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

[Maxperson]

I mean, within reason.

Not every paladin wants too face existential angst or the moral dilemma constantly. Sometimes a paladin just wants to kick butt for goodness.

Nobody has said that they should be challenged constantly. However, deep convictions that are never challenged are neither deep nor convictions. They're just words on a sheet.

 

[Chaosmancer]

If I was playing a druid and I took my taboo against wearing metal armor seriously, I would feel the same way. While I'm going to plead the 5th on personal religious beliefs or lack therein, people's faith is not something to f*** around with just because you can. The DM would have to knowingly set up this very specific scenario in an attempt to force someone to ignore a taboo, a very fundamental part of their belief system. I don't think it's okay to make lightly of religious beliefs like that.

In any case I'm going to go back to ignoring this thread other than the occasional fishing for laughs. I was just thinking about how I hadn't really explained why I think forcing a druid to wear metal armor should ever be a thing.

The bolded and underlined part? That is 50% of the problem. In your example, you chose to take the taboo seriously.

We don't get a choice. Our only choice is hoping that the DM gives us a choice, or to make the choice to not play a class that some of us really like. The point of these examples isn't to mock religious ideals, it is to show how egregious it is that we weren't given a choice in the matter.

Guess what? If I want to play a paladin who isn't "basically the Tick"? I have SEVEN alternatives. SEVEN. If I want to play a Druid who wears metal armor? That is taboo and forbidden, because no druid in the entire multiverse under any circumstances would do that. That is what makes you example not applicable.

 

[tetrasodium]

I think you are underestimating how much heavy lifting the PHB does.

There are twelve classes in the PHB, out of 13 official classes. For the past seven years that has been all we have. If I want something that is sort of like a druid but not a "traditional D&D reality" Druid, then my best bet as a player is to start with a druid as my base, and build from their.

A lot can be done with reflavoring. But somehow we have to maintain the purity of the single ideal (which doesn't even make sense) and not allow for a reflavored druid to use a metal shield. Or a Star Druid to use meteoric iron. Or a Wildfire druid who is a blacksmith and their spirit likes nesting in the smithy (embracing more the idea of fire than wildfires) or a Land Druid who made armor out of the heart of their sacred mountain, or a different land druid who spent their time mining in the underdark. Or a Dream Druid who was knighted by a Fey Court and given a set of armor (Background: Knight)

I can go on and on and on, concepts that already exist in the game, archetypes that make perfect sense, and yet are forbidden because "the traditional druid doesn't wear armor". Well the traditional cleric doesn't draw blood, but we've got no restrictions saying clerics can't draw blood. A traditional Paladin doesn't lie, but the choice to break that oath and lie is something within the player's purview. Traditional Barbarian hated magic and destroyed any magical items they came across, now we have Barbarians fueled by different types of magic.

You want to play a traditional druid? Happiness and Peace to you. But I shouldn't be forced to not play a class I greatly enjoy, because my concepts aren't "traditional". Or go begging the DM every single time I try and make a character and hope that they won't dig in their heels and deny me that chance, just because they think I'm powergaming and ruining the purity of the themes of the game.

Don't forget the moon druid acolyte of Vvaraak who follows the gatekeeper ways completely accepting that she too may need to perform the unspeakable mix of draconic & druidic magic to create horrid beasts and act as a shield against a world ending invasion from another plane just as was done in the past... of course wearing plate barding while doing that is so much further beyond the pale that it's completely unthinkable.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I disagree. If I were your DM, I'd likely say "sure, OK," and then imagine that you accidentally tapped into a patron with your hacking (when you hack into the Abyss, the Abyss hacks into you back), or that you even inadvertently created your patron when you were first experimenting with your coding. You might not realize either of those things until much, much later. And anyway, I could also say "no, the fundamental rule of being a warlock is making a pact with a patron; go with sorcerer instead--the Clockwork Soul fits your idea nicely."

I mean, if you actually said that exactly that, or subverted my basic character concept after agreeing to it, completely without any buy in from me, we would pause the game and have a pretty serious problem on a personal level.

Whereas if you were upfront about it without telling me what to play as if you know my mind better than I do, at worst we’d have a discussion about the warlock concept and what constitutes a rule.

But my best friend and main other GM in my group, who sticks as much as possible to RAW but has no issue with reflavoring that doesn’t change mechanics, is about as “letter of the rules text” a GM as I can stand to sit at a table with. The rules don’t matter. They’re just guideposts to facilitate play.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Of course, one man's mistake is another man's essential element. While the thread may be divided on the interpretation of the rule (or if it really is one) there seems to be a clear majority of people who don't want druids in half-plate as the norm.

I don’t think this thread even shows that. Most people are either engaging with the thread premise without much comment on whether they prefer druids to not wear metal armor as a fluff preference, or are saying they ditch the “rule” in their games. Even many of the people arguing that it is a rule, and is technically binding, have either suggested houseruling it, suggested it’s a bad/dumb rule, or said they ignore it in their own game.

personally, I don’t think there is anything at all “off” about a Druid in half plate. Chain I find a bit of an odd image, though. But scale, half plate, even plate, I don’t see what the problem is.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

If a player wants to play a warlock, but doesn’t want to have a patron, does that violate player agency?

Let’s take a real example. A player wants to play tiefling fiend warlock, but instead of having a devil as a patron, he wants his powers to come from his infernal bloodline (making him similar to a cambion).

Why would this be a problem?

That's why I say that Warlock patrons and the Druid metal taboo are on par. Both are strongly attached class fluff that you would need DM permission to change. I.e. the Warlock power thief or a druid with no metal armor taboo.

One time exceptions would not rise to that level and would not need permission.

Okay. I disagree. Well, I agree they’re on par, in that neither is a rule.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I need to further clarify (and revise) my position, because I realized something. Player agency and character agency are not the same thing.

There are a lot of 'choices' a player could make that I simply wouldn't allow at my table. It's not taking away player agency, it's enforcing the social contract that everyone agreed to.

For example, if a player said "I go find the town merchant, kill them, and take their stuff." I would just say, no, you don't. Before we started the game everyone agreed to not play an evil character and part of the definition of that was doing this sort of stuff.

The same goes for attacking other party members. It's simply not allowed.

How I see it is that all D&D classes come with certain amount of lore that assumes certain actions on part of the characters. Clerics pray to the gods to gain spells, wizards have to study spellbooks etc. And the player knew this when they chose that class. The willingly signed up for it. So that's why I don't think it is a terrible agency violation to expect them to follow these things they willingly chose. The armour restriction is the same. Druids not wearing metal is a part of being the druid, and the player chose to accept this when they made a druid.

I completely agree that players can be held to choices they made at the start of the game. That's part of the social contract. Choosing to do something you've agreed you aren't going to do is choosing not to maintain that social contract and might be choosing not to play the game. If it involves choosing an actions for your character, the DM is within their responsibility of enforcing the social contract by saying that, no, your character does not do that. You have the choice to change your mind about their actions or leave the game.

A PC druid not wearing metal armor can be part of this social contract. If the player chooses to play the druid in such a game, they are choosing not to wear metal armor. If an oddball situation comes up (such as my example of temporarily hiding in plate armor for some really good reason), they can discuss it with the DM and see if the DM feels an exception is appropriate or not.

The issue that I'm actually focused on is the ramifications of character agency. To avoid confusion, consider my reference to character in context of character agency to equal NPC.

Let me remind everyone that the Sage Advice likens a Druid wearing metal armour to a vegetarian eating meat. It's a contradiction. It is impossible because it is a conflicting definition.

When it comes to taboos and the (silly IMHO) scenario where a druid has to wear metal armor to save the world ... I have a story.
...
If I was playing a druid and I took my taboo against wearing metal armor seriously, I would feel the same way. While I'm going to plead the 5th on personal religious beliefs or lack therein, people's faith is not something to f*** around with just because you can. The DM would have to knowingly set up this very specific scenario in an attempt to force someone to ignore a taboo, a very fundamental part of their belief system. I don't think it's okay to make lightly of religious beliefs like that.

This is why the distinction between player and (NPC) character agency is important.

When I have supported extreme examples it has been to attempt to figure out how someone's world works; not how their game works. So, as I said, it's fine if the player isn't allowed to choose to wear metal armor under any foreseeable condition (or needs to discuss it with the DM if a rare situation comes up) as part of the social contract of the game. What I need to understand is what is going on in the world, with characters (again, stick to NPCs if it helps bring the distinction front and center as I intend it to be).

Have any NPC druid characters in the theoretical history of the world ever put on metal armor? If not, that seems...really, really, mind-bafflingly odd. I want to understand if anyone is actually saying that in their game world no hypothetical NPC druid has ever, under any condition, encased themselves in metal, or fallen from their druidic faith (with whatever consequences that entailed). Is anyone really saying that an NPC character when they become a druid become incapable of ever after violating this taboo?

Some people might be discussing something else, but from what I can tell, the crux of the argument comes down to a failure (which I was also guilty of) to correctly separate the issues of player agency in the game from character agency in the world.

(As an aside, I think the horrible phrasing in the PHB is responsible for this confusion, as druid armor is the only place where this confusion comes up.)

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I can go on and on and on, concepts that already exist in the game, archetypes that make perfect sense, and yet are forbidden because "the traditional druid doesn't wear armor". Well the traditional cleric doesn't draw blood, but we've got no restrictions saying clerics can't draw blood. A traditional Paladin doesn't lie, but the choice to break that oath and lie is something within the player's purview. Traditional Barbarian hated magic and destroyed any magical items they came across, now we have Barbarians fueled by different types of magic.

You want to play a traditional druid? Happiness and Peace to you. But I shouldn't be forced to not play a class I greatly enjoy, because my concepts aren't "traditional". Or go begging the DM every single time I try and make a character and hope that they won't dig in their heels and deny me that chance, just because they think I'm powergaming and ruining the purity of the themes of the game.

What you refuse to understand that without the restriction it is not just a neutral choice, either wear metal armour or don't. Wearing metal armour is simply better, so either do that, or take a significant mechanical hit for maintaining the concept.

It's like if monk class was constructed so that they could use great axes and two handed swords which were just simply better than their unarmed attacks and traditional monk weapons. Yes, in theory you could still choose to use flat out inferior options if you wanted the flavour, but would be strongly mechanically incentivised to not do so.

 

[tetrasodium]

I said that the issue would be easier if the page 45 was the whole truth. Page 65 definitely is weird. Crawford however confirms that it is not about proficiency, so if we believe him, page 65 it is and you can't overcome the limitation via proficiency; the druids already have it. So the actual rule is that no metal armour for druids and that's it, no ifs or buts except if the GM decides otherwise. And yeah, I can see how that might seem unsatisfying. Now if we ignore Crawford's "clarification" we actually have two different rules on the matter in the PHB, and the GM simply must choose which to use. And in some settings it might make more sense to use one, and in some others the other.

If I had written the rule, it would probably be that the no-metal is some sort of metaphysical or spiritual limitation and wearing such prevents them from using their druidic powers i.e. spells and wildshape. But that of course is just a potential houserule. However, simply handling it with proficiencies would be more parsimonious and would probably work fine. It kinda depends on how big deal you want the no-metal thing to be.

That bolded bit is hour house rule from dm fiat and 100% on you but such a houserule is so questionable you feel the need to dress it up as something else.

Spoiler: Th actual proficiency is one of these

No matter which you allow or impose on players gaining medium or heavy armor proficiency from a source like mountain dwarf racial proficiency, multiclassing, or feat expenditure makes it no longer meaningful. If you as a GM revoke mountain dwarf racial proficiency, multiclass proficiencies in a game with allowed multiclassing, or revoke/deny feat based proficiency in a game with feats allowed as you stated it's a pretty serious houserule 100% on you not simply a gm stating "the actual rule".

 

[Crimson Longinus]

That bolded bit is hour house rule from dm fiat and 100% on you but such a houserule is so questionable you feel the need to dress it up as something else.

Spoiler: Th actual proficiency is one of these

View attachment 141709

No matter which you allow or impose on players gaining medium or heavy armor proficiency from a source like mountain dwarf racial proficiency, multiclassing, or feat expenditure makes it no longer meaningful. If you as a GM revoke mountain dwarf racial proficiency, multiclass proficiencies in a game with allowed multiclassing, or revoke/deny feat based proficiency in a game with feats allowed as you stated it's a pretty serious houserule 100% on you not simply a gm stating "the actual rule".

No one is denied their proficiencies. They simply may not be able to utilise them fully. There are two rules about this in the PHB. Page 45 says druids are not proficient in metal armour page 65 says they won't use metal armour. If we take both at the face value, druids are not proficient in metal armour and won't use it even if they were. Now Crawford's clarification tells us at only 'won't' was intended, thus the page 45 is a misleading summary. He also tells that a player needs and explicit GM permission to ignore this 'won't.' So that's the actual rules, like it or not.

And no, I don't need to try to justify my houserules in weird ways. For my current campaign I completely rewrote both the rules for races and fore armour.