D&D 5E What potential problems are there with this medium armor fix?

[Sword of Spirit]

[UPDATE: I've changed the suggestion to Dexterity or Constitution, rather than Dexterity or Strength.]

A lot of us recognize that medium armor is mechanically problematic. (I'm not going to discuss the details--I've briefly explained the problem at the end of this post.) Here's my proposed fix:

If you wear medium armor, you add your Dexterity or Strength modifier (your choice), to a maximum of +2, to the base number from your armor type to determine your Armor Class.

I wanted my fix to accomplish 3 things:
1) Give satisfying numbers
2) Be simple
3) Avoid messing up monster/NPC statblocks

I got the feeling that this was one of those "pick 2" situations. I believe I've succeeded on #s 1 and 2.

As far as monsters go, of the 22 medium armor wearing statblocks in the MM, 15 of them are unchanged. Four of them gain +1 AC, two of them gain +2 AC, and one (the ogre) gains +3 AC. That seems to fall within reasonable tolerance--other than the ogre, and I could just say what they are wearing is mechanically studded leather. And importantly to me, the guard statblock--one of the most common statblocks in my games--remains unchanged.

Are there any potential problems with this fix?


Appendix: The Problem with Medium Armor

I'm assuming that medium armor is intended to be a reasonable choice for characters not proficient in heavy armor, and should be somewhere on par with light armor, just different. RAW, it fails in that.

A combatant either focuses on Dexterity or Strength. For those focused on Dexterity, light armor is the superior option, and for those focused on Strength, heavy armor is the superior option. The only time medium armor is the best option* is for Strength focused characters who lack proficiency in heavy armor or want to avoid its stealth penalties (generally rangers, valor bards, or barbarians). All of that is fine.

The problem is that a Strength focused character needs to put a 14 into Dexterity to get the full benefits of medium armor (and it is still the worst category of armor even with the 14 Dex). That is an absurd cost to pay just to have an average AC. If you don't spend that extra investment in Dexterity, then your AC is truly awful compared to everyone else wearing armor.


*A Dexterity focused character who is proficient in medium armor and willing to taking a penalty to stealth can get a slight AC boost from medium armor at low-levels only. Which means the armor is only of temporary situational benefit to them.

 

[CapnZapp]

Appendix: The Problem with Medium Armor

I'm assuming that medium armor is intended to be a reasonable choice for characters not proficient in heavy armor, and should be somewhere on par with light armor, just different. RAW, it fails in that.

A combatant either focuses on Dexterity or Strength. For those focused on Dexterity, light armor is the superior option, and for those focused on Strength, heavy armor is the superior option. The only time medium armor is the best option* is for Strength focused characters who lack proficiency in heavy armor or want to avoid its stealth penalties (generally rangers, valor bards, or barbarians). All of that is fine.

The problem is that a Strength focused character needs to put a 14 into Dexterity to get the full benefits of medium armor (and it is still the worst category of armor even with the 14 Dex). That is an absurd cost to pay just to have an average AC. If you don't spend that extra investment in Dexterity, then your AC is truly awful compared to everyone else wearing armor.


*A Dexterity focused character who is proficient in medium armor and willing to taking a penalty to stealth can get a slight AC boost from medium armor at low-levels only. Which means the armor is only of temporary situational benefit to them.

The basic fact Medium armor isn't as useful as Light or Heavy isn't a huge problem it itself.

The main issue is: "is it good enough for those forced to use it" which mainly means barbarians and valor bards. Any character that wants to sneak and therefore CHOOSES to use medium armor aren't forced to use it and instead are making an informed decision. (I mean, if you aren't losing some AC to gain back stealth, it's really not much of a choice, is it?)

And I think it is. And therefore it doesn't need any upgrades. (More specifically: upgrading it for everybody risks boosting its intended users too much)

Remember not everybody has the luxury of having one great value to place in either Str or Dex. The main category of medium armor users are martials with mediocre values.

With one 15 and one 14 (after racials), medium armor suddenly looks rather attractive. You can either go Strength 15 Dexterity 14 and gain optimal use out of medium armor (including sneak) - better than Light armor. If you go Strength 14 Dexterity 15 the heaviest armors are not available to you because you don't meet the strength requirements.

Now consider the case where you have one 14 and one 13. Now medium armor is outright superior to both light and heavy.

So, yes, medium armor is never going to be a best-in-class choice because it falls between two minmax peaks (light and heavy). But perhaps that's okayish?

 

[Sword of Spirit]

The basic fact Medium armor isn't as useful as Light or Heavy isn't a huge problem it itself.

The main issue is: "is it good enough for those forced to use it" which mainly means barbarians and valor bards. Any character that wants to sneak and therefore CHOOSES to use medium armor aren't forced to use it and instead are making an informed decision. (I mean, if you aren't losing some AC to gain back stealth, it's really not much of a choice, is it?)

I agree that choosing stealth should have a cost. 1 AC seems right, and even 2 is okay. That's how it currently shakes out, so no problem there.

And I think it is. And therefore it doesn't need any upgrades. (More specifically: upgrading it for everybody risks boosting its intended users too much)

Remember not everybody has the luxury of having one great value to place in either Str or Dex. The main category of medium armor users are martials with mediocre values.

So it's an NPC armor?

Unless you are playing a rather non-typical game, PCs don't have mediocre stats, and given the ability to add to them, they definitely won't have them for long. Fact is, an armor wearing combatant is going to have either a good Strength or a good Dexterity unless they aren't advancing their character in any normal sort of way.

With one 15 and one 14 (after racials), medium armor suddenly looks rather attractive. You can either go Strength 15 Dexterity 14 and gain optimal use out of medium armor (including sneak) - better than Light armor. If you go Strength 14 Dexterity 15 the heaviest armors are not available to you because you don't meet the strength requirements.

Yes, you can get +1 AC with medium armor and sneak with those stats. But you aren't going to have those stats for long.

Now consider the case where you have one 14 and one 13. Now medium armor is outright superior to both light and heavy.

Yes, but those are even less likely PC stats.

So, yes, medium armor is never going to be a best-in-class choice because it falls between two minmax peaks (light and heavy). But perhaps that's okayish?

All three categories of armor can't be the best. It's okay if medium armor is the weakest category. But it shouldn't feel as weak as it does. If I want to play a Strength based ranger, I lose 2 AC and take a stealth penalty. Or I lose 3 AC and don't take a stealth penalty. So much for wielding dual longswords.

See the thing is, it's still generally weaker than light or heavy even if you just dropped the ability bonus and gave the base AC a +2. It would be better than light at low levels that way--which is actually fine. I mean, it's supposed to be a step up from light. The overall balance of the armor really assumes that +2 Dex mod is included. Just run the numbers like that, and it actually makes the armor fit quite well. One of the reasons I don't just want to go that route is to avoid changing AC for statblocks that it might change.

 

[Horwath]

Best solution for medium armour category is to delete the medium armour category.


But, on this note I think it is a good idea as it would open up medium armour to more characters

 

[Shiroiken]

The only time I've seen people complain about medium armor is in games with point buy. Since my group always rolls or uses an Array, medium armor remains a viable choice.

 

[guachi]

I'm not particularly fond of the way medium armor works, either.

The option of using either Strength or Dexterity isn't particularly objectionable.

I guess what bothers me most is that light armor is so good. You could get around that by deleting the historically non-existent studded leather. This would give the armors a progression of a maximum of 16 for light, 17 for medium (16 with no dex penalty) and 18 for heavy. And that's a nice looking progression.

Alternatively, you could boost all medium armor by 1 and splint and plate by 1 (because those two already have the equivalent of a +2 stat modifier minimum for a STR 15 requirement)

 

[CapnZapp]

The only time I've seen people complain about medium armor is in games with point buy. Since my group always rolls or uses an Array, medium armor remains a viable choice.

Exactly my point.

The fact medium armor isn't an elite category that optimal PCs are going to choose under most circumstances doesn't have to be a problem.

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

 

[jaelis]

I don't like the idea of adding Str to AC. It doesn't make much narrative sense, and to the extent that it does, why wouldn't heavy armor wearers get the same (or better) benefit? And it would probably chain mail to the list of useless armors, since scale is cheaper and would give the same AC for essentially anyone who might wear chain.

Getting rid of studded leather is a better solution, but even simpler I think is to make studded leather give disadvantage on stealth. Then the benefits of medium and light armor are equivalent.

If you still don't like the need for Dex 14, then you could increase all the AC values for medium armor by 1 and cap the Dex mod at +1 instead.

 

[Giltonio_Santos]

Light armor is the choice for dex-focused characters, heavy armor is the choice for str-focused characters, medium armor is the choice for strength-focused characters who can/need to afford a +2 modifier Dex (valor bards, strength-based rangers, barbarians...).

At its best, it provides the same armor as light while allowing your stat increases to go somewhere else. It's not as powerful as a full plate, but at least is my games, those come by as often as magic items - they're not equipment, they're treasure.

Medium armor is ok. No need to make it more attractive for classes other than the ones that currently have it as their best choice, and no need to make those classes stronger by improving it either.

 

[jaelis]

medium armor is the choice for strength-focused characters who can/need to afford a +2 modifier Dex (valor bards, strength-based rangers, barbarians...).

I think the concern is that for everyone but a barbarian, all those characters have the option to be Dex based and, from an optimization perspective, they should.