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I'm not too far away from acquiring my holy mount in my crusade against evil. As I will most likely care for said mount, I will want to outfit him with decent barding. I, being a Tengu, am going to see if I can receive a roc as my mount (understanding that he'll have to grow into the role of mount), but am worried that I will not be able to afford his armor. I am aware that scale mail barding ought to cost about 200gp. However, as he needs to fly, I want to splurge and give him mithral scale mail. Will that cost about 4200gp or 16200gp? I'm really curious if material is multiplied into the cost, or if it is a flat rate added to the already multiplied armor.
Karasu, the plague doctor paladin.
There aren't (as far as I know) rules clearly stating this, but the cost of mithral should be applied after determining the base cost of the armor, not before. As you point out, a Large creature wanting armor is better off buying super-enchanted magic armor, rather than plain mithral.
That's why I don't quite understand. My gut says, "add material, then multiply," but that means mithral medium barding runs about the same cost as +4 light barding (within 1000gp)
Chainshirt barding:
100x4=400gp
+150 masterwork (as per crafting rules, cost is specifically added seperately)
+16000gp (+4 enchantment)
= 16550 for +4 chainshirt barding
Mithral Scale mail barding:
50x4=200
4000x4=16000 mithral
= 16200 (mithral scail barding)