D&D 4E Magic Armor at high levels...is the math messed up? (4e SPOILERS!))

[Stalker0]

In the armor section, it mentions masterwork armors. It mentions you have to have a minimum enhancement bonus, and mentions that the cost is included in the magic price.

So as far as I can tell, that means the second armor becomes +4, it turns into masterwork armor.

That's....um....really strong.

Let's take chainmail as an example. Normally it provides a +6 bonus. When you gain a +4 enhancement bonus, the armor turns into Forgemail, which provides a +9 bonus.

Overall, the bonus is 9 + 4 = 13. So the magic armor is added +7 to your AC!! That means without magic your taking hits 35% more often against equivalent monsters....which certainly is no small margin.

And now let's add in a +4 shield heavy shield, that's another +6 to AC.

That means the difference in hitting a shield guy vs a nonshield guy is 30%, and I don't see the nonshield guy getting that much of an extra bonus (a bit more damage, but nothing that compares to a 30% miss chance for AC and reflex).

And overall, for shield and armor combo, the magic is providing a +11 bonus, a 55% miss chance added in because of magic.


I keep thinking I'm missing something. There's got to be more to this masterwork armor thing, but it seems to work. So all I can say is, you will need magic armor to survive high levels, and sword/board seems to be the king now.

 

[Victim]

Magic shields don't provide an extra AC bonus.

Looking at monster stats, it seems like you really need the extra bonus at higher levels.

 

[Kordeth]

In the armor section, it mentions masterwork armors. It mentions you have to have a minimum enhancement bonus, and mentions that the cost is included in the magic price.

So as far as I can tell, that means the second armor becomes +4, it turns into masterwork armor.

Well, no, it means that any masterwork armor has to be at least +4. That doesn't preclude +4 ordinary chainmail.

Let's take chainmail as an example. Normally it provides a +6 bonus. When you gain a +4 enhancement bonus, the armor turns into Forgemail, which provides a +9 bonus.

No, it means if you find +4 chain mail, it's probably forge mail. Chain mail can be enchanted beyond +4 without becoming forge mail.

Overall, the bonus is 9 + 4 = 13. So the magic armor is added +7 to your AC!! That means without magic your taking hits 35% more often against equivalent monsters....which certainly is no small margin.

Remember you don't give armor in a vacuum--the power of the monsters you're fighting scales up along with your armor, and nobody's going to jump from ordinary chainmail to +4 forge mail.

And now let's add in a +4 shield heavy shield, that's another +6 to AC.

Shields don't get enhancement bonuses to AC any more.

That means the difference in hitting a shield guy vs a nonshield guy is 30%, and I don't see the nonshield guy getting that much of an extra bonus (a bit more damage, but nothing that compares to a 30% miss chance for AC and reflex).

Nope, see above.

And overall, for shield and armor combo, the magic is providing a +11 bonus, a 55% miss chance added in because of magic.


I keep thinking I'm missing something. There's got to be more to this masterwork armor thing, but it seems to work. So all I can say is, you will need magic armor to survive high levels, and sword/board seems to be the king now.

You're comparing 1st lebel n00bxor armor to gear that's appropriate for a 16th-level character. Of course there's a huge jump.

 

[Stalker0]

Hey glad to see I was wrong about the shields, I figured I had to be seeing something wrong.

Now that I think about it, I realize I was an idiot, because I kept thinking the only way weapons could keep up with the higher armor was a higher magical bonus. That is of course wrong, as stats continue to increase at higher levels.

If we assuming a character place 1 of 2 stats bumps in his primary attack stat (not an unreasonable assumption), at 16th level that would be a +2.5 extra bonus to attack rolls (bonus at 4,8,12,16, and then the bump to all stats at 11th, so either a +2 or 3 depending on initial stat).

Chainmail has evolved a +3 extra bonus from its special property, which very closely matches the offense.

If we push it all the way to 30th, you gain a +4.5 (4,8,12,16,20,24,28, +2 for 11th and 21st). Chainmail at this point provides an extra +6 overall, so the heavy armor has moved ahead a bit, but far less than I had originally feared.

So looks like all is well, and my fears were just irrational.

 

[Moon-Lancer]

I would be interested in seeing the math of a full dexed out elemental hide character +6 vs, God plate +6. I wonder who wins....

goes away and does some math.

 

[Moon-Lancer]

if you max out dex with an elf and elder hide, you tie godplate at +20. A shield breaks the tie.

 

[FadedC]

Keep in mind too that when you wear metal armor you don't get a reflex defence bonus. Given that your reflex defence will keep getting higher and higher, they will also need to make metal armor better and better to make it worth still using.

 

[Kordeth]

Keep in mind too that when you wear metal armor you don't get a reflex defence bonus. Given that your reflex defence will keep getting higher and higher, they will also need to make metal armor better and better to make it worth still using.

That's not true at all. Your Reflex Defense isn't affected by armor (other than shields, which give you a bonus); what you lose in heavy armor is your Dex or Int bonus to AC, whichever happens to be higher.

 

[Stalker0]

Keep in mind too that when you wear metal armor you don't get a reflex defence bonus. Given that your reflex defence will keep getting higher and higher, they will also need to make metal armor better and better to make it worth still using.

Agreed, seems like what will happen is your AC will slowly get better than the equivalaent attack bonus, but your reflex defense will slowly get worse. That's an acceptable tradeoff in my opinion.

 

[FadedC]

That's not true at all. Your Reflex Defense isn't affected by armor (other than shields, which give you a bonus); what you lose in heavy armor is your Dex or Int bonus to AC, whichever happens to be higher.

Sorry, that's what I meant. But over time your dex and int are likely to increase, so metal armor needs to get better and better to make up for losing it's bonus.