Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 8472210" data-attributes="member: 71699">Something I wanted to briefly investigate is the impact of +1 on AC. Sometimes it is discussed as 5% better. My interpretation differs. The model I suggest is that of reduction to incoming damage. Suppose 20 feeble skeletons are attacking a fighter, hitting on 16+ and dealing 5 damage on a hit. For the sake of argument assume perfect distribution: each round, five skeletons hit and deal 25 damage. What does +1 AC do for the fighter?<ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Continuing for the sake of argument to assume perfect distribution: each round four skeletons hit dealing 20 damage. Four skeletons, instead of five.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">In abstraction 4/5 = 0.8 so the incoming damage is 80% of what it had been.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">That means that the benefit of +1 AC to the fighter was to reduce the damage by 20% (the one out of five hitting skeletons that no longer hits.)</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">+1 AC is only a 5% improvement when all twenty skeletons are hitting (on 1+), so that +1 AC reduces that to nineteen instead: 19/20 = 0.95 for a 5% reduction in incoming damage.</li> </ol>That is why defense fighting style, at a meagre +1, is at least as good as archery and dueling, which both offer +2. They're all solid styles, but defense is sometimes evaluated as being much worse than it is. Additionally, AC is something that the more you have, the more additional points count. As can be seen by considering if only two feeble skeletons were hitting (on 19+) so that the change took incoming from two hitting each turn to one hitting each turn. 1/2 = 50% or an incredible 50% reduction in incoming damage.</blockquote>

Verification