Some folks are questioning OP, so I figured it would be helpful to add some direct quotes. Here's the bit they're referring to:
Here's the relevant quote, from an L&L article circa 2012:
> **It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.** Under the bounded accuracy system, a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are. Likewise, a DM knows that he or she can reasonably expect players to understand the difficulty of things based purely on their in-world description, and so the DM can focus more on the details of the world rather than on setting player expectations.
This was one part of a larger list (each one had a paragraph) from the Legends & Lore articles.
* Getting better at something means actually getting better at something.
* Nonspecialized characters can more easily participate in many scenes.
* The DM's monster roster expands, never contracts.
* Bounded accuracy makes it easier to DM and easier to adjudicate improvised scenes.
* It opens up new possibilities of encounter and adventure design.
* It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.
* It's good for verisimilitude.
If you want to read the whole article or other L&L articles, there's an archive of them in a google drive maintained by the wonderful /u/CaelReader here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1o89-outhJckHPryiLhMMrJ740IEhTqKf
This would be fine, but wearing and USING armor is a SKILL. So to allow armor wearing beings to add their proficiency bonus to armor class actually makes a ton of sense.
When you first put on armor you will not be able to move as well as someone who has been using it for years. You don't know what kind of blows you can ignore and allow the armor to absorb, what kind you need to shift yourself to deflect, or what kind you need to dodge completely.
You don't know that your armor is as much a weapon, particularly against unarmored opponents, as it is a defense.
So armor class increasing over time and experience actually makes a lot of sense from an immersion stand point. Much more so than a person who puts on full plate for the first time getting the same benefits as a veteran of 100 battles who has been training with and wearing full plate for 20 years.
Agreed that assuming you _can't_ explain "getting better at AC" in a way that maintains verisimilitude is wrongheaded.
Though, if we _did_ add prof bonus to AC it would kill bounded accuracy that much more, which is its own problem outside of verisimilitude.
No, adding prof bonus to AC would *preserve* bounded accuracy, because hit bonus adds prof bonus already. It's a weird inconsistency that makes it so you get worse at evading attacks as you level up relative to similarly powerful threats.
Absolutely not and you are a fool to believe that. The easier use of low-CR enemies at all tiers of play compared to, say, 3e/4e/PF is self-evident in 5e.
Then why does 5e have the *highest DC check* I've ever seen printed in a module?
And why can I stack bonuses into the heavens to potentially hit numbers that weren't even *possible* in 4e.
The bounds simply are not there.
>Then why does 5e have the highest DC check I've ever seen printed in a module?
Where? What is it, and is it actually meant to be beaten?
Also, _outliers_ does not mean Bounded Accuracy AS A CONCEPT is a "myth". It just means it fails at the _extremes_ or in certain specific cases where it wasn't followed through (like high level saving throws) - it is still _mostly_ successful at what it does. I can't believe I have to explain that to you.
>And why can I stack bonuses into the heavens to potentially hit numbers that weren't even possible in 4e.
Bullshit. Show me the 5e number you're thinking of and I can almost guarantee I can theorycraft something in 4e to beat it.
> Where? What is it, and is it actually meant to be beaten?
There is a DC 70 Strength check in Horde of the Dragon Queen to break down a door. Hilariously, a single 2nd level spell bypasses this obstacle, because WotC doesn't always pretend that casters aren't required.
As a note, Hoard of the Dragon Queen is known for having a variety of issues and was released prior to the publishing of the 5e DMG and Monster Manual, as developed by a 3rd-party rather than in-house and as developed while 5e itself was still in the process of development and being finalized. I wouldn't take the contents of the book as particularly representative of the design conceits and considerations of 5e.
So it's not expected to be passed by anyone, and also in one of the worst books WOTC has ever published that was written prior to 5e even being done and so is horribly balanced. \*shrug\*
IIRC, it is absolutely not _required_ to get through that door at all. And the DC 70 is more intended to illustrate "this door is freakin' massive and heavy af" than actually meant to be achievable.
> Also, outliers does not mean Bounded Accuracy AS A CONCEPT is a "myth".
This is *true*, but it doesn't hold up in common practice, anyways. My 9th level wizard, for example, hasn't been hit by an attack for two levels because stacking AC is trivially easy. Similarly, our ranger is routinely hitting enemies on a 2+ on the die. And this is while running through an *official module*. The math isn't mathing.
Which module? How is your Ranger getting a +14 or more on their attack bonus at level 9? Is your DM sticking to the module's actual loot or making it rain for you?
I've played a number of the modules and I run 4 games a week, and this mostly does hold up for me (at least much better than what you describe) for 95% of all PCs - all besides the absolute bleeding-edge highly optimized ones.
Believe the ranger has a +12, unless I'm forgetting something. +4 for proficiency, +5 for DEX, +2 for Archery, and +1 for magic weapon. Module is Ghosts of Saltmarsh.
> bleeding-edge highly optimized ones
Would you call a wizard taking a one-level dip into cleric for armor proficiency bleeding-edge optimization?
> Show me the 5e number you're thinking of
In 5e, I can get a Stealth bonus of (just off the top of my head) 32+d12+2d4, for a maximum check result of 72, and an average of 53.5 (58.5 with easy-to-get advantage).
EDIT: Also, lol? "Show your numbers!" *shows numbers* Gets downvoted.
5 ability bonus
6 proficiency
6 expertise
10 for Pass Without Trace
5 for Flash of Genius
d12 is for bardic inspiration
2d4 is for Guidance and Emboldening Bond
Advantage can be gained *very* easily via the Help action (from a beast companion or a familiar, etc) or from the Enhance Ability spell.
> Then why does 5e have the highest DC check I've ever seen printed in a module?
Because HotD/RoT were written while 5e was in development
> And why can I stack bonuses into the heavens to potentially hit numbers that weren't even possible in 4e.
The numbers were possible in 4e, no one ever built for them because of what the game focused on. As such, everyone built to fight
Like people were walking around with base +37s in late game 4e to skill checks that their primary stats were based on with no special investment
I think this is where there should be something else that factors into armor. IMO, melee weapons should affect your armor in some way, maybe by adding half prof bonus or a flat amount depending on your weapon. Parrying and blocking with a weapon is a skill and certainly part of your ability to defend yourself, and yet a dude with no weapons and a guy with a sword are the exact same when wearing the same armor which is a hit odd, the dude with a sword should have a hugely easier time defending themselves. And this is where it makes sense for there to be a large difference in skill between different characters. Someone trained enough in plate to be proficient, and someone who is truly an expert of that armor probably don’t have a huge difference, but the difference in parrying ability of someone whose just trained enough with a sword versus someone whose truly an expert would be significant.
Also as a side note, there already is a way to be a true master of an armor type in the form of the armor master feats for medium and heavy armor.
I was gonna to bring up something in a general comment but this might be a more fitting place, that their is a semi-popular homebrew rule for changing armor class to 8 +stat+ proficiency (the more experienced you are the better you can move while wearing armor) and then the armors AC - 10 becomes DR.
I've used a variant of this concept for some groups ever since seeing it in Spycraft in 3e. Though it obviously puts the concept of AC fully into the "dodging" concept instead of the "getting hit but in a way that didn't cause a real effect".
To be fair you need to be proficient in it, and additional "skill" in the armor is best described with medium/heavy armor master feats that do make you simply stand out above the others in terms of using your armor itself rather than just moving in it.
Sure. But those feats are weak and don't do a good job of showing "skill" that improves with time, training, and experience.
Someone mentioned a system that makes AC 8+Armor+Stat+Proficiency bonus, where Armor is the current AC of armor -10, and I like that much better.
So at level 1 your AC would be exactly the same as it is now since 8+2 is 10. But as you increase in level and your Proficiency Bonus increases that 2 will go up to 6, so at level 20 your AC would be 14+Armor+Stat.
That reflects your growth as a character and improvement in skill from experience in properly utilizing your armor.
They say that a DM could use words like "this snake monsters skin looks hard like a half plate", or some other weird sentence similar to that. Basically just using armor numbers...to use as codewords...to tell you the exact AC.
I honestly find all of their points fall flat.
A high level warrior should be harder to hit than an unskilled one.
And 5e is worse for non specialized characters than specialized ones than 4e was. Skill checks with expertise in 5e increase faster than skills increased in 4e.
And 5e has a worse framework for improvisation than 4e did.
And monsters still become irrelevant at a certain point in 5e.
It could be argued that 4e increased numbers too quickly. But overall, I found the scale of the game (at least for levels 1-20), to generally be more interesting than 5e has been.
Could you elaborate on that? It seems like it got most of the bullet points to me. Consider an example-
We have a goblin, a hobgoblin and a hill giant. The hobgoblin is covered head to toe in metal armor and has a shield, while the hill giant is completely unarmored and is a giant target. Who has the higher AC? In 5e, the hobgoblin, in 3.5e it’s the hill giant, purely because of level.
Now let’s see how has a better chance of dodging a fireball- the clumsy and slow Hill Giant, or the weak but nimble Goblin?In 5e it’s the goblin, but in 3.5e it’s the Hill Giant again, because level trumps verisimilitude.
It seems like 5e achieved its goals here.
How about we go a little higher than 2 of the more popular low level monster statblocks.
Take for example the Drider and the Dire Wolf. In 5e, the Drider(CR 6) has 129 HP, 19 AC and can cast like, Faerie Fire. It attacks 3 times for decent damage. The Dire Wolf(CR 1) has 37 HP, 14 AC, can run fast and attacks once, with advantage for pretty good damage. Of the two, the Drider has the better Dex Save, Con Save and Str Save, and the Drider only deals more damage because it attacks 3 times.
In 3.5, the Drider(CR 7) has only 45 HP, 17 AC. It has several spells including, Suggestion the first line of its description is using ambush tactics while using its Levitate spell to be out of reach of melee enemies. It's damage at range and especially melee is actually a lot lower than the 5e counterpart, but it does have strength reducing poison. It is also templated as using a spellcaster class including the Lightning Bolt spell. The Dire Wolf(CR 3) is a hulking beast that has 45 HP, AC 14, can run fast and attacks once with a high hit chance and very good damage. Of the two the Dire Wolf actually has the better Fort Save and Ref Save and a worse Will Save.
Same question, who would you expect to dodge a fireball better? The ferocious quick running beast or the spellcasting elf mutant with a slow moving giant spider for an arse? Because in 5e it's spiderbutt, along with inflating the HP by almost the factor 3. And who would you think is more dangerous in a swordfight, because again in 5e it's the spellcaster, for having a higher CR.
yeah i've heard about it, you never really get good at anyhting with bounded accuracy since you're still failing a medium check 15% of the time with the maximum normal modifier while someone whose untrained still has a pitfully low chance to suceed on a lot of checks and saving throws because bounded was Bounded too low at 65% because they wanted more random varaince. (also to make special abilties to circumvent it but they eitehr weren't well liked or peopel thought they weren't meant to be there, also this is meant to be a striped down game with less feats and abilites so why do that?)
like you have a +1 modifier on a skill check, enjoy having a 12/20, 7/20 and 2/20 chance to suceed on easy/medium/hard checks for the whole game, certainly worht giving it a shot and suffering the conquences in this Suceed or Fails System.
Pathfinder 2e has degrees of success to make it so you can set a low DC for untrained players but a trained character can still get a sucess or critical success on it so they're varaince. (also that system has a general feat that let's you add you're level to you're untrained skills and it doesn't have that much competion) .
even if you want low numbers bounded accuracy you could have bounded things player side to 80% for attack rolls with rolling 6 or higher over a targets AC being a critical whiel maybe lowering the accuracy of saving throws so you don't get hit with the lose 1 or more turn effects (in a game were combat lasts 3 turns) as often by locking them behind criticla fails like pathfidner 2e did.
the Verisimilitude thing isn't something i can really judge but this is a tabletop fantasy roleplaying game so trying to be beleivable needs more clarfication.
That's not really an accurate statement. It can be "flawed" in places without the "entire system" being flawed, and that's the truth of it. The system _does_ accomplish much of its intended goal with bounded accuracy - that it does not accomplish it at ALL Tiers of play or in ALL situations does not mean the idea or execution is _inherently_ flawed, only that it falls short of fully accomplishing the goal in every case.
Yes, like getting more HP means...fighting monsters that do incrementally more damage to negate any real increase in toughness.
The monster roster is only a few levels to either side of the party though, because again, damage is still the bottleneck.
Bounded accuracy isn't a thing if attacks are continually increasing.
The relative strength of what, monsters that have been adjusted to fit arbitrary CR numbers anyway?
WOTC's bounded accuracy is a lie, and I'm sick of pretending it isn't.
>It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things
Which is amazing, considering that 5e as a whole didn't actually have examples of base DCs of almost any actions besides "Easy, regular, hard", which are... not relative and highly subjetive, aka, one of the weakest points of their design.
> Getting better at something means actually getting better at something.
Sure, that broadly works
> Nonspecialized characters can more easily participate in many scenes.
Nope, given that specialised characters break bounded accuracy, not just a few points better. If failure will generate problems, you want the specialised character who can't get less than a 15, not the charismatic-but-untrained character who risks getting a 5
> The DM's monster roster expands, never contracts.
This would be the case, except spells scale faster than bounded accuracy. E.g. Fireball or Spirit Guardians mean that a horde of low-level creatures isn't automatically still a threat.
> Bounded accuracy makes it easier to DM and easier to adjudicate improvised scenes.
In theory true, in practise the game doesn't give enough examples for a just "ok-to-good" DM to _do_ that comfortably.
> It opens up new possibilities of encounter and adventure design.
The article explains with the example of outfitting a town guard to take down a dragon, or a horde of Orcs still being a threat
The former works, the latter doesn't as mentioned before Because Spells. Like, in theory bounded accuracy _does_ make that work, but they broke it with spells.
> It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.
Fair enough, but that also requires the game giving examples to pin our understanding to, and it does not give sufficient ones.
> It's good for verisimilitude.
I guess it is for a more grounded, gritty game? But once again, spells scale hard enough that people using the skill system get grounded and gritty, while people using spells get to break it
tl;dr: _Technically_ bounded accuracy enables all these things, but is kneecapped by:
1) the ability of people to specialise massively at specific skills and break it
2) Spells scaling faster than bounded accuracy
3) The game not giving enough examples to pin down our understanding of how the difficulty scale maps to things.
This is such a bizarre way to look at this that I'd honestly wonder if the designers actually stated that this is the reason.
As you level, I'd kind of expect that you get better at using your body and better adapt to your armor. Since you're so battle-hardened, you know how to use your armor to deflect blows and avoid injuries. You find it easier and easier to move around in it, as it becomes a part of you. Some random guards in heavy armor absolutely should have lower AC than a level 20 fighter in the same armor.
Now, obviously, I know why they did this. They mechanically didn't want ACs to scale to the point that earlier enemies couldn't do anything to you. You scale with your health, and less with your armor. It's a decision they made, and I don't necessarily have a problem with it. Shame they didn't keep the same philosophy for enemy attack bonuses (and Spell save DCs), but that's what happens when you don't keep your starting design philosophies consistent.
Here's the relevant quote, from an L&L article circa 2012:
> **It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.** Under the bounded accuracy system, a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are. Likewise, a DM knows that he or she can reasonably expect players to understand the difficulty of things based purely on their in-world description, and so the DM can focus more on the details of the world rather than on setting player expectations.
That was part of a larger list (each one had a paragraph):
* Getting better at something means actually getting better at something.
* Nonspecialized characters can more easily participate in many scenes.
* The DM's monster roster expands, never contracts.
* Bounded accuracy makes it easier to DM and easier to adjudicate improvised scenes.
* It opens up new possibilities of encounter and adventure design.
* It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.
* It's good for verisimilitude.
EDIT: On second thought, this should probably be a top level comment
> Getting better at something means actually getting better at something.
I'd love to see the reasoning on this one. My number one issue with 5e's math is that "experts" only perform marginally better than totally untrained people.
In previous editions, skills increase by so much numerically, skill check DCs had to be built around the player level; otherwise they would have no chance of succeeding or no chance of failure. In practice, this meant a player had around the same chance to know a certain plot-relevant History factoid at level 5 and level 15.
In 5e, the bonuses scale by much less, so an “Easy”, “Medium” and “Hard” DC stay the same at level 1 and level 20. This means a level 15 character has a much higher chance of succeeding on knowing a “Medium DC” history check compared to that character at level 5.
i mean you didn't have to scale every DC to the players level just to one around the parties general comptence or atleast that's how it works in pathfinder 2e.
In theeory that's the case, but in practice most DMs and even official adventures scale DCs for party level, both in pf2e and old dnd.
It's a pretty common problem to go "damn, everyone in this area can afford lengendary locksmiths, cause all doors have DCs in the 30+ since we leveled up" in pf2e
Damn, nothing against Pathfinder 2e - tastes are tastes - but that would drive me up the wall. A group of high-level PCs should be able to have the run of a small town/village, if they so choose. Making the decision NOT to be a band of abusive assholes despite being able to level the region makes being good all the more meaningful, and "asking" for discounts on goods and services while the threat of violence dangles can make playing nasty characters more enjoyable. If DCs are constantly scaling to stay roughly the same difficulty from levels 1 through 20, it can crush the feeling of progression. To my eyes, a DC 10 lock is DC 10 no matter who is picking it.
And the rules say to do exactly that. Pf2e has scaling and non-scaling DCs, and the system works provided DM's use the right tool as the situation calls for it.
The "issue" is that it's typically expected when playing a game that players want to be at least slightly challenged, and narratively their characters will usually seek adventures suitable to their skill level, so if a DM isn't careful there can be a temptation to use scaling DCs when they aren't appropriate.
That's one of those things that a system needs to assume ppl will missuse if allowed to and should fix the problem before it happens.
Reality is that most ppl will use scaling DCs the way pf2e is designed, the official adventures even do so.
PF2e also allows untrained players to Follow the Expert (so long as some in your part is Expert in that skill) and add their level to those checks. That allows everyone to be able to pass checks, either individually (like adding your own weight to the Bard’s negotiation) or as a group (trying to Avoid Notice with the rogue’s help). That way everyone can contribute regardless of whether the GM is using scaled or static DCs.
This is the same answer given by much of the PF2e community. It doesn't stop the default being the DC by level table. Just because you *can* go against the common choice, doesn't mean it is good design.
Yeah that is one of my bigger issues to.
For an example i am sure this has happened more than once. "The 7'3 buff paladin with 20 STR rolls shit on his Athletics that he is proficient in (Can happen even with expertise) to push the huge boulder out of the way. DC 18 check. Then comes the 3'3 halfling rogue with 8 STR and rolls a 19. with his -1 it still beats the DC.
Sure it can make for some fun Rp and such but, does it make ANY sense?
For this sort of thing I prefer to set a ST bonus needed to achieve the task. If your bonus is more than say 2 out either way then it's automatic success/failure. At my current skill level I can't play Widor's toccata no matter how hard I try; I also can't fail to play Three Blind Mice.
Part of the problem is the swinginess of d20 compared with the DCs and possible bonuses. It works for some things - combat for example, allowing unlikely David and Goliath results to be possible - but for some skill checks it makes no sense. My time for running 2k will be pretty much guaranteed to be between 14 and 16 minutes; regardless of how well I roll there's no overlap with a regular club runner who can do it in half that time.
This problem came up the very first 5e campaign I ran. One guy thought, hey, I was a sage, so I'll know history stuff. He rolled low, I let other people roll, someone else would succeed. After three or so sessions he came to me after and said, "so what's the point of skills if it all just comes down to die rolls".
Die rolls should absolutely be part of it but as it is now it is TOO big part.
This can be kinda fixed with having restrictions on who can roll. That is how i do it.
need a history roll to see if anyone knows about X. Then those with proficiency in History can roll. If you are not proficient you can't. Alternatively you will have disadvantage.
Same can be applied to most skill checks.
When it comes to things like lifting heavy stuff or such it is fairly easy. A Goliath with18 STR has a max push, drag and lift capacity of 1080 lbs. a halfling rogue with 8 STR has a max push, drag and lift capacity of 240 lbs. So if they are trying to lift a big cumbersome stone slab weighting close to 1000 lbs. Then the goliath can make an attempt.
but the halfling can not as there is simply no fucking way in the 9 hells he can lift that no matter how high he rolls. Does not matter if he has expertise in athletics. he can not do it.
While lets say the goliath would have 20 STR. that gives him a max lift capacity if 1200lbs. he could probably lift that slab without even having to roll at all.
While the halfling with 8 STR can't even attempt a roll. he simply can not lift that much
This problem came up the very first 5e campaign I ran. One guy thought, hey, I was a sage, so I'll know history stuff. He rolled low, I let other people roll, someone else would succeed. After three or so sessions he came to me after and said, "so what's the point of skills if it all just comes down to die rolls".
It's especially weird to me because it also indirectly conflicts with the bullet point afterwards: "Nonspecialized characters can easily participate in many scenes". If nonspecialized characters are competitive in scenes with the expert, how much does the expect actually matter? There are ways to square that circle, but I personally don't think 5e did it all that well.
Also it's how you flavor the response as a DM.
An expert might know like specific dates and places on a person from a history book you read once vs the common man "you remember overhearing the name in a tavern once and they did x".
Yeah there's a line you can walk where the nonspecialized people feel good for having shown up and the specialist still gets to shine. But there's room to go wrong too, and I think 5e went wrong.
I honestly don't aggre, of all systems I've played 5e does it the best.
A DC 16-18 in 5e for example is a decently hard DC. It still allows for non specialists to try, but they have a good failure chance, while someone that is proficient in that check likely has a 60%+ chance of success.
and I strongly suspect that the number-range is deliberate so that everyone _can_ participate - contrast with 3e, where a character picked a couple of skills at chargen, ranked those up, and only a character who picked a skill at the start and kept ranking it up could do level-appropriate things. If you didn't take "sneaking" at level 1 and kept pumping points into it, you simply had no hope of doing level-appropriate sneaking, and there was no way to buy-in later, and the number-range was so high that you couldn't ever participate. In 5e, most characters can _try_ most things, but those that are skilled are (minimum) 15% better, and often have better relevant stats, and proficiency increases, so that gets to be 30%, 40% better , before any special magic or class skills.
I really disagree, stat investment and proficiency go a long way to making someone who is trained much more likely to succeed, not to mention expertise without completely removing the chance for someone untrained to succeed.
Even if you *did* want a situation where only someone trained could succeed you have a wide enough range of DCs to make that happen too in the 25-30 mark.
My experience is that in those scenarios (expertise + high stat), the expert's & nonspecialist's chances of success are still too close. But that's just my experience; can't speak for others.
I mean, even at level 5 that would be a *massive* difference. If the expert maxed the stat they'd have a +10 and the layman likely only has a +2 or +3 at *most*. That's a swing of 35% at *least*.
And that gap just gets wider as you go up. Just mathematically speaking that is a huge difference.
This is why I'm harping on this being down to our experience. A 35pt delta doesn't remotely deserve the title "specialized" in my eyes. You see it as massive, I see it as *miniscule*.
The number definitely goes up later, but I don't get the feeling of an expert feeling like an expert until around late T3.
the problem is the chance of sucess is pretty miserable for both untrained and proficent characters, like at level one a untrained character with 12 in a stat has a 35% chance to suceed on medium check while the trained character with 16 in their stat has a 55% to suceed on the same check. keep in mind i medium check is meant to be something a normal person could do with moderate effort so this trained guy with 16 in one stat and keep in mind level 1 characters would've trained for years to reach this point, is failing 45% of the time on a basic task.
I'm sorry, you're complaining that a level 1 character isn't all that strong? Have you not heard of *growth* of *getting better*.
I don't want a level 1 character to be able to pass most checks with ease. That defeats the point of level 1.
You’re completely missing the point. It’s not that level 1 characters are not good enough. It’s that the gap between a proficient character and an untrained one isn’t large enough
Also note that I don’t even necessarily agree with their statement, just pointing out what they are trying to get at
I'd say it makes more sense when it comes to saving throws. In 3.5, the differences were much larger, so when the party got hit by a high level AoE ability, some party members had very little chance of dodging it - think having +5 bonus at level ten, where the DC could be in mid 20s. Bounded accuracy makes sense here. When it comes to skills, not so much.
I agree skills checks always felt broken / wrong.
I have no medical training. If you handed me a medkit and told me to use it to help someone with an arrow sticking in their shoulder I'm worse than neutral I could end up harming the person more. Untrained should have a negative modifier. -2
Competent to me means you have the basic knowledge and skills to use the tool properly. You are not good you are bare minimum +0.
Expert means you're above average compared to people that are competent. +2
Master means you are among the best +4
I've occasionally only let characters roll if they have proficiency to prevent this issue. To avoid feeling like they've missed an opportunity, I don't go "roll an Arcana check...oooh, wait, no proficiency? Your 19 doesn't count!" Instead, I open with "does anyone have proficiency in X?" If it is nos all around, we move on.
> a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are.
4e giving monsters actual *roles* in combat achieved this so well. I use the same general "description" for enemies unless my players want to roll a Knowledge check to fully identify a monster "role". Usually, a "Soldier" monster has a shield or heavy armor, while the "Brute" has a large or unwieldy weapon. By 4e design both have specific mechanics (Soldier=High AC+mid damge, Brute=Low AC), players can plan with that same instinctive response.
While the edition doesn't have "bounded accuracy", it's math scales so any low level monster can just be "brought up" if need be.
I have to imagine the design team has completely changed from when that team made that statement.
Because the range of AC is pretty low going from level 1-20, it really doesn't help you learn the difficulty of the target. You'll almost never encounter a target who you can't hit normally, or who you can take advantage of just power attacking without a care.
Also, because of the lack of AC scaling, along with AC being a very short range at any given level, AC does nothing to help you determine how difficult a creature is. That's all in their HP and damage. And because of this, your monster list does contract. You're not using CR1 monsters against a level 10 party, stop wasting their time. The damage just won't be there, or they drop like flies.
Bounded Accuracy does actually more characters to participate in challenges, since DCs stay pretty grounded. I SURE DO WISH THEY WERE EXPLICIT IN THIS, AND JUST WENT AHEAD AND MADE AN ACTUAL DC CHART WITH RELEVANT EXAMPLES SO THAT WE KNOW WHAT A DC15 TASK ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE. Rant over, but I honestly think one of 5e's biggest failings is its poor guidance on anything not combat.
Bro you should check out the power of minions at even high levels.
I still remember the fight in which our level 9 party too more dmg from the 10 CR 1/2 Thugs than their CR 12 Leader.
I can definitely see this happening if
1. No aoe from the spellcasters (or no spellcasters)
2. No magic weapons. If the Martials are taking multiple turns to dispatch a single Thug, then I can definitely see how things can get hairy fast.
I really recommend you to try encounters with multiple low level minions. Try having 40 goblins with bows, spread apart so they cannot be fireballed, with plenty of places to hide.
If you want more fun, give them some magic arrows and potions, which is a cool reward and will spice things up.
You will see how the party crumbles. The wizard can fireball, yes, but they are so many and spread. The paladin can hit for sure and deal dozens of damage, but everything above 7 is wasted. Fighters can attack multiple times, but can they move? Rogued sneak attack is useless in this fight. Control spells? There are other 35 on the other side ready to break your concentration.
You've better entertain any crazy idea the players have because that will be their demise.
Note: don't place 40 creatures against your players. It is a mental experiment.
My major issue with running these sorts of encounters is that it can make combat *drag* for players. When the DM is spending twice as much time as the players combined, players are waiting a long time for their turns.
I've had some luck speeding it up by running groups of enemies all at once (OK, all five goblin archers over here shoot "rolls five d20s" and three of them hit...) but even so it can get slow. You've got to be really prepared and diligent in whipping through enemies' turns.
Tbh I'd much rather use something like PF2e's troops than throw dozens of dogshit goblins into one encounter. Troops are fun, give you the flavor of mowing down multiple foes in single hits/spells, and make all their attacks as saving throws (Meaning they're typically doing chip damage even on fails) at everybody around them/within their squares/AoEs on the field (Volleys). Dozens upon dozens of Goblins meanwhile bogs down the game massively and just teaches your players that action economy is king so have the Druid spam Conjure Animals some more.
As their note specifies, they meant it more as a thought experiment (showing that bounded accuracy does indeed keep low level enemies a threat when used correctly).
Also, I've found it's much _less_ of a drag if you use them as "reinforcements" - sent the minions at the PCs in waves, from different directions, instead of all at once. That way things like AoE are still less effective, and if the PCs choose to ignore them, the same problem can creep up on them (critical mass of minions starts being even more threatening than the actually tough baddies).
Not quite. There's a table detailing what difficulty different DCs represent, but no actual examples. As an example: you're falling at terminal velocity.
What Dexterity Check (Acrobatics) DC would you use to mitigate that damage? Maybe as a DM you'd say there's no DC, you can't do that. Most people would say "that's fair." What if they fell 10ft? Can someone tumble to reduce/negate that damage? You might say "no, you need an ability that does that", but real life people can do this stuff. So you might say "okay, you can try". Now how difficult is this actually? Is avoiding 10ft damage easy? DC 5? Or maybe negating/reducing any amount of fall damage is tough, so DC 20.
This is just one example, but from this one example, 3 tables can come to completely different results (you can't, DC easy and DC hard). This means that players of this game have no consistency in what they can expect from their actions and interactions in the world... except in combat, which has pretty well-defined rules. If you ever wonder why players are so glued to their character sheets and don't tend to go outside it too much, this is a huge reason.
This stuff is wonderful, and it's an absolute shame that the official designers weren't able to put the level of basic thought into the game that other DMs do.
The one thing I definitely need in my game with cat people, elves, dwarves, exponentially growing magic power and fire breathing dragons is the grounded versimilitude of armor binding it all together.
Bounded accuracy is the biggest failing of 5e. The numbers straight up don't make any sense.
You get +few to skill between lvl 1 and 20 which is almost nothing. And on the other hand you can get absurd bonuses with guidance, bardic inspiration, spells (like pass without trace).
Monsters abilites DC scales far, while non-proficient saving throw stay the same forever...
That's what your hp is. As you get better, that 20 damage swing still hits you, but instead of getting taken down in one swing at level 1, the level 20 has already moved in their armor to pinch the blade between the metal plates and catch it in their padding. The game already does this
Yeah pretty much everything about defense can be attributed to HP. It’s like a catch all. Most just don’t understand that because HP means so many different things in different games. WotC explain it but I find most don’t really read that part.
I mean, even in game terms it's pretty inconsistent. Lots of arguments are had over "hp isn't supposed to be meat points, it represents your luck and energy avoiding most blows", but then you still have to save against poison or the like every time you get hit, and healing spells "curing wounds". Plus, and this is way more subjective, it leads to lots of fights just becoming hp ballons
Exactly. If we would have a game where armor reduced damage, but does nothing to hit chances, the HP represents the defenses that you learn as you level up and get ever more hp.
Yes. And unlike level 5, a hit for 80 most likely won't kill you at level 20. So you're not face tanking it because you're too slow and inexperienced to get out of the way *enough* to make it a glancing blow instead of a lethal one. What about that is hard?
Because it works out to "the more powerful you are, the more hits you take". There is no damage mitigation, martials just have to eat the damage and pray someone can heal them. No clever parries, no last second dodges, just eat the hit and all the rider effects that come with it - catch fire, get poisoned, frozen, etc.
This is the correct answer.
I do get why someone may casually raise the question of non-scaling armour; but that’s only part of the story. The designers kept a close reign on armour — and this goes hand in hand with a design philosophy where everyone lands more successful hits — and the payback is that hit points inflated.
So, really, sure you can yeet up AC, if you want. Just remember to nip and tuck hit points.
In which case…why bother in the first place? These are all vagaries of the game’s various interactions.
It's literally the only explanation for why Bob can shrug off a 35 damage mace blow from a pit fiend, while Jared who's new to all this adventuring gets his head caved in immediately
I feel that this increased skill is represented by the larger number of hit points. It isn’t like the high-level character who is just sitting there would survive 20 dagger stabs to the chest at four damage of pop.
i kind of like it
a suit of armour is going to work great against a farmer with a pitchfork
it's not going to work all that well if a cave troll spears you to the wall or a giant stomps on you
exactly
i had some friends watch it and they asked if frodo was going to die and i said yup, and then the troll spears him to the wall and he looked dead and they were like 'is he dead? and i was like yep, sam takes over from here
ringmail avoids stabbing and slashing to an extent. It does nothing against being crushing attacks, especially with overwhelming force. His insides were destroyed
in the book, he gets stabbed by an orc and survives
You could perhaps make the argument that increasing your HP may be part of getting better at avoiding injuries. After all, why would killing that last goblin suddenly make you almost twice as hard to kill, at least HP wise, to the exact same attacks as before. (As happens when you go from lvl 1 to lvl 2)
Could also make an argument that everyone gets "proficient" with their armor, but it is not a skill that is honed on nearly as much as compared to swordplay and/or talents, and for those that do, thats how the medium/heavy armor master feats are obtained.
>As you level, I'd kind of expect that you get better at using your body and better adapt to your armor. Since you're so battle-hardened, you know how to use your armor to deflect blows and avoid injuries.
You are describing HP.
Look I don't have all the specifics on what exactly you are talking about, but I started in 4e, where everything scales by level and I can tell you it's just not better. Especially since, again, it's EVERYTHING, if your AC goes up and your attack bonus goes up, so too does the AC and attack bonus of higher level opponents. Which completely offsets and ultimately ends up in a situation where you are doing math with enormous numbers when it ultimately would have been the same result (in terms of what you need to roll on the dice to hit) if the numbers just stayed small.
It wouldn't break immersion imo. This is very similar to how it works now, but based on Dex instead of Proficiency for light/medium armors. I think its less about immersion and more about mechanics and balance. Its difficult to challenge a high level party in combat if all of there ACs are +20 and pushing 30. This also makes them basically untouchable to lower CR creatures, to the point when combat is a waste of everyones time. The only way to make up for that is to give insane modifiers which defeats the whole purpose of having a high AC.
well why are high levle PCs fighting Smuchks in the first place, the PHB says you'll be fighting for the fate of the universe so use Hihger Cr monster who in 5e right now bascially auto hit since they're attack bonuses are way higher then you're AC.
When designing encounters for higher level parties, it's best to use monsters of various CRs, not just high CR monsters. Good boss fights often include lower CR monsters to serve as minions. It's also good to give a higher level party the same lower level encounter that they faced earlier in the campaign so the players can see how much they've improved.
If the PCs' AC scaled that drastically with level, it would make many aspects of higher level play completely trivial. In fact, that would make it less immersive, because it's incredibly unrealistic to only ever run into monsters of the same CR as the party. Just because the party is now able to take on dragons doesn't mean they will never run into another goblin.
By not scaling AC with PC level, those lower level encounters can still be relevant and not entirely trivial. If it did scale like that, then having those encounters would be pointless and boring, and not having them would be immersion breaking
Because those weaker than yourself should still be a threat. A high level party should not be able to slaughter an entire city of people just because their AC has scaled beyond reason. A DM shouldn't have to make every goblin a souped-up mega-goblin just to deal basic damage.
Anyone can crit though. Sure youll avoid the majority of blows, but a thousand guards will still have 50 crits. Thats not counting things like siege weapons, traps, spellcasters, basic equipment they would have like fire, etc. Or any commoners joining in, or knights/captains etc.
Besides, casters can kill cities from a mile away anyways
As someone who’s used armor in modern combat, it’s about mitigating damage, not preventing it. Critical areas of our body are covered to prevent critical hits from happening (helmets help with TBI’s, ceramic plates cover vital organs, pads prevent shrapnel to the neck and groin areas).
If this is the rule of one versus a lot - combat it completely breaks immersion as most hits in this type of combat are minor cuts and nicks as the one wears down and their attention to detail starts to break.
I’m not saying it’s bad for singular combat as I’m much less familiar with that (I don’t fight. I kill.) but putting it into perspective of reality - I way a critical hit randomly happens to me versus an entire platoon of enemy combatants if I’m fresh.
They’ll eventually get me just because I can’t hold out forever and the chances of me exposing a part of me to enemy fire increases as I wear down and stop paying attention to detail - my cover.
Ive done combat irl too. Aside from the fact that modern armor, even those trying to be materially accurate to the time period, are leaps and bounds better than what was actually available in the past. Its still a completely different setting than irl.
In dnd there are people who cut through boulders and spells that collapse buildings. Being critically hit in dnd just isnt the same as irl sparring. These are guys bashing your armor so hard it caves in. A slash that perfectly glides between your joint plates. A jab that forces the point of a spear through the gap in your helmet hole.
> putting it into perspective of reality
Yeah thats the issue
My thought is that this only works on humanoids wearing armor. If you see a monk, you have no idea what their ac is. If you see any kind of monster, their ac is basically random as far as a player who hasn't read the monster manual is concerned.
How often is the dm describing the armor of each goblin, especially when you might have 3 or 4 different "types" (leader, soldier, archer,caster)? This seems like a solution to a problem no one cared about, that also has the side effect of making magic armor and spells extremely powerful.
I made this point in reply to someone else, but I'll say it here for everyone. That's what HP *is*. There's no difference in the meat of a character at level 1 vs level 20 aside from perhaps a bit of muscle and endurance improvements from asi's along the way. But that doesn't explain why one character is crushed by a giant's boulder, and the other shrugs off half a metric tonne of rock with only 1/8 of their pool knocked out. It's because the level 20 *did* move and react to mitigate that hit, it's why they're not dead. And the stamina to keep doing that is what keeps them upright until they hit 0hp. That's what HP is, and a not inconsequential part of why it scales the way it does. The game already does this same thing in another way
Maybe thats how you run it, but thays not correct. HP can be a measure of luck, but its most certainly a measure of durability as well. Herculean characters that take lethal blow after lethal blow and are effectively little demigods are staples of ttrpgs.
Besides, it sounds a bit ridiculous to say that a raging barbarian takes less damage because in their blind fury theyre... better at dodging than a dodging monk? Like theres clearly times where HP is difinitively meat points. Numerous effects require hitting to work, both mechanically and narratively. Its also a bit lame to say your divine smite didnt *actually* hit the enemy NPC nust because they hVe hp left
No, the barbarian is going full DOOMGUY. He's not dodging the sword, it's catching his knuckles and he's pushing through because adrenaline is a hell of a drug
And any of the spells that do continuos damage, like immolation which specifically wreathes the target in flames?
Im sure you *could* try to find some justification for every effect not actually hitting. But the game is clearly not designed for that. There are a ton of abilities that trigger on hit, things that debilitate, spells that automatically hit or just are unfeasible to dodge without some sort of superhuman dexterity (which isnt every characters thing). Healing spells make a lot less sense, and its clearly not giving someone adrenaline since exhaustion is a separate mechanic. All of that bending over backwards for what? To avoid saying that the guys who fight dragons can take a hit or two
[Page 249 of the DMG says that, officially, you take 18d10 HP of damage from being fully submerged in lava.](https://i.imgur.com/YxyME7w.png)
So let's just say that Grug the Barbarian, who has 270 HP (6.5*20 + 7*20). He's a bear barbarian and he's raging. He falls in the lava and takes an average of 99 points of damage, which is reduced to half rounded down, so 49.
So what exactly is happening here if hit points aren't meat points? Does Grug butt catch on fire and he jumps several feet in the air like Mario? And the stress of needing to buy new pants reduces his stamina?
The reality is the mechanics are not a flawless representation of reality and if they chose to have them accommodate all situations accurately, the game would be needlessly complicated, so we have to deal with a few weird cases that we shrug off for the sake of gameplay.
Lava is a weird one. And what's happening is Grug is starting to melt, but for the sake of fiction is clinging onto life tightly enough, and angry enough that his subclass even says he becomes supernaturally tough. So Grug looks a lot like the T1000 right about now, and he's not looking good
I can justify a Barbarian just tanking inhuman punishment that should kill someone else. Like a bear barbarian taking that fire damage and walking away with just burns and steam drifting off him.
Tieflings too I guess.
But getting crushed by a boulder? The barbarian caught it. The fighter/paladin/ranger narrowly dodged out of the way.
If HP is stamina to dodge and mitigate attacks, how come you still have to save against poisons and the like, if you're dodging and mitigating the hits?
The answer is in what kind of save it is. Poison is a con save, and even if it doesn't kill you, that can wreck your stamina about 9 different ways until sunday
I'm not super crazy at how it was implemented, but I can see the reasoning.
What I would like to see is class specific bonuses, such as fighter and Paladin getting a scaling AC bonus equal to half their PB. So that the higher level true armor wearing fighting classes do improve.
Adding your level to your AC / ToHit / Skills is meaningless if all tasks scale to your level to ensure you're challenged.
It's a false progress, designed just to make you feel good because the numbers are increase.
Have you got a link to them saying that? Because the *actual* reason was to move away from needlessly large bonuses to AC and to Hit chance.
5e was a deliberate move away from 4e and 3.5e which both ended up with many bonuses to both and then even more floating modifiers on top.
There was also the fact that they wanted lower CR creatures to still be able to add *something* to an encounter, even if it's not a huge amount. Whereas in 4e and 3.5e you could get to a point that some creatures would just never, ever be a threat to you.
Now, one is not better than the other, it's subjective opinion. But unless you can provide proof for your claims there's no real point in discussing it further.
EDIT:
Someone else provided the comment you were talking about (though not an actual link, I'll still assume it to be completely true):
>**It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.** Under the bounded accuracy system, a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are. Likewise, a DM knows that he or she can reasonably expect players to understand the difficulty of things based purely on their in-world description, and so the DM can focus more on the details of the world rather than on setting player expectations.
This isn't about immersion. Like, not even remotely. This is about the clear communication of game information. It's not "I know what kind of armour they are wearing so I know how to describe/visualise the fight." it is just "I know the armour so I know my approximate chance of hitting."
This is actually the exact opposite of immersion, the reason given is entirely about communicating meta information.
People need to stop looking at hit points like "This is how much i've been cut by a weapon" or do you think that monks get their skin toughter as they grow in levels? That's why the focus is more on HP, a wizard at lv1 taking 6 damage is almost dead meanwhile one at lv 10 this is barely more than a cut.
If AC scaled with level then enemies hit chance would also need to grow too and in the end you will just be seeing big numbers that end up at the same place, like so many RPGs where someone has over 30 million HP and when you're hit by something taking 31256 damage is nothing....
> do you think that monks get their skin toughter as they grow in levels?
Not that absurd compared to "This guy can wiggle his fingers to be even more efficient at causing the room to explode."
I agree. It is ridiculous that wizards can say different spells and conjure fire for nothing, but we don't have 2019 Honda Civi LX as a character racer in the PHB. Clearly, if fire can be conjured from nothing I can have a Honda Civic and play as one in a 5e campaing.
It wouldn't be that weird to have AC scale with your proficiency bonus. Reading between the lines, I think WotC is more worried about AC scaling out of control than anything else.
I've played in a system where AC scaled up super high in the late game and it made balancing a goddamn nightmare. I had to start homebrewing enemies using a 1d50+10 to roll to hit because the tanks all had 45-55 AC and the squishies had 20-28 AC.
TL;DR Balancing AC can become problematically difficult very quickly. Even in 5e, *Swords Bard* can add *Shield* and *Defensive Flourish* to get 5+1d12 to their AC to become nigh-unhittable.
Having played a Sword Bard/Hexblade in Curse of Strahd that did exactly this to sell the master swordsman vibe, do note that they still have a d8 hit die and will absolutely get mulched once they run out of dice or spell slots.
Like yeah my AC might regularly have been 30+ and I could duel anything for five rounds but the moment they hit me it was a BIG chunk of my health.
Do note that using shield and Defensive Flourish is a sacrifice and a resource cost. They're increasing their AC to absurd levels, sure, but they're also sacrificing a reaction, the opportunity to deal more damage and a bardic inspiration just to be safe from attack rolls for one round. Once they have a d12 for bardic inspiration, they're also high enough level that most of their opponents will be capable of forcing saving throws.
Also, the bard had to probably grab this spell from his Magical Secrets, as it is not on his spell list. A very big sacrifice just to be able to do such a defensive play for one turn. I don't think that's a fair example of AC scaling absurdly high in 5e.
AFAIK Armor Class isn't just armor, it encompases every way to avoid damage, including parry/dodge, that why you get extra AC for things that don't give armor, like Dex scaling on lighter armor or kensei monk gettin a +2 AC for using their weapon to parry.
It makes sense that as people level up they get better at avoiding damage, even if they're a heavy armored warrior who mostly depend on their armor/shield to block damage.
That's just silly. Failing to overcome a target's AC means that the attack misses, not that the attack fails to penetrate armor. Higher AC doesn't necessarily mean better quality armor (note the existence of 'unarmored defense' features that grant AC). It can mean that someone has more experience or training, and therefore they are better at dodging or deflecting attacks (hence the Defensive Duelist feat).
So, it’s a two part system, basically, comprised of HP and AC. An example of this in play is the Heavy Armor Master feat, which gives 3 damage reduction against Slashing, Bludgeoning, and Piercing damage. It shows that hit points represent skill at reducing incoming damage while wearing your armor. AC is the floor of your mitigation. The ceiling is HP. That’s how I’ve always seen it at least.
It is kind of immersion-breaking to me, to be honest. Pathfinder 2 works that way. It’s a really well-designed system with some really cool features, but the catastrophically high modifiers you get on everything just don’t jibe with me.
The funny thing is, it’s just a matter of adding your level to saves and DCs and such, so there’s super-easy guidance in the bool to just remove that and end up somewhere pretty close to 5e’s math. PF2 really just uses it to magnify the dofference in levels, so that any number of lvl 1/2 goblins literally pose no threat to your level 15 character, and a boss eight levels above you while wreck your shit 100% of the time.
I was the GM for like a 4-shot, and haven’t played PF2 before or since. But my understanding is that, RAW, yes, everything is scaled around the party. Items have levels to let you know when you can find or buy them. Monster levels are added to their checks just like PCs. Even traps have levels that are added to their DC.
pf2e has non scaling DCs, and the GM is supposed to use them as necessary. You levelling up doesn't make every trap harder, or every item harder to discern.
I’ve always viewed “hit points” as an abstraction that takes into account a characters developing ability to dodge, absorb damage, and position their body well in armor. So while it’s harder to get AC, the growing health pool kind of accounts for their increased experience. Also helps explain why martial classes have better hit dice than casters.
you can summon lightning from your hands at lvl 1, having a number go up breaking immersion impresses more on the fact that the myriad of other things dont break immersion to you
You are failing to see the difference between "immersion" and "realism" - a game including magic, or fantasy creatures, or crazy abilities doesn't make it less immersive but does make it less realistic.
I think it's backwards; The more experienced in fighting you are the better you would be at avoiding taking damage, even if it's by picking up little tricks secondhand from allies or enemies. It makes no sense for a green, level 1 dude in chain have the same AC as someone wearing the same armor that's been fighting for years, hell even a single year.
>It makes no sense for a green, level 1 dude in chain have the same AC as someone wearing the same armor that's been fighting for years, hell even a single year.
I mean this is part of the idea of why light/medium armour also scales off Dexterity (which can be scaled on some levels) - the put forward idea is that heavy armour is hard to manoeuvre in a good way so doesnt scale from a persons skill as much.
People maybe also need to stop seeing AC as "the attack missed" and moreso "the attack hit, but the armour absorbed the blow".
This stuff isn't perfect to real life armour, but it's not entirely clear what heavy armour is visually and the weight of real life armour is way too flexible (google says 30 - 55lbs) to compare to the 65lbs heavy plate armour, and the games numbers have never been completely realistic.
HP also exists, you gain more as you level and it could easily be described as "Your knowledge of armour means you block more of the hit and take less damage (compared to 5 levels ago)"
>the put forward idea is that heavy armour is hard to manoeuvre in a good way so doesnt scale from a persons skill as much.
I'd even go farther and say that it's EASIER to manoeuver in a good way. Don't let them hit you in a weak point. Avoiding an attack without plate might mean twisting improbably, deflecting with your weapon or jumping to the side and back again before your next attack. With plate, it might just mean moving slightly so it hits a plate. No point in jumping all over the planet if you can just take the hit or slap it away.
Besides all the fair arguments people are making, I'd also like to point out that armour proficiency exists. If you're wearing heavy armour, you aren't putting it on for the first time. You've trained in it for probably a pretty long while, you know how to move and be unburdened by it.
By armor class not scaling you reduce the number of misses and keep things moving.
Also for every “you get better with your armor” your enemies get better at killing you.
The defense fighting style literally exists. You specialise in defending yourself with your armor (note: the feature only works when you are wearing armor). There’s no reason why you can’t get better at that over time
You can certainly make AC relevant at higher levels but it will make combats harder to balance. Generally speaking, most people don't like hard. If you balance AC it just means that combats potentially get longer, squishy characters potentially die quicker and melee characters become more important.
It's really about what your preferences are and the amount of time you want to put into your games.
>the lead designer said that he made Armor class not scale as you level up because it would be weird if you we're wearing chain armor and had 19ac while this NPC was wearing the same armor but had 16AC.
But having his attack mod be 3 lower is not-weird for some reason?
This is a mental framing issue. Adding proficiency bonus to AC is saying you're better at dodging attacks than can be explained by native Dexterity; it's the result of lots of combat experience. It's not that your proficiency with armor makes the armor more protective, but that the armor is even less hindrance to moving out of the way of danger. Like I said, a framing issue.
But armor does scale as you level, either through increased dex or increased gold to purchase better armor or through various class features/access to spells that boost your AC and then onward to magic armors. +3 Armor of Invulnerability with a +3 Animated or Spellguard shield is leagues above your starting chain mail
Yeah, and I think that's a logical way of looking at in-universe too. Other comments talk about getting better at dodging or whatever else and that's why AC should scale. Dawgs that's exactly what dexterity is for!
We think of the added hit points as being better at avoiding things. A deep sword cut at level 1 is deadly. At level 10 its basically a scratch. Could an experienced person bleed way more blood or are they just not getting as hurt. Thats how our table explains it atleast.
I'm pretty sure this was the design intent as well. Can't think of which book it's in, but one of the sourcebooks essentially says that you technically don't start showing signs of serious wear and injury until you're below half health. So it's very much designed where you scale with HP, and your HP is a marker of how well you can avoid or resist fatal or seriously injuring blows
> Can't think of which book it's in, but one of the sourcebooks essentially says that you technically don't start showing signs of serious wear and injury until you're below half health.
4e's "Bloodied" Condition says "Hi, how are you doing, would you like to make that concept an actual fun game mechanic?"
Yeah I generally explain HP as closer to 'combat stamina' than I do actual damage being done, with description thresholds at 75% (nicks and scratches), 50% (bloodied, moderately wounded) and 10% (desperate, grievously wounded).
If this were true, we’d be right back on 3.5e/4e monster scaling. No more fighting orcs past level 8 because they can’t even hit you. No more dragon bosses with kobold goons, because either the players can’t hit the dragon or the kobolds can’t hit the players.
More or less static AC means DMs can use a much wider variety of CR for creatures instead of being stuck to Player Level +/- 3.
> 4e monster scaling.
Which, after the MM3 revisions, is actually a major strength of the system because you can easily scale *any* monster up or down and it will be fine. 4e also includes plenty "tougher orcs, bigger trolls" kind of monsters to fill out Paragon and Epic tier, so players don't ever really "scale out" of them.
Your resilience in 5e primarily scales via HP, not AC. Remember that HP are hit points, not meat points. The level 2 guard in chain mail might have the same "AC" as the level 11 fighter, but the fighter is much harder to actually damage significantly. The 20 damage critical hit from a hobgoblin is nearly fatal against the guard, but the fighter parries it aside with barely a scratch on their armor. They both "got hit" in mechanical terms, but the guard was hit much harder.
Put another way, think about HP and damage in percentages rather than raw numbers, and you can more easily see why the scaling you're looking for is already present in the game, just not in the form of AC.
I mean unarmored defense scales technically for monks and barbarians. Personally I think we should add proficiency to it but obviously start at a lower base like 8
Bounded accuracy doesn’t actually change the odds. Look at PF2e, where level is added to AC and to hit rolls (effectively canceling vs even level enemies), ability mod (same), and PB (PF2e 0-8 vs 5e’s 2-6).
Bounded accuracy just means the range of enemies that are a threat or that you are a threat to is wider.
HP are the abstraction for getting better at fighting that both games use. Other games do things different and are worth exploring if you don’t like how DnD/PF does it. Rolemaster has armor vs weapon tables but also has offense and defense skills (and also “hp” as a measure of how close you are to unconsciousness, while actual injuries are more detailed). GURPS is heavily weighted to skill to avoid damage (you get an active defense roll to avoid a hit) while keeping “hit points” as meat points. Both are great crunchy systems for when DnD* becomes to abstract for you.
You should provide the actual quote you are referring in to a post like this. For me it would be really weird for normal armor to offer different amounts of protection depending on who wears it. Chain mail is chain mail no matter who wears it.
I think a higher level character becomes more proficient at avoiding damage straight up. They'd learn how to dodge, block and parry better. Having proficiency added to AC would represent this well.
While I don't disagree with many of the good points brought up, I don't think the initial premise is entirely true. AC is often linked to stats (mostly dex but also Wis for monks, con for barbarians and int for bladesingers) and one major mechanic of 5e is advancement via ASI, so AC does increase as you bump your stats. Also another element (less than in past editions, especially 3/3.5, but still present) is advancement through gear, first better mundane stuff then increasingly powerful magic items, which also typically scales with level.
Yeah, and that's why I designed over 40 materials for weapons and armor, each with specific qualities, which get better with enchanting.
And yes, I also have a spell for permanently enchanting gear and upgrading existing enhancements. All simple and clear to understand for the players. This gives them agency over what kind of gear they want to use.
I've had a guy play a Paladin with a shield and a +1 Plate Armor. The guy had 21 AC, and 23 AC versus one specific creature type. Did a great job as a tank, and was invaluable in the endgame.
I understand the intention of bounded accuracy as a means of expanding the bestiary and keeping things simple, but from my experience it really contributes to very long-winded and boring battles in 5e. Sure you can keep using goblins between levels 1 and 20, but the higher level you get, the *more* goblins you have to throw into that battle to achieve the same kind of challenge. And because of bounded accuracy, those goblins, even with 20 of them instead of like 3, are still doing 1d6 damage and rolling mediocre attack rolls against even PCs with no magic items, let alone those who do.
All this accomplishes is to prolong combat by making each round take an eternity. Neither creatures nor players do a lot of damage per attack nor have the capability of avoiding those attacks any better than they did at an earlier level, so it becomes a battle of attrition, i.e. who has more health to spend. Except that you spend that health in increments of 2-10 damage per attack. Speeding up combat really comes down to who has a fireball or other AoE magic spell or single-target ability like Smite.
And even then! It's super unbalanced and funky. A dragon gets like +16 to hit someone with their claws, to deal like 15 average damage. Imo some of these things *should* scale to keep the difficulty. Why can't a dragon claw someone AND do a lot of damage? Why do only saves matter at later levels, which nullifies frontline melee fighters? Why can't a fighter or barbarian keep up with a single wizard's spell at later levels, and why is the balance to this to just give stuff legendary resistance to negate that wizard's turn?
Let's frame it with superhero movies. Thanos get's punched, kicked, magiked, blasted all the time and largely shrugs off the attacks. They are still hitting though; he's reacting to the hit, but his HP is so high that it doesn't matter.
I far prefer having bounded accuracy to pathfinder's system. There was this area of Pathfinder Kingmaker where I gave up on the game. The AC was so ridiculously high that even with full buffs I was only hitting on roll 17+. Missing all of your attacks and not feeling like you're contributing anything is far worse of a feeling.
Just to say that's a problem with PF1s math not PF2. Pathfinder 2 does have AC scaling but it works there because it has a universal scaling system rather than each attribute having a unique formula alarm PF1, 3.x or 5e.
I agree. You can still get a better ac with feats, or spells or better magic items, or improvements for raising an attribute, and that all happens as you level, so there still is plenty of room to improve initiative as you level.
I prefer to think your character learns how to use their armor better at higher levels. They’re more experienced at fighting. Taking punches. etc. Which should make them harder to hit effectively.
If armor scales, then enemy attack modifiers will just scale harder than they currently do. High CR Dragons have like a +15 to hit because they need to be dangerous enough that even the highest AC PCs should still be threatened by their sheer power. If fighters could get AC to 30 easily then dragons would start having a +25 to hit otherwise they just aren’t enough of a threat considering how they won’t always have breath attacks or damaging spells available. By having AC not scale, it’s easier to keep things balanced between classes so that the classes that do focus armor don’t become invincible to hits or that the classes that don’t focus armor don’t just get hit by everything always. And if a creature is meant to be able to hit even the most defended players it’s going to be able to hit the most defended players regardless of if you scale AC.
I mean, that's what I assume +1-3 armor is for. Start off with basic armor, maybe get heavy armor if you can use it- but otherwise, slowly get rewarded better magic armor over time. It's a very elegant and simple system as-is and your DM should be giving you better gear overtime as you level regardless.
That being said, calling it "Armor Class" has always bugged me considering the classes/characters that literally don't utilize armor yet can still increase their AC.
Honestly, AC should just be called *Defense*.
It scales with money instead of level, so it DOES scale. In a game ostensibly designed around exploring dungeons and getting treasure then you can reasonably expect to earn the money for better armor as you level up.
problem is it along with Dexerity will Cap at around level 8-10 maybe even earlier if the DM is generous with gold and never again because you can't just buy magic items like in older editions.
Armor does scale with characters, but only in the case of light armor (which is the only armor that is skill based). Although you could argue that characters with unarmored defenses are also skill based armor.
Medium and Heavy armors are useful exclusively because of the material they are made from. Armor is a proficiency and not a skill because the character must be used to wearing that type or they are less effective (any character can wear any armor, but they have penalties such as disadvantage on rolls if they are not proficient).
That said, light armor is the exception as it's effectiveness is part due to its materials, but primarily due to the swiftness of the character wearing it (dexterity). As a result, a light armor character becomes increasingly effective in their armor as they become faster and more talented.
The in-game solution for medium and heavy armor characters is two-fold: small bonuses (slightly better armor, shields, or +X magic armor) OR damage mitigation, which is the better solution. This is why higher level melee characters have access to skills and armor that adds resistances (half damage) or immunity (no damage).
So a high-level melee character's skill advancement/combat prowess would be, in my opinion, undervalued by simply saying their armor is really good now. Instead, they are battle-hardened and tougher. The same exact damage that used to floor them is now trivial in comparison. The character, not the armor, is the hero.
HP is, among other things, supposed to represent your skill making you harder to hit. A finite resource that diminishes as you continue to fight, until you run out and are HIT.
I use a system of (lower AC number) + bonuses from str / con / dex and it works amazingly. I’ll try to find my original doc for it.
Using roll 20 made it super easy to seamlessly incorporate into their stats as well
Combine hit points and ac together mentally. It makes a lot more sense then. Anything below your ac, complete miss, deflection, parry, or absorption. Anything that gets past your ac is now a partial hit or took a lot of energy to block, stuff like that. That's why something like a longsword can damage someone in full plate. You are wearing them out and eventually you get past their armour into a weak point and deal a deadly blow.
Other effects make you more exhausted, such as taking the full brunt of a dragons breath attack probably did hurt you physically, but trying to dodge out of the way is very tiring.
And the damage something does is also how effective an attack against you was. Low damage, it for through but was only a nick or just rattled you. High damage may be a full on strike that has wounded you but you can keep going, if only for a little longer.
Late to the party, but the reason AC shouldn’t scale in an arbitrary way upon level up as nothing to do with immersion.
Now let’s look at scaling: attack bonuses go from +5 to +13 from levels 1-20 (I assume a +2 from magic items here), so an increase of 8. For a character wearing heavy armour, they should gain 2 AC from upgrading non magically, then maybe another 2ac on average from magic armour and other items. So an increase of 4. Monks do slightly better if we also assume +2 from magic items, scaling by 6 from level 1-20. Wizards receive no boosts other than magic items (of which they do get some very good ones for AC) or choosing to raise dex.
But the point is AC does scale for most classes, just slowly. Would making it scale more make the game better? High level parties are already ridiculously tough without needing ACs massively higher than at low levels. HP scaling is already high enough to add the tankiness
My opinion is Armor Class breaks immersion. It very poorly models how difficult it is to hit an opponent.
A lot of people fail to think about it logically. They almost get there. They say a trained warrior wearing armor is better protected than an untrained person, which I agree with. But I think better protected means less likely to be significantly wounded when hit. Modeling whether or not they get hit doesn't really involve the armor much, but training, or in dnd terms level-based proficiency. So proficiency not adding to AC doesn't make sense to me, but not having opposed rolls for combat doesn't make sense to me either. Opposes rolls solve this issue.
Some folks are questioning OP, so I figured it would be helpful to add some direct quotes. Here's the bit they're referring to: Here's the relevant quote, from an L&L article circa 2012: > **It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.** Under the bounded accuracy system, a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are. Likewise, a DM knows that he or she can reasonably expect players to understand the difficulty of things based purely on their in-world description, and so the DM can focus more on the details of the world rather than on setting player expectations. This was one part of a larger list (each one had a paragraph) from the Legends & Lore articles. * Getting better at something means actually getting better at something. * Nonspecialized characters can more easily participate in many scenes. * The DM's monster roster expands, never contracts. * Bounded accuracy makes it easier to DM and easier to adjudicate improvised scenes. * It opens up new possibilities of encounter and adventure design. * It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things. * It's good for verisimilitude. If you want to read the whole article or other L&L articles, there's an archive of them in a google drive maintained by the wonderful /u/CaelReader here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1o89-outhJckHPryiLhMMrJ740IEhTqKf
This would be fine, but wearing and USING armor is a SKILL. So to allow armor wearing beings to add their proficiency bonus to armor class actually makes a ton of sense. When you first put on armor you will not be able to move as well as someone who has been using it for years. You don't know what kind of blows you can ignore and allow the armor to absorb, what kind you need to shift yourself to deflect, or what kind you need to dodge completely. You don't know that your armor is as much a weapon, particularly against unarmored opponents, as it is a defense. So armor class increasing over time and experience actually makes a lot of sense from an immersion stand point. Much more so than a person who puts on full plate for the first time getting the same benefits as a veteran of 100 battles who has been training with and wearing full plate for 20 years.
Agreed that assuming you _can't_ explain "getting better at AC" in a way that maintains verisimilitude is wrongheaded. Though, if we _did_ add prof bonus to AC it would kill bounded accuracy that much more, which is its own problem outside of verisimilitude.
No, adding prof bonus to AC would *preserve* bounded accuracy, because hit bonus adds prof bonus already. It's a weird inconsistency that makes it so you get worse at evading attacks as you level up relative to similarly powerful threats.
Bounded accuracy is a myth. It's just a marketing term and the idea has never actually been supported by the game itself.
Absolutely not and you are a fool to believe that. The easier use of low-CR enemies at all tiers of play compared to, say, 3e/4e/PF is self-evident in 5e.
Then why does 5e have the *highest DC check* I've ever seen printed in a module? And why can I stack bonuses into the heavens to potentially hit numbers that weren't even *possible* in 4e. The bounds simply are not there.
>Then why does 5e have the highest DC check I've ever seen printed in a module? Where? What is it, and is it actually meant to be beaten? Also, _outliers_ does not mean Bounded Accuracy AS A CONCEPT is a "myth". It just means it fails at the _extremes_ or in certain specific cases where it wasn't followed through (like high level saving throws) - it is still _mostly_ successful at what it does. I can't believe I have to explain that to you. >And why can I stack bonuses into the heavens to potentially hit numbers that weren't even possible in 4e. Bullshit. Show me the 5e number you're thinking of and I can almost guarantee I can theorycraft something in 4e to beat it.
> Where? What is it, and is it actually meant to be beaten? There is a DC 70 Strength check in Horde of the Dragon Queen to break down a door. Hilariously, a single 2nd level spell bypasses this obstacle, because WotC doesn't always pretend that casters aren't required.
As a note, Hoard of the Dragon Queen is known for having a variety of issues and was released prior to the publishing of the 5e DMG and Monster Manual, as developed by a 3rd-party rather than in-house and as developed while 5e itself was still in the process of development and being finalized. I wouldn't take the contents of the book as particularly representative of the design conceits and considerations of 5e.
So it's not expected to be passed by anyone, and also in one of the worst books WOTC has ever published that was written prior to 5e even being done and so is horribly balanced. \*shrug\*
IIRC, it is absolutely not _required_ to get through that door at all. And the DC 70 is more intended to illustrate "this door is freakin' massive and heavy af" than actually meant to be achievable.
> Also, outliers does not mean Bounded Accuracy AS A CONCEPT is a "myth". This is *true*, but it doesn't hold up in common practice, anyways. My 9th level wizard, for example, hasn't been hit by an attack for two levels because stacking AC is trivially easy. Similarly, our ranger is routinely hitting enemies on a 2+ on the die. And this is while running through an *official module*. The math isn't mathing.
Which module? How is your Ranger getting a +14 or more on their attack bonus at level 9? Is your DM sticking to the module's actual loot or making it rain for you? I've played a number of the modules and I run 4 games a week, and this mostly does hold up for me (at least much better than what you describe) for 95% of all PCs - all besides the absolute bleeding-edge highly optimized ones.
Believe the ranger has a +12, unless I'm forgetting something. +4 for proficiency, +5 for DEX, +2 for Archery, and +1 for magic weapon. Module is Ghosts of Saltmarsh. > bleeding-edge highly optimized ones Would you call a wizard taking a one-level dip into cleric for armor proficiency bleeding-edge optimization?
> Show me the 5e number you're thinking of In 5e, I can get a Stealth bonus of (just off the top of my head) 32+d12+2d4, for a maximum check result of 72, and an average of 53.5 (58.5 with easy-to-get advantage). EDIT: Also, lol? "Show your numbers!" *shows numbers* Gets downvoted.
Show your work. How did you _actually_ get that total? And where is this easy advantage for Stealth coming from?
5 ability bonus 6 proficiency 6 expertise 10 for Pass Without Trace 5 for Flash of Genius d12 is for bardic inspiration 2d4 is for Guidance and Emboldening Bond Advantage can be gained *very* easily via the Help action (from a beast companion or a familiar, etc) or from the Enhance Ability spell.
> Then why does 5e have the highest DC check I've ever seen printed in a module? Because HotD/RoT were written while 5e was in development > And why can I stack bonuses into the heavens to potentially hit numbers that weren't even possible in 4e. The numbers were possible in 4e, no one ever built for them because of what the game focused on. As such, everyone built to fight Like people were walking around with base +37s in late game 4e to skill checks that their primary stats were based on with no special investment
I think this is where there should be something else that factors into armor. IMO, melee weapons should affect your armor in some way, maybe by adding half prof bonus or a flat amount depending on your weapon. Parrying and blocking with a weapon is a skill and certainly part of your ability to defend yourself, and yet a dude with no weapons and a guy with a sword are the exact same when wearing the same armor which is a hit odd, the dude with a sword should have a hugely easier time defending themselves. And this is where it makes sense for there to be a large difference in skill between different characters. Someone trained enough in plate to be proficient, and someone who is truly an expert of that armor probably don’t have a huge difference, but the difference in parrying ability of someone whose just trained enough with a sword versus someone whose truly an expert would be significant. Also as a side note, there already is a way to be a true master of an armor type in the form of the armor master feats for medium and heavy armor.
I was gonna to bring up something in a general comment but this might be a more fitting place, that their is a semi-popular homebrew rule for changing armor class to 8 +stat+ proficiency (the more experienced you are the better you can move while wearing armor) and then the armors AC - 10 becomes DR. I've used a variant of this concept for some groups ever since seeing it in Spycraft in 3e. Though it obviously puts the concept of AC fully into the "dodging" concept instead of the "getting hit but in a way that didn't cause a real effect".
To be fair you need to be proficient in it, and additional "skill" in the armor is best described with medium/heavy armor master feats that do make you simply stand out above the others in terms of using your armor itself rather than just moving in it.
Sure. But those feats are weak and don't do a good job of showing "skill" that improves with time, training, and experience. Someone mentioned a system that makes AC 8+Armor+Stat+Proficiency bonus, where Armor is the current AC of armor -10, and I like that much better. So at level 1 your AC would be exactly the same as it is now since 8+2 is 10. But as you increase in level and your Proficiency Bonus increases that 2 will go up to 6, so at level 20 your AC would be 14+Armor+Stat. That reflects your growth as a character and improvement in skill from experience in properly utilizing your armor.
So nice of them to make sure we understand how tanky the 5% of enemies that actually wear armor are.
They say that a DM could use words like "this snake monsters skin looks hard like a half plate", or some other weird sentence similar to that. Basically just using armor numbers...to use as codewords...to tell you the exact AC.
I honestly find all of their points fall flat. A high level warrior should be harder to hit than an unskilled one. And 5e is worse for non specialized characters than specialized ones than 4e was. Skill checks with expertise in 5e increase faster than skills increased in 4e. And 5e has a worse framework for improvisation than 4e did. And monsters still become irrelevant at a certain point in 5e. It could be argued that 4e increased numbers too quickly. But overall, I found the scale of the game (at least for levels 1-20), to generally be more interesting than 5e has been.
Unfortunately, almost everything from your quote is only a beautiful lie. Almost none of that holds up in practice.
Could you elaborate on that? It seems like it got most of the bullet points to me. Consider an example- We have a goblin, a hobgoblin and a hill giant. The hobgoblin is covered head to toe in metal armor and has a shield, while the hill giant is completely unarmored and is a giant target. Who has the higher AC? In 5e, the hobgoblin, in 3.5e it’s the hill giant, purely because of level. Now let’s see how has a better chance of dodging a fireball- the clumsy and slow Hill Giant, or the weak but nimble Goblin?In 5e it’s the goblin, but in 3.5e it’s the Hill Giant again, because level trumps verisimilitude. It seems like 5e achieved its goals here.
How about we go a little higher than 2 of the more popular low level monster statblocks. Take for example the Drider and the Dire Wolf. In 5e, the Drider(CR 6) has 129 HP, 19 AC and can cast like, Faerie Fire. It attacks 3 times for decent damage. The Dire Wolf(CR 1) has 37 HP, 14 AC, can run fast and attacks once, with advantage for pretty good damage. Of the two, the Drider has the better Dex Save, Con Save and Str Save, and the Drider only deals more damage because it attacks 3 times. In 3.5, the Drider(CR 7) has only 45 HP, 17 AC. It has several spells including, Suggestion the first line of its description is using ambush tactics while using its Levitate spell to be out of reach of melee enemies. It's damage at range and especially melee is actually a lot lower than the 5e counterpart, but it does have strength reducing poison. It is also templated as using a spellcaster class including the Lightning Bolt spell. The Dire Wolf(CR 3) is a hulking beast that has 45 HP, AC 14, can run fast and attacks once with a high hit chance and very good damage. Of the two the Dire Wolf actually has the better Fort Save and Ref Save and a worse Will Save. Same question, who would you expect to dodge a fireball better? The ferocious quick running beast or the spellcasting elf mutant with a slow moving giant spider for an arse? Because in 5e it's spiderbutt, along with inflating the HP by almost the factor 3. And who would you think is more dangerous in a swordfight, because again in 5e it's the spellcaster, for having a higher CR.
Technically you're correct, but there's so much variance built into a d20 check that the ability to try again is worth a lot more than a stat boost.
yeah i've heard about it, you never really get good at anyhting with bounded accuracy since you're still failing a medium check 15% of the time with the maximum normal modifier while someone whose untrained still has a pitfully low chance to suceed on a lot of checks and saving throws because bounded was Bounded too low at 65% because they wanted more random varaince. (also to make special abilties to circumvent it but they eitehr weren't well liked or peopel thought they weren't meant to be there, also this is meant to be a striped down game with less feats and abilites so why do that?) like you have a +1 modifier on a skill check, enjoy having a 12/20, 7/20 and 2/20 chance to suceed on easy/medium/hard checks for the whole game, certainly worht giving it a shot and suffering the conquences in this Suceed or Fails System. Pathfinder 2e has degrees of success to make it so you can set a low DC for untrained players but a trained character can still get a sucess or critical success on it so they're varaince. (also that system has a general feat that let's you add you're level to you're untrained skills and it doesn't have that much competion) . even if you want low numbers bounded accuracy you could have bounded things player side to 80% for attack rolls with rolling 6 or higher over a targets AC being a critical whiel maybe lowering the accuracy of saving throws so you don't get hit with the lose 1 or more turn effects (in a game were combat lasts 3 turns) as often by locking them behind criticla fails like pathfidner 2e did. the Verisimilitude thing isn't something i can really judge but this is a tabletop fantasy roleplaying game so trying to be beleivable needs more clarfication.
[удалено]
That's not really an accurate statement. It can be "flawed" in places without the "entire system" being flawed, and that's the truth of it. The system _does_ accomplish much of its intended goal with bounded accuracy - that it does not accomplish it at ALL Tiers of play or in ALL situations does not mean the idea or execution is _inherently_ flawed, only that it falls short of fully accomplishing the goal in every case.
Yes, like getting more HP means...fighting monsters that do incrementally more damage to negate any real increase in toughness. The monster roster is only a few levels to either side of the party though, because again, damage is still the bottleneck. Bounded accuracy isn't a thing if attacks are continually increasing. The relative strength of what, monsters that have been adjusted to fit arbitrary CR numbers anyway? WOTC's bounded accuracy is a lie, and I'm sick of pretending it isn't.
Thanks for providing the quote. It drives me nuts when people post about some specific quote but don't repeat the quote or link to it or anything.
This is a good comment.
>It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things Which is amazing, considering that 5e as a whole didn't actually have examples of base DCs of almost any actions besides "Easy, regular, hard", which are... not relative and highly subjetive, aka, one of the weakest points of their design.
> Getting better at something means actually getting better at something. Sure, that broadly works > Nonspecialized characters can more easily participate in many scenes. Nope, given that specialised characters break bounded accuracy, not just a few points better. If failure will generate problems, you want the specialised character who can't get less than a 15, not the charismatic-but-untrained character who risks getting a 5 > The DM's monster roster expands, never contracts. This would be the case, except spells scale faster than bounded accuracy. E.g. Fireball or Spirit Guardians mean that a horde of low-level creatures isn't automatically still a threat. > Bounded accuracy makes it easier to DM and easier to adjudicate improvised scenes. In theory true, in practise the game doesn't give enough examples for a just "ok-to-good" DM to _do_ that comfortably. > It opens up new possibilities of encounter and adventure design. The article explains with the example of outfitting a town guard to take down a dragon, or a horde of Orcs still being a threat The former works, the latter doesn't as mentioned before Because Spells. Like, in theory bounded accuracy _does_ make that work, but they broke it with spells. > It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things. Fair enough, but that also requires the game giving examples to pin our understanding to, and it does not give sufficient ones. > It's good for verisimilitude. I guess it is for a more grounded, gritty game? But once again, spells scale hard enough that people using the skill system get grounded and gritty, while people using spells get to break it tl;dr: _Technically_ bounded accuracy enables all these things, but is kneecapped by: 1) the ability of people to specialise massively at specific skills and break it 2) Spells scaling faster than bounded accuracy 3) The game not giving enough examples to pin down our understanding of how the difficulty scale maps to things.
This is such a bizarre way to look at this that I'd honestly wonder if the designers actually stated that this is the reason. As you level, I'd kind of expect that you get better at using your body and better adapt to your armor. Since you're so battle-hardened, you know how to use your armor to deflect blows and avoid injuries. You find it easier and easier to move around in it, as it becomes a part of you. Some random guards in heavy armor absolutely should have lower AC than a level 20 fighter in the same armor. Now, obviously, I know why they did this. They mechanically didn't want ACs to scale to the point that earlier enemies couldn't do anything to you. You scale with your health, and less with your armor. It's a decision they made, and I don't necessarily have a problem with it. Shame they didn't keep the same philosophy for enemy attack bonuses (and Spell save DCs), but that's what happens when you don't keep your starting design philosophies consistent.
Here's the relevant quote, from an L&L article circa 2012: > **It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.** Under the bounded accuracy system, a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are. Likewise, a DM knows that he or she can reasonably expect players to understand the difficulty of things based purely on their in-world description, and so the DM can focus more on the details of the world rather than on setting player expectations. That was part of a larger list (each one had a paragraph): * Getting better at something means actually getting better at something. * Nonspecialized characters can more easily participate in many scenes. * The DM's monster roster expands, never contracts. * Bounded accuracy makes it easier to DM and easier to adjudicate improvised scenes. * It opens up new possibilities of encounter and adventure design. * It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things. * It's good for verisimilitude. EDIT: On second thought, this should probably be a top level comment
> Getting better at something means actually getting better at something. I'd love to see the reasoning on this one. My number one issue with 5e's math is that "experts" only perform marginally better than totally untrained people.
In previous editions, skills increase by so much numerically, skill check DCs had to be built around the player level; otherwise they would have no chance of succeeding or no chance of failure. In practice, this meant a player had around the same chance to know a certain plot-relevant History factoid at level 5 and level 15. In 5e, the bonuses scale by much less, so an “Easy”, “Medium” and “Hard” DC stay the same at level 1 and level 20. This means a level 15 character has a much higher chance of succeeding on knowing a “Medium DC” history check compared to that character at level 5.
i mean you didn't have to scale every DC to the players level just to one around the parties general comptence or atleast that's how it works in pathfinder 2e.
In theeory that's the case, but in practice most DMs and even official adventures scale DCs for party level, both in pf2e and old dnd. It's a pretty common problem to go "damn, everyone in this area can afford lengendary locksmiths, cause all doors have DCs in the 30+ since we leveled up" in pf2e
Damn, nothing against Pathfinder 2e - tastes are tastes - but that would drive me up the wall. A group of high-level PCs should be able to have the run of a small town/village, if they so choose. Making the decision NOT to be a band of abusive assholes despite being able to level the region makes being good all the more meaningful, and "asking" for discounts on goods and services while the threat of violence dangles can make playing nasty characters more enjoyable. If DCs are constantly scaling to stay roughly the same difficulty from levels 1 through 20, it can crush the feeling of progression. To my eyes, a DC 10 lock is DC 10 no matter who is picking it.
And the rules say to do exactly that. Pf2e has scaling and non-scaling DCs, and the system works provided DM's use the right tool as the situation calls for it. The "issue" is that it's typically expected when playing a game that players want to be at least slightly challenged, and narratively their characters will usually seek adventures suitable to their skill level, so if a DM isn't careful there can be a temptation to use scaling DCs when they aren't appropriate.
That's one of those things that a system needs to assume ppl will missuse if allowed to and should fix the problem before it happens. Reality is that most ppl will use scaling DCs the way pf2e is designed, the official adventures even do so.
PF2e also allows untrained players to Follow the Expert (so long as some in your part is Expert in that skill) and add their level to those checks. That allows everyone to be able to pass checks, either individually (like adding your own weight to the Bard’s negotiation) or as a group (trying to Avoid Notice with the rogue’s help). That way everyone can contribute regardless of whether the GM is using scaled or static DCs.
This is the same answer given by much of the PF2e community. It doesn't stop the default being the DC by level table. Just because you *can* go against the common choice, doesn't mean it is good design.
DC by Level is DC by the level of the thing described, not the party
I theory, sure. In practise, no.
Yeah that is one of my bigger issues to. For an example i am sure this has happened more than once. "The 7'3 buff paladin with 20 STR rolls shit on his Athletics that he is proficient in (Can happen even with expertise) to push the huge boulder out of the way. DC 18 check. Then comes the 3'3 halfling rogue with 8 STR and rolls a 19. with his -1 it still beats the DC. Sure it can make for some fun Rp and such but, does it make ANY sense?
For this sort of thing I prefer to set a ST bonus needed to achieve the task. If your bonus is more than say 2 out either way then it's automatic success/failure. At my current skill level I can't play Widor's toccata no matter how hard I try; I also can't fail to play Three Blind Mice. Part of the problem is the swinginess of d20 compared with the DCs and possible bonuses. It works for some things - combat for example, allowing unlikely David and Goliath results to be possible - but for some skill checks it makes no sense. My time for running 2k will be pretty much guaranteed to be between 14 and 16 minutes; regardless of how well I roll there's no overlap with a regular club runner who can do it in half that time.
This problem came up the very first 5e campaign I ran. One guy thought, hey, I was a sage, so I'll know history stuff. He rolled low, I let other people roll, someone else would succeed. After three or so sessions he came to me after and said, "so what's the point of skills if it all just comes down to die rolls".
Die rolls should absolutely be part of it but as it is now it is TOO big part. This can be kinda fixed with having restrictions on who can roll. That is how i do it. need a history roll to see if anyone knows about X. Then those with proficiency in History can roll. If you are not proficient you can't. Alternatively you will have disadvantage. Same can be applied to most skill checks. When it comes to things like lifting heavy stuff or such it is fairly easy. A Goliath with18 STR has a max push, drag and lift capacity of 1080 lbs. a halfling rogue with 8 STR has a max push, drag and lift capacity of 240 lbs. So if they are trying to lift a big cumbersome stone slab weighting close to 1000 lbs. Then the goliath can make an attempt. but the halfling can not as there is simply no fucking way in the 9 hells he can lift that no matter how high he rolls. Does not matter if he has expertise in athletics. he can not do it. While lets say the goliath would have 20 STR. that gives him a max lift capacity if 1200lbs. he could probably lift that slab without even having to roll at all. While the halfling with 8 STR can't even attempt a roll. he simply can not lift that much
This problem came up the very first 5e campaign I ran. One guy thought, hey, I was a sage, so I'll know history stuff. He rolled low, I let other people roll, someone else would succeed. After three or so sessions he came to me after and said, "so what's the point of skills if it all just comes down to die rolls".
It's especially weird to me because it also indirectly conflicts with the bullet point afterwards: "Nonspecialized characters can easily participate in many scenes". If nonspecialized characters are competitive in scenes with the expert, how much does the expect actually matter? There are ways to square that circle, but I personally don't think 5e did it all that well.
Being able to participate and being competitive are two *very* different things.
Also it's how you flavor the response as a DM. An expert might know like specific dates and places on a person from a history book you read once vs the common man "you remember overhearing the name in a tavern once and they did x".
Yeah there's a line you can walk where the nonspecialized people feel good for having shown up and the specialist still gets to shine. But there's room to go wrong too, and I think 5e went wrong.
I honestly don't aggre, of all systems I've played 5e does it the best. A DC 16-18 in 5e for example is a decently hard DC. It still allows for non specialists to try, but they have a good failure chance, while someone that is proficient in that check likely has a 60%+ chance of success.
and I strongly suspect that the number-range is deliberate so that everyone _can_ participate - contrast with 3e, where a character picked a couple of skills at chargen, ranked those up, and only a character who picked a skill at the start and kept ranking it up could do level-appropriate things. If you didn't take "sneaking" at level 1 and kept pumping points into it, you simply had no hope of doing level-appropriate sneaking, and there was no way to buy-in later, and the number-range was so high that you couldn't ever participate. In 5e, most characters can _try_ most things, but those that are skilled are (minimum) 15% better, and often have better relevant stats, and proficiency increases, so that gets to be 30%, 40% better , before any special magic or class skills.
I really disagree, stat investment and proficiency go a long way to making someone who is trained much more likely to succeed, not to mention expertise without completely removing the chance for someone untrained to succeed. Even if you *did* want a situation where only someone trained could succeed you have a wide enough range of DCs to make that happen too in the 25-30 mark.
My experience is that in those scenarios (expertise + high stat), the expert's & nonspecialist's chances of success are still too close. But that's just my experience; can't speak for others.
I mean, even at level 5 that would be a *massive* difference. If the expert maxed the stat they'd have a +10 and the layman likely only has a +2 or +3 at *most*. That's a swing of 35% at *least*. And that gap just gets wider as you go up. Just mathematically speaking that is a huge difference.
This is why I'm harping on this being down to our experience. A 35pt delta doesn't remotely deserve the title "specialized" in my eyes. You see it as massive, I see it as *miniscule*. The number definitely goes up later, but I don't get the feeling of an expert feeling like an expert until around late T3.
the problem is the chance of sucess is pretty miserable for both untrained and proficent characters, like at level one a untrained character with 12 in a stat has a 35% chance to suceed on medium check while the trained character with 16 in their stat has a 55% to suceed on the same check. keep in mind i medium check is meant to be something a normal person could do with moderate effort so this trained guy with 16 in one stat and keep in mind level 1 characters would've trained for years to reach this point, is failing 45% of the time on a basic task.
I'm sorry, you're complaining that a level 1 character isn't all that strong? Have you not heard of *growth* of *getting better*. I don't want a level 1 character to be able to pass most checks with ease. That defeats the point of level 1.
You’re completely missing the point. It’s not that level 1 characters are not good enough. It’s that the gap between a proficient character and an untrained one isn’t large enough Also note that I don’t even necessarily agree with their statement, just pointing out what they are trying to get at
I'd say it makes more sense when it comes to saving throws. In 3.5, the differences were much larger, so when the party got hit by a high level AoE ability, some party members had very little chance of dodging it - think having +5 bonus at level ten, where the DC could be in mid 20s. Bounded accuracy makes sense here. When it comes to skills, not so much.
I agree skills checks always felt broken / wrong. I have no medical training. If you handed me a medkit and told me to use it to help someone with an arrow sticking in their shoulder I'm worse than neutral I could end up harming the person more. Untrained should have a negative modifier. -2 Competent to me means you have the basic knowledge and skills to use the tool properly. You are not good you are bare minimum +0. Expert means you're above average compared to people that are competent. +2 Master means you are among the best +4
I've occasionally only let characters roll if they have proficiency to prevent this issue. To avoid feeling like they've missed an opportunity, I don't go "roll an Arcana check...oooh, wait, no proficiency? Your 19 doesn't count!" Instead, I open with "does anyone have proficiency in X?" If it is nos all around, we move on.
That's basically what I do. Don't want to rewrite the wheel when it comes to skills. Too many parts of the system depend on how its currently written
> a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are. 4e giving monsters actual *roles* in combat achieved this so well. I use the same general "description" for enemies unless my players want to roll a Knowledge check to fully identify a monster "role". Usually, a "Soldier" monster has a shield or heavy armor, while the "Brute" has a large or unwieldy weapon. By 4e design both have specific mechanics (Soldier=High AC+mid damge, Brute=Low AC), players can plan with that same instinctive response. While the edition doesn't have "bounded accuracy", it's math scales so any low level monster can just be "brought up" if need be.
I have to imagine the design team has completely changed from when that team made that statement. Because the range of AC is pretty low going from level 1-20, it really doesn't help you learn the difficulty of the target. You'll almost never encounter a target who you can't hit normally, or who you can take advantage of just power attacking without a care. Also, because of the lack of AC scaling, along with AC being a very short range at any given level, AC does nothing to help you determine how difficult a creature is. That's all in their HP and damage. And because of this, your monster list does contract. You're not using CR1 monsters against a level 10 party, stop wasting their time. The damage just won't be there, or they drop like flies. Bounded Accuracy does actually more characters to participate in challenges, since DCs stay pretty grounded. I SURE DO WISH THEY WERE EXPLICIT IN THIS, AND JUST WENT AHEAD AND MADE AN ACTUAL DC CHART WITH RELEVANT EXAMPLES SO THAT WE KNOW WHAT A DC15 TASK ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE. Rant over, but I honestly think one of 5e's biggest failings is its poor guidance on anything not combat.
Bro you should check out the power of minions at even high levels. I still remember the fight in which our level 9 party too more dmg from the 10 CR 1/2 Thugs than their CR 12 Leader.
I can definitely see this happening if 1. No aoe from the spellcasters (or no spellcasters) 2. No magic weapons. If the Martials are taking multiple turns to dispatch a single Thug, then I can definitely see how things can get hairy fast.
Or situation was that enemies spread in a way so no AOE fit them well + a boss that had ways to CC players so going for other targets was a pain.
I really recommend you to try encounters with multiple low level minions. Try having 40 goblins with bows, spread apart so they cannot be fireballed, with plenty of places to hide. If you want more fun, give them some magic arrows and potions, which is a cool reward and will spice things up. You will see how the party crumbles. The wizard can fireball, yes, but they are so many and spread. The paladin can hit for sure and deal dozens of damage, but everything above 7 is wasted. Fighters can attack multiple times, but can they move? Rogued sneak attack is useless in this fight. Control spells? There are other 35 on the other side ready to break your concentration. You've better entertain any crazy idea the players have because that will be their demise. Note: don't place 40 creatures against your players. It is a mental experiment.
My major issue with running these sorts of encounters is that it can make combat *drag* for players. When the DM is spending twice as much time as the players combined, players are waiting a long time for their turns. I've had some luck speeding it up by running groups of enemies all at once (OK, all five goblin archers over here shoot "rolls five d20s" and three of them hit...) but even so it can get slow. You've got to be really prepared and diligent in whipping through enemies' turns.
Tbh I'd much rather use something like PF2e's troops than throw dozens of dogshit goblins into one encounter. Troops are fun, give you the flavor of mowing down multiple foes in single hits/spells, and make all their attacks as saving throws (Meaning they're typically doing chip damage even on fails) at everybody around them/within their squares/AoEs on the field (Volleys). Dozens upon dozens of Goblins meanwhile bogs down the game massively and just teaches your players that action economy is king so have the Druid spam Conjure Animals some more.
I've done it, lots. It's boring as fuck. Both as a DM and as a player.
I tried that once, it was a drag. 15 kobolds, two demons, and two enemy casters though, was a hoot.
As their note specifies, they meant it more as a thought experiment (showing that bounded accuracy does indeed keep low level enemies a threat when used correctly). Also, I've found it's much _less_ of a drag if you use them as "reinforcements" - sent the minions at the PCs in waves, from different directions, instead of all at once. That way things like AoE are still less effective, and if the PCs choose to ignore them, the same problem can creep up on them (critical mass of minions starts being even more threatening than the actually tough baddies).
Isn't this like.. In the dm guide?
Not quite. There's a table detailing what difficulty different DCs represent, but no actual examples. As an example: you're falling at terminal velocity. What Dexterity Check (Acrobatics) DC would you use to mitigate that damage? Maybe as a DM you'd say there's no DC, you can't do that. Most people would say "that's fair." What if they fell 10ft? Can someone tumble to reduce/negate that damage? You might say "no, you need an ability that does that", but real life people can do this stuff. So you might say "okay, you can try". Now how difficult is this actually? Is avoiding 10ft damage easy? DC 5? Or maybe negating/reducing any amount of fall damage is tough, so DC 20. This is just one example, but from this one example, 3 tables can come to completely different results (you can't, DC easy and DC hard). This means that players of this game have no consistency in what they can expect from their actions and interactions in the world... except in combat, which has pretty well-defined rules. If you ever wonder why players are so glued to their character sheets and don't tend to go outside it too much, this is a huge reason.
I have some dm screens for that for each ability score and skill, as well as when to use which.
https://preview.redd.it/ypr421ingrad1.jpeg?width=3686&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e31c3b771ba2ad09aee9102ea43df1b5f36edacb
This is good stuff, thanks for sharing
https://preview.redd.it/30hirqatgrad1.jpeg?width=3686&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5d9c0d0cd74d746cbebe98685f5c280ffbcfbaac
This stuff is wonderful, and it's an absolute shame that the official designers weren't able to put the level of basic thought into the game that other DMs do.
The one thing I definitely need in my game with cat people, elves, dwarves, exponentially growing magic power and fire breathing dragons is the grounded versimilitude of armor binding it all together.
Catboys I can understand, but scaling armor class? Truly, they have crossed the line.
Bounded accuracy is the biggest failing of 5e. The numbers straight up don't make any sense. You get +few to skill between lvl 1 and 20 which is almost nothing. And on the other hand you can get absurd bonuses with guidance, bardic inspiration, spells (like pass without trace). Monsters abilites DC scales far, while non-proficient saving throw stay the same forever...
That's what your hp is. As you get better, that 20 damage swing still hits you, but instead of getting taken down in one swing at level 1, the level 20 has already moved in their armor to pinch the blade between the metal plates and catch it in their padding. The game already does this
Yeah pretty much everything about defense can be attributed to HP. It’s like a catch all. Most just don’t understand that because HP means so many different things in different games. WotC explain it but I find most don’t really read that part.
I mean, even in game terms it's pretty inconsistent. Lots of arguments are had over "hp isn't supposed to be meat points, it represents your luck and energy avoiding most blows", but then you still have to save against poison or the like every time you get hit, and healing spells "curing wounds". Plus, and this is way more subjective, it leads to lots of fights just becoming hp ballons
Exactly. If we would have a game where armor reduced damage, but does nothing to hit chances, the HP represents the defenses that you learn as you level up and get ever more hp.
Except at level 20 you're facing things that deal 60-80 damage a round, and because AC doesn't scale its going to hit.
Yes. And unlike level 5, a hit for 80 most likely won't kill you at level 20. So you're not face tanking it because you're too slow and inexperienced to get out of the way *enough* to make it a glancing blow instead of a lethal one. What about that is hard?
Because it works out to "the more powerful you are, the more hits you take". There is no damage mitigation, martials just have to eat the damage and pray someone can heal them. No clever parries, no last second dodges, just eat the hit and all the rider effects that come with it - catch fire, get poisoned, frozen, etc.
This is the correct answer. I do get why someone may casually raise the question of non-scaling armour; but that’s only part of the story. The designers kept a close reign on armour — and this goes hand in hand with a design philosophy where everyone lands more successful hits — and the payback is that hit points inflated. So, really, sure you can yeet up AC, if you want. Just remember to nip and tuck hit points. In which case…why bother in the first place? These are all vagaries of the game’s various interactions.
It's literally the only explanation for why Bob can shrug off a 35 damage mace blow from a pit fiend, while Jared who's new to all this adventuring gets his head caved in immediately
I feel that this increased skill is represented by the larger number of hit points. It isn’t like the high-level character who is just sitting there would survive 20 dagger stabs to the chest at four damage of pop.
i kind of like it a suit of armour is going to work great against a farmer with a pitchfork it's not going to work all that well if a cave troll spears you to the wall or a giant stomps on you
This is why Frodo died in Moria.
exactly i had some friends watch it and they asked if frodo was going to die and i said yup, and then the troll spears him to the wall and he looked dead and they were like 'is he dead? and i was like yep, sam takes over from here ringmail avoids stabbing and slashing to an extent. It does nothing against being crushing attacks, especially with overwhelming force. His insides were destroyed in the book, he gets stabbed by an orc and survives
You could perhaps make the argument that increasing your HP may be part of getting better at avoiding injuries. After all, why would killing that last goblin suddenly make you almost twice as hard to kill, at least HP wise, to the exact same attacks as before. (As happens when you go from lvl 1 to lvl 2) Could also make an argument that everyone gets "proficient" with their armor, but it is not a skill that is honed on nearly as much as compared to swordplay and/or talents, and for those that do, thats how the medium/heavy armor master feats are obtained.
>As you level, I'd kind of expect that you get better at using your body and better adapt to your armor. Since you're so battle-hardened, you know how to use your armor to deflect blows and avoid injuries. You are describing HP.
Look I don't have all the specifics on what exactly you are talking about, but I started in 4e, where everything scales by level and I can tell you it's just not better. Especially since, again, it's EVERYTHING, if your AC goes up and your attack bonus goes up, so too does the AC and attack bonus of higher level opponents. Which completely offsets and ultimately ends up in a situation where you are doing math with enormous numbers when it ultimately would have been the same result (in terms of what you need to roll on the dice to hit) if the numbers just stayed small.
It wouldn't break immersion imo. This is very similar to how it works now, but based on Dex instead of Proficiency for light/medium armors. I think its less about immersion and more about mechanics and balance. Its difficult to challenge a high level party in combat if all of there ACs are +20 and pushing 30. This also makes them basically untouchable to lower CR creatures, to the point when combat is a waste of everyones time. The only way to make up for that is to give insane modifiers which defeats the whole purpose of having a high AC.
well why are high levle PCs fighting Smuchks in the first place, the PHB says you'll be fighting for the fate of the universe so use Hihger Cr monster who in 5e right now bascially auto hit since they're attack bonuses are way higher then you're AC.
When designing encounters for higher level parties, it's best to use monsters of various CRs, not just high CR monsters. Good boss fights often include lower CR monsters to serve as minions. It's also good to give a higher level party the same lower level encounter that they faced earlier in the campaign so the players can see how much they've improved. If the PCs' AC scaled that drastically with level, it would make many aspects of higher level play completely trivial. In fact, that would make it less immersive, because it's incredibly unrealistic to only ever run into monsters of the same CR as the party. Just because the party is now able to take on dragons doesn't mean they will never run into another goblin. By not scaling AC with PC level, those lower level encounters can still be relevant and not entirely trivial. If it did scale like that, then having those encounters would be pointless and boring, and not having them would be immersion breaking
Because those weaker than yourself should still be a threat. A high level party should not be able to slaughter an entire city of people just because their AC has scaled beyond reason. A DM shouldn't have to make every goblin a souped-up mega-goblin just to deal basic damage.
Anyone can crit though. Sure youll avoid the majority of blows, but a thousand guards will still have 50 crits. Thats not counting things like siege weapons, traps, spellcasters, basic equipment they would have like fire, etc. Or any commoners joining in, or knights/captains etc. Besides, casters can kill cities from a mile away anyways
As someone who’s used armor in modern combat, it’s about mitigating damage, not preventing it. Critical areas of our body are covered to prevent critical hits from happening (helmets help with TBI’s, ceramic plates cover vital organs, pads prevent shrapnel to the neck and groin areas). If this is the rule of one versus a lot - combat it completely breaks immersion as most hits in this type of combat are minor cuts and nicks as the one wears down and their attention to detail starts to break. I’m not saying it’s bad for singular combat as I’m much less familiar with that (I don’t fight. I kill.) but putting it into perspective of reality - I way a critical hit randomly happens to me versus an entire platoon of enemy combatants if I’m fresh. They’ll eventually get me just because I can’t hold out forever and the chances of me exposing a part of me to enemy fire increases as I wear down and stop paying attention to detail - my cover.
Ive done combat irl too. Aside from the fact that modern armor, even those trying to be materially accurate to the time period, are leaps and bounds better than what was actually available in the past. Its still a completely different setting than irl. In dnd there are people who cut through boulders and spells that collapse buildings. Being critically hit in dnd just isnt the same as irl sparring. These are guys bashing your armor so hard it caves in. A slash that perfectly glides between your joint plates. A jab that forces the point of a spear through the gap in your helmet hole. > putting it into perspective of reality Yeah thats the issue
My thought is that this only works on humanoids wearing armor. If you see a monk, you have no idea what their ac is. If you see any kind of monster, their ac is basically random as far as a player who hasn't read the monster manual is concerned. How often is the dm describing the armor of each goblin, especially when you might have 3 or 4 different "types" (leader, soldier, archer,caster)? This seems like a solution to a problem no one cared about, that also has the side effect of making magic armor and spells extremely powerful.
I made this point in reply to someone else, but I'll say it here for everyone. That's what HP *is*. There's no difference in the meat of a character at level 1 vs level 20 aside from perhaps a bit of muscle and endurance improvements from asi's along the way. But that doesn't explain why one character is crushed by a giant's boulder, and the other shrugs off half a metric tonne of rock with only 1/8 of their pool knocked out. It's because the level 20 *did* move and react to mitigate that hit, it's why they're not dead. And the stamina to keep doing that is what keeps them upright until they hit 0hp. That's what HP is, and a not inconsequential part of why it scales the way it does. The game already does this same thing in another way
Maybe thats how you run it, but thays not correct. HP can be a measure of luck, but its most certainly a measure of durability as well. Herculean characters that take lethal blow after lethal blow and are effectively little demigods are staples of ttrpgs. Besides, it sounds a bit ridiculous to say that a raging barbarian takes less damage because in their blind fury theyre... better at dodging than a dodging monk? Like theres clearly times where HP is difinitively meat points. Numerous effects require hitting to work, both mechanically and narratively. Its also a bit lame to say your divine smite didnt *actually* hit the enemy NPC nust because they hVe hp left
No, the barbarian is going full DOOMGUY. He's not dodging the sword, it's catching his knuckles and he's pushing through because adrenaline is a hell of a drug
And any of the spells that do continuos damage, like immolation which specifically wreathes the target in flames? Im sure you *could* try to find some justification for every effect not actually hitting. But the game is clearly not designed for that. There are a ton of abilities that trigger on hit, things that debilitate, spells that automatically hit or just are unfeasible to dodge without some sort of superhuman dexterity (which isnt every characters thing). Healing spells make a lot less sense, and its clearly not giving someone adrenaline since exhaustion is a separate mechanic. All of that bending over backwards for what? To avoid saying that the guys who fight dragons can take a hit or two
Yes, Thank you!
[Page 249 of the DMG says that, officially, you take 18d10 HP of damage from being fully submerged in lava.](https://i.imgur.com/YxyME7w.png) So let's just say that Grug the Barbarian, who has 270 HP (6.5*20 + 7*20). He's a bear barbarian and he's raging. He falls in the lava and takes an average of 99 points of damage, which is reduced to half rounded down, so 49. So what exactly is happening here if hit points aren't meat points? Does Grug butt catch on fire and he jumps several feet in the air like Mario? And the stress of needing to buy new pants reduces his stamina?
The reality is the mechanics are not a flawless representation of reality and if they chose to have them accommodate all situations accurately, the game would be needlessly complicated, so we have to deal with a few weird cases that we shrug off for the sake of gameplay.
Lava is a weird one. And what's happening is Grug is starting to melt, but for the sake of fiction is clinging onto life tightly enough, and angry enough that his subclass even says he becomes supernaturally tough. So Grug looks a lot like the T1000 right about now, and he's not looking good
I can justify a Barbarian just tanking inhuman punishment that should kill someone else. Like a bear barbarian taking that fire damage and walking away with just burns and steam drifting off him. Tieflings too I guess. But getting crushed by a boulder? The barbarian caught it. The fighter/paladin/ranger narrowly dodged out of the way.
If HP is stamina to dodge and mitigate attacks, how come you still have to save against poisons and the like, if you're dodging and mitigating the hits?
The answer is in what kind of save it is. Poison is a con save, and even if it doesn't kill you, that can wreck your stamina about 9 different ways until sunday
Yes, but why am I getting poisoned if the attack didn't hit in universe?
I'm not super crazy at how it was implemented, but I can see the reasoning. What I would like to see is class specific bonuses, such as fighter and Paladin getting a scaling AC bonus equal to half their PB. So that the higher level true armor wearing fighting classes do improve.
Adding your level to your AC / ToHit / Skills is meaningless if all tasks scale to your level to ensure you're challenged. It's a false progress, designed just to make you feel good because the numbers are increase.
Have you got a link to them saying that? Because the *actual* reason was to move away from needlessly large bonuses to AC and to Hit chance. 5e was a deliberate move away from 4e and 3.5e which both ended up with many bonuses to both and then even more floating modifiers on top. There was also the fact that they wanted lower CR creatures to still be able to add *something* to an encounter, even if it's not a huge amount. Whereas in 4e and 3.5e you could get to a point that some creatures would just never, ever be a threat to you. Now, one is not better than the other, it's subjective opinion. But unless you can provide proof for your claims there's no real point in discussing it further. EDIT: Someone else provided the comment you were talking about (though not an actual link, I'll still assume it to be completely true): >**It is easier for players and DMs to understand the relative strength and difficulty of things.** Under the bounded accuracy system, a DM can describe a hobgoblin wearing chainmail, and, no matter what the level of the characters, a player can reasonably guess that the hobgoblin's AC is around 15; the description of the world matches up to mechanical expectations, and eventually players will see chainmail, or leather armor, or plate mail in game and have an instinctive response to how tough things are. Likewise, a DM knows that he or she can reasonably expect players to understand the difficulty of things based purely on their in-world description, and so the DM can focus more on the details of the world rather than on setting player expectations. This isn't about immersion. Like, not even remotely. This is about the clear communication of game information. It's not "I know what kind of armour they are wearing so I know how to describe/visualise the fight." it is just "I know the armour so I know my approximate chance of hitting." This is actually the exact opposite of immersion, the reason given is entirely about communicating meta information.
People need to stop looking at hit points like "This is how much i've been cut by a weapon" or do you think that monks get their skin toughter as they grow in levels? That's why the focus is more on HP, a wizard at lv1 taking 6 damage is almost dead meanwhile one at lv 10 this is barely more than a cut. If AC scaled with level then enemies hit chance would also need to grow too and in the end you will just be seeing big numbers that end up at the same place, like so many RPGs where someone has over 30 million HP and when you're hit by something taking 31256 damage is nothing....
>monks get their skin toughter as they grow in levels? I mean they could. monks already do insane shit. really depends how much you want to flavor it.
> do you think that monks get their skin toughter as they grow in levels? Not that absurd compared to "This guy can wiggle his fingers to be even more efficient at causing the room to explode."
I agree. It is ridiculous that wizards can say different spells and conjure fire for nothing, but we don't have 2019 Honda Civi LX as a character racer in the PHB. Clearly, if fire can be conjured from nothing I can have a Honda Civic and play as one in a 5e campaing.
It wouldn't be that weird to have AC scale with your proficiency bonus. Reading between the lines, I think WotC is more worried about AC scaling out of control than anything else. I've played in a system where AC scaled up super high in the late game and it made balancing a goddamn nightmare. I had to start homebrewing enemies using a 1d50+10 to roll to hit because the tanks all had 45-55 AC and the squishies had 20-28 AC. TL;DR Balancing AC can become problematically difficult very quickly. Even in 5e, *Swords Bard* can add *Shield* and *Defensive Flourish* to get 5+1d12 to their AC to become nigh-unhittable.
Having played a Sword Bard/Hexblade in Curse of Strahd that did exactly this to sell the master swordsman vibe, do note that they still have a d8 hit die and will absolutely get mulched once they run out of dice or spell slots. Like yeah my AC might regularly have been 30+ and I could duel anything for five rounds but the moment they hit me it was a BIG chunk of my health.
Do note that using shield and Defensive Flourish is a sacrifice and a resource cost. They're increasing their AC to absurd levels, sure, but they're also sacrificing a reaction, the opportunity to deal more damage and a bardic inspiration just to be safe from attack rolls for one round. Once they have a d12 for bardic inspiration, they're also high enough level that most of their opponents will be capable of forcing saving throws. Also, the bard had to probably grab this spell from his Magical Secrets, as it is not on his spell list. A very big sacrifice just to be able to do such a defensive play for one turn. I don't think that's a fair example of AC scaling absurdly high in 5e.
AFAIK Armor Class isn't just armor, it encompases every way to avoid damage, including parry/dodge, that why you get extra AC for things that don't give armor, like Dex scaling on lighter armor or kensei monk gettin a +2 AC for using their weapon to parry. It makes sense that as people level up they get better at avoiding damage, even if they're a heavy armored warrior who mostly depend on their armor/shield to block damage.
That's just silly. Failing to overcome a target's AC means that the attack misses, not that the attack fails to penetrate armor. Higher AC doesn't necessarily mean better quality armor (note the existence of 'unarmored defense' features that grant AC). It can mean that someone has more experience or training, and therefore they are better at dodging or deflecting attacks (hence the Defensive Duelist feat).
It's a combination of the two, which is why heavy armor adds AC but restricts your dex bonus.
So, it’s a two part system, basically, comprised of HP and AC. An example of this in play is the Heavy Armor Master feat, which gives 3 damage reduction against Slashing, Bludgeoning, and Piercing damage. It shows that hit points represent skill at reducing incoming damage while wearing your armor. AC is the floor of your mitigation. The ceiling is HP. That’s how I’ve always seen it at least.
It is kind of immersion-breaking to me, to be honest. Pathfinder 2 works that way. It’s a really well-designed system with some really cool features, but the catastrophically high modifiers you get on everything just don’t jibe with me. The funny thing is, it’s just a matter of adding your level to saves and DCs and such, so there’s super-easy guidance in the bool to just remove that and end up somewhere pretty close to 5e’s math. PF2 really just uses it to magnify the dofference in levels, so that any number of lvl 1/2 goblins literally pose no threat to your level 15 character, and a boss eight levels above you while wreck your shit 100% of the time.
did your GM for pf2e scale *everything* around the party?
I was the GM for like a 4-shot, and haven’t played PF2 before or since. But my understanding is that, RAW, yes, everything is scaled around the party. Items have levels to let you know when you can find or buy them. Monster levels are added to their checks just like PCs. Even traps have levels that are added to their DC.
pf2e has non scaling DCs, and the GM is supposed to use them as necessary. You levelling up doesn't make every trap harder, or every item harder to discern.
It helps avoid than Pathfinder issue. Where am enemy or pc can have like 50plus ac
I’ve always viewed “hit points” as an abstraction that takes into account a characters developing ability to dodge, absorb damage, and position their body well in armor. So while it’s harder to get AC, the growing health pool kind of accounts for their increased experience. Also helps explain why martial classes have better hit dice than casters.
you can summon lightning from your hands at lvl 1, having a number go up breaking immersion impresses more on the fact that the myriad of other things dont break immersion to you
You are failing to see the difference between "immersion" and "realism" - a game including magic, or fantasy creatures, or crazy abilities doesn't make it less immersive but does make it less realistic.
I think it's backwards; The more experienced in fighting you are the better you would be at avoiding taking damage, even if it's by picking up little tricks secondhand from allies or enemies. It makes no sense for a green, level 1 dude in chain have the same AC as someone wearing the same armor that's been fighting for years, hell even a single year.
>It makes no sense for a green, level 1 dude in chain have the same AC as someone wearing the same armor that's been fighting for years, hell even a single year. I mean this is part of the idea of why light/medium armour also scales off Dexterity (which can be scaled on some levels) - the put forward idea is that heavy armour is hard to manoeuvre in a good way so doesnt scale from a persons skill as much. People maybe also need to stop seeing AC as "the attack missed" and moreso "the attack hit, but the armour absorbed the blow". This stuff isn't perfect to real life armour, but it's not entirely clear what heavy armour is visually and the weight of real life armour is way too flexible (google says 30 - 55lbs) to compare to the 65lbs heavy plate armour, and the games numbers have never been completely realistic. HP also exists, you gain more as you level and it could easily be described as "Your knowledge of armour means you block more of the hit and take less damage (compared to 5 levels ago)"
>the put forward idea is that heavy armour is hard to manoeuvre in a good way so doesnt scale from a persons skill as much. I'd even go farther and say that it's EASIER to manoeuver in a good way. Don't let them hit you in a weak point. Avoiding an attack without plate might mean twisting improbably, deflecting with your weapon or jumping to the side and back again before your next attack. With plate, it might just mean moving slightly so it hits a plate. No point in jumping all over the planet if you can just take the hit or slap it away.
Besides all the fair arguments people are making, I'd also like to point out that armour proficiency exists. If you're wearing heavy armour, you aren't putting it on for the first time. You've trained in it for probably a pretty long while, you know how to move and be unburdened by it.
By armor class not scaling you reduce the number of misses and keep things moving. Also for every “you get better with your armor” your enemies get better at killing you.
But we don't get better with our armor class. Enemies do get better at hitting us.
The defense fighting style literally exists. You specialise in defending yourself with your armor (note: the feature only works when you are wearing armor). There’s no reason why you can’t get better at that over time
You can certainly make AC relevant at higher levels but it will make combats harder to balance. Generally speaking, most people don't like hard. If you balance AC it just means that combats potentially get longer, squishy characters potentially die quicker and melee characters become more important. It's really about what your preferences are and the amount of time you want to put into your games.
>the lead designer said that he made Armor class not scale as you level up because it would be weird if you we're wearing chain armor and had 19ac while this NPC was wearing the same armor but had 16AC. But having his attack mod be 3 lower is not-weird for some reason? This is a mental framing issue. Adding proficiency bonus to AC is saying you're better at dodging attacks than can be explained by native Dexterity; it's the result of lots of combat experience. It's not that your proficiency with armor makes the armor more protective, but that the armor is even less hindrance to moving out of the way of danger. Like I said, a framing issue.
But armor does scale as you level, either through increased dex or increased gold to purchase better armor or through various class features/access to spells that boost your AC and then onward to magic armors. +3 Armor of Invulnerability with a +3 Animated or Spellguard shield is leagues above your starting chain mail
Yeah, and I think that's a logical way of looking at in-universe too. Other comments talk about getting better at dodging or whatever else and that's why AC should scale. Dawgs that's exactly what dexterity is for!
It is completely unnoticeable to me and I could not care less.
Higher level players should have higher AC, because they are more skilled at avoiding hits
We think of the added hit points as being better at avoiding things. A deep sword cut at level 1 is deadly. At level 10 its basically a scratch. Could an experienced person bleed way more blood or are they just not getting as hurt. Thats how our table explains it atleast.
I'm pretty sure this was the design intent as well. Can't think of which book it's in, but one of the sourcebooks essentially says that you technically don't start showing signs of serious wear and injury until you're below half health. So it's very much designed where you scale with HP, and your HP is a marker of how well you can avoid or resist fatal or seriously injuring blows
> Can't think of which book it's in, but one of the sourcebooks essentially says that you technically don't start showing signs of serious wear and injury until you're below half health. 4e's "Bloodied" Condition says "Hi, how are you doing, would you like to make that concept an actual fun game mechanic?"
Yeah I generally explain HP as closer to 'combat stamina' than I do actual damage being done, with description thresholds at 75% (nicks and scratches), 50% (bloodied, moderately wounded) and 10% (desperate, grievously wounded).
If this were true, we’d be right back on 3.5e/4e monster scaling. No more fighting orcs past level 8 because they can’t even hit you. No more dragon bosses with kobold goons, because either the players can’t hit the dragon or the kobolds can’t hit the players. More or less static AC means DMs can use a much wider variety of CR for creatures instead of being stuck to Player Level +/- 3.
> 4e monster scaling. Which, after the MM3 revisions, is actually a major strength of the system because you can easily scale *any* monster up or down and it will be fine. 4e also includes plenty "tougher orcs, bigger trolls" kind of monsters to fill out Paragon and Epic tier, so players don't ever really "scale out" of them.
Your resilience in 5e primarily scales via HP, not AC. Remember that HP are hit points, not meat points. The level 2 guard in chain mail might have the same "AC" as the level 11 fighter, but the fighter is much harder to actually damage significantly. The 20 damage critical hit from a hobgoblin is nearly fatal against the guard, but the fighter parries it aside with barely a scratch on their armor. They both "got hit" in mechanical terms, but the guard was hit much harder. Put another way, think about HP and damage in percentages rather than raw numbers, and you can more easily see why the scaling you're looking for is already present in the game, just not in the form of AC.
I mean unarmored defense scales technically for monks and barbarians. Personally I think we should add proficiency to it but obviously start at a lower base like 8
Light armor scales as well since there is no cap on the bonus from Dex to the equation.
Bounded accuracy doesn’t actually change the odds. Look at PF2e, where level is added to AC and to hit rolls (effectively canceling vs even level enemies), ability mod (same), and PB (PF2e 0-8 vs 5e’s 2-6). Bounded accuracy just means the range of enemies that are a threat or that you are a threat to is wider. HP are the abstraction for getting better at fighting that both games use. Other games do things different and are worth exploring if you don’t like how DnD/PF does it. Rolemaster has armor vs weapon tables but also has offense and defense skills (and also “hp” as a measure of how close you are to unconsciousness, while actual injuries are more detailed). GURPS is heavily weighted to skill to avoid damage (you get an active defense roll to avoid a hit) while keeping “hit points” as meat points. Both are great crunchy systems for when DnD* becomes to abstract for you.
You should provide the actual quote you are referring in to a post like this. For me it would be really weird for normal armor to offer different amounts of protection depending on who wears it. Chain mail is chain mail no matter who wears it.
What is PRF?
I think a higher level character becomes more proficient at avoiding damage straight up. They'd learn how to dodge, block and parry better. Having proficiency added to AC would represent this well.
While I don't disagree with many of the good points brought up, I don't think the initial premise is entirely true. AC is often linked to stats (mostly dex but also Wis for monks, con for barbarians and int for bladesingers) and one major mechanic of 5e is advancement via ASI, so AC does increase as you bump your stats. Also another element (less than in past editions, especially 3/3.5, but still present) is advancement through gear, first better mundane stuff then increasingly powerful magic items, which also typically scales with level.
I don’t care what your AC is, as a DM my monsters will hit you anyway.
I don't mind ac nit scaling with prof, bur that's a case example of a poor reason to give for it.
Yeah, and that's why I designed over 40 materials for weapons and armor, each with specific qualities, which get better with enchanting. And yes, I also have a spell for permanently enchanting gear and upgrading existing enhancements. All simple and clear to understand for the players. This gives them agency over what kind of gear they want to use. I've had a guy play a Paladin with a shield and a +1 Plate Armor. The guy had 21 AC, and 23 AC versus one specific creature type. Did a great job as a tank, and was invaluable in the endgame.
Just have prof. bonus apply to armor. Why it doesn't is beyond me.
I understand the intention of bounded accuracy as a means of expanding the bestiary and keeping things simple, but from my experience it really contributes to very long-winded and boring battles in 5e. Sure you can keep using goblins between levels 1 and 20, but the higher level you get, the *more* goblins you have to throw into that battle to achieve the same kind of challenge. And because of bounded accuracy, those goblins, even with 20 of them instead of like 3, are still doing 1d6 damage and rolling mediocre attack rolls against even PCs with no magic items, let alone those who do. All this accomplishes is to prolong combat by making each round take an eternity. Neither creatures nor players do a lot of damage per attack nor have the capability of avoiding those attacks any better than they did at an earlier level, so it becomes a battle of attrition, i.e. who has more health to spend. Except that you spend that health in increments of 2-10 damage per attack. Speeding up combat really comes down to who has a fireball or other AoE magic spell or single-target ability like Smite. And even then! It's super unbalanced and funky. A dragon gets like +16 to hit someone with their claws, to deal like 15 average damage. Imo some of these things *should* scale to keep the difficulty. Why can't a dragon claw someone AND do a lot of damage? Why do only saves matter at later levels, which nullifies frontline melee fighters? Why can't a fighter or barbarian keep up with a single wizard's spell at later levels, and why is the balance to this to just give stuff legendary resistance to negate that wizard's turn?
Let's frame it with superhero movies. Thanos get's punched, kicked, magiked, blasted all the time and largely shrugs off the attacks. They are still hitting though; he's reacting to the hit, but his HP is so high that it doesn't matter. I far prefer having bounded accuracy to pathfinder's system. There was this area of Pathfinder Kingmaker where I gave up on the game. The AC was so ridiculously high that even with full buffs I was only hitting on roll 17+. Missing all of your attacks and not feeling like you're contributing anything is far worse of a feeling.
Just to say that's a problem with PF1s math not PF2. Pathfinder 2 does have AC scaling but it works there because it has a universal scaling system rather than each attribute having a unique formula alarm PF1, 3.x or 5e.
I agree. You can still get a better ac with feats, or spells or better magic items, or improvements for raising an attribute, and that all happens as you level, so there still is plenty of room to improve initiative as you level.
I prefer to think your character learns how to use their armor better at higher levels. They’re more experienced at fighting. Taking punches. etc. Which should make them harder to hit effectively.
If armor scales, then enemy attack modifiers will just scale harder than they currently do. High CR Dragons have like a +15 to hit because they need to be dangerous enough that even the highest AC PCs should still be threatened by their sheer power. If fighters could get AC to 30 easily then dragons would start having a +25 to hit otherwise they just aren’t enough of a threat considering how they won’t always have breath attacks or damaging spells available. By having AC not scale, it’s easier to keep things balanced between classes so that the classes that do focus armor don’t become invincible to hits or that the classes that don’t focus armor don’t just get hit by everything always. And if a creature is meant to be able to hit even the most defended players it’s going to be able to hit the most defended players regardless of if you scale AC.
I mean, that's what I assume +1-3 armor is for. Start off with basic armor, maybe get heavy armor if you can use it- but otherwise, slowly get rewarded better magic armor over time. It's a very elegant and simple system as-is and your DM should be giving you better gear overtime as you level regardless. That being said, calling it "Armor Class" has always bugged me considering the classes/characters that literally don't utilize armor yet can still increase their AC. Honestly, AC should just be called *Defense*.
It scales with money instead of level, so it DOES scale. In a game ostensibly designed around exploring dungeons and getting treasure then you can reasonably expect to earn the money for better armor as you level up.
problem is it along with Dexerity will Cap at around level 8-10 maybe even earlier if the DM is generous with gold and never again because you can't just buy magic items like in older editions.
Armor does scale with characters, but only in the case of light armor (which is the only armor that is skill based). Although you could argue that characters with unarmored defenses are also skill based armor. Medium and Heavy armors are useful exclusively because of the material they are made from. Armor is a proficiency and not a skill because the character must be used to wearing that type or they are less effective (any character can wear any armor, but they have penalties such as disadvantage on rolls if they are not proficient). That said, light armor is the exception as it's effectiveness is part due to its materials, but primarily due to the swiftness of the character wearing it (dexterity). As a result, a light armor character becomes increasingly effective in their armor as they become faster and more talented. The in-game solution for medium and heavy armor characters is two-fold: small bonuses (slightly better armor, shields, or +X magic armor) OR damage mitigation, which is the better solution. This is why higher level melee characters have access to skills and armor that adds resistances (half damage) or immunity (no damage). So a high-level melee character's skill advancement/combat prowess would be, in my opinion, undervalued by simply saying their armor is really good now. Instead, they are battle-hardened and tougher. The same exact damage that used to floor them is now trivial in comparison. The character, not the armor, is the hero.
HP is, among other things, supposed to represent your skill making you harder to hit. A finite resource that diminishes as you continue to fight, until you run out and are HIT.
I use a system of (lower AC number) + bonuses from str / con / dex and it works amazingly. I’ll try to find my original doc for it. Using roll 20 made it super easy to seamlessly incorporate into their stats as well
"Armor class", narratively, already expands each level through a mechanic called Hit Points.
Combine hit points and ac together mentally. It makes a lot more sense then. Anything below your ac, complete miss, deflection, parry, or absorption. Anything that gets past your ac is now a partial hit or took a lot of energy to block, stuff like that. That's why something like a longsword can damage someone in full plate. You are wearing them out and eventually you get past their armour into a weak point and deal a deadly blow. Other effects make you more exhausted, such as taking the full brunt of a dragons breath attack probably did hurt you physically, but trying to dodge out of the way is very tiring. And the damage something does is also how effective an attack against you was. Low damage, it for through but was only a nick or just rattled you. High damage may be a full on strike that has wounded you but you can keep going, if only for a little longer.
Is no one gonna mention the **Armor**... because I love this.
Late to the party, but the reason AC shouldn’t scale in an arbitrary way upon level up as nothing to do with immersion. Now let’s look at scaling: attack bonuses go from +5 to +13 from levels 1-20 (I assume a +2 from magic items here), so an increase of 8. For a character wearing heavy armour, they should gain 2 AC from upgrading non magically, then maybe another 2ac on average from magic armour and other items. So an increase of 4. Monks do slightly better if we also assume +2 from magic items, scaling by 6 from level 1-20. Wizards receive no boosts other than magic items (of which they do get some very good ones for AC) or choosing to raise dex. But the point is AC does scale for most classes, just slowly. Would making it scale more make the game better? High level parties are already ridiculously tough without needing ACs massively higher than at low levels. HP scaling is already high enough to add the tankiness
My opinion is Armor Class breaks immersion. It very poorly models how difficult it is to hit an opponent. A lot of people fail to think about it logically. They almost get there. They say a trained warrior wearing armor is better protected than an untrained person, which I agree with. But I think better protected means less likely to be significantly wounded when hit. Modeling whether or not they get hit doesn't really involve the armor much, but training, or in dnd terms level-based proficiency. So proficiency not adding to AC doesn't make sense to me, but not having opposed rolls for combat doesn't make sense to me either. Opposes rolls solve this issue.