Ways to cast in armor

[Plane Sailing]

Doesn't Mage Armor (+4 to AC) provide the same benefit as a Chain Shirt and last all day?

Lasts for 1 hour per level.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I'm currently rolling up a wizard and I would like to be able to cast in light armor. Are there any feats, alternate class abilities, items, enchantments, spells or similar that would allow this?

You can do it just as it is, you just have the arcane failure chance

I'd just live with the arcane failure chance, to be honest. It's not that bad.

 

[CrimsonWineGlass]

I do not want to multiclass as I do not want to deal with loss of spell levels. I am willing to take a level of prestige class. I would prefer feats or alternate class abilities. Yes, I am set on it being dominantly wizard.

 

[Nifft]

I do not want to multiclass as I do not want to deal with loss of spell levels. I am willing to take a level of prestige class. I would prefer feats or alternate class abilities. Yes, I am set on it being dominantly wizard.

Please do let us know what you come up with.

Ciao, -- N

 

[rgard]

I do not want to multiclass as I do not want to deal with loss of spell levels. I am willing to take a level of prestige class. I would prefer feats or alternate class abilities. Yes, I am set on it being dominantly wizard.

Armored Savant class feature Wildstarsreach mentioned (it's actually a great class replacement feature) above or go with Urban Savant. With Urban Savant, you don't lose spell casting levels and it's the only PrC I know of that allows you to do '0' ASF in light armor as a Wizard. Spellsword aside as that one uses the % reduction in ASF.

Thanks,
Rich

 

[Kat']

Hands down agree with this, but boggle at thinking the chain shirt is expensive. A +1 twilight mithral chain shirt is 5ac for 5100gp... as compared to bracers of armour which are 25000 for the 5ac version. Now granted you can just cast mage armour, of greater mage armour, but those don't scale at all; +5 twilight mithral chain shirt will be quite affordable at later levels for 36k total, and give +9 armour (vs 81000 for +9 bracers of armour). Every little bit helps.

Suer. But the point is not being able to afford something. It is being able to afford it at a given level. Sure, you can grab a +5 twilight mithril chain, you can also get a robe of the archmagi if you got that kind of money. But what about level 2 wizards? They have to live with that wand of mage armor, or the thistelwood padded, or eat ASF.

BTW, if I'm not mistaken, Bracers of Armor +9 are Epic and cost 810.000, not 81.000.

I do not want to multiclass as I do not want to deal with loss of spell levels. I am willing to take a level of prestige class. I would prefer feats or alternate class abilities. Yes, I am set on it being dominantly wizard.

Good luck... Going 1 level of Spellsword lets you lose only ONE caster level (that 1 level of Fighter you need for the proficiencies) and reduces ALL your ASFs by 10%, as well as nicely boosting your Fortitude Save. I'd say it's worth it.

 

[Diirk]

Suer. But the point is not being able to afford something. It is being able to afford it at a given level. Sure, you can grab a +5 twilight mithril chain, you can also get a robe of the archmagi if you got that kind of money. But what about level 2 wizards? They have to live with that wand of mage armor, or the thistelwood padded, or eat ASF.

BTW, if I'm not mistaken, Bracers of Armor +9 are Epic and cost 810.000, not 81.000.

Hmm, good catch on the +9 bracers, apparently non epic they only go up to +8 for 64,000gp. Even more reason to eventually get +5 twilight mithral chain shirt. Not only is it cheaper, its better too. As for Robe of the Archmagi... not only is it over twice the price at 75000gp, it doesn't seem very good at all... its 4 less armour, the resistance bonus to saves is easily replaced by... virtually anything, and at those levels the spell resistance probably will never do anything.

For lower level wizards you do of course have to work your way up there. With my sorcerer I went mithral chain shirt mainly because with the extreme limitations of spells known at the early levels, there was no way I wanted to waste all of them on defensive spells and be unable to actually do anything. True I had 10% ASF, but even with no twilight enchant that came out to be 3-4 failed spells up until 10th level, and even a wand of mage armour (CL 1 = 750gp, 1 hour duration) works out to be signifantly more expensive in the long run.

 

[Diirk]

Of course lower level wizards can't do things like take 1 level of spell sword either; by the time you get to the levels where you can start thinking about prestige class dips, you should be able to afford the twilight enchantment.

 

[CrimsonWineGlass]

What book is the twilight bonus in?

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Hmm, good catch on the +9 bracers, apparently non epic they only go up to +8 for 64,000gp. Even more reason to eventually get +5 twilight mithral chain shirt. Not only is it cheaper, its better too.

One thing the bracers have over the chain shirt is that they are force effects, and therefore are useful against incorporeal touch attacks (which may be more or less useful depending on your DM's predilections).