New armour code - examples

[Dalvyn]

With all the recent modifications brought to armour code and stacking rules, it's quite easy to get completely lost. I am going to post a few examples here that, I hope, will help you undersand how things work. In those example, I am going to use numbers, because I think that it will be clearer that way. Obviously, you (currently) do not see numbers in game, but the underlying system uses those numbers.

[Dalvyn]

LOCAL ARMOUR

Some objects you wear affect your AC (armour class) locally only. Others work "everywhere", that is, affect ALL your local armour. There are 7 locations, and thus 7 local armours (armour values). You can see which ones by typing "defence".

Head
Body
Arms
Hands
Abdomen
Legs
Feet

PIECES OF ARMOUR

Pieces of armour only affect the local armour. Different pieces of armour will protect different locations (it does not take a genius to find out which ones).

Head: protected by helms, coifs, helmets, ...
Body: protected by shirts, robes, breastplate, 'armour', ...
Arms: protected by arm guards, sleeves, ...
Hands: protected by gloves, gauntlets, ...
Abdomen: proteced by belts, sashes, ...
Legs: protected by leg guards, leggings, ...
Feet: protected by shoes, boots, ...

Note that only those pieces of armour that are worn in the 'armour' layer (i.e., not close to the skin, and not 'fitting loosely over things') help with your local AC. If the armour object also has an enchantment to increase your armour AC, then this modifier applies locally too.

All other pieces of armour (those worn close to the skin, or fitting loosely over things, or worn on other locations, like fingers/wrists/floating around, ...) do NOT help in any way with your AC. Pieces of armour shouldn't have any magical AC modifier of type shield, natural, or deflection.

[Dalvyn]

EXAMPLE 1: local armour values

If you wear
- platemail (= +7 armour AC) gloves with a +2 armour AC magical modifier
- chainmail (= +5 armour AC) vest with a +3 armour AC magical modifier,
then, when your local armour for your hands is computed (that happens each time an opponent attacks you and your "hand" location is randomly determined), the +7 from the armour type and the +2 modifier will stack to give +9. (This +9 value might be later modified by other things, but I'm not going into those details right now).

The +3 magical modifier from your chainmail worn on the body will not influence in any way your local "hands" AC. Similarly, the platemail gloves you wear on your hands, including their +2 magical modifier will be completely ignored for other locations: this piece of armour (the gloves) and their armour modifier are only local.

[Dalvyn]

DEXTERITY MODIFIER

The higher your Dexterity is, the more it benefits your AC. That is partially true though ... for the contribution from your Dexterity to your AC is capped by two things:

• Your load (if your load is light, your Dexterity modifier is not capped; with a medium load, it is capped at +3; with a heavy load, it is capped at +1).
• The type of armour you wear.

The type of armour determines how much it protects (i.e., its base AC) and how much it limits your Dexterity modifier.

Code: Select all

                                   AC  Max Dex
Clothes                             0     /
Padded armour                       1    +8
Leather armour                      2    +6
Studded leather armour              3    +5
Hide armour                         3    +4
Scale mail                          4    +3
Chainmail                           5    +2
Splint mail                         6    +0
Banded mail                         6    +1
Half-plate/platemail/field plate    7    +0
Full plate                          8    +1

Note that special materials (e.g., mithril and elven metal) increase the Max Dexterity modifier cap. Magical pieces of armour also increase this Max Dexterity modifier cap. Finally, pieces of armour made of pure energy do not have any Dexterity cap (since they don't hamper movements).

[Dalvyn]

EXAMPLE 2: local armour values and Dexterity modifier

Let's assume a character with a 18 Dexterity (= Dexterity modifier of +4) who is wearing
- chainmail (+5/+2: this means that it has a base AC of +5 and a Max Dexterity modifier of +2) gloves
- magical platemail (+7/+0) leggings with a +2 armour modifier
- magical leather (+2/+6) sleeves with a +3 armour modifier.

If the character has a light load, the information given above will yield the following local ACs:

• Hands: +5 (chainmail) +2 (Dex modifier, capped at +2) = 7
• Legs: +7 (platemail) +2 (magical) +1 (Dex) = 10; the Dexterity modifier is normally capped at +0 (platemail), but since the armour is magical, it is raised to +1 (if the leggings were made of mithril or elven metal, it would be raised again to a final value of +2).
• Arms: +2 (leather) +3 (magical) +4 (Dex) = 9; the Dexterity cap is +6 here, but the character's Dexterity still limits the modifier to +4.

If the character had a medium load, those local ACs would become:

• Hands: 7 (same as above)
• Legs: 10 (same as above)
• Arms: +2 (leather) +3 (magical) +3 (Dex) = +8; the Dexterity cap is reduced to +3 because of the medium load.

If the character had a heavy load, those ACs would be:

• Hands: +5 (chainmail) +1 (Dex) = 6; the heavy load sets the Dexterity cap to +1.
• Legs: 10 (same as above)
• Arms: +2 (leather) +3 (magical) +1 (Dex) = 6

Generally, the higher your Dexterity, the more likely you are going to prefer to wear lighter armour. Note though that, since pieces of armour have only a local influence, even if you have a high Dexterity, you can still use those holy platemail gauntlets you got when you supplicated an object. Having a high AC is an interesting goal, but there are other things you might want to consider too (e.g., wearing matching sets of armour, wearing faith items, ...)

Magical heavy armour, especially when made of mithril or elven metal, can be an interesting alternative to light armour if you can find and afford them. Note that some pieces of armour (said "of comfort") are enchanted so that the Max Dexterity modifier for them is increased. Platemail gloves "of comfort" might have a Dexterity modifier cap as high as that of leather gloves.

[Dalvyn]

GENERAL ARMOUR

Pieces of armour and their armour AC modifiers apply only locally, and add up with a (possibly capped) Dexterity modifier.

Aside from that, other values are taken into consideration, but those are global values, that apply to all locations.

Deflection armour. Deflection is mostly given by magical rings. Deflection bonuses coming from two sources do not stack: only the best one applies. So, if you have a +2 deflection ring and a +4 deflection brooch, you will benefit only from the +4.

Natural armour. Natural armour can be 'natural' (tough skin, scales, ...) or magical (barkskin, amulets). There too, only the highest bonus applies. So, if you have a +2 natural amulet and gets a +3 barkskin spell, only the +3 will matter (till the spell fades off, then the +2 will still remain).

Shield armour. Shield armour can come from 'physical' shields or from spells (shield). If a shield has an armour magical modifier, this modifier is added to the +1 modifier of the shield. Some weapons can have a shield modifier too: those are weapons of defense (that help you parry incoming blows). There too, only the best shield modifier will apply.

Armour armour. Spells and some magical items can grant a global armour modifier. This is the case for the 'armor' spell as well as for most magical bracelets (called 'bracelets of defence'). When a local AC is computed, the mud uses EITHER the local armour AC (from the piece of armour and its modifier) OR the global armour value.

[Dalvyn]

EXAMPLE 3: Global values

A character is currently wearing and affected by ...
- a +2 natural armour amulet,
- +5 armour bracelets of defence,
- a +3 deflection ring of protection,
- a shield enchanted with a +2 armour modifier
- a shield spell granting a +4 bonus
- an armor spell granting a +3 bonus
- a barkskin spell granting a +3 bonus
- a shield of faith spell granting a +2 bonus

The global values for the character are:

• Natural: +3 (+2 from amulet, ignored; +3 from barkskin)
• Armour: +5 (+5 from bracelets; +3 from armor, ignored)
• Deflection: +3 (+3 from ring; +2 from shield of faith, ignored)
• Shield: +4 (+3 from physical shield, ignored; +4 from shield spell)

Note that it's important to check the help files of those spells to determine the kind of AC bonus they offer.

[Dalvyn]

EXAMPLE 4: Putting everything together

Let's use the character from the previous example again, with global values of +3 (natural), +5 (armour), +3 (deflection), +4 (shield) and let's pretend that he has a Dexterity of 16 (modifier of +3), a light load, and is wearing:
- leather vest (+2/+6)
- full plate (+8/+1) helmet
- platemail (+7/+0) mithril gloves with a +2 armor modifier

The local armour for the body location will be computed as follows:

• First, the local armour is +2 (leather).
• But, since the global armour (+5) is better, we'll use that value. In effect, wearing bracelets of defence +5 is the same as wearing chainmail everywhere on your body (except that the bracelets do not have any max Dex modifier).
• The Dexterity cap from the actual armour (leather) still applies. (That's important: even if your "global" armour is better than the local armour, the local Dexterity cap still applies!) This cap, +6, is beyond the actualy Dexterity modifier (+3), so the whole modifier still applies.
• The "armour + Dex" value of the body AC is thus: +5 (armour) +3 (Dex) = +8.
• We then add the global natural, shield and deflection values: +8 +3 +3 +4 = 18

Now for the head location.

• The local armour is +8, which is better than the global value of +5. We therefore use +8.
• The Dexterity modifier cap is +1 (because it's full plate). This yields +8 (full plate) +1 (Dex) = +9.
• We add the other values: +9 +3 +3 +4 = 19.

Finally, the hand location has the following AC.

• The local armour is +7 for plate armour +2 (magical modifier) = +9, which is better than the global armour of +5.
• The Dexterity cap is +0 (plate mail) +1 (magical) +1 (mithril) = +2, which gives a local total of +11.
• Adding the other values, we obtain +11 +3 +3 +4 = 21.

[Dalvyn]

Final note

ACs are generally computed (in d20) with a base of 10. That means that, in order to obtain the "exact" AC you have, you would need to add 10 to all the values stated above. In the last example, the body AC would be 28, the head AC, 29, and the hands AC, 31.