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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sword of Spirit" data-source="post: 7697165" data-attributes="member: 6677017">While I have no problem with the lore of druids not wearing metal armor, I have a serious problem with the lack of even a suggested concrete penalty for violating it. It singles them out as the sole class in such a condition. Paladins come in second, but at least the books provide guidance as to what might happen if they violate their code, and imply that a DM could choose to allow for an imperfect paladin who struggles with his code but is working at it.I'd like to see druids treated the same way. I hate design inconsistency. The analogy with a vegetarian is a poor analogy, because it is the simplest thing in the world for a vegetarian to eat meat. They lose the right to be called "vegetarian", but there are no special powers attached to it, and one could argue that they could still call themselves a "struggling vegetarian". The religious examples are better, and the consequence could then be exactly the same as for a cleric. They incur divine displeasure, with consequences up the DM--but they are still a cleric (or insert real world religious examples).To say a druid that wears metal armor isn't a member of the druid class is like saying that a fighter that stops fighting isn't a member of the fighter class. It's actually worse than that example, because fighting is literally the name and core definition of the fight-er class, while not-wearing-metal-armor-er is neither the name nor definition of the druid class. It's absurd. They might be a bad druid, they might be unable to gain further levels in the class, they might lose powers, and they might be ejected from druidic hierarchy. But unless we go old-school and mimic the paladin turning into a fighter rule (but what class would a druid turn into?) they are most definitely still a member of the druid class.Of course older editions did this stuff, and it was accepted as how things were. But most of the restrictions went away (clerics can wield whatever they want now) or were converted to concrete mechanical consequences (rogues suffer penalties to certain skills/features in heavier armor, wizards have trouble with spells in armor, etc) throughout the editions. The druid restriction is out of harmony with the rest of 5e. It is a wacky holdover that has no place in the 5e PHB, at least as it is stated. Honestly, I'd really like to hear at least one of the designers say something like, "yeah, if we had thought it through we probably would have phrased it more like the paladin's code".In some editions skeletons were just bony constructs. But in 5e that isn't the case. They aren't even mindless. They are intelligent and evil beings infused with negative energy in place of the positive energy that animates living creatures. In fact, the Monster Manual says that skeletons are empowered by a "hateful undead spirit." You're certainly free to run it differently, but it isn't a matter of changing how a spell interacts, it is actually changing the nature of the creature. In such a case you are probably better off treating them as a construct than an undead. Except then you have the problem that constructs aren't dispellable either.Yes.</blockquote>

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