Armor Class Control

[drskull]

To me, one of the key elements of a good RPG experience is to have the player characters be a workable part of a consistent world.

We all know that D&D has undergone a power-creep from edition to edition, step by step. This power-creep is most noticeable in character hit points, and attack ability, but I think the most important element of power-creep that must be watched is Armor Class.

In OD&D AC is basically impossible to increase. You can give the enemy a few points of penalty due to magic armor, but it's very small and manageable.

What is the impact of this? It makes the "Normal Men" and 1 HD troop-type monsters important and dangerous at every level of play. Under most circumstances, the best AC is AC 2, and the worst chance to hit that is a 17+, or 20%. That's pretty significant.

So, if you are an 8th level hero, and 20 "normal archers" shoot at you with bows, you're likely to be hit 4 times. That's going to be a pretty significant knock on your hit points.

With this set-up, it makes sense for evil overlords to have orc soldiers, even to fight against high level heroes. It makes sense for a player to bring men-at-arms with him on adventures, they're actually useful.

In AD&D this started to get worn away. With lots of magic armor, dexterity bonuses and magic rings to boost AC, it soon became the case that AC 0 or better was common. Now the troops needed a natural 20 to hit, and they became less and less useful.

It was worse in 3e with ACs getting to be in the area of 30 and 40 (-20 and -30 old-speak).

In 4e, everything is chucked out the window. You are supposed to have a 50% chance to hit everything and everything you fight is supposed to have a 50% chance to hit you. Bleck.

In OD&D, if the baron ordered his soldiers to attack the party, the party actually, well, has to FIGHT them. It's a real fight. The baron might be powerful and influential because his soldiers are dangerous!

In AD&D, the baron orders his soldiers to attack, and, well, they all just die.

In 3e, the soldiers are there just to look pretty, I suppose, they are worse than useless.

[Random]

I agree.

The fighting-man can cut through normal troops with ease, but can't do so without taking some damage in the process.

[jrients]

Good analysis drskull. However, I must note that as long as you use the overbearing rules, normal soldiers can be a danger to AD&D PCs. I'm not a fan of the DMG unarmed combat rules, but they do address this issue a bit.

[Finarvyn]

Aug 31, 2008 11:37:41 GMT -6 drskull said:

In OD&D AC is basically impossible to increase. You can give the enemy a few points of penalty due to magic armor, but it's very small and manageable.

Well, actually it depends upon whether you allow the supplements or not. Once you throw in Greyhawk with the +5 armor and +5 shield, AC can get up there in a hurry.

Case in point: when you look at the Judges Guild DM screen (which was done as early as 1976 or so) you note that the combat tables allow for AC as good as -9. That was before AD&D. Heck, even the chart in Greyhawk Supplement I (on page 15) lists AC values as good as -8.

So ... while you're right that most characters would have low AC, clearly the upper limit is pretty huge from almost the beginning.

[drskull]

Where I wanted to go with the analysis is this: if you want to have a game where the "legal-military" power structure of the world has an impact and meaning, and where the PC's acquiring soldier underlings is actually useful, then by far the most important thing is to keep a careful eye on AC.

The first thing is to avoid giving players an AC bonus for Dexterity (as the LBB's do). The second thing is to try your absolute best to not give out magic plate mail. Some magical chainmail (+1 or +2) might be okay, magical leather (+1, +2 or +3) would probably be okay too. Magic shields are okay too, since once a PC is surrounded, then some of the attackers can attack rear and unshielded flanks and ignore the shield bonus.

[ffilz]

Of course per OD&D, all magic armor is plate... Though that isn't explicitly called out, you sort of have to derive that (Greyhawk helps understand this). A big help in OD&D though is that shields don't stack. Rings of Protection to add to armor class also.

A problem with not allowing AC to improve is that high level monsters become awfully deadly.

Unfortunately, the real thing that makes the "normal man" not work well in D&D is the simple fact of how the level gain works. If you want PCs to continue to fear normal men, using a system that accelerates PC power unfortunately doesn't really work.

But you certainly are right that there is a real power creep as D&D moved through later editions.

Frank

[blackbarn]

Sept 1, 2008 22:25:19 GMT -6 ffilz said:

A problem with not allowing AC to improve is that high level monsters become awfully deadly.

Is that really a problem? And what about players using ideas to overcome the handicap with strategy, tricks, etc? I kind of like the concept of a clever idea rather than brute strength and direct combat being needed to bring down the worst monsters.

[Finarvyn]

My trick is to have adventurers wander around in a city setting where they aren't allowed to wear armor. They had to stash it in their room at the inn and see the city without it. Of course, once they went back into the wilderness/dungeon they bulked up in a hurry. :-)