I mean realisisticly you cant swim with armor on in real life I work out and own a set of full body metal chainmail, that thing makes walking strenuous and i have crossed a river in it before and just walking tru water is very hard, i thought i was going to fall over and drown(we were walking to my friend's cabin and the normal way in had collapsed over the summer), the water over the river was moving slowly and at the lowest point it was 5 feet deep(im a tad over 6ft) and i decided it would be a good idea to cross(i was 16 at the time)
but yeah, Chainmail in walkable water is hard, Plate mail is imposable, also fun fact, chain mail only cost like 400-600$ for a decent set(DnD and TTRPGs have ruined my finances)
Realistically, a person in a D&D world who wears armor is going to be considerably more used to moving about and performing strenuous physical activity than the average person in the modern world.
Fair point, However i do work out and actively swim, im 6ft 2 and weigh 200 ish pounds, i can Calf Raise 680 pounds max(but only once, i rep about 200)
This conversation has been going on for some time and i am now at home so im gonna hop in a pool with my chain mail to see if i can swim with it Reply to me in like a hour if you want to know the results
I mean realisisticly you cant swim with armor on in real life I work out and own a set of full body metal chainmail, that thing makes walking strenuous and i have crossed a river in it before and just walking tru water is very hard, i thought i was going to fall over and drown(we were walking to my friend's cabin and the normal way in had collapsed over the summer), the water over the river was moving slowly and at the lowest point it was 5 feet deep(im a tad over 6ft) and i decided it would be a good idea to cross(i was 16 at the time)
but yeah, Chainmail in walkable water is hard, Plate mail is imposable, also fun fact, chain mail only cost like 400-600$ for a decent set(DnD and TTRPGs have ruined my finances)
Realistically, a person in a D&D world who wears armor is going to be considerably more used to moving about and performing strenuous physical activity than the average person in the modern world.
Fair point, However i do work out and actively swim, im 6ft 2 and weigh 200 ish pounds, i can Calf Raise 680 pounds max(but only once, i rep about 200)
This conversation has been going on for some time and i am now at home so im gonna hop in a pool with my chain mail to see if i can swim with it Reply to me in like a hour if you want to know the results
Everybody would want an answer regardless. Thank you for putting your mail at risk.
I've only ever done the jeans and jacket swim.
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"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
The standard solution to swimming with a dense load is to have positive buoyancy from somewhere. Steel has a negative buoyancy of about 7/8 of its weight, so that's 17.5 lb for a chain shirt, 48 lb for a full suit. An air-filled container has a buoyancy of about 8.5 lb per gallon or 62 lb per cubic foot.
The other problem, unless you have rustproof armor (magic or modern stainless/alloy) is that you have to carefully clean and dry the armor immediately after immersion, or soft armors will rot, metal armors will rust. This goes double if you're swimming in salt or chlorinated water.
In general, it should probably be assumed that the PCs are doing all the necessary parts of caring for armor after water immersion in the same way that it's typically assumed that they're doing all the other forms of upkeep on their gear like cleaning their weapons and sharpening blades even if the players don't explicitly say so.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
In general, it should probably be assumed that the PCs are doing all the necessary parts of caring for armor after water immersion in the same way that it's typically assumed that they're doing all the other forms of upkeep on their gear like cleaning their weapons and sharpening blades even if the players don't explicitly say so.
Yes, but it's in the category of "congratulations, you turned a ten minute task into a six hour task".
If you're basing it solely on a buoyancy calculation though, there are plenty of characters in medium or even light armor who would still hit negative buoyancy due to the swords/axes belted to their hip, the crossbow and quiver on their back, the metal shield strapped to their arm, their backpack/pouch full of gold coins etc. And we haven't even gotten to how the "denser" fantasy races like dwarves or warforged or firbolgs or goliaths would respond to this sort of thing.
And then you've got the other side of this equation, where characters like Legolas are running on top of waist-deep snow while wearing a chain shirt, longbow, quiver, and a backpack.
In short, I think a desire for "realism" is not the best way to approach this question, and even if you value that more highly than I do for some reason, you're likely to still get it wrong if all you care about is armor type.
I mean realisisticly you cant swim with armor on in real life I work out and own a set of full body metal chainmail, that thing makes walking strenuous and i have crossed a river in it before and just walking tru water is very hard, i thought i was going to fall over and drown(we were walking to my friend's cabin and the normal way in had collapsed over the summer), the water over the river was moving slowly and at the lowest point it was 5 feet deep(im a tad over 6ft) and i decided it would be a good idea to cross(i was 16 at the time)
but yeah, Chainmail in walkable water is hard, Plate mail is imposable, also fun fact, chain mail only cost like 400-600$ for a decent set(DnD and TTRPGs have ruined my finances)
Realistically, a person in a D&D world who wears armor is going to be considerably more used to moving about and performing strenuous physical activity than the average person in the modern world.
Fair point, However i do work out and actively swim, im 6ft 2 and weigh 200 ish pounds, i can Calf Raise 680 pounds max(but only once, i rep about 200)
This conversation has been going on for some time and i am now at home so im gonna hop in a pool with my chain mail to see if i can swim with it Reply to me in like a hour if you want to know the results
Quite frankly more realistic does not exactly mean perfectly realistic,
And swim should be its own skill. Lumping it in with athletics leads me to think that the same skill could be used for high wire walking or cliff diving or deep sea diving. I have seen a lot of athletic people who could not do any of those activities.
Quite frankly more realistic does not exactly mean perfectly realistic,
And swim should be its own skill. Lumping it in with athletics leads me to think that the same skill could be used for high wire walking or cliff diving or deep sea diving. I have seen a lot of athletic people who could not do any of those activities.
Skill checks are somewhat oversimplified in 5e, but at least one of those would be Acrobatics, not Athletics.
If you're basing it solely on a buoyancy calculation though, there are plenty of characters in medium or even light armor who would still hit negative buoyancy due to the swords/axes belted to their hip, the crossbow and quiver on their back, the metal shield strapped to their arm, their backpack/pouch full of gold coins etc.
Oh, absolutely. The realistic answer is "if you're crossing a river or other deep water, strip down to nothing but light clothing, put all your possessions in a pack and portage them across" because almost everything an adventurer carries would be (a) extremely inconvenient in water, and (b) not very happy about being soaked. However, if you want heroic adventure... throw realism out the window.
The point is that the people unbothered by those things being consolidated under Athletics and Acrobatics, and thus don't see the need for a dedicated Swim skill in 5e, outnumber those who do.
And swim should be its own skill. Lumping it in with athletics leads me to think that the same skill could be used for high wire walking or cliff diving or deep sea diving. I have seen a lot of athletic people who could not do any of those activities.
There are several skills that I think should be put in the game before I'd want before getting Swimming as a separate skill - for example, the ability to craft, or to recall recent events (which is not the same as History).
While I can see why it'd be useful in this context to have swimming skill in this specific situation...all skills can be subdivided into new ones in specific situations. The game couldn't handle the number of skills exploding.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The ability to recall things would be a straight INT check, and crafting is a long-term activity and thus best not rolled for in exchange for the time investment.
Also, swim speed covers the mechanic of being especially good at swimming.
Quite frankly more realistic does not exactly mean perfectly realistic,
And swim should be its own skill. Lumping it in with athletics leads me to think that the same skill could be used for high wire walking or cliff diving or deep sea diving. I have seen a lot of athletic people who could not do any of those activities.
I think those fall under Acrobatics.
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"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
The ability to recall things would be a straight INT check,
Only because no skills apply and that's the only place that it could fit - except maybe History, which doesn't jive well either. Intelligent people are forgetful quite often. If there were a skill associated with it, it wouldn't be questioned.
and crafting is a long-term activity and thus best not rolled for in exchange for the time investment.
Crafting is a skill based activity, hence why WotC writers use a skill check in adventures when they want you to craft something.
Also, swim speed covers the mechanic of being especially good at swimming.
It covers how fast you can swim in an encounter. Not having a swimming speed doesn't mean that you can't overcome a water based obstacle or, more to the point, cover a scenario where the DM wants a probabilistic solution.
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If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Having a swim speed means you have a physiological, technical, or metaphysical means of propelling yourself through a liquid medium that most humanoids don't. That means can be an anatomical construct of your species like fins, special training of some kind (e.g. a class feature or feat) or a mystical affinity for the medium itself - which can also come from your species/class/subclass, or from a spell or item.
If you're basing it solely on a buoyancy calculation though, there are plenty of characters in medium or even light armor who would still hit negative buoyancy due to the swords/axes belted to their hip, the crossbow and quiver on their back, the metal shield strapped to their arm, their backpack/pouch full of gold coins etc.
Oh, absolutely. The realistic answer is "if you're crossing a river or other deep water, strip down to nothing but light clothing, put all your possessions in a pack and portage them across" because almost everything an adventurer carries would be (a) extremely inconvenient in water, and (b) not very happy about being soaked. However, if you want heroic adventure... throw realism out the window.
Exactly right; either you claim to care about "realism" and still bungle it by only discriminating against plate-wearers, or you actually apply "realism" correctly but the game becomes a huge PITA simulator as a result. It's a lose-lose situation, so you might as well chuck it out the window and go for Rule of Cool/Fun instead.
I see those in the phb but I also know realistically me wearing 65lbs of armor would sink me to the bottom of any natural body of water. I know the game is fantasy based but they do put restrictions in the game that make it more realistic, strength limits for armor, half speed on difficult terrain, low light restriction. That's why I figure they would have a swimming challenge for those in armor.
This is completely wrong; as someone who is a master diver; assuming your armor was overlain a quilted coat (very common); 65lbs of armor would barely be enough to sink you at all. At worst you'd be mildly inconvenienced.
In Scuba; a 7mm wetsuit (quilted coat but only 7mm thick) would require approximately ~30lbs to keep you neutrally buoyant. This can vary a bit but that's a rule of thumb.
When I was a firefighter; nothing could sink you. And those were literal quilted coats for overcoat and bunker pants.
It's simply a layman's mistake not to account for the displaced water in the "weighted equipment" you're wearing. 65lbs of armor on a thick overcoat might be displacing 50lbs or more.
I couldn't find a video that I think accurately represents attempting to swim in armor because today's "LARPs" don't seem to understand the concept of quilted armor. They seem to wear tunics underneath their armor and that simply isn't historically accurate.
But I did find an interest video to show how much misconception there is about acrobatics there is with armor. For balance reasons; to give "rogues" usefulness, plate-wearing fighters aren't the Dexterity character.
But in conclusion; it's important to understand that with quilted armor underneath your usual plate or chainmail you'd probably displace far more water than your weight and therefore be positively buoyant. Or at worse; not very negatively buoyant.
Here you can see at least a fully chainmailed scuba diver wearing approximately 10-20lbs in weights to keep themselves neutrally buoyant. I can't tell from just looking at them if the weights are 2.5lbs, 3lbs or 5lbs. But I'm leaning toward 5lbs. But for the sake of "conservatism" I'll be willing to go as low as 2.5lbs. 2 on one side means 2 on the other; so at least 10 additional lbs; in addition to their gear, to be neutrally buoyant. That means their BCD itself is empty of air.
I wouldn't be surprised if their BCD contains an emergency set of weights that can be easily dumped. If so; it'd likely be ~10lbs.
That shows you how "difficult" it is to submerge someone in armor.
I mean realisisticly you cant swim with armor on in real life I work out and own a set of full body metal chainmail, that thing makes walking strenuous and i have crossed a river in it before and just walking tru water is very hard, i thought i was going to fall over and drown(we were walking to my friend's cabin and the normal way in had collapsed over the summer), the water over the river was moving slowly and at the lowest point it was 5 feet deep(im a tad over 6ft) and i decided it would be a good idea to cross(i was 16 at the time)
but yeah, Chainmail in walkable water is hard, Plate mail is imposable, also fun fact, chain mail only cost like 400-600$ for a decent set(DnD and TTRPGs have ruined my finances)
I'm going to say you're wrong; but the reason is because you likely threw on some armor and never actually donned it as Medieval warriors would have. Quilted underarmor was a must.
Since I am a Master Diver and dive in chainmail I'd say you simply didn't do an accurate test. See above.
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Fair point, However i do work out and actively swim, im 6ft 2 and weigh 200 ish pounds, i can Calf Raise 680 pounds max(but only once, i rep about 200)
This conversation has been going on for some time and i am now at home so im gonna hop in a pool with my chain mail to see if i can swim with it
Reply to me in like a hour if you want to know the results
Everybody would want an answer regardless. Thank you for putting your mail at risk.
I've only ever done the jeans and jacket swim.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
The standard solution to swimming with a dense load is to have positive buoyancy from somewhere. Steel has a negative buoyancy of about 7/8 of its weight, so that's 17.5 lb for a chain shirt, 48 lb for a full suit. An air-filled container has a buoyancy of about 8.5 lb per gallon or 62 lb per cubic foot.
The other problem, unless you have rustproof armor (magic or modern stainless/alloy) is that you have to carefully clean and dry the armor immediately after immersion, or soft armors will rot, metal armors will rust. This goes double if you're swimming in salt or chlorinated water.
In general, it should probably be assumed that the PCs are doing all the necessary parts of caring for armor after water immersion in the same way that it's typically assumed that they're doing all the other forms of upkeep on their gear like cleaning their weapons and sharpening blades even if the players don't explicitly say so.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Yes, but it's in the category of "congratulations, you turned a ten minute task into a six hour task".
If you're basing it solely on a buoyancy calculation though, there are plenty of characters in medium or even light armor who would still hit negative buoyancy due to the swords/axes belted to their hip, the crossbow and quiver on their back, the metal shield strapped to their arm, their backpack/pouch full of gold coins etc. And we haven't even gotten to how the "denser" fantasy races like dwarves or warforged or firbolgs or goliaths would respond to this sort of thing.
And then you've got the other side of this equation, where characters like Legolas are running on top of waist-deep snow while wearing a chain shirt, longbow, quiver, and a backpack.
In short, I think a desire for "realism" is not the best way to approach this question, and even if you value that more highly than I do for some reason, you're likely to still get it wrong if all you care about is armor type.
Dave? Dave? DAAVVEE!!??
Its time to get out of the pool Dave.
Quite frankly more realistic does not exactly mean perfectly realistic,
And swim should be its own skill. Lumping it in with athletics leads me to think that the same skill could be used for high wire walking or cliff diving or deep sea diving. I have seen a lot of athletic people who could not do any of those activities.
Skill checks are somewhat oversimplified in 5e, but at least one of those would be Acrobatics, not Athletics.
But you do get the point I was trying make.
Oh, absolutely. The realistic answer is "if you're crossing a river or other deep water, strip down to nothing but light clothing, put all your possessions in a pack and portage them across" because almost everything an adventurer carries would be (a) extremely inconvenient in water, and (b) not very happy about being soaked. However, if you want heroic adventure... throw realism out the window.
I'm new to this game can someone help me
The point is that the people unbothered by those things being consolidated under Athletics and Acrobatics, and thus don't see the need for a dedicated Swim skill in 5e, outnumber those who do.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/how-to-play-dnd
There are several skills that I think should be put in the game before I'd want before getting Swimming as a separate skill - for example, the ability to craft, or to recall recent events (which is not the same as History).
While I can see why it'd be useful in this context to have swimming skill in this specific situation...all skills can be subdivided into new ones in specific situations. The game couldn't handle the number of skills exploding.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
The ability to recall things would be a straight INT check, and crafting is a long-term activity and thus best not rolled for in exchange for the time investment.
Also, swim speed covers the mechanic of being especially good at swimming.
I think those fall under Acrobatics.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
Only because no skills apply and that's the only place that it could fit - except maybe History, which doesn't jive well either. Intelligent people are forgetful quite often. If there were a skill associated with it, it wouldn't be questioned.
Crafting is a skill based activity, hence why WotC writers use a skill check in adventures when they want you to craft something.
It covers how fast you can swim in an encounter. Not having a swimming speed doesn't mean that you can't overcome a water based obstacle or, more to the point, cover a scenario where the DM wants a probabilistic solution.
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Having a swim speed means you have a physiological, technical, or metaphysical means of propelling yourself through a liquid medium that most humanoids don't. That means can be an anatomical construct of your species like fins, special training of some kind (e.g. a class feature or feat) or a mystical affinity for the medium itself - which can also come from your species/class/subclass, or from a spell or item.
Exactly right; either you claim to care about "realism" and still bungle it by only discriminating against plate-wearers, or you actually apply "realism" correctly but the game becomes a huge PITA simulator as a result. It's a lose-lose situation, so you might as well chuck it out the window and go for Rule of Cool/Fun instead.
This is completely wrong; as someone who is a master diver; assuming your armor was overlain a quilted coat (very common); 65lbs of armor would barely be enough to sink you at all. At worst you'd be mildly inconvenienced.
In Scuba; a 7mm wetsuit (quilted coat but only 7mm thick) would require approximately ~30lbs to keep you neutrally buoyant. This can vary a bit but that's a rule of thumb.
When I was a firefighter; nothing could sink you. And those were literal quilted coats for overcoat and bunker pants.
It's simply a layman's mistake not to account for the displaced water in the "weighted equipment" you're wearing. 65lbs of armor on a thick overcoat might be displacing 50lbs or more.
I couldn't find a video that I think accurately represents attempting to swim in armor because today's "LARPs" don't seem to understand the concept of quilted armor. They seem to wear tunics underneath their armor and that simply isn't historically accurate.
But I did find an interest video to show how much misconception there is about acrobatics there is with armor. For balance reasons; to give "rogues" usefulness, plate-wearing fighters aren't the Dexterity character.
In reality; a plate-wearing fighter would run circles around an ill-trained "Rogue".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzTwBQniLSc
But in conclusion; it's important to understand that with quilted armor underneath your usual plate or chainmail you'd probably displace far more water than your weight and therefore be positively buoyant. Or at worse; not very negatively buoyant.
https://youtu.be/f0dKkcNndTc?si=ct4-etEzHnTospHW&t=52
Here you can see at least a fully chainmailed scuba diver wearing approximately 10-20lbs in weights to keep themselves neutrally buoyant. I can't tell from just looking at them if the weights are 2.5lbs, 3lbs or 5lbs. But I'm leaning toward 5lbs. But for the sake of "conservatism" I'll be willing to go as low as 2.5lbs. 2 on one side means 2 on the other; so at least 10 additional lbs; in addition to their gear, to be neutrally buoyant. That means their BCD itself is empty of air.
I wouldn't be surprised if their BCD contains an emergency set of weights that can be easily dumped. If so; it'd likely be ~10lbs.
That shows you how "difficult" it is to submerge someone in armor.
I'm going to say you're wrong; but the reason is because you likely threw on some armor and never actually donned it as Medieval warriors would have. Quilted underarmor was a must.
Since I am a Master Diver and dive in chainmail I'd say you simply didn't do an accurate test. See above.