Warforged upgrade

[stoutstien]

https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/dp69th/warforged_no_longer_have_subraces_or_integrated/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share

Looks like a pretty big change for the printed warforged. Love or hate integrated protection it was a huge shift in the base power of a race. personally I like the idea of mismatching features that you can upgrade as you level up

[nickl_2000]

I like it and look forward to seeing the final result.

I apparently am in both camps. I think that the armor was some of the most broken **** ever, but also thought it was flat out awesome.

[stoutstien]

I like it and look forward to seeing the final result.

I apparently am in both camps. I think that the armor was some of the most broken **** ever, but also thought it was flat out awesome.

Agreed. I'd rather they kept the concept but it would need a extensive overhaul. I understand why they went with a flat AC bonus because of how complicated to get as far as integrated protection working with some features and not others. I'm really curious what the upgrades are going to until there could be an additional AC upgraded available at later levels so warforged will still have the ability to be the most heavily armored without much investment.

Overall it's probably a smart move on their part.

[AdAstra]

Gimme those customization options over funky AC calcs any day. This is far more like the sorta robot race I’d like to see.

[Yakmala]

It really comes down to the availability of magic armor in a given campaign.

In the Eberron game I currently play in, magic items in general, and magic armor in particular, are scarce, so Warforged characters definitely have an advantage in the AC department.

[MaxWilson]

Looks like a pretty big change for the printed warforged. Love or hate integrated protection it was a huge shift in the base power of a race. personally I like the idea of mismatching features that you can upgrade as you level up

I'd be okay with Integrated Protection as long as you add levels limits: say Fighter 11, Rogue 5, Barbarian 8, everything else 6 except warforged paladins are disallowed. Warforged Fighter/Rogues are okay, no other multiclassing options.

[Waterdeep Merch]

I really liked them, but yeah, they're a smidge too strong. Removing subraces is eyebrow-raising, that wasn't the problem.

Hopefully this means they're rebalancing them and not just taking them out back like they did with the githzerai.

[Tetrasodium]

I'm disappointed because integrated protection was really the thing that made warforge feel like they truly straddled an awkward line between humanoid & construct. But with that said... it depends on what the "customization options" wind up being.

[ProsecutorGodot]

Hard to argue that integrated protection wasn't over the top but I'm going to have to see these customization options before I can say whether I like the idea of subraces being gone.

I guess from a thematic standpoint it makes a lot more sense for subraces to not exist, my understanding of Eberron and Warforged is a bit limited but I thought they were intended to be modular, able to adjust themselves to fit new purposes. Even if it turns out that your customization options are simple rehashings of the subraces choices, it seems like a good fit to make your Warforged more purpose built.

[micahaphone]

If it's like the Simic Hybrid, I could see a second tier of options (at level 5 or 7 or 10), one of which is integrated armor, with prerequisites. Like racial invocations.

[SodaQueen]

I was planning not to really bother with warforged until actual Eberron comes out so I hadn't seen integrated plating.

When I just did a few minutes ago, I was deeply confused at why people were calling it overpowered...then I saw the proficiency bonus lol


It really comes down to the availability of magic armor in a given campaign.

In the Eberron game I currently play in, magic items in general, and magic armor in particular, are scarce, so Warforged characters definitely have an advantage in the AC department.That's...interesting. Magic items being very common is kind of a big theme in Eberron. It has it's own class for exactly that.

[Nagog]

I can see why Integrated Protection is out, but at the same time, I feel it's a good scaling. Having played in many a campaign where the DM gave out magic items like they were made of solid gold (we were lucky to get any loot at all. My best loot that campaign as a level 11 Wizard was a scroll of Fireball. Yeah, it was that bad), having race and class options to replace those when necessary is great. If I knew I were going into such a campaign, I'd go with Warforged Bladelock and take Improved Pact Weapon as an invocation, and if the DM allows UA, I'd go up to Ultimate Pact Weapon when I get to that level. None of these break the game any more than any other build, as each replacement stipulates that they aren't cross-compatible. The only way I can see this getting broken is if somebody doesn't understand the Unarmored Defense mechanics and lets that stack with the Darkwood Core (or if you powerbuild a Warforged Bladesinger, but even then that's balanced with a d6 hit dice).

[Tetrasodium]

I was planning not to really bother with warforged until actual Eberron comes out so I hadn't seen integrated plating.

When I just did a few minutes ago, I was deeply confused at why people were calling it overpowered...then I saw the proficiency bonus lol

That's...interesting. Magic items being very common is kind of a big theme in Eberron. It has it's own class for exactly that.

the outrage over integrated protection was from people afraid of how a sentient golem would affect their hypothetical low/no magic campaigns.

That last bit is only half right & pretty far off the mark though. Eberron is so awash in magical "items" that they use it to light streets & make billboards yea... but the presence of things likemagic self sharpening kitchen knives in most middle class kitchens doesn't mean that you can just go buy frostbrand, flametongue, +3adamantine armor, holy avenger, or whatever... Sure you might be able to find those things,but odds are good that they are in a stupidly rich person's collection/museum/high end auction house & none of those things are going to let just any murderhobo simply buy them. a collection owner might be willing to part with it for services rendered, but those services might be pretty heavy duty questing type stuff. Just finding out about that auction house (never mind getting into it) might take some heavy duty networking with the connected & well off. Altered carbon uses science & tech rather than magic, but the extreme night & day difference along with availability of tech between refugee poor/middle class/"merely wealthy" & absurdly rich is right on the markfor eberron & wealth/availability of magic

[Sigreid]

What they need is purchasable modifications that can be made by a specialist artificer, perhaps including integrated protection. IMO the problem wasn't that the integrated protection was there, it was that they got their magical full plate for free.

[SodaQueen]

That last bit is only half right & pretty far off the mark though. Eberron is so awash in magical "items" that they use it to light streets & make billboards yea... but the presence of things likemagic self sharpening kitchen knives in most middle class kitchens doesn't mean that you can just go buy frostbrand, flametongue, +3adamantine armor, holy avenger, or whatever... Sure you might be able to find those things,but odds are good that they are in a stupidly rich person's collection/museum/high end auction house & none of those things are going to let just any murderhobo simply buy them. a collection owner might be willing to part with it for services rendered, but those services might be pretty heavy duty questing type stuff. Just finding out about that auction house (never mind getting into it) might take some heavy duty networking with the connected & well off. Altered carbon uses science & tech rather than magic, but the extreme night & day difference along with availability of tech between refugee poor/middle class/"merely wealthy" & absurdly rich is right on the markfor eberron & wealth/availability of magicThe only thing off the mark and not even half right is your highly inaccurate interpretation of what I said. I don't recall saying that high powered +X magic items were easily and readily available. And you are mistaken if you assume that the only assume major magic items are the only magic items that matter. 3rd level artificers can craft magic items and even for a low power campaign setting there are plenty of minor magic items floating around. Even then, Sharn explicitly hosts "some dozens" of magic dealers, some catering to "lower level adventurers." If you're explicitly talking about legendary magic items, then you're mostly right about them belonging to collectors and unavailable to low level adventurers but, again, that's not what I said.

The 3rd point of Things You Need to Know About Eberron in the ECS tells you that this is a world of magic and tells of the advances in magic and magic items that have graced the world. That isn't exactly what strikes me as a setting well suited for low magic. I'm not saying you can't and it actually sounds like it may be fun but it's not what I think of when I hear 'low magic campaign'.

[Tetrasodium]

The only thing off the mark and not even half right is your highly inaccurate interpretation of what I said. I don't recall saying that high powered +X magic items were easily and readily available. And you are Wrong if you assume that the only assume major magic items are the only magic items that matter. 3rd level artificers can craft magic items and even for a low power campaign setting there are plenty of minor magic items floating around.

The 3rd point of Things You Need to Know About Eberron tells you that this is a world of magic and tells of the advances in magic and magic items that have graced the world. That isn't exactly strikes me as a setting well suited for low magic. I'm not saying you can't and it actually sounds like it may be fun but it's not what I think of when I hear 'low magic campaign'.

Don't give me a lecture about my favorite setting to disprove a point that I in no way was making.

It's great that you know about eberron, but not everyone does & the disaster of 4e certainly didn't help things. Just because you personally don't say "Magic items being very common" and think "high magic"doesn't mean that others won't.

[SodaQueen]

It's great that you know about eberron, but not everyone does & the disaster of 4e certainly didn't help things. Just because you personally don't say "Magic items being very common" and think "high magic"doesn't mean that others won't.Great then. When others come in and actually make those claims, I'm glad you're knowledgeable enough to inform them otherwise.

Back on topic, I'm also interested to hear the customization options. If some of the options reflected by the subraces aren't implemented, I'll probably find a way to incorporate them since I quite like the subraces they added.

[ravenkith]

Hard to argue that integrated protection wasn't over the top .... (snip)

It's actually not hard AT ALL to argue that integrated protection is perfectly reasonable, and even somewhat sub-optimal.

First off, the armor in question is fairly reasonable:
Light: 11+Prof bonus + Dex mod
Medium: 13+ Prof bonus + dex mod (max 2)
Heavy: 16 + Prof bonus (Disad on stealth)

In order to USE any of these, you must first be proficient with the armor type in question, and the race does NOT convey any such proficiency.

Now compare this to basic, bog-standard, common armor available in the gear section of the PHB
Studded Leather 12 + Dex mod
Half Plate 15+dex mod(max 2)
Splint Mail 17
Plate 18

You CAN use any of these, regardless of class or proficiency (as long as you have the strength score) at the cost of 5 ft of movement.


Your basic warforged, at level 1, is walking around with a base AC of 18 (16+2 prof bonus).

Now go Mountain dwarf, get your +2 to con and +2 to STR (that's a +4 overall bonus instead of +3 compared to WF), proficiency with light and medium armor, darkvision, dwarven resilience (compares quite closely with WF resilience), proficiency with the battleaxe, handaxe, light hammer and warhammer, proficiency with the crafter's tools of choice, stonecunning and common and dwarvish.

You basic dwarf, at level 1, absolutely CAN'T afford plate. If he could, he could walk around with an 18 AC too. However, he probably CAN afford Chain mail (AC 16). By level 2, the dwarf absolutely could be in Splint mail (AC 17). By level 5, there's a really good chance that the dwarf is now in Plate for real, if only because he looted it off someone else's dead body.

At level 5, The warforged will have a base AC of 19, while the Dwarf has a base AC of 18. The MOST advantage the warforged ever had over the dwarf was 2 points of AC at level 1, while the gap closed to just 1 point of AC at level 2. This is hardly game breaking.

Lets jump ahead to level 9, where the warforged gets his next point of AC, bringing him to a base 20.

Based on THIS (https://dmdavid.com/tag/what-is-the-typical-amout-of-treasure-awarded-in-a-fifth-edition-dungeons-dragons-campaign/) article, the party will have earned over 50,000 gp at this point, and even in the low magic default setting, a party of four will have 1 rare item and 2 uncommon items by this point. As a principal tank, it wouldn't be hard to guess that if one of these items was armor, the PC might end up getting it.

Adamantine plate armor, an uncommon, would give the 18 AC AND immunity to crits.

A +1 full plate, a rare, would close the gap completely at this juncture.

So really, the only difference between a mountain dwarf and a warforged at that point (if you go envoy) is basically the fact that the warforged doesn't need to eat, drink or breathe. Given the ease with which food and water are obtainable through magic, the only real advantage is the fact that WF can't choke to death or drown, and the warforged has a pretty BIG downside in that he can NEVER benefit from any kind of armor, and the nifty side effects that such armor can bring (elemental damage resistance, physical damage resistance, immunity to crits, etc).

As you go up in levels at Level 13 and then again at level 17, you'll net another +1 to AC at that time, for a total AC of 21 base at level 20.

Meanwhile, your dwarf tank absolutely has a base 18 from plate at this point, almost certainly a +1 (19) and possibly has a +2 armor (very rare) at this point, giving him a 20. If he took the protection fighting style, that bonus to ac is just gone.

Now if you are in a normal house campaign, magic items tend to be a little more free-flowing than normal, mind, so only in low magic campaigns are you likely to have an AC that is even two points higher than any other kind of tank, let alone the three implied above.

Basically you are trading potentially massive benefits in the late game (armor special abilities) for a + 1 bonus to AC throughout your career.

Finally, when it comes to using this for anything OTHER than a tank, don't forget that if you go warforged, you are going to HAVE to dip a full fighter class FIRST in order to get any kind of proficiency with armor at all, especially the heavy armor variant, and you CAN'T get any benefit from using an armor without proficiency.

With a Mountain dwarf, there is no class tax whatsoever, you can automatically use light and medium armor right off the bat, plus you get a few martial weapon pros sprinkled in as well.

While both can use ASIs to get into heavy armor at level 4, that would cripple the warforged's early game survivability advantage, which is 90% of the reason why you would ever take this. Warforged must spend their first level on a heavy armor class, period. If they don't, and only get medium armor proficiency, they will at best (with at least a 14 dex - thats a stat taxin') break even with the Dwarf tank. If they don't have at least a 14 dex, they will lag behind.

This means absolutely no casting class capstone ability, EVER. With the Mountain dwarf, you could go straight into a casting class wearing medium armor right off the bat.

Now compare this to the Tiefling and it's variants. +1 Int, +2 Cha. Darkvision 60 ft. Resistance to fire damage. Infernal legacy.

The variant tiefling can trade in infernal legacy (thematic spellcasting) for WINGED. 30 ft flight ALL the time at level effin 1. LEVEL 1! That's effectively immunity to melee attacks right there, pal. LOL. (granted, you can't use this in tight quarters, but anywhere there's any space? fuhgeddaboudid).

The there's the even MORE optimal choices such as taking a wood half-elf (fleet of foot) leading into Elven accuracy....use shadow blade for instance with this character and you're going to destroy with triple advantage basically all the time, LOL.

....and then there's the Yuanti pureblood. Whoa.

Just.....ok. Immunity to poison? Sure. Innate poison cantrip? Ok. Plus 2 to charisma and + 1 to intelligence? Nice. Darkvision is always great. Very thematic. Wait, what's this? I can't be reading this right, surely? No, that definitely says ADVANTAGE AGAINST ALL SPELLS AND MAGIC EFFECTS AT LEVEL 1.

Just, hold on a sec here.

Take that happy little warforged, with his 19 AC at level 7, make him an oath of the ancients paladin. Keep in mind, he got 1 point of con and 1 point to any two other stats. He's probably got a reasonably high charisma, maybe a 14 or a 16.

You take that yuanti with it's +2 charisma at first level (likely a 17 at least, maybe an 18), put 7 levels of paladin oath of the ancients on it, and you're gonna have a real, real good time. Not only do you get +3 or +4 to all saves (probably more than the warforged, but similar), you also have advantage vs all spells AND IMMUNITY to poison instead of just resistance/advantage. Plus the Yuanti can easily have an 18 AC at this point with plate.

I know which one of those is clearly borked, thanks.

[Wildarm]

The static +1 to AC is reasonable. I can see the logic of it. Simpler, less skew for AC at low levels. Honestly, if magic armor is reasonably available, there is little difference to builds at higher tiers.

The real tragedy(IMO) in losing integrated protection is that you can no longer dump strength as a heavy armored warforged. It opened up quite a few decent dex/wis/cha/int based build options. You could always just take the 10' movement penalty but warforged envoy avoided that, and gave super flexible stats to fit pretty much any class combo.

[Petrocorus]

Integrated Protection was a good idea, and would have been totally fine if the calculation mode would allow it to be on par with normal armor and simply make it enchantable by an artificer, instead of the BS with proficiency bonus.

It also needed to be clear on whether or not it count as armor for features and feats.

But those were solvable issues. The core idea was good.

A flat bonus to AC doesn't make much sense IMHO. And all the art we've got so far show that warforged don't wear armor.

[ProsecutorGodot]

First off, the armor in question is fairly reasonable:
Light: 11+Prof bonus + Dex mod
Medium: 13+ Prof bonus + dex mod (max 2)
Heavy: 16 + Prof bonus (Disad on stealth)

In order to USE any of these, you must first be proficient with the armor type in question, and the race does NOT convey any such proficiency.

Not technically true, you gain the unarmored (light) variant regardless, you just don't add your proficiency bonus unless you are proficient in light armor.

It's very presumptuous to say that a party will receive magical armor, and also that at any given table that magic items are for sale. I assume you're bringing up the 50k gold for magical item purchasing anyway, because one set of mundane Plate Armor will only compete for so long with the Warforged. The issue with Integrated Protection is that it kept you on par with Magical Armor (or better) for no cost for the very very low price of not actually benefiting from worn armor, which isn't much of a cost. You also didn't need to meet a strength prerequisite, which means a spellcaster who dips for heavy armor could focus their ability scores more on their main ability score (not that a movement penalty is all that severe for all you gain)

The only real cost that I'm aware of is that you lost the ability to use the defense fighting style, which was more than made up for with your passive armor value.

Just because you can keep up with Integrated Protection as a non warforged race doesn't mean that the feature is balanced. Comparing to Yuan-Ti especially is a bad example, very few races can compare favorably but that doesn't mean that one of their features isn't overtuned.


Finally, when it comes to using this for anything OTHER than a tank, don't forget that if you go warforged, you are going to HAVE to dip a full fighter class FIRST in order to get any kind of proficiency with armor at all, especially the heavy armor variant, and you CAN'T get any benefit from using an armor without proficiency.
...
This means absolutely no casting class capstone ability, EVER. With the Mountain dwarf, you could go straight into a casting class wearing medium armor right off the bat.

This I don't understand, Warlocks, Clerics and Druids have armor proficiency. If you choose Hexblade, all three start with Medium Armor proficiency. About the only class it really penalizes is Sorcerer, and with their predisposition to be multiclassed into Paladin I don't see the issue. It's surprisingly not that difficult to get armor proficiency as a spellcaster, and the cost is relatively low. That is assuming that multiclassing/feats are allowed, if they aren't then your point is entirely valid.

[Pex]

With bias I recently started a new character, warforged artificer. A drastic change may not have me want to play the character anymore. Nothing is stopping me continuing with what I have, but I use D&D Beyond and if it won't be supported anymore that will make things difficult. I have no issue with the built in armor. First level characters can have AC 18 with chainmail and shield. Once again 5E takes away a fun toy from players.

[SodaQueen]

With bias I recently started a new character, warforged artificer. A drastic change may not have me want to play the character anymore. Nothing is stopping me continuing with what I have, but I use D&D Beyond and if it won't be supported anymore that will make things difficult. I have no issue with the built in armor. First level characters can have AC 18 with chainmail and shield. Once again 5E takes away a fun toy from players.Once again? I don't really keep an eye on 5e updates. Would you mind elaborating? I'm curious

[MaxWilson]

Now go Mountain dwarf, get your +2 to con and +2 to STR (that's a +4 overall bonus instead of +3 compared to WF), proficiency with light and medium armor, darkvision, dwarven resilience (compares quite closely with WF resilience), proficiency with the battleaxe, handaxe, light hammer and warhammer, proficiency with the crafter's tools of choice, stonecunning and common and dwarvish.

You basic dwarf, at level 1, absolutely CAN'T afford plate. If he could, he could walk around with an 18 AC too. However, he probably CAN afford Chain mail (AC 16). By level 2, the dwarf absolutely could be in Splint mail (AC 17). By level 5, there's a really good chance that the dwarf is now in Plate for real, if only because he looted it off someone else's dead body.

Maybe I'm dumb but I don't understand why your hypothetical dwarf is wearing heavy armor. Dwarves don't have heavy armor proficiency as a racial. Neither do they get shield proficiency as a racial, so the best a basic Dwarf can do is 15 + Dex (max 2) if they happen to be rich enough to own half-plate armor. Sure, a dwarf can still get armor proficiency from a class, but so can anyone else. (And sure, you can wear armor you're non-proficient in, but then you can't cast spells and have disadvantage on all of your attacks and you become basically useless unless you're a Necromancer.)

What am I missing here? Why is the dwarf wearing splint/plate?


You CAN use any of these, regardless of class or proficiency (as long as you have the strength score) at the cost of 5 ft of movement.

10' of movement actually.

[Wildarm]

With bias I recently started a new character, warforged artificer. A drastic change may not have me want to play the character anymore. Nothing is stopping me continuing with what I have, but I use D&D Beyond and if it won't be supported anymore that will make things difficult. I have no issue with the built in armor. First level characters can have AC 18 with chainmail and shield. Once again 5E takes away a fun toy from players.

Well, you now can take advantage of armor infusions so that may be a plus depending on your build. Assuming warforged characters still have flexible stats similar to the envoy, I think your character will not be too drastically changed. A single point of AC at most that you could shore up with an infusion if you really needed to tank.

We'll see how it all shapes up on in a few weeks.

[stoutstien]

The changes to the artificer is going to be interesting also. Moving the upgraded familiar to the base class and expanding alchemist is a huge change. No idea how it's going to work for action economy.

I'm hoping for non DM Fiat potion crafting beyond being a healing potion factory. Lots of last minute changes or at least last minute announcements of the changes.

[Tetrasodium]

Maybe I'm dumb but I don't understand why your hypothetical dwarf is wearing heavy armor. Dwarves don't have heavy armor proficiency as a racial. Neither do they get shield proficiency as a racial, so the best a basic Dwarf can do is 15 + Dex (max 2) if they happen to be rich enough to own half-plate armor. Sure, a dwarf can still get armor proficiency from a class, but so can anyone else. (And sure, you can wear armor you're non-proficient in, but then you can't cast spells and have disadvantage on all of your attacks and you become basically useless unless you're a Necromancer.)

What am I missing here? Why is the dwarf wearing splint/plate?



10' of movement actually.



Warforge don't get heavy armor prof either. However the warforge gets it so can the dwarf, variant human, half elf, tiefling, etc. Warforge aren't a race made for an ultra low magic campaign set in darksun. Would you rather compare the ac of a dwarf wizard to a warforge wizard at various levels if the warforge? Be sure to include the opportunity cst of light medium & heavy armor proficiencies in your calculation i& say what the dwarf is taking instead if you think that the warforge will be picking them up

[MaxWilson]

Warforge don't get heavy armor prof either. However the warforge gets it so can the dwarf, variant human, half elf, tiefling, etc.

Right, so then if we're talking someone like a Fighter, why is the other guy a dwarf? Why not e.g. a human with HAM? What is dwarf even bringing to the table in this comparison?

[AdAstra]

Yeah, a better comparison would be Hill Dwarf, which can still use heavy armor without penalty, while getting extra HP. With the nice added bonus of Cleric being the only full caster that can have heavy armor at level 1.

[MaxWilson]

Yeah, a better comparison would be Hill Dwarf, which can still use heavy armor without penalty, while getting extra HP. With the nice added bonus of Cleric being the only full caster that can have heavy armor at level 1.

(Emphasis mine)


Eh, say rather that the penalty for dwarves is baked in: instead of moving 30' when unarmored and 20' when armored beyond his Str capacity, a dwarf just moves at 25' all the time.

I don't get why people think this is a good thing. In any campaign where movement rate matters due to playstyle, isn't moving 5' slower than everyone else a net negative instead of a net positive, especially when so many MM monsters move at approximately 30'? You can't run away from anything successfully!

Contrast with e.g. a Str 10 human [racial: Mobile] in plate armor moves at 30' (40' when unarmored), ignores difficult terrain when Dashing, and anyone he attacks in melee can't make opportunity attacks against him. That's clearly better than moving at 25' all the time.

[ravenkith]

Right, so then if we're talking someone like a Fighter, why is the other guy a dwarf? Why not e.g. a human with HAM? What is dwarf even bringing to the table in this comparison?

In this case, the mountain dwarf was selected as a 'tanky' race that had built in combat and non combat proficiencies, had the poison abilities, but DIDN'T provide anything 'extra'. Often discussed as a good 'vanilla' variant for a paladin, it leapt to mind as a race for comparison, precisely BECAUSE it didn't "bring anything to the table".

It was meant to be just a straight up comparison.

Splint is cheap in comparison to plate. The main argument against someone wearing plate at first-5th level is straight up going to be cost based. The other argument is going to be availability of more expensive armors as loot drops.

Splint has basically half the cost of plate, and between it and the scenario of a light armor wearing guy with a +2 dex, creates three scenarios where someone could conceivably get a 17 AC at low level. This is meant to showcase the fact that just by taking say, mountain dwarf and going a full caster, you are only 1 point of ac behind the warforged at this point - you aren't even doing anything optimal, yet here you are, keeping up.

The point was that you are basically getting a +1 to AC, and can't ever wear actual armors and benefit from their neat side effects. It is statistically likely that protection from crits or resistance to fire will be worth more depending on your style of play.


Love how you guys aren't really comparing the warforged to the super broken **** any more though. LOL.

[MaxWilson]

Love how you guys aren't really comparing the warforged to the super broken **** any more though. LOL.

Eh, I don't know who "you guys" is but Warforged still looks broken to me in anything but a high-magic context. Looking at low-level comparisons isn't where it's at. Your best counterargument was to say, "But it's not designed for low-magic campaigns anyway! If everyone else has plate armor +3, then Warforged is only getting +1 to AC!" to which I say yes... in a high-magic context. But in a more normal game that +4 to AC, in addition to floating stat bonuses/speed increases/poison resistance/not needing to breath or eat or sleep, definitely makes my powergamer instincts sit up and take notice.

Pointing to Yuan-ti as a point of comparison isn't a good move if you're trying to persuade people that the prior Warforged wasn't broken. : - ) Personally I feel Yuan-ti are a bit overrated but most people think they're completely OP.

[AdAstra]

It’s essentially free magic armor that scales with level, which comes on top of either very versatile stats or 35 ft speed. Whatever magical equipment you use to offset that extra AC, the warforged could be using to either buff their AC further (if they use a shield or can spare an attunement slot for rings/cloaks of protection), or boost their offense, or maybe fly, or just about anything. +3 armor is Legendary rarity, and Darkwood Core warforged have equivalent to that by level 9. Medium and Heavy warforged plating offers +2 over the best mundane armors at that level, still Very Rare.

Then there’s the fact that the AC calcs also take up so much room in the class’s design space. I’d rather see traits one can mix and match, including AC calcs (though probably weaker ones), than just numbers on the character sheet.

[Pex]

Once again? I don't really keep an eye on 5e updates. Would you mind elaborating? I'm curious

Personal pet peeve. Since 5E began when ever there was a rule that appeared to give a player a "Wow! Cool!" feeling, errata takes it away. A few eventually became official rules. For example, Evokers used to be able to Overchannel Cantrips at no personal damage. Fire based Dragon Sorcerers added CH modifier damage to all Scorching Rays. The most recent example is Shield Master not allowing you to bonus action Trip before your attacks. Technically revamping warforged isn't errata, but a Wow! Cool! thing is still being taken away. I can agree a Something that breaks the game could be a Wow! Cool! thing and should be fixed, but not every Wow! Cool! thing is broken and let the player enjoy it.

Anyway, I would have privately grumbled in my personal bias, but they could have kept the adaptive armor and lower the numbers a little if it was such a big deal.

[Tetrasodium]

Eh, I don't know who "you guys" is but Warforged still looks broken to me in anything but a high-magic context. Looking at low-level comparisons isn't where it's at. Your best counterargument was to say, "But it's not designed for low-magic campaigns anyway! If everyone else has plate armor +3, then Warforged is only getting +1 to AC!" to which I say yes... in a high-magic context. But in a more normal game that +4 to AC, in addition to floating stat bonuses/speed increases/poison resistance/not needing to breath or eat or sleep, definitely makes my powergamer instincts sit up and take notice.

Pointing to Yuan-ti as a point of comparison isn't a good move if you're trying to persuade people that the prior Warforged wasn't broken. : - ) Personally I feel Yuan-ti are a bit overrated but most people think they're completely OP.

It's not a matter of saying "It's not designed for low magic campaigns", it's people being polite enough to say that instead of "your low magic campaign has no bearing on & zero right to influence Eberron so clam up & go back to your irrelevant hypothetical campaign because that hypothetical campaign is obviously not set in Eberron." Now if you can explain why some hypothetical Athas (darksun) inspired campaign deserves so much consideration that it should supersede & overwrite the lore & tropes of Eberron your welcome to try making that uphill argument, but you aren't trying to make that argument & it's obvious why...

[Zalabim]

I want to be clear on the front end that warforged having a little more AC isn't actually going to bust any game. That said, there is no possible way to justify warforged getting (better than) free legendary armor. It would not be overpowered in a hypothetical campaign where every PC eventually gets literally free legendary armor anyway, but I know of no such campaign actually existing. More broadly, magic items are bonuses, boons, rewards, extras, optional. Warforged can be fine with an in-built armor that grows to match, or exceed, the best mundane armor fleshbags can wear, or even start out with in-built armor of the highest quality. That GP is small change in the grand scheme of things and, again, a few points of AC (within the normal range) won't actually break the game. What can never be justified is balancing racial features against magic items. Not wearing armor is not a penalty if your AC is still as good as armor, and if someone wants to award a warforged something that magic armor grants, there can still be a magic item, or other reward, with the exact same effect. Often times, there already is. Magic items can actually be or do anything, and there's example items that can only be used by warforged. They are not missing out on anything. Warforged can't wear adamantine armor? So what. That doesn't mean warforged cannot be immune to extra damage from critical hits some other way. In the end, magic items are balanced by magic items and racial features have to balance with racial features.

[Tetrasodium]

I want to be clear on the front end that warforged having a little more AC isn't actually going to bust any game. That said, there is no possible way to justify warforged getting (better than) free legendary armor. It would not be overpowered in a hypothetical campaign where every PC eventually gets literally free legendary armor anyway, but I know of no such campaign actually existing. More broadly, magic items are bonuses, boons, rewards, extras, optional. Warforged can be fine with an in-built armor that grows to match, or exceed, the best mundane armor fleshbags can wear, or even start out with in-built armor of the highest quality. That GP is small change in the grand scheme of things and, again, a few points of AC (within the normal range) won't actually break the game. What can never be justified is balancing racial features against magic items. Not wearing armor is not a penalty if your AC is still as good as armor, and if someone wants to award a warforged something that magic armor grants, there can still be a magic item, or other reward, with the exact same effect. Often times, there already is. Magic items can actually be or do anything, and there's example items that can only be used by warforged. They are not missing out on anything. Warforged can't wear adamantine armor? So what. That doesn't mean warforged cannot be immune to extra damage from critical hits some other way. In the end, magic items are balanced by magic items and racial features have to balance with racial features.

There is no need to justify it because it's a racial feature. Your post on the other hand does not even try to justify any reasons why warforge ac was problematic & skips straight to expecting people to justify why it should be as it is. Until we know what the "customization options are", {Scrubbed}

[AdAstra]

No one wants Warforged to be weaker than the average race, {scrub the post, scrub the quote}, and the Warforged Integrated Protection feature would have been a problem even in Eberron, which as you said, is wide-magic rather than high-magic.

[MaxWilson]

It's not a matter of saying "It's not designed for low magic campaigns", it's people being polite enough to say that instead of "your low magic campaign has no bearing on & zero right to influence Eberron so clam up & go back to your irrelevant hypothetical campaign because that hypothetical campaign is obviously not set in Eberron." Now if you can explain why some hypothetical Athas (darksun) inspired campaign deserves so much consideration that it should supersede & overwrite the lore & tropes of Eberron your welcome to try making that uphill argument, but you aren't trying to make that argument & it's obvious why...

Yes, it's obvious why--because I have no plans to buy the Eberron book, so the Warforged argument is just a hypothetical Internet argument to me. Spelljammer and Darksun are pretty cool though.

[Rukelnikov]

There is no need to justify it because it's a racial feature. Your post on the other hand does not even try to justify any reasons why warforge ac was problematic & skips straight to expecting people to justify why it should be as it is. Until we know what the "customization options are",{Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

Its doesn't only try, but it actually succeeds.

Getting a free legendary item, means its one legendary item ahead of the party, few racial skills are that powerful, only Aarakocras flight and Vhumans Feat top that, off the top of my head, and those are the two singlemost broken races in the game.

[Rukelnikov]

Yes, it's obvious why--because I have no plans to buy the Eberron book, so the Warforged argument is just a hypothetical Internet argument to me. Spelljammer and Darksun are pretty cool though.

Yeah... but tbh I just want a 5e Planescape... doubt it will happen though :(

[MaxWilson]

Yeah... but tbh I just want a 5e Planescape... doubt it will happen though :(

I'll offer you a 2E Planescape. Or I would, if we lived in the same city. : )

[Dork_Forge]

There is no need to justify it because it's a racial feature. Your post on the other hand does not even try to justify any reasons why warforge ac was problematic & skips straight to expecting people to justify why it should be as it is. Until we know what the "customization options are", {Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

Its the equivalent of free legendary armor AND a fighting style, can you honestly say that even Eberron is that magic rich? My understanding that the wide magic setting has no actual impact on the rarity of items like that kind of armor. So even in Eberron its out of place and completely outstrips other racial abilities (and the ones that keep up are more because they're a bit OP themselves). On top of that unbalanced AC they also get great abilities and stat improvements that makes the race great at literally any role.

Separate from that is the issue that the formula was developed with keeping up with a legendary item in mind. 5e design doesn't account for magic items, and there is no excuse for Warforged breaking that design philosophy, especially when the result breaks bounded accuracy.

I look forward to the Warforged, and find the idea of mix and match upgrades much more appealing than Integrated Protection was. This isn't bias against Eberron or low magic setting bias (which literally no one but you has brought up).

[Tetrasodium]

Its doesn't only try, but it actually succeeds.

Getting a free legendary item, means its one legendary item ahead of the party, few racial skills are that powerful, only Aarakocras flight and Vhumans Feat top that, off the top of my head, and those are the two singlemost broken races in the game.

Lets be honest, other races can wear +x armor, a ring of protection +1 is only rare & it's much a nonissue that LMoP includes both a ring & rod(?) of protection+1 & staff of defense +1 in a 1-4 adventure. Both would be quite available in eberron so I'll quote Keith Baker & wayfinder's guide to eberron on that availability

based on scarcity.
Rare magic. Spells of 4th through 5th level are beyond the reach of most people. People are familiar with the concept of spells like teleportation or raise dead, but few people have ever seen either of these things actually performed. Only the most remarkable magewrights have access to such magic, so these services usually come from the dragonmark houses, especially heirs with Greater Dragonmarks & Dragonshard Focus Items with Greater Dragonmarks and dragonshard focus items.

In theory, rare magic items can be purchased, with prices ranging anywhere from 2,000 gp–20,000 gp. In practice, these things are rare. A rare magic item might be the prize of a collection in a Sharn emporium, or the showpiece of a House Cannith forgehold. It’s more likely that such items will be acquired as rewards for working with a powerful organization than simply found for purchase in a store. Of course, should you have a ridiculous sum of gold burning a hole in your purse, you might be able to commission House Cannith to create a rare item for you... though this would take time.


In other words, they aren't off the shelf things you are going to find on the shelves of a village blacksmith like you might in FR. A tiefling has a free noattune cantrip wand (common or uncommon based on uncommon wand of magic missiles) & a free no attune ring of resistance for one of the most common& dangerous elemental damage types (also a rare magic item). A mountain dwarf gets light & medium armor proficiency for free, an elven chain shirt is a rare magic item that gives 14+dex(max2) & does not require you to be proficient... lots of rare magic items are duplicated by racial traits.

again, no he did not even try & simply hoped hyperbole would be enough.

@dork_forge, that should answer your question..
edit: on the fighting style point... It's only your lack of understanding that makes it relevant. Integrated protection is not "worn". Defense fighting style gives "While you are wearing armor, you gain a +1 bonus to AC.", a warforge can not apply that to the old IP.

[Petrocorus]

Personal pet peeve. Since 5E began when ever there was a rule that appeared to give a player a "Wow! Cool!" feeling, errata takes it away. A few eventually became official rules. For example, Evokers used to be able to Overchannel Cantrips at no personal damage. Fire based Dragon Sorcerers added CH modifier damage to all Scorching Rays. The most recent example is Shield Master not allowing you to bonus action Trip before your attacks. Technically revamping warforged isn't errata, but a Wow! Cool! thing is still being taken away. I can agree a Something that breaks the game could be a Wow! Cool! thing and should be fixed, but not every Wow! Cool! thing is broken and let the player enjoy it.

Anyway, I would have privately grumbled in my personal bias, but they could have kept the adaptive armor and lower the numbers a little if it was such a big deal.

While i overall agree with you (and don't apply that ruling on SM for instance), i definitely think that Warforged plating, as it was, was in the Too Cool and Unbalanced department.
Obviously, just tweaking the numbers would have make it a Wow! Cool! but balance thing.

My personal fix was to remove the prof bonus and raise the base numbers.


Unarmored: 11 + Dex mod
Light plating: 13 + Dex mod
Medium platin: 15 + Dex mod (max 2)
Heavy plating: 19 (Stealth disadvantage)
Proficiency required obviously.

This is still very good.
It still have +1 AC compared to the best armor of each category, for free, right from the start, and without strength requirement.
And it still more balanced that what the WGE gave us.
And it's possible to just homebrew a docent component that gives magical property to the plating.

[Dork_Forge]

Lets be honest, other races can wear +x armor, a ring of protection +1 is only rare & it's much a nonissue that LMoP includes both a ring & rod(?) of protection+1 & staff of defense +1 in a 1-4 adventure. Both would be quite available in eberron so I'll quote Keith Baker & wayfinder's guide to eberron on that availability

based on scarcity.
Rare magic. Spells of 4th through 5th level are beyond the reach of most people. People are familiar with the concept of spells like teleportation or raise dead, but few people have ever seen either of these things actually performed. Only the most remarkable magewrights have access to such magic, so these services usually come from the dragonmark houses, especially heirs with Greater Dragonmarks & Dragonshard Focus Items with Greater Dragonmarks and dragonshard focus items.

In theory, rare magic items can be purchased, with prices ranging anywhere from 2,000 gp–20,000 gp. In practice, these things are rare. A rare magic item might be the prize of a collection in a Sharn emporium, or the showpiece of a House Cannith forgehold. It’s more likely that such items will be acquired as rewards for working with a powerful organization than simply found for purchase in a store. Of course, should you have a ridiculous sum of gold burning a hole in your purse, you might be able to commission House Cannith to create a rare item for you... though this would take time.


In other words, they aren't off the shelf things you are going to find on the shelves of a village blacksmith like you might in FR. A tiefling has a free noattune cantrip wand (common or uncommon based on uncommon wand of magic missiles) & a free no attune ring of resistance for one of the most common& dangerous elemental damage types (also a rare magic item). A mountain dwarf gets light & medium armor proficiency for free, an elven chain shirt is a rare magic item that gives 14+dex(max2) & does not require you to be proficient... lots of rare magic items are duplicated by racial traits.

again, no he did not even try & simply hoped hyperbole would be enough.

@dork_forge, that should answer your question..
edit: on the fighting style point... It's only your lack of understanding that makes it relevant. Integrated protection is not "worn". Defense fighting style gives "While you are wearing armor, you gain a +1 bonus to AC.", a warforge can not apply that to the old IP.

I'll clarify, a warforged Fighter using the Heavy Armor version of IP tops out at 22AC, a non Warforged Fighter can only match that with a Legendary magic item AND spending their fighting style on defense. The race not only keeps pace with some presumed magic armor progression, but is a +1 step ahead of that.

In regards to any items of protection, they eat 1 of 3 attunement slots that could be used by another item. In comparison there is no significant cost to IP for the Warforged.

If you are going to claim many rare items are replicated by racial traits, then please can you give examples?

[MaxWilson]

Its the equivalent of free legendary armor AND a fighting style, can you honestly say that even Eberron is that magic rich?

Free, legendary, *weightless* magic armor and a fighting style. Not having to invest in Str is huge for armored spellcasters. It's practically a 3/4 feat.


While i overall agree with you (and don't apply that ruling on SM for instance), i definitely think that Warforged plating, as it was, was in the Too Cool and Unbalanced department.
Obviously, just tweaking the numbers would have make it a Wow! Cool! but balance thing.

My personal fix was to remove the prof bonus and raise the base numbers.


Unarmored: 11 + Dex mod
Light plating: 13 + Dex mod
Medium platin: 15 + Dex mod (max 2)
Heavy plating: 19 (Stealth disadvantage)
Proficiency required obviously.

This is still very good.
It still have +1 AC compared to the best armor of each category, for free, right from the start, and without strength requirement.
And it still more balanced that what the WGE gave us.
And it's possible to just homebrew a docent component that gives magical property to the plating.

I would allow that, if I were running Eberron. Still powerful, but in a way that makes sense, and isn't unprecedented. It's similar to a Mobile human, but with slightly better stat mods and more bonus abilities.

Note that the best medium armor is also AC 15 + Dex 2.

[Blood of Gaea]

+1 AC seems quite reasonable for the right build (I'm eyeballing an Eldritch Knight tank here), but I reserve my opinion until I get my hands on the entire kit.

[Rukelnikov]

Lets be honest, other races can wear +x armor, a ring of protection +1 is only rare & it's much a nonissue that LMoP includes both a ring & rod(?) of protection+1 & staff of defense +1 in a 1-4 adventure. Both would be quite available in eberron so I'll quote Keith Baker & wayfinder's guide to eberron on that availability

based on scarcity.
Rare magic. Spells of 4th through 5th level are beyond the reach of most people. People are familiar with the concept of spells like teleportation or raise dead, but few people have ever seen either of these things actually performed. Only the most remarkable magewrights have access to such magic, so these services usually come from the dragonmark houses, especially heirs with Greater Dragonmarks & Dragonshard Focus Items with Greater Dragonmarks and dragonshard focus items.

In theory, rare magic items can be purchased, with prices ranging anywhere from 2,000 gp–20,000 gp. In practice, these things are rare. A rare magic item might be the prize of a collection in a Sharn emporium, or the showpiece of a House Cannith forgehold. It’s more likely that such items will be acquired as rewards for working with a powerful organization than simply found for purchase in a store. Of course, should you have a ridiculous sum of gold burning a hole in your purse, you might be able to commission House Cannith to create a rare item for you... though this would take time.


In other words, they aren't off the shelf things you are going to find on the shelves of a village blacksmith like you might in FR. A tiefling has a free noattune cantrip wand (common or uncommon based on uncommon wand of magic missiles) & a free no attune ring of resistance for one of the most common& dangerous elemental damage types (also a rare magic item). A mountain dwarf gets light & medium armor proficiency for free, an elven chain shirt is a rare magic item that gives 14+dex(max2) & does not require you to be proficient... lots of rare magic items are duplicated by racial traits.

again, no he did not even try & simply hoped hyperbole would be enough.

@dork_forge, that should answer your question..
edit: on the fighting style point... It's only your lack of understanding that makes it relevant. Integrated protection is not "worn". Defense fighting style gives "While you are wearing armor, you gain a +1 bonus to AC.", a warforge can not apply that to the old IP.

I know, I'm not saying their final armor is over the top or anything (only the light armor, unarmored version which I do think its a bit OP).

The problem is that a Legendary item is normally very expensive in whatever currency its used, be it gold, AL's Treasure Points, or whatever a given group uses to trade or exchange them. My group while not a 3.5 lvls of custom crafting, still pretty much plays on those levels of availability. Whatever it is you wanna buy, if you can manage to get into the City of Brass or Union, or some other planar metropolis, you are likely gonna be able to find it (i.e: last campaign party spent a couple years in-game, from lvls 13 to 16, doing odd jobs accross the planes, to buy a spelljammer ship and some legendary items)

So while, yes others can get the same level of AC, they have to expend a considerable amount of resources there.

I wanna note however, that as long as Vhuman is the standard race, I think Warforged is ok with Integrated Protection. I've said before that if new content is balanced vs stuff that is generally considered underpowered, odds are the content landscape remains largely the same, and thus they become non-additions, so while I think this makes Warforged a very powerful race, likely amongst the most mechanically powerful races, I also think that is not a bad thing in itself, as long as its not more powerful than the most powerful, its fair game, and I 100% believe its not more powerful than Aarakocra or Vhuman. So if in my table I have 3 Vhumans, and someone wants to play a Warforged, I'd allow it as is.

[Zalabim]

Its doesn't only try, but it actually succeeds.

Getting a free legendary item, means its one legendary item ahead of the party, few racial skills are that powerful, only Aarakocras flight and Vhumans Feat top that, off the top of my head, and those are the two singlemost broken races in the game.
In terms of magic items, flight is available as an uncommon item, and +2 to an ability score (the cost of a feat) while breaking the 20 limit is very rare. Even the Yuan-ti's magic resistance shows up in magic items, blessings, or epic boons. It's neither strictly legendary nor does it strictly require attunement. There's the periapt of proof against poison. There seems to be no other racial ability that I could point to and so thoroughly say, this is unprecedented. That doesn't mean it's broken. That just means there's no existing justification for it.

There is no need to justify it because it's a racial feature. Your post on the other hand does not even try to justify any reasons why warforge ac was problematic & skips straight to expecting people to justify why it should be as it is. Until we know what the "customization options are", {Scrub the Post, scrub the quote}
Either +4 AC is fine or +4 AC is not fine, and no amount of "but magic armor" can change that. Racial abilities cannot be balanced by magic items. There is no exchange rate between them.

[Rukelnikov]

In terms of magic items, flight is available as an uncommon item

That is costing even more than the resources it takes to get the item itself which is the attunement slot, the real limiter at high level play.


, and +2 to an ability score (the cost of a feat) while breaking the 20 limit is very rare.

Exactly, the bonus the Warfoged get is more expensive, resource-wise, than a +2 to an ability score than can break the cap.
OT: We do changed the rarity/cost of a lot of items, the two you mentioned for instance, making the tomes legendary, and the boots rare.


Even the Yuan-ti's magic resistance shows up in magic items, blessings, or epic boons. It's neither strictly legendary nor does it strictly require attunement. There's the periapt of proof against poison. There seems to be no other racial ability that I could point to and so thoroughly say, this is unprecedented. That doesn't mean it's broken. That just means there's no existing justification for it.

The Magic Resistance, like the Winged Boots, takes an attunement slot, which is a rarer resource than gold or TP.

Boons, IMO, are an entire different category than magic items, so I don't put them in the same bag as the rest, the way I handle them, players have little agency of what boons they get, or even if they are getting any at all.

[Tetrasodium]

I know, I'm not saying their final armor is over the top or anything (only the light armor, unarmored version which I do think its a bit OP).

The problem is that a Legendary item is normally very expensive in whatever currency its used, be it gold, AL's Treasure Points, or whatever a given group uses to trade or exchange them. My group while not a 3.5 lvls of custom crafting, still pretty much plays on those levels of availability. Whatever it is you wanna buy, if you can manage to get into the City of Brass or Union, or some other planar metropolis, you are likely gonna be able to find it (i.e: last campaign party spent a couple years in-game, from lvls 13 to 16, doing odd jobs accross the planes, to buy a spelljammer ship and some legendary items)

So while, yes others can get the same level of AC, they have to expend a considerable amount of resources there. A warforge wanting to have PAM+GWM+Sentinel by fighter 6 literally can not do so & I'm unaware of any magic items or level 1-4 adventures that would allow the warforge to duplicate all three, and that's fine since we are talking about the wheelhouse of a variant human & the player should have chose that instead if they wanted to easily sit in that wheelhouse. If a variant human wants to stand level with a warforge in the warforge's own wheelhouse, that player can (with investment) while still sitting pretty in his own wheelhouse.

I wanna note however, that as long as Vhuman is the standard race, I think Warforged is ok with Integrated Protection. I've said before that if new content is balanced vs stuff that is generally considered underpowered, odds are the content landscape remains largely the same, and thus they become non-additions, so while I think this makes Warforged a very powerful race, likely amongst the most mechanically powerful races, I also think that is not a bad thing in itself, as long as its not more powerful than the most powerful, its fair game, and I 100% believe its not more powerful than Aarakocra or Vhuman.

I don't deny that there are opportunity costs, but people arguing that warforge IP is too good like to ignore that tchoosing warforge has an opportunity cost just like not choosing warforge is an opportunity cost. In both cases there is something gained from the choice that is hopefully something the player considers to be better or more interesting than the opportunity cost.

no ned to go to city of prass sigel etc, eberron does have sources for legendary gear


"Very Rare and Legendary Magic. Spells
of 6th level & above are largely the stuff legends and folktales. The few people known to wield this sort of power are themselves legends:
Mordain the Fleshweaver, the Keeper of the Silver Flame, the Daughters of Sora Kell. If encountered in the Five Nations, such magic will likely be tied to an eldritch machine or manifest zone.

Legendary magic items are generally the work of dragons or demons, or relics found in the ruins of Xen’drik. Very rare magic items could be tied to similar sources, or they might be masterworks of the elves of Aerenal or Valenar heirlooms. It’s unlikely that such a treasure would ever be sold."
That covers multiple locations on the continent of khorvaire & three other continents (Argonnessen, Xendriik, & Aerenal)



I'll clarify, a warforged Fighter using the Heavy Armor version of IP tops out at 22AC, a non Warforged Fighter can only match that with a Legendary magic item AND spending their fighting style on defense. The race not only keeps pace with some presumed magic armor progression, but is a +1 step ahead of that.

In regards to any items of protection, they eat 1 of 3 attunement slots that could be used by another item. In comparison there is no significant cost to IP for the Warforged.

If you are going to claim many rare items are replicated by racial traits, then please can you give examples?

{Scrubbed}

As to the non-warforge character hitting 22 AC... 19(+1 Plate, rare)+shield(+3 for an uncommon +1 shield) = 22 ac That player could alternately go with some combination of plain shield and fighting style or a ring/cloak of protection. 22 is Hardly an astronomical AC... especially at level 17+

No fighting style is needed, but the flesh race could benefit from it (something the warforge could not). The heavy plating is 16+prof. Prof is 2 then 3@5th, 4@9th, 5@13, & 6@17. A variant human who runs through LMOP(a 1-4 adventure) could have a staff & ring of protection (both rare items) for +2 ac on top of their armor. If they later pickup +1 plate armor (also a rare item) before 9th , they will actually beat the heavy plating warforge to 20 AC without a shield & match them all the way till 13 while keeping their feat/tiefling resistance & cantrip/etc.

[Dork_Forge]

{Scrub the post, scrub the quote}

As to the non-warforge character hitting 22 AC... 19(+1 Plate, rare)+shield(+3 for an uncommon +1 shield) = 22 ac That player could alternately go with some combination of plain shield and fighting style or a ring/cloak of protection. 22 is Hardly an astronomical AC... especially at level 17+

No fighting style is needed, but the flesh race could benefit from it (something the warforge could not). The heavy plating is 16+prof. Prof is 2 then 3@5th, 4@9th, 5@13, & 6@17. A variant human who runs through LMOP(a 1-4 adventure) could have a staff & ring of protection (both rare items) for +2 ac on top of their armor. If they later pickup +1 plate armor (also a rare item) before 9th , they will actually beat the heavy plating warforge to 20 AC without a shield & match them all the way till 13 while keeping their feat/tiefling resistance & cantrip/etc.

Just to be clear, I have always read the things you have actually written, what you're referring to is when I didn't read through several large copy and paste segments from the DMG (could have been another book).

Are you... Trying to say that items that give a +1 bonus to AC are the same thing? For the new Warforged sure, as from what we know they'll literally just give you a +1. That just isn't the same as giving you OP AC formulas (I think one if the ravnica races gives a +1, but I'm AFB and iirc that's also level gated and an option not the default) . There is nothing wrong with my reading comprehension here, you're just comparing apples to oranges from what I can see.

You seem to be giving the flesh race a bunch of magic items and a shield, but you're ignoring that those are all things that the Warforged could benefit from ON TOP of its Integrated Protection feature?

You're also successfully highlighting that ANY other race NEEDS magic items to be competitive with Warforged AC... And that's a huge part of the issue.

Cantrips and resistance don't really seem pertinent to IP power scaling, though since you brought it up, poison (one of the more common non BPS damage types) is a resistance that Warforged also benefit from.

[chainer1216]

I just hate that now my sentient golem built only for war now has to buy and wear the same armor as Fred the paladin.

[AdAstra]

Fire resistance and a cantrip? That's what you chose as an example of what's available to non-Warforged? Fire resistance is solid, if siuational, but the default Tiefling cantrip is Thaumaturgy, which is not worth much at all except for flavor. Hellish Rebuke and Darkness are alright spells, but hardly top picks. I would take a Wand of Magic Missiles over the spells in most cases, and that's a mere Uncommon item. Also, rings of resistance are not exactly prized magic items, even for fire.

Your own example states that it's going to be pretty much impossible to purchase Very Rare or Legendary items. Not exactly a great case that it's easy to match Warforged AC. The only item below that rarity that gives more than +1 is a +2 shield, which is Rare. The problem is that Warforged can use that just as easily as anyone else. In fact, since AC gives increasing returns the more you have, the Warforged is an ideal choice for such an item.

Plus, even with all of its power, the Warforged as a race feel kinda barren. The armor takes up so much balance space that there's very little room for more interesting/flavorful abilities, like hidden compartments or special vision modes. As I've said, I'd rather see something actually interesting rather than just big numbers.

[Tetrasodium]

I just hate that now my sentient golem built only for war now has to buy and wear the same armor as Fred the paladin.

I do too, it's completely incongruous with what warforge are & the reasons they were created to be used for. It's my hope that the "Customization options" are more like the body feats or something instead of rolling back to the original awful UA warforge.

[Tetrasodium]

Plus, even with all of its power, the Warforged as a race feel kinda barren. The armor takes up so much balance space that there's very little room for more interesting/flavorful abilities, like hidden compartments or special vision modes. As I've said, I'd rather see something actually interesting rather than just big numbers.

Others brought up tieflings, dwarves, & humans. I stuck with them. If you look at the quote from wgte, yea you probably aren't going to be buying them with coin; but doing work for your group's patron or someone they know could very well get you access to it. Keith talks about it in one of the manifest.zone podcasts.

Your looking in the wrong place for those things you mention though:

camouflaged compartment (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Camouflaged_Compartment): A warforged camouflaged compartment is a magically created compartment designed to appear exactly like the surrounding body part. This compartment creates an extra-dimensional space within the body of the warforged, where the warforged can store items. Camouflaged compartments were designed originally for the smuggling of contraband inside warforged slaves or to aid in the concealment of dangerous weapons. These compartments are traditionally found hidden in a warforged's chest, torso, or upper leg, and is a ten-cubic-foot space that holds up to 50 pounds. The opening face is no more than six inches across.
circlet of the eye (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/Circlet_of_the_Third_Eye):The circlet of the third eye is a blue-white headband, crafted from metal, which bears the icon of a single eye. When activated by the warforged, an actual eye sprouts from the icon, emerging on top of a six-inch-long eyestalk. This eye glows a bright yellow, and can be seen even in the darkest of shadows. In addition, the eyestalk can extend up to 10 feet.[1]
The circlet of the third eye grants the wearer both darkvision within a range of 60 feet and the effects of a continuous see invisibility spell. The eye can function for a total of one hour per day. This time does not need to be continuous, but each activation of the eye lasts at least 10 minutes.
Monocle of the ebon hunter (http://eberronunlimited.wikidot.com/monocle-of-the-ebon-hunter): his lens attached to your face makes you a deadly hunter at night, able to bring down your prey with arrows from the dark.
Lore: Warforged can attach a monocle of the ebon hunter to their temples; it improves their vision at night (Knowledge [arcana] DC 15). The monocle also help warforged archers hit their targets, whether it’s dark or not (Knowledge [arcana] DC 20).
[url="https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_warforged_components"]many many more components with interesting and/or flavorful benefits.
But I think that either it was a big coincidence or you were aware of these :D Having some of those "Customization options" be components might not be a bad thing either since Wotc's history has pretty much ignored them when building adventures mostly designed for FR & whatever 4e had

[Petrocorus]

Not only their AC is very good, but it's far from being their only feature.

If we look at the Envoy WF (because it's the best subrace for most build), in total, they get:

Dwarven resilience
Air genasi unlimited breath-holding (sorta), which include de facto an immunity to breathable poison.
Elf's immunity to sleep
No eat and drink, that's a ribbon in most cases, but combined with the immunity to sleep, that's a free warlock invocation.
Immunity to diseases. Without exception for magical ones.
Ability to hear and see while long-resting.
Integrated tool + specialized design that combined are almost as good as a feat (Prodigy).
+3 total ability bonus that can fit almost any build.


So they do get a lot in addition of their AC bonus.
And their AC bonus is free, from the start, auto-scaling, without a Strength requirement (aka drwarven speed). No other race has such a bonus to AC. For a composite plating, against level-appropriate magic armor if available, it's basically the equivalent of Medium Armor Master in term of AC, so half a feat.
They have a +1 to +4 bonus to AC compared to an equivalent build with any other race. And this is relevant in every single round of every single fight, contrary to damage resistance.
And it comes in addition of a package that would already be better than many race without it.

[AdAstra]

Not only their AC is very good, but it's far from being their only feature.

If we look at the Envoy WF (because it's the best subrace for most build), in total, they get:

Dwarven resilience
Air genasi unlimited breath-holding (sorta), which include de facto an immunity to breathable poison.
Elf's immunity to sleep
No eat and drink, that's a ribbon in most cases, but combined with the immunity to sleep, that's a free warlock invocation.
Immunity to diseases. Without exception for magical ones.
Ability to hear and see while long-resting.
Integrated tool + specialized design that combined are almost as good as a feat (Prodigy).
+3 total ability bonus that can fit almost any build.


So they do get a lot in addition of their AC bonus.
And their AC bonus is free, from the start, auto-scaling, without a Strength requirement (aka drwarven speed). No other race has such a bonus to AC. For a composite plating, against level-appropriate magic armor if available, it's basically the equivalent of Medium Armor Master in term of AC, so half a feat.
They have a +1 to +4 bonus to AC compared to an equivalent build with any other race. And this is relevant in every single round of every single fight, contrary to damage resistance.
And it comes in addition of a package that would already be better than many race without it.

Yeah even if you straight up removed Integrated Protection, the race would be far from the worst in the game. They'd definitely be better than non-fire Genasi, and probably better than the fire ones as well for most cases. Just having 35 foot movement as an option puts them on very good ground.

I think it's high time we talked about what kind of customization options we'd like to see, though, both as in-built race features and purchasable items.

I get the feeling there's already enough items designed that you could make a fantasy version of the Predator. I know there are integrated weapons, including possibly shoulder-mounted hand crossbows/wands, alternative vision modes, and hope there was some kind of invisibility/camouflage mode.

[Tetrasodium]

Yeah even if you straight up removed Integrated Protection, the race would be far from the worst in the game. They'd definitely be better than non-fire Genasi, and probably better than the fire ones as well for most cases. Just having 35 foot movement as an option puts them on very good ground.

I think it's high time we talked about what kind of customization options we'd like to see, though, both as in-built race features and purchasable items.

I get the feeling there's already enough items designed that you could make a fantasy version of the Predator. I know there are integrated weapons, including possibly shoulder-mounted hand crossbows/wands, alternative vision modes, and hope there was some kind of invisibility/camouflage mode.



The armblade/battlefist/etc were really3.5isms. Back then there were a lot more ways to get disarmd iirc & they pretty much made you immune to disarming. I'v tried thinking of ways to adapt them to 5e, but other than the wand sheath & maybe the armbow/shoulderbow it was difficult to come up with anything other than "this is just like X weapon from phb145/dmgxxx, but is physically attached to you & keeps that hand occupied" I couldn't really come up with anything :(. Wand sheath is detailed nicely in wayfinders & including some or all of crossbow expert in the armbow works to keep it different.

Without even one or two examples from wotc (we don't even know if the old body feats are among them or if wf will be wearing disgustinglyOP flesh armor+componts)it's difficult to even guess at the designspace allotted to the "customization options" :( People point at the AC of wf, but ignore the armor enchantments available to the armor of meat based races & those enchantments plus all(or even a notable fraction) of what the components allow could get kinda crazy

[MaxWilson]

I just hate that now my sentient golem built only for war now has to buy and wear the same armor as Fred the paladin.

What if they were written with the ability to rebuild themselves around equipment that they acquire? What if instead of wearing Fred the Paladin's armor, you were able to reconstruct your body out of Fred the Deceased Paladin's Armor? Would that still be lame or would it be cool? Mechanically it might be mostly equivalent to wearing armor (except you'd never have to take it off, and it probably wouldn't count against your encumbrance limit), but from a story perspective it avoids the stupidity of a armored metallic golem having to wear armor over its armored self.

Obligatory reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5TX4nWU2MM

[micahaphone]

I didn't even spot the reference, but that's a great way to do it.

[chainer1216]

What if they were written with the ability to rebuild themselves around equipment that they acquire? What if instead of wearing Fred the Paladin's armor, you were able to reconstruct your body out of Fred the Deceased Paladin's Armor? Would that still be lame or would it be cool? Mechanically it might be mostly equivalent to wearing armor (except you'd never have to take it off, and it probably wouldn't count against your encumbrance limit), but from a story perspective it avoids the stupidity of a armored metallic golem having to wear armor over its armored self.

Obligatory reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5TX4nWU2MM


For me personally, that still makes no sense lorewise, so is still lame, why would cannith make their war machines as fragile as a human? Why would the nations buy into something that needs to be equipped with everything a human soldier needs?

Your standard lvl1 warforged fighter is going to be running around in a chainshirt, thats just a dumb mental image, and if we go with your idea, how does one make sense of the warforged integrating that? What about leather armor?

Your idea also requires a lot of DM leniency, at the very best it will cost your warforged time to integrate new armor, most DMs will also demand a skill check and probably a gold cost, and a strict DM might not allow a warforged to use magic armor in this way, saying something like " because the integration process destroys the original item the enchantment doesnt survive." So at the very best a warforged is forced to expend resourses that no one else does just for being a warforged.

[JackPhoenix]

For me personally, that still makes no sense lorewise, so is still lame, why would cannith make their war machines as fragile as a human? Why would the nations buy into something that needs to be equipped with everything a human soldier needs?

What's the difference between making the warforged, including armor, and making the same warforged, making the same armor separately? Besides the visuals, nothing.... you still use the same amount of material to achieve the same result, except the later option is more modular.

Beyond that, warforged ignore huge part of human soldier's needs: no food, no clothes (and clothing variants depending on different climates, and replacement for damage and every day wear), no sleeping arrangements (and considerations for other biological functions), no medicine or hygiene (and diseases were the biggest killer in war until pretty recently in RL)... and the same tools used for WF maintenance would be required to maintain human equipment. The vastly simplified logistics would be a gamechanger in war. They can march for days without rest or supply lines, giving them considerable advantage in strategic mobility, and even if they lack darkvision, the enemy can't "catch them with their pants down" while they camp. They are immune to all but the most extreme enviromental effects. And when they suffer casaulties, they are easily replacable: you can get combat ready WF soldier in matter of weeks or months, but you'd have to wait 15-20 years with a human.

Thinking that Integrated Protection is the only reason why WF are more desirable than human soldiers shows lack of understanding how warfare works.


Your idea also requires a lot of DM leniency, at the very best it will cost your warforged time to integrate new armor, most DMs will also demand a skill check and probably a gold cost, and a strict DM might not allow a warforged to use magic armor in this way, saying something like " because the integration process destroys the original item the enchantment doesnt survive." So at the very best a warforged is forced to expend resourses that no one else does just for being a warforged.

It would require exactly zero DM leniency if the feature was written properly.

[Tetrasodium]

What if they were written with the ability to rebuild themselves around equipment that they acquire? What if instead of wearing Fred the Paladin's armor, you were able to reconstruct your body out of Fred the Deceased Paladin's Armor? Would that still be lame or would it be cool? Mechanically it might be mostly equivalent to wearing armor (except you'd never have to take it off, and it probably wouldn't count against your encumbrance limit), but from a story perspective it avoids the stupidity of a armored metallic golem having to wear armor over its armored self.

Obligatory reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5TX4nWU2MM


On top of all the reasons others have already explained why it would be "lame" rather than "cool" is the fact that it invades the designspace taken up by warforge components (https://eberron.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_warforged_components) (it's a huge list)because so many of them are designed to function outside what magic armor/robes/etc can grant rather than along with or in addition to what magic armor/robes/etc.

[Tetrasodium]

What's the difference between making the warforged, including armor, and making the same warforged, making the same armor separately? Besides the visuals, nothing.... you still use the same amount of material to achieve the same result, except the later option is more modular.

Beyond that, warforged ignore huge part of human soldier's needs: no food, no clothes (and clothing variants depending on different climates, and replacement for damage and every day wear), no sleeping arrangements (and considerations for other biological functions), no medicine or hygiene (and diseases were the biggest killer in war until pretty recently in RL)... and the same tools used for WF maintenance would be required to maintain human equipment. The vastly simplified logistics would be a gamechanger in war. They can march for days without rest or supply lines, giving them considerable advantage in strategic mobility, and even if they lack darkvision, the enemy can't "catch them with their pants down" while they camp. They are immune to all but the most extreme enviromental effects. And when they suffer casaulties, they are easily replacable: you can get combat ready WF soldier in matter of weeks or months, but you'd have to wait 15-20 years with a human.

Thinking that Integrated Protection is the only reason why WF are more desirable than human soldiers shows lack of understanding how warfare works.



It would require exactly zero DM leniency if the feature was written properly.
Once again you are ignoring the forest through the trees & cherry picking lore while excluding everything else from relevance in order to make a point. Cannith did not create or design the warforged like noonian soong (https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Noonian_Soong) created/designed Data & Lore. Cannith simply figured out how to turn on the creation forge before using trial & error to get enough understanding of how to use it that they could get it to spit out warforged. While diseases were a big problem in our wars until recently... but there is no reason to think eberron would have that problem. Cleansing stones are a thing & sub-cantrip level enchantments bound to items like a chamber pot entirely eliminates it from the equation. As far as medicine & managing disease, eberron is ahead of us in many ways simply by virtue of how magic in d&d works; Sharn & every underground Dhakaani city could not exist without hygiene related plagues from the amount of raw sewage alone if it was not.

[ravenkith]

Not only their AC is very good, but it's far from being their only feature.

If we look at the Envoy WF (because it's the best subrace for most build), in total, they get:

Dwarven resilience
Air genasi unlimited breath-holding (sorta), which include de facto an immunity to breathable poison.
Elf's immunity to sleep
No eat and drink, that's a ribbon in most cases, but combined with the immunity to sleep, that's a free warlock invocation.
Immunity to diseases. Without exception for magical ones.
Ability to hear and see while long-resting.
Integrated tool + specialized design that combined are almost as good as a feat (Prodigy).
+3 total ability bonus that can fit almost any build.


get a lot in addition of their AC bonus.
And their AC bonus is free, from the start, auto-scaling, without a Strength requirement (aka drwarven speed). No other race has such a bonus to AC. For a composite plating, against level-appropriate magic armor if available, it's basically the equivalent of Medium Armor Master in term of AC, so half a feat.
They have a +1 to +4 bonus to AC compared to an equivalent build with any other race. And this is relevant in every single round of every single fight, contrary to damage resistance.
And it comes in addition of a package that would already be better than many race without it.

Compare the Warforged Envoy to a Mountain Dwarf, with their shared benefits against poison, multiple feats and half feats, and situational benefits (darkvision vs not breathing), +3 stat points vs +4, etc.... It's pretty similar in terms of the overall AMOUNT of benefits.

That said...

ON INTEGRATED ARMOR:
Sure, the warforged can get a + 4 bonus to base AC over the course of 17 levels. Yep, absolutely true. The true AC gap between that player and others AT 17th level is definitely going to be less than 4, though. More likely it will be 3 or just 2. Most of the time along the way, the gap is just 1 or 2 points of AC. Keep in mind that at some point the group is getting a magic armor and it is ALMOST CERTAINLY going to the tank, period.

EXAMPLES AT CR 17:
CR 17 monsters in the SRD include adult gold and red dragons, the dragon turtle, and the androsphinx. The dragons get +14 to hit, the turtle gets +13 and the Sphinx gets +12. Worst case scenario is a +14 from either the red dragon or the gold, so lets look at that.

Lets say that the two characters aren't being particularly optimal. Neither are doing anything to increase their ac beyond the armor they are "wearing".

Your warforged has 16+6 (22) AC. Your non-warforged PC has 18. The dragon (whichever one) hits your warforged on an 8 or higher. The dragon hits the other characters on a 4 or higher. One is getting hit 60% of the time, the other 80% of the time. That's 20% difference, sure.

Note that the biggest bads in the SRD have +17s and +19s to hit, meaning that at those levels, the 18 vs 22 debate gets to a really strange place. At +17 to hit, the warforged character now does not get hit on a 1, 2, 3 and 4 while the other character would be getting hit on anything other than a 1. At 19, the advantage slides even further away, with the warforged not getting hit on a 1 or 2 while the other character is still not hit by a 1.

However, let's change things up a bit. Let's not forget that, by this time, the party (of 4 characters) will have, at level 17, 1 legendary, 2 or 3 rares and 2 or 3 uncommon permanent magic items per the chart.

We all know about +1(rare), +2(very rare) and +3 (legendary) armors, and their effect is obvious, so I wont waste time going into these too much, but it is NOT stretching things at all to say that you probably will have AT LEAST suit of +1 armor as the main tank in the group JUST FROM LOOT unless your GM is a total butt hole.

Keep in mind that loot isn't even your sole source for magic items. Even if magic items aren't freely available in the marketplace, there are, after all RULES FOR CREATING THEM (https://www.flutesloot.com/5e-crafting-magic-items/#dmgrules). Unless you and your party are TOTAL MORONS, or there is an artificial time crunch, there is no reason why, even if the items AREN'T available in the local economy, that you can't just MAKE THEM.

But lets take this further. We all know dragons don't just clobber people to death. What if they use their fiery breath weapons of doom?

Well, AC doesn't do **** to help you with that problem. It's all down to dex saves. EXCEPT!

What if the other PC has a suit of magic armor that gives them resistance to fire? That would only be a 'rare' item. But now, in comparison to the warforged who is denied this option altogether from armor, the warforged is saving for half, while the other character is only talking taking half on a FAILED save and saving for a quarter.

NOTE: Dragons are SMART. They aren't going to hit you where your defense is strongest.

Of course, some of you are going to say, that of COURSE there are ways of the warforged getting resistance or whatever, but equally, OF COURSE there are ways of making/finding/buying an armor bonus that is equal to what the warforged brings. The point here is that the warforged is actually pretty damn balanced, ESPECIALLY given that the bonus points of AC scale with level. The only thing it saves you is side quests and manufacturing time.

Remember the winged tiefling example? Yeah, that little lugger gets his full racial advantage at level one and keeps it all the way through the game. So does the Yuan-ti. THOSE are your broken races, folks.

What's really messed up is, it's the lower level mobs where the warforged actually gets less benefit, mathematically. Let's say our level 17 characters are each soloing a never ending horde of critters (individual bats). One has AC 18, the other has AC 22. The bat has +0 to hit.

The bat has a 5% chance to hit the warforged. This is flat, and cannot be obviated because of the crit rules. A crit is always a hit.It DOES NOT MATTER HOW HIGH THE WARFORGED AC is, he can never make the chance to hit him less than 5% with just his integrated armor.

The other character, with 18 AC, is getting hit 15% of the time, on an 18, 19 or 20, for the cost of 1500 gold pieces. AC 17 for 750 or 200 gp, depending on which way you go. Let's assume at 17th level he's managed to scrape together the 1500 for plate.

Now have both characters cast shield of faith or just carry a shield for a single + 2 to ac.

Now BOTH characters suddenly have only a 5% chance to be hit on a given role of the dice.

Everybody is out here acting like Warforged is utterly broken, but frankly, their big benefit can be pretty much negated by a level 1 paladin spell for 75% of the game.

TO PROVE MY POINT:
Going back to the dragons, there are many methods to improve AC.

Lets say that both characters are using +1 shields and are casting shield of faith, for a total of + 5 AC.

Lets say that the other character has a +1 armor and has the defense style, while the warforged took dueling (shrug).

Your Warforged is now at a nice 27 ac, while your other character is at 25. The dragon still has a +14 to hit. He'll hit the warforged with a 13 or higher, and the other character with an 11 or higher. They are both taking damage roughly half the time they are getting swung at.

Swap that +1 armor out for armor of resistance, and while the other character gets hit more often by the claws and bite, he's taking 50% less breath damage than the warforged, all other things being equal. With breath weapons maxing out at 120 points of damage each time it is rolled, that's pretty chunky.

Let's be clear here: The advantage to AC that the warforged provides is slim (mathematically significant to be sure, but still, closer to a +2 or +3 than a +4 as being touted by some folks) and the opportunity cost could be significant, especially if playing against a competent GM, as good GMs, like dragons, are smart, and will likely not attack you where you are strongest, lol.

Drop these characters down one level to 16 and fight these same CR17 critters and the warforged has lost a point of AC and the gap is even slimmer!

Take this pair down to level 12 and there is no gap for the warforged.

Yes, the warforged have a low level game advantage and a small high end advantage, but they really don't benefit much from integrated armor in the mid game.


ONE MORE THING....
Now lets look at another aspect of this: let's go back to that winged tiefling example. That guy can have an AC 17 base with medium armor (15+2 dex), have a flight speed, and carry a shield at low levels, putting him at a 19 AC (warforged is at 20, with a shield), with, effectively, immunity to melee attacks. Now THAT's broken :D

[AdAstra]

Ok, if we’re doing this, why would warforged AC increase with proficiency if they were built with it? Does their armor somehow get tougher with time? Aside from leveling not being directly correlated with time, that has issues. That might make sense for Darkwood Core, given that wood can strengthen when aged, but I’m pretty sure the self-repairing of the armor would get in the way of that, as the material is constantly being replaced. For the metallic armors it makes even less sense. Given that the scaling is based on proficiency, the logical explanation for the extra AC is that the warforged somehow get better at dodging/preventing people from targeting their weak spots. The issue with that is, why can nobody else do that? Why is it that even noncombatant warforged increase in AC as they get more experienced, while flesh-and-blood warriors cannot? You could say that as being hardwired for war, but that just turns into “oh yeah if you want to fight you better be warforged. No sense in even trying otherwise. They’re just built for it”.

Also, as to the advantages of Warforged as soldiers even if they didn’t have superior AC. Warforged are (fairly) easily trained to very high competence, can be created on-demand even if the rate is limited, don’t need to be paid or really cared for in any way aside from ensuring they have weapons. Using them means you don’t have to draft people who have jobs and lives to get back to, leaving your industries and farming operating at higher capacity than normal. Warforged obey (or used to, anyhow) orders without question or insubordination. Back in the Last War, you wouldn’t need to worry about spies amongst the ranks. Warforged have no families, nothing to come home to, and used to not have anything more to live for than following orders and fighting. That means they won’t rout or lose cohesion, which in real-world history is how most battles were lost, and how most casualties were inflicted. They also don’t tire as easily, and can stay alert and in fighting conditions with far less downtime, giving them unmatched endurance both on and off the battlefield. Plus, mortals only breed so fast. In a deadly, grinding conflict like the Last War, there would likely become a point where you just can’t draft any more people without causing problems in the future. Wiping out your younger generations tends to result in fewer children, which then results in fewer people. The creation forges bypass that problem.

[ravenkith]

Ok, if we’re doing this, why would warforged AC increase with proficiency if they were built with it? Does their armor somehow get tougher with time? Aside from leveling not being directly correlated with time, that has issues. That might make sense for Darkwood Core, given that wood can strengthen when aged, but I’m pretty sure the self-repairing of the armor would get in the way of that, as the material is constantly being replaced. For the metallic armors it makes even less sense. Given that the scaling is based on proficiency, the logical explanation for the extra AC is that the warforged somehow get better at dodging/preventing people from targeting their weak spots. The issue with that is, why can nobody else do that? Why is it that even noncombatant warforged increase in AC as they get more experienced, while flesh-and-blood warriors cannot? You could say that as being hardwired for war, but that just turns into “oh yeah if you want to fight you better be warforged. No sense in even trying otherwise. They’re just built for it”.

Also, as to the advantages of Warforged as soldiers even if they didn’t have superior AC. Warforged are (fairly) easily trained to very high competence, can be created on-demand even if the rate is limited, don’t need to be paid or really cared for in any way aside from ensuring they have weapons. Using them means you don’t have to draft people who have jobs and lives to get back to, leaving your industries and farming operating at higher capacity than normal. Warforged obey (or used to, anyhow) orders without question or insubordination. Back in the Last War, you wouldn’t need to worry about spies amongst the ranks. Warforged have no families, nothing to come home to, and used to not have anything more to live for than following orders and fighting. That means they won’t rout or lose cohesion, which in real-world history is how most battles were lost, and how most casualties were inflicted. They also don’t tire as easily, and can stay alert and in fighting conditions with far less downtime, giving them unmatched endurance both on and off the battlefield. Plus, mortals only breed so fast. In a deadly, grinding conflict like the Last War, there would likely become a point where you just can’t draft any more people without causing problems in the future. Wiping out your younger generations tends to result in fewer children, which then results in fewer people. The creation forges bypass that problem.

Not that "why" really matters, but proficiency bonuses represent learning/gained expertise from doing what you do over time, typically.

The reason why warforged get better at defense over time, and NOT other races, if I were writing the fluff to explain the mechanic, is because when they were initially created, their defensive behaviors were modeled off of flesh and blood creatures who actively avoid contact in battle because it comes with pain.

Their skills and actions had to come from SOMEWHERE, and the most likely source is being modeled off of a particularly skilled warrior (think Jango Fett as the source material for the clones in star wars). Those behaviors get wired into the makeup of warforged as they are built.

It takes time for warforged to overcome these hardwired pre-programmed behaviors as they learn the exact limits of their mechanomagical bodies and how far they can push those limits before they break - and they get better and better at being metal death machines the more time they have to stack learning on top of what was initially programmed into them.

The warforged do not feel pain. They do not bleed. They do not get tired in the same way fleshy creatures do. They don't have to protect their groins and the nerve clusters that are located there in battle in the same way that the fleshy creature they were modeled after had to.

It takes time to learn all the advantages their metal bodies give them - but learn them they do.

Simple, really.

[Tetrasodium]

@ravenkith great post, too many of the detractors want to ignore all of that and analyze AC in a vacuum.


Ok, if we’re doing this, why would warforged AC increase with proficiency if they were built with it? Does their armor somehow get tougher with time? Aside from leveling not being directly correlated with time, that has issues. That might make sense for Darkwood Core, given that wood can strengthen when aged, but I’m pretty sure the self-repairing of the armor would get in the way of that, as the material is constantly being replaced. For the metallic armors it makes even less sense. Given that the scaling is based on proficiency, the logical explanation for the extra AC is that the warforged somehow get better at dodging/preventing people from targeting their weak spots. The issue with that is, why can nobody else do that? Why is it that even noncombatant warforged increase in AC as they get more experienced, while flesh-and-blood warriors cannot? You could say that as being hardwired for war, but that just turns into “oh yeah if you want to fight you better be warforged. No sense in even trying otherwise. They’re just built for it”.

Also, as to the advantages of Warforged as soldiers even if they didn’t have superior AC. Warforged are (fairly) easily trained to very high competence, can be created on-demand even if the rate is limited, don’t need to be paid or really cared for in any way aside from ensuring they have weapons. Using them means you don’t have to draft people who have jobs and lives to get back to, leaving your industries and farming operating at higher capacity than normal. Warforged obey (or used to, anyhow) orders without question or insubordination. Back in the Last War, you wouldn’t need to worry about spies amongst the ranks. Warforged have no families, nothing to come home to, and used to not have anything more to live for than following orders and fighting. That means they won’t rout or lose cohesion, which in real-world history is how most battles were lost, and how most casualties were inflicted. They also don’t tire as easily, and can stay alert and in fighting conditions with far less downtime, giving them unmatched endurance both on and off the battlefield. Plus, mortals only breed so fast. In a deadly, grinding conflict like the Last War, there would likely become a point where you just can’t draft any more people without causing problems in the future. Wiping out your younger generations tends to result in fewer children, which then results in fewer people. The creation forges bypass that problem.

Mechanically it's convenient & perhaps easier to remember the scaling/print in a reasonable space than if it said it goes to x at 5 y at 9 z at 13 & q at 17 for composite then again for heavy plating.

Lorewise they are sentient golems made of living stone, living metal, & livewood (http://eberronunlimited.wikidot.com/livewood). Since age is not really an abstraction that gets tracked & advanced in any meaningful way during your average campaign it's as good a thing as any to peg the advancement of those materials becoming better structured or the warforge itself being more experienced in using their body defensively. That possibility is not without merit though... wood gets harder as it ages & a properly cared for cast iron pan only gets better the more you use it.

[JackPhoenix]

Once again you are ignoring the forest through the trees & cherry picking lore while excluding everything else from relevance in order to make a point. Cannith did not create or design the warforged like noonian soong (https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Noonian_Soong) created/designed Data & Lore. Cannith simply figured out how to turn on the creation forge before using trial & error to get enough understanding of how to use it that they could get it to spit out warforged.

Which, as usual, has nothing to do with anything I've posted. Yes, Cannith are using magic items they do not fully understand. No, they are actually pretty good at messing with minor stuff like what plating a WF has on top. What they don't know is what brings WF to life and where their sapience comes from. Warforged provably have souls, and nobody has any idea how that happened.


While diseases were a big problem in our wars until recently... but there is no reason to think eberron would have that problem. Cleansing stones are a thing & sub-cantrip level enchantments bound to items like a chamber pot entirely eliminates it from the equation. As far as medicine & managing disease, eberron is ahead of us in many ways simply by virtue of how magic in d&d works; Sharn & every underground Dhakaani city could not exist without hygiene related plagues from the amount of raw sewage alone if it was not.

And they do not exist without that. You may note that the lower districts of Sharn are described multiple times as filthy places, and diseases aren't uncommon amongst the inhabitants (though to what extent is that due to fallout from War of the Mark is anyone's guess), even with pretty effective system to deal with sewage. Upper levels, not so much, because sh** literally flows downhill, in this case. And we don't know much about hygiene in Dhakaani cities, but goblinoids were often described as more resistant to diseases and poor living conditions than humans in 3.5, even though that had no mechanical representation (well, there were, as it was usual in 3.5, some feats for that).

[AdAstra]

wood gets harder as it ages & a properly cared for cast iron pan only gets better the more you use it.

For this particular thing, there's more to it. Wood requires certain conditions to "season" properly (needs to be dried, but ideally not too fast), or else it has a good chance of getting weaker or rotting, rather than stronger. Field conditions are unlikely to be ideal for this. This probably shouldn't apply to livewood anyway, due to being, well, alive. Living wood can get stronger with age as well, but that depends. It's certainly plausible though.

For cast iron pans, "better" has nothing to do with strength. The improvement in quality comes from cooking oil carbonizing onto the pan surface, known as seasoning. This layer basically serves as a non-stick coating, and protects the metal from rust. Doesn't improve the strength of the metal. The seasoning itself is also quite fragile, being easily removed by hard scrubbing or harsh chemicals.

There are metals that develop superior properties with age, but that's usually on a scale of like, days. Whatever plate the warforged are built with would almost certainly have reached maximum strength by the time they were trained, since that takes months.

[Tetrasodium]

For this particular thing, there's more to it. Wood requires certain conditions to "season" properly (needs to be dried, but ideally not too fast), or else it has a good chance of getting weaker or rotting, rather than stronger. Field conditions are unlikely to be ideal for this. This probably shouldn't apply to livewood anyway, due to being, well, alive. Living wood can get stronger with age as well, but that depends. It's certainly plausible though.

For cast iron pans, "better" has nothing to do with strength. The improvement in quality comes from cooking oil carbonizing onto the pan surface, known as seasoning. This layer basically serves as a non-stick coating, and protects the metal from rust. Doesn't improve the strength of the metal. The seasoning itself is also quite fragile, being easily removed by hard scrubbing or harsh chemicals.

There are metals that develop superior properties with age, but that's usually on a scale of like, days. Whatever plate the warforged are built with would almost certainly have reached maximum strength by the time they were trained, since that takes months.

While all of that is true, we are talking about magical fantasy elements/compounds. There could be any number of reasons (including skill) for the ac to go up as a warforged levels, I just gave a few offhand possibilities

@jackphoenix: The lower levels of sharn are people nobody with money cares much about. Expensive trained soldiers way out near the front lines are absolutely someone people with money cares about because they can't fight & die for their nation if they are dieing of dysentary/sepsis/gangrene/etc in camp. The "hardy" goblins presented in 3.5 are still presented that way.... in the forgotten realms. The dhakaani were unquestionably more advanced than the five nations in many ways & it doesn't matter if all the people in those subterranean cities handled hygiene via magic or like ants (https://phys.org/news/2019-09-fungus-farming-ants-antibiotic-resistance-problem.html). The point is that it's a solved problem & the tools to fix it did not need to be invented or discovered during the last war. nearly a century of war is plenty of time to standardize the kinds of middle class consumer goods that absolutely must be included in a military camp. It didn't take a hundred years for militaries & countries funding expeditions to realize that mixing strong alchohol in with a soldier's/explorer's water would help disinfect the water if it wasn't properly boiled or that the quinine in Gin helped protect against malaria in tropical/jungle climates... people noticed that Gin drinkers frequently wound up not getting malaria even though their entire squad did & realized it was cheaper to give them gin than replace them. Over a hundred years of war, people would notice that people/units that employed various hygene products like cleansing stones & self Self-prestidigitating waste pots didn't come down with the horrible camp diseases as often or severely.

Edit: as to cannith's knowledge of the creation forge, they were experimenting with it right up to the final days of the war and maybe even after. Their ability to manipulate the results was limited to what it was made to build by the giants... Think of it like a printer. No matter how well you have mastery over it... You really can't print out your resume on paper using PLA or create a replacement gnob for your radio with an ink jet

[AdAstra]

While all of that is true, we are talking about magical fantasy elements/compounds. There could be any number of reasons (including skill) for the ac to go up as a warforged levels, I just gave a few offhand possibilities

@jackphoenix: The lower levels of sharn are people nobody with money cares much about. Expensive trained soldiers way out near the front lines are absolutely someone people with money cares about because they can't fight & die for their nation if they are dieing of dysentary/sepsis/gangrene/etc in camp. The "hardy" goblins presented in 3.5 are still presented that way.... in the forgotten realms. The dhakaani were unquestionably more advanced than the five nations in many ways & it doesn't matter if all the people in those subterranean cities handled hygiene via magic or like ants (https://phys.org/news/2019-09-fungus-farming-ants-antibiotic-resistance-problem.html). The point is that it's a solved problem & the tools to fix it did not need to be invented or discovered during the last war. nearly a century of war is plenty of time to standardize the kinds of middle class consumer goods that absolutely must be included in a military camp. It didn't take a hundred years for militaries & countries funding expeditions to realize that mixing strong alchohol in with a soldier's/explorer's water would help disinfect the water if it wasn't properly boiled or that the quinine in Gin helped protect against malaria in tropical/jungle climates... people noticed that Gin drinkers frequently wound up not getting malaria even though their entire squad did & realized it was cheaper to give them gin than replace them. Over a hundred years of war, people would notice that people/units that employed various hygene products like cleansing stones & self Self-prestidigitating waste pots didn't come down with the horrible camp diseases as often or severely.

Aside from the fact that there are many other advantages to Warforged soldiers, less disease is very different from no disease, especially considering people were probably using all kinds of magical superillnesses to gain an edge.

[Petrocorus]

Compare the Warforged Envoy to a Mountain Dwarf, with their shared benefits against poison, multiple feats and half feats, and situational benefits (darkvision vs not breathing), +3 stat points vs +4, etc.... It's pretty similar in terms of the overall AMOUNT of benefits.

No they don't.
Darkvision is more useful that not breathing.
But beside this, the Warforged Envoy is still better than the Mountain Dwarf for most builds.
The benefit of the Mountain Dwarf will not benefit so many builds, they cannot choose their benefit, while the WF can choose his ability bonus and his bonus proficiency, and his IP.
And honestly, the M-Dwarf weapon proficiencies and even more the armor proficiencies are basically a ribbon on a +2 Str race. How many builds can actually benefit from it? Most of the time you will use this race with a class that gives you this proficiencies.




ON INTEGRATED ARMOR:
Sure, the warforged can get a + 4 bonus to base AC over the course of 17 levels. Yep, absolutely true. The true AC gap between that player and others AT 17th level is definitely going to be less than 4, though. More likely it will be 3 or just 2. Most of the time along the way, the gap is just 1 or 2 points of AC. Keep in mind that at some point the group is getting a magic armor and it is ALMOST CERTAINLY going to the tank, period.

Which is on par with what i said. It will be +1 to +4 depending on the level, the specific build, and the availability of magic armor.




EXAMPLES AT CR 17:
CR 17 monsters in the SRD..... role of the dice.

Huge wall of text to argue that the Warforged's IP will be less relevant at level 17 against level-appropriate monsters.
Something i agree on, even if i don't agree with everything you said specifically. +1 to +4 AC at this level is clearly less relevant that at lower level, even if it's still relevant against attacks against AC (that are rarer) and against lower level mooks (that are not that threatening to other party members but still less threatening to the warforged).




Everybody is out here acting like Warforged is utterly broken, but frankly, their big benefit can be pretty much negated by a level 1 paladin spell for 75% of the game.

A spell that:
1) takes a spell prepared slot, a spell slot and your concentration.
2) can benefit a warforged also.
This point is moot.




TO PROVE MY POINT:
Going back to the dragons, there are many methods to improve AC.....but they really don't benefit much from integrated armor in the mid game.

You're still focusing on high or maybe mid-high game, but not every body play at high level.

The warforged will have a +1 to +4 AC compared to any other race with an equivalent build at every level from the start to level 20, for almost any build, all other things being equal.

"All other things being equal" because any spell, feat, class feature or wondrous item can benefit the warforged (except magic armor) if we consider the WF is wearing armor for the purpose of feat and feature, as it was apparently intended according to a tweet by one of the writers. Even without it, most of spells, features and wondrous items will still benefit him as much as an armored guy of another race.

And yes, this superior AC will be less and less relevant as the level is higher, it will still be there and will still be relevant against attacks targeting AC.



ONE MORE THING....
Now lets look at another aspect of this: let's go back to that winged tiefling example. That guy can have an AC 17 base with medium armor (15+2 dex), have a flight speed, and carry a shield at low levels, putting him at a 19 AC (warforged is at 20, with a shield), with, effectively, immunity to melee attacks. Now THAT's broken :D
First, his half-plate with opening for wings will cost a lot, and he won't have it for the first levels.

Two, the fly speed may become useless in many situations. Every time he's in a building or an dungeon with a low ceiling, he won't be able to really benefit from it. And there are a significant number of place like this in official campaigns.
This is actually why i dislike race with flight. It's whether brokenly powerful or basically moot depending on the situation.

Three, your point about IP being less relevant at high level is also valid for racial flight (to a lesser degree though). At level 17, this could just turn your Tiefling into the primary target of your CR 17 dragon's melee attacks.

[Zalabim]

Remember the winged tiefling example? Yeah, that little lugger gets his full racial advantage at level one and keeps it all the way through the game. So does the Yuan-ti. THOSE are your broken races, folks.

"All other things being equal" because any spell, feat, class feature or wondrous item can benefit the warforged (except magic armor) if we consider the WF is wearing armor for the purpose of feat and feature, as it was apparently intended according to a tweet by one of the writers. Even without it, most of spells, features and wondrous items will still benefit him as much as an armored guy of another race.

First, his half-plate with opening for wings will cost a lot, and he won't have it for the first levels.

Two, the fly speed may become useless in many situations. Every time he's in a building or an dungeon with a low ceiling, he won't be able to really benefit from it. And there are a significant number of place like this in official campaigns.
This is actually why i dislike race with flight. It's whether brokenly powerful or basically moot depending on the situation.

Three, your point about IP being less relevant at high level is also valid for racial flight (to a lesser degree though). At level 17, this could just turn your Tiefling into the primary target of your CR 17 dragon's melee attacks.
I'm combining these two points to bring up a fourth: AC stacks. Flying doesn't. Magic resistance/advantage doesn't. The warforged can add bonus AC to their already higher base AC, but winged tieflings cannot add any of the other methods of flight to their flight speed or ability. The Yuan-ti cannot add their magic resistance to a Staff of the Magi, Holy Avenger, Spellguard Shield, Scarab of Protection, or Mantle of Spell Resistance, or any lesser feature that gives advantage on a saving throwt. Some of those are powerful, indeed legendary, items that even a Yuan-ti spellcaster or paladin would still love to have. You can give a yuan-ti paladin and an envoy paladin both the Holy Avenger, and they'll both be happy, but it's pretty clear which one is the winner in that case.

t: Not intended as a defense of the Yuan-ti.

[JNAProductions]

I'm combining these two points to bring up a fourth: AC stacks. Flying doesn't. Magic resistance/advantage doesn't. The warforged can add bonus AC to their already higher base AC, but winged tieflings cannot add any of the other methods of flight to their flight speed or ability. The Yuan-ti cannot add their magic resistance to a Staff of the Magi, Holy Avenger, Spellguard Shield, Scarab of Protection, or Mantle of Spell Resistance, or any lesser feature that gives advantage on a saving throwt. Some of those are powerful, indeed legendary, items that even a Yuan-ti spellcaster or paladin would still love to have. You can give a yuan-ti paladin and an envoy paladin both the Holy Avenger, and they'll both be happy, but it's pretty clear which one is the winner in that case.

t: Not intended as a defense of the Yuan-ti.

Not QUITE true-spells like Expeditious Retreat or a Rogue's Cunning Action don't directly affect your fly speed, but let you get more mileage out of it.

That being said, the old Warforged's Integrated Protection was pretty damn busted.

[JackPhoenix]

Two, the fly speed may become useless in many situations. Every time he's in a building or an dungeon with a low ceiling, he won't be able to really benefit from it. And there are a significant number of place like this in official campaigns.
This is actually why i dislike race with flight. It's whether brokenly powerful or basically moot depending on the situation.

Three, your point about IP being less relevant at high level is also valid for racial flight (to a lesser degree though). At level 17, this could just turn your Tiefling into the primary target of your CR 17 dragon's melee attacks.

I feel like I should quote (well, paraphrase, I don't remember the exact words) Schlock Mercenary:

"Do you know what we call flying soldiers on a battlefield?"
"Air support?"
"Skeet."

Flying around to avoid melee attackers sounds like a great idea until enemy casts Hold Person