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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Herzog" data-source="post: 5601840" data-attributes="member: 25696">I've recently taken an interest in the various armors available for D&D, and ran into something I just can't wrap my head around. If you are limited to light armor, you have a range of options to choose from.The various armor's start with a +1 AC, with a max dex bonus of +8, and rangue up to +4 with a max dex bonus of +4.Higher AC (from the armor) also means higher price, so a starting character may opt to buy a cheaper armor. Also, when you have a high DEX it might be interesting to buy a lower AC, allowing you to take full advantage of your dex bonus. If you are in the position to take advantage of heavy armor, your range of options is very similar.Your AC ranges from +6 to +8, and an increase in price either means a higher AC bonus or a higher dex bonus and/or decreased ACP. Which leaves us with the middle ground, the Medium Armors. The cheapest armor available is Hide, which is slightly more expensive than leather, and slightly cheaper than studded leather.It has a lower max dex bonus and higher ACP than both leather and studded leather, and it carries the medium armor movement reduction.Only characters REALLY pressed for cash (or characters wearing hide because of RP reasons....) would get Hide armor. The second option when gettting medium armor is scale mail. Although half as cheap as a chain shirt, it's otherwise inferior to chain shirt in all aspects except the AC bonus. The last two options are chainmail and breastplate, which have the same AC bonus but give better dex bonus/ACP options with an increased price. So, to summarize: When getting armor, light armor gives you AC +1 to +4medium armor gives you AC +5heavy armor gives you AC +6 to +8 in addition, if you really want it, you can get slightly cheaper armor when you switch from light to medium, getting the same AC bonus but worse ACP/max dex. My question: WHY? Why reduce medium armor to the poor-mans-armor option it seems to be?  The ONLY reason you'd want to restrict yourself to medium armor (instead of heavy) is when your class abilities restrict you to it, and even then you end up with a maximum of +1 AC relative to light armor. The reason I was investigation armors is the selection of ranger levels for TWF, which requires me to wear light or no armor, and someone suggested I should buy a mithral breastplate. The increased price for that single +1 AC really makes me wonder about that suggestion.</blockquote>

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