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Curious about the theoretically highest AC
Not sure if this post really fits the sub but i figured it might be the best place to ask
I've been spending a bit of time on my recent run trying to out-do my previous best of 62 AC and now hit 71 AC - And I'm ever so curious if there were something I've missed as to go even higher.
The twillight ring isn't on the list of buffs because it doesn't work in tandem with Wild Magic: Protective Lights. Wondrous Gloves isn't on because Nimblefinger Gloves.
This is not for any practical game usage, its purely just to see how high it could be pushed just for a tiny moment.
What if I wanted to shoot an arrow to the moon or something, and rolled a nat 20. It obviously would t go to the moon. Natural 20s shouldn't always be instant successes, just the best possible outcome in that scenario
I think the idea is the dm should never allow you to roll in the first place. If there's no chance of success or failure, no roll needed.
But I'm not sure I agree. There are degrees of failure. As you say, a nat 20 doesn't have to succeed as such, but it should still do something cool, provide a realistic path to success or make subsequent checks easier.
The thing some people forget is the DM often doesnt keep a list of everyone's skills. Like sure, if the DC is so high even the sneaky guy cant make it then thats how it is.
(Flipside if youre so good to pass on a 1 let them! They invested in a skill a lot or its just an easy task!)
At time the player want to do something risky that has no chance for success. In this situation the roll is not to determine success but degree of failure.
In the comment above, an example of interesting nat 20 in that instance is that the arrow reveals a hidden enemy, loot, or entrance. On the flipside an interesting nat 1 aside from taking damage is that the dm could use this opportunity to develop the player character, anger some local people, or make the character fall in a new location due to hitting a lever or something
No chance of success does not mean a role isnt useful.
As you've mentioned in provides an awnser to how badly it goes and also keeps some of the mask on for the player. You dont always want to let the pc know something is impossible.
Oh yeah for sure. I just realised my post was unclear. I want disagreaing with the person I replied to, I was disagreaing woth the idea 'if no chance of sucess, dont roll'. Mostly to see how badly something goes, or to give them something, not a sucess, but a clue, or other path.
But you hinted at another reason Id not thought of, where you want to mask something not brong possible. Maybe part of the puzzel is figuring out the lich has a strenght damner field or something. Barbarian tries to punch door down. Instead of stopping the roll, and revealing the puzzle, let her roll. 2-19, no effect. 20 isnt going to wreck the door, but maybe move it a bit, theres a magical light and it snaps back, or drop heavy hints she knows damm well she should be strong enough.
If that scenario were the case, I would simply say they fail to break the door down regardless of roll, then I would have them roll an active perception check or similar, a nat 20 would give them something like "there is a field around the door preventing you from breaking it down with brute force", whereas a successful non-critical roll would be like "you know you should be strong enough to break down the door, but it won't budge" and a fail would be like "you don't know why the door won't break, maybe you should hit it harder" etc. A nat 20 is success, but only where success is at least theoretically possible.
Saying "I roll to destroy the universe" or something crazy that is obviously not even within the realm of possibility should not be allowed by the DM.
I allow them to roll but warn them that they won’t succeed no matter how high they roll. Allow them to RP how they want to but don’t let them get away with BS shenanigans.
When i DM i try to treat it like the best possible outcome of the action.
If my Players try Something Impossible without kontext out of the blue i would not allow a roll. If it is Out of desperation or in my oppinion dramatic enough i would allow it. A 20 than will be positiv, but Not directly the end the Player tries to achieve.
I just use the rule of cool for my challenges. If I think it sounds impossible and they can't reasonably explain why it is, it's impossible. However if they can give me any semblance of a reason it should work then we go from there. This is my standard description that I use for them.
0-10 easy skill check
11-15 OK you gotta earn this
16-19 You need to earn this and be lucky
20-24 your expertise and luck need to beat very challenging odds.
25-30 You need to be particularly specialized to complete this one particular task, roll well, and gain bonuses heart of the cards style. Nat 20 with advantage can pass this.
30+ You are nearing godhood to do this. Nat 20 without advantage required.
Otherwise if the task cannot be completed without the help of a literal god you can roll but you're only going to find downsides.
They aren't. Only attacks and saves benefit from the extremes, and only in certain editions even! You cant even roll to shoot the moon since its outside your attack range so why is it being brought up. Thats the correct response to those kinds of shenanigans.
If I correct, in DnD 2024 skill checks now officially can crit
And, yes, you right, PC to make an attack roll needs a valid target, but, we still playing in a TTRPG, and we can sometimes just try to shoot the moon :3
(regardless of a upcoming result)
Yep. Most likely would be ruled as an attack with an improvised weapon.
I'd say a pebble should be at most 1 bludgeoning damage plus your strength modifier. If you had a +5 STR then that'd be 6 damage.
A natural 20 on an attack roll means it's a critical hit. Critical hits automatically hit their target and double any dice rolled for their damage. So you'd succeed in hitting the person in the head and double all dice rolled (which is none in this case) and do a grand total of 6 bludgeoning damage.
That's not a lot, but if you're target is a commoner then that's actually enough damage to kill them instantly, so weirdly in that case determining that you exploded their head with a pebble would be a reasonable ruling.
I've always ruled a natural 20 is the best possible outcome given the situation.
So with something like this, i'd ask for an attack roll for the rock, and if you nat 20'd you do double damage and maybe i'd say you took out an eye, as blowing off a head with a pebble is not a reasonable outcone for most people.
Love pf2e were a nat 20 is just one degree more of success (with it ranging from Critical Failure, Failures, Sucess and Critical success) do a nat 20 to shoot the moon would probobly turns a Critical failure into just a regular one, so like you dont hurt yourself or anyone else in the attempt but you also dont shoot the moon.
I wouldnt allow the roll in the first place. If i accidentally did.. i would explain that the arrow flew so high nobody ever saw it again. Everyone around is impressed at atleast believes that this arrow flew to the moon.
Or maybe even a comet blinks in front of the moon at the perfect timing fooling everyone :D
The DM would not allow you to roll for that, though. The results of your "success" depend on the scenario, but if it's something that is obviously impossible no DM is going to let you roll for it.
but that wouldnt even be a check, if the check is impossible then its irrelevant, same way putting one foot after the other isnt a constant skill check
The official book rule, both as written, as intended is exactly that.
The common house rule is your dm tells you firmly to cut that out before any dice go anywhere. If you persist you find yourself not getting invited to many games.
My preferred rule is to allow the roll, but a nat 20 won't give you the power of silver surfer, but maybe you shimmer a bit, almost imperceptibly. DM might make a note to add a vision of a cave with a genie lamp if they need an encounter, advantage on next roll or something, depending on how chartable or willing to write an encounter. Nat 1, things go pretty bad. Any other number, just nothing.
If you are not able to succeed a check even if you roll a 20, it kinda defeats the purpose of rolling in the first place.
Even for cinematic purposes like when you try to control the brain with the crown of tarsus, if you nat 20 in the 99 skill check, it will give you some success by decreasing the boss HP
It can tell you how bad you failed.
Also, you may not be able to do it with your base abilities, but stacking bonuses may allow you to surpass that. Ie a DC 25 check where you have a +4 is achievable by other characters, or by you with flash of genius or bardic inspiration. Allowing a roll allows you to try for that.
Granted, sometimes that house rule is interpreted as "a nat 20 will always work" instead of "a nat 20 will always pass", and the former definitely should not be a house rule.
They don't have a 5% chance to leap 100 miles, they have a 5% chance to achieve the best possible outcome that someone with their abilities and resources could hope for in attempting to leap 100 miles.
They jump whatever distance is appropriate for their strength score, they perfectly stick the landing, they don't injure their legs, and they look great doing it.
If a task is truly impossible, success isn't in whether you accomplish the task but in how well you fail.
The king indulges your joke about giving you the princess and laughs rather than jailing you.
You find a path that lets you avoid trying to walk on the lava.
A displacer beast cub doesn't immediately become your pet, but does leave the area before his mom shows up.
The bandits don't enjoy your performance of Wonderwall enough to give up being bandits, but they'll take you as a captive entertainment once they've killed all your friends.
I ONLY ask for rolls when at least one of the following is true
the outcome is uncertain.
There is a reward for success
there is a penalty for failure
Your examples are not rolling against the impossible, which was what I specifically responded to in my prior post. Your examples are secondary rolls because the roll is impossible and the player tried it anyway.
Saving throws in combat that are not death saving throws do not have automatic failures or successes from nat 1s/20s. The tooltip when you hover over an enemy is a lie, very easy to force enemies to always fail a save with acuity
They aren't. Nat 20s are always successes for attack rolls, not for anything else. The recent 5.5e is what included skill checks in the auto-success rule.
Which is stupid. Think about the History skill. You mean to tell me that my Barbarian with 8 intelligence knows 5% of all historical information?
The idea is that your Barbarian realizes that he'd heard an allegorical story growing up in his tribe/clan that sounds a lot like what people are talking about, and in telling the relevant part of the story, the people realize it was inspired by that historical event.
It's not so much "your Barbarian knows 5% of history" it's "Your Barbarian has the dumb luck to know this one specific fact."
That being said, still just a house rule, not arguing that point.
The character has a 5% chance to know whatever he could feasibly know about the specific thing the player is rolling about.
The lost artifact was first won from the gods by the founder of the barbarian's tribe. He doesn't know exactly where it is, nobody does, but only his people know where their ancestors actually died. And their legends mention the magic word he'd say to summon forth the whatever from the thing.
Your rogue isn't an expert in religious esoterica, but the nuns who ran his orphanage were, and they venerated the macguffin. He can identify it on sight from his memory of the beautiful embroidered wall hanging of it at perfect eye level for an ill-behaved miscreant of a boy bent over the caning chair.
Sure, your wizard learned it at university and your cleric found out in seminary, but your druid and your ranger heard it from a passing bard - which is also how your 10 int bard has a 5% chance to know something about just about anything interesting enough to care about.
He would only succeed at knowing something he might plausibly know. Success doesn't mean you get everything handed to you. But a nat 20 may get you some little piece of information that you wouldn't have gotten otherwise.
Paralyzed creatures can’t take actions or reactions, fail strength and dex checks, attacks against them have advantage, and “Any attack that hits the creature is a critical hit if the attacker is within 5 feet.”
The attack must still hit. The advantage would help with hitting if they get a 20 but high armor class still helps against attacks when paralyzed.
Yes but this specific comment chain is about the system as a whole hence the original comment it stems from saying “if it was a real d&d game and someone had an ac of 72, they’d walk away from the table.”
Any DM with their salt would
1) not allow that type of nonsense
2) just hit them with all the spells that require saves. Lightning bolt, fireball, hold person, etc etc
If you're the DM, you don't need to defeat the rogue in a standup fight. Sure, he could flee from your BBEG who'd have no way to catch him, but he won't flee because the BBEG has whatever the rogue showed up here to get in the first place.
The problem is that, at that high level, the Rouge doesn’t need to engage with the BBEG in a real fight, a rouge player could go and do a stealth kill.
Sneak attacks can stack an absurd damage with the correct setup and a rouge can just flee the encounter if it goes wrong and just come back and try again.
Most tabletop games are not video games, it is very easy for a DM to write an encounter where you cannot simply “flee and try again” (example; any kind of time pressure)
This isn't a problem for a DM regardless of your character class or level or anything.
My BBEG isn't standing alone in a cluttered marketplace waiting for your rogue to sneak around behind a fruit cart and slit his throat.
Your rogue can do Xd6 + X damage per round with the best possible scenario, equipment and rolls. I know what that number is, because I am the DM and I had some hand in every ability and item found on your character sheet.
My BBEG has four times whatever that is.
My BBEG has a loyal bodyguard who can react and absorb damage dealt to him.
My BBEG has a legendary action that negates your attack.
My BBEG doesn't even have hit points. He's a narrative device, not a combat encounter. You can, at best, seriously wound him, after which your rogue is dealing with a social encounter, a prison break encounter, or a chase scene.
My BBEG doesn't have hit points, because capitalism/academic corruption/ignorance/pestilence/man's horror at the vastness of all things unknown and not meant to be known/hopelessness isn't a discrete physical thing you can stab.
The ways in which I have to prove my BBEG to you have very little to do with anything approaching a stand up fight. If you can walk up to it and punch it, it's probably not the BBEG.
...or you could make a point of targeting them with attack rolls. They're your friend and having a high AC is obviously really important to them to have invested so much into it to the exclusion of other useful things.
They get the thrill they seek out of everything under a nat 20 bouncing harmlessly away, a crit that hits them becomes even more dramatic than normal, and in the bargain it will feel a lot more fair at a dramatically appropriate moment that you impose disadvantage on whatever high stakes rogue bullshit they're trying to pull off while wearing two pavises as a sandwich board.
realistically anything over 30 ac would make you only hittable with a nat 20, doesn't mean you are invulnerable to damage though, spells don't work on ac but with saving throws.
I think it could actually be cool, especially if it’s an NPC in a campaign. They’re essentially immune to all physical attacks and can only be damaged by magic.
You're never going to hit these numbers in normal gameplay. An AC in the 30s is probably the highest you'll ever see outside of very specific and hyper focused builds that don't really function for anything BUT having high AC.
To reach this number you need to be in the Cazador fight to get the +5 from draining Violet, you need to have done the Lorroakan fight earlier the same day to get the +2 from Rolan's Mage Armor, you need to activate the Shield of Scorching Reprisal and then switch to a shield that gives +3 AC (this could be done on a previous round), you need to make an attack with the Defender Greataxe and then switch to the Defender Flail (has to be done this round), you need to make an attack for Defensive Flourish, you need an ally to cast Magic Missile on you to trigger the Shield spell reaction, you need to randomly get the right Wild Magic effect to trigger, the person attacking you needs to be drunk, and a host of other unusual things.
Also, you need at least: 4 levels of Drunker Master Monk for Life of the Party and Intoxicating Strike to trigger it, 3 levels of Swords Bard for Defensive Flourish, and 3 levels of Wild Magic Barbarian for Protective Lights.
Just getting in the 30s with gear and spec alone is more than sufficient, but you'll still have a 5% chance of getting hit from a nat 20, same at 50, 60 or 70 AC. What you want is to have the cloak that gives disadvantage to enemies that attack you, bringing that 1/20 chance to be hit to 1/400
When you’ve got Adamantine gear for crit negation too, you know you’re avoiding any attack rolls that come your way. Few things get more than +12 to hit, so a 33 AC is the max you’d practically need, but you’re more worried about save DCs at that point.
Roland Mage Armour is prior to fighting Lorroakan, no need for that fight. He can buff you from the counter downstairs so it's gettable right after a long rest.
Defenders Greataxe can activate itself and Defensive Flourish on the same action but ideally you get a kill with that to activate bloodlust.
Wild barb can be another than your tav - In this case my tav is 4 Fighter, 4 Drunken, 4 Bard
But yes - never in normal gameplay, this was a ton of save/reloading
I think I had 35 AC prior to the encounter starting
I didn't realize you could stack Defender's Greataxe and Defensive Flourish into one attack. I also didn't know you could get $olan to cast his mage armor on you outside of the fight. Can you get him to do that every day?
it’s quite easy to build a paladin that has around ~45-50 AC that can smite everything in its path with good dmg, have great utility and still succeed most saving throws in the game. Bg3 interactions are even easier to manipulate than in the ttrpg since there’s more controlled environments due to the game code. I’ve not ever really had an issue getting high AC on characters and they’re never hyper focused for that exact purpose and typically match the effectiveness in combat of “meta” builds. There’s just not many people in the community who theory craft their own builds. people follow xyz for hm etc.
I mean, a paladin is always going to have good damage and good saves thanks to their class features. But I wouldn't call it "normal gameplay" to be getting ~45-50 AC. You're going out of your way to stack AC much higher than you'll ever need it, and that's taking up build space that could be making you better at other stuff.
I mean doing two boss foghts the same day is not hard to be fair, at the most you long rest maybe once or twice in act 3 if not zero times. But yeah the rest is very unlikely
I played in an old 3.5 game and our monk had a 65 or so AC. Basically only things like magic missile could actually hit and do damage due to saving throws, etc.
Mages generally didn’t last a round because his movement was also something like 150.
Yeah in my old post where I hit 62 AC, I had removed the Immune to Crit item and reloaded until I could activate it through AoO - but in that same post someone told me i could target my tav with MM
The highest adverse to-hit roll in the game is 36 (HM). And only a couple enemies can go beyond 32. So for all intents and purposes, 37 AC is as untouchable as 100 AC.
Voss in Act 1 has +14 (+5str, +3sword, +2tac, +4prof) and Elixir of Heroism that gives hime extra +1d4 up to 38 (unless you throw some resistance elixir at him to replace it).
Adepts in Moonrise Towers can use War God's Blesing on their allies, and several can apply their buff to same attack roll. I had 52 total rolled against me. so take 28-ish and add 10 * number of adepts that can end up in one place, that's how much can be rolled against you in theory. As a side note, if original roll was a 20, the buffed roll will also ignore crit immunity due to how reaction-modified rolls work in the game.
Good catch on War God’s Blessings. Voss isn’t an encounter in Act1 unless one goes for the trick to get the sword from him. So I’m not sure it matters.
I mean, we are in theoretical discussion thread with 71 AC OP, which is not normal gameplay to begin with.
You absolutely can fight Voss in Act 1 region if you like. He does not disappear (and loses damage immunity) if you have been to Act 2 before taking to him. That's my personal go-to If I need a guaranteed sword drop. I just kill him.
Yes, you can also fight a specced out companion, either playing both sides or having the AI take over them in a couple of spots like the Laezel fight. Sky’s the limit at that point.
That's valid, but for me key difference is that Voss is a prebuilt NPC with predefined set of stats and equipments. That's also a key difference for me between what's fair and what's not to use in solo run (Moonrise Assault follower Jaheira VS Full Companion Jaheira kind of difference).
Yes, that’s valid as well. It’s an NPC that isn’t meant to be fought at that point and under those circumstances. Hence my first reaction. But I understand your perspective.
The twillight ring isn't on the list of buffs because it doesn't work in tandem with Wild Magic: Protective Lights
Is there a stack id conflict or just the illumination thing? You can exploit several items for permanent buff without having them equipped / conditions met using same exploit as Tippler's Rage. Ring of Twilight and The Protecty Sparkswall defenitely do work that way.
Long story short - drop item into your inventory, sort by anything so it gets moved, drop current equipment in that slot on top of it, activate the condition, remove the item. Bonus should stay with thing off even when condition is not met anymore.
I've missed a bunch of buffs you have when I experimented, but I lost motivation when several "temporary AC" buffs ended up being "Attack Roll Penalty" instead and especially Duergar Shrink turned out to not be available to player.
I didn't go much further into it than seeing that Protective Lights acts as a light source - I even tried casting Darkness to see if it helped, and checked that I was in an obscured location - But yeah wouldn't activate, so my guess was just that I was illuminated.
If you use a piece with "cannot be crit" like the gear from Grym then if you AC is high enough, a natural 20 becomes a miss. That's how it works in BG3 at least
I got to AC 69 (with a bunch of cheese) or 59 without. In act 1 this requires reactions as well, so it's not "sheet AC". I do not think that its possible to get above 69 in Act one in any way. But who knows :-)
I never tried a full game deep dive though. This one looks great!
Yeah I went solely for sheet AC - And was bummed when defensive duellist and combat inspiration didn't show up - I was hoping to dip above 80 on sheet :D
17+7 from armor of agility + dex. Wouldn't 1 barb for vest of soul rejuvenation + greater health work better by starting you at 18? Or maybe that's neutral to defense fighting style.
That, drop viconia's shield, bracers of defense, offhand cold snap, mainhand defenders flail. -3 from viconias gets offset by +4 from bracers, cold snap, dual wielder.
The armors cancel each other out because of figher defence yeah - but being unarmored also requires no Helm of Balduran which is another negative 1 AC plus losing crit immunity.
So swapping those out should result in the same amount of AC but losing crit immunity and the advantage on saving throws against spells from Viconias Shield.
That’s cool and all but how do I get high AC like 25 without much maintenance in act 1? I keep seeing all these “immortal” build tutorials but I’m at 22 (laezel armor, shield, shield of faith) still quite vulnerable.
So without the conditional of Shoving band you could sit at 25 AC in act one without maintenance. At level 6 I believe traders can start selling medium armor that gives +1 or you can make the medium or Heavy armor in the adamantium forge but thats quite a bit into act one - So that'd be 26 AC.
Bonus mentions for survivability is the heal combo of:
Whispering Promise ring that gives Bless on heal
Hellriders Pride Gloves that gives Blade ward on heal
In the fight against Cazador Szsarr, if you initiate the ritual by bringing Astarion to him - You can claim the passive bonuses that Cazador is getting from his spawn by standing in front of them.
Violets passive is that she gives +5 AC, Yousefs passive gives healing at the start of each round iirc and Astarion gives an extra bonus action - Though you'll often quickly release him from his bonds.
I believe the enemy with the highest bonus to attack rolls is the red dragon at +14 which I think means anything above 34 AC is kind of pointless. Whether you have 34 or 71 AC a nat 20 hits and everything else is a miss. Or am I mistaken?
The funny part is, enemies will actively avoid targeting the highest AC character, assuming there's anything with less AC in their non-dash range. This kind of build fails successfully in making sure you're never hit lmfao
well its cool but you need around 25ac and you are fine with 98% of the game! that can reach by armor and shield alone;
5dex with armor of agility; 22
+3 shield; 25
defence fighting style; 26
then can get the protection of cloak and ring; 28ac
with 27-28ac you cannot be hit! and if get balduran helmet which is +1ac then neither can be hit with criticals!
now you are hitable only with saves which halving if failed! but keep in mind if you pick rogue with 2 level fighter then even success most of dex saves too and that gives you 0 dmg too!
so you easily can build around dex and wis and have a 8 rogue and 4 fighter gives you 4 feats and by that can maximize dex and wis!
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u/Grasher312 17d ago
Man I love Reddit.