Why are Warforged so bad?

[ARandomGod]

As Mad Mac stated, it most certainly is not the same.

There's no way you can enchant your effectively leather armor to be +13 AC and DR2.

Which is +5 Adamantine Full Plate.

And, as far as I can tell, there's no way you can make your adamantine body armor into mithril armor (although I think maybe a limited wish would do it). Some people might prefer the higher dex bonus and better move (especially barbarians) that comes with Mithril full plate instead of Adamantine full plate.

Hrm... Correction.
Normal adamantine full plate gives DR 3/-, of course, not DR2/-. So it's full plate of inferior adamantine.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Hrm... Correction.
Normal adamantine full plate gives DR 3/-, of course, not DR2/-. So it's full plate of inferior adamantine.

Mithral Body gives you +5 armor bonus with max dex of +5, -2 ACP, ASF 15%, and counts as light armor.

Adamantine Body gives you +5 armor bonus with max dex of +1, -5 ACP, ASF 35%, counts as heavy armor, and gives DR 2/adamantine.

So yes, full plate of inferior adamantine... but not by much. Especially considering you are never caught without it. And you can get it at first level for a feat, which is really great for fighters who, as I said, get tons of feats.

 

[fanboy2000]

Maybe you missed it. A warforged starts out with what amounts to +0 leather armor of light fortification. Yes, this armor can be enchanted (up to a total AC enhancement bonus of +5, making the total AC benefit of this armor +7). That's it. Said warforged cannot get better armor.

But said warforged can buy a higher AC.

+7 is a respectible armor bonus depending on the class and how the player chooses to fight. Forgoing Adamantine Body means they can have an decent dex bonus. Enter Gloves of Dexterity, and they're better than an armor bonus because they add to your touch AC, and helps you hit with a ranged weapon. Oh, and if you have weapon finesse then it can add to your attack with a light weapon. Of course, if all you want to do is be harder to hit, you can't go wrong with a cloak of displacment.

Oh, and then there's the small matter of shields. Really, do you want me to go into detail about the diffrent shields and shield bonuses warforged have acess to?

Let's see, a warforged with composit plating can enhancet up to +5 for a total of +7, then we have Gloves of Dexterity +2 for a plus +1 to AC, then we have his actual DEX modifier +2 is good for a figher (might be a little high), and the shield could be heavy steel for +2 and enchant it up to +5 (now I'm getting rediculous).
+7 (armor) + 3 (total dex mod) + 7 (shield) = +17

And this is without maxing the gloves (+6 to dex, adding 3 to the mod, it go up to +20) or even having a high dex (a warforged with an 18 dex and +6 gloves of dexterity gives a plus +7 to AC all buy itself.)

It seems to me that ARandomGod made a poor feat selection for his character type. (I do it all the time.) And now thinks the feat is bad period.

If you want to buy an AC bonus for your warforged, you can.

However, I'm curious, ARandomGod, what do you want for your character? You mentioned Mithral Full-Plate, why? Do you want the higher dex bonus? Increased mobility? Maybe there's another way to work this out within the rules as written.

 

[Ds Da Man]

Hey, aren't all the rulebooks really just guides to give DMs more stuff to put into their games? Or would Whizzers of the Coast send their field investigators out to bust unruly DMs not adhering to their strict set of game-balancing rules?
Don't like the Adamantine Body feat? Gid rid of it! Make it so that stupid walking calculator has to go to an armourer, and pay like every other Joe Schmoe!
Make it a progressive feat scale, having to take Oak Body, Copper Body (walking lightning rod), Silver Body, Gold Body, then Adamantine Body!
YOUR IMAGINATION IS THE LIMIT!!!!!

 

[IcyCool]

Let's see, a warforged with composit plating can enhancet up to +5 for a total of +7, then we have Gloves of Dexterity +2 for a plus +1 to AC, then we have his actual DEX modifier +2 is good for a figher (might be a little high), and the shield could be heavy steel for +2 and enchant it up to +5 (now I'm getting rediculous).
+7 (armor) + 3 (total dex mod) + 7 (shield) = +17

And this is without maxing the gloves (+6 to dex, adding 3 to the mod, it go up to +20) or even having a high dex (a warforged with an 18 dex and +6 gloves of dexterity gives a plus +7 to AC all buy itself.)

So, let's put a fighter in the same gear, except instead of +5 leather of light fortification, let's buy the cheaper +5 full plate.

+13 for the armor, +1 for the gloves, +2 for the Dex, +7 for the shield = +23.

That's six full points of AC better than the warforged.

If you want to buy an AC bonus for your warforged, you can.

No one has said that you couldn't. What was said is that one of the Warforged limitations is their armor choice.

 

[ThirdWizard]

For the price of a feat, the warforged can have better armor than the fighter for cheaper, though.

 

[fanboy2000]

No one has said that you couldn't. What was said is that one of the Warforged limitations is their armor choice.

Here's an idea, why don't we go back to the origanal message to see what was said.

there are only two types of armor that they can get (other than their base), both of which would require their only first level feat

ARandomGod stated that warforged could only have three kinds of armor, and that two took up a feat. If you continue to read his post (#190), you see that he says that warforged can't buy better armor.

Now, forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't the point of armor to increase your armor class? So the main reason someone would want to buy armor is to increase their AC? So when someone claims that they can't buy better armor and is talking about trying physicaly alter it the armor that is built into their character, I'm going to infer that what they realy want is higher AC.

Now you can hide behind the actual text of the message, but I honestly belive that ARandomGod is saying that warforged can't improve their AC beyond the warforged feats. Read this quote and tell me he's not talking about AC:

I mean, unless you're playing a game wherein you'll never see that kind of equipment, what you've done is give up something good now but will get better and better as time goes on (being one step further up the feat chain) for something that's great now, but will get less and less good as time goes on.

There it is. He's implyed that a warforged's AC will not go up and that you cannot purchace more AC. Again, you can hide behind the actual text, but why else would a character want to by armor if not to increase his AC?

Oh and about that +6 diffrence. Composit Plating is +2, Adamantine Body is +8. As ThirdWizard said, it's only the price of a feat. One feat in a class that gets 18. (11 bonus feats plus 7 regular feats.)

 

[Felon]

Don't like the Adamantine Body feat? Gid rid of it! Make it so that stupid walking calculator has to go to an armourer, and pay like every other Joe Schmoe!
Make it a progressive feat scale, having to take Oak Body, Copper Body (walking lightning rod), Silver Body, Gold Body, then Adamantine Body!
YOUR IMAGINATION IS THE LIMIT!!!!!

It's one limit. Another, more substantial limit, is what the group(s) you game with is going to agree upon as acceptable without bickering. Personally, as a player I don't like to sell my DM off of bad rules that are canon in favor of a house rule, and as a DM I don't like the converse situation of players dissatisfied with bad canon that I don't feel like house-ruling. It's a lot more convenient to have good source material up front than it is to make lots of half-assed, off-the-cuff, improvised rules. YMMV.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Point taken about the elves, but that in no way hurts the argument because of the aforementioned "not a lot of obstacles in the core rules exist that they have immunity to; a lot of obstacles in the core rules exist that the warforged have immunity to" case. The Warforged are a much grosser offender in quality and quanity than even the elf.

I'm thinking that "different is bad" isn't a very strong argument.

Oh but it is! A DM of basic skill level has it within his power to run a fun adventure for a great wyrm red dragon, a stone golem, an ice elemental half-vamire rogue, a dwarven wizard, a human paladin, and an intelligent gelatinous cube who has the ability to cast cleric spells somehow. Most DM's are perfectly *able* to run an adventure with these characters, and do it in a way that's fun and richly engaging for all involved. Hell, I half expect someone who reads this post to go out and do just that. Balance and power are all ultimately campaign-specific ANYWAY.

But most DM's don't really want to be bothered with taking into account all those dramatic differences in the party, and if they do it once, they generally don't want to have it as repeat themes in their ongoing game. It's just not fun for most DM's to constantly keep in mind the wild and wacky powers of this kind of party, while still introducing challenges where the paladin and wizard can feel useful. Or at least, if this point was wrong, I imagine I'd be reading less about humans and halflings on these boards and more about wraiths and dragons. The Core Rules keep everything humanoid for a reason, after all. And the game is set up with that in mind. The Warforged break this sucker wide open.

You have, on a drastically smaller scale, the same thing. They don't work like the other races in the game. Some DM's (such as myself) don't really want to be bothered with taking into account the dramatic difference of this ONE character, or this ONE race. From a design standpoint, on this note, the are a failure for some in a way that could have been avoided while retaining their unique flavor and fun concept with a few simple adjustements. As far as I can tell, the designers noted that there was this easier way to do it, but decided not to go with it because they felt the warforged should feel totally different but still be basically playable. They succeeded on this goal, but I think it was the wrong goal. I don't know why the warforged deserve to be drastically different. And I certainly don't want them muscling in and making me accomodate their difference just because they have a cool idea attatched to wonky mechanics.

In a game where all the players are supposed to be "separate but equal", at least in terms of overcoming challenges, a dramatic difference of any one feature is, in effect, an inequality. The warforged are not equal to any other race. This difference is bad for MANY reasons, but most importantly for me, it's bad because I have to spend a few minutes thinking about what the Warforged character could do because he's a Warforged in a way I don't have to think about what the halfling can do because he's a halfling. Elves do share that thought-hogging process, but when it's three spells in the game or one attack from one monster, that's not a major time-consumer. The broad, sweeping immunities and non-living-ness of the Warforged, however, ARE.

Different is bad. Different requires special thought, special consideration, special preparation, special attention. They hog the spotlight and demand to be paid attention to because they're so dramatically different.

For comparison:
* Elves are immune to Sleep, Deep Slumber, Dream, and Nightmare spells, and to a ghoul's paralysis. If I have an elf in the party, I should be taking these into account. Annoying, but not that big of a list.
* Warforged are immune to all those. Furthermore, they are immune bleeding, starvation and thirst, suffocation, disease, nausea, sickness, normal fatigue and exhaustion, and drowning; alter self (and the various spells built off of it) can turn them into golems; they are immune to charm person, hold person, hold monster, poison (the spell), touch of fatigue, ghoul touch (the spell), ray of exhaustion, reduce person, contagion, enervation, mass reduce person, waves of fatigue, dominate person, part of the eyebite spell, flesh to stone, mass hold person, waves of exhaustion, mass hold monster, and energy drain; they are immune to a defining or prominent damage form from any creature using poison on a weapon, especially if said weapon only deals damage to deliver the poison (daggers, blowdarts, shuriken...); they are immune to a defining or prominent damage form from aranea, athaches, basilisks, beholders, belkers, carrion crawlers, chuuls, cloakers, cockatrices, bebeliths, hezrous, quasits, succubi, bone devils, imps, devourers, dire rats, doppelgangers (since they can't mimic a warforged), driders, drow, ettercaps, formian warriors, formian myrmarchs, violet fungus, gorgons, homunculus, all lycanthropes (especially wererats), medusa, mohrgs, mummies, all nagas, night hags, night crawlers, otyughs, phase spiders, pseudodragons, rasts, red slaad (one would think a robot body can't incubate eggs...), blue slaad, spectres, spider eaters, stirges (debatably; it's said they suck blood, so one would think a robot wouldn't be a target), all swarms to a certain degree, but especially bat, centipede, hellwasp, rat, and spider swarms, troglodytes, wights, wyvrens, most yuan-ti, all vipers, giant bees, giant wasps, all monstrous centipedes, all monstrous scorpions, all monstrous spiders, and probably a few more that I missed. If I have a Warforged in the party, I should be taking these all into account. This is not acceptable to me. That's a BIG part of the game that the warforged just waltz through.

It was acceptable to the designers because they figured there were other ways to challenge the character, and that these still pose a challenge for the party as an entire unit. But if the major story arc involves yuan-ti and a nest of spiders and drow, well...the Warforged character will probably feel especially powerful when compared to all these guys who have to keep saving. Or if it involves a necromancer-king with an army of basilisks and spectres at his beck and call, the Warforged will again feel mighty indeed, in compairison to others. Stirges used to spend the rescources of the entire party. Now, one guy is immune. All characters used to fear getting inhaled by a Belker. Now, one member doesn't. Mummies and lycanthropes struck terror into the PC's because they could die or loose humanity from a powerful supernatural disease. Now at least one character doesn't have to fear that.

In exchange, he can fear rust monsters and well-prepared druids.

Yeah, this seems totally on par....

 

[Flyspeck23]

Oh and about that +6 diffrence. Composit Plating is +2, Adamantine Body is +8. As ThirdWizard said, it's only the price of a feat. One feat in a class that gets 18. (11 bonus feats plus 7 regular feats.)

By the time the character has 18 feats, his adamantine body will look pale in comparison.
It's at the low levels the warforged with that feat is probably better than other fighters. Later on, it doesn't matter that much, so it's kind of unfair to say that it cost him only one of 18 feats.

It's one limit. Another, more substantial limit, is what the group(s) you game with is going to agree upon as acceptable without bickering. Personally, as a player I don't like to sell my DM off of bad rules that are canon in favor of a house rule, and as a DM I don't like the converse situation of players dissatisfied with bad canon that I don't feel like house-ruling. It's a lot more convenient to good source material than it is to make lots of half-assed, off-the-cuff, improvised rules. YMMV.

Indeed.