Pliable Armor (Is this Spell OP)

[Indi523]

Comfort Armor (Tradition Arcane, Divine)
Rank 1
Actions >>>
Requirement: A set of armor
Range Touch
Duration: One Minute

You manipulate a set of armor while casting the spell with gestures indicating you are covering it (rubbing in oil, dust, etc.) The armor become enchanted for the duration of the spell granting the magical benefits of the spell. You may cast this spell on armor you are wearing or another creature if they are willing.

The Armor immediately gains the following benefits:
+ The Comfort Trait
+ It loses the Noisy Trait if it had it.
+ The Armor's DEX Cap increases to the modifier you use to cast spells such as Intelligence for a wizard. So Plate Armor with a 0 Dex Cap enchanted by a wizard with a +4 Intelligence by this spell rises to +4.
+ The armor can be donned or removed as easily as putting on a cape. This is two actions.
+ The armor has no check penalty nor a speed penalty
+ The Armor counts as only Light Bulk for encumbrance purposes
Heightened
2nd The spell duration increases to One Hour
4th The spell duration increases to 24 hours or the next time the caster prepares spells whichever comes first.
6th The armor provides a +1 circumstance bonus to AC and a +1 circumstance bonus to all saving throws. The armor provides resistance equal to its armor bonus such as 6 for plate to all physical damage plus fire and electricity.

Yes this is a workaround for Dex Cap which might make against a core concept of the game regarding Dex and Armor bonuses. If too OP what would fix this? Any thoughts?

[Teridax]

There are elements to this that I like, though the main issue I take with this suggestion is less that the spell lets you substitute Dexterity for your spellcasting attribute for AC, though that I think is certainly contentious by itself, and more that this would make spellcasters the best armor users in the game, and by far. For instance, a Warpriest could use this spell on full plate to effectively add a +4 to a +7 to their AC, the latter of which would be a +3 compared to the Champion's legendary armor proficiency. Even with the Warpriest's reduced Hit Points, this could still make them more durable overall than what is meant to be one of the tankiest classes in the game.

With that said, however, I do think a lot of the other benefits listed could make this a fun utility spell for making a suit of armor stealthier and generally more convenient. There are two different levels of adjustment I'd suggest to the OP, based on your preference:

1. The much more conservative option would be to simply take out the Dex cap increase, which would prevent casters from exceeding the AC of martials. This I think could allow the base duration to be a lot longer.

2. The in-between option could be to replace the Dex cap with a cap based on the class's spellcasting modifier, so that a caster could increase their AC without exceeding the usual limitations. This would make the spell especially effective at providing an AC boost early on if the caster can make themselves proficient in light armor.

Although the central goal is in my opinion is to fix something I'd consider a feature rather than a bug, I also don't think it's necessarily the end of the world to let casters opt into slightly better early defenses. My main issue is when this could lead casters to exceed martials at martial specialties, but that in my opinion is something that can be addressed in simple ways. I also think the convenience features are a nice touch, though the comfort trait should probably only be given when the duration is long enough to let someone sleep in the armor, i.e. at 4th rank. Overall, this looks like it could be a nifty utility spell!

[WatersLethe]

Indi523 wrote:

Yes this is a workaround for Dex Cap which might make against a core concept of the game regarding Dex and Armor bonuses. If too OP what would fix this? Any thoughts?

As Teridax said, this is definitely OP. As written, it's essentially a longwinded version of "+~4 to AC while wearing medium or heavy armor with a ton of other useful bonuses on top", which is an insanely overpowered spell.

The first fix would be to remove the increased dex cap to armor, or limit it to a modest +1 to AC or something along those lines.

I think the more important question is: what your goal is for the spell? Do you just want a spell that makes the downsides of heavy armor less onerous? Or are you more interested in playing around with Dex Caps, and this spell is just one way to do that?

[Indi523]

WatersLethe wrote:

Indi523 wrote:

Yes this is a workaround for Dex Cap which might make against a core concept of the game regarding Dex and Armor bonuses. If too OP what would fix this? Any thoughts?

As Teridax said, this is definitely OP. As written, it's essentially a longwinded version of "+~4 to AC while wearing medium or heavy armor with a ton of other useful bonuses on top", which is an insanely overpowered spell.

The first fix would be to remove the increased dex cap to armor, or limit it to a modest +1 to AC or something along those lines.

I think the more important question is: what your goal is for the spell? Do you just want a spell that makes the downsides of heavy armor less onerous? Or are you more interested in playing around with Dex Caps, and this spell is just one way to do that?

I had not considered casters wearing armor but even wizards can invest in armor proficiencies with general feats so it is a thing to consider.

My main goal was to correct an imbalance of anyone paying a fighter investing in Dex not wearing heavier armor because the intend to take a background giving them a Dex boost, Choose Dex for the class boost, and invest up to +5 as soon as they can 10th level the minimum I believe but I could be wrong.

I replaced the DEX Cap with the Caster's modifier but the individual would still have to have the +5 dex. The idea was one could wear Plate armor with a dex cap of 0 and still get benefit from their +5 dex.

I am not married to the Dex Cap increase but what I was trying to do was create a spell that would allow a high dex martial who wanted to do the tank option, such as the dwarf wearing plate to decide, I will just wear light armor or clothing because I can put an armor rune on it and get the same AC anyways.

I knew the Dex cap might be an issue when I wrote the spell but the idea was give a martial a reason to wear full plate if he has a high dex. Right now it seems there is not much reason to do that unless they are making Dex a dump stat. That was what I was hoping to correct.

Perhaps adding +1 to the DEX Cap and then adding +2 maybe at the 6th level version make this more helpful. Not sure.

I watch a lot of HEMA content online and know that maneuverability in Plate armor is not as bad as people might think.

[Indi523]

WatersLethe wrote:

Indi523 wrote:

Yes this is a workaround for Dex Cap which might make against a core concept of the game regarding Dex and Armor bonuses. If too OP what would fix this? Any thoughts?

As Teridax said, this is definitely OP. As written, it's essentially a longwinded version of "+~4 to AC while wearing medium or heavy armor with a ton of other useful bonuses on top", which is an insanely overpowered spell.

The first fix would be to remove the increased dex cap to armor, or limit it to a modest +1 to AC or something along those lines.

I think the more important question is: what your goal is for the spell? Do you just want a spell that makes the downsides of heavy armor less onerous? Or are you more interested in playing around with Dex Caps, and this spell is just one way to do that?

AS I replied to Terridax the Dex cap was put in place to make it meaningful for a fighter relying on Dex as their main stat to be able to wear heavy armor. As it stands now choosing to wear full plate for someone with even a +5 Dex actually gives no armor class benefit.

Maybe add a +1 to the Dex Cap of any armor it is applied, Not sure if that works. Right now as I see it the only player that is going to wear full plate is someone using dex as a dump stat. That story narrative wise does not work for me.

[WatersLethe]

Actually, heavy armor has 1 higher AC than medium or light (+6 total from item/dex, instead of +5), which is definitely not nothing. I've also made several characters who wear heavy armor and max out dex for the ranged options alongside the +1 total AC and rune and armor specialization options.

So increasing dex cap so much just means it's night and day optimal to invest in that spell as well as dex while wearing plate.

I think increasing the dex cap by only 1 is interesting, because it can combine with item, circumstance, an status bonuses, making it a very powerful effect.

You could also work on the other end and increase the value of heavy armor in other ways, such as giving them resistance to damage equal to their dex modifier.

Or limit it in scope, such as gaining the full benefit of your dex modifier against one attack to make it a miss as a reaction, which dismisses the spell.

[Teridax]

If a Dex Fighter wants to wear heavy armor, their best option would be half plate, which lets them get the full +6 item bonus from heavy armor while also applying their full Dex modifier to Reflex saves, as opposed to the fixed +3 from the bulwark trait. In this respect, Dex characters can very much already benefit from heavy armor by gaining both the increased AC relative to other defenses and greater Reflex saves.

[Indi523]

WatersLethe wrote:

You could also work on the other end and increase the value of heavy armor in other ways, such as giving them resistance to damage equal to their dex modifier.

Or limit it in scope, such as gaining the full benefit of your dex modifier against one attack to make it a miss as a reaction, which dismisses the spell.

Maybe that is the way to go. From what I see when asking AI about this the consensus on reddit is that there is no reason to wear any heavy armor at all unless you make dex your dump stat. Sure one could do it to be the tank for flavor but the benefit is not worth the downsides of encumbrance to speed, etc.

But the pathos for this game seems to want to level out AC so maybe any adjustment to that for the spell is not the way to go. Every armor based on their type (not sure the label to apply so I will go with type) such as Chain, Composite, Leather, Plate has built in resistances to damage to certain attacks.

Maybe for every physical attack which the spell will include as slashing, piercing, bludgeoning and lets ad force damage, the armor will provide a minimum of 1 (2 for heavy armor) + potency rune + caster's INT modifier as resistance.

Furthermore once per turn the wearer can use their armor to block an attack the way a person with a raised shield does to block an attack reducing the damage by the armor's hardness and the armor takes damage and is broken on a flat check of 10 or if the armor is reduced to zero hp. Maybe the spell ads an ability to take one minute maintaining the armor that removes the broken condition and ads back hp day 1d10 plus INT of the caster while the spell is active. Broken armor give no AC benefit or limited making doing this a risk in combat.

This then would make the protection more in line with the cosmetic aspect of the spell and ignores the issue of messing with the Dex Cap altogether. I'll have to think about it.

[Ryangwy]

... You should not use AI for analysis of niche game products. Heavy armour is better because it gives +1 AC in a way that almost nothing can replace and there's people who argue that even Dex based Fighters/Champions should get non-Bulwark heavy armour. On top of that martials generally don't cast spells anyway, so

Armour does not provide resistance unless you have armour specialisation, which very little grants.

Spells no longer use stat modifiers for anything, because it's both hugely swingy with off-casters and also really flat in terms of progression for main casters (prior to remaster, cantrips, and only cantrips, use attribute modifiers to damage). +INT to resistance will scale really weirdly, because it's strong early (+4) and pathetic late (+6). Look at other spells that grant resistance like Stoneskin and Resist Energy to understand how spells scale resistances with level.

I'm really uncertain what the purpose of the spell is besides 'make Dex+Int Magus have stupidly high AC for a day'. The most interesting part of the original spell is giving armour comfort and removing negative traits like noisy. Removing speed penalty puts it on par with good old Tailwind, one of the most used spells in the game, so you can drop all the numerical bonuses, make it 8 hours at first level (so you can make use of the comfort trait right away) and 24 hours at second move the removal of speed penalty to like 3rd and that's already a good spell.