Best Possible AC

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There was a debate about this started in the ToB thread, and because of a lot of spells and such, there was some debate about what was the best possible AC. That got me to thinking about the same question for BG1. Fortunately, I think we can give an exact answer to this question. I've done some thinking, and I think I've come up with a best AC of -13. This is attainable by any race, but only by classes of fighters (and only good aligned fighters), paladins and rangers.

Here's the rules I used: I assumed that you didn't use any cheat program to raise your dexterity to 25 to give you a better AC. I'm assuming you rolled a standard character, and played through the game once. You are allowed to use the book that raises your dexterity a point, but you're not allowed to console a whole bunch of those books in. Also, we're using standard BG1 rules that says you can't use both magical armor and a magical ring/amulet/robe, or use more than one ring/amulet/robe in combination with each other.

OK, here's what I came up with for equipment, and it's pretty non-negotiable, also with location provided).

Armor: Full Plate Mail (merchant or bandit camp)
Helm: Balduran's (Helm and Cloak)
Shield: +2 Medium Shield (Lower Levels of Durlag's Tower)
Ring Slot #1: +2 Ring of Protection (Razamith)
Ring Slot #2: Claw of Kazaroth (Purchased from High Hedge)
Cloak: Balduran's Cloak (Undercellars)
Weapon: Drizzit's Scimitar (both +3 weapons, but you're specifically looking for the one that grants the bonus of 2 AC.
Minimum Dexterity of 18. (You can legally get your dexterity as high as 20 if you play a halfling or an elf, but regardless of whether your dexterity is 18, 19 or 20, it's a bonus of 4 to AC. Anything beyond 18 only helps your to hit roll with missile weapons, and adds to thief skills.)

That uses up everything except the amulet slot. Unfortunately, the only amulet I could find that gave a bonus to AC was a +1 Amulet of Protection, but that is not allowed, as we are already using a +2 Ring of Protection. If you add up everything that should come out to -13. Am I missing anything here?

 

Would the shield amulet help with AC? Does it work with armor or a shield? I never used it and don't know, but it gives a base AC4.

 

if you used the cloak of the shield and the cloak of balduran you might gain a point of ac, maby.

 

According to the item description the shield amulet stacks with AC bonuses from dexterity bonuses, shields, ring/cloak/amulet of protection, and any other nifty add-ons like Balduran's Helm and Cloak. However, it DOES NOT stack with armor. Therefore, because Full Plate Mail has an AC better than 4, you couldn't get lower going this route. However, the shield amulet is an excellent way to signifcantly lower the AC of say, a F/M multi-class.

Except for the small problem that you only have one cloak slot. You can't equip the cloak of shield and the cloak of Balduran simultaneously, as they use the same slot on the paper doll.

 

Does the Shield Amulet stack with Bracers? I'm not sure if bracers are considered armor. The Bracer AC6 would take it down to AC0 -- with Blur that would be -3AC. Combine all the other equipment you have (sans full plate) and you could get -17AC -- perhaps only -16 if a F/M could not use the helm.

For that matter, you could use spirit armor in place of the full plate to give the -13AC -- add blur to that for -16AC. I don't know if the shield amulet will stack.

I did get Imoen down to -17AC versus missiles -- her spells were never interupted.

 

I've got Ajantis down to -20 AC vs. missiles. Basilisks and ankhegs become orange cake.

Thrasher

 

Isn't the Drizzt sword that grants an AC bonus the one you can NOT pickpocket from him? IOW, you'd have to kill the drow, right?

Since t2Bruno is adding in spells, Protection from Evil stacks, so it's really unlimited how low you can get your AC. Without abusing the game engine, Blur, Prot. from Evil (one time) both add to your AC, and there might be more spells (I can't think of any right now).

Without killing Drizzt, and without spells, a -11 is still an awesome AC.

 

Well, technically by the 2E rules the max should have been -10 no matter what. And since this is forgotten Realms, it is expanded to a max of -12. The fact that the game does not CAP the max AC is a fault in the 2E rules used

Planescape torment did it right, and caps AC at -10.

 

A potion of Defense or Invulnerability gives you a base AC of 0 instead of the 1 offered by full plate armor.

 

Yes, yes, yes. I understand that there a means of lowering your defense even further by use of spells and potions. However, potions are in limited supply, and unless you feel like resting after every few battles the use of spells to lower your AC (especially in BG1 where your spells are very limited in number) is also not a practical tactic.

When I say lowest possible AC, I'm talking about just normal, constant, walking around AC. Or if you prefer, pre-buffed AC. The AC that you will have for most battles other than the ones you expect to be exceptionally difficult so that you pre-buff ahead of time.

 

You can improve your AC vs special weapons further by wearing a belt like the girdle of bluntness (+4 AC bonus)

Lower AC than -13 is useless unless the attacker has a thac0 lower than 6 .

Are there any monsters with lower thac0 than 6 in BG1 ?

 

Yes, but the Girdle of Bluntness, Girdle of Piercing, Golden Girdle, etc. do not give an AC bonus to everything. They give bonuses to specific weapon types (like only piercing, only blunt weapons, only slashing weapons, etc. You'd need to wear all three of them to effectively get your armor class lowered against everything.

Sarevok may have a THAC0 under 6. He's a decently high level fighter, he has a magical sword, (the +2 sword you find at the beginning of SoA was said to be Sarevok's) and probably has proficiency points spent in large swords. It's got to be close to 6 anyway. What about the demon that the cult spawns from the dagger in Durlag's Tower? Imagine his THAC0 is pretty darn low too, although his THAC0 is actually the least of your worries.

EDIT: Let's assume that Sarevok is level 8 (that's the max level a regular fighter can get as a PC, so I feel safe in assuming Sarevok is at least level 8.

That's a base THAC0 of 12. His strength is 18/00 which is +3, so we're down to 9. He has at least a +2 weapon, so it's 7, and he probably has 4 or 5 points spent in 2 handed weapons, which brings it down to 5. And that's conservative estimates on everything.

Also Drizzit absolutely HAS to have a THAC0 lower than 6. I mean even without strength bonuses and everything, isn't he something like a 20th level ranger? With a +5 weapon?

 

Actually, um, not quite. Full Plate, for example, already has -4 against slashing and -3 against piercing and missile, and when combined with the Girdle of Bluntness, the effective AC plummets 3 points. When you've got AC 1 with -4 to slashing and crushing, and -3 to piercing and missile, it's effectively the same as AC -2 with just -1 to slashing and crushing. But it does take lowering all three categories with armor and belt combined.

EDIT:

No, that'd be a THAC0 of 13. But regardless, TotSC's harder Sarevok is a 15th level "Sarevok" with a THAC0 of 2. Combined with the bonuses he has (strength, prof, weapon), he should be attacking at THAC0 -9 three times a round.

Drizzt is even weirder, since he's classified as a 16th level "Innocent" (that's actually his class) with a THAC0 of 0 and 10 attacks a round, with only 13 STR. With bonuses, he gets down to THAC0 -6.

[ February 01, 2006, 21:50: Message edited by: Felinoid ]

 

The full plate also gives extra protection vs several weapon types. Large shields also grant +1 vs. missiles.
So the girdle of bluntness might improve the worst AC (vs crushing) and improve the AC vs everything.

Sarevok uses a slashing weapon. So he'll still need a critical unless his thac0 is better than 2.

If we knew the hard monsters' exact thac0 we could decide which girdle would be the most useful one or if such an AC is needed at all.

Does anyone know the exact thac0 values from the big baddies ?

 

Sarevok can hit you on his better rolls through ac-10. I'm not sure about -13. The Demon Knight and the which ever kind of demon it is that the cult summons up in the basement both can and regularly will pound you hard and often through -10 AC so I'm guessing their Thac0 is lower than 6. They don't miss too much of the time.

 

I ALWAYS do that. I take the fighter's level and subtract it from 20 to get the base THAC0, which is, of course, wrong. I forget that when you're THAC0 is 20, you're already level 1, that you don't "earn" that level. Your THAC0 is of course your fighter level minus 1 and subtract that from 20.

 

Actually, I usually just subtract the level from 21 (blackjack! ); it's a bit simpler and works the same.

Okay, let's get some demon THAC0s:

Aec'Letec has THAC03 with 4 attacks per round. Add in 20 STR and 5* in everything (and a mediocre 1d10 claw), and you get THAC0 -3 and 5 attacks per round. Not as good as I would have expected.

The Demon Knight has THAC06 and 9 attacks per round. Add in 18/00STR and Sarevok's sword (re-use is important ) with grandmatery, and you get THAC0 -5 and 10 attacks per round.

 

That IS surprising. Especially since I don't typically have too much problems with the Demon Knight, but Ace'Letec tpically applies a serious butt-whipping on my party. All things considered, Ace shouldn't be that bad, if the numbers are right. A 20 in strength is +8 to damage, so his hits are for 9-18 apiece. I high level fighter should be able to absorb several of them without having to worry much, espcially if you have a fighter with the very attainable AC of -11 or so, he may actually miss a couple of times each round.

 

Plus the 5* puts it up to 14-23. Still not terribly much when compared to others, but Aec's real danger comes from his demonic "death gaze". Not to mention that you can't just focus on Aec'Letec (his disciples), while you can just give the Demon Knight a proper whooping.