Highest AC

[Nail]

Anything I missed?

Animated spiked mithril light shield with +5 defending property. You won't get the shield bonus of course, but you get another +5 AC from the defending property.

...but not as a Monk or Duelist!

 

[Grog]

Animated spiked mithril buckler with +5 defending property. You won't get the shield bonus of course, but you get another +5 AC from the defending property.

A shield, even an animated one, kills the Duelist and Monk bonuses, doesn't it?

 

[Nail]

Yup, yer right.

 

[Nail]

Huh, I didn't know you could create items that gave those kinds of bonuses. Well, stack em all on my character, then, and his AC goes up to 111

I could have sworn there was a thread at WotC boards with an AC +200 build.

 

[Grog]

I could have sworn there was a thread at WotC boards with an AC +200 build.

Core only, or splatbooks? If the former, I don't know how they did it - if the latter, I can easily believe it.

 

[Rystil Arden]

By creating new magic items, using the core rules on Magic Item Creation.

I would personally never allow that, though--by RAW those are guidelines, not rules.

 

[gnfnrf]

My entry, which uses takes different liberties with "core only"...

This is his continuous state, with no actions required. He can fight defensively on top if he feels like, and with some feat shuffling, he can make another ~10 points circumstantial.


Bob, stone giant monk 2 (ECL 20)

Base AC 10

Dex 33, +11 [Rolled or PB 18, +6 enhancement, +4 racial +5 inherent](173.5k)
Wis 32, +11 [Rolled or PB 18, +6 enhancement, +2 racial +5 inherent +1 16 HD bump](173.5k)

+17 Natural Armor [+11 base +6 Improved Natural Armor at 1,3,6,9,12,15 HD]

+8 armor from bracers (64k)

+5 deflection from ring (50k)

+5 enh to nat armor from amulet (50k)

+10 untyped from 2 +5 defending kama (144k)

+1 insight from dusty rose prism ioun stone (5k)

-1 size

AC 77

Total money left 99k

--
gnfnrf

 

[SlagMortar]

Not too bad considering it's all by core rules. Anything I missed?

Reduce person could add another +1 from Dex and +1 from size.

There's probably a race out there with a natural armor bonus that would help as well. Kobold would work if you balanced out the monk and rogue levels and took sorcerer instead of wizard. I'm not sure why you used rogue levels other than the favored class for halflings. Maybe do Monk 8 / Sorcerer 2 / Duelist 10 with a kobold and you get an extra +1 monk bonus to AC.
Edit: Or not since you need Charisma for casting as a sorcerer. Boo

So for AC, we get:

10 (base)
+2 size (tiny due to reduce person)
+8 armor (bracers of armor)
+5 deflection (ring of protection)
+6 natural armor (1 nat from kobold + 5 enhancement from amulet of natural armor)
+5 unnamed (+5 defending rapier)
+22 Dexterity bonus (+13 from 36 Dex (34 base + 2 from reduce person), +9 from Canny Defense (duelist) and 28 Int)
+9 unnamed (from monk Wisdom bonus to AC + 1 for monk levels)
+5 Combat Expertise
+3 fighting defensively with 5 ranks in Tumble
+10 dodge (Elaborate Parry and 10 levels of duelist)
+1 dodge feat
+4 shield (from Shield spell)

= 90 AC

 

[Plane Sailing]

Not too bad considering it's all by core rules. Anything I missed?

Barkskin spell - improves any existing natural armour bonus by up to +4 (or is it +5?)

Bardic inspire Heroics - +4

 

[hong]

Super AC man in the Sultans of Smack thread has AC 142.

Amazingly, this was done without Superior Expertise! Also, I'm curious how some of these smacks, from 2002, have stood the test of time....