Heavy armor

[micdy]

How can i get heavy armor proficiancy on a bard primary class.
Is there a race that give it to me?
Thanks.

[Ghost]

You'll have to take a feat for that. None of the races give it, and you don't get it from multiclassing.

[MeldinX2]

You could start out as a Fighter or something that have heavy armor and then take Bard later.

[Luck Be A Lady]

Originally posted by micdy:

How can i get heavy armor proficiancy on a bard primary class.
Is there a race that give it to me?
Thanks.

You take a level one in dip in paladin or fighter. or a level two dip in Ranger with the knight background or (don't do this last one) cleric with a heavy armor subclass before multi classing to bard for rest of the game. (actually cleric with heal domain isn't a bad shout)
Or you waste a feat on getting it.

[fenikshero]

A few good options:

Start as a one level into Fighter/Ranger/Paladin/War Cleric

OR

Multiclass into a War Cleric

Since War Cleric is a level 1 subclass, you get their proficiency with multiclass. (I think Life cleric also gets Heavy armor).

You could also grab a feat instead, but I think it's a worse option.

[ThePlatypus]

Important thing to note is that multiclassing INTO a Heavy armor class doesn't give you Heavy armor by default. So taking a level of Fighter as your 2nd level won't get you Heavy Armor. Your options are:

1. Spend a Feat. Worst option, don't do this.

2. Start as a Heavy armor class. Better, though there can be downsides depending on what your classes are.

3. Multiclass into a class that gets Heavy Armor as a SUBCLASS feature or an extra ability. Two examples are Ranger (picking the Ranger Knight option) and Cleric (picking a Domain that gives Heavy Armor).

For example, a Bard might consider grabbing a level of Cleric to get Heavy armor. Taking the Life domain wold also buff your healing if you want to lean into that aspect of the class, and the spell slots will stack.

Alternatively, a popular Bard build is to start as a Paladin for, say, 2 levels, then go Bard. In addition to the Heavy Armor, that also gets you Smite, some spell slots, full Martial weapons.

But at the same time, be wary of what you give up. Every level of a different class is one less level in your primary class, and this can especially be an issue with caster classes who might not get their high level spells if they multiclass too much.

Finally, roleplaying aside, Heavy Armor isn't that great. It'll get you 1 AC more than the equivalent Medium armor with corresponding DEX, and depending on how much we can pump our stats lategame, it might even get outperformed by Light armor (which has no cap on the DEX bonus). DEX also has more skills tied to it, determines Initiative (pretty important), DEX saves are quite common, and is overall a more useful stat. STR gives you more carry weight (lol) and lets you focus on weapons with better base damage, but that's about it.

[micdy]

Lots of good answers thanks
I think, i will go for multiclass with Cleric light domain for added healing power on top of heavy armor. So i will be bard lvl 11 and cleric lvl 1

[Hamlet3145]

Originally posted by micdy:

Lots of good answers thanks
I think, i will go for multiclass with Cleric light domain for added healing power on top of heavy armor. So i will be bard lvl 11 and cleric lvl 1

Light domain doesn't get heavy armor.

[Hayes]

Heavy armour isnt necessarily good.. first of for the most part if you just have a +2 dex modifier medium armour can give the same AC (heavy armour does NOT add any dex modifiers while medium adds up to +2 with more if you take a specific feat) on top of that ALL standard heavy armours have disadvantage on stealth rolls so you really should first figure out WHY you want heavy armour and if you really need it .. even light armour can get as high as AC17 if you have 20 dex

[Madmarcus OO]

One thing that probably doesn't need to be mentioned but might help a few people. If you take a 1-2 level dip in fighter, paladin, ranger (for ranger knight), or cleric (for the domains that give heavy armor) you will also give up one ASI. You get some other class features from the dip so it might still work out better than simply using the ASI for the heavy armor feat.

A 4 level multiclass would give back the ASI but with Bard that means giving up a lot of spell casting power.

[Dremall]

AC is nice for low to mid levels. Once you start hitting mid levels AC quickly becomes cosmetic as enemies will have attack bonuses that will result in their rolls easily reaching the mid twenties.

[fenikshero]

Strength is fun cause of Jump/Throw/Shove in this game.

Plus focusing on Strength instead of Dex let's you use non Finesse weapons.
Greatsword bard, if you feel like it.

[Detective Costeau]

Comedy option- Dwarf or Gith bards start with medium armor proficiency, so you'd only need 1 feat for heavy armor at level 4.
I wonder what a Gith bard sounds like?
Also, Dwarves get battleaxe proficiency, so you can imagine them making "shredding on my axe" jokes constantly in combat.

[Muppethero]

It's not heavy. its my armor