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

[Crimson Longinus]

And they can then change their minds with no repercussions except a possible DM hissyfit.

No they can't. Because 'druids will not wear metal armour' is a rule.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

It's not really much. The class section where the proficiencies are in greater detail says what the rule is. Medium armor proficiency with some lore about not wearing metal armor. The page 45 chart is small and to save space they shorted "will not wear metal armor" to "non-metal," but a space saving paraphrase isn't going to trump the real thing that is on page 65.

I made no claims one way or another - except that: there it is for those that hadn't realized it.

Your interpretation is fine. You can choose to ignore whatever rules you like for any reason you like at your table.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

It's a personal rule of the PC, sure. Much like people making new years resolutions are making personal rules to do or not do something. Those rules can be broken by personal choice. Nothing prevents it.

No it is an actual rule literally printed in the book with actual letters. Just like every other rule.

 

[Maxperson]

Would they? It requires +5 dex modifier to equal halfplate with +2 dex modifier. I have hard time seeing druids getting 20 in dex and with anything less you're better off with the halfplate.

The armor class doesn't really matter that much. It's all going to ultimately fall within a point or two of every other armor anyway. This isn't about cheesing the system, and as the sage advice says, it's not going to unbalance anything if the druid wears metal armor. It's simply about choice and theme.

 

[Maxperson]

I made no claims one way or another - except that: there it is for those that hadn't realized it.

Your interpretation is fine. You can choose to ignore whatever rules you like for any reason you like at your table.

Yep. Not ignoring any rule with the druid, though. The armor thing is a strong lore related preference, not a rule.

 

[Maxperson]

No it is an actual rule literally printed in the book with actual letters. Just like every other rule.

Not in the PHB that I can see. Not in the Sage Advice unless the DM house rules in a consequence.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

Yep. Not ignoring any rule with the druid, though. The armor thing is a strong lore related preference, not a rule.

So, to you, the table on page 45 is "not a rule"?

 

[TwoSix]

'Druids will not wear metal armour' That is the rule! I literally cannot understand where the difficulty is. If your character has a rule 'Will not do X' then them doing X is against the rules. This must truly be the bizarrest attempt at rules lawyering I have ever seen; simply claiming that words don't mean things.

The problem is that the rule hearkens back to older AD&D style item prohibitions like "Magic Users can never wear armor" or "Cleric can only use Blunt Weapons"; those rules were problematic then and seem fundamentally atavistic in a modern game.

The problem is that those types of prohibitions are fundamentally gamist without even the shred of verisimilitude that a D&D style game requires. The characters are presumably human-type creatures capable of breaking rules and strictures placed on them, therefore, those type of prohibitions needs to have some in-narrative consequence for breaking the stricture to seem realistic. 5e has plenty of those types of rules in place, look at barbarian as a way to use the rules to maintain armor tropes without running into requiring metagame prescriptions to keep druids out of metal armor.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

If a player has their PC put on metal armor, I know that PC is not a druid no matter what their character sheet says because druids will not wear metal armor.

Feel free to ignore the rule from the PHB at your table.

You aren’t any more RAW on this than I am.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Not in the PHB that I can see. Not in the Sage Advice unless the DM house rules in a consequence.

Armor: Light armor, medium armor, shields (druids will not wear armor or use shields made of metal)

A rule. Not a suggestion, a rule. The consequence of not following is the same than me deciding to roll 2d12 for my attack rolls instead of d20, so likely people not wanting to play with me.