The thing is that to really do armor as DR you need to rework pretty much everything in the game that affects to hit, AC, DR, HP, and saves from massive damage. So almost everything besides skills and some saves. It just doesn't make sense to make this and optional rule.
That's what makes it an optional rule. It's something to test, play with and figure out what other changes need to be made to make it work. Or if, for you, it is workable.
That's what makes it an optional rule. It's something to test, play with and figure out what other changes need to be made to make it work. Or if, for you, it is workable.
The thing is that to really do armor as DR you need to rework pretty much everything in the game that affects to hit, AC, DR, HP, and saves from massive damage. So almost everything besides skills and some saves. It just doesn't make sense to make this and optional rule.
Sigh. That is pretty much the exact opposite of what makes a good house rule. A good house rule can be run or returned to normal as is, and doesn't have huge rule implications that require massive rebuilds of PCs if brought into a running game or ones rolled up for normal Pathfinder to be redone when brought to the table.
I think it is fair to say that the most runners alone don't have the time to examine every spell that changes AC they let in there games. So right there you are going in blind. This isn't a tweak like hero points or standardized hit dice rolls it's a rework from the ground up. It's a poor idea to encourage people to do highly labor intensive tasks at home in their free time, like rebuild a game system from the ground up.
If big things are going to smack you without even stopping at your armor, the Reflex needs to be used in lieu of Dex for AC. Or using Dex to hit instead of Str, since Str is added to the damage because you're penetrating the armor.
I personally don't like the large creatures ignoring armor. Smaller the creature the easier is should be to ignore armor, (not natural armor) as they can slip between the cracks easier.
In addition, the ignoring is based purely upon size....not size difference, and not STR. I don't think this rule was playtested. The only thing protecting characters from the bigger mobs IS the AC. Take that away and you're going to have smears.
Sigh. That is pretty much the exact opposite of what makes a good house rule. A good house rule can be run or returned to normal as is, and doesn't have huge rule implications that require massive rebuilds of PCs if brought into a running game or ones rolled up for normal Pathfinder to be redone when brought to the table.I think it is fair to say that the most runners alone don't have the time to examine every spell that changes AC they let in there games. So right there you are going in blind. This isn't a tweak like hero points or standardized hit dice rolls it's a rework from the ground up. It's a poor idea to encourage people to do highly labor intensive tasks at home in their free time, like rebuild a game system from the ground up.
If you don't have the time / inclination to tinker then you don't use it. It's strictly optional. That's the point. It's a complete system change presented as an idea. Working it out is up to the DM / players. It is not a simple change or limited house rule.
There are plenty of "house rules" which make extensive changes to the rules. It isn't about "good or bad" rules. Complex or simple would be a better dichotomy. A simple or a complex rule could be either "good" or "bad".
Would it be game breaking to remove the size-bypass rule altogether? Also, what if DR/armor was equal to DR/-? How would that impact the game instead?
Right now, zen archer monks, Druid animal companions (large) and anyone with the enlarge spell cast on them get a serious advantage.
Goodness, I want to get this system to work, but I'm not sure if it's possible without tons of houserules.
Zen Archers shouldn't have any easier time overcoming armor DR than any other archer; they don't get the ki pool counts-as-magic/alignment/adamantine to their bow attacks, just their unarmed attacks. Ki arrows only changes the damage dice, nothing else.
Boy, I want to say you're wrong here, but I'm having trouble proving it. You're right that no where in Zen Archer does it say Ki Strike applies to bows.
My group doesn't have magic weapons yet (low magic world), but they will soon.
I would like to see he DR/- idea playtested. Of course, typed DR would still stack and exist, but DR/- would exist for armor.
What do you think about the defense rating? Is it acceptable to make it so very easy to hit things? It really gives a power boost to players, but now that I think about it, it makes things like combat expertise and fighting defensively a workable battle strategy.
Why do you need to re-work everything? At most you'd need to add in a small scaling defense bonus that increases as you level up, if it proves that the small AC loss from the non-enchanted parts of armor and the bonus of an amulet of natural armor winds up hurting high-defense, low-armor-DR builds too much.
Because if you change the way damage, AC/to hit, and DR works, pretty much everything besides skills needs to be looked at again. Check the SKR link earlier in the thread.
If you don't have the time / inclination to tinker then you don't use it. It's strictly optional. That's the point. It's a complete system change presented as an idea. Working it out is up to the DM / players. It is not a simple change or limited house rule.
And giving people a option that will take huge amounts of time to do correctly and acting like it's something they can try on a normal weekly game session is complex to the point of being bad.
Where's the problem again?
Sigh. The problem is that there are tons of feats, class abilities, and spells that change AC, DR, and to hit bonuses. If you do a major change they need to be reexamined at the least, possibly reworked. It opens the door to who knows what silly and/or OP builds that didn't work before.
You keep making this assertion, but you have not provided any reason that the assertion is true.
Are you seriously claiming you don't understand why changing the rules for AC and DR requires you to reexamine game effects that are based around AC and DR? That is something that needs a proof?
If you don't have the time / inclination to tinker then you don't use it. It's strictly optional. That's the point. It's a complete system change presented as an idea. Working it out is up to the DM / players. It is not a simple change or limited house rule.And giving people a option that will take huge amounts of time to do correctly and acting like it's something they can try on a normal weekly game session is complex to the point of being bad.
Where do you see them encouraging this as something easy? You must be reading a different book than me. To quote from the intro on the optional rules:
"As these options significantly revise how the game works, players
and GMs should be extremely careful when deciding whether or not to incorporate these optional rules into an existing campaign, and should be prepared for an additional layer of complexity and potential slowdowns in gameplay as everyone at the table works on getting up
to speed." (Ultimate Combat, page 190)
Well? I think they laid out the effort and problems succinctly.
I'm hoping to apply the DR/armor rules to my upcoming Jade Regent game, in conjunction with Wounds/Vitality & Called Shots. My main concern with the DR/armor rules is a feeling (no math behind it, just going with simple observation) that the rules in and of themselves support the "sweet spot" of mid-level gaming. Low levels will see medium to heavily armored foes practically invulnerable to characters that can't do a lot of damage, but the Defense stat shouldn't make hitting much harder than with AC. High levels and everyone will be pretty easy to hit, and most characters will have a variety of methods to chew through DR like it's so much paste.
On the plus side, I see "Enlarge Person" will swiftly become a much more popular spell.
I removed some posts. Play nice.
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Here is my two cents:
Allowing certain types of creatures to override DR is the equivalent to allowing them to make touch attacks.
Allowing certain weapon types to override DR is the equivalent to allowing them to make touch attacks.
The Crit system is needlessly complicated. I'd rule that confirmed critical hits override armor-based DR. Simple as that.
I was so excited to see Armor as DR, and then was so disappointed once I read it. I don't know what I'd change to make it work, but until you can show me that it is equal in power to the standard system (I think the new system is underpowered and complicated) I won't be using it.
My biggest issue is that it makes AC even worse. With armor as DR, GM really doesn't even need to roll to hit by level 10.
Here is my two cents:
Allowing certain types of creatures to override DR is the equivalent to allowing them to make touch attacks.
Allowing certain weapon types to override DR is the equivalent to allowing them to make touch attacks.
The Crit system is needlessly complicated. I'd rule that confirmed critical hits override armor-based DR. Simple as that.
I was so excited to see Armor as DR, and then was so disappointed once I read it. I don't know what I'd change to make it work, but until you can show me that it is equal in power to the standard system (I think the new system is underpowered and complicated) I won't be using it.
Agree.
So my idea (even before Paizo made this bungle) is:
Armor provides DR.
Armor type (light/medium/heavy) provides bonus to AC/defense (+1/+2/+3).Shield provides shield bonus to AC.
AC is 10+Reflex Save (but reduce Dex bonus to Reflex Save if the Armor's Max Dex bonus reduces the Dex bonus to AC)+armor bonus to AC+Shield bonus+other bonuses.
Mage Armor provides DR and +1 AC.
Shield provides shield bonus to AC.
So yes, Fighters will most likely have lower AC, but will also wear heavier armor. I also had to be creative as a GM with some Combat Archetypes (allowing switching of Fortitude Saves to Reflex saves for more nimble fighters, etc.).
Later on I added Penetration based on max damage/8, round down. (So if you have someone inflict 2d8+10 dmg, that character would have (26/8=3.25) Penetration 3 for that weapon) Add +1 to Penetration to arrows and +2 to crossbow bolts (even though you could just increase the dmg crossbows inflict to a next higher step = 1d6 to 1d8; 1d8 to 2d6; etc).
I also use called shots, lower Massive damage threshold with variants on what happens to the character based on the amount of damage received, etc.
And Player's adjusted and have become more creative in how they resolve attacks.
It's just a quick and dirty intro into this version of Armor as DR.
Regards,
Kosta
What you have outlined here is almost exactly what I plan to use, except for the penetration rule. I instinctively like the idea of it, but I am not quite sure of its purpose. IF an attack does more damage, then more will get through. What are you modelling with your penetration?
After numerous discussions, this is what we will play test next session:
Armor provides DR/- and stacks, Example, chain shirt provides 4 DR/-, if you already have DR from another source it stacks, but as listed. So 4 DR/slashing would be 8 DR vs all attacks, but only 4 DR vs slashing.
Size never bypasses DR
Defense is calculated as RAW, except you get +1 per 1/2 character level. 4th level character has a +2 to defense.
For now, we will keep crits as the optional rules to see the effects of these changes.
Well, here's a perspective from the gaming table. We used the Armor as DR rules in conjunction with Wounds/Vigor & Called Shots in our opening fight with some random goblins, and found it mainly made the game a whole lot slower. While conceptually the rules look great on paper, it made for Goblins that couldn't harm the front-line fighters, though their archers proved somewhat effective against the PC archers/spellcasters. Because of that, we experimented with the idea that Called Shots could slip pass (or reduce) DR. My players concluded it negated the point of wearing armor as everyone would move to Called Shots just to avoid DR, and the penalties for Called Shots didn't balance out with what they were loosing in AC for Defense.
The Wound/Vigor rules just slowed the Goblin's inevitable demise to a crawl.
Back to focusing on the DR/armor issue (this threads main subject, after all), just from the perspective of low level encounter builds, it means that many low-end monsters will effectively be unable to harm their opponents, leaving them open to be slaughtered in turn, as they often will not have comparable AC-to-DR ratios. However, any monster with both DR, Natural Armor & regular armor (such as Skeletons, who end up with a DR of 9 vs. most attacks at that point) will be MUCH harder to kill for the PCs. If I were to use DR as Armor again, I'd consider changing CRs of most encounters where the DR/armor & Defense ratings made such a drastic change in battle-strengths.
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Having finally gotten ahold of UC, the armour as DR system presented in it makes no real sense to me.
As far as I can can, you now always hit the guy's armour, even on a critical, because the DR always applies. So, even if the guy you're attacking is just wearing one of those haramaki 'belly warmer' things as a strip of chainmail across his stomach, you always hit it, every time... I guess it helps with the chainmail bikini wearing crowd, but apart from that, it's just a horrid concept, IMHO.
Compare to the Conan RPG armour as DR rules, where you can try to bypass the armour instead of go through it (via finesse fighting), and weapons have penetration ratings (coupled with Strength bonuses) to help defeat DR too.
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Pathfinder's system isn't designed to completely rewrite the combat system with ten different modifiers to apply for every attack. It's an extension of an abstract combat system that remains an abstract combat system.
Allowing characters to try to bypass, instead of go through, armour takes at most one or two added lines of text. It's hardly a huge added layer of complexity or a complete re-write. In fact, it's less of a re-write, as it's just saying 'hey, you can still choose to do it the old way too'.
Adding penetration rules would be a little added complexity, and would require penetration values for all the existing weapons, so I can see why they'd steer clear of that one, yes.
And a chainmail bikini is only going to be DR 1 at most unless it's magical, which kind of negates your entire snarky point.
How does that negate my point (snarky or not, YMMV) that the rules are forcing you to target the armoured sections of your enemy every single time? It's the same point, be it 1 DR or 100 DR their armour gives them.
How does that negate my point (snarky or not, YMMV) that the rules are forcing you to target the armoured sections of your enemy every single time? It's the same point, be it 1 DR or 100 DR their armour gives them.
I look at the DR as being averaged by coverage. Hence lower DR for chain shirts vs. full chainmail. Thus the effect of trying to bypass DR by avoiding the armor is built in. Saves a called shot type alternative to avoid it. My 2 cp.
*edit* It would be fairly easy to build in armor penetration for different types of attack (piercing, slashing, bludgeoning) vs. specific armor types but that does add a layer of additional complexity to an abstract system. Having critical hits bypass DR / vigor and go straught to wound points (probably without a damage multiplier) would be another way of simulating missing the armor. Ymmv.
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The core armour rules already abstract armour as both coverage and difficulty to penetrate - it's fluff as to whether your attack went through or around the armour.
With the UC armour as DR rules, since armour always has an effect now, you're either hitting it all the time, or the system has abstracted combat to an even greater degree. Maybe that's what the designers were going for - an even more abstract combat system - I really don't know; but in my experience it's usually people more concerned with adding levels of realism, not subtracting them, who call for armour as DR in the first place. I could be wrong...
The core armour rules already abstract armour as both coverage and difficulty to penetrate - it's fluff as to whether your attack went through or around the armour.
With the UC armour as DR rules, since armour always has an effect now, you're either hitting it all the time, or the system has abstracted combat to an even greater degree. Maybe that's what the designers were going for - an even more abstract combat system - I really don't know; but in my experience it's usually people more concerned with adding levels of realism, not subtracting them, who call for armour as DR in the first place. I could be wrong...
True about the always effective DR. I think they opted to keep it simple. Otherwise you end up with Runequest style fights where you make umpteen rolls to see if you hit, where you hit (armor by location), if they dodge, what the damage was. One way of dealing with that is to make DR a range instead of a fixed value. I.e. roll a d8-2 for chainmail DR. Not sure what values I'd use but that worked fairly well in another Chaosium game Elric / Stormbringer to reduce the complexity a bit.
You could say that crits bypass DR (all of the DR) seeing as they are generally rare and represent a particularly nasty strike.
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You could say that crits bypass DR (all of the DR) seeing as they are generally rare and represent a particularly nasty strike.
While that's a reasonable idea, for me it falls down because the high crit-range weapons are all the ones which really shouldn't be armour piercing in any realistic context (scimitars et al), and the realistically armour piercing weapons (military picks, etc.) have high crit multipliers instead.
Just been thinking about it , and though the DR, piecemeal armor, and called shot rules make things more complicated, they also make combat something more than the usual roll-to-hit/roll-to-damage. That could be a good thing for players who have been playing a long time and want some new toys. The piecemeal armor gives you an idea as to what parts are covered, the DR and called shots rules tell you when your hit armor and when you bypass it.
Me and a friend of mine spent last night talking about the Armor as DR system, and we thought up of some "fixes" for it, since it seems to require a full out re-haul of the system to work correctly.
Let's start out with the fact at low level, it works due to the low attack roll bonuses. By higher level, everyone hits. What I thought up/realized was that this system is supposed to make it more realistic. So I thought of this: do humans really use brute strength to hit? Sure, we need it to damage, but not to hit. The concept of Dexterity also seems odd-ish. So I thought up of these simple (or not so simple, maybe :/ ) rules for my games, which I'll be trying out.
Attack rolls no longer add Str or Dex to them. If you look at the higher BAB levels, the first attacks are sure hits, but the following ones aren't. Imagine a fighter swinging a greatsword. His first blow will strike true, but he has to use the momentum and time to bring the weapon fully back around, giving his foe a chance to dodge (Example: Monk's flurry of blows at level 20 is: +18/18/13/13/8/8/3. The first four punches/kicks strike true, but the last 3 are slower). This also works well for feats like Power Attack, as the penalty becomes worthy, just as in normal rules (with these home rule fixes, that -1 or -2 penalty from levels 1 to 5 make a big difference if your normal attack roll is +0). Furthermore, the size modifiers on attack rolls and Defense work normally. It's hard for a lumbering Hill Giant to crush an agile Halfling (the difference granted is basically a +2 Defense bonus for our Halfling hero)
Furthermore, we downdated the favored enemy back to 3rd edition, where you gained the bonus to damage rolls, but not to attack. Makes sense, given if they're your favored foe, you'd want to work on your damaging power. (+2 bonus no longer applies to attack rolls)
The fighter's weapon training works as normal at first, but as the damage bonus increases, attack stays(to clarify, every level of Weapon Training grants a +1 on attack rolls to the new focused weapon group, as you've focused on your swings with the weapons, while the damage grows to +2 at Weapon Training 2 for your first group. Basically, by WT2, your first WT is +1/+2. At WT4, it's +1/+4)
The Paladin's Smite Evil works out prefect, as the Cha mod bonus to attack rolls is fitting, as your deity fills you with the power to strike true.
Now, as for the damage reduction, let's look at it like this. Most high level monsters don't wear armor, but have massive natural armor. At this time, you're likely to have a magic weapon or three on hand.
We'll use the Grablezu Demon as an example. In these rules, it has DR 32 (DR 10/good, DR 22/magic or Gargantuan). The size overcoming DR is based on +1, +2, and +3 size modifiers(nonmagic, magic, and adamantine armor, retrospectively). This leaves our AC 28 demon at Defense 8, with a massive DR if you don't use a magic weapon on it.
The Nymph, however, gains no difference in Defense, as all her bonuses to AC are naturally added to Defense, making her have Defense 23, Flatfooted 17. It makes sense, since her "deflection" bonus is the fact no one wants to harm such a thing of beauty.
While I'm at it, I'll cover Wounds and Vigor. At low levels, it makes the foes harder to kill (your Goblin with 6 HP becomes 6 Vigor, Wounds 24, making it have HP 30, while the 6 HP wizard goes 6 Vigor, 20 Wounds, to basically 26 HP), but at higher levels, they become easier to kill (Our Glabrezu demon goes from 186 HP to Vigor 66, Wounds 62, making it 128 HP). Anyone who looks at the higher levels knows that the battle drag on due to the high HP, High AC ratio. By fusing Armor as DR and Wounds and Vigor, you create creatures that are easy to hit, but hard to damage, with less ability to absorb damage that reaches their body than normal.
These homebrew rules may need revising, so I'm grateful to anyone who'd be willing to look these over and edit it :)
I thought up of more ideas to my fix.
To make up for the fact that light armored heroes, like Rogues, lack the high Defense they deserve, I added a feature from 4th edition DnD to it: a dodge bonus to Defense equal to half your character level, subject to the same limitations as Dex bonus with armor. This way, heavy armored units offer low Defense, but high DR, while agile light units like Rogues still maintain their mobility and evasive natures.
The second add-on is a special way to overcome or reduce DR from armor. A warhammer or heavy mace shouldn't be subject to the same DR as a longsword or dagger. Henceforth, a new weapon special ability is made: Armor Break (name subject to change). With this ability, any weapon that possesses this trait treat DR from armor and natural armor as being 1/2, rounded up. This acts similar to DR/Bludgeoning weapons. Furthermore, if the damage dealt equals at least twice the DR the armor/natural armor grants, it completely ignores the DR (this is due to the sheer force of the attack, as given enough force, any blow can break through armor). HOWEVER, Armor Break only works against METALLIC or STONE-based armor (stone-based includes Stoneplate) Meaning, any type of armor that a Druid is naturally allowed to wear (including Dragonhide armor) is immune to the Armor Break property
I'll be making a list of weapons that possess Armor Break, but feel free to add it to weapons as you see fit. A normal unarmed strike does not have Armor Break; however, a monk's unarmed strike possess it (or perhaps Ki Strike acts like it, seeing as how Ki Strike grants it the properties that overcome nonmagical and magical armor DR)
Also, Natural armor hinders this Agility Dodge bonus. To give a rough basis, treat natural armor as armor that grants roughly the same bonus amount [within +1 bonus] (ex. +4 =hide armor, +9 or higher= full plate) to determine maximum Agility dodge bonus. If two sets of armor offer the same bonus, treat the natural armor as the worse of the two for Dex bonus.
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Good day everyone. I just recently read though this treat and I'm quite thankful for all the feedback. Makes my work easier on this particular project.
I have not changed much as of yet, but I do belief that the "size required to bypass DR" needs a revision. Mine is that the system will work with size differences, rather than with the normal sizes. For example: a Medium Humanoid's armor would be bypassed by a Large creature, but if the humanoid drinks a potion of enlarge person and turns large, the large creature and him now share the same size, thus they do not negate each other's DR.
Also I noticed that there was nothing regarding size benefits for smaller creatures which, in my humble opinion, just screws them much more. Say you play a halfling. Every human you encounter will ignore your armor unless you get your hands on a magical one. Sucks for you, young halfling cavalier.
So per each size category you are smaller than your enemy you add +2 to your defense.
Is this any good?