Are Enhancement and Armor/Shield Bonuses supposed to be separate?

[John34404]

I noticed when using the royal guardian armor, and casting Mage Armor I have only the AC from the royal guardian armor. Is this intentional?

Explanation/Spiel:
In PnP Pathfinder Armor and Enhancement are listed as two different sources of bonuses. In PnP i normally use Mage Armor with clothing that has a +5 enhancement bonus for a total of (4+5) +9 AC and a +5 Buckler with the Shield Spell for another +9 AC. I may be wrong on how that bonus works, and would enjoy someone pointing out where it says that the Armor and Enhancement bonus MUST exist together since any amulet of Natural Armor is an enhancement bonus. Also on the pathfinder section of wearing multiple armors it states you choose which Armor score you get, without mentioning Enhancement, and any sane person would always choose the highest bonus.

[Procrastinating Gamer]

There may be some homebrew going on with your game.

Physical armour gives an Armour Bonus to AC, as does the Mage Armour spell.
Physical shields give a Shield Bonus to AC, as does the Shield spell.

Most times I've seen a non-armour item like clothing give a bonus to AC, it's always been stated as an armour bonus (ie; Robe of the Archmagi[www.aonprd.com] and Bracers of Armour[www.aonprd.com]). I can't recall seeing an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own as far as AC goes, and you can't apply armour enhancements to normal clothing (the fact you can in Pathfinder 2e was a big deal when that edition came out). So I think your GM may be homebrewing the clothing augmentations you're talking about and likewise with letting a buckler and a Shield spell stack.

[John34404]

Originally posted by Procrastinating Gamer:

I can't recall seeing an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own as far as AC goes, and you can't apply armour enhancements to normal clothing (the fact you can in Pathfinder 2e was a big deal when that edition came out).

As stated, any Amulet of Natural Armor is an an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own. As for the clothing, you have not pointed out anywhere in the rules it does not work, because there is no general rule in the Non-unchained books that ordinary clothing isn't armor. Furthermore Unchained Rules[www.d20pfsrd.com] does state an enhancement bonus is possible for normal clothing.

The question is stacking Since An Amulet of Natural Armor is an Enhancement bonus is the Armor/Shield Enhancement Separate as well. Because you can get +15 to any character from enhancement... and some of us are planning on the INSANE difficulty playthorugh.

[Alyena]

Originally posted by John34404:

Originally posted by Procrastinating Gamer:

I can't recall seeing an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own as far as AC goes, and you can't apply armour enhancements to normal clothing (the fact you can in Pathfinder 2e was a big deal when that edition came out).

As stated, any Amulet of Natural Armor is an an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own. As for the clothing, you have not pointed out anywhere in the rules it does not work, because there is no general rule in the Non-unchained books that ordinary clothing isn't armor. Furthermore Unchained Rules[www.d20pfsrd.com] does state an enhancement bonus is possible for normal clothing.

You're being unnecessarily contrary. You asked your question and you got a correct answer. It doesn't matter whether or not enchantments can go on clothes, and natural armor is an entirely different bonus. Different bonuses stack. The same bonuses do not.

If your clothing has a enhancement to its AC, it's still treated as an armor bonus. The armor bonus you get from armor does not stack with the armor bonus you get from mage armor. The shield bonus you get from wearing a shield does not stack with the shield bonus you get from the shield spell. Enhancements to your equipment aren't treated as separate bonuses - they're additions to the equipment's armor or shield bonus. When you cast mage armor or shield, you get to use the best bonus between your equipment and spells - they don't combine. Not sure how many other ways to explain it.

If this is how your group at home does it, they're doing it wrong.

[John34404]

Originally posted by alyena.eregrand:

Originally posted by John34404:

As stated, any Amulet of Natural Armor is an an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own. As for the clothing, you have not pointed out anywhere in the rules it does not work, because there is no general rule in the Non-unchained books that ordinary clothing isn't armor. Furthermore Unchained Rules[www.d20pfsrd.com] does state an enhancement bonus is possible for normal clothing.

You're being unnecessarily contrary. You asked your question and you got a correct answer. It doesn't matter whether or not enchantments can go on clothes, and natural armor is an entirely different bonus. Different bonuses stack. The same bonuses do not.

If your clothing has a enhancement to its AC, it's still treated as an armor bonus. The armor bonus you get from armor does not stack with the armor bonus you get from mage armor. The shield bonus you get from wearing a shield does not stack with the shield bonus you get from the shield spell. Enhancements to your equipment aren't treated as separate bonuses - they're additions to the equipment's armor or shield bonus. When you cast mage armor or shield, you get to use the best bonus between your equipment and spells - they don't combine. Not sure how many other ways to explain it.

If this is how your group at home does it, they're doing it wrong.

Can you show me where in the rules it says that? Please.

[[ACES] Vas]

"A magic shield typically grants an enhancement bonus to the shield's shield bonus"
"enhancement bonuses to armor or natural armor effectively increase the armor or natural armor's bonus to AC"

Edit:

Tl;dr clothes have 0 bonus to AC, if you apply something that gives +5 enhancement bonus to the clothes 0 AC (which the system counts as a +5 armor bonus) and you have mage armor (+4 armor bonus) you should only get a +5 armor bonus to AC instead of the 9 you think you should be getting because in the end enhancement bonuses still count as an armor bonus

[John34404]

Originally posted by ACES Vas:

"A magic shield typically grants an enhancement bonus to the shield's shield bonus"
"enhancement bonuses to armor or natural armor effectively increase the armor or natural armor's bonus to AC"

Edit:

Tl;dr clothes have 0 bonus to AC, if you apply something that gives +5 enhancement bonus to the clothes 0 AC (which the system counts as a +5 armor bonus) and you have mage armor (+4 armor bonus) you should only get a +5 armor bonus to AC instead of the 9 you think you should be getting because in the end enhancement bonuses still count as an armor bonus

Thank you. That is exactly what i wanted to know. From your quote/explanation i was able to find the page for that. I will bring it up to my table. Now to continue preparing for the Insane run.

[Procrastinating Gamer]

Originally posted by John34404:

Originally posted by Procrastinating Gamer:

I can't recall seeing an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own as far as AC goes, and you can't apply armour enhancements to normal clothing (the fact you can in Pathfinder 2e was a big deal when that edition came out).

As stated, any Amulet of Natural Armor is an an enhancement bonus on an item standing on its own. As for the clothing, you have not pointed out anywhere in the rules it does not work, because there is no general rule in the Non-unchained books that ordinary clothing isn't armor. Furthermore Unchained Rules[www.d20pfsrd.com] does state an enhancement bonus is possible for normal clothing.

The question is stacking Since An Amulet of Natural Armor is an Enhancement bonus is the Armor/Shield Enhancement Separate as well. Because you can get +15 to any character from enhancement... and some of us are planning on the INSANE difficulty playthorugh.

Well I ignored that bit from Pathfinder Unchained because that's part of the Automatic Bonus Progression variant rule which WotR is clearly not using.

But yeah, someone else clarified it overnight - didn't think to clarify that until after I'd gone to bed and Vas phrased it far better than I ever could.