Prior to 4e, AC didn't scale with level.  This created problems in which attack bonuses rapidly increased while armor bonus plodded along.  This had the unique effect of increasing your chances of hitting an equal-level opponent the higher you went.  Whether this is a good thing is up for debate.  In some ways, I feel that it was, but it also presented problems for the system.

Tell me your thoughts.  Show your work.

Scaling everything with level = always fighting orcs.

It used to be, level made you better by a) making you better to hit and d) making you able to absorb more damage. While b) you ability to not be hit and c) you ability to actually deal damage where fixed. So you had tow things staying still, and two things raising with level, and they where asymmetrical, which was interesting, but arguably hard to balance.

Then it moved to all four increasing with level, which is less interesting and somewhat redundant. If a) ability to hit and b) ability to to damage both increase, why not combine a and b into one new stat. The same with c) AC and d) Hit points.

Indeed, if there is no non-scaling with level component involved in Attack and Defence, you could just make the whole thing an opposed Level Check and be done with it.

If AC scales with level, then you might as well have a single combat bonus, to which you would add an equipment bonus to get defence and offence values.

Having AC scale at the same rate as AB means that you'll pretty much always hit a monster of similar level to you on the same roll, (sometimes referred to as being on a treadmill, or not going anywhere), which makes sense but is kind of dull. On the other hand, if you're fighting goblins, then they're going to get increasingly easy to dispatch as you go up in levels and leave them behind, which probably works well in a sandbox style game where the world doesn't level up around you.

If AC doesn't scale with level, then you'll gradually notice your attacks landing more often as your level goes up, which is nice, but you won't gain immunity to goblins (who will be a threat if there are lots of them). However, it's probably more difficult to make sense of, as HP become your major source of defence, which some people just don't like.

So, you'll have to weigh up how much abstraction you can wrap your head around against how much you like how it affects gameplay. From a purely subjective perspective, I think I preferred AC to not scale with level, (but only for D&D).

Scaling ACs and scaling DCs are things I coukd do without.

yes but not as AC more as a defense score and it depends on hit points.

When I used to fence our instructor also taught the UK olymic team. You couldn't hit him. serious you just couldn't.

He was in effect high level and I wasn't.

However you do want to avoid always fighitn orcs. The way to do this is to let PCs buy attack or defense (or some other stuff) as they progress. So when a fighter goes up a level he can add damage, attack, defense or hit points.  What that means is that at 5th level 2 fghters will not have idientical attack and defense so you avoid always fightign orcs.

Now you have to remove armour from this or it makes no sense.

Lastly if you use a 4e healing surge model where HPs are recovered quickly and you are happy with abstract combat then you cudl argue that my missed attacks were actually just minor hit point damage his dodges , the ability to do which rise in level (with hit points) are partly about him dodging and not taking damage. Now of course that fails if you add poison and a load of other stuff but  kind og works in D&D (you need hearling surges as its obvious that if I fight him again tomorrow or in 2 hours he will still be hard to hit unless i have improved as he will have had a day to recover)

It's a good idea, but you must remove bonus to AC from actual armour then, and replace it with damage reduction/something like that.

Quote from: B.T.;518197Prior to 4e, AC didn't scale with level.  This created problems in which attack bonuses rapidly increased while armor bonus plodded along. ur thoughts.  Show your work.

Armor should remain the same. It doesn't magically increase it's protection because your are a experienced fighter.

But...

It can indeed magically increase it's protection because you are now a experienced adventurer with gold at your disposal to hire a wizard to enchant said armor.

You can get a pretty hefty bonus by having armor, ring, shield, etc enchanted up to the max bonus.

so in the end you wind up with the same thing but done in a way that makes you feel like you are a character in a world rather than playing a game.

Substituting AC for a level-dependent defense score, using armor as damage absorption and using static hit points (say, Con score) is one fix I've often considered... But by the time I'm done I might as well be playing Runequest.

Nevertheless, sometimes it's easier to get a group of casual gamers to play a houseruled version of a familiar system, than it is to persuade them to try a new, unfamiliar game.

Quote from: Rincewind1;518212It's a good idea, but you must remove bonus to AC from actual armour then, and replace it with damage reduction/something like that.

Of course

Quote from: estar;518216Armor should remain the same. It doesn't magically increase it's protection because your are a experienced fighter.

But...

It can indeed magically increase it's protection because you are now a experienced adventurer with gold at your disposal to hire a wizard to enchant said armor.

Exactly. However, I would not mind a limited bonus for fighter classes to represent their experience using armor effectively. Assuming as soft cap on level of 20, a bonus of: a) +1 AC plus +1 AC every fifth level for actual fighters, and b) +1 every fifth level for fighter subclasses -- with the bonus treated the same as a DEX bonus to AC in TSR D&D (you have to be conscious and able to move to get it) -- would be okay. This type of rule might be a good idea if all/most classes can wear all types of armor.

I think scaling AC or DC by level in general does not make for the type of game I like. I want "challenges" fixed by what they are and not varying with level of the PCs).  

Side Note: I also think that scaling saving throws vs spells by the level of the caster (as WOTC D&D does) simply makes higher level spell-casters far too powerful.

Quote from: StormBringer;518198Scaling everything with level = always fighting orcs.

Repeated for truth.

Besides, what's wrong with a fighter with more experience figuring out the weaknesses in armor better? It just means equivalent-leveled fighters with equivalent armor would have to rely on other gear and situational tactics to best the other. It also means that expected passive defenses cannot muscle through a far more crafty and capable opponent.

To quote the estimable Martha Stewart, "It's a good thing."

Quote from: estar;518216Armor should remain the same. It doesn't magically increase it's protection because your are a experienced fighter.

But...

It can indeed magically increase it's protection because you are now a experienced adventurer with gold at your disposal to hire a wizard to enchant said armor.

You can get a pretty hefty bonus by having armor, ring, shield, etc enchanted up to the max bonus.

so in the end you wind up with the same thing but done in a way that makes you feel like you are a character in a world rather than playing a game.

The problem of course is that a 10th fighter wearing no armour should be harder to hit than a 1st level fighter wearing no armour.

I actually think that skill at wearing armour is another thing that is a bit ignored. If I stick an untrained guy in a suit of field plate he will be slow and cumbersome, if I stick a trained guy in it he will be much more able to move about and importantly use the armour itself to defend from blows.
Armour Use is you like is a definite skill and it varies with type. Using a studded leather bracer to deflect a sword thrust is very different from using a steel splauder to block a mace.
This is particularly relevant in Japanese armour where the suit of armour isn't as integrated or articulated so there are metal plates tied over a padded jacket with lots of gaps. The skill is to block the sword with the metal bit.

However.... that is as has been said a game of a different colour.

You could build a D&D mod with increasing defence score with level, armour that absorbs damage and which you need to spend proficiency slots on to master (and avoid penalties). My heartbreaker works in precisely this way with levelling giving you the option to buy stuff from a menu which includes attach, defence , hitpoints and skills. But its not really D&D anymore at that point.

Quote from: Opaopajr;518224Repeated for truth.

Besides, what's wrong with a fighter with more experience figuring out the weaknesses in armor better? It just means equivalent-leveled fighters with equivalent armor would have to rely on other gear and situational tactics to best the other. It also means that expected passive defenses cannot muscle through a far more crafty and capable opponent.

To quote the estimable Martha Stewart, "It's a good thing."

But it also means that in a unarmoured fencing match a 1st level fighter has as much chance of landing a blow on a 10th level fighter as he does an untrained 3 year old..... just saying.

Imagine a DnD training hall. The 10th level PC is ther and he gets challenged by a newbie. first to score a touch wins. Initiative the newbie wins. He now has a 50% chance of scoring the first touch, now if he misses the 10th level guy will probably win as he has to get a 5 to hit AC 10 but the point is that in anything that resembles, genre, real life, immersion or commone sense the 10th level guy should scor ehte point every time (well maybe 99 times in 100)

Quote from: jibbajibba;518225The problem of course is that a 10th fighter wearing no armour should be harder to hit than a 1st level fighter wearing no armour.

As you said though, to pursue this is to pursue a game different from AD&D. Because AD&D already abstracts this out into Hit Point increases per level. In this way damage from a lower leveled character isn't as much of a threat to the HP bloat a veteran has to work with.

(And well, there's also weapon skill as AC modifiers, but then we're talking 2e weapon styles in the Fighter's Handbook and the like.)

It's already there, just not expressed in a way everyone enjoys.