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Personally I don't think comparing a special material cost to a +x enhancement or ability is a fair comparison. One is a one time fee, and the other makes +x enhancement or ability cost more. What you really should be asking is: is DR 3/- worth 15000 GP? And the answer is yes, but...
And there are a lot of qualifiers there. At level 20 every heavy armor user can afford adamantine armor, but some builds might want Mithral, or dragon scale, or a specific armor. And if you're not starting play at high levels, you'll probably already have magic amor that you'll have to sell, so you kind of have to include the money you're losing in the trade in the price of the adamantine armor. So the best time to get adamantine is around level 10-12 when your armor can still be around 2-3, but there's a lot of really nice things you can buy for similar costs at that level. If you wait til later levels you're probably trading in a higher enhancement armor, and the DR 3/- is going to be less and less impressive.
So is adamantine a good option? Yes. But so are a lot of things. And just how good it is depends on what you're playing.
Adamantine Haramaki is good, if you never want to worry about your Max Dex Bonus.
From the evidence, rust monsters rust all metal, without exception
I direct you to the Silversheen material ;)
Umm?It's not immune to a rust monster, if that's what you're asking.Silversheen is.Link?
(The description of Silversheen doesn't say that.)
Blades made of this special metal count as alchemical silver weapons and are immune to rust, including that of rust monsters, the rusting grasp spell, and so on. They are always masterwork weapons—most often scimitars or longswords; the listed price includes the cost of the masterwork bonus.
Linky (Requires a bit of scrolling)
Umm?It's not immune to a rust monster, if that's what you're asking.Silversheen is.Link?
(The description of Silversheen doesn't say that.)
Blades made of this special metal count as alchemical silver weapons and are immune to rust, including that of rust monsters, the rusting grasp spell, and so on. They are always masterwork weapons—most often scimitars or longswords; the listed price includes the cost of the masterwork bonus.Linky (Requires a bit of scrolling)
That Silversheen is from a Player Companion (Qadira, Gateway to the East). There is a different Silversheen in the Core Rulebook. That is the reason for the confusion.
A caster with access to the magic vestment spell could mitigate the cost. I'm thinking the armor would be viable for an 8th+ level cleric with heavy armor proficiency, Travel domain, and Extend Spell.
I have never seen a player choose Adamantine over Mithril unless playing a Fighter.
Generally overpriced garbage.
I have never seen a player choose Adamantine over Mithril unless playing a Fighter.
Generally overpriced garbage.
Agreed.
"But what about the mooks?". What about them? If you're getting hit multiple times per round by mooks with weapons, you deserve to die.
Well, depending on how your DR stacks, it can totally be worth it. Unless I am remember incorrectly (which I might be, please correct me if I'm wrong) DR of the same TYPE stacks, but DR of other types does not. So in the sense of using it as yet another source of DR, yes, it is very helpful because it helps to add a bonus here or there or everywhere.
I have a Brawler who's going to pick up an Adamantine Breastplate, because that along with everything else he's working with gives him quite a sizable amount of damage reduction. I believe by 20th he'd be getting somewhere close to DR 20/-, which is pretty nice. As a stand-alone item, it's generally not super useful, but if you don't need the mithral for higher Max Dex, I see no reason not to pick it up eventually.
Dwarfs mostly don't need mithral. But I haven't used adamantine armor so far.