Sorry to spam these threads like this, but I figure that I had best get my opinions in before Alpha 2 comes out and the boards are inundated with things about the other classes.
1. Weapon Training should give a +1 bonus to attack rolls and a +2 bonus to damage rolls. This serves two purposes. First, it fits with the Weapon Focus feat tree: +1 to-hit, +2 to damage. Secondly, it makes fighters that wear shields more viable--one of their biggest hindrances is their inability to do damage because of the 1-for-1 trade with Power Attack.
2. Damage reduction 5/- at level 19 is too little, too late for the fighter. This needs to be given out incrementally, probably with the armor training class feature.
3. Characters are still at a disadvantage for wearing heavy armor. In the grand scheme of things, that +3 to AC from wearing full plate doesn't matter that much compared to combat mobility. A mithril breastplate is light armor, and it's going to have an AC of 14 (5+5+4) versus the platemail's AC of 17. That's just not a big enough difference. I propose that damage reduction be incorporated into the armor training system:
--Wearing light armor grants a bonus of +1 AC and DR 1/- per armor training.
--Wearing medium armor grants a bonus of +1 AC and damage reduction 2/- per armor training.
--Wearing heavy armor grants a bonus of +1 AC and damage reduction 3/- per armor training.
This way, the heavily armored dwarf will play differently from the fleet-of-foot fencer. (Maybe this should stack with adamantine?)
Aside from that, I'm loving the changes to the fighter. It makes the "new player-friendly class" viable for twenty levels. As a final thought: Should the armor training bonus apply to unarmored fighters wielding a shield? I would say "yes," but that's just me.
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Plain armor should not give DR as a Pathfinder core rule imo, although I understand this is an option in a book I don't own (Unearthed Arcana?).
The game I just ran was at 1st level, so there wasn't much difference between the current 3.5 rules and the Alpha rules we were playtesting. The two fighter PCs did significantly more damage than the other three party members, but everyone got their own chance to shine. I'll have to playtest some midlevel and higher games for a full assessment.
You might have missed this, but Mobility has been changed. Now its a combat action that lets you simply ignore all AoO for the round.I don't think he was talking about the feat. I think he was talking about the ability to move around in combat, in that heavy armor slows down your character.
Correct.
Plain armor should not give DR as a Pathfinder core rule imo, although I understand this is an option in a book I don't own (Unearthed Arcana?).
I meant as a class feature of the armor training ability.
Bump.
--Wearing light armor grants a bonus of +1 AC and DR 1/- per armor training.
--Wearing medium armor grants a bonus of +1 AC and damage reduction 2/- per armor training.
--Wearing heavy armor grants a bonus of +1 AC and damage reduction 3/- per armor training.This way, the heavily armored dwarf will play differently from the fleet-of-foot fencer. (Maybe this should stack with adamantine?)
Should the armor training bonus apply to unarmored fighters wielding a shield? I would say "yes," but that's just me.
Hmm, agree with all of this. Actually makes me wanna use heavy armor when I'm not playing a Knight for once.
So let's vote "yes" on Fighter Proposal #723!
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Perhaps I misread your post. The way I read it, a fighter with armor training and full plate would get 24/- DR immediately. Now as I look over it again, I think you were saying they should add DR for each point of AC bonus from armor training. That is considerably smaller and more balanced, and I think it's worth playtesting.
Perhaps I misread your post. The way I read it, a fighter with armor training and full plate would get 24/- DR immediately. Now as I look over it again, I think you were saying they should add DR for each point of AC bonus from armor training. That is considerably smaller and more balanced, and I think it's worth playtesting.
Verily, thou has misread. I meant the latter.
Bump.
On behalf of Armor Training, I REALLY would like to see it improve the max.DEX as well!
(Besides, I think this makes even more sense than an improved AC-check penalty!)
I am all for removing armor penalties from fighters - speed, armor penalty, perhaps even Dex max.
I am not so happy about DR, mainly because it differs in effect too greatly between different enemies. The one-hit-wonder ignores it, the hundred-hit-horror is completely neutered.
What I have been using is a small amount of Hardness -- which works against all damage. Even a single point helps a lot against those pesky magic missiles.
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I am all for removing armor penalties from fighters - speed, armor penalty, perhaps even Dex max.
I am not so happy about DR, mainly because it differs in effect too greatly between different enemies. The one-hit-wonder ignores it, the hundred-hit-horror is completely neutered.
What I have been using is a small amount of Hardness -- which works against all damage. Even a single point helps a lot against those pesky magic missiles.
I have been testing in my current campaign the DR system in the UA (also in the SRD) where armors AC value is divided between AC and DR, thus full plate gives +4 AC and DR4/-.
My biggest problem with this system is the affect it has on small creatures who deal most of their damage through effects such as poison. creatures such as the quasit, imp, and even the sinspawn in Burnt Offerings find it hard to do enough damage to bypass the DR and if a creature hits but does no damage with the attack due to DR any effect delivered by wound such as poison also gets prevented.
Having used this system for a couple of sessions now there has been a great appeal to the players to upgrade their armor.
What I think would be a good solution is making DR a part of the armor focus fighters gain (granting them a unique benefit over other wearers of armor) and making the reduction specific to the armor, reducing damage to a minimum of 1 helps preserve the death-by-a-thousand-stings metaphor.
This also helps provide a distinct difference between the barbarians DR and a fighters.
Hardness seems a little too powerful for my liking as it affects every type of damage.
I think that heavy armor SHOULD make a huge difference. The person wearing it is sacrificing mobility for tankability (unless he's a dwarf, but dwarves are very strong as a race).
I also would like to see the fighter gain some type of mobility as a class ability when wearing armor, wether it is a "fighter only feat" or an actual class ability. Is it the knight that has this already? I can't remember.
I also like the idea of adding damage reduction to armor. I think it would be better to add it to the armor type itself rather than to the fighter as a class ability, but the fighter can improve an armor's starting DR as a class ability, much like reducing Armor check penalties an increasing the AC bonus as has already been proposed
I would also like to see a bump in the AC bonus of light and heavy shields to +2 and +3 respectively and make heavy shields harder to obtain for most classes. Small, but to me it makes sense.
Speaking of Weapon Training, is that bonus designed to stack with the Weapon Focus/Weapon Specialization Feats or replace it?