Arcane Spell Failure

[Liadel]

I'm working on playing an arcane archer and was hoping to wear some of sort of armor in order to stay alive longer.

I can wear light armor from my ranger levels, but don't trust my luck against 15-20% failure rates. Ideally I'd like to get it down to 0%, and was wondering if anyone know ways to reduce the failure rate?

Are there any feats, materials, enchantments, etc that anyone knows about?

[Mina Kobold]

doesn´t masterwork helps :confused:

[Helgraf]

I'm working on playing an arcane archer and was hoping to wear some of sort of armor in order to stay alive longer.

I can wear light armor from my ranger levels, but don't trust my luck against 15-20% failure rates. Ideally I'd like to get it down to 0%, and was wondering if anyone know ways to reduce the failure rate?

Are there any feats, materials, enchantments, etc that anyone knows about?

Mithril

The 'Twilight' armor property

[kamikasei]

Mithril, twilight (+1, PHB2), thistledown padding (Races of the Wild), and possibly feycraft or githcraft templates from DMG2.

[Fenix_of_Doom]

doesn´t masterwork helps :confused:

No, but twilight and feycraft and the like do, they cost +x armour enchantments however. A good place to start would be mithral, assuming you were metal armour.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Mithral Twilight Chain. No ASF, no check penalty, great max dex mod. Alternatively, though I wouldn't normally recommend it, there may be good synergy between Ranger and Warmage. It may be worth a look.

[kamikasei]

No, but twilight and feycraft and the like do, they cost +x armour enchantments however. A good place to start would be mithral, assuming you were metal armour.

Nope, the DMG templates are fixed costs I believe.

If you want light armor that means either a mithral chain shirt or mithral breastplate for 20% and 25% respectively reduced to 10%/15% by the mithral.

Twilight knocks 10% off for a +1 bonus. A +1 twilight mithral chain shirt is excellent light armor with 0% ASF and costs 5100gp, not too bad.

Feycraft knocks off 5% for a fixed 500gp cost. Githcraft does the same for 600gp. They have other benefits, but feycraft is probably handier in terms of prerequisites.

An undersuit of thistledown padding gets you -5% at a cost of +1 ACP for 250gp. So, a feycraft mithral chain shirt with thistledown padding gets you 0% ASF with +1 ACP for 1850gp, excellent value (especially as it's mundane, so it won't make future enhancements more costly, which is the disadvantage of twilight.

You might also give some thought to getting your arcane casting from Duskblade levels if that's feasible, as then you'll have the ability to ignore ASF from light armor anyway.

[Neon Knight]

As a quirky option, the Blue Ice material from Frostburn negates all ASF for arcane spells with the cold descriptor. You'd have to get the Cold Endurance feat to wear it without penalties though.

[Telonius]

Do note that you get access to Medium armor when you take a level in Arcane Archer. A Mithral Twilight Breastplate might give you a bit better protection, if your Dex isn't stratospheric, and you would only have a 5% spell failure.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Do note that you get access to Medium armor when you take a level in Arcane Archer. A Mithral Twilight Breastplate might give you a bit better protection, if your Dex isn't stratospheric, and you would only have a 5% spell failure.1: That's still light.
2: He's an Archer, his Dex better be stratospheric.
3: 5% still hurts at the worst time. I can't count how much more often spell failure comes up against bosses rather than mooks.

[Deepblue706]

Do note that you get access to Medium armor when you take a level in Arcane Archer. A Mithral Twilight Breastplate might give you a bit better protection, if your Dex isn't stratospheric, and you would only have a 5% spell failure.

But the breastplate would only grant a +1 AC compared to the Chain Shirt, would it not? I'd rather take the Mithral Buckler, instead (no penalty when you're wielding a bow, and it'll have no ASF). Of course, it's not exclusive - but that can be enchanted in its own right, if you really need bonus AC.

[kamikasei]

Do note that you get access to Medium armor when you take a level in Arcane Archer. A Mithral Twilight Breastplate might give you a bit better protection, if your Dex isn't stratospheric, and you would only have a 5% spell failure.

That's light armor anyway, though. And Arcane Archer grants proficiency with medium armor, but Ranger still loses class abilities while wearing it.

[Darrin]

Are there any feats, materials, enchantments, etc that anyone knows about?

Check here first:

http://forums.gleemax.com/wotc_archive/index.php/t-604255

The Gold Standard for Zero ASF is:

Twilight Mithril Githcraft Breastplate +1. AC bonus of +6, Max Dex 5, Armor Check Penalty -1, 0% ASF. Not cheap, though... 4350 GP for +1 Twilight Breastplate, 4000 GP for mithril, and 600 GP for githcraft, so 8950 GP total.

Githcraft Mithril Chainshirt with Thistledown Padding is a bargain steal at 2100 GP. AC bonus +4, Max Dex 6, Armor Check Penalty 0, 0% ASF. Enchant it with +1 enhancement for just 1000 GP extra.

Add a Heavy Mithril Githcraft shield for a +2 shield bonus. 0% ASF, and Armor Check Penalty is 0, so you can use it without proficiency and take no penalty. 1170 GP.

Things can get a little wackier after that, if the DM permits... you can add a Dastana (Arms & Equipment Guide or Oriental Adventures) *and* a Chahar-aina (Oriential Adventures) on top of a chain shirt, and both +1 bonuses are supposed to stack with your armor and shield bonuses. Both have a 5% ASF that you can cancel out with Githcraft/Feycraft, and a -1 Armor Check Penalty (mithril will get rid of both the ASF and ACP). According to OA, a Dastana requires Light Armor Proficiency, and a Chahar-aina requires Medium Armor Proficiency. 600 GP each for Githcraft if you have the necessary armor proficiency, or 1000 GP + 4000 GP if you're going all-mithril.

[Deepblue706]

What are the prereqs for Thistledown Padding and Githcraft/Feycraft? Are there any drawbacks?

[Person_Man]

Also note that you can use a buckler (or an animated shield) as well, which can also be made out of special materials and enchanted. As long as the spell failure and armor check penalties are 0, anyone can use them, and they give an additional boost to AC. Add in an amulet of natural armor and respectable Dex, and its easy to get high AC.

[Jack_of_Spades]

There were feats in Complete Arcana to cast spells in armor. Each once you got let you cast in a type of armor, Light , Medium, and heavy. The pre-reqs, if I remember correctly, were to be proficient in that type of armor.

[Nerd-o-rama]

You also have to have some ability to cast in armor beforehand, making them great for Bards, Warmages, and Duskblades (though all but the latter could just use Mage Armor, I think), but not so great for Wizard and Sorceror-based builds.

[Telonius]

Huh, that's odd. I'd always played it that you need proficiency in the base armor before adding any specialties like mithral, but the FAQ seems to contradict that. Learn something every day, I guess.

Of course there's always the Dusty Rose Ioun stone to consider. Relatively cheap at 5k gp, +1 AC, and no ACP or failure. And other magic items that give you miss chance can be just as good as AC.

EDIT: Just out of curiosity, what's your class progression, that you need to worry about Arcane failure overmuch? You mentioned Ranger is in there. Though I know you do need at least a level in an arcane class to qualify for Arcane Archer, if the build is mostly Ranger (a Divine caster) you might not need to worry.

[Merlin the Tuna]

Mithral Bucklers don't do a whole lot of good for archers; you don't get the AC bonus when wielding your bow unless you've got Improved Buckler Defense. And typically you've got better things to do with your feats.