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I'm curious if there was ever an official ruling or lacking such what the general thought on this subject is.
A clever player wants to use a tower shield and occasionally use its special ability to gain full cover to block hallways while the spell casters stand behind him. Most monsters would either retreat or begin Sundering the shield. The 5 Hardness won't get very far as monsters get bigger so the player finds a way to get a shield normally not able to be crafted (Tower Shields normally can only be wood).
Make a Light Mithral Shield.
Enchant it to +1.
Enchant it with the Folding property.
Command the shield to be a Tower Shield which will stay as one until otherwise commanded to change again.
For Good Measure add a Fortifying Stone to give the new Tower Shield 20 hardness.
However do you think the shield would have the Base HP of it's original form or the form that it is currently in? Light Steel Shields have 10 Hp while Wooden Tower Shields have 20 before any enchantments.
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shields
Mithral
Damaging Objects
Folding
Stone Fortifying
Hardening
The difference between the buckler and tower shield in HP is 5 vs. 20. The size difference is enough to explain the added HP. I would be fine with allowing the HP to be that of the current size. However, if the current size is damaged and you reduce the size by folding it, you risk breaking it if the HP drops to zero.
According to Damaging Objects, each +1 enhancement gives +2 hardness and +10 HP.
Special materials for armor do not change the HP of that armor, so there is no reason it would change it for shields.
So, a mithral tower shield +1 w/fortifying stone would be:
Hit Points: 20 [tower] + 10 [+1 enchant] + 20 [stone] = 40
Hardness: 15 [mithral] + 2 [+1 enchant] + 5 [stone] = 22
Once 20 HP has damaged the shield, it drops to 17 hardness.
For the price of the Fortifying Stone, you could pay a 16th level wizard to cast Hardening. You get +8 rather than +5, and it never wears away. You don't get the 20 HP, but that additional hardness could prevent that much damage. For 1200 gp, you get +10 Hardness from a 20th level wizard. Only downside is that it is dispellable. [Again higher CL means harder to dispel.]
/cevah