Tortle monk AC question

[huginn]

Hello

I am in a 5e group with limited experience and someone made a 3rd tortle monk and claimed his AC is 19 based on what is on this page https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Tortle_(5e_Race_Variant) , his stats and the monk description. I have 2 questions
1) is an 19 ac right? He is adding his con and dex modifiers to 13
2) Is what on that page official or is it homebrew. I thought all tortles has an ac of 17

[DarknessEternal]

Those aren't official tortle rules.

Tortles have 17 Ac, or in the case of a Tortle monk, he could have 10+dex mod+wis mod.

You get to pick one method of determining AC.

[vasharanpaladin]

1) Incorrect. It would be 13 + Dexterity OR 10 + Dexterity + Wisdom. These AC calculations never stack. However...

2) The linked page is homebrew, and Dandwiki besides. Official tortles do not have subraces, and do in fact have a set AC of 17 due to racial features.

EDIT: Ninja'd.

[Xiander]

The link you posted does not show the tortle's official stats.

From D&D beyond on tortles and ac:
Natural Armor
Due to your shell and the shape of your body, you are ill-suited to wearing armor. Your shell provides ample protection, however; it gives you a base AC of 17 (your Dexterity modifier doesn’t affect this number). You gain no benefit from wearing armor, but if you are using a shield, you can apply the shield’s bonus as normal.


This means that his AC is 17. He can raise it to 19 by donning a shield.
He can also choose to use the monk's unarmored defence instead, in which case his AC is 10+dex+wis. These to abilities do not synergise, you have to pick one of the two ways to calculate your armor.


Note, that this is all according to the published Tortle statblock. If your group decides to use the stats you posted, more power to you :smallcool:

[Zhorn]

If the DM's signed off on it, then the player can use whatever rule set regardless of source.

however

dandwiki is a bit notorious for badly informing new players. If anyone is trying to use that as a source, you can be sure almost none of it will be RAW compliant or official.

As already stated above: AC calculations are not combined. Any that set a base number and the modifier that apply ONLY use those, unless some other feature talks in a more general modifier. example;
A cloak of protect is a +1 to AC, so it'll work with any AC calculation

Mage Armor is 13+DEX
Unarmored defense (monk) is 10+ DEX+WIS
Natural Armor (tortle from the tortle package) is 17.
Each give a base number, cannot be combined

[huginn]

If the DM's signed off on it, then the player can use whatever rule set regardless of source.

however

dandwiki is a bit notorious for badly informing new players. If anyone is trying to use that as a source, you can be sure almost none of it will be RAW compliant or official.



A large part of the problem is that this is a DM new to 5th and 2 players are telling her its official

[Zhorn]

A large part of the problem is that this is a DM new to 5th and 2 players are telling her its official

The top of the very page linked to says in the purple banner
"Homebrew Page
This page was created by a user of D&D Wiki, and is not official content. Talk to your Dungeon Master before you use it"

[Magicspook]

That's quite an achievement. Your player miscalculated his AC and didn't manage to find the official tortle stats.

1) dndwiki has a lot of homebrew, but you can easily find which is which by looking at the top of the page. Purple banner means homebrew. As a DM, I wouldn't want my players to use dndwiki homebrew stuff as it's mostly super unbalanced.
2) you can choose which way of AC calculation to use, but you cannot mix and match. So imagine if you did allow the player to use this tortle, he would have to choose 13+CON OR 10+DEX+CON. 13+DEX+CON is not valid, and I'd check your player's character sheet for other 'mistakes' as well because the rules clearly say so. It might be that he is trying to get away with a bit of creative character creation.

Cheers!

[kazaryu]

Hello

I am in a 5e group with limited experience and someone made a 3rd tortle monk and claimed his AC is 19 based on what is on this page https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Tortle_(5e_Race_Variant) , his stats and the monk description. I have 2 questions
1) is an 19 ac right? He is adding his con and dex modifiers to 13
2) Is what on that page official or is it homebrew. I thought all tortles has an ac of 17

so...im not gonna completely reiterate what everyone else has said.

what i will *add* however. is that 1 is wrong and the linked page explicitly says that its wrong.

under the 'softshell' subrace, the 'softshell' trait starts with: 'A softshell tortle's loses their Shell and Retreat into Shell traits.' and its the 'shell' trait that gives 13+con. im pointing this out so you know how to explain *why* that player doesn't get a 19 AC.


'

[Lavaeolus]

A large part of the problem is that this is a DM new to 5th and 2 players are telling her its official

The Tortle is an official race, and as a bit of trivia D&D Wiki does have a page (https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Tortle_(5e_Race)) on the Wizards version. Granted, the page solely consists of "Tortle is copyrighted by Wizards".

As mentioned by others, the page linked outright says "This page was created by a user and is not official content." You might notice it's titled (5e Race Variant) -- because it's a homebrew alternative to the actual race. Not realising this is probably what's tripping your two other players.

Allowing for the homebrew, the AC calculation is still wrong, of course, as mentioned above.