Enhancement bonuses to weapons, shields and armors? +n?

[Bartol91]

So, I couldn't find an official ruling for this.

I wanted to have a clear rule that would say:
a) What bonuses does a weapon get when it gets enhanced to +n?
b) What bonuses does a shield get when it gets enhanced to +n?
c) What bonuses does a armor get when it gets enhanced to +n?

Thank you in advance, please either clarify my question with a official ruling or tell me where in the Pathfinder rulebooks I can find the rules that define this.

[Galnörag]

I'm not sure an official ruling is needed, as I wasn't aware of a great conflict.

But I can try and provide some reference and clarity.

a) What bonuses does a weapon get when it gets enhanced to +n?

A weapon gains an enhancement bonus to attack and to damage equal to +n.

Now to be clear, that n is only the +n of the weapon, if a weapon is a +1 flaming sword, from a magic item creation perspective that is a +2 item, but it is for the purposes here a +1 weapon with the flaming property.

So in this example, assuming we are working with Joe the Level 5 fighter, with 14 strength and a longsword +2, (for which he has weapon specialization and focus.) His to hit roll would look like this:

BAB 5
Strength Bonus 2
Focus 1
Enhancement 3
======
+11

He would have a damage bonus of:
Strength 2
Specialization 2
Enhancement 3
===============
1d8+7

On a critical he would do 2d8+14.

For a reference you can see here.

or quoted in line

srd wrote:

A magic weapon is enhanced to strike more truly and deliver more damage. Magic weapons have enhancement bonuses ranging from +1 to +5. They apply these bonuses to both attack and damage rolls when used in combat. All magic weapons are also masterwork weapons, but their masterwork bonuses on attack rolls do not stack with their enhancement bonuses on attack rolls.

I highlighted the masterwork bit, because it is important.

Additionally you can see here that as a +3 weapon it would over come DR of creates with DR x/Silver or DR x/Cold Iron.

[hogarth]

Galnörag wrote:

I'm not sure an official ruling is needed, as I wasn't aware of a great conflict.

The weird area is with armor or shields, which get an enhancement bonus to the armor bonus or an enhancement bonus to the shield bonus, respectively.

The "bonus to a bonus" idea is a bit convoluted.

[Galnörag]

b) What bonuses does a shield get when it gets enhanced to +n?
c) What bonuses does a armor get when it gets enhanced to +n?

These both behave similarly, except that shields provide shield bonus to AC and armor provides armor bonus to AC.

In either case a Heavy Steel Shield +2 provides a shield bonus to AC of 4, 2 for the heavy steel and 2 for the enhancement bonus to shield AC.

A magical shield would not stack with the shield spell since they both provide a shield bonus to AC.

Likewise an chain shirt +4 would provide a +4 AC bonus with a +4 enhancement bonus to armor for a total of +8 armor bonus to your AC. It would not stack with mage armour.

Here is your reference, and your quotation:

SRD wrote:

In general, magic armor protects the wearer to a greater extent than nonmagical armor. Magic armor bonuses are enhancement bonuses, never rise above +5, and stack with regular armor bonuses (and with shield and magic shield enhancement bonuses). All magic armor is also masterwork armor, reducing armor check penalties by 1.

[Galnörag]

hogarth wrote:

Galnörag wrote:

I'm not sure an official ruling is needed, as I wasn't aware of a great conflict.

The weird area is with armor or shields, which get an enhancement bonus to the armor bonus or an enhancement bonus to the shield bonus, respectively.

The "bonus to a bonus" idea is a bit convoluted.

I'm working on it, figured I would divide them into two posts. From the quote from the SRD you can see they explicitly call out the bonus bonus.

[hogarth]

Galnörag wrote:

Here is your reference, and your quotation:

SRD wrote:

In general, magic armor protects the wearer to a greater extent than nonmagical armor. Magic armor bonuses are enhancement bonuses, never rise above +5, and stack with regular armor bonuses (and with shield and magic shield enhancement bonuses). All magic armor is also masterwork armor, reducing armor check penalties by 1.

Huh...that doesn't mention a "bonus to a bonus" at all. So magic armor gives you an actual enhancement bonus to AC, not an enhancement to the armor's armor bonus? So if I have a Mage Armor spell (+4 armor bonus) and I'm wearing +3 leather armor (+3 enhancement bonus and +2 armor bonus), I actually get a total +7 bonus to AC?

That's not how I've been playing it.

[SlimGauge]

hogarth wrote:

So if I have a Mage Armor spell (+4 armor bonus) and I'm wearing +3 leather armor (+3 enhancement bonus and +2 armor bonus), I actually get a total +7 bonus to AC?

No. Mage armor gives you a + 4 armor bonus. +3 leather armor gives you a +5 armor bonus ( + 2 armor bonus PLUS + 3 enhancement bonus to the leather armor's armor bonus). The +3 enhancement bonus to armor only applies to the leather armor's base armor bonus, not to the armor bonus provided by Mage Armor (or any other armor).

The + 4 armor bonus from mage armor does not stack with the +5 armor bonus from the +3 leather armor, it overlaps.

[Bartol91]

Thank you. I know the rules about stacking, just wanted to confirm that weapons get a +n bonus to attack roll and damage. Armor gets a +n bonus to AC as does the shield. Just one more question, wouldn't an armor remove n from its AC penalty where n is +n enhancement?

[Kalyth]

hogarth wrote:

Galnörag wrote:

Here is your reference, and your quotation:

SRD wrote:

In general, magic armor protects the wearer to a greater extent than nonmagical armor. Magic armor bonuses are enhancement bonuses, never rise above +5, and stack with regular armor bonuses (and with shield and magic shield enhancement bonuses). All magic armor is also masterwork armor, reducing armor check penalties by 1.

Huh...that doesn't mention a "bonus to a bonus" at all. So magic armor gives you an actual enhancement bonus to AC, not an enhancement to the armor's armor bonus? So if I have a Mage Armor spell (+4 armor bonus) and I'm wearing +3 leather armor (+3 enhancement bonus and +2 armor bonus), I actually get a total +7 bonus to AC?

That's not how I've been playing it.

That isn't my understanding.

I have always read it to be that The enhancement bonus increases the Armor Bonus provided by the item enchanted. Leather Armor +3 would be a total armor bonus of +5 (+2 base +3 from the enhancement bonus). If you had Mage Armor (+4 Armor Bonus to AC) and wearing Leather Armor +3 (+5 Armor Bonus to AC) you would have a +5 Armor Bonus to AC. You would not stack the Leather Armor's Enhancement bonus on to the Mage Armor.

The Enhancement Bonus applied to the Armor's Armor Bonus not to your AC directly.

Is this wrong?

[IkeDoe]

hogarth wrote:

Galnörag wrote:

Here is your reference, and your quotation:

SRD wrote:

In general, magic armor protects the wearer to a greater extent than nonmagical armor. Magic armor bonuses are enhancement bonuses, never rise above +5, and stack with regular armor bonuses (and with shield and magic shield enhancement bonuses). All magic armor is also masterwork armor, reducing armor check penalties by 1.

Huh...that doesn't mention a "bonus to a bonus" at all. So magic armor gives you an actual enhancement bonus to AC, not an enhancement to the armor's armor bonus? So if I have a Mage Armor spell (+4 armor bonus) and I'm wearing +3 leather armor (+3 enhancement bonus and +2 armor bonus), I actually get a total +7 bonus to AC?

That's not how I've been playing it.

The 3.5 DMG clearly explained what an enhancement bonus was (increases the base bonus or quality).

Since that explanation wasn't part of the 3.5 SRD, Jason forgot/decided not to explain enhancement bonuses in the Pathfinder corerulebook, an error imo.

The SRD says that enhancement bonus to AC stack with regular armor bonuses (note that it is the bonus of a regular armor - whatever it was intended to mean-, but given the rules for english compound nouns it could be a regular "armor bonus"), in a line that speaks about magic armors. Which is one of the worst and most ambiguous explanations in the book.

[hogarth]

SlimGauge wrote:

hogarth wrote:

So if I have a Mage Armor spell (+4 armor bonus) and I'm wearing +3 leather armor (+3 enhancement bonus and +2 armor bonus), I actually get a total +7 bonus to AC?

No. Mage armor gives you a + 4 armor bonus. +3 leather armor gives you a +5 armor bonus ( + 2 armor bonus PLUS + 3 enhancement bonus to the leather armor's armor bonus).

That's how I've been playing it, but that's not really what it says in the paragraph quoted above. As IkeDoe pointed out, I think there's something that got dropped in the translation from the 3.5 SRD.

[IkeDoe]

Bartol91 wrote:

Thank you. I know the rules about stacking, just wanted to confirm that weapons get a +n bonus to attack roll and damage. Armor gets a +n bonus to AC as does the shield. Just one more question, wouldn't an armor remove n from its AC penalty where n is +n enhancement?

The +n enhancement bonus does NOT modify shield's or armor's:

Maximum Dexterity Bonus to AC
Skill penalties

However ALL magic armor and shields are masterwork items too (Improves skill check penalty by 1)

[Bartol91]

IkeDoe wrote:

Bartol91 wrote:

Thank you. I know the rules about stacking, just wanted to confirm that weapons get a +n bonus to attack roll and damage. Armor gets a +n bonus to AC as does the shield. Just one more question, wouldn't an armor remove n from its AC penalty where n is +n enhancement?

The +n enhancement bonus does NOT modify shield's or armor's:

Maximum Dexterity Bonus to AC
Skill penalties

However ALL magic armor and shields are masterwork items too (Improves skill check penalty by 1)

Thank you. In the combination with the replies here and on another (Croatian) forum, I managed to clear it up in my head. It is actually stated in the SRD loud and clear, and for some reason I read right through it.

To close, +n bonus is applied for:
a) weapons, as +n to attack rolls and +n to damage rolls
b) shields, as +n to shield AC & reduce ACP by 1
c) armors, as +n to armor AC & reduce ACP by 1

There, thank you all, finally got that cleared up!

[IkeDoe]

Plus a few obscure things:
- Weapon enhancement bonus (not price) +3 or higher allows magic weapons to bypass Damage Reduction as if the were made of special materials (see Damage Reduction description in the Glossary)
- The enhancement bonus increases hit points and hardness of the item (in case someone tries to sunder the item).

[Bartol91]

IkeDoe wrote:

Plus a few obscure things:

- Weapon enhancement bonus (not price) +3 or higher allows magic weapons to bypass Damage Reduction as if the were made of special materials (see Damage Reduction description in the Glossary)
- The enhancement bonus increases hit points and hardness of the item (in case someone tries to sunder the item).

Thank you!

[Galnörag]

IkeDoe wrote:

Plus a few obscure things:

- Weapon enhancement bonus (not price) +3 or higher allows magic weapons to bypass Damage Reduction as if the were made of special materials (see Damage Reduction description in the Glossary)
- The enhancement bonus increases hit points and hardness of the item (in case someone tries to sunder the item).

Actually there is something even more obscure to add to that hardness thing.

prd wrote:

Damaging Magic Weapons: An attacker cannot damage a magic weapon that has an enhancement bonus unless his weapon has at least as high an enhancement bonus as the weapon struck.

from here you have to search for the heading "Damaging Magic Weapons".

So not only does the magic increase the hardness and hp of the weapon, the weapon has in effect DR against anything weaker then it.

[Strife2002]

"" wrote:

Actually there is something even more obscure to add to that hardness thing.

prd wrote:

Damaging Magic Weapons: An attacker cannot damage a magic weapon that has an enhancement bonus unless his weapon has at least as high an enhancement bonus as the weapon struck.

from here you have to search for the heading "Damaging Magic Weapons".

So not only does the magic increase the hardness and hp of the weapon, the weapon has in effect DR against anything weaker then it.

Wow, this is actually great news for wizards that pick a weapon as an arcane focus. Just enchant the crap out of it.

[darkorbit]

Anyone here

[blackbloodtroll]

It's two year old thread.

So, I doubt it.

[Barachiel Shina]

Strife2002 wrote:

"" wrote:

Actually there is something even more obscure to add to that hardness thing.

prd wrote:

Damaging Magic Weapons: An attacker cannot damage a magic weapon that has an enhancement bonus unless his weapon has at least as high an enhancement bonus as the weapon struck.

from here you have to search for the heading "Damaging Magic Weapons".

So not only does the magic increase the hardness and hp of the weapon, the weapon has in effect DR against anything weaker then it.

Wow, this is actually great news for wizards that pick a weapon as an arcane focus. Just enchant the crap out of it.

Ok I cannot find this rule in the PRD anymore, did they take it out?

[Archaeik]

Barachiel Shina wrote:

Ok I cannot find this rule in the PRD anymore, did they take it out?

Yes, this was removed, you can damage any weapon normally, regardless of enhancement bonus.