D&D 5E Can your Druids wear metal armor?

[Faolyn]

The Fighter is proficient with "ALL" armor. An Eldritch Knight can spellcast in "ALL" armor.

The situation is different from the Druid.

The Druid lacks proficiency in metal armor therefore cannot spellcast in it.

Anyone can cast in armor if they are proficient in the armor. The Eldritch Knight is no different than a wizard with proficiency in armor. Which is why there was so a to-do about letting races have floating ASIs; it mean that mountain dwarfs could put their +2 in Int and wear armor at the same time.

And again, all armor proficiencies are divided into "light armor," "medium armor," and "heavy armor." And shields. There are no materials-based armor proficiencies.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

So, you're only issue with it is that druids would gain a benefit for using metal armor?

No. My issue is that wearing metal armour wouldn't fit the look and feel of the druids. Metal armour being beneficial is an incentive to wear it.

And yet... people are constantly bending over backwards to make quests to allow druids to struggle and get that same benefit... and that's okay?

Yes. They can gain armour that fits the themes of the class.

Yeah, sure, in a world where druids can wear armor to save their lives, many of them would. Because, you know, people don't want to die. That's the same reason they use metal swords. An iron staff has no benefit? It has all the same benefits of a oaken staff.

Indeed. Same as the oaken staff. So there is no incentive to use a iron staff over more readily available and presumably cheaper wooden staff.

Just like Chitin Half-Plate has all the benefits of metal half-plate.

It could. Or not. AFAIK; it is not an item that exists in the game, so GM would need to create it. As I said earlier, realistically it definitely wouldn't. But this is D&D so it might. Then again, if people can make things equally good than metal items out of dead animals, how did metal working ever get invented? But if it is something pretty rare and relatively hard to get, then that would probably work. It's basically a minor magic item, a non-metal armour equivalent of metal armour. In fact, 'strange material', the item being made out of unusual material for its purpose is one of the minor quirks in DMG that can be assigned to magic items.

But it is perfectly acceptable to use an iron staff but it isn't to wear metal half-plate? Because they would gain a benefit from using half-plate?

Imagine a bunch of people are creating characters. And lets say this armour restriction doesn't exist. What are the chances that a druid player chooses their character to have a metal armour and what are the chances that they want to have an iron staff? Because it they understand the rules, they will get the metal armour. It simply is better. Or if they feel it doesn't suit the themes of their character and are super committed to that, they might intentionally nerf their own character for looks, but this is unlikely. They would have absolutely zero incentive to ask for an iron staff.

The themes and looks of archetypes should matter, and the rules should not incentivise choices that are contrary to those themes.

 

[tetrasodium]

It is description in the fiction the GM made up to go with the rule 'druids will not wear armour'. Do you think the GM should not describe the result of rules in the fiction, should they just communicate in rule terms? What's your actual problem here?

Using GM fiat is fine, however using GM fiat and denying that was done to justify defending an awful worded rule of pointless legacy fluff that once had a reason to exist (old barkskin) with gm fiat is a different story because it's not just pointing out the rules. The fact that there we so many attempts to hang justification for fiat onto something rather than just saying something like "Yea I made up something to support will not wear metal armor" because I don't want the druid player to decide they will" with multiple posters jumping in to defend dancing around it shows clearly the situation wotc created.

Even if the druid player disagrees with what is literally GM fiat being invoked to create reasons why the druid is not allowed to say "well yes I will" or will be punished for doing that, the druid can't even try to make a case against that use of gm fiat because it's hiding behind an endless parade of excuses for why the gm was forced to simply apply the rules in an impartial manner.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Tell me. What belief system must you be engaged in to be a cleric?

Depends on the deity and the setting.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Using GM fiat is fine, however using GM fiat and denying that was done to justify defending an awful worded rule of pointless legacy fluff that once had a reason to exist (old barkskin) with gm fiat is a different story because it's not just pointing out the rules. The fact that there we so many attempts to hang justification for fiat onto something rather than just saying something like "Yea I made up something to support will not wear metal armor" because I don't want the druid player to decide they will" with multiple posters jumping in to defend dancing around it shows clearly the situation wotc created.

Even if the druid player disagrees with what is literally GM fiat being invoked to create reasons why the druid is not allowed to say "well yes I will" or will be punished for doing that, the druid can't even try to make a case against that use of gm fiat because it's hiding behind an endless parade of excuses for why the gm was forced to simply apply the rules in an impartial manner.

There was no fiat, it's following the rule with fluff description made for up for flavour. I get that you think it is a stupid rule. There are certainly many rules in D&D that I find stupid too. I still won't get angry at the GM is they expect me to follow them.

 

[Yaarel]

"They are proficient in Medium armor that is not made of metal."

I agree, your wording is clearer, and I hope errata updates the Druid class description to something like that.



In any case, what the Druid class currently says is:

"PROFICIENCIES: Armor: Light armor, medium armor, shields (druids will
not wear armor or use shields made of metal)"

There is no flavor here. There is only a mechanic that lacks an explanation.

It says, the Druid armor proficiencies grant light armor and medium armor. However, Druids "will not wear" metal armor, is added parenthetically because it is a special restriction. Other classes dont have parenthetical special restrictions. The Druid appears to have the only restriction that relates to the material that the armor is made out of.

Because the metal itself is the issue, it would disinclude leather armor that was "studded" with metal.

In order to become proficient with an item, one must learn how to use it. Refusing to use it, prevents training the proficiency.

In any case, the special restriction against metal is explicitly in the description of what the Druid class grants proficiency with.

In the case of the Druid, the nonproficiency especially impacts spellcasting while wearing metal armor. They can physically wear it, but not spellcast thru it proficiently.

 

[Yaarel]

Anyone can cast in armor if they are proficient in the armor. The Eldritch Knight is no different than a wizard with proficiency in armor. Which is why there was so a to-do about letting races have floating ASIs; it mean that mountain dwarfs could put their +2 in Int and wear armor at the same time.

And again, all armor proficiencies are divided into "light armor," "medium armor," and "heavy armor." And shields. There are no materials-based armor proficiencies.

I actually agree with what you say in this post.

However, the Druid class mentions a specific rule that trumps the general rule that is true for the other classes. The general rule is, material doenst matter. Just the armor type or category matters. But for the Druid, the material does matter. It is a special exception − added parenthetically.

 

[CleverNickName]

Ah, so you made up something to enforce the rules, and prevent a player's actions.

The rules were preventing the player's actions, not me. You're arguing with a sheet of paper.

Tell you what: quote this message, add another "so what you're really saying here is..." twist to it, and let me know if the ink on page 65 of the Player's Handbook changes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

THP from symbiotic entity can't be recovered by any means I'm aware of.

It can be maintained as long as you haven’t lost it all yet, and False Life upcasts really well.

I have advice for the rest, if you’re interested, but for now I’m at work. Druids are an odd class, and require a little bit different thinking than a Wizard does, for sure.

 

[cbwjm]

Every time this question is brought up, it creates so much drama. This isn't like previous editions where the druid loses all of their druid powers if they wear metal armour, that hasn't been a thing since 3e, they're just trying to fit the flavour of past editions but really, nothing bad would happen and even if you bring it up with a player that a druid will not wear metal armour, they can just come back with "actually, my character's fine with it..." and then nothing will happen when put on that shiny new breastplate that they found. Any penalty that the DM decides to impart would be the real houserule, not the druid wearing metal armour.