Bracers of Armor limit

[BowStreetRunner]

On page 130 of the Arms and Equipment Guide there is a sidebar dealing with Bracers of Armor and Armor Special Abilities. There is a sentence there that I find perplexing:


Just as magic armor can never exceed a +8 enhancement bonus, bracers of armor never provide more than a +8 armor bonus.

Where does the part about 'armor can never exceed a +8 enhancement bonus' come from?

[tstewt1921]

I've never seen that anywhere before.....I wasn't aware of that because I know there are prices in the EPH for +10.

[Mike Miller]

Probably a 3.0 thing (or typo).

[Thurbane]

That's weird, here's what the 3.0 SRD said:


Magic armor bonuses are referred to as enhancement bonuses, never rise above +5, and stack with regular armor bonuses (and with shield and magic shield enhancement bonuses). Further, all magic armor is also masterwork armor, so armor check penalties are reduced by 1.

In addition to an enhancement bonus, armor may have special abilities. Special abilities count as additional bonuses for determining the market value of an item, but do not improve AC. A suit of armor cannot have an effective bonus (enhancement plus special ability bonus equivalents) higher than +10. A suit of armor with a special ability must have at least a +1 enhancement bonus.

[BowStreetRunner]

Right. As far as I am aware, the 3.0 rules are the same as 3.5 in this respect. Armor can have a +5 enhancement bonus and cannot have an effective bonus (enhancement plus special ability bonus equivalents) higher than +10. Additionally, the base armor bonus didn't have a cap in the rules - while Full Plate was the highest at +8 in the Player's Handbook, things like Dendritic and Dwarven Stone armor (both +9) were both right there in the Arms and Equipment Guide. Which is what perplexes me about what they were trying to say with this sidebar.

So it seems clear that Bracers of Armor cannot have an Armor bonus higher than +8, and while they can pick up an additional +5 effective bonus from special abilities, you cannot add an enhancement bonus on top. (Which is what I was wanting to do - Bracers of Armor +8 with a +5 enhancement bonus for a total +13).

But the wording really made me wonder if I missed something in the 3.0 core rules.

[Crake]

This was almost definitely a typo, though what it ACTUALLY was referring to is hard to tell. Was it referring to the enhancement cap of +5? or was it referring to the total cap of +10? considering it uses the world enhancement, I assume it was going to say that you can't get bracers above +8 armor, just like how armor can't go above +5, but you can still add on special abilities up to +10.

[Mordaedil]

The only thing I can think of it actually intending to mean is that armor don't come in versions above 8 armor bonus (except they do).

[Fizban]

The sidebar goes on to say that Bracers of Armor with non-enhancement abilities can go up to a total of +13, 8 from armor and 5 from other abilities, making it abundantly clear what they meant. The typo should have been +5 enhancement/ +8 bracers.

It also makes mention of the ELH, stating that bracers higher than +13 can be made with the Epic feats, though the ELH might very well charge epic prices at +9 (I haven't checked).

Though it is pretty clear that there's a phantom +10 total AC cap floating around, aside from a couple of snowflake light armors with jacked up max dex and specific magic items (some kind of snakeskin and shadowcloth, and Celestial Armor and Millenial Chainmail).

[Crake]

The sidebar goes on to say that Bracers of Armor with non-enhancement abilities can go up to a total of +13, 8 from armor and 5 from other abilities, making it abundantly clear what they meant. The typo should have been +5 enhancement/ +8 bracers.

It also makes mention of the ELH, stating that bracers higher than +13 can be made with the Epic feats, though the ELH might very well charge epic prices at +9 (I haven't checked).

Though it is pretty clear that there's a phantom +10 total AC cap floating around, aside from a couple of snowflake light armors with jacked up max dex and specific magic items (some kind of snakeskin and shadowcloth, and Celestial Armor and Millenial Chainmail).

Do you mean +9? Fullplate is 8+1 dex, and it's the best combo of armor+dex, while all the other "best" armors only go up to 8. Chain shirt, studded leather and leather all add up to 8, breastplate adds up to 8, unless I'm missing something? I guess if you're including mithirl, but then fullplate jumps up to +11, not +10.

[Fizban]

Padded armor also goes to +9 (as does Dentritic, and Sharkskin, and Heavy Plate from Underdark), but the +10 is from Mechanus Gear. Though Races of Stone also has the (strictly inferior) exotic Battle Plate and Mountain Plate. One could say that the intended cap is +9 with the exotic armor feats being effectively worth +1 AC and Mechanus Gear just being an OP armor from the otherwise mostly underpowered Planar Handbook, but I choose to take Mechanus Gear as the standard cap and just ignore the RoS armors. The cap for not having your movement speed further reduced in heavy armor is +9.

Underdark was also the source of the snowflake light armors I was thinking of, Spider Silk and Nightscale, which go to +11 and +12, for far cheaper than you'd expect of even "mithril" light armors.

[BowStreetRunner]

With most armors you have the Armor Bonus coming from the armor itself (which I have seen up to a +10 on Mountain Plate), an Enhancement Bonus to armor of up to +5 (pre-Epic), and a Maximum Dexterity Bonus (which isn't actually an armor bonus, but just a cap on the Dex bonus). A lot of the numbers used in the examples being discussed above are including the Max Dex as if it were part of the Armor Bonus. I don't think that was part of the consideration of the A&EG entry. It is significant however, as the Bracers have no Max Dex cap.

What really isn't clear to me is whether you can add a +5 enhancement to the Bracers that doesn't come from special abilities. Essentially, can you get +13 (8 armor, 5 enhancement) bracers? The way the description is stated, it almost seems as if they are saying +8 Bracers are already treated as if they had the maximum Enhancement Bonus to armor and you can only increase the Effective bonus with special abilities.

However, they never seem to bother to state things that clearly so the description seems a bit muddled.

[Thurbane]

I believe that the intent with Bracers of Armor having a +8 limit was so that it would equal the armor bonus from the best (core) armor (i.e full plate).