Talk:Artificed Plate (5e Equipment)

Armor's Issues

Looking at this armor, it is essential a super buffed up plate armor. Because of this the armor is unbalance, but more specifically, heavy armor should never add your Dexterity modifier, the cost of the armor is far outside the realm of what a mundane piece of armor could reasonably cost (plate is already pushing it in terms of cost), the AC you can get with this armor is far too good as even a +1 boost to plate's AC is considered extremely strong (see fortress armor for how it tries to balance this), etc. Overall, I am not too sure what exactly to do with this armor (perhaps convert it to a magic item, but there really isn't that much to work with here), but it is very much not balanced. I would recommend taking a look at other comparable 1st party and homebrew armor. --Blobby383b (talk) 00:11, 13 December 2021 (MST)

Looking at the pages you recommended, I see two armors that are very similar, but not marked as unbalanced. There is the Cyber Armor (https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Cyber_Armor_(5e_Equipment)), which is a medium armor with AC 18 + Dex mod without the limit I included in this item, and with several very powerful abilities (although I will acknowledge that it is a Unique item). There is also the Orkz Arma, which is a heavy armor with AC 15 + Str mod, again without a listed limit. If my armor is overpowered (despite the high cost & easy justification for DMs with low-powered campaigns to disallow it) I don't see how those aren't as well. I acknowledge that this may not fit every table (though it does in mine), but what homebrew item does fit all campaigns? --SpectreSpartan (talk) 16:24, 20 December 2021 (EDT)

The Cyber Armor and Orkz Arma are poor points of comparison, for the following reasons:

1. The Cyber Armor is made for futuristic settings, and as you can see, armor and weapons made for more technologically advanced settings typically get stronger and stronger as tech advances. Furthermore, the futuristic armors don't even have gp costs, instead being assigned rarities like magic items, because if you introduced them to a typical D&D fantasy setting, that is what they might as well be.

2. The Orkz Arma is a joke page which is clearly riffing off of how Warhammer 40,000 orks act and talk, and the weird stats (15 + Str) are just a reflection of the goofy, orky culture it draws inspiration from. In this case, rule of funny largely takes precedent over strict balance (and in any case it should be better compared to future tech since it hails from a future setting just like generic Cyber Armor).

3. This Artificed Plate doesn't have either of those holding it up, so it has to be compared to normal armor sets, and by that metric this set does not hold up. It costs ten times more than plate armor (which itself frankly already tips the high end of the scale in terms of gp cost for armor, meaning artificed plate's cost is basically too high to be even meaningful) and lets you add your dex modifier to your AC, which heavy armor sets by definition aren't allowed to do, and it doesn't even give you stealth disadvantage.

So yeah. You have your work cut out for you for bringing this up to code. It either needs to be toned back or reformed into a magic item. Endermage77 (talk) 13:05, 24 December 2021 (MST)