Getting rid of masterwork/expertise

[Nichwee]

About "it avoids messing with the armor balance" - I don't see what you're proposing. (Remember, the goal when tweaking AC is to not have to have masterwork materials around)

I think that is the balance issue he is refering too.
A static boinus to AC would be the same regardless of armour type. So suddenly the Heavy Armour is being caught up by the light stuff (the difference remains the same but the values of total AC are higher = less % difference).
This makes it more and more damaging to take Heavy Armour as the AC difference is, proportionally, shrinking while the downsides stay the same (or some do - check penalties will fade to no biggie but speed penalties are never going to fade out).

 

[keterys]

while the downsides stay the same (or some do - check penalties will fade to no biggie but speed penalties are never going to fade out).

Unless you're referring to taking armor expertise to reduce check penalty, the check penalty has the same effect at level 1 as it does at 30. -1 on a d20 is still -1 on a d20.

 

[Nichwee]

Unless you're referring to taking armor expertise to reduce check penalty, the check penalty has the same effect at level 1 as it does at 30. -1 on a d20 is still -1 on a d20.

Yes -1 is always -1, but I meant the idea that relative to your skill the effect falls away.
The Lvl 1 character trying to swim with armour takes the same penalty as the Lvl 30. But the Lvl 30 is less likely to need the extra 1 for the same river, as he has +15 by level. This is offset by the idea that you always get the Lvl 30 to swim in a Lvl 30 river, but that doesn't always hold (as the river in question doesn't knwo who is swiming in it).

 

[keterys]

Yeah... in 4e it's always a -1 on a d20 and it always matters the same, pretty much.

Same way -1 to attack always matters the same.

 

[Nichwee]

Wel what if you are scaling the walls of a city at Lvl 1 and again at Lvl 7 (the same walls, some campaigns do return to places later in level)?

Surely the DC hasn't jumped up, unless you had the city rebuilt in the interim? So assuming a average player at Lvl 1 may have needed an 11 unarmoured the -1 has dropped his odds by 10% (from 10 values to 9).
At Lvl 7 the same guy needs a 8 unarmoured, so the -1 only drops his odds by 1/13th (< 10%).

 

[keterys]

At level 1, it reduces his chance by 5%.
At level 7, it reduces his chance by 5%.

 

[Nichwee]

True and false. It adds 5% chance to the odds to roll the required value. If the odds of rolling said value was 15% originally this +5% chance has increased his odds from 15% to 20% = 33% increase. And as you level the odds on hitting any given DC drop (as given DC unchanged, Check +1/2 level) thus the 5% drop in odds for hitting the required number is a smaller % change to your odds of hitting that number.

However I really am not that bothered about the diminshing (or not) of the armour check penalty tbh.

I was just pointing out that I felt what Eamon meant by "armor balance" was that by the original rules the difference in Cloth to Plate goes from 8AC to 12AC, while without masterworks it stays as 8AC.
Thus the downside to Heavy Armour still follows the original mapping but the advantages don't = Heavy Armour lost something by removing masterworks = upset the armour balance as written by WotC.

If this wasn't what Eamon meant I apologise for the confussion.

 

[eamon]

To start off with, the first issue (concerning item enchantments) is much more important that the heavy/light armor issue! That really needs to be fixed if you want to use this progression.

The heavy/light balance issue I'm referring to is this:
- a typical scale armor goes from +7 (non-magical) to +19(+1feat) throughout the PC's career, for a +13 bonus.
- a typical hide armor goes from +3(+4stat) to +11(+8stat)(+1feat) throughout the PC's career. These options are fairly balanced, they both gain 13AC.

Real tanks can then choose plate armor or a 20 stat, shields, some class features, some paragon paths, or even an epic destiny to further this number, but this is fairly typical for a reasonable investment.

This house-rule would raise the light-armor gain 14AC, which is problematic, because the light/heavy balance is already somewhat precarious. It is already the case that "tanks" have difficulty actually competing with light armor classes for AC, notably, avengers, swordmages and barbarians (particularly post-primal power), get extra boosts as light armor wielders, as do those epic desitnies which grant stat-boosts which is only barely offset by the shield option (which two-weapon defense can compensate anyhow).

In short, I wouldn't touch this precarious balance if I could help it, so hence my suggestion to leave masterwork benefits in place. It's not like "arbitrary" masterwork benefits are any less playable than an "arbitrary" advancement table. So this house rule isn't winning anything, and it's losing in terms of charbuilder interop and WotC support (the more "different" house rules in place, the less likely new WotC stuff is to mesh well with your campaign).

And in any case, armor actually works just fine as-is; unlike attacks and FRW. Hence my suggestion to just hand out expertise for free (perhaps at level 5), and be done with it. Granting an expertise-identical bonus to FRW mostly fixes them too (except the weak NAD, which, well, that's just your weak spot :-D).

So, for almost no balance issues whatsoever, you can get decent progression and stay close to the core rules with a very simple fix: grant +1 to NADs and attacks at levels 5,15, and 25. That's my preference.

 

[keterys]

True and false. It adds 5% chance to the odds to roll the required value. If the odds of rolling said value was 15% originally this +5% chance has increased his odds from 15% to 20% = 33% increase. And as you level the odds on hitting any given DC drop (as given DC unchanged, Check +1/2 level) thus the 5% drop in odds for hitting the required number is a smaller % change to your odds of hitting that number.

As you level, the DCs increase. In fact, the DCs increase by more than half your level, so the average DCs just increase. DCs go up 2 every 3 levels, or 18 over 27 levels. For some skills your ability score bumps will keep pace with that, but for others you'll just fall behind by 2 over levels. Sure, you'll do some easy DCs at higher level, but you'll do some easy DCs at lower level. Ditto for high ones.

So, your basic premise is false. Further, unlike damage where it's relevant how much you've just increased it by, it's rarely the case where you care that for skills - it matters more than in 4 checks of 20 you failed. Or in 3 checks of 20 you failed.

Either way, though, much like -1 to attacks, the -1 to skills is a relevant factor at all levels. On some attacks, or checks, the penalty might matter more to you than others, but the important part is that it matters.

And yeah, it's not terribly important, but it's a common misperception that leads to badly designed things like higher level powers that give out bigger and bigger penalties or bonuses to checks or attacks.

 

[Elric]

So, for almost no balance issues whatsoever, you can get decent progression and stay close to the core rules with a very simple fix: grant +1 to NADs and attacks at levels 5,15, and 25. That's my preference.

Indeed, this is basically the simplest fix (plus ban Expertise feats, Robust Defenses, and the Epic FRW line of feats- maybe paragon defenses becomes an epic feat as well).

While I see the necessity for Masterwork Heavy Armors, Masterwork Light Armors seems like an unnecessary kludge. One solution: give characters +1 to-hit and to all defenses (including AC) at levels 5/15/25, but change MW Armors:

Masterwork Light Armors don't exist. Masterwork Heavy Armors are as follows:
+1 additional bonus to AC for heavy armor with a +2 magic enhancement bonus
+2 additional bonus to AC for heavy armor with a +3 or +4 magic enhancement bonus
+3 additional bonus to AC for heavy armor with a +5 magic enhancement bonus
+4 additional bonus to AC for heavy armor with a +6 magic enhancement bonus

If you give out higher plus armor at the start of levels ending in 3/8, the current progression leads to near equality in the pace of scaling of light and heavy armors. The AC progression ends up 1 better than it is currently, which could be a problem for characters with exceptionally high AC, but I think those problems generally come from other abilities (e.g., the Avenger feat that eventually grants +3 AC, or it seems like the Con to AC feat in primal power for Barbarians).