Level Appropriate

[souran]

Pulling hate for a sword and boarder is a non-trivial problem at mid levels, and it's damn near impossible at high levels. But it can be done. There aren't a whole lot of viable sword and boarders around, and most people don't really think of "Tower Shield and Harpoon" as a heroic fighter strategy (even if it is a classical Roman fighting style). But they exist. Just barely, but they do.

If someone wants to run around with a rapier and a buckler and stab shit for damage, you should probably just kill their character though.

-Username17

Yep, and it totally sucks. The tripstar gimmick is terrible, and the other options are not ones that people without extensive experience will think of. Also, harpoon and towershield is a concept that brings a smile to almost nobodies face.

it just both sucks and is stupid that in a game called dungeons and dragons there is no way to build a viable character who puts on armor, picks up a shield, draws his sword and goes into the dungeon to slay the dragon. Fuck, that guy isn't even useful with the group of guys who go to slay dragons.

Also, armor class is the least satifying defense mechanic ever. The all or nothing defense scheme makes playing an armored character feel like a huge gamble when normally you pick defense over offense in games because you don't want to gamble.

[tzor]

If someone wants to run around with a rapier and a buckler and stab shit for damage, you should probably just kill their character though.

First of all rapier and buckler is a bad combination in the real world. Rapier and main gauche was never properly designed in D&D (and whenever anyone says rapier they more than likely are thinking of movies which used foils or fantasy literature which really used small swords but technically speaking small sword and parrying dagger is the famous method of combat for the Gray Mouser) and the only way you could approach the technique behind them is to go into the Book of Vile Darkness and even then you still get FAIL.

(Side Swords were often used with Bucklers, not rapiers.)

(Small Swords were often triangular in their design, this lead to a piercing cut that unlike the two dimensional cuts of classic swords did not close and heal easily. Thus the victim would continue to bleed profusely long after the first successful hit, if the duel continued long enough they could bleed to death.)

[Judging__Eagle]

Item access can also be arranged at lower levels by virtue of having item crafters Roy. You can also break the game just by RPing, and asking for almost inconsequential favours. I edited that in later, I just take too long when posting/editing at times.

Orion, level 10 encounters are seriously 4 CR 10 stone golems. Your AC build dies like a chump under that.

Or, they grow a brain, and hide behind the Wizard, who is using Acid Cloud and Magic Mouth to kite the golems in a circle.

Level 10 encounters can seriously be a level 11 wizard who is waiting for the party in the last room of the dungeon; sort of how every printed adventure is arranged. The last room always has not only a higher level creature, but usually one with a bunch of minions to delay the PCs while the BBEG spams SoDs on the PCs.

Either way, AC is useless at 'higher' levels.

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CR 11 Centipede: +18; CR 10 Scorpion: +21 CR 10 Giant +20/15/10. CR 9 Vrock +15/13, CR 10 Clay Golem +Motherfucking 14

Sure there's also Earth elementals (23 at 9, 27 at 11) and CR 11 Spiders +27.

+to hit does NOT scale smoothly by 3 per level. It DOES vary wildly within a CR, even among "brute" monsters. Your 27 AC WILL substantially reduce the incoming damage from most of these monsters. And if you fight lower CRs it gets even better. If your level 10 guy fights 2 CR 8 Stone giants, their +17 hits you only half the time, their second wswing only a quarter. At that point, since 32k into a +4 Amulet of Natural Armor does WAY more for you than buying moderate fortification.

The thing is, those numbers don't reflect everything. Those creatures will also have stuff like reach on you, and more damage than is "assumed" that PCs can acheive with "melee" characters (not clerics/druids/wizards with buffs).

A Fire Giant, the +20/+15/+10 Greatsword deals 3d6+15 damage, and has reach on the PCs, usually meaning extra hits, plus the option to move back for more free hits.

That's about 27 damage per hit; meaning 4-5 hits and the average fighter goes down like a sack of bricks. This mythical "8-10" hits territory does not exist. The fighter that can survive that amount of abuse is super optimized,

Super Resilience Territory:

-Having miss chance (maybe even stacking miss chance, by getting say, Cover, and stuff like Displacement, and Mirror Image, and say, Blur just for kicks).

-Being something whose Con doesn't give a damn about enemy damage. Being 'changed somehow into a creature with really High con, or something, or just not giving a shit, and being a Shambling Mound; and having someone in the party have a Shocker Lizard Familiar/Animal Companion/Pet/Pokemon. You've got a natty AC of +11, and you're only large and weird shaped, so you only pay x4 Cost of materials, and x2 Weight for armour (6,150 for mwk FP; 36k Mithral, 60k Adamantine). A Shambling mound seriously can get a Con of 77, minimum 300 HP at all levels; average Con is 2.5*60, putting HP anywhere from a min of 308, and average of 624, and a max of 984 hp.

-Stacking DR properly, then layering DR from different sources; Most 'core' way, is being a Were-Rat, and buying Improved Damage Reduction over and over again; and using a Bow; then being the party Tank, due to sheer DR, and lack of monsters with Silver weapons in most printed adventures.

Really, being able to soak 10 hits in a combat is "really hard" territory for melee characters, involving unusual characters, that most people wouldn't assume or consider. The best most PCs pull off if 3-4 normal hits before they die; even using Tome material. Using straight Core stuff; you're better off having a wizard cohort just to cast protective spells on you.

Well, more CR 10 'things'

Gargantuan Monsterous - It seriously doesn't care, it has a +21 to hit; Imrpoved Grab, and a Grapple check of +37. Unless you've got an Elf wizard with an Octopus pet who goes by the name "Der Crack Ein" (aka. the Grapple-Wizard), whoever gets grabbed is gonna get a lot of damage.

11-Headed Hydra - Yeah... not much per hit if you have stacked DR, but the sheer number can wear down PCs who have no or low DR.

9-Headed Cryo/Pyro Hydra - This flavour freezes/burns people with DR; and only slightly less dangerous in the raw damage dealt department. Only a PC with a lot of ER or DR (or both) can stand up to one of these.

Noble Salamander - It's got a Huge Fire Elemental 1/Day (ie. this encounter, first round action), and can cast 3 Walls of Fire (ie. it's next three rounds). Those spells are going to last the whole fight (15 rounds max); and PCs are going to take anywhere from 4-21 pts of damage every round from each Wall (On wall, 2d6+CL (15); within 10' (2d6); and 20' (2d4). Hopefully someone has a Resist Energy Prepared, or had a resist item. Most of this creature's danger doesn't rely in melee, but non-melee damage.

Juvenile Red Dragon - [sort of an outlier, Dragons are 'really' supposed to be 4 CR lower if used at 'random'] Still, it's a critter with +16 to hit; and 6 attacks (2d6 Bite, 1d8 2 Claw, 1d6 2 Wing, 1d8 Tail Slap; with +9 from Str), AC 26 is hittable; and only until you get to 31+ AC are you out of the creature's average to-hit range.

Also, it has an AC of 24 (aka, you're gonna hit this monster); it's seriously the size of a large Panther or Tiger; with wings; it's not Elephant Sized kitty tiem yet. Since nothing it seems, has an AC that's worth a damn anyway. So focusing on damage dealing is more win than focusing on To-Hit, or AC.

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Anyway, Turtling does not work as a viable D&D tactic, the mechanics and the rules and items simply don't support it.

Even most creatures don't do these things; instead they have defenses that are unusual, like Spell Resistance, or Spell Immunity.

[Orion]

Wow, JE, you really are a condescending asshole aren't you?

I have never argued an "AC build" is good or viable. I have also never argued that a fighter can successfully melee giants of his level.

I didn't present an AC build but, (once Roy corrected me) a "build" that could happen entirely by accident: low-level buff spells and mundane equipment. The point was not to show that "tank" characters work, but that if you ignore the effect of AC, you will model encounters inaccurately.

[Judging__Eagle]

Uh, no, I'm just doing what I usually do. Throw down numbers that are related to the topic, hope that the idea gets across.

If I was condescending, I'd talk about you in some demeaning way, or something; if I wanted to shit on you, I'd just do the normal thing around here, and tell you to "suck a bag/barrel/Thunderhawk/tanker/space ship full of cocks". This forum can be just as crazy as high powered games, and calling people war criminals, or telling them to suck buckets of cocks is what the administrators here accept as appropriate 'banter'. I hope that my previous posts weren't that level off offensive at all.

Anyway, 'straight' AC alone won't defend a typical creature in D&D for more than 2 to 4 hits from a level appropriate creature. Of that, it's hard to find any way, short of massive AC stacking from multiple sources, for an AC build to be viable in mid level or higher play.

Honestly though... I'm fine with that. Having people scale from using steel daggers, up to using Thinaum Lifedrinkers is something that I'm fine with. Having to make about 4 attacks to drop any monster is sort of something that is consistent from low levels, up to higher levels (note, not 4 hits, 4 attacks, at lower levels, your attacks miss).

[Murtak]

JE, how many CR 10 monsters can reliably hit an AC of 45? Heck, how many can even hit it on anything but a 20? Because that is how much an AC build will have at that level, more if the player dumpster dives. Turtling keeps you alive against normal attacks and to an extent against grapples. Being a credible threat while turtling is the hard part. Grabbing AC is not.

Seriously, what part of grabbing armor, a shield and some defensive bonuses and fighting defensively is hard or counterintuitive? A +2 Platemail, +2 shield, Barkskin (+4), Shield of Faith (+3), and a positive Dex modifier while fighting defensively will give you an AC of 33. Anyone at all can do this, investing nothing but money and a couple of low level spells. A fire giant will likely score a hit every other round, the Scorpion is too dumb to figure out that normal attacks are likely to miss (if it hits the grapple is bad though), the hydra at least hits about one attack per round, the pyrohydra is only scary because of the breath, the dragon (again) will hit about one attack per round and four clay golems (a full party encounter at level 10) will, if they manage to all get full attacks every turn, barely outdamage a wand of cure light wounds.

This is an option open to everyone with a Dex of 12 and someone to cast a couple of low level spells.

[Red_Rob]

It seems everyone agrees on the following points:

[*]AC does not increase in line with BAB after around level 10
[*]Diverting resources into AC leaves your ability to attack underpowered

Therefore it seems like there should be some additional bonus to AC to allow melee specialists to actually last more than a round against equal CR opposition. This dovetails neatly with a gripe I've always had with DnD - parrying. AC in DnD comes from 2 main sources - your ability to dodge a blow, and your ability to get hit and not notice. However, the reason that unarmored warriors don't get hit all the time isn't because they leap around like some kind of monkey on speed, its because they can turn aside attacks using their weapon. This source of defensive ability has always been given very short thrift in D&D, however in the source material it is a primary way to defend against attacks. When describing a miss in game I will more often than not use the phrase "you clang swords", which seems odd given the combat ability of the defender is the one thing not referenced in AC.

So, how about creating a "Parrying bonus" to AC, which is equal to 1 per 2 points of BAB you have? This would scale at roughly half your level for pure warriors, and less for everyone else. Would a +5 AC at lvl 10 help out?

You could allow a feat to increase this to 1 per 1 point of BAB if you are unarmored to finally give Errol Flynn and Conan types a chance.

[Murtak]

Therefore it seems like there should be some additional bonus to AC

No. If you let someone add another +5 AC you may fix the game for that particular person, but others still won't have a decent AC and more importantly, you make it easier to get too much AC to ever get hit. AC has too many stackable bonuses, not too few. Eliminate half of the available bonuses, double those you have left over and then have shields give a fixed AC instead of having them scale by enhancement bonus. If you are in the middle of the RNG adding 5 AC from a shield halves the damage you take - that sounds like a decent tradeoff for only doing two thirds of your regular damage. But at lower levels you don't get 5 AC from a shield - you get 1 or 2 AC.

Short version: Fix general AC bonuses so it is both simpler and more predictable to actually stay in the middle of the RNG. That means getting rid of a crapton of tiny stackable bullshit bonuses and increasing AC bonuses from other bonuses. Then make shields provide the same AC at each level.

its because they can turn aside attacks using their weapon. This source of defensive ability has always been given very short thrift in D&D

What is wrong with the Tome of Battle version? Everyone can grab that with a single feat (which should actually be a good deal for anyone who doesn't already have a use for his swift actions).