Greywander
2019-03-02, 06:01 AM
Barding. Barding is armor designed to protect an animal's head, neck, chest, and body. Any type of armor shown in the Armor table in this chapter can be purchased as barding. The cost is four times the equivalent armor made for humanoids, and it weighs twice as much.
In most cases, a magic item that's meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build. Many magic garments are made to be easily adjustable, or they magically adjust themselves to the wearer.
I'm currently working on some rules for playing as an animal character, and got to thinking about magical armor. However, this is just as relevant for familiars, animal companions, and mounts. If you find some magical studded leather +2, can you put it on your owl familiar, for example? The quote from the DMG suggests that yes, you could. This also suggests that magical armor specifically intended for animals could be worn by a humanoid. It also seems a bit strange that the armor would get heavier as per the PHB quote when worn by an animal. I can see this getting abused by players to protect their mounts and animal companions, but honestly animals already get the short end of the stick in that they don't scale and are usually pretty squishy.
Honestly, magically resizing to fit any creature sounds like it would make a good minor property (see DMG pg. 143) for a magical item, and could be a common magical item as seen in Xanathar's (pg. 136-140), instead of making it a property that every wearable magic item had. Then again, this seems like a really odd property to put in a magic item. Generally, when you make armor or clothing, especially the expensive stuff, it's meant to be worn by a specific person and would thus already be fitted to that person. I can see a few scenarios where you'd want magically fitting armor, such as if you don't know the person's measurements when you're making it, or you want it to always fit even if you lose or gain weight, or you want to be able to pass it on to your children, who may have different measurements. Honestly, though, magically fitting armor and clothing seems like a contrivance to allow it to be usable after you kill and loot the previous owner, which isn't really something you'd want to encourage if that owner is you and you're commissioning someone to make it for you.
In most cases, a magic item that's meant to be worn can fit a creature regardless of size or build. Many magic garments are made to be easily adjustable, or they magically adjust themselves to the wearer.
I'm currently working on some rules for playing as an animal character, and got to thinking about magical armor. However, this is just as relevant for familiars, animal companions, and mounts. If you find some magical studded leather +2, can you put it on your owl familiar, for example? The quote from the DMG suggests that yes, you could. This also suggests that magical armor specifically intended for animals could be worn by a humanoid. It also seems a bit strange that the armor would get heavier as per the PHB quote when worn by an animal. I can see this getting abused by players to protect their mounts and animal companions, but honestly animals already get the short end of the stick in that they don't scale and are usually pretty squishy.
Honestly, magically resizing to fit any creature sounds like it would make a good minor property (see DMG pg. 143) for a magical item, and could be a common magical item as seen in Xanathar's (pg. 136-140), instead of making it a property that every wearable magic item had. Then again, this seems like a really odd property to put in a magic item. Generally, when you make armor or clothing, especially the expensive stuff, it's meant to be worn by a specific person and would thus already be fitted to that person. I can see a few scenarios where you'd want magically fitting armor, such as if you don't know the person's measurements when you're making it, or you want it to always fit even if you lose or gain weight, or you want to be able to pass it on to your children, who may have different measurements. Honestly, though, magically fitting armor and clothing seems like a contrivance to allow it to be usable after you kill and loot the previous owner, which isn't really something you'd want to encourage if that owner is you and you're commissioning someone to make it for you.