Armor Variant

[Vanquishing Leviathan]

This is an armor variant I've been brainstorming; feedback/criticism is welcome.

The purpose of this variant is to make shields & helmets more useful, and to make every armor & armor combination useful. I've posted it in both descending and ascending AC formats:

Descending AC
Leather only 6AC
Shield only 6AC
Leather & Shield 5AC
Mail only 5AC
Mail & Shield 4AC
Helmet provides a further -1 to AC

Ascending AC
Leather only +3AC
Shield only +3AC
Leather & Shield +4AC
Mail only +4AC
Mail & Shield +5AC
Helmet provides an additional +1AC

Helmets and shields can easily be discarded, but armor cannot. Shields take up one hand, whereas armor leaves both hands free. In the original system, there were three armors, but one of those was largely pointless (chain), and leather wasn't a real option for the fighting man, so choices have been reduced to two real alternatives: leather/light armor vs. mail/metal/heavy armor. Should the fighting man go with mail for that extra bit of protection, or go with the slightly inferior protection but superior movement and stealth of leather? Or should the fighting man go it with shield and helmet alone, worthy of a Frazetta painting?

[oakesspalding]

I'm not sure I precisely agree (or understand) the details, but I like the idea, especially the binary nature of armor and the "Frazetta" options. In the medieval world, a suit of mail was it. Plate would come later, but by then you wouldn't want mail.

What happened to AC2, or am I misunderstanding things?

[Merctime]

I have to say that the coolest houserule I've read for helmets is by a poster here, Waysoftheearth, and you can find it on this post (just scroll way down until you find the subheading "Combat", then look for "Helmets"

forum.immersiveink.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=87

Note that I use this, but don't give the ac bonus from them; just the ability to soak terrible hits.

As for shields, I think the 'shields shall be splintered' rule from Fight on! magazine is pretty awesome, too. You can find a variant of that rule in the above link, just a tiny bit below the wonderful helmet rule. Note also that I don't reduce AC by 2 as it's listed there. I believe Ways was testing these rules for that specific game, but I could be wrong; In any event, it's great stuff

From your post, what I get is that you'd like fighting men to be able to wade in like Conan or any of the hero's as depicted by many fantasy artists with nary any armor. I think your scale for that might work out for those reasons. I'd still be inclined to include Plate armor at the AC 2 level, and just make it far more scarce, perhaps. Up to you. If it were me, I'd also probably only use something like this for a very specific type of game, and not in general (Say, a game set in the Hyborean Age).

A final consideration, is that if the best AC you're offering your players is 4 base, then later on in levels they may begin to find themselves hit very, very often... Without something of a profuse amount of magical protection. If you are still wanting to have the 'less armor is still strong' thing going on, then you might go with AC 2 being something like 'breastplate only' or 'steel greaves and vambraces only' sort of thing (the second option meant for bare-chested types) while still offering a bit more protection (i.e. lower ac attainable). Food for thought!

[Deleted]

This is close to the system I used for awhile before I switch to armor saving throws. I noticed that historically, shields tended to get smaller (and dropped altogether) as armor improved so I modified the shield's AC bonus to be based on the type of armor worn with it.

[Vanquishing Leviathan]

As the traditional rules go, a fighter effectively has no choice, he will virtually always be forced to choose plate.

Under this rule, there is no AC2 option. The best possible armor would give you AC3, which is close enough in my estimation, but it would hurt low level fighters a bit. This is the only negative that I can see.

For the trade off, a fighter could forgo body armor and not be suicidal, and every armor choice would be useful. Leather is no longer only for thieves - it is now a viable option, particularly for those who wish to make a leather-clad, nimble fighter-type. And since Mail armor = heavier, metal armor, the player is free to envision it as chain or plate & chain, whichever they prefer aesthetically.

You could still add any splintering shield/helm rules, as this variant only has to do with passive defense.

[tog]

Jul 4, 2014 17:22:37 GMT -6 Vanquishing Leviathan said:

As the traditional rules go, a fighter effectively has no choice, he will virtually always be forced to choose plate.

"Forced" in what sense, exactly?

[Merctime]

Hey, if this works for you, Game-on, bro! For my own part, I was just offering feedback. But, yeah, I see that many (including myself, more often that not, with a few exceptions) will race for plate armor as soon as possible. I don't see it as 'being forced'; But that may depend from one group to another. I'm sure it's reasonably obvious that fighting-men types want the best AC possible (well, and the other classes too, really!). Thus the plate assumption.

Still, some players might don armor much more light (and thus, gaining less AC) for a specific purpose in-game (even if for a short or medium duration). I'm in an online game on these boards where an experienced player running a fighting-man is going to do just this for the sake of stealth. This is something I would do, and have done, also.

In any event, it's alot of fun to houserule this game. I'm sure many if not most players have done that at least once! Still, the reasoning behind your houserule you're presenting here seems easy to understand, and probably just as effective in-game as any other. Like I say, I'd use something like this only in specific games, but what is fun for you is generally the best 'rule', in my opinion.

Now that I think about it, the steel vambraces and greaves thing is kinda cool. I'd go for that, and this set of rules, if I was using Jason Vey's really awesome 'Age of Conan hack'. Would fit perfectly in that genre in my opinion!

[luc]

I think I get what you are trying to achieve, but to me it just looks like you just want every armour class to be ‘better’. If you want a campaign without plate I can see that stretching out the ACs like this would be useful. I’ve got a similar issue at the moment with a desert campaign where I don’t want everyone running around in armour, but I’m finding that their low AC’s are making combat a bit difficult at the moment.

I do like the idea of a shield by itself being better than just a +1 improvement to AC though.

I’ve always see it that each suit of armour already comes with a helmet. So you could just rescale all armours down by 1. It basically ends up exactly the same as ‘normal’, but with a little bit more flexibility.

EXAMPLE:
———————————
Leather AC: 8
Chain AC: 6
Plate AC: 4

Shield (No armour) AC 7
Shield (With armour) improves AC by 1
Helm improves AC by 1

[Merctime]

Jul 5, 2014 4:10:40 GMT -6 luc said:

I think I get what you are trying to achieve, but to me it just looks like you just want every armour class to be ‘better’.

Hmm. Enjoy your day!

[tetramorph]

I've been imagining a campaign set in an early, more "dark ages" kind of medieval Europe, before "plate" was around.

I also like the idea of a Conan type warrior -- who uses "plate" when he finds it, but barely needs it!

What do you guys think of something like this:

AC starts at the maximum of 9 for all PCs. Clerics may wear leather under their cassocks and breastplates over. Only Knights, Dwarves and Elves may wear -2 armor. Chainmail requires leather underneath.

Classes are limited to a range of non-magical armor before applying dexterity and strength bonuses and penalties. All PCs may increase their relative armor class beyond this range by wearing magical armor of the type allowed within their non-magical range.

AC Range per Class

• Knights and Dwarves 2-4
• Clerics and Elves 4-7
• Magi and Scouts 7-9

Armor Type to Armor Class Effect

• -1 Leather, “boiled”
• -1 Buckler*
• -1 Cap, steel*
• -1 Breastplate
• -1 Defensive arts
• -2 Chainmail
• -2 Shield*
• -2 Helmet*

*PCs may not wield both shield and buckler, or both helmet and cap.

“Defensive arts,” indicates previous training in martial arts granting specialized skills in defensive maneuvers while attacking. Such training takes a full year of game time.

(In this campaign, characters would age and die. This would be built into the mechanic and be part of the planning of "end game" scenarios, etc. Thus "losing" a year "costs" the players something. Final note: I call "thieves," "scouts," because I want a generic name that allows for "lawful" versions of this archetype.)

[Deleted]

I think there was a 2E rulebook that broke down armor into smaller chunks alot like what you seem to be doing. Might have been the "gladiator" sourcebook for Dark Sun. I don't think I have it anymore, but maybe someone with 2E books could find and post what TSR did. Might help your process.

[scottenkainen]

>In this campaign, characters would age and die. This would be built into the mechanic and be part of the planning of "end game" scenarios, etc. Thus "losing" a year "costs" the players something.<

Are you sure it's not Pendragon you want to be playing...?

~Scott "-enkainen" Casper

[tetramorph]

Thanks guys. Yeah, I have heard about Pendragon, but I have never explored it.

The aging thing is more about "end game" stuff with realm and stronghold building. I house-ruled it from the ACKS. But it is pretty "rules-lite," and doesn't really start affecting game play until higher levels. Is that true for Pendragon?