The Point of Masterwork Armor?

[Subedei]

Plate armor has a base AC bonus of +8.

+6 Godplate armor grants a +20 bonus to AC.

+6 Plate armor would only grant a +14 bonus to AC if it existed, but it doesn't because you cannot make Plate armor with a higher enhancement bonus than +3.

There's your answer.

 

[Particle_Man]

What's the point of masterwork armor? I don't see any difference from the stats of regular hide armor or darkhide or elderhide.

I do. Regular Hide has a +3 armor bonus before magical enhancements are applied. Darkhide has a +4 armor bonus before magical enhancements are applied. Elderhide has a +5 armor bonus before magical enhancements are applied.

That said, you can't get "regular" darkhide armor -- it has to have an enhancement bonus of +4 (this is separate from and in addition to the armor bonus of +4).

edit: That is a whole lot of ninjas!

 

[Stalker0]

While not the best explanation in the book, masterwork armor has an important place in the balance of 4e.

Basically, every so often armors get a better bump than the standard +1 enhancement bonus would indicate. This keeps a player's AC in line with attack rolls. I've looked over the progression, and it actually does a very good job of this.

 

[Rith the Wanderer]

Does anyone have any idea on how to separate out the masterwork armors price-wise from the enhancement bonuses? I think with the light armors masterwork 1 will be the base armor added to the base armor+1 price, and masterwork 2 will be the base armor added to the magic armor+2 price. Effectively they will be non-magical +1 and plus +2 armors. However when you attempt to do this with heavy armors and/or add lower than intended bonuses to this it breaks down. My GM (and me) really have trouble with the whole, you can't make masterwork armor unless its already made and magical at the same time. I understand why this was done from a balance standpoint, but any suggestions as to how to houserule this would be appreciated.

 

[DogBackward]

Wait a sec, though. I took the masterwork armor stuff to mean that you could still have +6 plate, for example, but you couldn't have +2 godplate. Is there somewhere that it specifically says that you can't enchant normal armors past a certain bonus? Admittedly, I haven't had a chance to go through the whole book yet, but I didn't notice anything like that.

Obviously, you'd want the godplate version, since there's no actual cost increase, but I always figured that if you couldn't get ahold of any of the masterwork armors, you could still enchant the normal stuff as high as you wanted. It just wouldn't be as good.

 

[small pumpkin man]

Does anyone have any idea on how to separate out the masterwork armors price-wise from the enhancement bonuses? I think with the light armors masterwork 1 will be the base armor added to the base armor+1 price, and masterwork 2 will be the base armor added to the magic armor+2 price. Effectively they will be non-magical +1 and plus +2 armors. However when you attempt to do this with heavy armors and/or add lower than intended bonuses to this it breaks down. My GM (and me) really have trouble with the whole, you can't make masterwork armor unless its already made and magical at the same time. I understand why this was done from a balance standpoint, but any suggestions as to how to houserule this would be appreciated.

Ignore them. When light armour gets enchanted to +4 or +6, give them an extra +1 AC. When heavy armour gets enchanted to an extra +4 or +6, give them an extra +3 AC.

 

[Stalker0]

Yep, here's how it works (and I know its a bit confusing in the book).

There is no such thing in the game as +4 plate. It does not exist, its a complete an utter myth. There is +1 plate, +2 plate, and +3 plate. However, there does exist +4 warplate. There's +4 warplate and +5 warplate.

There is NO such thing as +6 warplate. There is however something called +6 godplate.

As a DM when you tell your players they found new armor, you don't say, you all found +4 plate. You say you found a +4 warplate.

When a player creates magic armor, he does not create +4 plate, his skills are at the point where he can create +4 warplate.

I hope that clears it up a bit.

 

[JohnSnow]

Yep, here's how it works (and I know its a bit confusing in the book).

There is no such thing in the game as +4 plate. It does not exist, its a complete an utter myth. There is +1 plate, +2 plate, and +3 plate. However, there does exist +4 warplate. There's +4 warplate and +5 warplate.

There is NO such thing as +6 warplate. There is however something called +6 godplate.

As a DM when you tell your players they found new armor, you don't say, you all found +4 plate. You say you found a +4 warplate.

When a player creates magic armor, he does not create +4 plate, his skills are at the point where he can create +4 warplate.

I hope that clears it up a bit.

It's clear. But wrong.

+4 Warplate provides a +11 bonus from armor (warplate) and +4 from enhancement. If you want an example of this, check out p. 275 of the PHB and the sample fighter "Brandis" who's wearing +4 battleforged Warplate, and gets both the +4 enhancement bonus and the +11 armor bonus.

+4 Plate provides a total bonus of +12, an armor bonus of +8 and an enhancement bonus of +4.

What IS a myth isn't +4 plate, it's +0, +1, +2 or +3 Warplate. Warplate just doesn't come with an enhancement lower than +4. Likewise, you can't buy Godplate that isn't +6, feyleather that's less than +4, and so forth.

The system isn't complicated. People are just having a hard time accepting it. But it's spelled out in black and white. And if you're still thick, there's the example given on page 275.

 

[Rith the Wanderer]

Ignore them. When light armour gets enchanted to +4 or +6, give them an extra +1 AC. When heavy armour gets enchanted to an extra +4 or +6, give them an extra +3 AC.

You know, I think this might be the best solution. Occam's razor I suppose (and no more dumb names!). Thanks

 

[Gloombunny]

The system isn't complicated. People are just having a hard time accepting it. But it's spelled out in black and white. And if you're still thick, there's the example given on page 275.

Um, what does the example on page 275 have to do with it? That example features a fighter wearing +4 warplate. Nobody's disagreeing about what kind of AC boost a character gets from +4 warplate. The example does nothing at all to prove or disprove the existence of +4 regular plate.