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D&D 3E/3.5 Anyone else do this with AC (PF or 3.5)
- Thread starter GreyLord
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Could you give more details on the AC issues you had? I've never had them, so unsure if we simply have a different idea of when something is a problem, or if there's something to AC that I missed. I'm currently looking at things that may make the non-caster types a bit stronger, and giving armours a flat dex penalty and introducing a feat to ignore that penalty completely would give some versatility I think (sure, clerics and druids could benefit from that as well, but they have a lot less feats and generally not much dex to begin with, making it less interesting for them).
Pathfinder examples:
To give you an idea, take a level 3 Fighter with Tower Shield Specialist. Dex 14, Full Plate, Tower Shield.
AC=25. Typical high attack bonus for a CR 3 monster: +6. So, hitting only on 19-20. (Note: armour training has increased the Max Dex by 1).
At level 10, with a crafter PC making magic items, (62,000 gp), mithril full plate +3, tower shield +3, ring +3, amulet +2, dex 16 (+4 from item), dodge feat +1
mithral full plate +3 (15,150 gp); tower shield +3 (4,500 gp), ring +3 (9000 gp), amulet +2 (4000 gp), dex +4 (8000 gp) - that leaves 22,000 gp worth of equipment
AC=38. Typical high attack bonus for a CR 10 monster: +18. Hitting only on 20.
Between the cleric and wizard in my groups, they generally cover all the magic item types, and it is very, very easy to break AC. I'm not really trying with the above examples.
To give you an idea, take a level 3 Fighter with Tower Shield Specialist. Dex 14, Full Plate, Tower Shield.
AC=25. Typical high attack bonus for a CR 3 monster: +6. So, hitting only on 19-20. (Note: armour training has increased the Max Dex by 1).
At level 10, with a crafter PC making magic items, (62,000 gp), mithril full plate +3, tower shield +3, ring +3, amulet +2, dex 16 (+4 from item), dodge feat +1
mithral full plate +3 (15,150 gp); tower shield +3 (4,500 gp), ring +3 (9000 gp), amulet +2 (4000 gp), dex +4 (8000 gp) - that leaves 22,000 gp worth of equipment
AC=38. Typical high attack bonus for a CR 10 monster: +18. Hitting only on 20.
Between the cleric and wizard in my groups, they generally cover all the magic item types, and it is very, very easy to break AC. I'm not really trying with the above examples.
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Seems like a lot of resources devoted to the fighter's AC. Several Wizard and Cleric feats, so they are less versatile in combat themselves. Fighter is devoting a lot of his own resources to AC, leaving less for other abilities.
That DEX +4 costs 8,000 only if he gives up augmenting STR (or CON, but with that AC, CON's not as big a deal). That 22,000 remaining gp needs to cover weapons (if it all goes into a powerful melee weapon, then add some ranged encounters).
He's focused his character on being very difficult to hit. How's his offense? Should opponents engage him, or break off and go after the cleric or wizard first? Touch AC is much easier to target, and many spells will bypass armor entirely, so spellcasters and creatures with spell like and supernatural abilities will have a much easier time.
Do the opponents consider other tactics? If faced with a similar challenge, what would the PC's do? I suspect they would consider Trips, Grapples and Bull Rushes.
Sure, he's very well defended. He should be - he used a lot of character resources to be very well defended. If he focused a similar amount of character resources (feats, crafting and wealth) on offensive power, how much more damage could he inflict?
That DEX +4 costs 8,000 only if he gives up augmenting STR (or CON, but with that AC, CON's not as big a deal). That 22,000 remaining gp needs to cover weapons (if it all goes into a powerful melee weapon, then add some ranged encounters).
He's focused his character on being very difficult to hit. How's his offense? Should opponents engage him, or break off and go after the cleric or wizard first? Touch AC is much easier to target, and many spells will bypass armor entirely, so spellcasters and creatures with spell like and supernatural abilities will have a much easier time.
Do the opponents consider other tactics? If faced with a similar challenge, what would the PC's do? I suspect they would consider Trips, Grapples and Bull Rushes.
Sure, he's very well defended. He should be - he used a lot of character resources to be very well defended. If he focused a similar amount of character resources (feats, crafting and wealth) on offensive power, how much more damage could he inflict?
Agreed. Fighters I know are wearing +4 Str items, not dex. They tend to improve their weapons a lot more than their armours. I've yet to see the level 3 fighter walking around in fullplate; most prefer going for a weapon enhancement. Also, while his AC is great against regular mellee, it's not nearly as good against touch attacks. I'm not seeing anything to boost his saves either, so if Mr Evil Wizard targets him with a will save, chances are he's toast.
This build is what we cal a Cork, someone good at blocking the enemy so that someone ELSE can do the damage. That CAN be a good role, but usually after a few swings the monsters will just ignore the cork and go after his buddies.
remove "wealth-by-level" and make the game low(er) magic and this shouldn't be as much of a problem.
It is - actually, it's a bit too many, but his AC doesn't drop so much if I take some out. It might drop to being hit on a 17!
The trouble with defending against spells, touch and special manoeuvres is that (in general) there isn't any defense against them save spells that counter their effect. A purple worm has a +36 grapple check - I'm yet to see any sort of PC who can defend against that without (a) being a monk focused on defense or (b) having freedom of movement. Likewise, you might have one or two good saves, but all three? At the levels a properly optimized foe will cast against you? There's a huge disparity between the DCs of spells at higher levels and the low saving throws of characters.
There's a foe in the final book of Kingmaker who casts mass hold person with a DC of 23. You probably should be 17th level by that stage, which means that a fighter with a +5 cloak and a 10 Wisdom has a Will save of +10. What's the counter for that? Really, it's a ring of freedom of movement. In that campaign, we had every craft feat between the casters in the party. (I don't think they made that ring, though - an oversight!)
AC works against most of the foes you'll likely face. And - for a relatively traditional campaign with more bruisers than special effects foes - it's really very good. Both my Council of Thieves and Kingmaker campaigns have had a PC who has focused on AC, and it hasn't proved to be a poor choice - and they've had good enough weapons to be effective.
Mind you, the purely offence-focused fighter is a scary sight. In Way of the Wicked, the 3rd level great-axe wielding fighter is attacking at +10 vs AC and dealing 1d12+13/x3 damage or thereabouts. (I think his AC is around 20). The disparity between his damage and that of everyone else is notable.
My experience is that there are a lot of items to boost AC, and not that many for attacks.
Cheers!
GreyLord
Legend
I personally like low magic campaigns, but even in the high campaigns, I think the High AC isn't much of a problem overall, especially if it's truly a high magic campaign and enemies have just as much access to the magic as players. So the PC has a high AC, how will he fare against an enemy fighter with a High bonuses to hit and damage...and as other's have pointed out, there's always the touch attacks.
AC IS a good thing, but typically not a big gamebreaker in my book.
AC IS a good thing, but typically not a big gamebreaker in my book.
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