I already explained the unworked gold... no one USES unworked gold. Gold armor is never stated as 100% pure and it a final product that's "Magically strengthened" and that can't happen unworked as even simple rings can't keep their shapes when made of pure gold.I'm AFB, but what I can find on Gold as a special material is "Items constructed purely of gold cost 10 times the normal cost for items of their type." and that you can make Light and Medium metal armor out of gold.
When people say "it's made of gold", that's most times not exactly true. It's mostly in grade or karats less than 24 karats. So for instance, I'm assuming that "constructed purely of gold" is made purely of 22 or 18 karat gold. Recall the section is differentiating between plated vs uniform construction.
The reason I'm assuming 22 or 18 is that pure gold in unsuitable for making even small jewelry as it's too soft. You'd have to construct the entire suit of armor before hardening it magically [it targets items not pieces of items] so I just can see 100% pure gold as a viable possibility.
And to be clear, me tossing out reasons for the metal armor ban is just that: in the end, it really doesn't matter and doesn't have to make the least bit of 'sense' to us. The power's that grant druids power set up the rules and it only has to make sense to them. It can be symbolic, metaphysical or the result of time and space having a game of darts... Maybe Mother Nature is allergic to metal? In the end, it's all pretty moot.
The reason I'm assuming 22 or 18 is that pure gold in unsuitable for making even small jewelry as it's too soft. You'd have to construct the entire suit of armor before hardening it magically [it targets items not pieces of items] so I just can see 100% pure gold as a viable possibility.
I stand by the gold armor is silly position, but I disagree with so stringent that view of making a magic suit of nonsense armor is. Yes, we have the list of mechanical prerequisites to make the suit, but the process itself needn't be so rigid.
That said, if we want to be so precise on process, medieval armor was generally constructed in pieces by apprentices or journeymen, then those components were inspected and assembled into one final piece by the master armorsmith. Each individual component could be made of 24k gold, then be subjected to a Hardening spell, which is permanent, and gives the armor the hardness it requires to, you know, exist as a physical object long enough to be put together. Then once all these hardened pieces are put together into a suit of masterwork armor, enchant the final whole, giving that 24k gold the strength of steel.
|
Metal armor => mine ore, cut trees to make charcoal and or dig coal out to the ground, smelt metal, burn more wood/charcoal/coal to forge the raw metal to armor.
Leather armor => Thank you animal for giving your life to feed me and my family. I will in your honor use all of your body for a useful purpose which can include tanning your hide to make leather and armor.
Seems to make sense to me......
I'll give you one whole interweb cookie if you can reverse this, since one is clearly a process without roleplay and the other is full of it.
Put a Dwarven spin on it if it will help. :)
Metal is natural.
Rules are not.
Blame Gygax. At least Clerics can now use swords, Dearves can be wizards and Bards aren't a PrC.
That said, if we want to be so precise on process, medieval armor was generally constructed in pieces by apprentices or journeymen, then those components were inspected and assembled into one final piece by the master armorsmith. Each individual component could be made of 24k gold, then be subjected to a Hardening spell, which is permanent, and gives the armor the hardness it requires to, you know, exist as a physical object long enough to be put together. Then once all these hardened pieces are put together into a suit of masterwork armor, enchant the final whole, giving that 24k gold the strength of steel.
I'm aware of how armor is processed. I'm also aware of how it's stated in the special material section: you harden an item and not individual pieces.
However, let's go with your theory that parts can be done individually... that means hardening each part individually... SO you make a chain shirt and each link gets its own hardening: the catch is that when you're using special materials that have an unlisted weight, the minimum cost is 1/2 a pound [FAQ] so that means each part is a minimum of 50gp to harden. So lets say a conservative 20,000 links at 50gp a piece... so 1 million gp. Or of course, you can put it together first with a feasible karat of gold so you can only pay once. ;)
The metal restriction is a silly, inconsistently-applied artifact from the days when clerics couldn't wield swords and wizards didn't know how crossbows worked. You can feel free to ignore it if you think it's too dumb to put up with. They'll just wild shape out of the armor in a few levels, anyways.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
EDIT: In fact, one could make the argument that it is precisely the lack of rational sense that makes the prohibition so valuable. All of the explanations cover up the fact that, when you get right down to it, the taboo is absurd and serves no purpose. Which, paradoxically, is what gives it its value and purpose.
So it's a pointless inconvenience and pain to teach a lesson in humility and faithfulness to all laws of nature, even the arbitrary ones. A literal hairshirt, if you will. I like that spin the best.
I'm aware of how armor is processed. I'm also aware of how it's stated in the special material section: you harden an item and not individual pieces.
However, let's go with your theory that parts can be done individually... that means hardening each part individually... SO you make a chain shirt and each link gets its own hardening: the catch is that when you're using special materials that have an unlisted weight, the minimum cost is 1/2 a pound [FAQ] so that means each part is a minimum of 50gp to harden. So lets say a conservative 20,000 links at 50gp a piece... so 1 million gp. Or of course, you can put it together first with a feasible karat of gold so you can only pay once. ;)
Ah, but we aren't talking about just ANY special material. We're talking about GOLD!
And conveniently enough, gold has its own special subdivided unit of 1gp (which is 1/50th of a pound). :P
Also, it seems like it would be significantly easier to make a small portion of mail, then harden that to "save" your work, so you're not doing each link individually.
Its really more so about the iron. Iron is bane to fae and spirits and druids were suppose to be getting their powers from that sort of thing. You would think worked steel would be ok at that point really. Since technically its cold iron that gets fae but these restriction are grandfathered in on down the line back in 1st edition it was like this.
I always felt Druid were meant to be anti-science in flavor. There is plenty of material for druids if one would want to find examples of anti-civilization druids. There is a point in human history where we moved away from being dependent on nature to starting to harness it and becoming independent from it. When man stop being a nomad and built his settlements, he was forever divorced from the normal cycles and roaming of nature.
But DnD does not have to be so hardcore about it. I do love me some Circle Orboros sometimes. Walls are a sin!
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Metal armor => mine ore, cut trees to make charcoal and or dig coal out to the ground, smelt metal, burn more wood/charcoal/coal to forge the raw metal to armor.
Leather armor => Thank you animal for giving your life to feed me and my family. I will in your honor use all of your body for a useful purpose which can include tanning your hide to make leather and armor.
Seems to make sense to me......
I'll give you one whole interweb cookie if you can reverse this, since one is clearly a process without roleplay and the other is full of it.
Put a Dwarven spin on it if it will help. :)
Am I eligible for the cookie?
Metal armor => The fruit of the deep earth's womb, purified and shaped in elemental fire fed by the smoldering nuggets of trees felled by lightning. The earth protects me as I protect her children.
Leather armor => Kill animal, skin it, soak the skin in water to get rid of the filth, then scrape off flesh and fat, soak in urine, scrape off hair, soak in dung, boil the stuff to harden it, stitch it together.
|
Is steel? No.Sure it is. Steel is created by humans, and humans are part of nature.I'll alert everyone that climate change is naturally caused, as is radioactive waste then.
Often is the adventure I find a wagon naturally sprouting in the middle of a forest. And sometimes a village. Maybe your.druif can wear that village.
Well technicalllllly some climate change is caused by natural events. Volcanic explosions put huge amounts of pollutants into the atmosphere.
In fact, it's thought that if one of Earth's dormant super volcanoes were to go off it would put us into another ice age.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
congratulations everyone the thread has gone into the absurd.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Internet threads are naturally absurd
| 14 people marked this as a favorite. |
congratulations everyone the thread has gone into the absurd.
We've long since crossed that bridge, burned it, smelted the remains, molded the result into armor, and slapped it on a druid, thereby causing every paladin in a thirty mile radius to spontaneously fall hammer-first onto a pile of baby goblin orphans, exploding each infant into a fine red mist.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
congratulations everyone the thread has gone into the absurd.We've long since crossed that bridge, burned it, smelted the remains, molded the result into armor, and slapped it on a druid, thereby causing every paladin in a thirty mile radius to spontaneously fall hammer-first onto a pile of baby goblin orphans, exploding each infant into a fine red mist.
Wow I actually for true laughed out loud on that one not just the standard LOL.
Metal armor disrupts the mystical flow of electromagnetic flow of nature energy that empowers druids. Smaller amounts of metal, like in a scimitar, will not so this.
And Druids are OK with this restriction, because normally metal armor can only be forged by highly developed civilizations of the sort that drive away nature.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
congratulations everyone the thread has gone into the absurd.We've long since crossed that bridge, burned it, smelted the remains, molded the result into armor, and slapped it on a druid, thereby causing every paladin in a thirty mile radius to spontaneously fall hammer-first onto a pile of baby goblin orphans, exploding each infant into a fine red mist.
In older editions druids and clerics had a sacred Ethos tied to the class. No metal armor for druids and no certain weapons for clerics and druids. Talking from pure memory here, but I think barbarians also had a superstitious fear against arcane magic (The Art).
Nowadays is just a flavor rule, the class is strong enough to live with that rule. I've yet to see a day when one of our table complains about that rule in a "damn I could use a metal armor right now" manner.
Fun fact: In Ad D&D Merlin was a high level wizard-druid.
As others have pointed out it's just a relic from previous editions; how you explain it in your games or if you have it at all is up to you. It's like how until alternative race traits were an option you'd have human raised half-orc wizards who are somehow innately proficient with greataxes and falchions.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Have you heard of any climate change or radioactive waste... not caused by the laws of nature? If so, please enlighten me, as that would be a confusing, fascinating, and rather terrifying occurrence.
While I agree "natural" is a somewhat loaded word and difficult to pin down, being deliberately obtuse about it is not helpful, nor is it in good faith.
The type of "natural" relevant to the druid is more closely related to aesthetics and sentiment than definitions and semantics. And you are leaning hard into those semantics.
The type of "natural" relevant to the druid is more closely related to aesthetics and sentiment than definitions and semantics.
And nothing matches those 'aesthetics and sentiment' more than covering yourself in ostentatious bling like gold full chain! ;P
Now I can't get the thought of Mr T as a druid out of my head...
|
|
Metal armor => mine ore, cut trees to make charcoal and or dig coal out to the ground, smelt metal, burn more wood/charcoal/coal to forge the raw metal to armor.
Leather armor => Thank you animal for giving your life to feed me and my family. I will in your honor use all of your body for a useful purpose which can include tanning your hide to make leather and armor.
Seems to make sense to me......
I'll give you one whole interweb cookie if you can reverse this, since one is clearly a process without roleplay and the other is full of it.
Put a Dwarven spin on it if it will help. :)
Am I eligible for the cookie?
Metal armor => The fruit of the deep earth's womb, purified and shaped in elemental fire fed by the smoldering nuggets of trees felled by lightning. The earth protects me as I protect her children.
Leather armor => Kill animal, skin it, soak the skin in water to get rid of the filth, then scrape off flesh and fat, soak in urine, scrape off hair, soak in dung, boil the stuff to harden it, stitch it together.
Here's your interweb cookie. *hands one over*
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
And nothing matches those 'aesthetics and sentiment' more than covering yourself in ostentatious bling like gold full chain! ;P
Now I can't get the thought of Mr T as a druid out of my head...
Now that's just silly.
Everyone knows Mr. T is a Night Elf Mohawk! :D
True, I am being deliberately obtuse, and for that I apologize.
But my obtuseness has a point. Namely, that the so-called human/nature dichotomy is an arbitrary and contrived distinction that only serves to further the destructive narrative of human exceptionalism that pervades so much of mainstream philosophical thought.
Is that a bit more constructive?
It is, but that's also literally the foundation of the Druid class. They're built on Captain Planet logic.
And modern science and logic does not necessarily apply in a setting where clapping your hands if you believe mends bones, ten ton lizards can fly on bat wings, and high level mundane human can easily survive having their throat slit a dozen times in their sleep.
Now that's just silly.
I can see him saying "I pity the fool that doesn't respect nature!" while riding a dark black wagon [van] with a red streak down it, and punching people out with gold encrusted fists!
At this point, I've decided that Druid Magic is similar to Vegan Powers. It is simply a power attained when you follow an arbitrary set of rules that a bunch of people came up with in order to make themselves feel better than everyone else. ;)
I still find it humorous that people are looking for rational explanations behind religious strictures.
If anything, I think Pathfinder religions in general are entirely too rational. There aren't anywhere near enough arbitrary restrictions and requirements akin to those that we see in "real world" religions.
Does anyone remember the Sherri S. Tepper book where sometime in the distant past this woman had saved civilization and then, just before departing, said "Don't let anyone mess with your heads" and it had evolved into an elaborate (and bitterly contested) set of hair/head themed religious restrictions?
Considering we're talking about access to a powerful energy source, in my perspective it's like asking hydroelectric plants to make sense.I still find it humorous that people are looking for rational explanations behind religious strictures.
If anything, I think Pathfinder religions in general are entirely too rational. There aren't anywhere near enough arbitrary restrictions and requirements akin to those that we see in "real world" religions.
*narrows eyes*
Considering we're talking about access to a powerful energy source, in my perspective it's like asking hydroelectric plants to make sense.I still find it humorous that people are looking for rational explanations behind religious strictures.
If anything, I think Pathfinder religions in general are entirely too rational. There aren't anywhere near enough arbitrary restrictions and requirements akin to those that we see in "real world" religions.
Well yes, if power plants were powered by "personifications of elemental forces, natural powers, or nature itself" but then we're coming AWFUL close to FF7 Mako power. Since we aren't in FF7 though, it's kind of moot.
You're expecting a "personification of elemental forces" to make logical 'human' sense, and that's illogical. You can't explain divine/mystical power with real world physics. Well, you don't if you care about all the catgirls you kill trying to do it. ;)
Considering we're talking about access to a powerful energy source, in my perspective it's like asking hydroelectric plants to make sense.
I would say it is much more equivalent to fulfilling the regulatory requirements to build a hydroelectric plant and also to distribute the energy. Some make sense, some less so and opinions on which is which vary widely depending on personal perspective and ethos.
But if you don't follow them, you can't build the plant and sell the power no matter how much you might believe they are frivolous.
Does anyone remember the Sherri S. Tepper book where sometime in the distant past this woman had saved civilization and then, just before departing, said "Don't let anyone mess with your heads" and it had evolved into an elaborate (and bitterly contested) set of hair/head themed religious restrictions?I still find it humorous that people are looking for rational explanations behind religious strictures.
If anything, I think Pathfinder religions in general are entirely too rational. There aren't anywhere near enough arbitrary restrictions and requirements akin to those that we see in "real world" religions.
No, but you've just added to my ridiculously long author backlog. Thanks a lot. : )
No, but you've just added to my ridiculously long author backlog. Thanks a lot. : )Does anyone remember the Sherri S. Tepper book where sometime in the distant past this woman had saved civilization and then, just before departing, said "Don't let anyone mess with your heads" and it had evolved into an elaborate (and bitterly contested) set of hair/head themed religious restrictions?I still find it humorous that people are looking for rational explanations behind religious strictures.
If anything, I think Pathfinder religions in general are entirely too rational. There aren't anywhere near enough arbitrary restrictions and requirements akin to those that we see in "real world" religions.
Don't blame me. Blame Gutenberg.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It is, but that's also literally the foundation of the Druid class. They're built on Captain Planet logic.I mean, the question of "is metal armor natural?" is entirely separate from the question of "can druids wear metal armor?". The answer to the latter is obviously "no," for exactly the same reason that druids need a grasshopper's hind leg to cast jump - because the rules say so. It's a hoop that druids have to jump through, and if you don't like it, you can find a workaround or play something else. But none of that has any bearing on whether steel armor or radioactive waste or the Eiffel Tower are natural. The answer to that is obvious as well, unless you contort your worldview to maintain an image of humans as categorically special entities that stand apart from the rest of the universe.
The Aboleths stand by that.
The Aboleths stand by that.It is, but that's also literally the foundation of the Druid class. They're built on Captain Planet logic.I mean, the question of "is metal armor natural?" is entirely separate from the question of "can druids wear metal armor?". The answer to the latter is obviously "no," for exactly the same reason that druids need a grasshopper's hind leg to cast jump - because the rules say so. It's a hoop that druids have to jump through, and if you don't like it, you can find a workaround or play something else. But none of that has any bearing on whether steel armor or radioactive waste or the Eiffel Tower are natural. The answer to that is obvious as well, unless you contort your worldview to maintain an image of humans as categorically special entities that stand apart from the rest of the universe.
And most PC's... If THEY weren't there, how many times would the village, town, city, country, multiverse or plane of existence been destroyed? If you go by the AP's, the PC's are a key existence in making the world work. ;)
The Aboleths stand by that.
Abowhats? Heh, heh, sure, yeah... there's no such thing. You're just joshing us, ya big kidder. *eyes dart nervously*
I feel like nobody here is familiar with the concept of magic based just as much around arbitrary concept and association as on physics and logic. You can't control a person with Control Water because a person is a person, not water. Metal is symbolic of artifice, whereas leather is symbolic of nature since it is what animals use to protect themselves.