Don't Leave Home Without It...

[Thorvald Kviksverd]

Why...your helmet of course!
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Another tidbit from the dusty tomes...

Much of my campaign has a dark ages feel with respect to the type of armor worn, yet the primary defensive items of this time are woefully under-represented in the game. The helmet is not presented at all (leaving aside its inclusion in certain armour descriptions), except as a magical item, and the shield provides minimal protection. If any others feel the same, I offer a few suggestions on how to rectify this.

(Note: I've only included Helmets in this post--they seemed to get the most positive response last time around )

The underlying assumption being, that wearing a helmet doesn't make you any harder to hit; but when a threat is scored a disproportionate number of these will target the head, and therefore a helmet should provide a disproportionate amount of protection at these times--and not having one on at such times is a VERY bad idea indeed!

[color=red][size=4]
HELMETS
                  
Type     ThreatAP's    Penalty     SpellFail

None        -4            0           +0%
                  
Light       -2           -1           +10%

Medium       0           -3           +25%

Heavy       +2           -6           +50%

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notes-

Assumes values for armour given in PHB are sans helmet.

ThreatAP's: added to armor class before threat roll is made to test for a critical.

Penalty(proficient): applies to all checks related to vision or hearing(and perhaps smell, in the case of the heavy helm). One-half of the modifier(0/0/-1/-3) applies to archery(bows, not crossbows).

Penalty(non-proficient): applies to all checks related to vision or hearing(and sometimes smell). The greater of the helmet or armor penalty applies to all attack rolls.

SpellFail: applies to spells with verbal components.

Well, there you have it. Let me know what you think; also, I'd be interested in seeing any
house rules you may have come up with to deal with these issues.

 

[Thorvald Kviksverd]

Yikes!

Not even a negative comment, just how boring is this idea anyway?

 

[angramainyu]

I kinda like it. I just may have to use it.

 

[milo]

I don't know if the penalties for search, spot, and listen checks is worth it to negate an occasional critical hit. How long would it take to put the helmet on? You could carry your helmet around and when you see and opponent put your helmet on if it only takes a partial action or move equivalent action. I think there were rules in 2e for this, I don't know I never played until 3e came out. The only way I know any rules from 2e is from my group talking about them.

 

[trentonjoe]

Again , I think you have the coolest name ever.

About the thread, I think it is a great idea.

I would change it to this though.

Name AC bonus to criticals Penalty check
Leather cap (light) +1 -1
Chain helmet (medium) +3 -2
Full helm (heavy) +5 -3

I am kinda seeing it as the warrior prepares for battle by donning his giant helm. I think in battle it should be a move equivilant action that draws an AoO. I think your spell failure chance is fine.

Again, great idea.

 

[Thorvald Kviksverd]

Thanks for the feedback everyone. It's nice to know that others may get some use out of this as well

Again , I think you have the coolest name ever.

Thanks. Wouldn't it be great if we got to choose our names, instead of our parents?

About the thread, I think it is a great idea. I would change it to this though...

Thanks again. I started off (as I recall, it was quite a while ago) with numbers similar to yours i.e. No penalty for "none", and progressively higher bonuses for the heavier varieties. I just thought it made heavily armoured types too difficult to injure--and also had the potential to lead to bizzare situations where the naked great helm wearer is as difficult to score a critical against as someone wearing a full suit of chainmail.

Anyway, feel free to play with the numbers to suit your campaign.

I am kinda seeing it as the warrior prepares for battle by donning his giant helm. I think in battle it should be a move equivilant action that draws an AoO.

I agree, similar to readying a shield.

Additionally, you could allow the knight to wear a camail(light helmet equivalent). This would give him some protection while riding along with his helm at his saddle. He could then don his helm directly over it; however, when doing so, I would add the penalties together for proficiency and spellfailure checks, while only granting the higher of the Threat AP bonuses.

So...

Camail: as Light Helmet

Helm & Camail: +2/-7/+60%

 

[med stud]

Thorvald, do you got Norwegian parents? If so, are you from the West coast?

 

[Cabral]

Yikes!

Not even a negative comment, just how boring is this idea anyway?

Heh. I can relate; you can hear your own echo on my Dragonstar related threads... As for helmets, I would recoomend making it more of a mix and match AC system.

For each category you helmet is above you armor, your ThreatAP increases by 1. For each level your helmet is below your armor, your decrease your ThreatAP by 1.
Wearing no helmet with no armor doesn't affect you, but wearing no helmet with Heavy Plate gives you a Threat AP of -3 (No armor is 3 levels below Heavy Armor)

The rest would be as per your chart. That way, you don't get an AC penalty or bonus for using the helmet that came with your armor ...