I made a Dwarf Fighter4/Barbarian x for soloing purposes. When I got fighter levels and heavy armour proficiency I started to wear half plate armour. It seemed that his extra speed was lost. Can't be truly sure, since I was solo.

I have since given my character Chainmail +1 since the total Dex and armour bonuses are higher than half plate. I like that point in 3E rules. However, I can't really tell if he "speeded up" again.

I am imagining a barbarian with the regular speed factor, Dash feat and speed boots eventually. If it is all ruined by heavy armour then I will go for a really magical chain mail of some sort.

Is the speed factor of barbarians and monks lost if they wear chunky heavy armour? Has anyone tested this?

Thanks.


[Please don't put periods in titles except in special occasions like describing a file.] - Ex

[ November 06, 2002, 22:36: Message edited by: Extremist ]

Barbarians loose their bonus to speed whe they wear any armour heavier than light. I think monks loose it if they were any armour at all.

Even chainmail? Crying...

I doubt that, my barbarian - up to lvl-11 I made him use chain - was always a good deal faster than the rest of my party. I think the loss of speed in heavy armor may perhaps ... result from the fact that a barb isn't proficient with them? Just a guess ... :)
Now that I gave my barb his four fighter levels I don't feel he's slower but that's difficult to say since my two other frontliners now wear boots of speed :D

In D+D 3rd ed. all armors have a max. speed you can move while wearing them. Leather has the highest, down to full plate. And certain character classes lose special abilities when wearing heavy armors. Monks lose wisodm bonuses to AC, Rangers lose ambidesterity and 2 weapon fighting, and I believe Barbarians lose their increased speed .

In my first party I had a half-orc barb with 4 levels of fighter. He was packing heavy armor the whole game and he could still make use of his barb speed bonus. Both him and the monk in that party were flying compared to my other characters by chapter 2, and they only got faster.

Anyway, he wore the chain +1 you can buy in Targos until he got the 1/4 weight full plate from Oswald. Later when I picked up the Duergar mail from Barud at the outpost he used that... None of the armors seemed to affect his movement.

Grey Ghost,

massive sigh of relief!

I thought that I had wasted my time on a barbarian.