The devs created an situation which punishes Monks and boosts Mages. I think ONE or the other option needs to be settled on: Either its NOT armor, in which case Bladesong, Unarmored Defense, etc work. Or It IS armor and no such features work. I am inclined to allow the stacking. Its just another example of the devs not being consistent for no good reason.
Mage armor works with the new Bladesong in the UA. Mage armor gives an AC calculation and Bladesong adds a bonus of your INT modifier just like a ring of protection would. No conflicts here. Mage armor doesn’t work with unarmored defense because both are AC calculations. But a monk/Bladesinger can add INT to the monks unarmored defense.
Unless I took the rolling method, and got extremely lucky. Rolling 4 (15s) or higher. The Intelligence mod would be detrimental or no gain. I would need an artificer player to create a magic item that would benefit Intell ( ie like gauntlet of ogre = str) to make this work
The devs created an situation which punishes Monks and boosts Mages. I think ONE or the other option needs to be settled on: Either its NOT armor, in which case Bladesong, Unarmored Defense, etc work. Or It IS armor and no such features work. I am inclined to allow the stacking. Its just another example of the devs not being consistent for no good reason.
Ok you are missing the central point. They do both "work" but neither is a bonus to AC. Mage Armor does not give you a +3 bonus to AC and unarmored defense does not let you add your Wisdom to AC. Both of these set your AC to a certain value and from there any bonuses are added. Using either of these gives you an entirely different base AC.
Ahen you cast Mage Armor and your AC is 13+ Dex, it is not your old AC +3, and it is not 10+3+dex. If you are using Unarmored Defense your AC is 10+dex+wisdom, again it is not your old AC plus your Wisdom score. Either of these provide an entirely new method to calculate AC and an entirely new base AC.
So yes, your Monk can cast mage armor, but that does not give you a +3 bonus to your Unarmored Defense AC, because that is not what mage armor does. If your Wisdom is 15 or less it will result in a better AC and Unarmored Defense will be meaningless. If your Wisdom is 16 or more Mage Armor is meaningless.
This is fundamentally different from other things like Haste, Shield of Faith or the Shield spell. If your Monk casts these, they DO add a bonus to Unarmored Defense AC because unlike Mage Armor these are bonuses to your AC. Bladesong from the UA also adds a bonus to Unarmored Defense because it is a bonus. All of these also add a bonus to Mage Armor.
It makes no sense to "stack" Unarmored Defense and Mage Armor just like it makes no sense to "stack" Chainmail I put on over my Leather Armor. They are two different base AC values.
The devs created an situation which punishes Monks and boosts Mages. I think ONE or the other option needs to be settled on: Either its NOT armor, in which case Bladesong, Unarmored Defense, etc work. Or It IS armor and no such features work. I am inclined to allow the stacking. Its just another example of the devs not being consistent for no good reason.
Mage armor works with the new Bladesong in the UA. Mage armor gives an AC calculation and Bladesong adds a bonus of your INT modifier just like a ring of protection would. No conflicts here. Mage armor doesn’t work with unarmored defense because both are AC calculations. But a monk/Bladesinger can add INT to the monks unarmored defense.
Unless I took the rolling method, and got extremely lucky. Rolling 4 (15s) or higher. The Intelligence mod would be detrimental or no gain. I would need an artificer player to create a magic item that would benefit Intell ( ie like gauntlet of ogre = str) to make this work
I don't agree with that. On point buy you can start with a 14 Intelligence and 16s in Dexterity and Wisdom pretty easily. You can technically start with 16s in all three if you dump Constitution, Strength and Charisma. That is pretty playable too if you get the tough feat and start as a Wizard.
The devs created an situation which punishes Monks and boosts Mages. I think ONE or the other option needs to be settled on: Either its NOT armor, in which case Bladesong, Unarmored Defense, etc work. Or It IS armor and no such features work. I am inclined to allow the stacking. Its just another example of the devs not being consistent for no good reason.
Mage armor works with the new Bladesong in the UA. Mage armor gives an AC calculation and Bladesong adds a bonus of your INT modifier just like a ring of protection would. No conflicts here. Mage armor doesn’t work with unarmored defense because both are AC calculations. But a monk/Bladesinger can add INT to the monks unarmored defense.
Unless I took the rolling method, and got extremely lucky. Rolling 4 (15s) or higher. The Intelligence mod would be detrimental or no gain. I would need an artificer player to create a magic item that would benefit Intell ( ie like gauntlet of ogre = str) to make this work
I don't agree with that. On point buy you can start with a 14 Intelligence and 16s in Dexterity and Wisdom pretty easily. You can technically start with 16s in all three if you dump Constitution, Strength and Charisma. That is pretty playable too if you get the tough feat and start as a Wizard.
W didn’t say it couldn’t be done,. I said what I would need to do to make it work personally. And you could take Feat mage initiative, boost up Wis, with out MC. As an alternative route to obtain the same goal.
Sounds like rules lawyers ignoring the basic premise that signifying a magical spell as un-stackable because we said it a certain way is stupid. It costs a spell slot per instance, classes can make differing use levels of the same resource unfairly. There is no wiggle room that there is an inconsistency based on flawed logic. If it doesn’t stack, change the description and move on so everyone has a solid, equitable use of the same resource.
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Unless I took the rolling method, and got extremely lucky. Rolling 4 (15s) or higher. The Intelligence mod would be detrimental or no gain. I would need an artificer player to create a magic item that would benefit Intell ( ie like gauntlet of ogre = str) to make this work
Ok you are missing the central point. They do both "work" but neither is a bonus to AC. Mage Armor does not give you a +3 bonus to AC and unarmored defense does not let you add your Wisdom to AC. Both of these set your AC to a certain value and from there any bonuses are added. Using either of these gives you an entirely different base AC.
Ahen you cast Mage Armor and your AC is 13+ Dex, it is not your old AC +3, and it is not 10+3+dex. If you are using Unarmored Defense your AC is 10+dex+wisdom, again it is not your old AC plus your Wisdom score. Either of these provide an entirely new method to calculate AC and an entirely new base AC.
So yes, your Monk can cast mage armor, but that does not give you a +3 bonus to your Unarmored Defense AC, because that is not what mage armor does. If your Wisdom is 15 or less it will result in a better AC and Unarmored Defense will be meaningless. If your Wisdom is 16 or more Mage Armor is meaningless.
This is fundamentally different from other things like Haste, Shield of Faith or the Shield spell. If your Monk casts these, they DO add a bonus to Unarmored Defense AC because unlike Mage Armor these are bonuses to your AC. Bladesong from the UA also adds a bonus to Unarmored Defense because it is a bonus. All of these also add a bonus to Mage Armor.
It makes no sense to "stack" Unarmored Defense and Mage Armor just like it makes no sense to "stack" Chainmail I put on over my Leather Armor. They are two different base AC values.
I don't agree with that. On point buy you can start with a 14 Intelligence and 16s in Dexterity and Wisdom pretty easily. You can technically start with 16s in all three if you dump Constitution, Strength and Charisma. That is pretty playable too if you get the tough feat and start as a Wizard.
W didn’t say it couldn’t be done,. I said what I would need to do to make it work personally. And you could take Feat mage initiative, boost up Wis, with out MC. As an alternative route to obtain the same goal.
No. Never has.
Oh brother. Just realized I already answer this question and the thread was resurrected. 🙄
Hey, at least you agreed with yourself.
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Sounds like rules lawyers ignoring the basic premise that signifying a magical spell as un-stackable because we said it a certain way is stupid. It costs a spell slot per instance, classes can make differing use levels of the same resource unfairly. There is no wiggle room that there is an inconsistency based on flawed logic. If it doesn’t stack, change the description and move on so everyone has a solid, equitable use of the same resource.