Question about mithral armor

Post/Author/DateTimePost
#1

NirvanS

Oct 11, 2014 22:37:05

Playing 5e. Player has magic mithral scale armor +3. Claims that as mithral and magic, should have full dexterity bonus added to AC. Is that correct? I know for weight category, mithral is one category lighter. So mithral scale armor would go from medium to light armor.

  Would it still be the case if non-magical? 

#2

Novacat

Oct 11, 2014 23:26:51

NirvanS wrote:
#3

Coredump00

Oct 11, 2014 23:39:34

I don't know of any 5E publication/pdf that even mentions +3 armor nor mithril armor.  So not sure where he got the magic armor from. Another homebrew campaign?  What level is he?

 

From what they have published so far, something like that would be *really* rare.... (if it exists at all)

 

 

edit: heh... yeah, Novacat said it better than I did...

 

 

#4

Plaguescarred1

Oct 12, 2014 2:40:16

NirvanS wrote:
#5

NirvanS

Oct 12, 2014 5:19:44

He is 10th level ranger. Him and another player played 2e and they made their characters 5e. Many of the items they had were taken as 5e has less magic items available as well as only 3 attune items permissible.  He cited the 5e play test for mithral armors, the mention of mithral in the magic items as you posted above, and will bring in the module where he got the armor from a dragon lair

#6

Dragoloth

Oct 12, 2014 5:25:15

In the last playtest download there were 3 different mithril armors. Mithril plate, mithril scale and mithril chain shirt. The mithril scale is medium, as per the chart, and has a max dex bonus of 2. It also costs 5,000 gold. But this is playtest data and not finished product, thus not balanced with the released materials. The only mithril armor that has a weight catagory change is the chain shirt.

#7

Coredump00

Oct 12, 2014 6:12:10

The player is making a lot of assumptions while 'transfering' his character.  What you allow is completely up to you, but his stats and magic items may be quite different in 2E then they are designed in 5E.  With the new emphasis on 'bounded accuracy' the stronger magic items can have a pretty big effect.

 

 

#8

Dragoloth

Oct 12, 2014 6:41:54

Coredump00 wrote:
#9

NirvanS

Oct 12, 2014 12:02:41

The player showed me the adventure. The Night Below an Underdark Campaign is where he got the elven chain +3 (originally it was +4, but he lowered it). Additionally he pointed out the the adventure into Dragon's Lair has a Elven Plate +2. 

 

He also pointed out that in the magic item list, minimum 7th level for very rare and minimum 9th for legendary. 

 

I am am leaning to allowing it as it doesn't possess any special abilities like the breast plate with dragon breath resistance or the magic 2handed sword.

#10

NirvanS

Oct 12, 2014 12:07:12

And I did take away his sun blade and ring of spell turning among others. Otherwise, he will be on par with the other characters that we have changed to 5e and playing 3e and 4e adventures adjusted to 5e rules

 

#11

Novacat

Oct 12, 2014 12:26:15

Whatever you want to allow in your campaign is fine... I don't foresee myself ever giving my players anything more than +1 stuff. If I were in your position, I would probably take all the magic items away altogether.

#12

Plaguescarred1

Oct 13, 2014 10:12:01

NirvanS wrote:
#13

Sword_of_Spirit

Oct 12, 2014 14:13:40

As a DM, I would never let a player convert a magic item from a previous edition. I'm pretty lenient on allowing stuff, but that is straight up DM territory. Unless it is a named item (like a flametongue) and he just ditches the original stats and uses the 5e stats (which don't exist yet), I'd do all the conversion work myself, although I'd allow suggestions. As others have said, if it has more than a +1 magical bonus, it is probably not functioning as intended according to 5e rules.

 

 

(Reply to #9)

Coredump00

NirvanS wrote:
#15

NirvanS

Oct 12, 2014 16:40:45

I was not going to give full dex bonus. It was going to be max 2.  

 

Wish they put the DMG already. Would help with all these arguments. 

#16

mellored

Oct 12, 2014 18:04:39 		IMO 15+dex mod (max 3)
#17

mellored

Oct 12, 2014 18:08:17 		And in general divide all magic item bonuses by 2 (round down)
#18

NirvanS

Oct 12, 2014 18:28:24

I decided to make item a +1 with an advantage vs either spells (as item spellgard shield) or dragon breath weapons (as I'm the D&D starter set adventure. 

I think good compromise and still max 2 dex but no stealth disadvantage

(Reply to #18)

Coredump00

NirvanS wrote:
#20

NirvanS

Oct 12, 2014 19:37:14

Thanks for everyone's help

(Reply to #20)

Lucas_Blackstone

It's things like this that make me wish they would not do a staggered release on the three core books. If people feel they do not have the funds to buy all three at once, then they don't have to. But it would be nice to have all three books to draw from when a new edition comes out.

(Reply to #21)

Timborama

Lucas_Blackstone wrote:
#23

talsharien

Oct 13, 2014 12:20:07

NirvanS wrote:
#24

Spoo1018

Jun 24, 2015 12:00:51

+3 Mithral Chain That acts as light doesn't even seem close to reasonable. Think from a math and design standpoint.

 

Consider the fact that the armors and weapons in dnd next are normalized to allow for greater versatillity of use. 

So you are not constrained by stats in order to free up roleplay options.  

 

At lvl 1, you AC should reasonably start out between 15 - 18 (if you use the point buy system out of the book that caps a starting stat at 15) 

light 14-15  +2  with shield

medium 14-16 +2 with shield

heavy - not really much of an option in terms of price... unless you want ring mail and a +2 shield so 16

Basically everyone can start out on nearly equal footing. Even those classes with no armor can enjoy a 15-16 given class abilities.

 

Later levels should still be normalized around the line of: 

17-19ish Light

17-19 Medium

18-20 Heavy

16-18 None

 

I wouldn't mind mithral removing the disadvantage from stealthing and reducing the weight by half. Weight is a real problem for adventurers and fighters alike.

 

But understand that removing the Dexterity Cap pretty much throws this armor into overpowered mode, combined with the fact that he wants +3?  (Worst case, one or the other but not both) Under his thought process that would make him have a possible 21 AC not including if he later tacks on a shield.  That makes his to hit crazy stupid.

 

Understand that the to hits are hard enough and monsters don't usually get a procficiency bonus in their attacks. Meaning a monster attacking with +7ish typcially has about 60% chance of connecting to someone in medium armor AC.  That AC takes that 60 and shoves it down to 30%.  20% if he adds a shield.  That is just plain ludicrous for someone of level 10 to achieve.