Dragon Armour... My thoughts...

[Jesus_marley]

I currently play D&D 3rd Ed. (I refuse to play 3.5 simply because they brought it out so dang close to the original 3.0 release. In my view it was nothing but a cash grab but I digress).

In reading the rules for making armour from dragon hide, I found I was very disappointed. While they did cover different kinds of armour (leather, banded, plate) they neglected (in my view) to allow for a "specialness" that one would expect from the hide of such a creature. I'm not talking about fire or acid resistance (unless magically placed on such armour) but more along the lines of accounting for a "toughness" from dragons of different age categories.

My thoughts are that if a PC is able to kill and skin an ancient dragon, he or she should be rewarded with something more than a cool looking set of regular leather or plate mail. That is why I have decided to post my idea concerning dragon armour. I feel it takes into account the fact that as a dragon ages, it's skin gets significantly tougher.

The system is really quite simple and I believe it makes a lot of sense. The rules for making the actual armour remain unchanged. Let me know what you think.

Leather - Additional non-magical armour bonus equal to 1/4 (fractions round down) of the dragon's age category (eg. the skin from a category 4 dragon would give an addition +1 on top of any bonus for MW.)

Banded - Additional non magical armour bonus equal to 1/3(fractions round down) of the dragon's age category (eg. the skin from a category 6 dragon would give an additional +2 on top of any bonus for MW). Weight reduction 60% of normal.

Plate - Additional non-magical armour bonus equal to 1/2 (fractions round down) of the dragon's age category (eg. the skin from a category 8 dragon would give an additional +4 on top of any bonuses for MW). Weight reduction 50% of normal.

 

[Evilhalfling]

I do something similar but far less generous -
All dragon armor has an unamed nonmagical bonus = to 1/10 of the dragons NAC bonus
this works out to +1 in most cases, +2for dragons on the edge of reason and +3 for anchient or older.
although no one has tried it I would prolly say that enchanting to resist the dragons elemental type is half the listed price. having the the price goes from
27.5 k to 13.75 k to create, so far the 11th lvl party even come close to having 27k to spend on one char. but 13k might be possible.

according to your system you could get a +2 bonus from a young adult Black CR 9? then enchant it and have +3 armor for 1000 gp ?
This seems to like to much.

 

[Vrecknidj]

I've been playing in a campaign where the DM assumes that all dragon armor is as light as leather, provides the ACP and ASF penalties of leather, but has an armor bonus based on (but not equal to, there's a formula somewhere, I'm sure) the natural armor bonus of the dragon when it was killed.

Very nice.

Dave

 

[Jesus_marley]

although no one has tried it I would prolly say that enchanting to resist the dragons elemental type is half the listed price. having the the price goes from
27.5 k to 13.75 k to create, so far the 11th lvl party even come close to having 27k to spend on one char. but 13k might be possible.

I like this idea... makes sense.

according to your system you could get a +2 bonus from a young adult Black CR 9? then enchant it and have +3 armor for 1000 gp ?
This seems to like to much.

Of course, the fraction can easily be tweaked for your own preferences.. perhaps leather is 1/5 of age category, banded is 1/4 and plate is 1/3. that cuts it down considerably yet rewards a player suitably (pardon the pun) for overcoming such a great challenge.

 

[Wolf72]

ooh house rules, I like house rules ... and I suffer, like many others, the need to post them when you see similiar thread


3.5 SRD & Draconomicon (pp115-6), and … but of course … House Rules!

Dragonhide:

Base Price: 2 x MW

Alchemically Enhanced Armor:
Light +2000gp
Medium +4000gp
Heavy +7000gp

Extras:
1. Resistance 2 (for multiple resistances) 750gp /ea
2. Resistance 5 (if only one resistance) 1000gp
3. Mobility (one category lighter for movement/spec abilities) 2500gp
4. Armor check Penalty (additional -1 ACP) 500gp
5. Max Dex Bonus (additional +1) 1500gp
6. AC Bonus (additional +1, may be taken multiple times) 2000gp /ea
7. Lightness (armor weights half as much as standard armor) 1000gp
8. DR 1/- (stacks w/ optional heavy armor DR) 1000gp

Number of Extras based on size of Dragon: Colossal (7), Gargantuan (6), Huge (5), Large (4), Medium (3), Small (2), Tiny (1)