D&D 5E Can your Druids wear metal armor?

[Chaosmancer]

Considering I'm 5 pages back, this is likely covered, but just for the sake of completeness

Druids have a taboo against wearing metal armor and wielding a metal shield.
[Not in D&D 5e. In 5e there is no taboo.]

The idea is that druids prefer to be protected by animal skins, wood, and other natural materials that aren’t the worked metal that is associated with civilization.
[This idea of a "taboo" is absent from the Players Handbook. Hypothetically interpolating a taboo into 5e, what remains unexplained is, why druids like attacking with metal but not defending with metal.]

Druids don’t lack the ability to wear metal armor.
[Just like Wizards dont lack the ability to wear metal armor.]


They choose not to wear it.
[Which is why the Druid class doesnt grant proficiency with it.]

This I think is the core of where your views and mine on the sage advice diverge. The idea of the taboo is that that is represented by the "will not wear" line. That is where it is represented by the text of 5e. Alternatively, while I had not considered the "lack the ability" in terms of wizards, I think I've been adding the word "effectively" to the sentence.

So, to me, that line "Druids don’t lack the ability to wear metal armor." is meant to indicate that they do not lack proficiency in Metal Armor. It is all based around that taboo and the druid "preferring" to be protected by natural materials that aren't worked metal. Which is why the whole thing is so egregious to me, because it is a preference, a choice, and one that I should be more than capable of having my druid change.

 

[mrpopstar]

Eh, I tend to post in spare moments between other things.

I can't do that. LOL

 

[Crimson Longinus]

That isn't to say that there are no issues with taking it to mean that way though, because it then opens up potential questions of how proficiency interacts with materials. We can ignore those questions, and assume that it doesn't matter in 99% of all cases, but it does make it a point that could be brought up.

I mean, if I am proficient with nonmetal shields, how does that make sense? What makes a metal shield function differently than a wooden shield? Does that mean that there has to be something for using a turtle shell as a shield. Likely not, but the question is brought up.

Yeah. Mechanically material based proficiencies would work just fine, but it certainly is pretty hard to rationalise what's actually going on in the fiction. How it requires different sort of training to use a similarly shaped object depending on it's material? Then again, the flat restriction also invites similar questions about what's actually going on.

 

[Chaosmancer]

This is a social game. It isn't grossly unjust that anyone might have to engage with the DM to build the character of their dreams.

Grossly unjust? No, I guess I wouldn't call it that. But can you name a single other restriction in the game that actively tells the player what their character will choose not to do?

And it isn't paladins. Paladins can choose to break their oaths. They have consequences, but the rules explicitly allow that choice. The rules, read by RAW and taken literally, prevent the Druid from making that choice.

 

[Charlaquin]

I can't do that. LOL

I’m one of those face-always-in-phone millennials.

 

[Charlaquin]

I want to add to this part:

Technically, the players describe what they WANT to do and the Dungeon Master narrates the results. So, it's important to recognize that "my fighter casts fireball!" is a want, not a guaranteed outcome.

Right, so here I think we get to the heart of the issue. The druid player isn’t allowed to say their character wants to wear metal armor, because the way the restriction is constructed prevents that. Druids “won’t” wear metal armor. It’s a choice. You can’t want to wear metal armor if you’re a druid! That’s something your character wouldn’t do! That’s an agency problem.

 

[mrpopstar]

Grossly unjust? No, I guess I wouldn't call it that. But can you name a single other restriction in the game that actively tells the player what their character will choose not to do?

Passages like this stand out: "A rogue would rather make one precise strike, placing it exactly where the attack will hurt the target most, than wear an opponent down with a barrage of attacks."

As would is the past tense form of will, these passages are equally as prescriptive in terms of what any given character thinks or does.

 

[Charlaquin]

Passages like this stand out: "A rogue would rather make one precise strike, placing it exactly where the attack will hurt the target most, than wear an opponent down with a barrage of attacks."

As would is the past tense form of will, these passages are equally as prescriptive in terms of what any given character thinks or does.

Right, but no one tries to say that passage is a rule. It’s just a statement about the flavor of the class. That’s why I say the restriction isn’t a problem if you interpret it as a statement about the flavor of the class. It’s only a problem if you interpret it as a rule.

 

[mrpopstar]

Right, but no one tries to say that passage is a rule. It’s just a statement about the flavor of the class. That’s why I say the restriction isn’t a problem if you interpret it as a statement about the flavor of the class. It’s only a problem if you interpret it as a rule.

Another semantic distinction, but I do understand what your perfectly valid gripe is.

 

[Maxperson]

That's just how things sometimes are. "Vegans only eat food made of plants and mushrooms."

And yet sometimes eat animal products as an exception while remaining vegan.