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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Azlan" data-source="post: 871789" data-attributes="member: 2340">We have several ways to deal with this...1. The Dodge feat gives a +2 dodge bonus to your defense class if you're wearing light armor or none, or a +1 dodge bonus to your defense class if you're wearing medium armor. The Dodge feat gives no bonus if you're wearing heavy armor.2. Parry (a new feat): With a melee weapon, you can take a number as a penalty to your attack rolls with that weapon, and add that same number as a deflection bonus to your defense class against other melee weapons. The penalty to your attack rolls and the bonus to your defense class last until your next turn. The deflection bonus given by a parrying weapon cannot stack with other deflection bonuses, including that given by a shield. This feat cannot be used while you're flat-footed or otherwise denied your Dex bonus. If wielding two weapons, you can use your secondary weapon to parry with, thereby taking the attack penalty to that weapon instead of your primary.3. Block (a new feat): You increase the deflection bonus of your shield by 1 against melee weapons, or by 2 against missile weapons. You cannot use this feat while flat-footed or otherwise denied your Dex bonus.4. Since your attack bonuses do indeed tend to be rather high in comparison to the defense classes of your opponents, you can afford to fight defensively more often, taking a -4 attack penalty but giving yourself a +2 dodge bonus to your defense class. (Of course, if you have the Expertise feat or the Parry feat, it's more efficient for you to use those instead.)5. Against an opponent in heavy armor, you may find yourself needing to take stiff attack penalties to increase your damage (via the Power Attack feat), in order to penetrate your opponents' armor DR.All in all, it balances out, without the need for automatically increasing a combatant's defense class as he gains in levels.To demonstrate, let's imagine a swashbuckler. He's a 5th level fighter. His Str is 12; his Dex, 16; and he uses Weapon Finesse with a +1 rapier, which he has Weapon Specialization with. His attack bonus with that rapier is +10; his damage, d6+4. He's wearing the ubiquitous chain shirt, with a buckler. He has the Dodge and Parry feats. His armor DR is 4. (We're using method #1, here.) His defense class is 14 (+3 Dex, +1 buckler).The swashbuckler's opponent is a knight, who's also a 5th level fighter. The knight is wearing full plate armor. His Str is 16 and his Dex, 12. He wields a +1 greatsword, which he has Weapon Specialization with. His attack bonus with that greatsword is +10; his damage, d12+6. His armor DR is 8. His defense class is 11 (+1 Dex).The swashbuckler and the knight square off.The swashbuckler uses his Dodge feat, which increases his defense class to 16. Using his Parry feat, he takes a -4 attack penalty, increasing his defense class to 20. That leaves him with a +6 attack bonus versus the knight's defense class of 11, which is a good chance for hitting (80%). Problem is, even if the swashbuckler does hit, with his d6+4 damage he's going to have difficulty getting much if any damage past the knight's armor DR 8.The knight has a +10 attack bonus versus the swashbuckler's defense class of 20, which is only a fair chance for hitting (55%). But if the knight does hit, with his d12+6 damage he's easily going to get a decent amount of damage past the swashbuckler's armor DR 4.Really, a swashbuckler with a rapier should be at a severe disadvantage against a knight in full plate armor. (This is not the case with D&D, by-the-book.) With rules for armor DR in place, the only chance the swashbuckler has for inflicting a decent amount of damage is if he scores a critical; in which case, he rolls 2d6+8 damage versus the knight's armor DR 8.It's not necessary to tinker with hit points for characters (which would also lead to tinkering with hit points for monsters; as well as making spells like Fireball too powerful, as you stated).Instead, make criticals more frequent. You can do this by simply increasing the threat ranges of all attacks by 2. So, the threat range with a longsword would become 17-20. Upon scoring a critical, the damage would be rolled twice (with modifiers), and the opponent's armor DR would be subtracted from that total.(BTW: With these more frequent criticals, the Improved Critical feat and the Keen enchantment should further increase a weapon's threat range by 2, rather than doubling it.)Increased frequency for criticals would greatly help mitigate things, keeping combat from dragging out due to high armor DRs.</blockquote>

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