As the title says, this question goes out to people who have worn plate armor in real life, such as medieval reenactments.
Do you feel that armor proficiency in D&D should be a thing? Physical aptitudes aside, does it take serious training to be able to move and fight to the potential imposed by its inherent limitations?
Or is it something more intuitive that you get used to pretty quick? Like, say you're a pretty good sword fighter that has never worn heavy armor before. You put on a suit for the first time. How long until you feel like you've gotten as comfortable fighting in the armor as you're ever going to get?
Armor Proficiency is a thing in D&D; or, are you asking if it should be ignored/removed?
Its been a while but at a basic level you don't really need to be proficient in it. You do need a certain level of physical fitness in it though if you are being physical so yeah I suppose being proficient in it could reflect that training. There is some amount of skill in it IMHO though.
I have to disagree with Zard, honestly. It is a skill to move in armor, and of course it requires some level of fitness to carry around the weight, but skill at dealing with it is more important than fitness.
This is not to suggest that I'd become faster than someone who was in good shape because I've worn it before and sort of know what I'm doing, but I would be impaired significantly less. They might still be faster than me, but there would be a noticeable difference in how much the armor impaired us.
My experience with it was that it took a year or so of wearing armor one weekend a month to get reasonably used to it. So it could be done in focused training in a week, probably, but the same is true of most D&D proficiencies or skills that you don't get to train in-game.
I've done some combat training and sparring with medieval equipment (other historical periods too).
I think armor proficiency is a great way to have an in-character representation of the real-world truth that there is putting on the gear, and there is knowing how to actually use the gear to its fullest.
The only issue I have is that there would be a possibility of knowing how to use heavy armor to their full potential while being entirely clueless about what to do differently in light armor.
...well, that and that the penalties for movement and the like in D&D are often overly harsh or applied to the wrong armor types - chain mail should be, in my opinion, the most movement restricting armor because of the way it hangs all its weight on very few parts of the body, and when its weight sways it takes effort not to sway with it. I can sprint and do cartwheels in a properly fitted suit of what D&D calls plate, but even a short jog in chain mail leaves me winded, off balance, and hoping that the forward swing of the chain doesn't carry me off my feet when I try to stop upon arriving at my destination.
However, I might not be the person to ask about armor since I have always prefered something very light and non-restrictive that covers the commonly cut surfaces of my body and a pair of weapons to use in combined offensive and defensive techniques (one to occupy an opponents weapon or pull on their shield, the other to land blows) - I find getting out of the way more instinctive and effective than learning how to let my armor take a hit for me.
Nevvur wrote:
ankiyavon wrote:
I'm not asking because I intend to house rule D&D 5e to create verisimilitude with real world training in armor. I'm fine with the system as it is.
The answers I seek are to inform my balancing of such proficiency in an entirely new system, and using D&D as a baseline comparison, particularly the selection of feats. Should it be as hard to learn to move in the next heavier class of armor as it is to learn how to effectively wield 4 new weapons? Or to fire a bow with such precision that you can ignore cover? I realize D&D is not the best point of reference, but it's the system I'm most familiar with, and I'm more comfortable posing the question to this community than elsewhere.
A better question to start the thread might have been: assuming you are in peak physical condition, how intuitive is learning to wear armor effectively? It's a subjective question, I realize, but ultimately I'm trying to draw a rough comparison between armor use as a skill with every other type of skill.
To add to this question, would heavy armor completely negate a person's natural dexterity? I would tend to think that being dextrous could still be beneficial while wearing heavy armor. I am also finding it hard to justfiy wearing anything above light armor and just going with a high dex char and using a finesse weapon.
Scruffy68 wrote:
All this aside, plate doesn't help you not get hit. It better allows for glancing blows or complete stopping of damage which is reflected in other gaming systems as Damage Resistance.
DnD uses a simple approach to this in a game mechanic, hit and damage absorption are rolled into one.
Proficiency is just another mechanic, being proficient with all martial weapons is going to take much more time than being proficient in heavy armor. In DnD it’s rather trivial to get proficiency in all marital weapons but rather difficult to get heavy armor prof.
Example: Learning real skill at a longbow would take training at a young age through adulthood and that is just one weapon.
Scruffy68 wrote:
TV/Hollywood depictions aside, doing anything well takes a lot of practice. When you're putting your life on the line you want to do it really really well.
FFSAA wrote:
Scruffy68 wrote:
edwin_su wrote:
Thanks for the feedback, all. It sounds like physical fitness plays the biggest role in effective armor use, as armor tends to provide a familiar range of motion. Nevertheless, energy conservation is an important tactic, and novice armor wearers could quickly wear themselves out. I'm not sure yet how this will translate into mechanics, but this has been a fruitful discussion for me. Feel free to add further thoughts if they occur, I'll be around.
i found the issue Aaron had with mail and weight distribution to be mostly alleviated by a belt around the waist.
to conclude wearing full harness requires some but not much skill and gives great range of motion but it is important to learn to conserve energy and is uncomfortable to wear in anything but middling weather. If a roleplaying game were attempting to mimic reality I would suggest proficiency not being required but mastery to reduce fatigue and the effects of weather and possibly other bonuses should be available. Dungeons and dragons in particular does not attempt to be realistic instead using armour proficiency to reflect fantasy archetypes which is important to enforce genre expectation. When making a game be sure to take into account what you are trying to present and create mechanics that encapsulate and enforce those ideas.
I hope this was helpful to you.
I have owned, worn, and engaged in various types of medieval combat re-enactment while wearing full plate armour for many years.
That's me on the left. My harness weighs about 70 lbs as worn in the photo.
I wouldn't say that wearing full armour is a skill to be studied, necessarily. It's more like something that you just have to accustom yourself to--get used to it over time by spending time on the field engaged in athletic pursuits while wearing it. It does alter your center of gravity and that takes some getting used to.
Only with the proper rocking 80s power ballad.
OoftaMeg wrote:
Ralif_Redhammer wrote: