D&D 5E Exanding on splintered shields

[overgeeked]

I'm sure many are familiar with the idea of splintered shields from an older blog post, here. While I really like the idea, I wish it would go further.

So this thread is about brainstorming expanding the splintered shields rules for 5E.

The basic premise is simple: you can sacrifice a shield (it is destroyed, i.e. splintered) to negate the damage of one attack. You, of course, lose your shield and the AC bonus it provides along with no longer having a shield to sacrifice.

The house rule is generally meant to be used with mundane shields against mundane attacks. There are variants that include magical shields being splintered or melted (destroyed) in order to negate the damage from one magical attack. But not crossing those streams, as it were. Mundane attacks are too weak to destroy magical shields and mundane shields are too weak to block magical attacks.

So far, so good.

I think it would be fun to expand on that to fully ablative armor. My initial thoughts are to have armor categories (light, medium, and heavy) have 1, 2, and 3 hits they can negate before they're destroyed and you lose your AC bonus. But I think they should degrade as you negate hits. Light armor is easiest, it's simply destroyed after negating the damage from one attack. And medium armors are fairly easy, simply halve the AC bonus after negating the damage from one attack and the armor is destroyed after negating the second. But heavy armor with 3 hits makes for odd math. I could bump it up to 4 hits, but that seems too much. Doing a flat -2 AC per attack negated for heavy armor doesn't feel quite right either.

Any ideas?

 

[Krachek]

dehydrated armor, you can add water and after a rest you get a new armor suit!

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

You would need solid rules for mending the damaged shields and armour.

Would this require a feat, fighting style or proficiency? Or could anyone do it?
I'm not sure that I'm happy with the idea that describing your shield as splintered allows you to negate any mundane attack, but a +1 sling stone just punches through unimpeded.

 

[Steampunkette]

Have you looked at the Advanced 5e combat rules?

They allow you to sacrifice your shield to turn a critical hit into a normal hit. I think that's a great way to handle it, since players are -much- more likely to be critically hit than any given NPC (just because they're around longer) and it would give them a big dramatic way to stop a massive hit from landing.

You could treat armor in the same sort of way. Have it only reduce the damage of hits that would otherwise be critical.

 

[GMMichael]

I'm not sure that the work is worth the reward here. With "ablative" armor and shields, your PCs will need/desire a separate character sheet for their protective gear, for an effect that will probably get saved up only for fighting bosses, ala Inspiration.

My problem with the idea is that it further convolutes the hit/miss problem of not knowing what actually happened in the story:

• Make an attack roll to "hit" your opponent. (Roll too low, and you "miss.")
• No matter how hard you "hit," your living opponent doesn't necessarily acknowledge your attack.
• You are as likely to "miss" slow, armored opponents as nimble, unarmored opponents.
• With the new rule, a "hit" can still become a "miss," but only at this point does armor begin to reflect its hard work (of taking damage).

This situation is not impossible to narrate, but it sounds like a lot of extra effort to me!

 

[overgeeked]

You would need solid rules for mending the damaged shields and armour.

Absolutely.

Would this require a feat, fighting style or proficiency? Or could anyone do it?
I'm not sure that I'm happy with the idea that describing your shield as splintered allows you to negate any mundane attack, but a +1 sling stone just punches through unimpeded.

Maybe something like the mending spell. It wouldn't repair the magic of broken magic items, of course. But repair them to mundane items. Likely a tool proficiency, the right tools, the right materials, and enough time. It wouldn't need to be complicated.

Have you looked at the Advanced 5e combat rules?

They allow you to sacrifice your shield to turn a critical hit into a normal hit. I think that's a great way to handle it, since players are -much- more likely to be critically hit than any given NPC (just because they're around longer) and it would give them a big dramatic way to stop a massive hit from landing.

You could treat armor in the same sort of way. Have it only reduce the damage of hits that would otherwise be critical.

That doesn't seem like enough incentive. Negate a critical. That's neat. But negating the entire hit seems a lot better, and if you're sacrificing your shield/armor, you'd want it to be a big result. The crit might roll low, or a normal hit might roll really high and you're low on hp. Completely negating a hit seems more useful and not too powerful considering you're destroying your shield/armor.

I'm not sure that the work is worth the reward here. With "ablative" armor and shields, your PCs will need/desire a separate character sheet for their protective gear, for an effect that will probably get saved up only for fighting bosses, ala Inspiration.

My problem with the idea is that it further convolutes the hit/miss problem of not knowing what actually happened in the story:

• Make an attack roll to "hit" your opponent. (Roll too low, and you "miss.")
• No matter how hard you "hit," your living opponent doesn't necessarily acknowledge your attack.
• You are as likely to "miss" slow, armored opponents as nimble, unarmored opponents.
• With the new rule, a "hit" can still become a "miss," but only at this point does armor begin to reflect its hard work (of taking damage).

This situation is not impossible to narrate, but it sounds like a lot of extra effort to me!

You either hit or you miss. If you hit, the PC can choose to destroy/damage their shield/armor to not take damage form the hit. Your opponent "acknowledges" the attack by sacrificing their shield/armor to prevent themselves from taking the damage. That's a rather hefty acknowledgement. I don't see how that's convoluted.

It sounds like part of your issue is with how AC works in D&D. That's not something this house rule is meant to address.

 

[Steampunkette]

And guess that it's much less constantly available as a critical hit. But it's also a question of how often do you want people cycling through their armor?

Once they've got a few levels under their belt they can start sacrificing any armor and/or shield they're wearing off any freaking hit reach into a bag of holding and pull out a fresh set of armor and a brand new shield.

 

[overgeeked]

And guess that it's much less constantly available as a critical hit. But it's also a question of how often do you want people cycling through their armor?

Well, it's up to them, really. It's not something that they ever have to do. But it makes for a cool visual and lets the PC feel like they're awesome while also giving them an "oh crap" moment.

Once they've got a few levels under their belt they can start sacrificing any armor and/or shield they're wearing off any freaking hit reach into a bag of holding and pull out a fresh set of armor and a brand new shield.

PHB, p146. Donning and Doffing Armor. It takes 1 minute to doff light and medium armor, 5 minutes to doff heavy armor. It takes 1 minute to don light armor, 5 for medium, and 10 for heavy. Swapping armor is not something they'll be doing mid-combat. But sure, if someone wants to take 10 rounds mid-fight to doff their destroyed light armor and 10 more rounds to don their new light armor to avoid the damage of one hit...absolutely their choice to make. Dropping a shield and picking up a new one, sure. It's only an action to doff or don a shield. If they have the spares and if they have the bag of holding. And if they want to take their entire turn to do that. Sure. It's not like the enemies will ignore them while they're doing that shield swap.

 

[Steampunkette]

Sorry... I was on Text to Speech. That should have been "I get" not "And Guess".

And I'm not talking about mid-combat doffing. I'm talking between-combat doffing. Unless you keep the pressure on them that whole time, 2-6 minutes isn't that long a period.

I'm talking about the kind of people who carried a sack of rats for Hex before they realized they didn't need to move it immediately but could do it at any later time.

Spending a couple minutes out of combat to put on a new set after your old one broke... Oh. naughty word. Would this work with Mage Armor, as well?

'Cause it would be thematic, but would mean a Warlock with the right Invocation could just sacrifice their armor every third turn or so.

 

[billd91]

The question that comes to mind for me - is this going to be worthwhile enough to players for them to engage with it and be willing to suffer the hassles of wrecked gear (and replacements)? Or are you just going to see more characters who might have gone with a shield taking up a two-handed weapon?

If a PC is going to sacrifice a shield, the sacrifice had better be worth it. Negating a crit doesn't seem like enough, for me. Adamantine armor already makes a PC immune to them without having to sacrifice anything on a regular basis. Sacrificing a shield has to be a more significant or repeatable (within limits) event to be worth it.