Addressing Medium and Light Armor utility

[Dark_Vengeance]

A conversation about the white dragonscale robes in General Discussion got me to thinking again about something that's been bugging me for a while now.

My halfling Rogue recently hit level 9, and now has exceeded the Max Dex bonus on his +5 Mithral Chain Shirt. He has a +5 Studded Leather and +5 Leather in the bank, but loses AC if he equips either of those as alternatives to the MCS. Once your DEX hits 24 (for us lowly non-dwarves), leather and studded leathers become obsolete in favor of mithral armors.

As he continues to level and acquire treasure, he will get access to better +DEX items, better +Armor items, DEX enhancements, DEX tomes, and additional stat points. By my math, a race with a natural +2 to DEX can start with as much as 20, and increase to about 36-38 by level 14. That's a modifier of +13 or +14, but since 38 would require finding a race restricted +7 DEX item and a +3 DEX tome, let's call it 36. That's still +13 to AC...the equivalent of a 10 DEX human equipping +5 fullplate.

Now by 14, he can also equip +7 race-restricted armored bracers, and can use a +5 mithral heavy shield of stability, and a protection +5 item. With all of the other items I can tack on, he can easily reach into the 40s on his AC.

Unless he wears armor. Someone mind explaining that one to me?

Now I realize this is a PnP staple, been around for quite some time. You don't get your full dex bonus in plate, because it's bulky. Fine. Put a high-dex dwarven fighter with the right enhancements into some MFP, and he can reduce that to the equivalent of padded armor. Silly for a race of stout miners with stubby legs, but whatever.

Since non-metal armors don't get any kind of equivalent to mithral, and can't deliver the AC of metal armors, they are worthless. Other than roleplaying reasons (and we don't even have druids yet), why would someone use hide armor over say mithral chainmail?

And moreover, why are armors like padded considered so restrictive? Why don't dex-based classes like rangers and rogues and bards have equivalent enhancements for more fluid movement in light armors (especially non-metal ones)?? For that matter, why don't classes like barbarians have similar enhancements for medium armors (especially hide)?

And how exactly is it that bulky flowing ankle-length wizard robes have no max dex bonus? Watch a robe-clad person sneak sometime and tell me that a real person wouldn't be stepping on those robes, or have other people stepping on them. Certainly there is no way that padded armor is so much more restrictive than robes to impose a penalty greater than that of the difference between leather and full plate (and I say greater because as the level cap increases the gap between max dex 8 and unlimited max dex will widen).

Now I'm not saying to nerf robes with a max dex bonus (although maybe I should), but can you at least toss a bone to us light and medium armor proficient classes that currently have to choose between gimping our AC or wearing dresses?

Bring the noise.
Cheers............

[KristovK]

Get used to wearing dresses would be my suggestion, since we don't have plain clothing you can wear like in PnP that has no max dex bonus on it.

[Laith]

with monks, we'll hopefully get some "plain clothing"

padded armor though is just that: ARMOR. 10lbs of thick, juicy, protective, slightly-movement-restricting goodness.

[Dark_Vengeance]

with monks, we'll hopefully get some "plain clothing"

padded armor though is just that: ARMOR. 10lbs of thick, juicy, protective, slightly-movement-restricting goodness.

Compare full plate to leather. Is the difference between padded armor and plain clothing that great?

It shouldn't be. Padded armor is only 2 AC, and would be about the equivalent of wearing a heavy coat.

Bring the noise.
Cheers............

[Laith]

Compare full plate to leather. Is the difference between padded armor and plain clothing that great?

It shouldn't be. Padded armor is only 2 AC, and would be about the equivalent of wearing a heavy coat.

Bring the noise.
Cheers............

it's not a heavy coat. it may be the same weight, but it's distributed completely differently, of a different material, and with special chemical treating that limits flexability (but improves durability).

if your heavy coat has a 10% potential to deflect any lethal blow though, the comparison holds.

[Dark_Vengeance]

it's not a heavy coat. it may be the same weight, but it's distributed completely differently, of a different material, and with special chemical treating that limits flexability (but improves durability).

if your heavy coat has a 10% potential to deflect any lethal blow though, the comparison holds.

Yeah, it's distributed differently...it's distributed evenly across the body. That's why it's supposed to be easier to fight in padded armor compared to a heavy coat.

Regardless, the difference between padded armor and robes should not be greater than the difference between leather and full plate. Which it currently is.

And we can talk about removing high stat items and movement rates all day. That probably won't happen. My guess is that we will get one of the following, if anything:

1) Some type of benefit for light-armor proficient and medium armor proficient classes to use those respective armors. Some examples:

a) Perhaps allowing for class specific enhancements to get the equivalent of Armor Mastery on armors typical of their class.

or

b) Perhaps allow +Armor items to stack 100% with non-metal armors, +50% (rounded down) with light metal armors, and +33% (rounded down) with medium armors. These items would still not stack with heavy armors.

or

c) Adjusting the Max Dex bonuses upwards on light and medium armors to make them more appealing.

2) A max dex bonus on robes (basically nerfing robes). A max of +10 would seem likely, because it is in perfect line with the AC-to-MaxDex relationship found on other armors.

3) Both.

I'm just trying to come up with something workable that can get us something from #1, and not #2 or #3.

Bring the noise.
Cheers.............

[Teufel_Hunden]

Wholeheartedly. I even started a post in the Development (here, i guess) about that. http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=111736

even named it for them.

[Mercules]

Now I'm not saying to nerf robes with a max dex bonus (although maybe I should), but can you at least toss a bone to us light and medium armor proficient classes that currently have to choose between gimping our AC or wearing dresses?

I have a solution... Strip all the +stat items, +stat enhancments, and other Monty-Haul style equipment and enhancements from the game and suddenly that +4-+5 Studded Leather is looking pretty good.

This is the thing some of us have been talking about when mentioning gear and enhancements being over powered. D&D was designed around a certain range of numbers. DDO gave stacking boosts to those numbers that didn't take into account the less obvious limits on them. In PnP you don't often see a Dex over 24, at least not 24/7 at 14th level. You might see someone buff up to a Dex of 28-30, but normally it stays below 26 Dex, +8 Dex bonus to armor and that means Padded is still usable.

Turbine didn't take that into account when they decided people want to see BIG numbers.

[Shamguard]

What the game needs is to either slow down the power level of items, or bring in plain clothing that can be enchanted, both are often used in PnP to resolve the armor issue.

[Gimpster]

Now I realize this is a PnP staple, been around for quite some time. You don't get your full dex bonus in plate, because it's bulky. Fine.

The numbers are fundamentally off from PnP because of enhancements. The racial and class enhancements give you a total of +5 dex above what a PnP character could get. Additionally, the lower need for intelligence to get skillpoints lets you pour even more of your ability points into physical scores.

Another factor is that in PnP, sometimes a character would benefit from wearing light armor even without enough dex to fill it out. The +50% running speed boost can be well worth some lost AC. But in DDO, no armor type has a speed benefit over another.

[Mercules]

Another factor is that in PnP, sometimes a character would benefit from wearing light armor even without enough dex to fill it out. The +50% running speed boost can be well worth some lost AC. But in DDO, no armor type has a speed benefit over another.

Another good point. I've seen characters choose Medium armor over Heavy in PnP because while combat movement among them is the same, running in Heavy only gives you a x3, not a x4. Always fun when the Orc horde can catch up to you.

[EinarMal]

Jeez this is too easy instead of mithral "cloth" type armors need the kevlar modifier.

Problem solved....

[skraus1]

There are 3 robes that don't look like dresses and give you armor bonuses ranging from 4-6. Without any buffs whatso ever, in a robe, my ranger can pull off a 45, 50 with his own bark.