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A good Armor Class Bonus to Damage Reduction house rule?
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<blockquote data-quote="Plane Sailing" data-source="post: 5299794" data-attributes="member: 114"><p>Thread Necromancy to answer a question from <strong>El Mahdi</strong></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>My old website is dead, so I'm posting the details in this thread</p><p></p><p><strong><span style="font-size: 15px">Optional Rule: Armour Providing Damage Reduction</span></strong></p><p><em>(from 2003)</em></p><p><em></em></p><p>I like the idea of armour reducing damage rather than making you harder to hit. D&D has always had the abstraction of hit points, but now there is less reason than ever to stick with the old ways.</p><p></p><p>We already have damage resistance for high level barbarians as a result of their increasing toughness. We also have damage resistance for natural objects. And damage reduction that can be bypassed by magical weapons. It seems like a natural step to extend that to armour, and differentiate between "being hit" and "being hurt".</p><p></p><p><strong>Roll to Hit</strong></p><p></p><p>The roll to hit AC is a base of 10 modified by size, DEX bonus and any similar bonuses such as dodge, deflection and luck, as well as cover. The expertise feat still affects AC.</p><p></p><p>Shields give cover rather than armour, and magic shields give their bonus to the cover value (they are good at moving just at the right time). The cover value is higher than the physical size of the shield because of the ability for the character to move it slightly to cover the vital locations better.</p><p></p><p>[code]</p><p>[b]Shield bonus Cover for M size Armour check Weight[/b]</p><p>Tiny/Buckler +1 None -1 5lb</p><p>Small +2 Quarter -1 5lb</p><p>Medium +4 Half -2 10lb</p><p>Large/Tower +7 Three quarters -3 20lb</p><p>[/code]</p><p></p><p></p><p><strong>Roll to Hurt</strong></p><p></p><p>Armour worn (and natural armour) provides damage reduction rather than an increase in AC. Standard armour provides damage resistance equal to it's bonus. This will stack with natural armour such as monsters have, and high level barbarians gain. This is a practical solution since there are so many ways that damage from weapons can be increased now (crits, feats, magic etc).</p><p></p><p>Critical threats (on creatures which are subject to critical hits) have found a vital location in their armour - an eye, a joint, a hollow over the heart or whatever - and ignore the armour when assessing damage whether or not a critical hit is confirmed. This is in addition to the weapon damage multiplier.</p><p></p><p>[code]</p><p>[b]Armour bonus Maximum DEX Armour check Weight[/b]</p><p>Padded +1 +8 0 10lb</p><p>Leather +2 +6 0 15lb</p><p>Studded Leather +3 +5 -1 20lb</p><p>Chain Shirt +4 +4 -2 25lb</p><p>Hide +3 +4 -3 25lb</p><p>Scale Mail +4 +3 -4 30lb</p><p>Chainmail +5 +2 -3 40lb</p><p>Breastplate +5 +3 -4 30lb</p><p>Splint Mail +6 0 -7 45lb</p><p>Banded Mail +6 +1 -6 35lb</p><p>Half-Plate +7 0 -7 50lb</p><p>Full Plate +8 +1 -6 50lb</p><p>[/code]</p><p></p><p>Magic armour adds its bonus to the damage reduction, so +4 Full Plate would give damage resistance 12/-- instead of 8/--. Creatures that have natural armour and damage reduction get the natural armour against all attacks, and add on the damage resistance to attacks which don't meet the threshold value. E.g. +1 or better weapons attacking the great red worm face natural armour 24 (it gets past the 10/+1). Non magic weapons face an additional 10 points, making it 34 points armour - pretty difficult to get through!</p><p></p><p>One effect of this is that colossal creatures such as Dragons become much harder to hurt without critical hits and power attacks (The great red dragon has +24 natural armour, but it's AC is now down to 8 (10, -2 size). Let's face it, it's easy to hit, but hard to get through all that scale and bone!</p><p></p><p>On the other hand, heavy armour is very nice to have if you are getting into a big battle - cutting down on the amount of damage from each hit is very helpful, especially if you are wearing magic armour with a magic shield!</p><p></p><p>I have done some basic playtesting of this effect with characters of 1st-4th level, and in general it seems to work out that the characters last slightly longer in combat. One of the main implications is that weapons which do smaller amounts of damage find it much harder to hurt someone who is wearing armour, unless they get a critical hit or the attacker is strong, or perhaps using "power attack".</p><p></p><p><strong>Additional Rules</strong></p><p></p><p>Armour only protects against blows in combat. It provides no special damage reduction against energy attacks, magic damage, drowning or falling etc. It provides no protection against touch spell damage.</p><p></p><p><strong>Spell notes</strong></p><p></p><p>Shield spell still provides cover, like a large shield, as before.</p><p></p><p>Mage Armour gives 4/-- armour (doesn't stack with other worn armour)</p><p></p><p>Stoneskin still gives 10/adamantine damage resistance, that will stack with natural or worn armour.</p><p></p><p>Barkskin gives natural armour (that will stack with worn armour)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Plane Sailing, post: 5299794, member: 114"] Thread Necromancy to answer a question from [B]El Mahdi[/B] My old website is dead, so I'm posting the details in this thread [B][SIZE="4"]Optional Rule: Armour Providing Damage Reduction[/SIZE][/B] [I](from 2003) [/I] I like the idea of armour reducing damage rather than making you harder to hit. D&D has always had the abstraction of hit points, but now there is less reason than ever to stick with the old ways. We already have damage resistance for high level barbarians as a result of their increasing toughness. We also have damage resistance for natural objects. And damage reduction that can be bypassed by magical weapons. It seems like a natural step to extend that to armour, and differentiate between "being hit" and "being hurt". [B]Roll to Hit[/B] The roll to hit AC is a base of 10 modified by size, DEX bonus and any similar bonuses such as dodge, deflection and luck, as well as cover. The expertise feat still affects AC. Shields give cover rather than armour, and magic shields give their bonus to the cover value (they are good at moving just at the right time). The cover value is higher than the physical size of the shield because of the ability for the character to move it slightly to cover the vital locations better. [code] [b]Shield bonus Cover for M size Armour check Weight[/b] Tiny/Buckler +1 None -1 5lb Small +2 Quarter -1 5lb Medium +4 Half -2 10lb Large/Tower +7 Three quarters -3 20lb [/code] [B]Roll to Hurt[/B] Armour worn (and natural armour) provides damage reduction rather than an increase in AC. Standard armour provides damage resistance equal to it's bonus. This will stack with natural armour such as monsters have, and high level barbarians gain. This is a practical solution since there are so many ways that damage from weapons can be increased now (crits, feats, magic etc). Critical threats (on creatures which are subject to critical hits) have found a vital location in their armour - an eye, a joint, a hollow over the heart or whatever - and ignore the armour when assessing damage whether or not a critical hit is confirmed. This is in addition to the weapon damage multiplier. [code] [b]Armour bonus Maximum DEX Armour check Weight[/b] Padded +1 +8 0 10lb Leather +2 +6 0 15lb Studded Leather +3 +5 -1 20lb Chain Shirt +4 +4 -2 25lb Hide +3 +4 -3 25lb Scale Mail +4 +3 -4 30lb Chainmail +5 +2 -3 40lb Breastplate +5 +3 -4 30lb Splint Mail +6 0 -7 45lb Banded Mail +6 +1 -6 35lb Half-Plate +7 0 -7 50lb Full Plate +8 +1 -6 50lb [/code] Magic armour adds its bonus to the damage reduction, so +4 Full Plate would give damage resistance 12/-- instead of 8/--. Creatures that have natural armour and damage reduction get the natural armour against all attacks, and add on the damage resistance to attacks which don't meet the threshold value. E.g. +1 or better weapons attacking the great red worm face natural armour 24 (it gets past the 10/+1). Non magic weapons face an additional 10 points, making it 34 points armour - pretty difficult to get through! One effect of this is that colossal creatures such as Dragons become much harder to hurt without critical hits and power attacks (The great red dragon has +24 natural armour, but it's AC is now down to 8 (10, -2 size). Let's face it, it's easy to hit, but hard to get through all that scale and bone! On the other hand, heavy armour is very nice to have if you are getting into a big battle - cutting down on the amount of damage from each hit is very helpful, especially if you are wearing magic armour with a magic shield! I have done some basic playtesting of this effect with characters of 1st-4th level, and in general it seems to work out that the characters last slightly longer in combat. One of the main implications is that weapons which do smaller amounts of damage find it much harder to hurt someone who is wearing armour, unless they get a critical hit or the attacker is strong, or perhaps using "power attack". [B]Additional Rules[/B] Armour only protects against blows in combat. It provides no special damage reduction against energy attacks, magic damage, drowning or falling etc. It provides no protection against touch spell damage. [B]Spell notes[/B] Shield spell still provides cover, like a large shield, as before. Mage Armour gives 4/-- armour (doesn't stack with other worn armour) Stoneskin still gives 10/adamantine damage resistance, that will stack with natural or worn armour. Barkskin gives natural armour (that will stack with worn armour) [/QUOTE]
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A good Armor Class Bonus to Damage Reduction house rule?
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