Pregens use a standard array of [8, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15], before class and racial ability score modifiers. Fighters get a +1 in Constitution; Humans get a +1 in everything, save one stat which is +2; Dwarves get a +1 in Strength; Halflings get a +1 in Dexterity. These are important points here: for a point-buy system of ability scores, it looks like it would be pretty hard to start with anything greater than a 15 without having more 10s, and in 5e, where ALL your abilities matter to some extent since they act as your skills, you don't want to dump anything.
So having dual-primaries is almost out of the question. Unless you're a human, you're not getting two 16+ for Str and Dex. And even then, if you don't want to completely dump your other stats, then you need at least a 14 and a 15, and if you want to get rid of that 8, you're likely losing either your 12 or your 13 as well – making it more like 10, 10, 10, 11, 14, 15 – AND be Human. You'd then have 11, 11, 11, 12, 16, 16, and you wouldn't have any very good skills besides Str or Dex type-skills. But at least you wouldn't be god-aweful.
But that's pretty much the only way you could dual-primary. Otherwise, it's a toss up – do you do more damage with Str, or do you use lighter armor and finesse weapons and thus save money? You might have a slightly higher AC, which reflects your dodging ability, and you have more money to spend on other things, but you're not as good at killing things. It's a tough toss-up.
A great man once said "If WotC put out boxes full of free money there'd still be people complaining about how it's folded." – Boraxe
Pregens use a standard array of [8, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15], before class and racial ability score modifiers. Fighters get a +1 in Constitution; Humans get a +1 in everything, save one stat which is +2; Dwarves get a +1 in Strength; Halflings get a +1 in Dexterity. These are important points here: for a point-buy system of ability scores, it looks like it would be pretty hard to start with anything greater than a 15 without having more 10s, and in 5e, where ALL your abilities matter to some extent since they act as your skills, you don't want to dump anything.
So having dual-primaries is almost out of the question. Unless you're a human, you're not getting two 16+ for Str and Dex. And even then, if you don't want to completely dump your other stats, then you need at least a 14 and a 15, and if you want to get rid of that 8, you're likely losing either your 12 or your 13 as well – making it more like 10, 10, 10, 11, 14, 15 – AND be Human. You'd then have 11, 11, 11, 12, 16, 16, and you wouldn't have any very good skills besides Str or Dex type-skills. But at least you wouldn't be god-aweful.
But that's pretty much the only way you could dual-primary. Otherwise, it's a toss up – do you do more damage with Str, or do you use lighter armor and finesse weapons and thus save money? You might have a slightly higher AC, which reflects your dodging ability, and you have more money to spend on other things, but you're not as good at killing things. It's a tough toss-up.
But a dex fighter in light armor with finesse weapons would have a low strength, would it not?
I know this is in poor taste but...“4th edition - bad enough to kill Gary Gygax.”
Actually, between the fact that 2 handed weapons dont add 1/2 str (per the current rules), and that dex weapons add dex to damage, the difference is less than 3.5.
Just one question: Who have to make more damage? A two handed greatsword? Or a two weapons wielder?
And then Martial was a new exciting new source of power, its practitioners manipulating the energies emanating from the plane of oiled-up burly weightlifters.
I really don't understand why everyone is so surprised by this, isn't this always how D&D has worked? The advantage of light armor is you get to add your dex, the advantage of heavy armor is that you don't have to. I guess being able to actually have a higher AC with light armor might be throwing people off, but that's really how it should be anyway. Dex based characters are good ad dodging, they should be harder to hit, while the guys with better armor should be able to take more hits. Which they can, cause they have more HP.
Not in 2E, in 2E the best Fighters had high Dex since Full plate didn't lower Dex (or disallow it) letting you get the best AC.
"If you can't believe in yourself, believe in me who believes in you."
and
"Go beyond the impossible, and kick reason to the curb" Kamina, from Gurren Lagann
Fighters get a +1 to Strength, it's the Hill Dwarf that gives +1 Constitution. The Hill Dwarf Fighter has Strength 16, Constitution 14 and Wisdom 14, this is only possible if you're getting +1 to Strength, and +1 to one of the other two. It's almost certainly the Dwarf giving a Constitution bonus, since, y'know... Dwarf.
But a dex fighter in light armor with finesse weapons would have a low strength, would it not?
Not necessarily. You could still have a 12 or 14 there. Remember, this isn't 4th edition, 18 isn't the minimum stat to not suck. A 12 or 14 is still decent.
Really, medium armor is the only class that seems "weak" but I think we're looking at medium armor wrong. Its less "just the stuff you wear until you can afford heavy" and more "just for high Dexterity fighters who don't need sleath"; an 18 Dex Fighter has the same AC in Mithril Chain as he does Dragons Scale - its largely a matter of what you want your character to wear.
Pregens use a standard array of [8, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15], before class and racial ability score modifiers. Fighters get a +1 in Constitution; Humans get a +1 in everything, save one stat which is +2; Dwarves get a +1 in Strength; Halflings get a +1 in Dexterity. These are important points here: for a point-buy system of ability scores, it looks like it would be pretty hard to start with anything greater than a 15 without having more 10s, and in 5e, where ALL your abilities matter to some extent since they act as your skills, you don't want to dump anything.
So having dual-primaries is almost out of the question. Unless you're a human, you're not getting two 16+ for Str and Dex. And even then, if you don't want to completely dump your other stats, then you need at least a 14 and a 15, and if you want to get rid of that 8, you're likely losing either your 12 or your 13 as well – making it more like 10, 10, 10, 11, 14, 15 – AND be Human. You'd then have 11, 11, 11, 12, 16, 16, and you wouldn't have any very good skills besides Str or Dex type-skills. But at least you wouldn't be god-aweful.
But that's pretty much the only way you could dual-primary. Otherwise, it's a toss up – do you do more damage with Str, or do you use lighter armor and finesse weapons and thus save money? You might have a slightly higher AC, which reflects your dodging ability, and you have more money to spend on other things, but you're not as good at killing things. It's a tough toss-up.
But a dex fighter in light armor with finesse weapons would have a low strength, would it not?
My point was that it's very hard to have a Fighter wielding heavy weapons for attacks (and thus have high Strength) and also use Light Armor for AC (requiring high Dex). You have to choose, unless you jump through some hoops, be a Human, and sacrifice your other abilities for the cause, if you want to be both. I imagine the Barbarian will fulfill the needs of people who want to wield heavy two-handed martial weapons and also wear light armor. They'll probably get some advantage for doing just that, when we finally see the other classes.
A great man once said "If WotC put out boxes full of free money there'd still be people complaining about how it's folded." – Boraxe
I really don't understand why everyone is so surprised by this, isn't this always how D&D has worked? The advantage of light armor is you get to add your dex, the advantage of heavy armor is that you don't have to. I guess being able to actually have a higher AC with light armor might be throwing people off, but that's really how it should be anyway. Dex based characters are good ad dodging, they should be harder to hit, while the guys with better armor should be able to take more hits. Which they can, cause they have more HP.
Yes, exactly this. I'm just trying to help disspell the notion that heavy armor is useless.
So why not make the heavy armor represent the ability of it to shrug off blows by giving it a little bit of DR? It's simple and elegant. Just a tiny bit of dr depending on which heavy armor you're using, and you've got a viable choice for character concept, and it makes heavy armor worth the oddles of cash you're throwing into it.
Do you really need DR on top of your higher HP though? You can already take a lot more damgage than the dex guy, deal a bit more, you get to dump dex, you can't lose your dex bonus to AC, and all you lose is like a 5% chance of being hit. If the speed penalty bothers you that much, you can always play a dwarf. Or hell, play a dex fighter if you think it's so much better. But Enrathi is absolutely right, there are advantages to taking heavy armor over light armor, and they pretty much balance out against the advantages that light armor have over heavy armor. The only exception that can't be mitigated by building your character to suit your fighting style is the price, which I agree looks really weirdly inflated. But the price is what needs fixing, not the AC value or adding DR, a mechanic that hasn't existed in any version of D&D and is, for me, an absolute dealbreaker. Not that WotC should leave DR out on my account of course, but I think bringing the price down a bit is a much more elegant solution than adding a brand new mechanic to the core rules of the game.
Really, medium armor is the only class that seems "weak" but I think we're looking at medium armor wrong. Its less "just the stuff you wear until you can afford heavy" and more "just for high Dexterity fighters who don't need sleath"; an 18 Dex Fighter has the same AC in Mithril Chain as he does Dragons Scale - its largely a matter of what you want your character to wear.
This. Except it's not just medium armor people are looking at wrong. If you build correctly for your fighting style, you should have roughly the same total AC bonus give or take about 1 point, maybe 2, as someone built correctly for a different style. It really comes down to a choice of taste in RP, rather than one or the other being mechanically superior.
Obviously, unarmored casters will be an exception because they don't even wear armor, but that's obviously not what we're talking about here.
I really don't understand why everyone is so surprised by this, isn't this always how D&D has worked? The advantage of light armor is you get to add your dex, the advantage of heavy armor is that you don't have to. I guess being able to actually have a higher AC with light armor might be throwing people off, but that's really how it should be anyway. Dex based characters are good ad dodging, they should be harder to hit, while the guys with better armor should be able to take more hits. Which they can, cause they have more HP.
Yes, exactly this. I'm just trying to help disspell the notion that heavy armor is useless.
So why not make the heavy armor represent the ability of it to shrug off blows by giving it a little bit of DR? It's simple and elegant. Just a tiny bit of dr depending on which heavy armor you're using, and you've got a viable choice for character concept, and it makes heavy armor worth the oddles of cash you're throwing into it.
Do you really need DR on top of your higher HP though? You can already take a lot more damgage than the dex guy, deal a bit more, you get to dump dex, you can't lose your dex bonus to AC, and all you lose is like a 5% chance of being hit. If the speed penalty bothers you that much, you can always play a dwarf. Or hell, play a dex fighter if you think it's so much better. But Enrathi is absolutely right, there are advantages to taking heavy armor over light armor, and they pretty much balance out against the advantages that light armor have over heavy armor. The only exception that can't be mitigated by building your character to suit your fighting style is the price, which I agree looks really weirdly inflated. But the price is what needs fixing, not the AC value or adding DR, a mechanic that hasn't existed in any version of D&D and is, for me, an absolute dealbreaker. Not that WotC should leave DR out on my account of course, but I think bringing the price down a bit is a much more elegant solution than adding a brand new mechanic to the core rules of the game.
DR is in AD&D, and 3rd......
Also, the dex guy should have the same HP, since he's gonna be dumping strength, not constitution.
Edit: Also, in 3rd, adamantine armor gives DR also.
I know this is in poor taste but...“4th edition - bad enough to kill Gary Gygax.”
