Wearing mithril chain shirt and not being proficient?


Rules Questions


So mithril chain chirt has an armor check penalty of 0. Not being proficient with armor gives you a penalty to attacks equal to the armor check penalty. Does this mean that somone could wear a mithril chain shirt, not be proficient with it and take abs. no penalties? And is so would this work for mithril shields as well? I have a kensai magus that is using bracers of ac and ive been unable to find any above +2 so i was considering getting set of this enchanted and just eating the 10% spell fail... Thoughts?

Silver Crusade

You're spot on. No ACP, Arcane Failure chance of 10%.

There are feats and magical armour special abilities that can reduce that 10% to zero. 'Eating' that 10% sounds okay, until you lose a spell at exactly the wrong moment!

Try it! At the very least you'll end up with an interesting character death story! : )


Don't do it, simply because potions of Mage Armor don't have the penalty and are really cheap.

Also, though unlikely, while you're still in light armor some dms might invoke that you lose your canny defense in lew of no actual penalty for not being proficient(totally jerk dm move, but possible).


On the plus side he could cast his shocking hands before combat, and if he ever loses a spell he can still hit something with his sword!

If you want to go that route take the arcane armor feat!


hmm Potions or scrolls of mage armor would probably be better for the short term.


TheRonin wrote:
If you want to go that route take the arcane armor feat!

One of the prerequisites for arcane armor training is light armor proficiency.


Mythral Bucklers have no ACP, nor ASFC due to Mythral reducing it to 0 and leaves you with a free hand. SO your +5 Mythral buckler gives you the AC boost, no penalties (besides money) and stacks with Mage Armor. (Shield bonus)

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