Is Armor Class useless?


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A poster in another thread stated the following:

Quote:
Armor Class is useless to players and animal companions. Armor class is the worst Mitigation in game.

He apparently believes that AC is useless. While it is entirely within the realm of possibility that I am woefully misinformed I don't believe that is true. However, as I try to stay open minded to other ideas I would prefer to allow myself to be convinced.

So what of it? Do you believe that AC is as useless as this person thought? If so why? If not, why not?


Personally, not getting hit seems like a good thing to me. As AC is largely what determines that it seems like a fairly important stat to me.

I am not discounting other methods of protect, mind you. Saves are important as well and displacement and concealment type effects definitely have their uses. However, with the number of threads I have seen here with a DM coming to these forums with a character with an unhittable AC causing balance issues I don't think that it is trivial either. It is true that there are other ways of dealing with high AC like attacking the character's saves or using spells or effects that don't target the character at all but rather their surroundings. But to me that doesn't make it "useless". It is still a very important defensive stat. For some builds more than others.

That is my opinion. I am more interested in yours.

Sczarni

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Every attribute matters. He must play some weird homebrew games. He could also just be butthurt about his and/or his companions poopoo AC.

Dealing with high AC is easy - Just target something else that will likely be lower. A good DM should prey upon his player's weakness here and there, enough to make them struggle and provide both a reality check and challenge.

AC isn't useless by any means, it's what defends you from the majority of the attacks in campaigns(not every homebrew included).


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But don't you know that that is the way of the boards? If something isn't 100% useful its useless.


I don't think that the AC is that useless. The problem with it is: it's more difficult to boost the AC than the attack bonus (you need far more magic item, and sometime a little bit of creativity) and let's admit that it's funnier to build a character able to do massive damage than an untouchable tank.

In one of my group of level 12, we got the two type: a summoner-paladin with something like 34 ac who does around 40 damages per round, and the barbarian with 20 ac in rage who does ove 100 damages par round.

Sczarni

RDM42 wrote:
But don't you know that that is the way of the boards? If something isn't 100% useful its useless.

Your sarcasm is delicious.

I agree though. It seems to be the case in many of the "sour" instances of various threads and posts.

Scarab Sages

Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

The general issue is that To-Hit (attacks) go up directly with character level where as AC does not. The counter to that is there are more magic items (rings and necklesses) that increase AC then Attack.

Still more often then not, Atk bonuses increase faster per HD/Level then AC.

In the end I have that there are three teirs of AC at the higher levels:

1) AC 35-ish "Unhittable." But that is stacking alot of feats, magic items and other options to get that.

2) AC mid-20's "Good enough." At this level the AC is more to reduce the critical confirmation and iterative attacks. Though the primary attaks will still hit you regularly

3) AC sub-20 "Don't Care." At this point you just accept that you have no AC and that your magic item investments are all offense to kill the Mobs before they have a chance to damage you.

In general it is always a trade off between investing in defense vs offense. It is a matter of personal taste on where that sweet spot is.


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The 'useless' bit about armor class is that it generally goes up as you level and BaB also goes up as you level. It seems like a zero-sum game sometimes.

You struggle to get your AC to stratospheric heights, only to face monsters who have a +25 attack bonus that will hit you most of the time anyway.

Still, I wouldn't really call it useless. Keeping that AC up can at least mean the occasional attack will miss. And that will save resources. At the end of the day D&D is a resource-management game.


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When people say "AC is useless", they mean it's rarely possible to raise it to a useful level, and expensive to even try. For example, if your character has 29 AC at level 15 (10 base, +1 Dex, +9 full plate, +3 enhancement, +3 deflection, +3 natural), a CR 15 monster has a 75% chance to beat it. A CR 17 monster has a 95% chance to beat it. Each +1 upgrade will be expensive and only improve those odds by 5%, and enemy attack rolls will scale right up with it.

Perfect example, the Fighter in the Rise of the Runelords campaign I played had the group's highest AC, in the low 40s (higher with Combat Expertise) at level 16. He still got stomped on by every non-trivial encounter, because his AC was simply not high enough and there was nothing he could really do to increase it.

A 20% Miss Chance will be cheaper in the long run. It also provides a second hoop they have to jump through. Ultimately a good offense is the best defense; kill or debilitate an enemy and he won't hit anyone's AC. And use positioning and battlefield control spells to ensure melee enemies can't close with you, and ranged enemies can't get line of sight.

Dark Archive

On these boards, you'll hear about ac being anything but useful-unless you take that to heart and make a character with no ac, then it is treated as though it is relevant.

The truth? Ac is incredibly useful but is a double edged sword as levels progress and enemies have more options. Ac stops you from dying to the most common form of damage- an attack.

At low levels and high levels, attacks are dangerous and will kill you eventually. So ac is generally necessary but only because hp pools tend to be low enough that attacks will reduce them to 0 or below.

If you have enough HP to take all the attacks and still do your thing (easier at low levels) then you do not really need ac for an individual encounter. HP will suffice and HP is the entire purpose of ac: Protecting it.

As you level, if you realize that ac protects HP and you get more ac and enemies start having difficulty hitting you, they change tactics based on the difficulty of hitting you. When they miss you on a 15 or 16 they may rely entirely on flanking and/or start using combat maneuvers as primary attack forms. The next step is to use spells followed by spells that target saves you are likely poor with and then touch spells.

All of these things follow a general progression as a character advances, though enemies of all levels use a variety of offensive forms. This is just the base progression of attack prioritizing.

Each of the types of attacks costs an increasing amount of resources, most of which are increasingly limited the further up the chain you go with the most limited option being no sr, no save, magic effect, once per day or eats up high level spell slot with material components that are costly, to the basic attack which can be done over and over for free.

So long as things try to hit each other, ac is always important and useful. But I know of 10 ac pure caster builds who get by- they just understand what needs to be done to avoid things trying to hit them and therefor their ac.

A simpler explanation is this: at low levels mundane attacks are common so people need ac to reduce the chance of being hit and eventually killed.

At medium levels a variety of effects are common and saving throws matter more so that you don't take damage and die or succumb to an effect and die.

At high levels magic is common so you use spell resistance to avoid being affected at all and dying, being dominated or whatever else high end magic does.

There are ways to avoid needing to protect yourself via SR, ac or saves in each case, they just require more forethought, different play styles and are uncommon and more difficult solutions to common problems (relatively speaking).


On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.

Scarab Sages

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Layered Defenses are more powerful than a single defense. Miss chances and or DR are more powerful than AC because AC is binary. AC is either all or nothing, and unless you spend ALL character resources on AC by the time you get to high level non-mooks will hit you even if you AC is in the 40s. You need AC to be in the 50 range to be able to rely on it high level, and it's very difficult to get AC that high without severely gimping your damage output.

So if something is hitting you 75% of the time, it's more protection for you to get a 20% or 50% miss chance on top of your AC than to just boost your ac to a point where they are hitting you 40% of the time.

DR and Fast Healing on top of that is even better.

Scarab Sages

RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.

True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.


If AC scaled hand in hand with BAB, fights involving attack rolls would take a lot longer to resolve at higher levels. As others have noted, a layered defense is often beneficial (DR, resistance), particularly anything that adds a flat % (concealment, fortification). Generally, I try to get an AC high enough to withstand a monster's iterative attacks so that my character (or someone else's) can deal wih the threat.


Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.

Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Scarab Sages

RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.


Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.

And in your world, all combats take place in ideal conditions, and you are never dumped into combat with no chance to prepare?


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Of course AC is useless, it is something that martial characters use.


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Marius Castille wrote:
If AC scaled hand in hand with BAB, fights involving attack rolls would take a lot longer to resolve at higher levels. As others have noted, a layered defense is often beneficial (DR, resistance), particularly anything that adds a flat % (concealment, fortification). Generally, I try to get an AC high enough to withstand a monster's iterative attacks so that my character (or someone else's) can deal wih the threat.

If AC scaled hand in hand with BAB you would be playing 4th edition.


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RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.

And in your world, all combats take place in ideal conditions, and you are never dumped into combat with no chance to prepare?

Hopefully there's more than one caster in the party. One can drop the control spell first round and the other can cast Haste. Or weigh up your priorities and decide which spell is more important in the first round (the melee won't benefit as much from Haste in round 1 if they can't full attack).


Athaleon wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.

And in your world, all combats take place in ideal conditions, and you are never dumped into combat with no chance to prepare?

Hopefully there's more than one caster in the party. One can drop the control spell first round and the other can cast Haste. Or weigh up your priorities and decide which spell is more important in the first round (the melee won't benefit as much from Haste in round 1 if they can't full attack).

Initiative. Sometimes if you don't get your haste in the first round, the beneficiary loses TWO ROUNDS of potential use.

Combats do not take place in perfectly sealed laboratory conditions.


Athaleon wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.

And in your world, all combats take place in ideal conditions, and you are never dumped into combat with no chance to prepare?

Hopefully there's more than one caster in the party. One can drop the control spell first round and the other can cast Haste. Or weigh up your priorities and decide which spell is more important in the first round (the melee won't benefit as much from Haste in round 1 if they can't full attack).

Or a least rod of Quicken Spell

Scarab Sages

RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.

And in your world, all combats take place in ideal conditions, and you are never dumped into combat with no chance to prepare?

No, but if you are smart about it then it should be VERY rare. Divination and scouting should let you know your enemy location before you fight. Distraction and decoys can make it appear that you are where your are not.

And in the rare case that you are ambushed, it would be better to use a Wall spell to block a retreat or a Teleport spell to withdraw when you are ambushed and then prepare a counter ambush of your own than to cast haste and try to slug it out when you are not ready.


AC is typically only useful against mooks, but there are lots of mooks to be fought.


RDM42 wrote:
Athaleon wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.

And in your world, all combats take place in ideal conditions, and you are never dumped into combat with no chance to prepare?

Hopefully there's more than one caster in the party. One can drop the control spell first round and the other can cast Haste. Or weigh up your priorities and decide which spell is more important in the first round (the melee won't benefit as much from Haste in round 1 if they can't full attack).

Initiative. Sometimes if you don't get your haste in the first round, the beneficiary loses TWO ROUNDS of potential use.

Combats do not take place in perfectly sealed laboratory conditions.

And what happens if you're attacked before you can put on your armor? Better hope for a concealment spell. What happens if you're attacked by spellcasters? Etc, etc.

Combats don't take place in sealed laboratory conditions, but on the other hand, a situation can always be contrived to "disprove" someone's point. What if sweeping away the mooks is still the best way to prevent incoming damage, and clear the way for your melee characters to charge the enemy archers/casters?


Athaleon wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Athaleon wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.
Ah, so your wizard should skip casting haste or other buffs in order to take out the mooks first round?

Ideally, they would buff before the fight begins so they aren't wasting turns buffing during combat.

Never engage at the battlefield of the enemies choosing.

And in your world, all combats take place in ideal conditions, and you are never dumped into combat with no chance to prepare?

Hopefully there's more than one caster in the party. One can drop the control spell first round and the other can cast Haste. Or weigh up your priorities and decide which spell is more important in the first round (the melee won't benefit as much from Haste in round 1 if they can't full attack).

Initiative. Sometimes if you don't get your haste in the first round, the beneficiary loses TWO ROUNDS of potential use.

Combats do not take place in perfectly sealed laboratory conditions.

And what happens if you're attacked before you can put on your armor? Better hope for a concealment spell. What happens if you're attacked by spellcasters? Etc, etc.

Combats don't take place in sealed laboratory conditions, but on the other hand, a situation can always be contrived to "disprove" someone's point. What if sweeping away the mooks is still the best way to prevent incoming damage, and clear the way for your melee characters to charge the enemy archers/casters?

Yes, that is possible too. But the question was whether AC was useless, and clearly the answer is 'no' given the number of situations in which it accomplishes useful things.

Scarab Sages

RDM42 wrote:

C-C-C-C-Combo Breaker!

Yes, that is possible too. But the question was whether AC was useless, and clearly the answer is 'no' given the number of situations in which it accomplishes useful things.

AC isn't useless. But it's more useful to get non-AC protection unless you have an AC in the stratosphere.


It is as I suspected. Most people are agreeing that a multi-layered defense is best. No one believes that AC is useless but that it is one of the stats that is important to defense.

For front line sluggers it is more important than those who typically stay in the back row, that is just logical. But it is never "useless".


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One other thing that deserves to be said about AC is how it relates to natural weapons vs iteratives. It tends to stay more relevant when fighting other PC-type opponents. Sure, they might have a 85% chance of hitting with their first attack, but that means the next one is only 60%, 35%, maybe a 10% at the end. Against this, AC has a good chance of mitigating a hit or two. Which, given how much damage grows relative to hitpoints, can determine the winner of this round of rocket tag.

Against "monsters," on the other hand, it can be much closer to "useless." If their first weapon has an 85% of hitting so does their second, third, and so on. If you are lucky some are secondary, but in that case Multiattack is almost assumed and they are only at -10%. Plus, "brute" monsters tend to combine massive strength with piles of HD (and thus BaB), which can mean even a moderately pushed AC is only contributing a few percent to the miss chance (if that).

So basically, it is "useless" in the same way that Combat Maneuvers are "useless." Against other player-type characters things actually scale fairly reasonably. However, when you crack open the bestiary, things can change dramatically.


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It boils down to this: there are FAR more effective ways to avoid being hit that applies to all attacks--save AOEs, or save or suck--that classes can get.
A while ago I pointed out how having 8 mirror images and displacement reduces your chance to get hit to 6%. The enemies have to effectively crit on the percentile dice to hit. You can even craft magical items that can be used to give yourself mirror image (CL9 I think was needed) and displacement. If you can spam your defense and make it a point to always keep it topped off then you have the best defense in the game. Though, the more you get hit the less defense you have so unlucky crits can lead to you being quickly easy to hit.

That all said AC is rarely "useless." However there does come a point where if your AC is low enough that you effectively have no AC at all. If a roll of a 2 is a hit against you then mitigation is your only option.

Possible defenses:
Displacement + Mirror Image + Stoneskin(blood money to make it affordable) is probably your most insane defense.
50% miss chance, 11% to be hit if miss chance is bypassed, DR 10/Adamantine if it hits you instead of a clone.
At higher levels you will still take damage if it hits you since almost all enemies after a certain level do more than 10 damage on a damage roll of a 1, but the point is that they shouldn't hit often and when they do they will hit considerably less hard.

The average "high attack" for a CR 20 is +30, an Ancient Gold Dragon (CR20) has a +36 to hit with most of its attacks. However, that is not its sole method of attack. If your AC is lower than 1+(Average for a CR of your level) then you effectively have no AC meaning it doesn't matter if your AC is 8 or 31.


That is a good point, Mort. FYI - I have been around this board and several others before it and am no Neophite. I haven't really looked at it from that specific perspective but it is true. Typically monsters have lower to hit than something swinging a weapon of equal CR but they dont have to worry about iterives missing.

And I would agree that it is about equal to combat maneuvers... however, a grapple focused character will typically have no problem meeting those CMDs.

Dark Archive

If you want to keep your AC reasonably relevant then level + 20 is a good target to aim for, and perfectly doable for most classes, layer that with, as many have noted, some miss chance and/or DR and you'll do far better than someone who just focuses on one or ignores AC altogether.


thorin001 wrote:
If AC scaled hand in hand with BAB you would be playing 4th edition.

Don't do that. Edition flaming, apropos to nothing, is one thing that's almost always flag-worthy on these boards.


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Didn't seem like flaming to me.


Lune wrote:

A poster in another thread stated the following:

Quote:
Armor Class is useless to players and animal companions. Armor class is the worst Mitigation in game.

He apparently believes that AC is useless. While it is entirely within the realm of possibility that I am woefully misinformed I don't believe that is true. However, as I try to stay open minded to other ideas I would prefer to allow myself to be convinced.

So what of it? Do you believe that AC is as useless as this person thought? If so why? If not, why not?

Let's look at CR 10 encounter for fun shall we?

Most creature that relies on attack have in between + 18 to + 15 to hit anyone. so the question becomes how to get 39 AC and more a that level to optimize our chances of never getting hit.

Let's play with our cleric hes a crusader and thus gain a few combat feats to better his defense.

He should spend about 1/3 of his budget on defensive items so about 20667 GP of defensive gear:

10 base AC
11 from +2 full plate (5650 GP)
6 from +2 tower shield (4210 GP)
1 from Dex
1 from the dodge feat
2 from amulet of natural armor (8000 GP)

That would put our AC at 31 in combat without any spell aid.

But remember we are a battle cleric! we can cast a few spells and on top of that we will use these bonus feats to boost our Ac even more!

1 more from shield focus
1 more from greater shield focus

Let's cast shield of faith for
3 point of deflection AC

so grand total or 36 AC at level 10 by using a level 1 spell, something every group should have access via potions, scrolls, want, friend at level 10. So yeah AC is awesome if you invest in it.


Well, at extremely high (and in my opinion, not fun) levels of optimization where everyone is a full caster with a plethora of contingencies and defensive spells, maybe. But I've never actually played a game like that, and in my experience DMing from levels 1-20, armor class has never become useless.

Liberty's Edge

As others have said, it depends on what AC you can get, and how much you're willing or able to invest in it. The earlier 29 AC example is a very telling one, actually, since at 15th I'd expect an AC of more like 33 (+3 Dex, +14 Armor, +2 ring, +2 Amulet, +1 Ioun stone, +1 Jingasa) from someone who devoted even a quarter of his wealth to it.

And considering what else you need to buy (a +6 weapon at 72 k, a +5 Cloak at 25, a belt at 40k and a headband at 16k, say) you could invest up to 30k more into it pretty easily depending on specific build.

Now if you need a Ring of Freedom of Movement or something, yeah, okay, that'll eat into that...but that's hardly a universal need.

And all that's without investing a single Feat or skill or spell into it. Toss on UMD (which you can get from that headband I mentioned, if you like...or an Ioun Stone) and a Wand of Shield, and you're suddenly at 37, toss on Crane Style (even post-nerf) and for three Feats you're at -2 to hit but +4 AC all the time (for 41) and have a couple other tricks, throw on Dodge and Ironhide (for 43), start counting in Class Features (Beast Totem for Barbarians or Armor Training for Fighters leap to mind) and it's up another 2 or 3...call it 45 AC pretty readily on a Fighter. More if you invest some more gold...so call it 47 or so. And I can easily get that a lot higher if I try.

Is that starting to be worth it?

Now...Miss Chance is often a better way, especially for spell casters, to increase one's odds of survival but AC useless? Not if you invest in it.

Scarab Sages

Laiho Vanallo wrote:
Lune wrote:

A poster in another thread stated the following:

Quote:
Armor Class is useless to players and animal companions. Armor class is the worst Mitigation in game.

He apparently believes that AC is useless. While it is entirely within the realm of possibility that I am woefully misinformed I don't believe that is true. However, as I try to stay open minded to other ideas I would prefer to allow myself to be convinced.

So what of it? Do you believe that AC is as useless as this person thought? If so why? If not, why not?

Let's look at CR 10 encounter for fun shall we?

Most creature that relies on attack have in between + 18 to + 15 to hit anyone. so the question becomes how to get 39 AC and more a that level to optimize our chances of never getting hit.

Let's play with our cleric hes a crusader and thus gain a few combat feats to better his defense.

He should spend about 1/3 of his budget on defensive items so about 20667 GP of defensive gear:

10 base AC
11 from +2 full plate (5650 GP)
6 from +2 tower shield (4210 GP)
1 from Dex
1 from the dodge feat
2 from amulet of natural armor (8000 GP)

That would put our AC at 31 in combat without any spell aid.

But remember we are a battle cleric! we can cast a few spells and on top of that we will use these bonus feats to boost our Ac even more!

1 more from shield focus
1 more from greater shield focus

Let's cast shield of faith for
3 point of deflection AC

so grand total or 36 AC at level 10 by using a level 1 spell, something every group should have access via potions, scrolls, want, friend at level 10. So yeah AC is awesome if you invest in it.

Crusader Clerics do not have Heavy Armor Prof or Tower Shield Prof, although they can take them as bonus feats. They also have reduced spellcasting and reduced domains, and are generally a terrible archetype unless you are dipping.

This character has invested all feats and resources into AC at the cost of being less effective in combat (-2 to hit from tower shield, no room for weapon focus with 5 ac feats), reduced spellcasting from the archetype, and being slower than a merman on land thanks to Heavy Armor and a 40 lb tower shield. At least the shield can provide cover.


Um, no?


Taku Ooka Nin wrote:
A while ago I pointed out how having 8 mirror images and displacement reduces your chance to get hit to 6%.

Unless they have blind sight or true seeing. Heck, even a guy with his eyes closed has a 50% chance.

Scarab Sages

Matthew Downie wrote:
Taku Ooka Nin wrote:
A while ago I pointed out how having 8 mirror images and displacement reduces your chance to get hit to 6%.
Unless they have blind sight or true seeing. Heck, even a guy with his eyes closed has a 50% chance.

True, but Blindsight doesn't protect against Blink, and a Deafness or Silence spell will negate it if it's based on hearing.

True Seeing doesn't work against concealment, so the miss chance for a simple obscuring mist is effective against it.

And if you are forcing someone to choose between closing their eyes for 50% miss chance or leaving their eyes open for a 94% miss chance, that's still better than you might get from adding 10 points of AC.


Athaleon wrote:
When people say "AC is useless", they mean it's rarely possible to raise it to a useful level, and expensive to even try. For example, if your character has 29 AC at level 15 (10 base, +1 Dex, +9 full plate, +3 enhancement, +3 deflection, +3 natural), a CR 15 monster has a 75% chance to beat it. A CR 17 monster has a 95% chance to beat it. Each +1 upgrade will be expensive and only improve those odds by 5%, and enemy attack rolls will scale right up with it.

And what about 6 CR 10 opponents? IN a recent barbarian thread the DPR of two hill giants against a level 10 non beast totem barbarian was 33 and against a full armored fighter was 12. That is a big difference.

In one red hand of doom game, the AC 16 barbarian taken 40+ of dmg from six hobgoblin archer. The AC 23 paladin take 8.


How about this?

Level 10 Ankylosaurus Animal Companion:
10 base
+2 Dex 15 (Starting 14 -2 from size increase at 7th +3 Dex from levels)
+6 Natural armor from levels
+11 Natural armor (+9 base +2 after size increase at 7th)
+10 armor (+1 mithril full plate barding, 16K gp - not unreasonable for average wealth for a character of this level)
+4 Barkskin (cast by his druid)

Thats 43. This would be considered good for that level. Right? I mean you could easily bump that up by a few more points. Most casters of this level would likely have a strand of prayer beads to cast their daily buffs with so that would rase the Barkskin to it's full +5. This also isn't counting any deflection or insite bonus to AC which are fairly easy to obtain cheaply. No shield bonus which could be gained via a potion if need be. I could see easily getting that to 50 at level 10 for a minor investment.


Imbicatus wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
On the other hand most encounters aren't against one opponent of equal or higher cr. that ac will make it so the lower cr portion of the encounter can't hit you easily and drain hp. Combats are not one on one arena matches against equal or higher cr foes.
True, but this is where your Wizard/Battle field controller should be neutralizing the mooks in one round. Mooks are not a challenge, it's the +CR bosses. It's the same reason Rogues and Monks need more accuracy.

I disagree. IN PF single bosses are the one that do not present challenges.

Liberty's Edge

The issue with Mirror Image is that it's ablative. It's one of the best defensive spells in the game, don't get me wrong, but it buys you about a round, in my experience. Maybe two at high levels. Maybe even three if you're not the primary target. And then it's gone. And it cost you a round to cast it (unless you Quickened it, in which case other resources were expended).

It's very good (I never take a Bard without it, and would always say it's worth it on Wizards and Sorcerers as well)...but it supplements rather than replaces the need for AC.


I wanted to test this out and I took an Invulnerable Barbarian with the Stalwart feats. I had a mitheral breast plate for armor and had AC of 26 at level 16 which was 19 at when raging. I used reckless abandon with combat expertise and had DR of 16/-. I can tell you this, AC is better by far. Sure 16 off any physical damage looks nice but when creatures are doing 40-60 damage a hit and now they hit you with every attack you just die, well I didn't die because of all the feats I had but I spent a lot of time in the negative hit points range.

The fighter in the group with an AC over 40 rarely got hit. Maybe once a round. So saying the monster has 4 attacks doing an average of 40 damage per hit. I was taking 96 damage to the fighters 40 damage. Good thing I had a lot more hit points than the fighter. The fighter was STR/DEX while I was STR/CON.

So yeah, AC is useful if you can keep it up.


There is also the thing about rider effect. Getting hit and then grapled/poisoned/whatever is a bad thing. You should strive for high saves anyways, but it is better to not get hitted in the first place.

Scarab Sages

AC alone is more effective than DR alone, no question. AC alone is about equal to a flat miss chance alone depending on what the AC and CR is. The most effective defense will be a AC good enough for mooks, on top of miss chances and DR, with fast healing/regeneration on top.

Unless you spend a very high amount of resources on AC, it's far cheaper to get an equivalent flat miss chance than it is to get an AC in the range where it is the same level of defense.


Laiho Vanallo wrote:
Lune wrote:

A poster in another thread stated the following:

Quote:
Armor Class is useless to players and animal companions. Armor class is the worst Mitigation in game.

He apparently believes that AC is useless. While it is entirely within the realm of possibility that I am woefully misinformed I don't believe that is true. However, as I try to stay open minded to other ideas I would prefer to allow myself to be convinced.

So what of it? Do you believe that AC is as useless as this person thought? If so why? If not, why not?

Let's look at CR 10 encounter for fun shall we?

Most creature that relies on attack have in between + 18 to + 15 to hit anyone. so the question becomes how to get 39 AC and more a that level to optimize our chances of never getting hit.

Let's play with our cleric hes a crusader and thus gain a few combat feats to better his defense.

He should spend about 1/3 of his budget on defensive items so about 20667 GP of defensive gear:

10 base AC
11 from +2 full plate (5650 GP)
6 from +2 tower shield (4210 GP)
1 from Dex
1 from the dodge feat
2 from amulet of natural armor (8000 GP)

That would put our AC at 31 in combat without any spell aid.

But remember we are a battle cleric! we can cast a few spells and on top of that we will use these bonus feats to boost our Ac even more!

1 more from shield focus
1 more from greater shield focus

Let's cast shield of faith for
3 point of deflection AC

so grand total or 36 AC at level 10 by using a level 1 spell, something every group should have access via potions, scrolls, want, friend at level 10. So yeah AC is awesome if you invest in it.

Forgot that if you have 3 ranks in acrobatics you get +3 dodge ac from fighting defensively! so make that a total of 39 AC making any CR 10,11,12 need to roll a 19-20 to get you, add the fact that you can use your tower shield to get total concealment, it's pretty boss!

Grand Lodge

I'm throwing myself into this now considering it is me who the OP is quoting in his first post.

First and Foremost the statement was said in response to people who want to take light/medium/heavy armor proficiency as feats for Animal Companions.

When it comes to Playing pathfinder I find what people say Dual-Layered defenses to be better in the long run but focusing on Saves towards endgame.

Athaleon wrote:

When people say "AC is useless", they mean it's rarely possible to raise it to a useful level, and expensive to even try. For example, if your character has 29 AC at level 15 (10 base, +1 Dex, +9 full plate, +3 enhancement, +3 deflection, +3 natural), a CR 15 monster has a 75% chance to beat it. A CR 17 monster has a 95% chance to beat it. Each +1 upgrade will be expensive and only improve those odds by 5%, and enemy attack rolls will scale right up with it.

Perfect example, the Fighter in the Rise of the Runelords campaign I played had the group's highest AC, in the low 40s (higher with Combat Expertise) at level 16. He still got stomped on by every non-trivial encounter, because his AC was simply not high enough and there was nothing he could really do to increase it.

A 20% Miss Chance will be cheaper in the long run. It also provides a second hoop they have to jump through. Ultimately a good offense is the best defense; kill or debilitate an enemy and he won't hit anyone's AC. And use positioning and battlefield control spells to ensure melee enemies can't close with you, and ranged enemies can't get line of sight.

Basically this guy sums it up completely. Early Levels all you have is AC but at higher levels when Creatures can just smash through AC it becomes Useless if not backed up by a 2nd layer of Mitigation. Blur, cover, Displacement, Mirror Image, ext ext.

In the original statement:

Quote:
Armor Class is useless to players and animal companions. Armor class is the worst Mitigation in game.

People where debating armor proficiency on animal companions to try and put heavier armor on a animal companion to help keep it alive longer. I consider them to be wasted feats when a animal companion can wear Light armor with 0 Armor check penalty and can boost their Defenses in a more efficient way then blowing feats to increase their AC by 2 more. That +2 more is going to make no difference in the fight against a creature with +25 or better to hit. Your better off spending the feats for better saves, more magical items, and damage output. Kill it before it kills you and mitigate damage by force feeding your pet potions. or giving it a back slot for a cloak of minor displacement.

But as most the community has pointed out jacking AC to unreal levels becomes less optimal the higher levels that you climb. It becomes about the 2nd layer of defense, the HP pool, and the saves.

FOr the most part I was talking Higher levels where simple "armor" is not as effective as lower levels when low level chumps can't even scratch you. Giants, Dragons, Monsters are going to be able to smash you just fine in that 40 AC like its almost not even there.

Quote:
Perfect example, the Fighter in the Rise of the Runelords campaign I played had the group's highest AC, in the low 40s (higher with Combat Expertise) at level 16. He still got stomped on by every non-trivial encounter, because his AC was simply not high enough and there was nothing he could really do to increase it.

I will give the same example of Rise of the Runelords. Our Paladin in heavy armor and a AC 40 was being hit almost every turn. Our Dragon Disciple Sorcerer had a 30 AC, Mirror Image, and stone skin wearing robes. Hardly anything touched him because when they got on him they couldn't hit him due to the combination of Mitigation and his flying movement. Not being there for full attacks is smarter then just relying on AC to trade blows with a creature with a 30+ strength. The paladin of that group died a total of 4 times that campaign because he was relying on AC and lay on hands to be enough to get him through. The player just thought it was his job to die so we could finish the fights but didn't see how he was costing the group. Resurrections are not cheap and some of his deaths could have easily been prevented with a potion of Mirror image.

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