armor class on id vs score

[faylen]

So, I'm not a tabletop DnD player, which I recognize puts me at a bit of a disadvantage, but I'm wondering if anyone can help explain a bit of how the mechanics work with AC, particularly where there are also AC enchantments on armor pieces.

Question 1, if id shows a piece has an enchantment of +1 to ac, is that to ac on the wear location it goes on only, or on all wear locations?

Question 2, is there a max to how much ac you can have in a specific location?


Here's part of what's confusing me. Cilah has several armor pieces with a +1 enchantmet to AC, and one piece that has a +2. The latter piece has a normal AC value of 7, so you would think it would increase the location, in this case head, by 9, yet it only increases it from 11 to 19. Huh?

Complicating this even further, I have a shield which shows an AC of 4 plus an enchantment adding 2 to the shield ac spot. When I wear it, my shield bonus shows as 4, and my individual locations also go up by 4, this is with only one other armor piece on. So where did the other two go? I suspect some things don't stack which is fine, but even testing a piece at a time the numbers just aren't adding up.

Any help to get me not so confused would be very much appreciated. Thanks!

[Benorf]

First off, the armor that is enchanted will only provide a bonus to the slot it is worn upon.

The AC bonus given when you identify an item is the total AC provided.
For example, if you had a +2 fullplate helmet, it would say
AC 10
+2 enhancement to AC

It leaves out that fullplate normally provides a +8 bonus to AC. Then you would have to include the additional +1 from dexterity (If your dex is 12 or higher)

This is the same reason that a +2 heavy shield would provide the +4 stated when identifying.

Now, a moment to talk about stacking bonuses. Similarly named bonuses do not stack. So if you have Bracers of Armor +1, it will provide you with +1 AC to all of your slots. However, if you're wearing some plain leather, you would get only the +2 from the leather, because both are an ARMOR bonus. You get the higher bonus. This is why the spell 'Shield' and wearing a shield do not stack with one another. They are both SHIELD bonuses. In addition to this, since the feat two-weapon defense gives a shield bonus when wielding two weapons, it *also* would not stack.

This also explains why you can't have gauntlets that give +2 str and then cast bull strength for a total of +6. They are both enhancement bonuses, so you only get the greater bonus.

A fun bit of trivia, the *only* bonus that stacks with itself is a dodge bonus. I don't think we really even have those in this game, though, so lets just ignore that.

I hope that answered your questions without rambling too much.

[Jerrel]

This is why the spell 'Shield' and wearing a shield do not stack with one another. They are both SHIELD bonuses.

While "Shield of Faith" and wearing a shield do because Shield of Faith grants a deflection bonus, not a shield bonus.

[Benorf]

While "Shield of Faith" and wearing a shield do because Shield of Faith grants a deflection bonus, not a shield bonus.

YES! Thank you, that's one of the trickier examples I forgot to mention.

[Yemin]

A fairly reliable way to tell what kind of bonus something is is to look at the help file for certain defensive magics.
If i remember rightly most of them have keywords like, this provides a *deflection* or this manifests a *shield* or something.

[faylen]

Ok, that actually helps a lot! It definitely explains the ac bonuses to armor because I thought the enchantments were in addition to, not included in the normal ac part of the identification.

So then, what kinds of equipment would provide bonuses to all slots? You mentioned the bracers. Does that work for all slots because they are worn in a location that's not normally using armor? I know that deflection/shield/natural are added to all slots on top of the armor stuff so that's fine.

Now, what about armor locations such as feet and hands? I've noticed that we never get damaged in those locations. Is there even any point, mechanically speaking, to wear armor there if it doesn't have special bonuses like resistance to cold or a stat point or something? Obviously for IC reasons people may or may not want armor there.

Thanks again for the explanation!

[Hrosskell]

Bonuses that apply to all slots include shield, deflection, and natural. A generic "+armor" like you see on a +2 full plate would be very, very powerful in the sense that it would negate the need for any individual magic pieces, so I believe it's limited to "+base armor" and that can't be stacked.

Last I recall you did actually have hands and feet, and leaving these areas unarmored made the arms and legs more likely to be hit. I might be wrong but some deep forum searching could probably yield an answer.