Piecemeal Armor
Breaking down armor into its component parts can be a way of adding a degree of realism to your setting. The notion that a pair of greaves, pauldrons, or a helmet is found without the full set is not unreasonable. In fact, it makes sense that after a pitched battle, only parts and pieces of armor survived.
Consider how incorporating piecemeal armor can affect gameplay, from constructing full suits of magical armor and questing until all of the pieces have been found to incorporating dark fantasy style rules for breaking, repairing, and scrapping armor.
Making Sense of Armor
While working through and play-testing piecemeal armor, the main issue I ran into was that armor in 5e doesn't really make sense. Armor is composed of pieces and those pieces are not reflected very well in the way the original rules were created, as the goal of the developers seemed to be simplicity (which is perfectly fine). However, that simplicity does not translate well when it comes to creating a system of piecemeal armor because some suits of armor have too many pieces to realistically reach the target number for the armor as written, and the costs and weights often seem strange, since the values of some pieces of armor are clearly listed, but their component parts either don't measure up or seem incongruous with the expectations we would have for those values.
As such, this set of rules is meant to represent how 5e armor looks as written.
RAW Weight
The weights for suits of armor are rounded off for ease of access, and sometimes it was necessary to artificially inflate the weight of a piece of armor to make sense within the overall suit. For example, Plate armor has pieces based upon half plate and the breastplate suits of armor. The leftover pieces must represent the remaining weight not accounted for, which leaves us with strangely heavy pauldrons. I could have tried to absorb some of that weight into the greaves, the only remaining piece in the suit not reflected elsewhere, but the fact that they are already equal weight with the cuisses is somewhat strange.
RAW Cost
Similar to RAW Weight, the rounding and representation across suits requires artificial manipulations of some prices to help shoehorn individual prices into the cost of the suit. An argument could be made that individual pieces should cost more or less, but I leave that to personal preference, having simply done my best to try and make the prices seem realistic and, more pointedly, fit to the overall cost.
RAW Types
The choices for how suits of armor are labeled is something that any historian will tell you are extremely boiled down or wrong. Padded armor is meant to represent a gambeson. Ring mail is not a suit of armor represented well in this edition and is ultimately silly to include, never having been used in any game I have run or played in and should be medium armor. Older editions of D&D are more successful at having more and realistic armor options if you have resources available.
Positive Armor
You will notice that all AC values have been converted into bonuses to AC rather than set values. This change was necessary to represent the concept of found pieces of armor or the sundering of individual pieces of armor. Since, outside of the torso piece, all pieces of armor are +1, the math becomes pretty easy for changing values.
Light, Medium, or Heavy
When it comes to armor proficiency or determining Dex to AC or disadvantage to stealth, I cannot figure why some of the choices were made by the developers. (Why does padded have disadvantage? It is made of cloth!) However, here are some simple rules for piecemeal:
Proficiency
- Characters cannot wear a piece of armor if it does not appear under a heading they aren't proficient in (e.g., plate gauntlets are under medium, but plate pauldrons are not.)
- Characters proficient in Medium armor cannot wear more than 3 pieces of medium armor or exceed a base +5 to their AC from component pieces without wearing Heavy Armor.
Dex to AC
- Characters cannot gain Dex to AC while wearing armor that is part of a suit that is itself limited to either "max 2" or no bonus.
- If a piece of armor appears on both the Medium and Heavy lists, as long as the character is not considered to be wearing heavy, they assume the better value (e.g., Half plate armor vs plate armor).
Disadvantage to Stealth
- Characters have disadvantage to stealth while wearing armor that is part of a suit that is itself disadvantaged.
- If a piece of armor appears disadvantage and not as disadvantage, as long as the character is not considered to be wearing other disadvataged pieces, they assume the better value (e.g., Plate gauntlets appear under the Breastplate and Plate armor).
Armor Table
Medium Armor
| Armor | Cost | Armor Class (AC) | Strength | Stealth | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chain shirt | 50 gp | 3 + Dex modifier (max 2) | — | — | 20 lb. |
| Leather | 10 gp | +1 | — | — | 10 lb. |
| Chain Haubergeon | 40 gp | +2 | — | — | 12 lb. |
| Scale mail | 50 gp | 4 + Dex modifier (max 2) | — | Disadvantage | 45 lb. |
| Padded | 5 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Scale Hauberk | 25 gp | +1 | — | — | 25 lb. |
| Scale Greaves | 10 gp | +1 | — | — | 5 lb. |
| Scale Cuisses | 10 gp | +1 | — | — | 7 lb. |
| Breastplate | 400 gp | 4 + Dex modifier (max 2) | — | — | 20 lb. |
| Leather | 10 gp | +1 | — | — | 10 lb. |
| Plate Front Cuirass | 240 gp | +2 | — | — | 6 lb. |
| Plate Gauntlets | 150 gp | +1 | — | — | 4 lb. |
| Half plate | 750 g | 5 + Dex modifier (max 2) | — | Disadvantage | 40 lb. |
| Padded | 5 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Plate Cuirass | 500 gp | +3 | — | — | 20 lb. |
| Plate Cuisses | 245 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
Heavy Armor
| Armor | Cost | Armor Class (AC) | Strength | Stealth | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ring mail | 30 gp | +4 | - | Disadvantage | 40 lb. |
| Padded | 10 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Ring Reinforced Cuirass | 15 gp | +2 | — | — | 25 lb. |
| Ring Reinforced Greaves | 5 gp | +1 | — | — | 7 lb. |
| Chain mail | 75 gp | +6 | Str 13 | Disadvantage | 55 lb. |
| Padded | 5 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Chain Hauberk | 40 gp | +3 | — | — | 35 lb. |
| Chain Guantlets | 10 gp | +1 | — | — | 6 lb. |
| Chain Coif | 20 gp | +1 | — | — | 6 lb. |
| Splint | 200 gp | +7 | Str 15 | Disadvantage | 60 lb. |
| Padded | 5 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Splinted Leather Cuirass | 105 gp | +3 | — | — | 35 lb. |
| Chain Guantlets | 10 gp | +1 | — | — | 6 lb. |
| Chain Coif | 20 gp | +1 | — | — | 6 lb. |
| Splinted Leather Cuisses | 60 gp | +1 | — | — | 5 lb. |
| Plate | 1,500 gp | +8 | Str 15 | Disadvantage | 65 lb. |
| Padded | 5 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Plate Cuirass | 500 gp | +3 | — | — | 20 lb. |
| Plate Cuisses | 245 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Plate Greaves | 300 gp | +1 | — | — | 8 lb. |
| Plate Gauntlets | 150 gp | +1 | — | — | 4 lb. |
| Plate Pauldrons | 300 gp | +1 | — | — | 17 lb. |
Armor Terms
A few terms to help clarify the various component pieces of various suits of armor.
Types
Chain. Usually chain mail, small metal rings linked together to form a mesh, from which various other pieces of armor are constructed.
Gambeson. Layered cloth armor that is most often used as a layer under metal armors, but still remarkably effective in its own right.
Leather, boiled. Large pieces of leather boiled in a bath of salt, wine, oil, or other mixtures to create a hardened product for making armor. Usually the base of any other armor that uses leather.
Leather, lamellar. Small pieces of leather that are layered like scales to create a solid piece. Oftentimes it is attached atop a gambeson.
Padded. RPG term for a gambeson.
Plate. Solid metal pieces smithed to contour over the human body. It is rounded or domed to deflect weapons and missiles.
Ring. Metal rings affixed to leather armor.
Splint. Long hard strips, usually metal, affixed to leather armor.
Arms and Shoulders
Gauntlet. Armor, made from a variety of materials, that is designed to protect the hands and sometimes extending up the forearm.
Pauldron. Armor designed to cover and protect the shoulders.
Head
Coif. Hood, usually of chain mail, designed to protect the head. It can extend under the chin to cover the throat and may even extend over the shoulders.
Legs
Cuisses. Curved plates designed to protect the upper leg, usually formed around the thighs. Also, see Tassets.
Greave. Armor that is designed to protect the leg, it extends from the ankle up to the knee or thigh. One greave for each leg.
Torso
Cuirass. One or more plates designed to protect the torso. A cuirass can cover the front of the torso or the front and back if constructed with a front plate and back plate.
Haubergeon. Chain shirt of armor that does not have full sleeves and may not extend too far beyond the waist.
Hauberk. Chair shirt of armor with full sleeves and extends to at least mid-thigh.
Art
- Artwork is vector art on Pixabay