UA Class Defense.... Armor as DR?

[thundershot]

I let my players character use the Unearthed Arcana Class Defense bonuses. It gets their AC up pretty high, but I get to use it for my bad guys too.

However, I was initially combining it with the "Armor as DR" rule from UA, but the players brought up a pretty good point. What's the purpose of buying magical armor (with plusses) if the plusses don't count toward the Damage Reduction?

Would it be too powerful to allow the armor's armor bonus + enhancement bonus / 2 = DR? Naturally, it would apply to their foes as well, but I just wanted to get an opinion on how plausible it is.


Thanks!
Chris

 

[ValhallaGH]

It shouldn't be too broken, though it means that things will be really difficult to damage, making big two-handed weapons or tons of sneak attack necessary to deal damage in melee.

May I suggest changing each armor's DR to 1dX where X is its normal bonus to AC? This makes magic armors very desirable and allows the peasant to occaisionally hurt the knight in full plate and occaisionally the knight is invincible.
So +3 Adamantine full plate would give DR 1d8+6/-, 7 to 14 points of DR, and a +4 mithril breastplate would give DR 1d5+4/-, 5 to 9 points of DR.
It leads to even more dice rolls per round but in my experience the chance to affect their own defense is enjoyed by the PCs.

 

[thundershot]

Hm... that seems a little over-complicated. +3 Adamantime Full Plate, the way I have it set up, would clock in at DR 8/-. Full plate is +8, with +3 enhancement bonus would be +11. Divide in half rounded down is 5. Then add the DR 3 for being adamantine, so I think having that much armor is fair at a DR of 8/-. Doesn't that seem reasonable? You didn't take into account the part where I divide the total AC in half rounded down to get the DR.

This armor would cost 25,650 gp and give a DR of 8/- with a max Dex bonus of +1. It would give the fighter a great DR, sure, but it won't do a bit of good against spellcasters, and if he had a decent Dex, it'd be useless in this armor.

If I did this, then I'd make the Bracers of Armor work in a similar fashion, giving a little bit of DR rather than an AC bonus. Though maybe instead of having Bracers of Armor +1, they'd be Bracers of Damage Reduction 1/-. Then up the cost of them a little...


Thanks!
Chris

 

[ValhallaGH]

Hm... that seems a little over-complicated.

Really? I find it to be one of the simplest "Armor as DR" systems around. But everyone has their own tastes. "How much DR does full plate give?" 1d8. "How much DR does Leather give?" 1d2. "How much DR does Banded Mail give?" 1d6. "How much DR does Scale Mail?" 1d4.
But to each their own.

This armor would cost 25,650 gp and give a DR of 8/- with a max Dex bonus of +1. It would give the fighter a great DR, sure, but it won't do a bit of good against spellcasters, and if he had a decent Dex, it'd be useless in this armor.

A decent dex is never useless. Initiative, ranged attacks, reflex saves and skill modifiers. Even if you're running about in +0 max dex armor, you want to have the highest dex you can because it does so much more than just add to defense.
Since you're using the class defense variant, the class defense bonus works on all defenses including touch, removing one of the big drawbacks to max dex limits.
As for the quality of the armor, under my suggestion the cost and limitations are the same but the DR is a variable between 7 and 14, average 10.5. Under yours it is a static amount of 8.

If I did this, then I'd make the Bracers of Armor work in a similar fashion, giving a little bit of DR rather than an AC bonus. Though maybe instead of having Bracers of Armor +1, they'd be Bracers of Damage Reduction 1/-.

Wouldn't you just have Bracers of Armor 1, 2, 3 and 4, priced as BoA +2, +4, +6 and +8? Divide by two and round down, after all.

 

[Paraxis]

I just got Iron Heroes and I do like the system they have wich is basicly the dX system above. But have not used it yet, what I have done in my most recent game is to allow the following option as the attacker likes.

Any time you attack before a to hit roll, you may declare you are attacking as a touch attack, but you take all the armor bonus you bypass and apply it as DR/-.

It has worked out ok so far, but most of my players are not wearing much armor anyway, and I use a defense bonus to AC.

 

[thundershot]

Tomorrow night I'm going to test my system on the players. As of right now, I don't think any of them have armor, simply because it's useless at 15th-17th level with the class defense. I'm going to tell them it's the armor's bonus plus the enhancement bonus / 2 as DR. That keeps it low enough so they're vulnerable, but still has a point to the armor.

So +1 studded leather would give a DR of 2/- while full plate +2 would be DR 5/-. We shall see..



Chris