Unburdened Iron and Hindering Armor Trait

[SirGeshko]

The Reddit seems divided on how these two interact.
Bastion Plate, from the Treasure Vault has a Strength score of 18, a Speed Penalty of 10, and the Hindering trait, which reads:

Hindering wrote:

This armor is so heavy and bulky it slows you down no matter what. You take a –5 penalty to all your Speeds (to a minimum of a 5-foot Speed). This is separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty, and affects you even if your Strength or an ability lets you reduce or ignore the armor's Speed penalty.

Unburdened Iron wrote:

You've learned techniques first devised by your ancestors during their ancient wars, allowing you to comfortably wear massive suits of armor. Ignore the reduction to your Speed from any armor you wear.

In addition, any time you're taking a penalty to your Speed from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell), deduct 5 feet from the penalty. For example, the encumbered condition normally gives a –10-foot penalty to Speed, but it gives you only a –5-foot penalty. If your Speed is taking multiple penalties, pick only one penalty to reduce.

So a Dwarf with a Strength of 16 in Bastion Plate would have a move Speed of 5 feet. (20-10-5=5) A Dwarf with Strength 18 in the same armor would have a Speed of 10 feet. (20-5-5=10)

A Dwarf with Unburdened Iron, regardless of Strength score, would ignore the 10 foot Speed penalty from the armor.
The question is, does the "any time you're taking a penalty to your Speed from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell), deduct 5 feet from the penalty" apply to Hindering, or does the newer "This is separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty, and affects you even if your Strength or an ability lets you reduce or ignore the armor's Speed penalty" override the feat?

[aobst128]

Looks like the second part of unburdened iron covers that well enough. Reduce the penalty from other sources by 5 feet.

[aobst128]

Only thing unburdened iron wouldn't cover is the the ash oracles curse because you're not allowed to reduce curse effects in any capacity.

[SuperBidi]

I agree that the interaction is unclear. As Unburdened Iron reduces your armor's speed penalty, it triggers the "affects you even if your Strength or an ability lets you reduce or ignore the armor's Speed penalty". But at the same time, one can argue that you are affected by Hindering even if Unburdened Iron reduces it to nothing. So unclear per RAW.

Still, it seems that the RAI of Hindering is to affect you no matter what. So I'd default to the interpretation of RAW that follows this RAI and won't allow Unburdened Iron to reduce Hindering penalty. But that's an RAI call and as such others may see an other intent.

[Captain Morgan]

Personally I'd allow unburdened iron to cancel the hindering trait.

[SuperBidi]

Reading more Hindering, the ability is obviously badly written.

"This is separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty"

What's the point in stating the obvious? If you take a 5-foot speed penalty from Hindering, it's obviously separate and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty.

"affects you even if your Strength or an ability lets you reduce or ignore the armor's Speed penalty"

Once again, what's the point in that as Hindering is separate from armor's Speed penalty. Once again stating the obvious.

So I really feel that Hindering is just badly written. From that moment on, any strict RAW reading has great chances to be wrong.

Then, there's the flavor text: "This armor is so heavy and bulky it slows you down no matter what."

Obviously, flavor is no rule text, but it may give an intent. And the fact that you are supposed to be slowed no matter what is the important aspect.

So, in my opinion, the ability is just badly written and the intent was to consider that you can't get away from Hindering's 5-foot penalty.
I'd apply this ruling personally.

[shroudb]

I agree with the above.

RAW is unclear, could really be either way.

Personally I feel like I would apply the penalty regardless of unburdened iron, but it's not a position I'm too heavily invested in either.

[Captain Morgan]

From a balance perspective, this "combo" still isn't amazing. It basically nets you +5 feet movement from an ancestry feat, which other ancestries already do. An elf and a dwarf could both have 20 foot speed in inheritor plate, with the dwarf having darkvision and 4 more hp. But the elf also has significantly better ancestry feats beyond that.

And the gains of bastion plate are already pretty marginal. An action per round for +1 circumstance bonus to AC isn't THAT good, especially when it is limited to melee OR ranged. There are also ancestry feats which net you +1 AC actions that work for both.

Once you can afford Bastion of the Inheritor things get better, but that is a 12th level item. By then you've had a lot of opportunity to boost your speed anyway.

[SuperBidi]

Captain Morgan wrote:

From a balance perspective, this "combo" still isn't amazing. It basically nets you +5 feet movement from an ancestry feat, which other ancestries already do.

+10 feet. 5 for the reduction of the armor check penalty and (potentially) 5 from Hindering. So you completely cancel the 10 feet of movement difference between dwarf and elf, that's very close to amazing to me.

Now, I agree that the Bastion Plate is not incredible. Also, it's definitely a high level item, taking it at level 1 puts you at 15 feet of move for a Human, which is close to unplayable. So the Bastion of the Inheritor is much closer to the level where you buy it.

[Captain Morgan]

SuperBidi wrote:

Captain Morgan wrote:

From a balance perspective, this "combo" still isn't amazing. It basically nets you +5 feet movement from an ancestry feat, which other ancestries already do.

+10 feet. 5 for the reduction of the armor check penalty and (potentially) 5 from Hindering. So you completely cancel the 10 feet of movement difference between dwarf and elf, that's very close to amazing to me.

Now, I agree that the Bastion Plate is not incredible. Also, it's definitely a high level item, taking it at level 1 puts you at 15 feet of move for a Human, which is close to unplayable. So the Bastion of the Inheritor is much closer to the level where you buy it.

Yeah, it definitely makes dwarves the undisputed kings of hindering armor. I'm just not sure hindering armor is strong enough for that to matter. With equal investment, an elf could have 25 foot speed in regular full plate. Would you trade 5 feet of speed for an AC bonus you need to spend actions on? Maybe sometimes. There are builds where third actions are low value enough to justify it. But there's a lot of builds where I wouldn't make that trade.

[SirGeshko]

Yeah, that's where I'm at. It *seems* like the intent is for Hindering to affect you regardless of your abilities or ancestry Feats, but it makes sense for Dwarves to be exceptionally good with heavy armor, like Elves are good at moving fast.
And it's not like the second part of Unburdened Iron negating the Hindering Speed penalty is exceptionally powerful...

I'm taking Unburdened Iron anyway as a flavor thing in PFS, but if there was going to be table variation, I might go with regular full plate. I'd appreciate a ruling though!

[Squiggit]

The second part of Unburdened Iron clearly applies to Hindering.

Hindering has no clause preventing you from mitigating it (like oracle curses).

Hindering clarifies that it is not effected by things that reduce armor speed penalties, which means the first part of Unburdened Iron does nothing, but there's no reason to think the second ability wouldn't work just fine.

[The Raven Black]

Squiggit wrote:

The second part of Unburdened Iron clearly applies to Hindering.

Hindering has no clause preventing you from mitigating it (like oracle curses).

Hindering clarifies that it is not effected by things that reduce armor speed penalties, which means the first part of Unburdened Iron does nothing, but there's no reason to think the second ability wouldn't work just fine.

Agreed. Hindering is almost completely written as if it specifically countered Unburdened Iron and then it misses the few words that would allow it to do just that.

[Gortle]

SuperBidi wrote:

So you completely cancel the 10 feet of movement difference between dwarf and elf, that's very close to amazing to me.

Thinking that the dwarf is just a good as the elf in heavy armor is an odd rule - the dwarf should be better. It is their thing. It comes with being slower everywhere else. So where it is even a little bit unclear I'm going to put my finger on the scale for the dwarf.

[aobst128]

As far as I'm aware, unburdened iron is the only ability in the game that allows you to ignore armor speed penalties so hindering is most likely meant to be highlighting that as non applicable. Whoever wrote it must have forgotten about the last part of the ancestry feat though.

[Themetricsystem]

Unburdened Iron doesn't care. Unburdened Iron perseveres. Unburdened supremacy.

[aobst128]

It is, after all, called *Unburdened* for a reason.

[Baarogue]

Even though it is "separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty", Hindering is STILL a "reduction to your Speed from any armor you wear." It's not "from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell)"

You take the -5' penalty that Hindering imposes even if you have Unburdened Iron, as written

[The Raven Black]

Baarogue wrote:

Even though it is "separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty", Hindering is STILL a "reduction to your Speed from any armor you wear." It's not "from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell)"

You take the -5' penalty that Hindering imposes even if you have Unburdened Iron, as written

I think that is clearly the intent, but it is not clearly worded.

[Baarogue]

The Raven Black wrote:

Baarogue wrote:

Even though it is "separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty", Hindering is STILL a "reduction to your Speed from any armor you wear." It's not "from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell)"

You take the -5' penalty that Hindering imposes even if you have Unburdened Iron, as written

I think that is clearly the intent, but it is not clearly worded.

At some point, some players may have "simplified" the wording of Unburdened Iron in their heads to be

Quote:

You've learned techniques first devised by your ancestors during their ancient wars, allowing you to comfortably wear massive suits of armor. Ignore the reduction to your Speed Speed Penalty from any armor you wear.

In addition, any time you're taking a penalty to your Speed from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell) anything else, deduct 5 feet from the penalty. For example, the encumbered condition normally gives a –10-foot penalty to Speed, but it gives you only a –5-foot penalty. If your Speed is taking multiple penalties, pick only one penalty to reduce.

So now we come to the Hindering trait, which says

Quote:

This armor is so heavy and bulky it slows you down no matter what. You take a –5 penalty to all your Speeds (to a minimum of a 5-foot Speed). This is separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty, and affects you even if your Strength or an ability lets you reduce or ignore the armor's Speed penalty.

And they get to the part that says, "this is separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty," so they go "welp, it's not the first part of Unburdened Iron so it must fit into the 'anything else' part"

But it's not. It is "a reduction to your speed from any armor you wear." That is a very open-ended and inclusive phrase, and not at all restricted to the column labelled "Speed Penalty" on the armor tables. Trying to say that the armor's Speed Penalty is cancelled by the first part of Unburdened Iron and then the ARMOR'S Hindering penalty is cancelled by the second part is double-dipping, and the Hindering trait goes out of its way to tell us so

It's not just the intent. It is very clearly worded

[The Raven Black]

Baarogue wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

Baarogue wrote:

Even though it is "separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty", Hindering is STILL a "reduction to your Speed from any armor you wear." It's not "from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell)"

You take the -5' penalty that Hindering imposes even if you have Unburdened Iron, as written

I think that is clearly the intent, but it is not clearly worded.

At some point, some players may have "simplified" the wording of Unburdened Iron in their heads to be

Quote:

You've learned techniques first devised by your ancestors during their ancient wars, allowing you to comfortably wear massive suits of armor. Ignore the reduction to your Speed Speed Penalty from any armor you wear.

In addition, any time you're taking a penalty to your Speed from some other reason (such as from the encumbered condition or from a spell) anything else, deduct 5 feet from the penalty. For example, the encumbered condition normally gives a –10-foot penalty to Speed, but it gives you only a –5-foot penalty. If your Speed is taking multiple penalties, pick only one penalty to reduce.

So now we come to the Hindering trait, which says

Quote:

This armor is so heavy and bulky it slows you down no matter what. You take a –5 penalty to all your Speeds (to a minimum of a 5-foot Speed). This is separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty, and affects you even if your Strength or an ability lets you reduce or ignore the armor's Speed penalty.

And they get to the part that says, "this is separate from and in addition to the armor's Speed penalty," so they go "welp, it's not the first part of Unburdened Iron so it must fit into the 'anything else' part"

But it's not. It is "a reduction to your speed from any armor you wear." That is a very open-ended and inclusive phrase, and not at all restricted to the column labelled "Speed Penalty" on the armor tables. Trying to say that the armor's Speed Penalty is cancelled by the first part of Unburdened Iron and then the ARMOR'S Hindering penalty is cancelled by the second part is double-dipping, and the Hindering trait goes out of its way to tell us so

It's not just the intent. It is very clearly worded

I think you are right. But if it was very clearly worded, we would not have this thread.

[SirGeshko]

*raise thread*
I don't have Player Core 2 yet, does anyone know if this was addressed?
It would be nice to have an official resolution to this issue.

[YuriP]

Unburdened Iron was reprinted in PC1 and nothing changed about this and Hindering trait is from Treasure Vault that wasn't remastered nor get an errata. So nothing was changed.

Both interpretations are valid and still GM dependent.