[4e] Wizards wearing Robes (Feats)

[Yakk]

Mage Armor
Requirements: 15 int or 15 charisma, and at least one Daily Attack power with the Arcane power source
Gain a +2 Armor bonus to AC while in Cloth or No Armor. This increases to +3 at level 16, and +4 at level 26. Enchantment bonuses from your armor stack with this bonus.

Cloth Armor Specialization
Requirements: 13 Dex 13 Int, Paragon Tier
Gain +1 AC, +1 Reflex and +1 Will defense when wearing Cloth or No Armor

[Tengu_temp]

I assume this is to balance the fact that wizards can take proficiency in leather/hide armor?

No need. Many good caster enchantments are limited to cloth armor.

[ghost_warlock]

Mage Armor
Requirements: 15 int or 15 charisma, and at least one Daily Attack power with the Arcane power source
Gain a +2 Armor bonus to AC while in Cloth or No Armor. This increases to +3 at level 16, and +4 at level 17. Enchantment bonuses from your armor stack with this bonus.

Cloth Armor Specialization
Requirements: 13 Dex 13 Int, Paragon Tier
Gain +1 AC, +1 Reflex and +1 Will defense when wearing Cloth or No Armor

Should be over in Homebrew, but anyway...

Why does Cloth Armor Specialization add to Will defense? I'm not saying that I think it's overpowered (for paragon tier), just that I don't understand how specializing in armor would help your defenses against (predominatly) mind-affecting attacks.

[MammonAzrael]

First, this should be in the homebrew forum.

Second, I think Mage Armor (I'm assuming it's a feat) is way too strong.

As for Cloth spec, I could see it being useful (and possibly picked instead of Leather prof), but it's notably better than all the other armor spec feats, for no apparent reason.

EDIT: The ninjas, they attacked me!

[Tengu_temp]

Also, there's nothing prohibiting you from counting a heavy, reinforced combat robe as leather armor.

[TwystidMynd]

I agree with the other posters. This seems extremely powerful for a 4e feat. Most feats grant a +1 or +2 to a single defense. Some damage feats scale on new tier. If I had to allow a feat that granted defense bonuses for cloth armor in my game (and I probably wouldn't without a REALLY good argument for why it was necessary) I would modify the Mage Armor feat to only grant +1 feat bonus to AC until level 20, where it would scale to +2, and I would have two required stats (just like the other armor proficiencies do). 15 Int and 13 Cha sounds good, off-hand.

The Cloth Armor Specialization feat I could see granting a +1 feat bonus to Reflex saves and mayyyybe to Fort, but I don't quite see the Will or further AC bonuses being too reasonable.

[fractic]

You could just fluff leather armor as a robe. The feat as written now is almost scrictly superior to leather armor proficiency which can't be a good idea since that feat is allready considered worth taking for wizards.

Cloth armor specialization is also too strong. The other specializations give +1 AC and maybe remove a check penalty. +1 to three defenses is way to powerful.

[ghost_warlock]

I agree with the other posters. This seems extremely powerful for a 4e feat. Most feats grant a +1 or +2 to a single defense. Some damage feats scale on new tier. If I had to allow a feat that granted defense bonuses for cloth armor in my game (and I probably wouldn't without a REALLY good argument for why it was necessary) I would modify the Mage Armor feat to only grant +1 feat bonus to AC until level 20, where it would scale to +2, and I would have two required stats (just like the other armor proficiencies do). 15 Int and 13 Cha sounds good, off-hand.

The Cloth Armor Specialization feat I could see granting a +1 feat bonus to Reflex saves and mayyyybe to Fort, but I don't quite see the Will or further AC bonuses being too reasonable.

Well, Combat Anticipation grants a +1 feat bonus to all defenses against ranged, area, and close attacks; which is almost better. Also, it has no prereqs (other than paragon), so I see it as actually being a better feat all-around.

Mage Armor treats an unarmored character as if he was wearing leather armor. And, since it scales, this bonus improves as if the character was wearing feyleather and then starleather; plus you get to keep the enhancement bonus of any cloth armor you're actually wearing. Too good for a heroic tier feat, on reconsideration.

[TwystidMynd]

Well, Combat Anticipation grants a +1 feat bonus to all defenses against ranged, area, and close attacks; which is almost better. Also, it has no prereqs (other than paragon), so I see it as actually being a better feat all-around.

Mage Armor treats an unarmored character as if he was wearing leather armor. And, since it scales, this bonus improves as if the character was wearing feyleather and then starleather; plus you get to keep the enhancement bonus of any cloth armor you're actually wearing. Too good for a heroic tier feat, on reconsideration.

Well, shoot. I'd forgotten about that. For a caster, they'll not be targeted with too many melee attacks, so Combat Anticipation would almost be 100% better.
In that case, though, if Cloth Armor Specialization had to exist, I don't know what kind of bonus it would give. So, for me, I'd just not allow it to exist.
Maybe a speed bonus? But a feat like that already exists.
A bonus to attacks doesn't make much sense, nor does a bonus to damage.
Any kind of resistance would be overpowered, I'd bet...
A bonus to a few skill checks, maybe?
Just brainstorming ideas.

Anyways, like I mentioned in my previous posts, I don't think mages need these feats, so it'd take a good argument to convince me otherwise. If a player really had a problem with being a leather-armor wearing caster, I'd suggest that they just take Leather Armor proficiency and wear a robe over the leather. Alternatively, they could invest in any of the awesome cloth-only magic armor sets.

[fractic]

Mage Armor treats an unarmored character as if he was wearing leather armor. And, since it scales, this bonus improves as if the character was wearing feyleather and then starleather;.

Well the numbers on the feat are wrong for that ;). It doesn't stack with feyweave and starweave so that doesn't make it better. But it does save you the trouble of actually having to get a feyweave or starweave armor.

[MammonAzrael]

Mage Armor treats an unarmored character as if he was wearing leather armor. And, since it scales, this bonus improves as if the character was wearing feyleather and then starleather; plus you get to keep the enhancement bonus of any cloth armor you're actually wearing. Too good for a heroic tier feat, on reconsideration.

There shouldn't be a feat that effectively replaces wearing leather armor. If Wizards want that higher AC, well, thats what leather armor is for. The trade off is that they don't get some of those cloth-only enhancement options. And that's for a good reason. It's supposed to be a trade off.

[ghost_warlock]

There shouldn't be a feat that effectively replaces wearing leather armor. If Wizards want that higher AC, well, thats what leather armor is for. The trade off is that they don't get some of those cloth-only enhancement options. And that's for a good reason. It's supposed to be a trade off.

Well, it's sort of the point of a feat to allow a character to do something they normally wouldn't be able to do (e.g., Heavy Blade Opportunity) or do something that they can already do but do it better (e.g., Scale Specialization).

The trade off is that you spent a feat you could've used on something else.

Think of it this way: Two-Weapon Fighting or Weapon Focus?

[Yakk]

Sorry -- yes, I put it in the wrong forum.

Good point, I should rework it.

Mage Armor
Requirements: 15 int or 15 charisma, and at least one Daily Attack power with the Arcane power source
Gain a +1 Armor bonus to AC while in Cloth or No Armor, and a +1 Fortitude Defense bonus. The AC bonus increases to +2 at level 11, and +3 at level 21. Enchantment bonuses from your armor stack with this bonus, but armor bonuses do not.

Thoughts:
This is now worse than leather armor, as +1 Fortitude is worse than +1 AC in general. It is, however, good enough that people will be tempted to wear Cloth rather than Leather.

The lowering of AC by 1 gives room to have the AC go up with tier instead of where the actual armor gains AC.

Cloth Armor Specialization
Requirements: 13 Dex 13 Int, Paragon Tier
Gain +1 AC and +1 Reflex defense when wearing Cloth or No Armor

Thoughts
The above is intended not only for Wizards, but anyone who ends up wearing Cloth. You'll notice that each "Specialization" feat ends up with a suit of armor that is in some way better than "wearing the next tier of armor up".

The freedom of movement that cloth or no armor grants seems to work, thematically, with a +1 bonus to Reflex.

[fractic]

The reworked mage armor looks just about right. I still think the cloth specialization is a bit to strong though, but it's close.

[TwystidMynd]

Oooh, I think I got it.

Here we go:

Mage Armor
Prerequistes: 15 Int, 15 Cha
Heroic Tier
Benefit: You gain a +2 feat bonus to AC when wearing cloth or no armor.

Mage Armor Specialization
Paragon Tier
Prerequisites: Feat: Mage Armor, 15 Int, 15 Cha, 13 Wis
Benefit: You gain a +3 feat bonus when wearing cloth or no armor.

(The Specialization provides a +3 bonus, since the feat bonuses don't stack)
This way, you get the benefits of Leather Armor without having to wear it. Plus, the added bonus of opening the door to Mage Armor specialization (which is essentially the same thing as the Hide Specialization feat). The Prereqs are a bit more stringent, and caster-oriented, as a trade off to not actually having to wear the Leather Armor.
Overall, with 2 feats at Paragon Tier, you get the effective ability to wear Hide Armor, with no penalty, and use Cloth-only magic items, as long as you have good mental stats.

Maybe knock the feats down to +1/+2, so you're effectively wearing Leather with no penalty, and can use Cloth-only magic items.

Eh, even that seems a bit overpowered.

Edit: yakk posted before I posted this, but I didn't read his. His might be better.

[Mando Knight]

I'm not really sure that Wizards need the AC boost on cloth: I rolled up a wizard who had nearly as much AC as his Paladin and Warlord party-mates, with far superior Reflex thanks to his massive Int (I went and gave him a 20 in Int...). He also had more reliable hit rates than the others because he was slamming the weaker defenses and his stat-points weren't spread out among abilities that didn't contribute to his skills and powers...

I say that if a Wizard finds himself in melee frequently, leather armor is a logical and easy choice for increasing his armor. With one feat a Wizard can show the Paladin (the champ in the focusing-on-heavy-armor group) why the currently-in-development Swordmage will have unhittable AC and Reflex defenses.

[Yakk]

Note that with both of these feats, you match a Wizard wearing Leather Armor in AC, and get 1 fortitude and 1 reflex defense.

That's 1 feat over buying Leather Armor, and +1 to two defenses.

[Demonix]

Mage Armor
Requirements: 15 int or 15 charisma, and at least one Daily Attack power with the Arcane power source
Gain a +2 Armor bonus to AC while in Cloth or No Armor. This increases to +3 at level 16, and +4 at level 26. Enchantment bonuses from your armor stack with this bonus.

Cloth Armor Specialization
Requirements: 13 Dex 13 Int, Paragon Tier
Gain +1 AC, +1 Reflex and +1 Will defense when wearing Cloth or No Armor

How about this feat?
Men Without Pants
requirements: 13+ Charisma, Male, must wear a kilt or robe
Gain a +1 confidence bonus to any social skill challenge or reflex/will/fortitude save (chosen at the time this feat is taken) while wearing cloth or no armor. Anything heavier will negate this bonus.

And just to be completely fair...

Women With Pants
Requirements 13+ Strength or Constitution, Female, must wear pants
Gain a +1 Intimidation bonus to any social skill challenge or damage roll while wearing cloth or no armor. Anything heavier will negate this bonus.

-edit: allow defense option when feat is taken, include other articles of clothing worn instead of pants.

[Tengu_temp]

Women With Pants
Requirements 13+ Strength or Constitution, Female, must wear pants
Gain a +1 Intimidation bonus to any social skill challenge or damage roll while wearing cloth or no armor. Anything heavier will negate this bonus

I vote for renaming it Women With Legs for a Witches Abroad reference.

[Treguard]

Aww, I kinda liked the inclusion of the will save bonus:

"You may have mind controlled my uncouth allies, villain, but not me whilst I'm looking this faa-bu-loous!"

[Artanis]

Note that with both of these feats, you match a Wizard wearing Leather Armor in AC, and get 1 fortitude and 1 reflex defense.

That's 1 feat over buying Leather Armor, and +1 to two defenses.
You said you wanted there to be an incentive to wear cloth. Well, there is: like MammonAzrael said, if you wear leather, you don't get the caster-geared enchantments that are available to cloth. So in other words, these feats add up to the Wizard spending one extra feat to get all the benefits of leather plus even more defenses on top of that without any of the drawbacks.

So why not just make a feat that requires leather armor proficiency - but can only be taken by guys with arcane-based powers - and makes leather armor give +1 FORT, +1 REF, -12 pounds, and the ability to have cloth-only enchantments on leather?



It just seems fundamentally imbalanced to me. Now, it might be balanced overall, but it's fundamentally out-of-kilter, and I'd rather have something that's unbalanced due to bad numbers than something that's balanced in spite of being broken to start with.

[Demonix]

Aww, I kinda liked the inclusion of the will save bonus:

"You may have mind controlled my uncouth allies, villain, but not me whilst I'm looking this faa-bu-loous!"

I thought about it, but I wanted it to be silly AND functional. I suppose you can rewrite it to say +1 to will, fort or reflex save, chosen at the time you take this feat. I did reflex initially because you have so much more mobility in em.

and I have to admit, I've never heard of witches abroad. explain?

[Tengu_temp]

It's a book by Terry Pratchett, from the Discworld series. One of the female protagonists, who unlike the other women is wearing pants, is sometimes referred to as a woman with legs.