My group is discussing what is going to go into 4E armor class and how it will work. Right now we are using AC against all melee attacks and Reflex vs. all ranged attacks. The problem that I have is that it makes no sense to me that their would be no benefit to having armor vs. arrows, thrown weapons, slings etc. In addition it makes no sense to me that a dragon or other such creatures thick tough armor would not also help deflect, if not outright stop arrows and the like. In addition if a character is wielding a spear in melee, but can't hit due to the opposed creatures (or character or whatevers) armor why should he suddenly have a much better chance to hit if he throws the spear? It just does not make sense. I think reflex to hits are going to apply to things like breath weapons, spells, etc. Things that armor can not protect you from logically. Does anyone have any thoughts on this or any links that you have seen regarding this topic? Thanks.
AC vs. reflex and what is what
- Thread starter kodyboy
- Start date
kodyboy said:
While we've not seen a *ton* of detail on how this works, the Spined Devil preview card had an attack that went against reflex that would traditionally have been a reflex save, but its attacks were still against AC.
Best guess seems to be that all physical attacks -- swords, arrows, spears, and punches -- are going against AC, while anything that merely needs to touch you -- eldritch bolts of energy, ghosts, grapple attempts, small children covered in peanut-butter -- attack Reflex.
There's some room to play there: since it looks like AC will be informed by Reflex, which might be as simple as AC = Reflex + Armor + Shield, or might be something completely different, it's possible to have a sword miss the AC but hit the reflex, or miss both, or miss neither. If it misses AC but hit reflex, then it was clearly absorbed by the armor, which might have some lesser effect.
Stuff like that.
Hope this helps, and welcome to the boards!
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chitzk0i
Explorer
Lackhand said:
In all of the much-aligned 3.5, I can only recall one feat that involved a mechanic like that, Blood-Spiked Charger. In light of the whole 'stream-lined' thing they're going for, I doubt that they'll use that type of mechanic in 4e. Then again, Blood-Spiked Charger is far from streamlined, so I guess they could make it work.
But the impression I got from the previews is that reflex defense is taking over the role of touch AC.
Plane Sailing
Astral Admin - Mwahahaha!
The most obvious division to me is that Reflex defence becomes your 'touch AC' as well as your 'AC against spells that used to have reflex saves', while AC is used against normal attacks, whether melee or missile or whatever.
Nikosandros
Golden Procrastinator
That's what I got as well. I wonder whether AC will be reflex + equipment or if they will be considered separate, so that a defender might have a bonus to AC but not one to reflex defense.Plane Sailing said:
comrade raoul
Explorer
I don't see these as incompatible. Just as in 3e everything (pretty much) everything that increases your touch AC increases your regular AC (but not vice versa), it seems likely that in 4e everything that increases your reflex will also increase your AC (but not vice versa).
captaincursor
First Post
Won't it be some kind of variation off of SWSE? AC will be some kind of combo of armor, dex, experience (level based AC progression) with armor giving reduced benefits unless you have the feats or talents to keep it viable? So for a rogue AC and Reflex will be around the same number since their AC is essentially representing their ability to dodge out of the way, while a sword and board fighter will have a much higher AC than reflex since they'll be encased in protective magical steel with a huge shield to deflect arrows (and in 4e apparently fireballs and falling rocks), but still a big target to zap with a magical ray.
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