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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie the Duck" data-source="post: 8671533" data-attributes="member: 6799660">IMO, and I think Steampunkette's point, the guy with 20 Dex and leather approaches the same defense as the guy in full plate is a real but separate issue*. I think the question is: is the guy with a great dexterity and wearing plate mail hugely better at avoiding taking damage than someone else in plate mail who is not massively dexterous? The person in cloths or light armor has to dodge and duck and weave and evade the attacks coming their way. The person in plate mail, they can still dodge (again, we all agree that knights in armor weren't lumbering tin cans), but how much additional protective quality does it provide them?honestly, the OP used AD&D and 3E, and that's where I think these analyses work better in that context. 5e went all-in on dashing swashbucklers and Dex supremacy, and beyond that bounded accuracy puts all sorts of things within a hair's breadth of each other. In 3e, well, medium and heavy armor do allow you to add dex bonuses -- just with a relatively low cap (+1 at dex 12 for plate mail). Also in 3e, leather armor only gets you just-shy-of-plate AC when one has a Dexterity score well in excess of starting base human*.**although, at that point we should probably mention that 20 Dex is in excess of starting base human in 5e as well.</blockquote>