Most Useful Armor enchantments

[Aleolus]

Hey all. I'm one of the few people in our gaming group that normally uses armor (most either use the Defense Bonus from UA, or just don't bother with armor), and I was wondering. What would you say are the most useful armor enchantments in 3.5? Don't worry about the gold cost, just in general.

I ask because most of the armor/shield enchantments I have seen seem either pointless, very situational, or just downright dumb. My personal favorites are Fortification (preventing SA and crits is always useful) and Called ("Blathering Blatherskite!" and now your safely in your tin can)

[ComaVision]

My two favourites are:

Soulfire (+4 bonus): Immunity to death affects and ability drain
Gleaming (+3 bonus): constant 20% concealment

[Troacctid]

Fearsome (DrU) lets you demoralize as a move action, which is pretty nice.

Animated is a great property for shields, obviously.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Mindarmor (MIC) 3,000gp for a +5 to will saves against mind-affecting 3/day? Yes please. An absolute must for low-will types before you can afford constant mind blank.

Resilient (FoW, +1 bonus) similar to Mindamor (but with no daily limit), this one's a untyped bonus to any one save of your choice as an immediate action, again up to +5 with Magic Vestment. Useful and cheap enough to get if you wear more than one piece of enchantable armor, but it takes until the higher levels to make Mindarmor obsolete.

Easy Travel (MIC, 1,500gp) for the low strength types, because even a wizard needs some stuff, and getting into medium load sucks.

Soulfire was already mentioned, but there's also Death Ward (MIC, +1 bonus) for the smaller wallet. And 1/day is often enough - at least enough to save you from a nasty surprise and get that cleric to cast Death Ward already.

Empyreal (BoED, +2 bonus) +5 sacred to saves is worth more than +5 AC in most situations. If you get it without anything else and use Magic Vestment it's also cheaper than a +5 Cloak of Resistance (which it stacks with at higher levels). I like putting this on dastana.

[T.G. Oskar]

I'd consider Blueshine, Healing and Greater Healing from the MIC. All three have fixed GP costs rather than enhancement bonuses, so they're quite great.

Blueshine covers your weapon from all things that might destroy it, like acid or rust, and the cost is around 1,500 gp, so it's a steal.

Healing (MIC, 8,000 gp) grants a 1/day CMW effect (at CL 5), but the kicker is that it can activate when you're under 0 HP for a quick get-up. Greater Healing (MIC, synergy, 24,000 gp) turns that into CSW (at CL 15), which restores a good amount of HP if you can mitigate the damage reasonably.

While you get Gleaming, the Displacement (MIC, +1 bonus) property grants 50% concealment 1/day for 5 rounds, which is enough for at least one tough battle. Once you get a lot of GP, replace it with Gleaming. Blurring (MIC, +1 bonus) is also a choice (3/day Blur for 5 rounds), but Greater Blurring (MIC, synergy, +2 bonus) isn't, because it costs the same as the Gleaming property. If you want, you can also stack it with Blinking (MIC, 15,000 gp) for a Blink effect, which grants invisibility and etherealness.

Magic-Eating (MIC, 10,000 gp) does minor healing on a successful save against a spell effect, meaning you get some mitigation against damaging spells and you can use other spells to heal. Coupled with high saves, it's pretty solid, even if it's basically 1 hp/spell level.

Finally: Ghost Ward (MIC, +1 bonus) might not seem like much, but you can get an easy +5 to touch AC, based on your armor's enhancement bonus (even against incorporeal touch attacks!). Coupled with something like the Parrying Shield or Shield Ward feats, you can get a pretty decent touch AC, enough to deal with the peskiest of rays and touch spells.

Notice that, other than the Ghost Ward, Displacement, Blurring and Greater Blurring enchantments, all of the mentioned ones cost no enhancement bonus, so you can stack them freely (though it'll make your armor costly). Enhancements with no bonus cost are more valuable than you might think, once you get access to more GP and moreso if your allies get to craft items at a discount.

[Nashira]

Enhancements with no bonus cost are more valuable than you might think, once you get access to more GP and moreso if your allies get to craft items at a discount.

While I agree with this, it's also important to remember that there is a hard limit in the raw gold value of an enchanted piece of armor, just like the +X bonus limit. I can't recall exactly what it is, and it's a fairly generous limit, but it's also frequently forgotten.

[Necroticplague]

Wild is excellent for those who can use it. Lets you ignore profeciency, asf, encumbrance, and acp.

[Deophaun]

Blueshine covers your weapon from all things that might destroy it, like acid or rust, and the cost is around 1,500 gp, so it's a steal.
First, only applies to armor.

Second, the Durable enhancement from Dungeonscape does the same thing, except for 1,000 gp less and without the +2 competence bonus to Hide checks that no one cares about. Now that's a steal.


While I agree with this, it's also important to remember that there is a hard limit in the raw gold value of an enchanted piece of armor, just like the +X bonus limit. I can't recall exactly what it is, and it's a fairly generous limit, but it's also frequently forgotten.

There are ways around this. I don't think there is anything that prevents you from wearing three armor items, each with different enhancements. You could have a mithral breastplate, a tabard, and bracers of armor all contributing different effects, even if only one of them applies its AC bonus.

[Marlowe]

I like Gloryborn and Glamoured, simply because they allow a character to be wearing whatever armour you want while being able to use whatever image or model you want for them. Not a huge game advantage, but convenient.

[sleepyphoenixx]

While I agree with this, it's also important to remember that there is a hard limit in the raw gold value of an enchanted piece of armor, just like the +X bonus limit. I can't recall exactly what it is, and it's a fairly generous limit, but it's also frequently forgotten.
There is no hard limit, but items over 200,000gp are epic, meaning you need Craft Epic Arms and Armor to enhance them further. Since +10 armor only costs 100,000gp you have some room to add flat-cost enhancements before that happens.
If your armor also exceeds the parameters for non-epic items (+6 or higher enhancement bonus, an ability that costs +6 or more or +11 or more total enhancement) you also incur a x10 price modifier.


There are ways around this. I don't think there is anything that prevents you from wearing three armor items, each with different enhancements. You could have a mithral breastplate, a tabard, and bracers of armor all contributing different effects, even if only one of them applies its AC bonus.

I don't think you can put armor enhancements on a tabard.
If you do this you should go for chain shirt, dastana and chahair-ana. You get more base AC (6), possibly with 0 ACP with mithral/masterwork and can enchant everything separately. If you also wear a shield you have 4 separate enchantment targets, which should be more than enough for just about anyone.

[Deophaun]

I don't think you can put armor enhancements on a tabard.
Clothing is armor.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Clothing is armor.

Yeah, but clothing goes in the body slot. A tabard usually goes in the torso slot.
You can argue that it's still clothing of course, but you can also argue that your belt, your boots, your gloves, etc. are clothing. Should you be allowed to put armor enhancements on those too?

[Nashira]

There is no hard limit, but items over 200,000gp are epic, meaning you need Craft Epic Arms and Armor to enhance them further. Since +10 armor only costs 100,000gp you have some room to add flat-cost enhancements before that happens.
If your armor also exceeds the parameters for non-epic items (+6 or higher enhancement bonus, an ability that costs +6 or more or +11 or more total enhancement) you also incur a x10 price modifier.

This is the rule I was referencing, yeah. I'd have elaborated more in my post but I was on mobile. Thanks for adding the clarity.

Also, I'm 90% certain that RAW clothing is not armor and you cannot put armor enhancements on it either. Armor is limited only to those things listed on the various armor tables in the core books and splat books.

[Darrin]

Most of the good ones have already been mentioned. I was working on an Armor Handbook awhile back, and it turns out that the majority of armor enhancements are awful... just outright worse than getting an AC bonus, overpriced, or too situational to be reliably useful. The standouts:

+1: Death Ward, Light Fortification
+3: Moderate Fortification
+4: Soulfire
+5: Freedom, Heavy Fortification

It boils down to: "When in doubt, get more fortification."

For fixed-price stuff: Durable (500 GP, Dungeonscape), Restful (500 GP, Dungeonscape), Easy Travel (1500 GP, MIC), and Anti-Impact (2000 GP, Complete Warrior).