Awfully Alarmed About Armour

[Argyle King]

str bonus to ac is a terrible idea.

I think plate should give a -2 to hit, even WITH training and the appropriate strength. Try boxing a few rounds in your shorts, then try the same wearing a winter ski suit. 45 pounds, even perfectly distributed around your body, in the midst of life-threatening combat (or even sports combat), would cause you to drain stamina like crazy. Maybe with years of training...but the same guy not wearing armor should hit more often. (but get killed faster too, in trade).

Fighters or those with a certain theme could offset that penalty.

I'd agree that being encumbered would cause more fatigue. I highly disagree that wearing 45 pounds of armor would cause such a penalty to the ability to fight. Granted, I've never worn plate armor. However, I have worn body armor in combat. While the type of armor I've worn is a lot different than that of a knight, I'd like to believe I have some amount of insight.

Beyond that, I don't like the idea of heavily armored D&D characters needing to take a feat to be effective with a piece of equipment they already know how to use. To me, that's starting to edge into 'feat tax' territory. Such a feat or theme becomes too much of a no-brainer choice; even with flatter math.

If we're shooting for more realism and granularity, I would agree that using a shield would give a penalty to hit without proper training. D&D as a system would need to be a lot more detailed overall for that to fit in with the rest of the game though. Otherwise, I feel it still edges into feat tax territory.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Beyond that, I don't like the idea of heavily armored D&D characters needing to take a feat to be effective with a piece of equipment they already know how to use. To me, that's starting to edge into 'feat tax' territory. Such a feat or theme becomes too much of a no-brainer choice; even with flatter math.

If we're shooting for more realism and granularity, I would agree that using a shield would give a penalty to hit without proper training. D&D as a system would need to be a lot more detailed overall for that to fit in with the rest of the game though. Otherwise, I feel it still edges into feat tax territory.

In 3e using a shield did give a penalty to hit without proper training.

Let's keep in mind that in 3e, heavily armored character already had 4 feats to wear their use their armor and shield properly. Then they created additional feats on top of that to get an odd +1 here or there so that it would be possible to not fall behind. So a high level tank that actually went with the defensive route could have 6 (or more!) feats invested.

In comparison, the Rogue had 1 feat (Light Armor Proficiency).

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

But this was a bad solution to the problem. First, it overcomplicated things (when simple was better). Second, most of the extreme AC issues were caused by +5 shields stacking with +5 armor. Remove that and a lot of the issues vanish as well.

I think you put your finger on an important piece on the problem.

There was a concern that in a simple "AC = armor + shield + dex" throwing a very good magical shield in could potentially blow the curve. (I am not agreeing with this sentiment, but I have seen this argued.)

OTOH, there is a resistance to having shields be anything but brain dead simple.

What non-AC version of a shield would satisfy those who want simple?

My thought was that light armors are simply too good. If the best light armor you can acquire is a +2 to AC, then there is room for the value of mail or plate or shield shine through.

A light chain shirt that is almost as good as full mail is an absurdity that only exists in fantasy literature.

 

[Argyle King]

In 3e using a shield did give a penalty to hit without proper training.

Let's keep in mind that in 3e, heavily armored character already had 4 feats to wear their use their armor and shield properly. Then they created additional feats on top of that to get an odd +1 here or there so that it would be possible to not fall behind. So a high level tank that actually went with the defensive route could have 6 (or more!) feats invested.

In comparison, the Rogue had 1 feat (Light Armor Proficiency).

True, but I took the post I was commenting as meaning you'd need more feats on top of that. As in a fighter (who is already proficient with heavy armor) would then need to take another feat on top of proficiency so as to not have a penalty.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Yeah, but if we're being realistic, a large steel shield is also worth a Hell of a lot more than a +2 bonus to AC-- give me a choice between any body armor lighter than a full suit of six-in-one chain or carrying a shield in my skivvies, and I'm taking the shield.

Unless it's a gunfight. I just hope that the gun rules-- whenever and however they should occur-- aren't as messed up as they have been in certain recent offshoots.

 

[Stalker0]

If any armor as DR rules exist, then they have to scale at higher levels. Because damage scales, if DR doesn't scale with it, then the DR eventually becomes useless.

But then you get in the situation where the 20th level fighter in the chain shirt has DR 20 where as the 1st level guy puts on the same chain shirt and gets DR 1, which could be unnerving to some.

Honestly, I like the one stop shop of AC bonus and prefer it over any DR system.

That said, I do like the idea of crit immunity/resistance being roped in with heavier armor, that has some merit.

 

[Votan]

Yeah, but if we're being realistic, a large steel shield is also worth a Hell of a lot more than a +2 bonus to AC-- give me a choice between any body armor lighter than a full suit of six-in-one chain or carrying a shield in my skivvies, and I'm taking the shield.

Unless it's a gunfight. I just hope that the gun rules-- whenever and however they should occur-- aren't as messed up as they have been in certain recent offshoots.

No to mention just how helpful a helmet is an an actual fight. Notice that even the 20th century (think WW1 and WW2), the helmet was the one piece of armor that persisted through all of the technological advances.

 

[Derren]

Yeah, but if we're being realistic, a large steel shield is also worth a Hell of a lot more than a +2 bonus to AC-- give me a choice between any body armor lighter than a full suit of six-in-one chain or carrying a shield in my skivvies, and I'm taking the shield.

Well, if we are being realistic, no one would use steel (or iron) shields. Wood and leather only.
But yes, shields are much more useful than D&D portrays them. There is a reason why every culture on the planet used shields (except 2 I know off. The Japanese and Native Americans. And I am not so sure about the latter one).

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

The Sioux used shields-- stretched hide over wooden frame. They weren't bulletproof by any means, but bullets were known to deflect off of them fairly regularly.

 

[jadrax]

There is a reason why every culture on the planet used shields (except 2 I know off. The Japanese and Native Americans. And I am not so sure about the latter one).

Samurai did not use hand held shields*, but did use something equivalent to a Pavise (known as a 'tate') when facing archers, which was discarded when then enemy closed.

Some other Japanese troops did use hand held shields (known as the 'te-date'), normally based on Chinese or Korean designs. These where particularly in common use by the Japanese equivalent of naval troops.

The issue is, Samurai culture totally came to dominate Japan's history, so you only commonly get images of that, thus relegating any shield using troops to the dustbin of history.


*well after the 5th century AD anyway, there are some images of Samurai shield use pre-dating that. Apparently there are some nice colour plates in Tony Bryant's 'Early Samurai 200-1500 AD'