The AC on a Budget challenge

Presume a Ranger with a decent Wisdom and Dex.

How high can you stack his AC on a budge of 100,000 gp?

Creative is good, sane is optional, legal is required. Within those guidelines, there are no wrong answers. Have fun!

Ring of Blinking- 27,000gp.
Miss Chance > increased AC, accomplishes the same thing.

Sort of the same thing, but not really. Still, though I asked about AC, I also said "no wrong answers" and I'll live by it.

8 hirelings, trained to Aid Another to add to your AC. Also provide cover. I don't know the price off-hand, but it can't be that high. Maybe give them tower shields so they can advance with you in a phalanx, you ready an action to attack when they open their shields, then they close the shields again to protect you.

I like it. AC 26 on the cheap.

Here's my entry: Cube of Force (62 k by the book) As written, the Cube keeps effects out. It never says anything about keeping them in. In theory our Ranger could melee, cast spells or fire his bow from inside with 100% protection.

Admitted, it has charges that don't last all day. And it isn't strictly AC, but like RumbleTiger's solution, it has a very similar effect.

AC doesn't work. Monsters have too high bonuses to make it efficient.

...That said, there are a few fun tricks, most notably the Chahar Aina/Dastana trick. They're in OA and A&EG, respectively, and basically they're +1 armor bonuses that stack with chain shirts. The fun bit is that there's no exception for enchantment, so, for example, you could get a +2 shirt, +1 chahar aina, and +1 dastana for a +10 cheaper than most other +10s to AC with the side benefit of having Dex.

Or you could use SotAO or just UMD and a bunch of Fine animals to get ludicrous Aid Another bonuses. But at that point, we may as well throw wealth loops in, so it doesn't matter too much.

Ok, let's look at the pros and cons...

There's always the competition between slot economy and cash economy. Lots of little items are cheaper, but they end up running into each other competing for item slots. You can make them "off slot" or even slotless, but that runs the cost up again.

There are other tricks as well. A slotless Hand of Glory costs 16k, but lets you wear an extra magic ring. Doesn't really come into play here, but it's the kind of thinking needed for this.

If he has a decent Wisdom, a Monk's Belt works, but he can't wear any other armor. A Periapt of Wisdom would be cheap AC in that case, but would keep him from wearing an Amulet of Natural Armor.

Dastana aren't "armor", but count as Shields instead. Similar to a Buckler, they allow 2 weapon fighting, which I would construe as working with a bow as well.

If we go with actual armor, he could go as heavy as Full Plate if it was Mithral or Glass Steel. (Both drop armor weight by one category). It restricts movement and DEX though. Maybe Mithral or Glass Steel Chain Mail?

An Animated shield would leave his hands free for two weapon or archery, but gets expensive. Still, +1 Animated Shield costs (+1 enchantment, +2 Animated) 9k and gives a total AC bonus of +3, so it's one of the cheaper +3s out there.

Over all, I'm thinking Monk's Belt, Periapt of Wisdom, Gloves of Dexterity, a Ring and either Dastana or an Animated Shield.

The Periapt vs the Natural Armor amulet is a question. With the Monk's Belt they give the same bang for the buck, but the Periapt also adds to Touch AC, as well as enhancing his spell capacity. It also leaves him open to casting Barkskin on himself.

Dastana get a better bang for the buck than the Shield, but they conflict with actual Bracers.

So...

Bracers of Armor +5, for 25K
Monk's Belt 13K for current Wisdom bonus to AC. Call it 3
Periapt of Wisdom +4, another 2 AC for 16k
Ring of Protection +3, for 18k
Animated Shield +1 gives 3 to AC for 9k
Gloves of Dexterity +4 give 2 points to AC for 16k.

My total on that is 97k out of my 100k budget, and a non-flatfooted AC of <drumroll> 28.

Seems like we should be able to do better than that. Even with Barkskin at maximum level, he's still only at 33.

C'mon you guys, somebody make me look like a piker here.

RUMBLETiGER said:

Ring of Blinking- 27,000gp.
Miss Chance > increased AC, accomplishes the same thing.

Click to expand...

I like the argument about the miss chance being better than AC.

---

20* Dex to start (+5 bonus to AC)
Mithral Breastplate +5 (29,200gp / +10 bonus)
Shield, Heavy +5 (25,157 gp / +7 bonus)
Ring of Protection +2 (8,000gp / +2 bonus)
Amulet of Natural Armor +2 (8,000gp / +2 bonus)
Ring of Blinking +27,000 (50% miss chance)

=97,357 gp for AC 36 (+21 over the Dex) and 50% miss chance

* If the Dex was only 16, then spend some of the extra money to get a bunch of potions of cat's grace.

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Against an attack bonus of +16 or lower, this is better than having a higher AC because half of the natural 20s still miss.

Against an attack bonus of +17 to +33, the effective AC is 37 + (attack bonus - 17)/2. So, a 37 vs. attack bonus of +17 all the way to 45 against an attack bonus of +33.

Against an attack bonus of 34 or higher, the effective AC is the attack bonus +11.5 (since they hit 9.5 out of 20 times given the auto-miss on a 1). So if you are fighting a Tarrasque, your AC is effectively 68.5 against the bite attack. Also, a natural 20 that otherwise would have been a critical is also concealed away 50% of the time.


Edit: Ack! Forgot the base of 10 for the AC the first time through. Should be right now.

One problem with the Ring of Blinking is that it also gives our Ranger a 50% miss chance. Displacement is better.

But, like I said, I'm looking for actual AC more than miss chance.

Now just running the numbers on your idea, I think you forgot something.

He starts at AC 10. +10 for the Breastplate is 20, +5 from Dex is 25, +7 from the Heavy Shield is 32, +2 from the Ring of Protection is 34, +2 from the Natural Armor amulet is 36. And that's without the Blink effect.

Not too shabby.

Greenfield said:

Now just running the numbers on your idea, I think you forgot something.

He starts at AC 10.

Click to expand...

I think I caught that just as you were posting to point it out. If I forgot the base 10 maybe I should take a nap before AC optimizing!

If you don't like the ring of blinking, you can use the savings to bump some of the other things up (10k more to go from +2 to +3 on the ring and amulet), or get the gloves of dexterity (+2 = 4k, +4=16k) if the 20 seemed like cheating.