Certain types of armor are never worn.

[Elder-Basilisk]

I've seen a lot of these types of armor worn on a regular basis:

Other than at very low levels where the characters have little or no money, why would a character ever wear the following types of armor?

Padded

As a DM, I often use this for the kind of piecemeal armor a commoner militia turns out in.

Leather

This is often used as cheap barding (one of my characters has leather barding for her riding dog) or as cheap armor for use when shipboard (my cleric bought a suit for that purpose at first level and still uses it when he thinks he might be ambushed in his sleep), or for starting rogues.

As others point out, the max dex bonus will sometimes make it optimal if the DM tightly controls mithral armors and Celestial Armor.

Druids who value mobility also generally wear leather.

Hide

This is fairly common for druids who want good armor.

Scale Mail

This is the standard starting armor for clerics and many fighters. It's also a good balance between cost and protection for NPCs purchasing barding.

Chainmail

This is another good starting armor for many clerics and fighters. (with <=+2 dex bonus). I currently have a 3rd level fighter/cleric/monk in Living Greyhawk who often wears chain mail.

Splint Mail

This is the heaviest and most protective armor it's practical for starting characters to buy. I've seen more than a few fighters and paladins without a dex bonus start out with splint mail.

Banded mail

IME, this is a very good compromise between price and protection for characters who want to eventually buy fullplate but can't afford it yet. My cleric wore banded mail from level 2 to level 4.

I've also seen it favored by clerics with low strength scores. Fullplate weighs too much for them to carry any gear along with their armor.

Half-plate

I've seen a number of characters wear this. . . but I think they're nuts. It's too expensive to be worth buying as a stopgap measure until fullplate is affordable.

If I was a fighter with a +0 Dex bonus to AC I would be wearing Full Plate. The only reason that medium Armors are worn in our game is because we have house rules where medium armor is considered light for movement penalties.

 

[Diirk]

For druids I tend to favour leather over hide, the armour check penalty and movement restrictions for only 1 more AC is just too painful. For any other sort of light fighter, I can't see any reason to not go for a chain shirt. Chain shirts are silly powerful. In fact I can't see any reason to go for any medium armour at all, I'd just stick with the chain shirt. Breastplate gives a whopping 1 more ac, and again, movement restrictions etc.

The other good armour is full plate. Style reasons and druids aside, and not coutning those armies that need cheaply equipped, I don't understand why anyone after the first few levels would be wearing anything but a chain shirt or full plate.

The only exception I can think of is possibly a dwarven barbarian who could be justified in using a breastplate

 

[kirinke]

unless you have some really weird house rules that negate encumberance i have a perfectly valid reason why characters would chose something other than full-plate.

here are the stats for full plate
COST: 1500
AC BONUS: +8
MAX DEX BONUS: +1
ARMOR CHECK PENALTY: -6
ARCANE SPELL FAILURE: 35%
SPEED: WALK 20FT, RUN 15FT
WGT: 50 LBS

Now, only a brick is going to want any kind of plate.
Rogues, druids, rangers, wizards, clerics and characters with low strength scores are going to get into trouble real quick.
Especially rogues and rangers who can't use their special abilities while wearing anything heavier than light armor.
Druids are prohibited from wearing plate. Clerics and wizards have that nasty spell-failure check etc.
So, there's lots of reasons why a character wouldn't buy any kind of plate or 'heavy' armor. And all are valid.

 

[Archer]

All the replies so far appear to not contradict the initial post except in the case of druids and people with 6+ dex bonuses. PCs will wear the best armor of each weight class as soon as they can afford it, those being chain shirt, breastplate and full plate. They will also buy mithral versions of each as soon as they have the money. Druids use ironwood/elf bark/other special material full plate if they don't have much of a dex mod.

NPCs and low level characters are affected by cost and weight limits but that was already declared explicitly or implicitly in the beginning.

 

[reapersaurus]

PCs will wear the best armor of each weight class as soon as they can afford it, those being chain shirt, breastplate and full plate.

This seems to me to be rather obvious.

Why would anyone bother wasting time denying this very obvious generalization?

Who cares about the exceptional case, or a flavor choice?
The fact of the matter is, and HAS been for years, that 3E armor is badly designed, with obvious optimal choices.

 

[shilsen]

Clerics and wizards have that nasty spell-failure check etc.

Sorcerers and wizards. And bards too, if wearing medium or heavy armor.

 

[The Spectrum Rider]

>Who cares about the exceptional case, or a flavor choice?

You'd be surprised.

The Spectrum Rider

 

[AeroDm]

A while back I was trying to tweak armor for this same reason and I got some interesting results. In the end I ignored it because I figured it didn't add enough to force people to carry around another piece of paper; there is something to be said for using the rules.

The gist, however, was that I modified a lot of prices making the low-end heavy armors desireable. Also tweak armor checks, max dex, and weights. Although perhaps realism dictates that chainmail is really inferior to breastplate, game rules don't have to. Also, I gave certain armors Fortification 10% that seemed to be lacking.

 

[kirinke]

heck, also plate armor has to be custom built (which is why it's so bloody expensive). so it's just easier to kill a bunch of plate-wearing bad-guys, loot their stuff, save up and buy magical studded leather armor. ^_^

 

[Diirk]

unless you have some really weird house rules that negate encumberance i have a perfectly valid reason why characters would chose something other than full-plate.

here are the stats for full plate
COST: 1500
AC BONUS: +8
MAX DEX BONUS: +1
ARMOR CHECK PENALTY: -6
ARCANE SPELL FAILURE: 35%
SPEED: WALK 20FT, RUN 15FT
WGT: 50 LBS

Now, only a brick is going to want any kind of plate.
Rogues, druids, rangers, wizards, clerics and characters with low strength scores are going to get into trouble real quick.
Especially rogues and rangers who can't use their special abilities while wearing anything heavier than light armor.
Druids are prohibited from wearing plate. Clerics and wizards have that nasty spell-failure check etc.
So, there's lots of reasons why a character wouldn't buy any kind of plate or 'heavy' armor. And all are valid.

Yes I believe if you actually read my post I mentioned "chain shirt or full plate" not just full plate ;p And I mentioned druids as an exception. While you have a point on the sorceror/wizard thing I would have thought that would be obvious too.

And if you start gettign the huge dex bonuses, I think a mithril chain shirt is something like 1100 gp or so (1000 light mithril + 100 chain shirt, masterwork included in mithril price).

Clerics don't have spell failure btw.