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

[Crimson Longinus]

it can indeed happen as soon as the druid player says "actually yes my character will wear this armor they are proficient with".

Sure, a situation can happen where the player declares that they're not following the rules of the game, not that it has ever happened to me in real life.

Seriously, your character is bound by a rule "will not do X" thus "my character will do X" is not a valid action declaration under the rules. It is simple as that. Feel free to think it is a stupid rule, but that in itself doesn't give the player a justification to unilaterally ignore it. When we sit down to play this game, the assumption is that the players will follow the rules.

 

[Faolyn]

I don't understand why we are all so passionate about this. I don't like druids in armor. I think the rule says they don't wear it. Good for me.

Because someone is wrong on the internet.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I don't understand why we are all so passionate about this. .

Better to get all hot and bothered about something stupid like a D&D rule than look around at all the horrors in real life?

… that’s working theory 1.

Working theory 2 is… Forget it, Jake. It’s the internet.

 

[cbwjm]

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.

I don't believe false life extends symbiotic entity, the ability specifically refers to losing the temp. hp from symbiotic entity as a means for it ending. If you cast false life and replace the temp. hp with the spell's then you lose the benefits. Though honestly, I'm not sure I'd be against it working as long as you had temp. hp from any source.

 

[Oofta]

I think we're mostly on the same side of this argument. I give style points for druids who choose to not wear metal armor, but I think that's all it is, style. And style points don't really count for anything outside of good story telling, and if there's no good storytelling to go along with with metal armor prohibition then it feels pretty empty and pointless.

The poster in the thread with the mariner's armor that made the druid feel icky doesn't bother me much. But personally, I'd still allow the character to wear icky-feeling armor if that's what they wanted to do, and they'd suffer no mechanical penalties for it, but I'd hope that we could not just forget about it, but use it as a minor element in the story, for moving along a sideplot, or as comic relief or whatever.

If I want to start a game as a cleric with scale mail, and then take level two in druid, what happens? I mean, ideally, to take a level of druid I should be associated with a circle or somehow acquire a mentor or whatever, but in reality, it's a game with other players who all have their own storylines and character development that they want to realize and there's limited table time. I know there are probably many ways to go about it, but what do you do with, for instance, a cleric that wants to continue to be a frontline fighter, that has taken a druid level, and has not yet had time to go questing for special armor? I like all the individual pieces of the puzzle. You can tell the druid initiate that they have to strip and they get an armor penalty until the party can get around to going to kill an ankheg and then finding an armorer to make them a half-plate... You can drop an ankheg half-plate in the next pile of loot? I think it feels best to say that the character continues to do what they are doing. Maybe at some point they meet up with a group of druids that give the character the business for wearing gross stinky metal, or maybe they just feel increasingly uncomfortable in the metal armor. Maybe it actually gives them a rash.

I'm starting to ramble. I'll try to wrap it up. I would not drop everything to get the new druid new armor. That seems disrespectful to the other players. I would not give the new druid an armor penalty for taking a multiclass when I fully intend to get them whatever armor they want in the future, and I wouldn't just drop a chitin halfplate in the next loot pile because that's incredibly cheesy. I'd let the character keep wearing the scale mail and I'd work on the roleplay to get from druid wearing armor they don't prefer to armor that they really like, because that feels like the best story. But as always, it's all going to be different depending on the table.

For me? The mariner's armor may have actually been made of fish scales. But the real issue is how much you wan to be a stickler for rules. The rule, to me, is simple. It has nothing to do with proficiency, it's a taboo.

So I would have just done a timeout with the player and tell them that: it's a taboo to wear armor for druids, when you pick this up you realize it's metal so you won't wear it unless you want to no longer be a druid. I've never hit this situation but there are (incredibly rare) times when I have to remind players what the rules are. On the few times it's come up there wasn't any real pushback other than to perhaps clarify.

How easy you want alternative armor to be is up to the DM and group. Wooden shields I have no problem with (although they'd have a chance to break if not magical), I would say that exotic material armor would be similar to adamantine or mithral. Difficult, but not impossible to purchase in my campaign.

 

[tetrasodium]

The fact that players exist that are so toxic to the "house rules" that are at the core of 5Es ruling design is the reason these arguments get so spicey. I'm not surprised that less confident DMs hide behind arguing "RAW" when a player tries to browbeat them, but really, the discussion should go like this and no further: "Can i use metal armor?" "No" "OK".

There you go placing 100% of the blame for your house rules and your fiat on the player who wants to use their class abilities within the parts of 5e not borked like barkskin or left on the cutting room floor like alternate armor materials. Wotc designed the rest of the class abilities with a power level fitting with the assumption that 15+dex(2) standing ac from half plate was easy to obtain for 750gp but wants to have it both ways without adjusting the class abilities & spells or providing the secondary systems like alternate materials, that's not the player's fault nor is the player being toxic for saying they will use something they are proficient at. The player doesn't need to ask "Can I use metal armor" because they already can.

 

[carkl3000]

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.

I don't see it. Is there a reason that False Life stacks with other THP when other sources generally don't? (The other problem being that False Life isn't a druid spell?)

 

[Oofta]

Funny. Many years ago I had a guy play a seven foot tall albino elf who said that everyone was scared of him. No rules for it, just that everyone was frightened when he walked into the room.

I simply told him that, no, no one was frightened without rules support. I'd say the same thing to a player who said their druid would indeed wear metal armor. The rules say they won't, so if you play a druid your PC does not so let's discuss alternatives.

A player can always ask. Sometimes the answer will be "no", sometimes it will be "no but here's what we can do", sometimes it will be "yeah, okay, cool idea". Same as if I'm a player in someone else's game.

 

[ECMO3]

You could say the exact same thing about a Wizard. A Wizard with full plate would be more difficult to hit.

Just because it is stronger for the class doesn't mean it should be part of the class.

No you can't say "the exact same thing" because a Wizard can actually get plate through another class or a race and a feat or multiple feats. RAW a Druid can't at all.

A Shield Dwarf Wizard can wear half-plate on day 1. A shield Dwarf Druid never can wear half plate even though he has proficiency from both his race and his class.

 

[carkl3000]

Because someone is wrong on the internet

My wife effin hates it when I (legitimately of course) tell her that this is why I am not coming to bed, but instead, staying up until 2 AM sh*tposting.