Say I have the trait Defender of the Society trait, and wanted to trade in my old scale mail for Mithral Scale Mail; would the trait still apply?
Here is all the data that I think is applicable to the situation.
Defender of the Society
Your time spent fighting and studying the greatest warriors of the society has taught you new defensive skills while wearing armor.
Benefit: You gain a +1 trait bonus to Armor Class when wearing medium or heavy armor.
Scale Mail 50 gp AC:+5 MAx Dex:+3 Armor Check:–4
Mithral
Mithral is a very rare silvery, glistening metal that is lighter than steel but just as hard.
When worked like steel, it becomes a wonderful material from which to create armor, and is occasionally used for other items as well. Most mithral armors are one category lighter than normal for purposes of movement and other limitations. Heavy armors are treated as medium, and medium armors are treated as light, but light armors are still treated as light. This decrease does not apply to proficiency in wearing the armor. A character wearing mithral full plate must be proficient in wearing heavy armor to avoid adding the armor's check penalty to all his attack rolls and skill checks that involve moving. Spell failure chances for armors and shields made from mithral are decreased by 10%, maximum Dexterity bonuses are increased by 2, and armor check penalties are decreased by 3 (to a minimum of 0).
Items not primarily of metal are not meaningfully affected by being partially made of mithral. (A longsword can be a mithral weapon, while a quarterstaff cannot.) Mithral weapons count as silver for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
HP/inch 30
Hardness 15
Cost Weapons or armors fashioned from mithral are always masterwork items as well; the masterwork cost is included in the prices given below.
Weight 1/2 normal
Weight (Longer Wording) An item made from mithral weighs half as much as the same item made from other metals. In the case of weapons, this lighter weight does not change a weapon's size category or the ease with which it can be wielded (whether it is light, one-handed, or two-handed).
Yes. You threat mithral scale mail as a light armor for several purposes but it is still a medium armor (for example you need medium armor proficiency to use it witout penalty).
Thank you, that is exactly what I thought, but I wanted to double check.
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Nicos is correct, and the answer is in your quote:
When worked like steel, it becomes a wonderful material from which to create armor, and is occasionally used for other items as well. Most mithral armors are one category lighter than normal for purposes of movement and other limitations. Heavy armors are treated as medium, and medium armors are treated as light, but light armors are still treated as light. This decrease does not apply to proficiency in wearing the armor. A character wearing mithral full plate must be proficient in wearing heavy armor to avoid adding the armor's check penalty to all his attack rolls and skill checks that involve moving. Spell failure chances for armors and shields made from mithral are decreased by 10%, maximum Dexterity bonuses are increased by 2, and armor check penalties are decreased by 3 (to a minimum of 0).
Defender of the Society has nothing to do with movement, and being able to get +1 to your AC is certainly not a limitation. Therefore, it is not considered lighter armour for the purposes of the trait.
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So I looked up the rule:
Defender of the Society
Benefit: You gain a +1 trait bonus to Armor Class when wearing medium or heavy armor.
Your AC is different than your Armor Bonus, so if I got a +1 to AC it seems like this should be to all AC, as if my base AC is 11 rather than 10.
Or am I reading this incorrectly?
I think RAW it adds to touch AC just by being a bonus that is not defined one way or the other. It probably shouldn't, though.
Because he has a really good dex? If you have the dex to max out the AC bonus mithral armor allows you to obtain with it, it is always the best choice of armor.
He could be an archer fighter and thus have a high dex.
Multiclassing mainly...fighter and ranger :)
Not min maxing, but trying to keep with the character behavior and theme.
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Rules As Written. The other thing is RAI: Rules as Intended.
Basically RAW is "the letter of the law", RAI is "the spirit of the law".
The question is, why is a fighter buying mithral medium armor?
Because armor check penalties Suh-UCK.
Ah,but you barely have any skills as a fighter, so it will only affect one or two skills anyway :)
Which means you want them to actually count for something.
Man, y'all are getting side tracked and poor OP might not get the fighter innuendos going on here.
The trait applies when you are wearing any medium or heavy armor. The armor you are wearing, scale mail, is a medium armor, period. Mithral lets you treat it as if it were one category lighter specifically for the purpose of movement and encumbrance. But it is still medium sized armor, and still takes up the same amount of space as medium sized armor.
Your bonus to AC from the trait is a trait bonus, meaning it applies anywhere to AC that doesn't specifically say it doesn't. Luck, Sacred, Morale, Dodge, and Deflection bonuses all apply to Touch AC, so why not Trait? There is nothing in the rules that say it doesn't.
It seems we found one point in which mithral chainmail might be better than elven chain.
I know this is about scale mail but still.
It depends whether or not this falls under "other limitation",