the rest. Expensive magic.

Magic that you couldn't use without a shield, and its cheap magic. Its the same pricing as magic armor, which is half as much as magic weapons, or other AC bonuses. A +5 shield only costs 25k. Thats pretty cheap.

You can use it without a shield, though. I outlined exactly how.

A dastana provides a shield bonus. It explicitly stacks with armor. It costs 25 gold, and can be enchanted in exactly the same way.

It doesn't use a hand, though. So...use of hand is buying you exactly +1 AC. That's it.

[Seerow]

You can use it without a shield, though. I outlined exactly how.

A dastana provides a shield bonus. It explicitly stacks with armor. It costs 25 gold, and can be enchanted in exactly the same way.

It doesn't use a hand, though. So...use of hand is buying you exactly +1 AC. That's it.

So your point is one poorly designed item exists, so everything else needs a huge buff to compensate?

[Mystify]

You can use it without a shield, though. I outlined exactly how.

A dastana provides a shield bonus. It explicitly stacks with armor. It costs 25 gold, and can be enchanted in exactly the same way.

It doesn't use a hand, though. So...use of hand is buying you exactly +1 AC. That's it.
It says it stacks with sheilds and armor, and I don't see anything saying it can be enchanted.
But if it does work as you say, that is an argument that the item is poorly designed, not that shields are worthless.
And some research online indicates that it would provide an enchantment bonus to armor, and hence that would not stack with magic armor, and would not infringe on sheilds.

[Gwendol]

Seerow, I really like your suggestions for armor: they make sense, and provide players with some interesting options that actually matter, rather than counting coins in order to buy the mithral armor of choice.

Shields simply don't work well in D&D, and the example of the dastana just highlights the problems of the shield: instead of being a strategic choice for the melee fighter it is reduced to another slot for enchantments, and one that carries significant penalties at that unless you go for the stupid animated shield.

[Voyager_I]

I think a bigger problem with Shields is that Dancing Shields exist. While the rules certainly undervalue the amount of protection you can get just from having something to interpose between you and an attacker (if you think a Shield wouldn't make you harder to trip, you've never touched one), the failure of one-handed weapons probably has more to do with the fact that everyone can have a shield that doesn't require them to give up a hand.


Why would I ever wield a sword in one hand with a shield in the other when I could carry a bigger sword and let the shield tend to itself?

[Mystify]

I think a bigger problem with Shields is that Dancing Shields exist. While the rules certainly undervalue the amount of protection you can get just from having something to interpose between you and an attacker (if you think a Shield wouldn't make you harder to trip, you've never touched one), the failure of one-handed weapons probably has more to do with the fact that everyone can have a shield that doesn't require them to give up a hand.


Why would I ever wield a sword in one hand with a shield in the other when I could carry a bigger sword and let the shield tend to itself?
I agree, animated sheild are the real problem. And with the way the pricing works, an animated heavy sheild isn't unusually expensive for an AC boost, and is still one of the cheaper ones you can get.
Then you combine that with 2 handed power attack heavily skewing the offensive balance, and the tradeoffs fall apart.
Allowing sheilds to apply to touch AC would probably eb a good change, though. You can spend a feat on it, but that takes up a feat. Boosting touch AC for fighters would certainly make them much more appealing.

[Tyndmyr]

So your point is one poorly designed item exists, so everything else needs a huge buff to compensate?

It's a +1 AC item. It's not exceptionally broken. Dodge is also not broken. At least, not in the strong sense of being broken.


It says it stacks with sheilds and armor, and I don't see anything saying it can be enchanted.
But if it does work as you say, that is an argument that the item is poorly designed, not that shields are worthless.
And some research online indicates that it would provide an enchantment bonus to armor, and hence that would not stack with magic armor, and would not infringe on sheilds.

They stack. Dastana's have explicit language that they do stack.

All AC enhancement bonuses to shields/armor merely increase the size of the AC bonus given by the item. They do not change stacking rules(unless a property specifically says it does).

Instead of reading random posts by uninformed people on the internet, go straight to the source, Arms and Equipment.

I would agree that dancing shields are...also hilarious. By the time someone is considering dropping 25k on a shield, going animated is pretty much a gimmie. Actually giving up the arm to wear the shield is STILL not worth the extra AC you'd get.

This means that the value of giving up an arm is GREATER than +2 AC, as that's the effective price of animated, and we all agree that animated is an easy choice.

[Seerow]

It's a +1 AC item. It's not exceptionally broken. Dodge is also not broken. At least, not in the strong sense of being broken.

No, but it is a slotless item that gives all the benefits of a slotted item. It's all the cheese of an animated shield for a fraction of the cost.

Sword and Board is a style that could do to be better supported, but simply doubling AC bonuses across the board isn't a fix. All it is is bigger numbers. Contrary to popular belief bigger numbers do not make things better. It's the reason why AC is so binary at higher levels, because the RNG is so borked you either have a high enough AC to be basically immune to everything, or an AC low enough you get hit by everything. Giving shields bigger numbers makes it easier to get into the "I never get hit" category, but that's sidestepping the larger issue.

[Tyndmyr]

No, but it is a slotless item that gives all the benefits of a slotted item. It's all the cheese of an animated shield for a fraction of the cost.

Nah. Animated shields can be tower shields. In fact, they basically always seem to be. So, the numbers are notably different.


Sword and Board is a style that could do to be better supported, but simply doubling AC bonuses across the board isn't a fix. All it is is bigger numbers. Contrary to popular belief bigger numbers do not make things better. It's the reason why AC is so binary at higher levels, because the RNG is so borked you either have a high enough AC to be basically immune to everything, or an AC low enough you get hit by everything. Giving shields bigger numbers makes it easier to get into the "I never get hit" category, but that's sidestepping the larger issue.

The biggest problem with shields is that it's basically never worth giving up the arm for one. Any fix has to address that.

[Taelas]

The animated property still gives you all the penalties of the shield you're wielding. The +2 to AC isn't worth the -2 to attacks.

Unless your DM for some reason ignores the explicit language under the animated property which states you still receive all penalties associated with shield use, there's absolutely no point in enchanting a tower shield with it.

Tower shields are too situational to lug around in most cases. Throw one in a bag of holding, and if you need it, pull it out and duck behind it.

I wouldn't enchant a tower shield with anything. It's not like that's gonna help you achieve total cover, which is the only point of a tower shield... and if you need total cover enough that it makes sense to enchant it, then you're doing something wrong.

[Mystify]

No, but it is a slotless item that gives all the benefits of a slotted item. It's all the cheese of an animated shield for a fraction of the cost.

Sword and Board is a style that could do to be better supported, but simply doubling AC bonuses across the board isn't a fix. All it is is bigger numbers. Contrary to popular belief bigger numbers do not make things better. It's the reason why AC is so binary at higher levels, because the RNG is so borked you either have a high enough AC to be basically immune to everything, or an AC low enough you get hit by everything. Giving shields bigger numbers makes it easier to get into the "I never get hit" category, but that's sidestepping the larger issue.
I fully agree with this. Shields need lateral buffs. Increasing their AC value is not the way to do it. Making them apply to touch would help, as that is a lateral buff. Alternative mechanics could also work, but that has complexity tradeoffs to make.

[Hiro Protagonest]

I fully agree with this. Shields need lateral buffs. Increasing their AC value is not the way to do it. Making them apply to touch would help, as that is a lateral buff. Alternative mechanics could also work, but that has complexity tradeoffs to make.

Extra AC against ranged attacks and a bonus to reflex saves against Fireballs and dragon's elemental breath weapons would also work, although a shield should take damage if you only succeed on the reflex save or beat a touch attack roll against damage other than regular piercing, slashing, or bludgeoning damage, after any elemental resistances the shield has. Maybe make the shield have a chance take piercing or slashing damage if made of wood, but also allow an AoO as the enemy has to tug their weapon out of the wood.

But that would make it that we'd have to come up with a system of applying damage to armor and weapons or it would be unfair to shield users.

The simplest way to fix shields would be to let the AC bonus apply to touch AC and refle saves, and, to keep AC scaling, add half BAB to AC for guys without shields and full BAB to AC for guys with shields.

[georgie_leech]

No, but it is a slotless item that gives all the benefits of a slotted item. It's all the cheese of an animated shield for a fraction of the cost.

Sword and Board is a style that could do to be better supported, but simply doubling AC bonuses across the board isn't a fix. All it is is bigger numbers. Contrary to popular belief bigger numbers do not make things better. It's the reason why AC is so binary at higher levels, because the RNG is so borked you either have a high enough AC to be basically immune to everything, or an AC low enough you get hit by everything. Giving shields bigger numbers makes it easier to get into the "I never get hit" category, but that's sidestepping the larger issue.

Personally, I usually add a couple of options for wielding shields. One of my feats lets you use you add your shield bonus to reflex, to represent the greater cover a shield provides (fighters get this for free at 3rd, to represent their training in arms and presumably shields). Note that this doesn't include enhancement bonuses to the shields, just the shield bonus itself. There's another that, along with a couple of shield related feats, grants you an evasion effect while wielding a heavy or larger shield. I've got a player in a mid-op group that made a sword-and-board fighter, and he's doing doing quite well and enjoying the options, 'cause it makes him feel likehe's doing things with his shield that are different than what some random commonner or wizard can do if they happen to pickup a sheet of metal.

[rollforeigninit]

Nice thread. We look at it a little differently in my campaigns or at least we use a little different rules. Here's how we run things.

Light Armor grants DR 1/-

Medium Armor Grants DR 2/-

Heavy Armor Grants DR 3/-

The Advantages to this system is minimal retrofitting and new armor is easily ported in.

Adamantine doubles the value. We mulled over making normal Armor DR vs Adamantine instead but it made Adamantine Weapons even better than they already are.

Only actual Armor grants DR in this fashion. Bracers & the like just don't quite get there.

We also considered Extra DR vs Piercing, Slashing or Bludgeoning depending on the specific armor type. It just made for even more bookkeeping which gets tedious as is.

We do use the values for armor used in PF now which makes medium & Heavy Armors slightly better in general.

As for the red-headed-stepchild (shields) we just double the AC they provide.

It's worth noting that, with the extra feats in PF that fleshing out shield use (both for offense & for defense) is more viable.

We did make up a feat that allows Heavy Shields to provide cover if your character is on Total Defense, Fighting Defensively, or using Combat Expertise at at least -5. You couldn't be Flat-footed or unaware of the attack. The Shield did take damage from any attack it blocked in that way. (If the attack would damage a shield, that is.)

[ngilop]

I posted a homebrewed set of Shield feats (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=231710), granted they are not the best but are just a quick jot down of ideas, maybe some of you can expand upon them

I have alwasy loathed the idea of classic warrior archetypes ( sword and sheild, the archer, etc) of fantasy being poorly if at all supported by the 3rd ed rule set. It wasn't enough for Monye, skip, and johnathan to not only give wizards everything and think 'warriors can't have nice things' but then to take away in my opinion integral features of being a warrior just added insult to injury...

[Venger]

the issues with plate vs chain mail is that while chain mail does provide better overall protection due to the bed of nails effect, distributing the force over many links instead of one plate. protectively, chain was better against some of the weapons faced in addition to weighing less

mobility however is not wholly dependent on weight. while chain mail weighed less than plate, all the weight in chain mail goes down onto your shoulders whereas with plate mail it's distributed all over your body providing less fatigue over long periods of time and allowing for better range of motion (depending on the period of course)

[Rejusu]

They have already destroyed all elements of wearing a variety of armor, I don't think I have ever seen someone wear anything but a chain shirt or full plate (maybe a breast plate if you can't yet afford mithril full plate).
Off the top of my head I can't think of class which wears medium armor, or that wears heavy armor other than full plate. Of the other classes everyone else wears either chain shirts or no armor at all, save druids and rogues. At least in core.

I agree there's little variety in armour, primarily because most of the armours weren't statted very well. Ideally all armours should be able to provide the same total AC bonus through a combination of armour and Dex and then you'd pick them based on your character and stats. Everyone has roughly the same overall level of survivability but has a weakness in the area they didn't choose to focus in. So a nimble rogue is buggered when caught flat footed, and a sturdy warrior can be easily touched.

Light armour is the only category in which this is actually implemented well. All light armours can provide a total bonus to AC of 8 (excluding padded which gives 9) which is the same as full plate. The only armour's that can provide +8 AC in medium and heavy though are a breastplate and full plate. And then of course mithral screws everything up.

But honestly scrapping it would remove what little variety there is. It'd go from most people wearing chain shirts or full plate to nearly everyone wearing full plate. The only people that wouldn't would be arcane casters (who don't generally wear armour anyway making it kind of a moot point) and the small number of people who rely on skills that have an ACP. But since MFP only has a -3 ACP they're still probably gonna go with full plate.

At least this way anyone with a Dex greater than +3 has other options.


Yes, it can defend your ankles, and all other stuff as well.

The only kind of shield that could effectively cover your ankles would be a tower shield. Any other shield, even large shields wouldn't be enough to cover your feet unless you were constantly crouching.


Your examples are weird - yes if opponent is strong etc. he can do this and that - but shield bearer can be strong and agile as well, and counter appropriately.

But that's the thing. Touch AC is exactly what it sounds like. It's how difficult it is to TOUCH your opponent. It's a kind of attack that HAS to be dodged, NOT blocked. Yes the shield bearer can be agile, but his shield doesn't help him dodge. Now if the defender is strong he can resist the attempt to force him prone, he can even counter by forcing the attacker prone. But that's the actual trip check, not the touch attack roll. The touch attack is simply to check whether you hit the opponent, or rather whether you've made physical contact with the defender. Even if he's holding a shield and you touch that it's still contact, because he's holding it.


Shields of different kind can be all about cover and intercepting attacks etc.

If someone dives for ankle pick with bold move, but his head/arm movement is blocked by shield, it's going to fail, obviously.

And so on.

If someone has their shield raised to protect from attacks coming in around their mid-region (where you'd typically be defending with a shield) and the attacker just does a sweeping kick a shield isn't going to stop that. Even trying to move their shield to stop the kick could catch them off balance. The actual method of the attack is kind of irrelevant. Simply a trip attack is about making contact and then making an opposed str/dex check to see whether you successfully bring the opponent to the floor.

How contact is made isn't really that relevant, but for the third time: A shield won't help you avoid an attack. It can only block attacks. The goal isn't to penetrate your defences, it's to make contact. The only way that can be avoided is through dodging, that's why shield AC bonuses don't (and shouldn't) count for touch attacks. Shields may need fixing to make them relevant but making them apply for touch (at least without any sort of feat) would be silly.


Once you get into superhuman levels of strength, dexterity, constitution, you can have viable dude who moves around in really cumbrous mail/scale/plate but his endurance, vitality and muscles are so insane that he prances around like in winter jacket and doesn't get tired at all, against all probability.

So it all work both ways.

But it doesn't work like that. Armour restricts your movements (whether this is realistic or not is another matter) so it doesn't matter how strong or agile you get the limiting factor is the armour, not your physical capabilities. Even if you're superhuman you're not going to be able to move any more easily than Joe Average in tightly fitted armour that limits the motions you're capable of.

At least not without tearing the armour apart in the process.

[JadePhoenix]

A dastana provides a shield bonus.

It does not. It requires shield proficiency but it adds onto armor bonus.

[Alias]

- If, on the other hand, the Chain guy has crazy-good reflexes though, he'll literally be running rings around Plate guy, wearing him down and taking advantage of every opening and slow strike he makes; whilst Chain guy is just getting warmed up, Plate guy is feeling the strain of being encased in a steel suit and trying to exert himself against a faster opponent. Full Plate is heavy.


Ah, the lovely misconceptions modern players have about armor. 13th century full plate armor was not *that* thick. It weighs about 50lb., but did you know a modern soldier is expected to lug around 80lb. of gear and ceramic plated kevlar clocks in at around 30 lb. and it's just a vest.

When modern players think "heavy" full plate they are thinking the jousting armor from around the late 1500's, early 1600's long after armor had left the battlefield. That armor was for a sport and had nothing to do with combat, but boy the misconceptions they made.

There are historical accounts of knights doing cartwheels in full plate, and I've seen re-enactors in *accurate* replicas do the same. A man isn't going to wear something into combat that will slow him down and kill him. That hasn't changed in 2000 years.

The max dex limit of 3e has always been mis-informed bunk from a realism standpoint - and from a game balance standpoint it only serves to help keep AC down. I've never enforced it.

[Rejusu]

There are historical accounts of knights doing cartwheels in full plate, and I've seen re-enactors in *accurate* replicas do the same. A man isn't going to wear something into combat that will slow him down and kill him. That hasn't changed in 2000 years.

The max dex limit of 3e has always been mis-informed bunk from a realism standpoint - and from a game balance standpoint it only serves to help keep AC down. I've never enforced it.

That's kind of the point. It's meant to keep the AC of Dex monkeys down so they don't completely outstrip everyone else. Compare two characters wearing full plate and assume no Max Dex bonus, one with a Dex of 18 and the other with a Dex of 12. The former will have an AC bonus of 9 and the latter will have an AC bonus of 12. This is at first level mind if you ignore the fact that typically 1st level PC's can't afford full plate. Even if you don't there's still a reasonable divide if they had scale mail instead. And this disparity will just get worse and worse with level and will cause classes to become needlessly MAD because Dex is the only way to boost their AC.

And keeping the overall AC down is important as well, otherwise you end up with PC's almost impossible to hit at low levels. With no max dex on armour it'd be very easy to build a first level PC with an AC around or over 20. I mean a first level halfling can easily get a Dex of 20 (18 score then +2 racial) which means a +5 AC bonus. Then add in their size bonus of +1 and the armour bonus from scale mail or a chain shirt (both affordable at first level with an AC bonus of 4). With all that this first level halfling has an AC of 20, FF of 15 and Touch of 16.

That's just off the top of my head too. I'm pretty sure it could be raised higher quite easily. Conversely a fighter would have far less AC unless they went for a Dex based build. And the divide just gets worse with better armour and greater increases to dex.

Also two things to note about your points on the misconceptions about armour:
1) You're assuming D&D armour is exactly like real-life armour. It's implied there's a parallel, but how do you know their full-plate is exactly the same as our full-plate?

2) You're making assumptions based on real people wearing similar armour. Except most real people in D&D terms don't have a Dex above 12. That's a +1 modifier which even full plate allows. Yes you may be able to move around pretty easily in full plate, but that doesn't mean you can pull off super human feats of agility in it.

[Doug Lampert]

the issues with plate vs chain mail is that while chain mail does provide better overall protection due to the bed of nails effect, distributing the force over many links instead of one plate. protectively, chain was better against some of the weapons faced in addition to weighing less

mobility however is not wholly dependent on weight. while chain mail weighed less than plate, all the weight in chain mail goes down onto your shoulders whereas with plate mail it's distributed all over your body providing less fatigue over long periods of time and allowing for better range of motion (depending on the period of course)

Padding for historical chain was up to an inch thick padding. This is NOT light, nor is it cooler than plate. Chain is quite simply an inferior armor to plate, it cost MORE (seriously, drawing wire was hideously hard), it weighed more when you included appropriate padding, it was hotter to wear, harder to move in, and less protection.

Gaming where both exist at once make chain cheaper and lighter to give anyone a reason to use chain. In actual history neither factor applied and chain went out of use when plate came in.

By the fifteenth century a suit of chain on the battlefield was as much of an anacronism as it would be NOW! Everyone in the military had plate of some sort or another.

[Alias]

1) You're assuming D&D armour is exactly like real-life armour. It's implied there's a parallel, but how do you know their full-plate is exactly the same as our full-plate?


You're really grasping at straws there. Seriously.

[B1okHead]

I think an important thing that you're missing is that the chain shirt is +1. The cost for enhancements on armor increases non-linearly. So although a +1 chain shirt may be less expensive than a normal suite of full plate that may not be true once you get to the higher enhancement bonuses. The chain shirt needs to have one more enhancement bonus than the full plate to have the same effectiveness. So although a +1 chain shirt is more expensive than a non-magical set of full plate, a +5 chain shirt is not cheaper than a +4 full plate.

[Rejusu]

You're really grasping at straws there. Seriously.

Frankly I'd say that assuming the mechanics of a fantastical world filled with dragons, dwarves, and magic are identical to our own is grasping at even more straws. Also you completely ignored my second point, maybe because you couldn't just easily dismiss it?

[Kalmageddon]

I have nothing against light armour protecting more then heavy armor... Except you use your strenght by defautl to hit, thus being agile shouldn't matter all that much if what we are mesuring is the strenght of a blow against your ability to withstand it (shield, armor, deviation bonus, natural armor...).

[Gwendol]

All the shield bearer has to do to cover his ankles is lower his shield a little, as long as we don't talk about bucklers. And touching the shield is not the same thing as touching the opponent, at least not in this game. If that was the case then you could use disarm attacks to deliver touch spells, which on enemies carrying reach weapons could be done from 10' away... Just touch their weapons!

I suggest reading up on some ancient warfare: start with the hoplites and the roman legions: both used shields to great effect.

[Rejusu]

I have nothing against light armour protecting more then heavy armor... Except you use your strenght by defautl to hit, thus being agile shouldn't matter all that much if what we are mesuring is the strenght of a blow against your ability to withstand it (shield, armor, deviation bonus, natural armor...).

Well strength means you can swing with greater force, and by extension greater speed. After all Force = Mass x Acceleration. Strength based attacks I see as being fast and heavy where as dex based ones I see being cunning and unpredictable. They're both about as difficult to dodge or block as each other, just in different ways. A strength based hit is designed to penetrate through your armour where as a Dex based one is designed to strike at the vulnerabilities in your armour.

I don't think weapon finesse should cost a feat though. That's kind of silly.

[Knaight]

Gaming where both exist at once make chain cheaper and lighter to give anyone a reason to use chain. In actual history neither factor applied and chain went out of use when plate came in.

By the fifteenth century a suit of chain on the battlefield was as much of an anacronism as it would be NOW! Everyone in the military had plate of some sort or another.

How much better plate is is contested, for a few reasons. Primary among them is that it is very clear that the change was largely economic, as blast furnaces made making large plates relatively cheap, where drawing wire or punching rings in metal was still a gigantic and incredibly time consuming pain.

Now, on shields, ankles, and tripping. Shields can be put somewhat away from the body, which means that something being used to trip can be intercepted at some distance up the shaft. Even a fairly small shield is usable - they tended to have center grips, which meant moving them further forward was a possibility. As such, strikes to the leg aren't actually that difficult to block, assuming that you know they are coming. With that said, regarding pole arms in particular it is also relatively easy to feint a thrust towards the face then transition quickly to a leg strike, so it's not as if shields somehow make leg strikes near impossible.

[Doug Lampert]

How much better plate is is contested, for a few reasons. Primary among them is that it is very clear that the change was largely economic, as blast furnaces made making large plates relatively cheap, where drawing wire or punching rings in metal was still a gigantic and incredibly time consuming pain.

How much better is debatable, and depends a lot on the specific chain and plate involved (no chain is anywhere close to as good protection as face hardened full gothic plate). But while good chain might have been better than cheap plate, who cares?

The sensible comparison is at same cost, and on that basis chain ALWAYS lost because its cost was higher than cheap plate and it wasn't as good as good plate.

Chain could easily have better joint protection than early cheap plate (for example), which is why early expensive plate used chain for joint and neck and some head armor while using plate for the large pieces, combining the superior plate protection for major pieces with the joint protection of chain for LESS than the cost of a full suit of chain. Win/Win.

Plate was (as you say) MUCH cheaper, and when you include the effects of the heavier padding that chain needed it was also easier to move in and lighter and not as hot.

Plate is just plain better armor. If chain had been substantially more useful for almost anything then someone would still have used it, there were still nobles paying huge fortunes for single suits of personal armor long after chain had gone totally out of use.

Given that Plate is widely available in D&D land the existence of any other type of metal armor is anacronistic. You can reasonably have 27+ grades of different type of plate. But any claims of a "realistic" armor system should constist of types of armor with names like "back and breast", "half-plate", "plate and mail" (chain joint protection), "full-plate", "field plate", "jousting plate", "gothic plate", ext.... Trying to find a "realistic" reason for chain to be competative with plate is like trying to find a "realistic" reason that an American Civil War 12 pounder is competative with modern field artillery. It isn't, that's why people stopped using the 12 pounders.

The plate is simply a later and technologically superior type of armor. Cheaper for any given combination of protection and mobility.

[TuggyNE]

It occurs to me that someone wishing to rework the armor system might still want to include chain, if only to represent "legacy" magic armors. However, this implies that there'd be several grades of armor: "modern", perhaps, representing whatever the current state of the art would be, and having various tradeoffs between max dex and base AC (or whatever system is eventually worked out); "archaic", for old armor designs that aren't used anymore; perhaps "simple" for crude designs that are only used by those without much money; and others that might be thought up. That's just a rough sketch of course.

[Mystify]

For D&D, I think there should be a higher priority on capturing the classical fantasy feel, not duplicating realistic medieval technology.

[Doug Lampert]

For D&D, I think there should be a higher priority on capturing the classical fantasy feel, not duplicating realistic medieval technology.

The designers seem to agree with you. I don't actually care that much either way. I'm just pointing out that "realism" doesn't dictate that there be more than a handful of types of armor that are optimal or that chain armor ever be a good idea.

Complaining that its unrealistic for their to be only a handful of armor types actually used is actually complaining about it being realistic, but probably bad game design. (Why include an option no one uses? Are we back to claiming we're rewarding system mastery?)

Chain shirts in D&D land are insanely good compared to historical chain because Frodo and Bilbo had a chain shirt that was insanely good. Of course their chain shirt seems to have been a magical mithril coat built for an elven prince or something similar. But the basic stats, so light and well fitted that its no real hinderance and yet very good protection is from that coat (then D&D lets you make it out of mithral and enchant it, because they don't admit that the basic stats are already for a mithral and enchanted suit).

Similarly there are plenty of weapons in D&D that are historical nonsense. Not just the obvious like the spiked chain, but try looking up "shortbow" in a historical armory or modern dictionary. Longbow is there, but the alternative to longbow is crossbow. AFAICT shortbow as a term is purely an invention of moderns who wanted some way to distinguish other selfbows from military Welsh Longbows. Anything D&D calls a shortbow the English of 1400 would have called a longbow without a second thought. Rule of cool rules, if there is a longbow then there must also be a shortbow. If there is a shortbow and a longbow then there must be some tradeoff that makes both worthwhile.

The rules are for a game. Not a historical simulation.

[ngilop]

How much better is debatable, and depends a lot on the specific chain and plate involved (no chain is anywhere close to as good protection as face hardened full gothic plate). But while good chain might have been better than cheap plate, who cares?

The sensible comparison is at same cost, and on that basis chain ALWAYS lost because its cost was higher than cheap plate and it wasn't as good as good plate.

Chain could easily have better joint protection than early cheap plate (for example), which is why early expensive plate used chain for joint and neck and some head armor while using plate for the large pieces, combining the superior plate protection for major pieces with the joint protection of chain for LESS than the cost of a full suit of chain. Win/Win.

Plate was (as you say) MUCH cheaper, and when you include the effects of the heavier padding that chain needed it was also easier to move in and lighter and not as hot.

Plate is just plain better armor. If chain had been substantially more useful for almost anything then someone would still have used it, there were still nobles paying huge fortunes for single suits of personal armor long after chain had gone totally out of use.

Given that Plate is widely available in D&D land the existence of any other type of metal armor is anacronistic. You can reasonably have 27+ grades of different type of plate. But any claims of a "realistic" armor system should constist of types of armor with names like "back and breast", "half-plate", "plate and mail" (chain joint protection), "full-plate", "field plate", "jousting plate", "gothic plate", ext.... Trying to find a "realistic" reason for chain to be competative with plate is like trying to find a "realistic" reason that an American Civil War 12 pounder is competative with modern field artillery. It isn't, that's why people stopped using the 12 pounders.

The plate is simply a later and technologically superior type of armor. Cheaper for any given combination of protection and mobility.

I agree with the main point here about with plate being so profuse in standard D&D society that having all other armors is a moot point.

In my world its not so, you can;t go up to blah town armorsmith and say 'hey make me full plate' and a week later have full-plate like RAW you can in D&D standard. IF my adventurers can find somebody actually capable of making plate its cost is not teh measly 1,500 but 2,800 gold. and there is literally 2 MAYBE 3 actual master armor smiths in a kingdom of 2 million people ( the sixe of mideival england) and say each has 1 or 2 apprentices. that 1 for every half million people.

But just about every armor smith in the world can make chain, hence why a chain shirt is only 75 gold im my world. it typically the best armor that an armorsmith can make in a reasonabel amount of time, and turn a profit.

But that is just my world and it might not be for everyone.

and D&D failed horribly at even
capturing the classical fantasy feel Look no fuhrer than the completely unsuported sword and board classical fantasy archetype, or really any none casting archetype the game has. also Doug Lambert just won 20 cookies for making me laugh really hard at his 'system mastery' and the underlining meaning of that set fo words.

[rrgg]

@mail vs plate

You know, you could always go for the simple solution of using a different classification system rather than the armor's name.

For instance, you could define all armors by their type (light, medium, heavy), and then their quality (low, average, high).
So if you had a full suit of plate armor and a full suit of mail then they could be regarded as pretty much the same as have the exact same stats as long as both were labeled "high quality, heavy armor." Obviously you could have multiple sorts of each armor, so "low quality" mail wouldn't be nearly as good as "high quality" mail.
This way you could turn the debate into simply a cosmetics complaint.

[Gavinfoxx]

Again, this problem has been solved already, guys...

http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=77993&it=1

This talks about all these types of armors, places them at different eras and places in history, prices them in a meaningful way, categorizes them by light / medium / heavy, and -- of course -- the various sorts of plate are just plain better.

Peascod Cuirass is GREAT light armor, as is a Brigandine Doublet for something cheaper -- both plate based. Lorica Plumata is great old-school really fancy ostentatious light armor (scale mail! No really, it's scales on top of chainmail!)...

Heavy three quarters plate is great medium armor...

And some of the best heavy armors include Gothic Harness, Maximilian Harness, Milanese harness, Field Harness, and the incredible King's Harness, which is ridiculously awesome armor...

It also talks about munitions-grade options. Really, great book!

[rrgg]

I don't think the plumata would be all that light, but I suppose it depends on how they define "light armor."

[Gavinfoxx]

They define light/medium/heavy mostly by quantity of the body covered.

[Alefiend]

...but try looking up "shortbow" in a historical armory or modern dictionary. Longbow is there, but the alternative to longbow is crossbow. AFAICT shortbow as a term is purely an invention of moderns who wanted some way to distinguish other selfbows from military Welsh Longbows. ...

While it's not a rigorous definition, a short bow is considered to be one that isn't designed to allow the user to pull the bow to full draw. Early bows that were drawn to the chest instead of the ear are shortbows.

That's just me nitpicking, though. I am mostly on the side of the majority in this thread.

[Knaight]

@mail vs plate

You know, you could always go for the simple solution of using a different classification system rather than the armor's name.

For instance, you could define all armors by their type (light, medium, heavy), and then their quality (low, average, high).
So if you had a full suit of plate armor and a full suit of mail then they could be regarded as pretty much the same as have the exact same stats as long as both were labeled "high quality, heavy armor." Obviously you could have multiple sorts of each armor, so "low quality" mail wouldn't be nearly as good as "high quality" mail.

If you are having full, high quality plate, high quality mail doesn't make sense. It's really a matter of picking an era - I would probably usually favor the age of mail, and just not have plate at all, which neatly avoids problems of mixing them.

[Spiryt]

If you are having full, high quality plate, high quality mail doesn't make sense.

Except when you want armor you can somehow easily fit in the backpack/sack, can be without that much problem donned by yourself, covers all body without need to supplement joints with a lot of clunky parts (or mail voiders), is more flexible, easily transportable, can be still made much lighter for given area...

And so on.

As apparent by the fact that in and after the age of highest plate popularity standalone mail not only didn't disappear, but was used a lot in many different forms. While plate was obviously more usual choice for heavy troops for open battlefield.

Obviously D&D (among others) makes absolutely no/poor attempt at replicating all those "details", but still saying that "once there's plate, then no mail" doesn't really make sense either.

[tenshiakodo]

Forgive me if someone brought up this point already, but I saw a few posters mention the "armor as dr" option out of UA. While at first it sounds like a good idea, this optional rule has a major drawback in the form of the Power Attack Feat.

[ahenobarbi]

tl; dr


but with every armor in the 3rd ed player's handook giving a total ac of +7 - +9 (couting both armor AC and max dex allowed) +1 chain shirt comes out 100 gold less that platemail...

You are wrong, the best option is no armor - it's free and it has no dex limit so you can get your AC as high as you want! And it works perfectly against touch attacks! I wonder hy enyone ever wears anything else /sarcasm

[Gwendol]

Correction: no armor, just magic is as always in this game the better option. High DEX, mage armor, Shield spell (or shield of faith), bracers of armor and you are good to go. Strap on a monk's belt, or do some dipping for WIS to AC will be better, and probably more economical than having to spend gold on armor/shields.

[TuggyNE]

Well, gnomish twistcloth I've heard is pretty good (1 AC, enchantable, 0 ACP, 0% ASF, no max dex). I forget which book it's from though....

[JaronK]

The best armor in the game involves using the Dragon Magazine article that gives you armor modifiers... and it still uses Chain Shirts. Those rules give you Reinforced (+1 AC, weight goes up a bit) and Vital Protection (+2 AC vs Critical Hits), as well as Caster Armor (-5% ACF) and Light Weight (reduced weight). Plus you can use the DMGII templates to make the armor that much better (I'd recommend Glory Born and Soul Forged)... and then you combine this with Dastanas, a Chain Shirt, and a Chahar Aina, making all of this out of Mithral (the Dastanas don't have to be if you're not an arcane caster). For an arcane caster, throw in Thistledown Padding and Feycraft to avoid any ACF.

The result is +9 AC (+15 vs critical hits) with a high enough max dex that it probably won't come up ever, with the possibility of no ACF, and it's all light armor. You can also get decent extra mods out of the templates. The best part? None of this is all that expensive, and you can enchant all three items independently which is pretty cheap.

JaronK

[Knaight]

Except when you want armor you can somehow easily fit in the backpack/sack, can be without that much problem donned by yourself, covers all body without need to supplement joints with a lot of clunky parts (or mail voiders), is more flexible, easily transportable, can be still made much lighter for given area...

And so on.

As apparent by the fact that in and after the age of highest plate popularity standalone mail not only didn't disappear, but was used a lot in many different forms. While plate was obviously more usual choice for heavy troops for open battlefield.

However, within the context of unified armor definition, where high quality obviously refers to the level of protection, the best mail wouldn't be sorted into it. The presence of mail at all makes sense, for the reasons you listed among others, but it won't match high end plate for protection.