Saving Throws through the editions

[Kraydak]

Some of this needs a dose of common sense...

Shocking Grasp, Arc Lightning and other electrical effects vs. metal armour, for example - the armour should give a penalty, not a bonus!

If you want to invoke RL physics, metal armor will provide excellent protection against electrical attacks by grounding them. Same theory as a lightning rod.

Touch AC (and surprised AC) are easy enough things to keep in the game; and touch AC will be needed later on anyway unless incorporeal creatures are gone.

If heavy armor is to be an actual class advantage, then it should be universally applicable.

 

[Li Shenron]

I am totally hooked on the 5e playtest proposal for ST...

Reducing ST to ability checks has a couple of very good points IMHO:

- simplicity: essentially it doesn't add another stat to your character sheet; you may still have a bonus to apply, but you're not going to re-calculate your ST scores every time you level up (not to mention, recalculate them every time you get ability damaged/drained)

- balance: in the sense that all stats are potentially useful for your defense, which means stat-dumping is always dangerous (it is very different when a stat is useful in offensive/proactive skills only, because you can always choose how to attack, but you cannot choose what you're going to defend against!)

Also, I generally prefer to roll for ST rather than having static defenses.