Hello Adventurer's! I couldn't help but notice this chair was free and was hoping you'd allow a weary traveller the benefit of resting his feet by the fire. Also, if you could lend your ears for a moment, I had an issue that I encountered in the neighbouring village I've just travelled from that maybe you might be able to help me with...

Short Version - How do you as a DM handle Armour Class and Hit Points for regular vehicles such Carriages, Chariots, Wagons etc??

Long Version - In the past, I've run chase scenarios where I've pretty much homebrewed the rules on how much 'health' a vehicle has/how much damage a vehicle can take. For my current campaign, there is a potential that things may go terribly for the players (when do they not!) and they may have to get out of a situation FAST. One option is that they may be able to seize a wagon which may in turn lead to a chase sequence.

To my knowledge, there is no official rules for AC and HP for the land vehicles in 5E. I've only recently discovered the 'health' system that is employed for the Waterborne Vehicles in Ghosts of Saltmarsh - should mention I don't own the book itself, just access to the Vehicle Info.

Each vehicle is broken down into sections (Hull, Ballista, and Sails to name a few examples for the 'Galley' vehicle) with each having their own AC and HP. The way I understand is, because the Hull is the 'main body of health' for the vehicle with 500hp, once depleted the ship is effectively taken out of the fight. The Hull also has a Damage Threshold to ensure that superficial damage does not impact the vehicle which I think is a very sensible idea.

With this in mind, I created my own AC + HP values for each vehicle:

I'm interested to know from others - Do you use a similar system as Ghosts of Saltmarsh? Would you break it down by each part like the ships are? (e.g. Wheel 10 HP, Dmg Threshold 15  -  Chassis 100hp, Dmg Threshold 16). Or do you have a general AC and HP for the vehicle to make things easier to track? Do you have your own system entirely? Are my Stats for the Land Vehicles completely awful!?

Thanks for reading :)

There are some statistics for object durability based on size and substance.

https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/running-the-game#Objects

I do like your break down though.

The recently released Descent Into Avernus just uses AC, HP, Damage Threshold, with no breakout or speed reductions. I like that because it makes things much simpler.

Thanks for the responses!

Somehow managed to overlook the rules on Objects - that's definitely helpful; glad to hear you like the breakdown I have :)

I'm interested in getting the Avernus content although I'm waiting for some gold to make it to the treasury first - that's really useful to know about how that campaign handles vehicles though! I definitely agree simpler is better, although I'm usually happy to make something up on the fly if a player decides to 'take aim at the wheel' etc.