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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tequila Sunrise" data-source="post: 6505815" data-attributes="member: 40398">It has indeed! But your memory hasn't failed; 2e AD&D does have an optional parry rule which requires a character to forfeit not only all attacks, but all movement as well, to get a half-level AC bonus!...However I've always felt that these various opt-in defense options and even Dex are woefully unsatisfying representations of basic dodge/parry skill. The Dex modifier to AC doesn't normally improve with level, so clearly it represents talent rather than skill. Which makes D&D combat look like a bunch of characters just standing in one place wailing on each other, aside from a bit of instinctive ducking and backpedaling.Similarly, optional parry rules and buy-in feats that cap at +5 AC aren't at all satisfying representations of the basic defensive skills that any character ought to start learning in his first tavern brawl, and continue improving with every survived fight. I mean the feat in question is called Combat Expertise, and the parry rule is explicitly described as defense above and beyond the dodging and parrying that a character is supposedly doing normally. Which makes these options more like specialized skills that a character would have to learn from the Senpais of the Butterfly Wrist who practice their secret fighting techniques at the monastery at the top of Mount Bui Hoshan, or something.Anyhow, you're right that the 4e level-based AC bonus wasn't the first attempted representation of dodge/parry skill...but it is the first and only one to pass my verisimilitude standards. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /></blockquote>

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