Equipment - Armor and Shields

Equipment - Armor and Shields

Armor (n.). A suit of clothes made by a blacksmith. (Ambrose Bierce)

Fantozzi Armor: 4-way vane functioning as a plume, fearsome Viking helmet with zero visibility, bronze suspender stolen from the statue of Pepin the Short and, on the feet, heavy irons for charcoal pressing made of molten lead. Total weight of Fantozzi armor: 4 quintals, 32 kilos and 7 and a half hectograms. (Superfantozzi, Film)}

Armor helps to not be hit (raises Defense) and penalizes Magic Checks and Basic proficiency checks and movement.

The Proficiency Penalty is the penalty applied to Basic proficiency checks influenced by the weight and Encumbrance of the armor. Different, specific, or magical armors have different scores; this table serves as a guideline for the Narrator.

Armor Table

Armor	Cost	Defense	Prof. Pen.	Type	Mov.	Magic Check	Encumbrance
Padded	5 gp	1	0	L	0	-	2
Leather	10 gp	2	0	L	0	+4	2
Studded leather	25 gp	3	0	L	0	+4	2
Chain shirt	15 gp	4	-1	M	0	+8	4
Scale	50 gp	5	-1	M	0	+8	4
Ring	150 gp	6	-1	M	0	+8	4
Breastplate	200 gp	6	-2	M	0	+8	4
Banded	250 gp	7	-2	H	0	+16	8
Half plate	1200 gp	8	-2	H	1	+16	8
Field plate	1350 gp	9	-3	H	2	+16	8
Full plate	1500 gp	10	-4	H	3	+16	8

Cost: is for a medium-sized armor.

Defense: is the bonus given to Defense

Prof. Pen.: is the penalty given to Basic Proficiency checks due to the weight and Encumbrance of the armor.

Type: indicates whether the armor is Light, Medium, or Heavy.

Encumbrance: indicates the encumbrance of the armor.

Mov. (movement): is the reduction in meters of movement to apply per Movement Action.

Magic Check: The - indicates that Magic Check isn’ **t required. The numbers indicated are to be added to difficulty of the Magic Check.

Cost: the cost of a +1 armor or shield is 2250gp, +2 10000gp. It is practically not possible to purchase armor or shields or weapons with enchantments higher than +2, they must be found.

Check the requirements for wearing Armor or Shield on pg. .

Armor, Shields and Magic

All Armors, except for Padded armor, force spellcasters to pass a Magic Check with an increased difficulty indicated in the table.

Example: Tups wears Breastplate armor (medium armor) and casts a spell. He is forced by wearing the armor to perform a Magic Check. He rolls 3d6 +3 dice (because he has 9 points in Magic Proficiency), ignores 2 dice (because he has taken Magic Adept 4 times).

The difficulty of the spell he casts, Lightning Bolt, is 10+ 2*3 (Spell level) +8 (additional difficulty from the armor).

In the test he rolls 4,5,5 / 3,4,1,1. He removes the two 1s for Magic Adept, they count as zero and if he had rolled 3 it would have been a Critical Failure! Total 4+5+5+3+4=21, against a difficulty of 10+2*3+8=24. Tups fails to cast the spell!!!

If Tups had worn Studded Leather the difficulty would have increased by only 4 and therefore he would have succeeded in casting the spell.

Description of Armor

Light Armor

Made of light and flexible materials, light armor favors agile adventurers as it offers protection without sacrificing mobility.

Padded. Padded armor consists of quilted layers of cloth and batting.

Leather. The breastplate and shoulder protectors of this armor are made of leather that has been stiffened by being boiled in oil. The rest of the armor is made of softer and more flexible materials.

Studded Leather. Made from tough but flexible leather, studded leather armor is reinforced with close-set rivets or spikes.

Medium Armor

Medium armor offers more protection than light armor, but it also impairs movement more.

Chain Shirt. Made of interlocking metal rings, a chain shirt is worn between layers of clothing or leather. This armor offers modest protection to the wearer’ **s upper body and allows the sound of the rings rubbing against one another to be muffled by outer layers.

Scale. This armor consists of a coat and leggings (and perhaps a separate skirt) of leather covered with overlapping pieces of metal, much like the scales of a fish. The suit includes gauntlets.

Ring. This armor is leather armor with heavy rings sewn into it. The rings help reinforce the armor against blows from swords and axes. Ring mail is inferior to chain mail, and it’ **s usually worn only by those who can’ **t afford better armor.

Breastplate. This armor consists of a fitted metal chest piece worn with supple leather. Although it leaves the legs and arms relatively unprotected, this armor provides good protection for the wearer’ **s vital organs while leaving the wearer relatively unencumbered.

Heavy Armor

Banded. This armor is made of overlapping strips of metal sewn to a backing of leather and chain mail. The strips cover vulnerable areas, while the chain mail and leather protect the joints and allow freedom of movement. Straps and buckles distribute the weight evenly.

Half Plate. Half plate consists of shaped metal plates that cover most of the wearer’ **s body. It does not include leg protection beyond simple greaves that are attached with leather straps.

Field Plate. Very similar to full plate armor but lighter in construction sacrificing a bit of protection for greater flexibility and mobility.

Full Plate. This armor consists of shaped, interlocking metal plates to cover the entire body. A suit of plate includes gauntlets, heavy leather boots, a visored helmet, and thick layers of padding underneath the armor. Buckles and straps distribute the weight over the body.

Basic rules for using armor

Using Armor without adequate proficiency prevents using the Dexterity bonus and decreases the Defense bonus provided by 1.

Using a Shield without adequate proficiency worsens the Attack Roll by 1 and decreases the Defense Bonus granted by 1.

Sleeping in Armor: if you sleep in medium or heavy armor, the next day you are automatically Fatigued.

Sleeping in light armor does not cause Fatigue.

The character’ **s movement capability will remain the same up to banded armor, then it will decrease progressively. The value indicated in the Mov. column is the meters less that the character makes per Movement Action.

For example, a human in full plate armor has a movement of 6 meters, a dwarf 3 meters.

Weight: the weight indicated refers to the version for Medium-sized characters. Armor adapted for Small-sized characters weighs half, while for Large-sized ones it weighs double.

Perfect Armor

Perfect armor is armor created by a highly skilled blacksmith that, while not being magical, thanks to its perfect balance, has a +1 to Defense. A blacksmith to create perfect armor must succeed with a Critical Success the DC set for the creation of the armor. Perfect Armor costs twice as much as normal armor.

Magical Armor and Shields

Magical armor or shield not only protects better but is also lighter and more attuned to magic.

A +1 armor reduces the Proficiency penalty by 1 and the movement penalty by 1 meter.

A +2 armor or shield also reduce by 2 the penalty to Magic Check. A +3 armor further reduces the Proficiency penalty by 1, reduces the Movement penalty by 1m, and reduce by 2 more the penalty for Magic Check.

Shields

Shields allow you to increase your Defense; the more imposing and heavy the shield is, the more it protects, the more it increases penalties to magic proficiency checks, and the less easy it makes to fight (Attack Roll penalty).

Shields can be Light, Medium, or Heavy.

Defense Bonus: is the bonus applied to Defense when the shield is worn.

AR Penalty: is the penalty to the Attack Roll that you have when the shield is worn and you do not have at least Strength 3.

Type: indicates the size of the shield. Light, Medium, Heavy.

A Light Shield has Encumbrance 1, a Medium Shield has Encumbrance 2, a Heavy Shield has Encumbrance 4.

The penalty to the Magic Check adds up with that possibly due to armor and applies when the shield is worn.

A shield can be used as an improvised weapon. A small shield does 1d4 damage (B/S), a medium shield does 1d6 damage (B/S), a heavy shield does 1d8 damage (B/S).

Using the shield as an improvised weapon does not apply its bonus to Defense unless you use a Reaction to reset it to Defense after attacking.

Wielding a shield occupies the hand and arm.

Shields Table

Shields	Cost	Defense	AR penalty	Magic check	Type	Encumb.
Light wooden shield	3 gp	+1	0	+2	L	1
Light metal shield	9 gp	+1	0	+2	L	1
Medium wooden shield	5 gp	+2	0	+4	M	2
Medium metal shield	12 gp	+2	0	+4	M	2
Heavy wooden shield	9gp	+3	1	+6	H	4
Heavy metal shield	20 gp	+3	1	+6	H	4

Donning and Removing Armor

Wearing and removing armor is an operation that requires time and attention; doing it in a hurry doesn’ **t help and in fact tends to worsen the protection provided.

Table: Time to don and remove armor

Armor Type	Don	Don Hastily	Remove
Shield	1 Action	-	1 Action
Padded, Leather, Studded leather	1 minute	3 rounds	-
Chain shirt	1 minute	5 rounds	5 rounds
Scale mail, Ring mail, Breastplate, Banded mail	4 minutes	1 minute{*}	1 minute
Half plate, Field plate, Full plate	4 minutes{}{}	4 minutes{*}	1d4+1 minutes

{*} If someone helps, the time is halved. A single character who is not doing anything else can help one or two adjacent characters. Two characters cannot help each other don armor at the same time.

{}{} You must be helped to don this armor. Without help, you can only don it hastily.

Donning armor hastily results in a -1 penalty to the Defense provided by the Armor and an additional +1 penalty to Basic Proficiency checks.

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