Expanded Masterwork Armor

[Anthony Jackson]

The masterwork armor rules seem to have two purposes:
1) Cause PC AC to keep up with monster attacks, since there are rather few power bonuses to AC out there.
2) Cause heavy armor AC to keep up with light -- otherwise, the fact that light armor gets a stat boost means it will improve by up to +4 relative to heavy armor by level 26.

However, this creates weird problems where +4 heavy armor is 4 AC better than +3 heavy armor, which is a huge jump. To be fair, it seems like the armor types should be spread out. Suggestions on smoothing this out:

Masterwork Armor

Masterwork armor, in addition to giving an enhancement bonus to AC, gives a masterwork bonus to AC. Masterwork armor has the same cost as an enchantment of 5x the masterwork bonus (heavy) or 15x the masterwork bonus (light) -- thus, +3 masterwork heavy armor and +1 masterwork light armor both cost the same as a level 15 magic item. Masterwork is, however, free on any armor that's higher level than the desired masterwork (i.e. level 16+ armor can be +3/+1 masterwork for free). The standard names for masterwork armors are as follows:

• +1 Light: feyweave, feyleather, or darkhide.
• +2 Light: starweave, starleather, or elderhide.
• +1 Heavy: meteoric iron
• +2 Heavy: mithril
• +3 Heavy: forgemail, wyrmscale, or warplate
• +4 Heavy: adamantine
• +5 Heavy: abyssal steel
• +6 Heavy: spiritmail, elderscale, or godplate.

So, does this all sound reasonable? Better names for the intermediate grades? Is the ability to have low enhancement masterwork armors useful?

 

[erik_the_guy]

I don't think there would be any serious problem implementing this. I use the current system for two reasons. For one it is simpler. Secondly, the harder to find armor is very exciting for the PCs to get their hands on. Finding plate armor that is slightly better every level is fun, but going from normal plate to warplate during the paragon tier is a major achievement for a character, and can even be one of the main goals or rewards for a quest.

Your suggestion may or may not improve balance, decide whether it will lead to more or less fun for the players in your specific group.