Adamantine armor?

[Yqatuba]

I noticed the book just says adamantine armor is "amazingly durable", but doesn't provide any stats. Is this a typo?

[Rysky]

The stats for Adamantine are on p. 578

For armor its Bulk and AC are not affected.

[Zapp]

Rysky wrote:

The stats for Adamantine are on p. 578

That's about items made out of the material. Armor (and Weapons) have sections of their own. Adamantine armor is specified at page 555.

Quote:

For armor its Bulk and AC are not affected.

I personally believe it is helpful to the OP to spell it out: in Pathfinder 2, there is next to zero reason to get Adamantine armor. You pay a lot of money, but all you get it is a miniscule bonus* that only applies against those few abilities that directly target your armor.

Regular steel is Hardness 9 and 36 hit points. Even high grade adamantine is only 17 hardness and 68 hit points.

Against level-appropriate monsters, none of this matters in the slightest, since a monster will easily shred both types of armor to shreds if it wants to (and are able to). Dealing 85 points of damage (17+68) in a single blow is easily within range of a crit at level 19.

Whenever you find a cool suit of powerful magic armor, you either use it or sell it. Whether it's made out of adamantine or not plays a very little role in this decision.

PS. Rysky isn't wrong, he's just not getting to the real point :)

[Rysky]

Uh actually I was since OP already knew about Adamantine Armor on page 555, where it says it’s “amazingly durable”. They were asking for stats for Adamantine which is on page 578 because Adamantine only affects the durability of the armor, it doesn’t provide much benefit for the wearer like DR or an AC boost.

[Zapp]

Rysky wrote:

Uh actually I was since OP already knew about Adamantine Armor on page 555, where it says it’s “amazingly durable”. They were asking for stats for Adamantine which is on page 578 because Adamantine only affects the durability of the armor, it doesn’t provide much benefit for the wearer like DR or an AC boost.

Absolutely.

It's just that I find that "don't bother" is more clear and direct than "look at page 123" :)

Cheers

[thenobledrake]

...because why would anyone prefer to check the information and make a decision for them self rather than just go with whatever some person on the internet said?

[Cyder]

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

[Samurai]

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

I agree with you. I created special abilities for the various armor (and weapon) materials types.

For Adamantine: Wearing Adamantine armor provides Resistance to all physical damage attacks (Bludgeoning, Piercing and Slashing). The value is 1 for Light armor, 2 for Medium armor, and 3 for Heavy armor. High-grade adamantine doubles these values.

[Kasoh]

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

Last time it came up I believe an idea I liked (can't remember if it was mine or not) was that Adamantine Armor gets a 'shield' block reaction with the armor.

[Zapp]

thenobledrake wrote:

...because why would anyone prefer to check the information and make a decision for them self rather than just go with whatever some person on the internet said?

You would be surprised... ;)

[larsenex]

Samurai wrote:

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

I agree with you. I created special abilities for the various armor (and weapon) materials types.

For Adamantine: Wearing Adamantine armor provides Resistance to all physical damage attacks (Bludgeoning, Piercing and Slashing). The value is 1 for Light armor, 2 for Medium armor, and 3 for Heavy armor. High-grade adamantine doubles these values.

I get the feeling that special materials should have had addiotnal properties just like this.

This is an excellent reason to own a full suit. Its not much mitigation but still its nice.

[Thomas5251212]

Yeah, there doesn't seem too much point in most special materials as armor and shields these days. One of those things that can feel kind of jarring to old hands, at least when it comes to mithril and adamantine, which traditionally were the bee's knees as such went.

[Angel Hunter D]

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

Given my own experiences with PFS, the core rulebook doesn't do us all that many favours. They just wanted special materials to suck instead of waiting to print them and making them more exciting.

[Thomas5251212]

Angel Hunter D wrote:

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

Given my own experiences with PFS, the core rulebook doesn't do us all that many favours. They just wanted special materials to suck instead of waiting to print them and making them more exciting.

I'd be cautious about using a word like "wanted" here. Its most likely there was some other purpose was being served where the side effect of making special materials underwhelming (especially compared to cost) ended up being an unintended side effect.

[Kekkres]

Thomas5251212 wrote:

Angel Hunter D wrote:

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

Given my own experiences with PFS, the core rulebook doesn't do us all that many favours. They just wanted special materials to suck instead of waiting to print them and making them more exciting.

I'd be cautious about using a word like "wanted" here. Its most likely there was some other purpose was being served where the side effect of making special materials underwhelming (especially compared to cost) ended up being an unintended side effect.

I'm not sure how it could be unintended, stats they give for adimantine could all be a billion and it would still be worthless because you are paying extra, for more armor thatvis more limited in runes, and only has any benefit whatsoever when you are facing like, all of 7 abilities in the game. On shields sure, but hp hardness and break threshold are just not numbers that matter in any meaningful way in pf2

[Rysky]

Kekkres wrote:

Thomas5251212 wrote:

Angel Hunter D wrote:

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

Given my own experiences with PFS, the core rulebook doesn't do us all that many favours. They just wanted special materials to suck instead of waiting to print them and making them more exciting.

I'd be cautious about using a word like "wanted" here. Its most likely there was some other purpose was being served where the side effect of making special materials underwhelming (especially compared to cost) ended up being an unintended side effect.

I'm not sure how it could be unintended, stats they give for adimantine could all be a billion and it would still be worthless because you are paying extra, for more armor thatvis more limited in runes, and only has any benefit whatsoever when you are facing like, all of 7 abilities in the game. On shields sure, but hp hardness and break threshold are just not numbers that matter in any meaningful way in pf2

They will be as more threats that can damage armor is introduced.

Will that comprise every encounter? No, but then adamantine and mithril no longer being must haves and all the other special materials not seeing the light of day is a good thing.

[thenobledrake]

Kekkres wrote:

On shields sure, but hp hardness and break threshold are just not numbers that matter in any meaningful way in pf2

I think it's kind of like resistance to a particular energy type. In general it's not of much use, because it so heavily depends on what opposition you actually face in the game.

But in that one campaign that happens to include tons of opposition that deal out the chosen type of damage, it can be one of the better defensive options to get resistance to it.

The special materials are the same way. Generally you're not going to encounter frequent damage to your armor or weapons - but if the campaign focuses on those creatures that do damage to your equipment, suddenly something normally "useless" is a great choice.

[Thomas5251212]

Rysky wrote:

Kekkres wrote:

Thomas5251212 wrote:

Angel Hunter D wrote:

Cyder wrote:

Its kind of sad the armour materials make so little real impact on the game. I would liked to have seen some benefit to armour is made of Adamantine (I know it affects shields).

I am sure it wouldn't be too hard to homebrew it. If my players want to spend cash money on special materials for their plate armour or quest to retrieve precious adamantine ore it should amount to something. I worry sometimes that PF core rules are done with the restriction 'we have to make work for PF Society type games' rather than those of us who run more sandbox games.

Given my own experiences with PFS, the core rulebook doesn't do us all that many favours. They just wanted special materials to suck instead of waiting to print them and making them more exciting.

I'd be cautious about using a word like "wanted" here. Its most likely there was some other purpose was being served where the side effect of making special materials underwhelming (especially compared to cost) ended up being an unintended side effect.

I'm not sure how it could be unintended, stats they give for adimantine could all be a billion and it would still be worthless because you are paying extra, for more armor thatvis more limited in runes, and only has any benefit whatsoever when you are facing like, all of 7 abilities in the game. On shields sure, but hp hardness and break threshold are just not numbers that matter in any meaningful way in pf2

They will be as more threats that can damage armor is introduced.

Will that comprise every encounter? No, but then adamantine and mithril no longer being must haves and all the other special materials not seeing the light of day is a good thing.

You've clearly not seen the tendency for game designers to get tunnel vision on design choices enough. Doing one thing ("Special materials should be expensive") while not noticing another ("We don't want special materials to be must haves") is endemic in designs. I can't say for a fact that happened here, but it happens often enough I wouldn't write it off, either.

[Rysky]

They cost more cause they add on things, letting them have abilities or bonuses and not be must haves are not contradictory to each other.