ugh math... str dex fighter in hide.

[Ulrik]

Hide armor does provide a bonus to fort defense. I just mentioned it in my long post, but it is a non-trivial benefit. What hurts it is not getting specialization feat until epic levels. Hide is actually best at heroic levels if you're going to boost dex anyway, since it gives the same AC (give or take) and a bonus to fort in addition to +1 speed. I would say scale pulls away at paragon since you can take specialization and it doesn't have so harsh

A half-orc would have starting stats of 18 str, 18 dex, 12 con and 12 wis. This gives a great ref defense with a shield, and not too shabby fort/will defenses.

Plate is really a bit beside the point. It does give the best ac, but it requires a feat, a high con and gives a -2 check penalty. Either you find the trade off worth it or you don't.

 

[Klaus]

So scale AC advances faster than Dex/Hide now with the new armor advancement rules in AV I? I find that ironic since those additions were supposed to balance heavy armor with light/AC. Now the second best heavy armor is superior to the best light armor and high starting DEX. Its really bad design when a character with 18 starting DEX is better off taking scale armor than light armor.

Scale and chain have always advanced faster than hide. Hide never had masterwork versions for +2 enhancements, only +3.

 

[Ulrik]

Scale and chain have always advanced faster than hide. Hide never had masterwork versions for +2 enhancements, only +3.

That's not really true though. Light armor assumes you will use stat boosts on int or dex (or whatever stat you can add to ac), so it advanced faster and heavy armor caught up at +4 and +6. The new masterwork ACs give heavy armor more ac at approx. the same levels as stat boosts, while light armor gets bonuses to fort, ref or will.

 

[Tai]

So scale AC advances faster than Dex/Hide now with the new armor advancement rules in AV I? I find that ironic since those additions were supposed to balance heavy armor with light/AC. Now the second best heavy armor is superior to the best light armor and high starting DEX. Its really bad design when a character with 18 starting DEX is better off taking scale armor than light armor.

Is that so bad? Scale has a speed penalty, not to mention that you have to cough up feats to get it...