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General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions
It Made Sense at the Time: Descending AC
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<blockquote data-quote="rogueattorney" data-source="post: 8951069" data-attributes="member: 17551"><p>Right. At the beginning, armor class was just the heading at the top of a column in a non-linear chart. They could have named it anything. It was static in that it never changed unless your character changed his armor. There was no way to have a negative Armor Class in the original rules. Dexterity didn’t affect AC, nor did magical shields and armor, which affected the opponent’s hit roll and not AC. </p><p></p><p>As the rules got more complex, a lot of situational modifiers got added such that by the time 1e came out, your character’s AC would slide right and left on the chart based on circumstances, with the armor that the character wore only one factor in determining AC. Negative AC became possible, although I only ever commonly saw it in the 2e era video games like Baldur’s Gate, but maybe that was just me. </p><p></p><p>Gygax said he considered changing AC to ascending at the time of 1e’s publication, but decided for the sake of continuity to keep it as it was. And it is convenient for players of older versions that Chain and Shield was AC 4 in every (A)D&D product for 25 years no matter the edition. </p><p></p><p>THAC0 was an attempt to make things easier. It wasn’t fully useful in 1e and the D&D editions because of the non-linear nature of the charts. 2e “fixed” that by making the charts linear, effectively turning THAC0 from a limited tool to the rule. Again, probably a point where they should have changed AC to ascending, but again with the backwards compatibility issues.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="rogueattorney, post: 8951069, member: 17551"] Right. At the beginning, armor class was just the heading at the top of a column in a non-linear chart. They could have named it anything. It was static in that it never changed unless your character changed his armor. There was no way to have a negative Armor Class in the original rules. Dexterity didn’t affect AC, nor did magical shields and armor, which affected the opponent’s hit roll and not AC. As the rules got more complex, a lot of situational modifiers got added such that by the time 1e came out, your character’s AC would slide right and left on the chart based on circumstances, with the armor that the character wore only one factor in determining AC. Negative AC became possible, although I only ever commonly saw it in the 2e era video games like Baldur’s Gate, but maybe that was just me. Gygax said he considered changing AC to ascending at the time of 1e’s publication, but decided for the sake of continuity to keep it as it was. And it is convenient for players of older versions that Chain and Shield was AC 4 in every (A)D&D product for 25 years no matter the edition. THAC0 was an attempt to make things easier. It wasn’t fully useful in 1e and the D&D editions because of the non-linear nature of the charts. 2e “fixed” that by making the charts linear, effectively turning THAC0 from a limited tool to the rule. Again, probably a point where they should have changed AC to ascending, but again with the backwards compatibility issues. [/QUOTE]
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It Made Sense at the Time: Descending AC
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