D&D (2024) Armor, simplified for 5.5E:

[fluffybunbunkittens]

While this is an interesting discussion of a potential house rule, what does this have to do with the playtest and why is it in the playtest subforum?

omg I didn't even notice what is it doing here

 

[Mistwell]

omg I didn't even notice what is it doing here

He's advocating for this change to take place in 5.5 I assume?

 

[Horwath]

I think it's easier to just remove Dex-to-dmg to scale the stat back a bit.

no thanks, I had enough of 1d8+0 bow damage.

 

[Remathilis]

You can still go for dex if you want to be best ranged attacker, supported by weaker melee finesse weapons.

and OFC skills and initiative.

Can you show us on the doll where the Rogue sneak-attacked you?

 

[gorice]

I think its a good idea to condense the armours, since they were fairly redundant and the flavour was kind of weird anyway. I would probably keep a gold-plated and/or cumbersome version in each category (e.g. heavy plate) to give people something to work towards, but w/e.

OTOH, once you start talking about DR and removing DEX bonuses from AC, I think you'd be better off just having armour only give DR, and something like 'evasion' (the old AC) be dex bonus + proficiency or something.

It's far too sensible a change to actually happen, but we can dream.

 

[tetrasodium]

As a gm I despise the armor types in 5e. In the simplifications 5e made to the d20 core it built off wotc stripped away all of the mechanical hooks that allowed two armors of the same light/medium/heavy class with a different AC to be subjectively desirable. Now it's just "what gives more AC" and literally nothing beyond that to influence selection

edit: Someone could say "well what about disadvantage on stealth?" but no that's not something that's going to influence people who might wear that class of armor. People considering on if a bit of armor gives stealth disadvantage are going to sit back not moving & send someone with an actual stealthy dex built PC off ahead to be stealthy if it might actually matter

 

[Eubani]

Oversimplifying the armor table has reduced the design space and created the illusion of choice. Simplifying further would only exacerbate things.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Oversimplifying the armor table has reduced the design space and created the illusion of choice. Simplifying further would only exacerbate things.

This. Level Up's more detailed armor system is much more my speed. This is the opposite of what I would want.

 

[gorice]

I guess I'd rather have no choice than the illusion of choice. But, a little more depth would be nice.

 

[Horwath]

I guess I'd rather have no choice than the illusion of choice. But, a little more depth would be nice.

in 5E there is no real choice

you have studded leather for light.

you aim for halfplate with medium or if your REALLY aim for stealth it will be breastplate, but that will be aimed towards mithral halfplate.

and you have full-plate for heavy. or if you're lucky mithral or adamantium version of it.


same as in 3.5e;
there was 3 basic armors only: chainshirt, breastplate, full-plate.