"A druid typically wears leather, studded leather, or hide armor, and if a druid comes across scale mail made of a material other than metal, the druid might wear it."
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Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
That is new leave it to wizard to screw up a balance. e2 it was a hard no. Druids are already good enough op sucks out the fun.
I mean, IDK how this is somehow problematic to you when they have access to Hide which has an EVEN HIGHER AC bonus.
Also, balance is overrated. This isn't a CCG. If everyone in the party is having fun, OP classes don't exist. Find a druid armor smith willing to make you armor out of stone plates. Find an exotic animal with tough skin who will grant you a higher AC (assuming you can find a tanner capable of working with the materials). If you want something, and it doesn't feel like it's going to ruin things for everyone else, talk with your DM and see if you can't go on a quest (or series of quests) to make it happen.
Final point: If you want to go full OP, a Level 1 Lizardfolk druid can have a 17 AC with standard array and gear found in the PHB and melee for 1D10 with a +5 to hit if you bring in XGtE. This is all RAW.
Final point: If you want to go full OP, a Level 1 Lizardfolk druid can have a 17 AC with standard array and gear found in the PHB and melee for 1D10 with a +5 to hit if you bring in XGtE. This is all RAW.
Or as a level 1 tortle you could have 19 AC regardless ability scores and still start with +3 WIS.
Final point: If you want to go full OP, a Level 1 Lizardfolk druid can have a 17 AC with standard array and gear found in the PHB and melee for 1D10 with a +5 to hit if you bring in XGtE. This is all RAW.
Or as a level 1 tortle you could have 19 AC regardless ability scores and still start with +3 WIS.
Will the last true Fighter please turn the lantern out as they leave.
Historically - since edition one, we never considered Studded Leather has having enough metal to bother Druids, some argument for wizards, which in 3.5 Warmage addressed.
In the game I'm in the DM had the Druid, who just got a lvl in Tempest Cleric, go thru a quest to have a NPC Druid preform a ritual to create Ironwood. Which was then turned into Plate by my Forge Cleric.
In the game I'm in the DM had the Druid, who just got a lvl in Tempest Cleric, go thru a quest to have a NPC Druid preform a ritual to create Ironwood. Which was then turned into Plate by my Forge Cleric.
This DM gets it. You wanted something that falls outside the realm of common things (iron wood plate armor) so your DM made you go on a quest in order to obtain that item. Fun and adventure was had. Sounds great.
The FAQ is clear. "Druids don’t lack the ability to wear metal armor. As long as you abide by your character’s proficiencies, you’re not going to break anything in the game system".
Druid can wear metal armor, most druids choose not to.
My problem with the FAQ is this "your DM has the final say on how far you can go and still be considered a member of the class". This is NOT something for the GM to decide, this is something for the player to decide. The player decides the choices a character makes not the GM. If a player wants to follow the tradition and go on a quest for Ironwood Plate or chitin chain or scale mail... That's the players decision. If a player decides his or her character would rather put on a chainshirt then get stabbed in the kidneys. that's the player's decision.
These are heroes bucking and making tradition and redefining tradition is often about who these people are.
My problem with the FAQ is this "your DM has the final say on how far you can go and still be considered a member of the class". This is NOT something for the GM to decide, this is something for the player to decide. The player decides the choices a character makes not the GM.
I mean, that's the point of a DM. To keep the game "on the rails" so to speak. There are things that define a class (spell access, proficiencies, skills, etc) and if you're editing RAW, then the DM is there to arbitrate between you and RAW. DMs should collaborate with players on cultures/backstory related items, but the DM always holds the trump card. A player can decide to do anything possible in the game (wear metal armor as a druid, make a tiefling PC, punch a guard in the face) and the DM acts as the narrator to how the world responds (exile from your circle, constantly being harassed by town guards, getting stabbed to death).
This is just the way it has to be for the social contract of the game to work. The DM needs to trust the PCs are being reasonable and not trying to break the game, and the PCs need to trust that the DM is acting reasonably and not trying to abuse the players and hinder their fun.
#slipperySlope but if I decide it "makes sense" for my druid to have access to Lightning bolt and Fireball because he's an elemental druid and those spells make sense to him, the DM gets final say on whether that's going to ruin his game. Some DMs would agree, others would feel that it's not the druid's place and makes them OP. As always, do whatever works in your group. I know that as a PC if I was playing with someone who just edited out the things he didn't like about his class, I wouldn't want to play with that guy for very long. Munchkins ain't fun.
HomeBrew is obviously Homebrew and everything is up for grabs. If a Druid wants to have access to Lightning Bolt, they have to play a Circle of the Land: Mountain. That's RAW.
In RAW nothing stops a Druid from wearing metal armor. The don't lose their powers, they can still cast spells. It could/would be perfectly reasonable for other Druids to be upset that the Player's character, if they follow the social taboo and the PC doesn't. This is akin to punching an NPC as you pointed out and them being upset.
The designers even said that there is nothing that will break the balance of the game if a Druid is to wear metal armor. So it's not a question of Munchkin or being OP.
HomeBrew is obviously Homebrew and everything is up for grabs. If a Druid wants to have access to Lightning Bolt, they have to play a Circle of the Land: Mountain. That's RAW.
In RAW nothing stops a Druid from wearing metal armor. The don't lose their powers, they can still cast spells. It could/would be perfectly reasonable for other Druids to be upset that the Player's character, if they follow the social taboo and the PC doesn't. This is akin to punching an NPC as you pointed out and them being upset.
The designers even said that there is nothing that will break the balance of the game if a Druid is to wear metal armor. So it's not a question of Munchkin or being OP.
I think we're on basically the same page, I was more going after your point of "the DM doesn't get to decide how his world works". With anything the rules are interpreted at the table. "If it works for you, it works" is basically what every designer has said about anything. I was was just pointing out that if a player wants something, and a DM feels it doesn't work in their world, then the DM always wins. In a perfect world, groups all get along well and understand each other's points of view and play a game to have fun together, but the DM is there to serve as arbiter/central storyteller.
Going back to the metal armor: a player could decide they want the armor and wear it. If a player comes to the table and says "My group of druids don't do this thing that the book generally states druids do" and then DM was never told about this prior feels that the player is just trying to power game, he's 100% in his rights to say "there are no druidic circles in my world that behave this way, so no" or coming up with some mechanical way of pushing the player towards a preferred behavior ("you suffer a 25% chance of not regaining spell slots while you dishonor your circle by wearing metal armor"
I don't have a problem with players wanting things that they don't normally have access to, and the DM's allowing them to earn those things. I don't have a problem with groups deciding as a whole that "this rule/ability is stupid, let's do something better". I don't have a problem with Druids wearing metal/non-animal-based armor. I have a problem with, and would not play with, players who feel that they get to decide how the shared world works without input from others in the group, because that's how Munchkins are born. Everything else in your post I'm 100% behind.
I´ve been wondering the same. I was thinking maybe with Stoneshape spell you could create better medium armor. I´m thinking on a stone breastplate for my druid.
Based on the lack of real world stone armor, I doubt it's viable. Mythbusters explored the plausibility of paper armor and it seems to provide good protection against slashing and piercing damage but had durability issues and can't get wet. Personally I'd convince the DM to use the magic item creation rules in Xanathar's Guide to Everything and work towards Dragon Scale Mail.
If only Glassteel was still a thing, glassteel armor would be a perfect fit.
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Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
I'm going to disagree with InquisitiveCoder. We just earlier agreed that magical wood would make acceptable "armor" as would dragon scales and the chitan of giant insects. We're talking about "realism" in a game with magic!
He points out there is no use of stone in armor in ancient warfare. I would agrue a lot of this comes from the lack of workability. Metal is both ductile and malleable making it easy to work and easy to replair. Stone is niether of these things. Stone armor would be impossible to repair and can only be created with subtractive manufactured. Making it unusable in a pre-modern society. Magic completely changes this equation with Shape Stone, Fabricate, and Mending. There are magical manufactoring methods which are beyond what we have today.
In the modern day we don't use metal for armor, we use ceramics because they are much harder at a lower weight. For example Boron Carbide is an extermely hard boron-cardon ceramic and is used for tank armor and bulletproof vets. Only beaten out by boron nitride and diamond for hardness. If you look at the Moh's mineral hardness scale granite is a 6, quartz is a 7 (lots of high end granite is heavy in quartz), topaz and corundum (rudy) are 8 and 9 respectively, while diamond is a 10.
If we take a loof at weight: 0.283 lbs: cubic inch of steel 0.283 lbs: cubic inch of iron 0.095 lbs: cubic inch of quartz 0.108 lbs: cubic inch of basalt 0.126 lbs: cubic inch of diamond
You can see that ceramic and crystline materials are vastly lighter then metallics, but they can't be worked and shaped easily. Also remember 80% of diamonds mined are unusable as gemstone, but they are still diamonds. So it's possible to create diamond weapons and armor with magic. Because gems are stone.
Side Note: The 1st Emperor of China was buried with a suit of stone armor, but it was likely cerimonial, so while stone armor could have existed it was unlikely to be manufactured for war.
I'm going to disagree with InquisitiveCoder. We just earlier agreed that magical wood would make acceptable "armor" as would dragon scales and the chitan of giant insects. We're talking about "realism" in a game with magic!
A magic item is one thing. Mundane items should still respect the laws of physics insofar as they don't get in the way of playing the game.
Trying to get around a limitation built into the class with homebrew non-magical armor is too much wanting to have your cake and eat it too for my tastes. Kinda like a rogue asking for a homebrew two-handed finesse weapon so they can sneak attack with it. Both classes were designed with the official list of equipment in mind.
If you really want to get into the stone armor thing, I doubt it'd work even if you could magically fabricate it. Part of what makes metal armor useful is that it deforms. Stone/ceramic/crystalline materials might be hard to scratch and support great loads, but they shatter with impacts.
But they can:
http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/rules-answers-march-2016
"A druid typically wears leather, studded leather, or hide armor, and if a druid comes across scale mail made of a material other than metal, the druid might wear it."
Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
Tasha
That is new leave it to wizard to screw up a balance. e2 it was a hard no. Druids are already good enough op sucks out the fun.
+1 AC isn't a big deal.
Also, balance is overrated. This isn't a CCG. If everyone in the party is having fun, OP classes don't exist. Find a druid armor smith willing to make you armor out of stone plates. Find an exotic animal with tough skin who will grant you a higher AC (assuming you can find a tanner capable of working with the materials). If you want something, and it doesn't feel like it's going to ruin things for everyone else, talk with your DM and see if you can't go on a quest (or series of quests) to make it happen.
Final point: If you want to go full OP, a Level 1 Lizardfolk druid can have a 17 AC with standard array and gear found in the PHB and melee for 1D10 with a +5 to hit if you bring in XGtE. This is all RAW.
Roleplaying since Runequest.
Historically - since edition one, we never considered Studded Leather has having enough metal to bother Druids, some argument for wizards, which in 3.5 Warmage addressed.
"I...Drank...WHAT?!" - Socrates
In the game I'm in the DM had the Druid, who just got a lvl in Tempest Cleric, go thru a quest to have a NPC Druid preform a ritual to create Ironwood. Which was then turned into Plate by my Forge Cleric.
Here is my thing on it.
The FAQ is clear. "Druids don’t lack the ability to wear metal armor. As long as you abide by your character’s proficiencies, you’re not going to break anything in the game system".
Druid can wear metal armor, most druids choose not to.
My problem with the FAQ is this "your DM has the final say on how far you can go and still be considered a member of the class".
This is NOT something for the GM to decide, this is something for the player to decide. The player decides the choices a character makes not the GM.
If a player wants to follow the tradition and go on a quest for Ironwood Plate or chitin chain or scale mail... That's the players decision.
If a player decides his or her character would rather put on a chainshirt then get stabbed in the kidneys. that's the player's decision.
These are heroes bucking and making tradition and redefining tradition is often about who these people are.
#slipperySlope but if I decide it "makes sense" for my druid to have access to Lightning bolt and Fireball because he's an elemental druid and those spells make sense to him, the DM gets final say on whether that's going to ruin his game. Some DMs would agree, others would feel that it's not the druid's place and makes them OP. As always, do whatever works in your group. I know that as a PC if I was playing with someone who just edited out the things he didn't like about his class, I wouldn't want to play with that guy for very long. Munchkins ain't fun.
HomeBrew is obviously Homebrew and everything is up for grabs.
If a Druid wants to have access to Lightning Bolt, they have to play a Circle of the Land: Mountain. That's RAW.
In RAW nothing stops a Druid from wearing metal armor. The don't lose their powers, they can still cast spells.
It could/would be perfectly reasonable for other Druids to be upset that the Player's character, if they follow the social taboo and the PC doesn't. This is akin to punching an NPC as you pointed out and them being upset.
The designers even said that there is nothing that will break the balance of the game if a Druid is to wear metal armor. So it's not a question of Munchkin or being OP.
I don't have a problem with players wanting things that they don't normally have access to, and the DM's allowing them to earn those things. I don't have a problem with groups deciding as a whole that "this rule/ability is stupid, let's do something better". I don't have a problem with Druids wearing metal/non-animal-based armor. I have a problem with, and would not play with, players who feel that they get to decide how the shared world works without input from others in the group, because that's how Munchkins are born. Everything else in your post I'm 100% behind.
I´ve been wondering the same. I was thinking maybe with Stoneshape spell you could create better medium armor. I´m thinking on a stone breastplate for my druid.
It's an interesting idea. The spell states "The object you create can have up to two hinges and a latch, but finer mechanical detail isn't possible."
That means each piece will take a casting. Time consuming, but crafting isn't exactly quick.
Based on the lack of real world stone armor, I doubt it's viable. Mythbusters explored the plausibility of paper armor and it seems to provide good protection against slashing and piercing damage but had durability issues and can't get wet. Personally I'd convince the DM to use the magic item creation rules in Xanathar's Guide to Everything and work towards Dragon Scale Mail.
If only Glassteel was still a thing, glassteel armor would be a perfect fit.
Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
Tasha
Wildshape and Shapechange are spells that can give you a higher AC, as well as Dragon scale.
Why do rogues wear leather armor? Because it's made of hide.
I'm going to disagree with InquisitiveCoder.
We just earlier agreed that magical wood would make acceptable "armor" as would dragon scales and the chitan of giant insects. We're talking about "realism" in a game with magic!
He points out there is no use of stone in armor in ancient warfare.
I would agrue a lot of this comes from the lack of workability. Metal is both ductile and malleable making it easy to work and easy to replair. Stone is niether of these things. Stone armor would be impossible to repair and can only be created with subtractive manufactured. Making it unusable in a pre-modern society. Magic completely changes this equation with Shape Stone, Fabricate, and Mending. There are magical manufactoring methods which are beyond what we have today.
In the modern day we don't use metal for armor, we use ceramics because they are much harder at a lower weight. For example Boron Carbide is an extermely hard boron-cardon ceramic and is used for tank armor and bulletproof vets. Only beaten out by boron nitride and diamond for hardness.
If you look at the Moh's mineral hardness scale granite is a 6, quartz is a 7 (lots of high end granite is heavy in quartz), topaz and corundum (rudy) are 8 and 9 respectively, while diamond is a 10.
If we take a loof at weight:
0.283 lbs: cubic inch of steel
0.283 lbs: cubic inch of iron
0.095 lbs: cubic inch of quartz
0.108 lbs: cubic inch of basalt
0.126 lbs: cubic inch of diamond
You can see that ceramic and crystline materials are vastly lighter then metallics, but they can't be worked and shaped easily. Also remember 80% of diamonds mined are unusable as gemstone, but they are still diamonds. So it's possible to create diamond weapons and armor with magic. Because gems are stone.
Side Note: The 1st Emperor of China was buried with a suit of stone armor, but it was likely cerimonial, so while stone armor could have existed it was unlikely to be manufactured for war.
A magic item is one thing. Mundane items should still respect the laws of physics insofar as they don't get in the way of playing the game.
Trying to get around a limitation built into the class with homebrew non-magical armor is too much wanting to have your cake and eat it too for my tastes. Kinda like a rogue asking for a homebrew two-handed finesse weapon so they can sneak attack with it. Both classes were designed with the official list of equipment in mind.
If you really want to get into the stone armor thing, I doubt it'd work even if you could magically fabricate it. Part of what makes metal armor useful is that it deforms. Stone/ceramic/crystalline materials might be hard to scratch and support great loads, but they shatter with impacts.