no armor attack bonus

[Beholder]

Not sure if that's the right place to post this...

Does anyone one uses any "no armor" bonus for fighters?
Most fighters, that I've seen in game, are always trying to armor up to get good AC.

What if (fighters only) got bonuses for not wearing armor, like Conan lets say.
No armor = +1 on melee attack, + 1 on damage and + 1 on AC (gets better at dodging).

I'm pretty sure I've read something like this for AD&D...

[Mushgnome]

Aug 31, 2012 10:55:21 GMT -6 Beholder said:

Does anyone one uses any "no armor" bonus for fighters?

No. Well, actually, yes--they're faster, which is a pretty big bonus!

Aug 31, 2012 10:55:21 GMT -6 Beholder said:

Most fighters, that I've seen in game, are always trying to armor up to get good AC.

Yup, armor's good like that.

One house rule I do use is that players can describe what they want their armor to look like. So if you want your leather armor to be a bearskin loincloth, your chainmail to be a chain bikini, or your plate to be a Roman-style breastplate/greaves/helmet, that's OK with me. Mechanically it makes no difference.

[monk]

I used to let a character use his DEX bonus (this was in B/X) as a melee attack bonus if he was just wearing a loincloth. He decided (edit: for his character!) to go full nude and spent quite some time that way until he acquired some magical armor.

[Ynas Midgard]

For more sword & sorcery oriented games, one may consider allowing half-naked characters to use their CHA score as their AC (or 19 minus CHA score for descending AC).

[zeraser]

I use a rule for "special attacks" in melee: If the player can convincingly describe a particularly pyrotechnical or stealthful attack for her character to execute, I grant a bonus to the attack roll equal to the character's AC and a bonus to damage equal to her HD. If this attack fails, however, any attacks made against the character's AC in the next round will be successful - which at low levels is often a lethal gamble.

This rule rewards lightly armored characters whose players are willing to take a risk and go an extra role-playing mile for narrating something cool. My house rules don't include ability score bonuses or modifiers to initiative or AC of any kind, so no character's AC will ever go above 9 or below 2 - and the aforementioned "special attack" rule is the only way to get a bonus to one's attack roll.

[Stormcrow]

Conan usually preferred armor when he could get it, if he was expecting battle.

The only reason to use such a bonus is to emulate the half-naked barbarian stereotype, but I see little need to do so.

At best, I could see a barbarian sub-class allowed a bonus when not wearing heavy armor... which (gasp!) is already written into the barbarian class of AD&D!

[jjarvis]

Less armor does not make one a more effective fighter, the role of armor is to protect the wearer so they can kill others not juststand still and have blows be deflected by the armor. Heavy armor let's one engage in moves and practices that would certainly get them killed if they had no armor.

[zeraser]

Less armor does not make one a more effective fighter, the role of armor is to protect the wearer so they can kill others not juststand still and have blows be deflected by the armor. Heavy armor let's one engage in moves and practices that would certainly get them killed if they had no armor.

Historically, that may be true; I have no way of knowing. But we're talking not only about what's plausible in reality but also about la bataille ecrite, the battle as it appears in literature and in the fantastical imagination. It's thought that a lightly armored or unarmored combatant could attempt more spectacular maneuvers than a heavily armored one owing to her increased agility, isn't it? And if it is, shouldn't we take that into consideration when we adjudicate how events go down in the game world?

[thorswulf]

Best advice ever given to me about getting into a knife fight:

1) Don't, if you don't have to.
2) Expect to get cut!
3) Fight like you are going to die and try to kill that bastard!

In light of this most armor makes good sense to me. Remember also that in history as well as fantasy armor is a mark of status and wealth. Nobles and good warriors got to wear chainmail, the rest relied on their shields!

I'ts my opinion that shields and good shieldwork aren't given enough of a modifier to protection

[machfront]

I don't really give a rat's patootie about 'realism'. I want to be able for fighters of the 'Buscema barbarian', Gray Mouser, D'Artagnan, Robin Hood, etc. to work within the system.

I've long used a simple house rule in B/X: dex bonus to AC is doubled when not wearing any armor or shield.
(Actually, I also used to add in that anyone who wanted to duel wield was the same mechanical effect as a shield. Both of these helped mitigate the 'everyone has to wear armor and that's boring' issue that my players and myself have.

Never caused a single problem. I'd guess mainly because this doesn't change that PCs are effectively 'naked' vs. missiles and attacks from behind, etc. and things non-mechanical (like a sliding down a craggy surface may not harm someone in chain or plate, while a loincloth as one's only 'protection' may cause the DM to assume a lil bit of hp loss from such a scenario...stuff like that.

[waysoftheearth]

The disconnect might lie somewhere between D&D's "one factor" combat system and the "two factor" system it models. In fantastical (or historical) combat there are two considerations:

1) how likely are you to get hit?
2) if you are hit, how likely are you to be hurt?

D&D's alternative combat systems rolls these two concerns into one by having it: wearing armour reduces the hurt you suffer over many rounds by reducing the probability that you will be hit in any one round.

In fact, it seems likely that wearing armour would have little or no impact on the possibility of being hit, but would significantly reduced the chance of being hurt if you were hit. Doubtless why wearing armour was so popular.


---


With that and a little gamesmanship in mind, an alternate system might be to have it that wearing armour makes you easier to hit, but harder to hurt.

Imagine for a moment that plate armour was AC 9, chainmail AC 8, leather AC 7, no armour AC 6, and that carrying a shield improved your AC by 2 pips.

(In D&D combat expertise is modeled with HD, so your AC would be improved by 1 pip for every 2 HD you have -- but that is a bit off topic).

Imagine also that wearing armour made you tougher by reducing the amount of damage suffered on a hit; leather armour -1 damage per hit, chainmail -2 damage per hit, and plate mail -3 damage per hit.

Against a possible 1-6 points of damage, DR 3 is pretty tough.

In this scenario, players could toy with the sub-game of trading off better AC against better damage reduction.

All pure speculation of course... and not thought through in the least !

[jcstephens]

Beware: That way lies Runequest!

[Beholder]

Thanks for all the replies

I like the B/X rule of no armor = AC bonus from dexterity doubled. Sounds interesting.

Yes, there's the movement price for heavy armor, but to a certain extent. Never seen a fighter with less then a leather armor.

The reason I tried to apply it to attack is because AC and attack are so connected.
Feels like a good trade off... less AC for more attack and vice versa. Expose yourself more and get the chance of hit the opponent more.

That way you can choose between an offensive or defensive fighter.

[Necropraxis]

Something I've been playing around with recently is adding a "defense" trait. This is actually for different game, but could easily be hacked into vanilla OD&D too (just make it equal to the fighter's attack bonus).

Defense trait: range 0 - 6. This is a floating AC bonus that may be used for the fighter herself, or party members nearby that the fighter would be reasonably able to protect. This bonus does not stack with armor though, either on self or others.

This allows the lightly armored fighter to be viable and makes it possible for the fighter to act as a protector. Protection will also be most effective for those that are not armored. It doesn't really compete directly with armor use though, because a fighter using the defense bonus on themselves will not have it available to aid others. Use of the floating bonus must be declared whenever actions are declared.

The defense trait could just be gained along with attack bonus for simplicity's sake (and compatibility with systems that don't use skills or whatever) or could be gained using whatever skill of feat system is being used.