Some Adjustments to Armor

[airwalkrr]

The armor types available in 3e really have me baffled. There is no mechanical benefit to having armor such as scale mail or chain mail besides the saving of 50 or so gp over a chain shirt or breastplate instead. Additionally, full-plate is seen as a "must have" armor for all melee classes as soon as they can afford it. Another problem is that although +1 leather armor is almost mechanically identical to masterwork studded leather armor, the +1 leather armor costs 985 gp more. It really isn't worth it to ever have magical leather armor.

Here is my proposed solution to these problems. As armor improves, there should always be a commensurate cost. First of all I recommend getting rid of chain shirts, breastplates, and banded mail altogether as they make scale mail, chainmail, and splint mail inconsequential after level 1, which I think is rather silly (either that or get rid of scale mail, chainmail, and splint mail which just makes armor better in general). Second, there should be a more significant tradeoff than armor weight and max Dex alone (which often doesn't matter) when deciding whether to wear studded leather or +1 leather armor or +1 banded mail or half-plate. Padded armor imposes a -1 armor check penalty, leather imposes a -2, studded leather -3, scale mail -4, chain mail -5, banded mail -6, half-plate -7, full plate -8.

Magical armor enhancements also scale in price according to the type of armor being enhanced. Padded armor would cost (bonus squared) times 300 gp to enhance, leather armor (bonus squared) times 400 gp, studded leather (bonus squared) times 500 gp, scale mail (bonus squared) times 750 gp, chain mail (bonus squared) times 1,000 gp, splint mail (bonus squared) times 1,250 gp, half-plate (bonus squared) times 1,500 gp, and full plate (bonus squared) times 2,000 gp. For comparison purposes, the armors that grant +6 to armor class would be +5 padded - 7,655 gp, +4 leather - 6,560 gp, +3 studded leather - 4,675 gp, +2 scale mail - 3,200 gp, +1 chain mail 1,300 gp, and split mail 200 gp. This simply reduces the disparity between magical armor and mundane armor prices to be a bit more reasonable while still favoring heavier armor over magical enhancements. Few fighters will shell out 7,655 gp for +5 padded armor when splint mail can be had for 200 gp unless they really desire the increased speed, weight, and armor check penalties.

There might be a better formula to use. If you can come up with one, that would be awesome. I'm just throwing it out there as an example of how I might do it.

 

[Land Outcast]

so... magical light armor would be extremly rare; which armor enchanter would enchant a studded leather to sell when he can, spending the same resources, enchant a full plate and sell it for quadruple the price?

Or, Full Plate over Half Plate? The full plate can be sold for 1.25 the cost of the enchanted half plate (costs of armor aside).

BTW: I do belive armors aren't enough differentiated, but I think that pricing is not the way to go...

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

Armor in d&d certainly is bogus, but I think a new pricing system is more complication than it's worth. Here's my solution: every armor is classified in two ways; material and size.

Materials:
Leather: grants DR 1
Chain: grants DR 2
Scale: grants DR 3
Plate: grants DR 4

Size:
Shirt Armor: +2 AC
Full Armor: +4 AC
Mail Armor: +6 AC

There are 12 resulting combos that can be chosen from, each having an armor check penalty from +0 to -7.

 

[ChrisHaines]

I changed Armor a bit in an effort to make it more desirable as a mundane item.

The Armor Class bonus from armor can also convert Lethal Hit Point damage from non energy attacks to Nonlethal damage. The conversion for each type of damage is as follows, all of the AC bonus can convert Bludgeoning damage, ½ of the AC bonus can convert Slashing damage, and ¼ of the AC bonus can convert Piercing damage. Medium armors have a +2 to their AC bonus for purposes of conversion and Heavy armors have a +4 for purposes of conversion.

This does create more math work for everyone and slows combat down a bit. Me and my players found it acceptable though.

 

[Stalker0]

Armor in d&d certainly is bogus, but I think a new pricing system is more complication than it's worth. Here's my solution: every armor is classified in two ways; material and size.

Materials:
Leather: grants DR 1
Chain: grants DR 2
Scale: grants DR 3
Plate: grants DR 4

Size:
Shirt Armor: +2 AC
Full Armor: +4 AC
Mail Armor: +6 AC

There are 12 resulting combos that can be chosen from, each having an armor check penalty from +0 to -7.

I like the basics of this, with a few more mechanics and a bit of balancing I think you could make a decent system out of this. For instance, if the ACP goes above -4, the armor reduces speed...things like that.

 

[Ravenall Stormborn]

The armor and fatigue rules from the game of thrones campaign setting work nicely and make shields more valuable, but may be out of place outside the campaign setting. Light Melee's really act like light melee's: they fight defensively wearing down their foes until they can get the edge in as opposed to, "I'm Light Armored because I want to use some class benefits". You really have to pick and choose when you fight and when you don't, and learn when to surrender and run.

But actually rolling for defense does bog it down sometimes, so you may just want to keep the base 10 thing.

 

[librarius_arcana]

The armor types available in 3e really have me baffled. There is no mechanical benefit to having armor such as scale mail or chain mail besides the saving of 50 or so gp over a chain shirt or breastplate instead. Additionally, full-plate is seen as a "must have" armor for all melee classes as soon as they can afford it. Another problem is that although +1 leather armor is almost mechanically identical to masterwork studded leather armor, the +1 leather armor costs 985 gp more. It really isn't worth it to ever have magical leather armor.

Here is my proposed solution to these problems. As armor improves, there should always be a commensurate cost. First of all I recommend getting rid of chain shirts, breastplates, and banded mail altogether as they make scale mail, chainmail, and splint mail inconsequential after level 1, which I think is rather silly (either that or get rid of scale mail, chainmail, and splint mail which just makes armor better in general). Second, there should be a more significant tradeoff than armor weight and max Dex alone (which often doesn't matter) when deciding whether to wear studded leather or +1 leather armor or +1 banded mail or half-plate. Padded armor imposes a -1 armor check penalty, leather imposes a -2, studded leather -3, scale mail -4, chain mail -5, banded mail -6, half-plate -7, full plate -8.

Magical armor enhancements also scale in price according to the type of armor being enhanced. Padded armor would cost (bonus squared) times 300 gp to enhance, leather armor (bonus squared) times 400 gp, studded leather (bonus squared) times 500 gp, scale mail (bonus squared) times 750 gp, chain mail (bonus squared) times 1,000 gp, splint mail (bonus squared) times 1,250 gp, half-plate (bonus squared) times 1,500 gp, and full plate (bonus squared) times 2,000 gp. For comparison purposes, the armors that grant +6 to armor class would be +5 padded - 7,655 gp, +4 leather - 6,560 gp, +3 studded leather - 4,675 gp, +2 scale mail - 3,200 gp, +1 chain mail 1,300 gp, and split mail 200 gp. This simply reduces the disparity between magical armor and mundane armor prices to be a bit more reasonable while still favoring heavier armor over magical enhancements. Few fighters will shell out 7,655 gp for +5 padded armor when splint mail can be had for 200 gp unless they really desire the increased speed, weight, and armor check penalties.

There might be a better formula to use. If you can come up with one, that would be awesome. I'm just throwing it out there as an example of how I might do it.

I like that Idea,


was thinking about armor, but not along these lines, but the dex limit per armor,

if you had say +2 dex bonus to ac, and wear armor that limits dex to +2 no problem,

but if you say had like a +50 dex bonus (dunno how, this is just to make a point) you are still limited to only +2 due to the armor, (thats just nuts) the best thing I can cme up with (thats simple) is that once you reach the dex limit of the armor (instead of stopping at that unrelated limit) you instead average your dex mod with the max dex of the armor,

(so if you some how had a dex mod of +50, and wore dex limiting armor of +2 you would still have a dex mod of 27, (+2 + (the average of the remaining 48 points in dex with the +2 armor limit =) 25 =27

 

[smootrk]

Armor in d&d certainly is bogus, but I think a new pricing system is more complication than it's worth. Here's my solution: every armor is classified in two ways; material and size.

Materials:
Leather: grants DR 1
Chain: grants DR 2
Scale: grants DR 3
Plate: grants DR 4

Size:
Shirt Armor: +2 AC
Full Armor: +4 AC
Mail Armor: +6 AC

There are 12 resulting combos that can be chosen from, each having an armor check penalty from +0 to -7.

Rather than call it material and size (both of which are already used - size for creature size (and subsequent armor size) & materials like mithril, adamantine, etc). You should call it type (chain, scale, plate) and style (shirt, mail, full, with the addition of partial/piecemeal - like gladiators might wear). Style corresponds well to the type of 'cut' of armor, while type is the best I could think of for the basic armor construction.

While you are developing this line of thinking (which I like very much), you should include the special materials and magical enhancements into your logic process. It will come up eventually and should be incorporated into your early thinking process alongside your initial assumptions. Please post what you might come up with.

 

[Land Outcast]

Another thumbs-up for the Material-Size for armor building

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I didn't include speed penalties or even Max Dex because this armor system is actually part of my total d&d revamp. Instead of the aforementioned armor traits, I gave each armor a required Str score. It might not be totally realistic (especially in the case of heavy armors), but it's simpler.

You should call it type (chain, scale, plate) and style (shirt, mail, full, with the addition of partial/piecemeal - like gladiators might wear). Style corresponds well to the type of 'cut' of armor, while type is the best I could think of for the basic armor construction.

Full armor is, despite the name, any piecemeal-fashion armor. I.e, more than a shirt but not total protection. (you may have noticed, I'm not very creative with my technical terms)

While you are developing this line of thinking (which I like very much), you should include the special materials and magical enhancements into your logic process. It will come up eventually and should be incorporated into your early thinking process alongside your initial assumptions. Please post what you might come up with.

Like I said, I'm revamping the system and I'm doing it low-magic style. Or at least 'no magic items style'. Weapons and armor have five grades of masterwork quality. Each masterwork grade for armor grants +1 AC and +1 DR. I don't use special materials, though they could be added in later.