What's with all the companions that can't wear armor?

[Knightmage Bael]

between Lann, Ember, Woljif and Nenia, a lot of these companions are really hurting for AC.

I'm level 6 and they some really low ACs. Especially Ember and Nenia who have an AC of 12 and get hyper targeted. In fact the AI just takes AoO and goes through my entire party to get at them, and because my roll RNG is really bad, I miss all the AoO, the enemy gets into my backline, and kills them easily with consistently high rolls.

Lann has higher AC though so he's harder to hit, but with +14 base attack bonuses on mobs its still not really enough. They all have high attack bonuses, and I don't have enough equipment I can buy to improve AC.

The entire equipment inventory is completely and utterly barren. no necklaces, belts, rings, boots, or gloves anywhere.

So basically might as well not take Ember or Nenia around at all because they die before they can get any attacks off. Especially Nenia. Her hexes never hit at all, and her ice cantrip does like 3 damage. Using spells or scrolls only does like 12 damage or so per hit to enemies with like 70 HP. I have more success with tanks and rogues with Lann in the back than I do actually using any spellcasters.

I'd love to use spell casters, but my issues with spellcasters right now are :

-Their AC is low and they get hyper focused by the entire mob
-They never overcome spell reisistance
-they have too few charges to do meaningful damage during long drawn out fights
-enemy always (and I mean always) pass the DC checks with consistent 16+ dice rolls


So yeah, I'd love to use these characters I'm constantly hearing about how utterly broken Nenia and Ember are, but so far all they've done is drag me down.

I had to build Camellia into a pseudo-healer/buffer from the recommended hexer build just to add some survivability. Having a hard time finding ways to increase AC to meaningful levels.

Taking dodge for +1 AC wont cut it. I need at least 10 more AC on these characters. Might as well take some light armor proficiency for the spellcasters....

[Darakkuu]

If you playing on higher difficulties(like Core) you NEED to use buffs on top of regular char's AC for them to be properly defended. Like the Lann you mentioned. Thanks to being Monk(and his stats) even without much of multiclassing, he is amazing tank/melee archer. But you need those buffs to support him.
Maintaining them will become trivial after you get mythic that prolongs their duration up to 24 hours.

Regarding spellcasters(or others squishies) getting focused. Thankfully, this happens not in every fight and only with some specific enemies. Against them you need to have protective spells ready. For example, at the beginning, short time invisibility works great against non true sight enemies to make them lose focus on your backliners. Protection from energy/arrows great way to defend in range, and terrain morphing spells and speed buff - to protect from melee.

Depending on you diffficulty, you may not need ALL of these. On Core you can build great and succesfull team without too much optimization as long as you don't forget to utilize proper buffs and defences at correct timing.
Also, don't underestimate +1 AC from Dodge. Properly combining those small bonuses that can stack with each other is how you ultimately reach desirable characteristics.

[Gregorovitch]

If you deploy your melee well to intercept the enemy advance it is unusual for your backline to be molested in the early battle. Ther are a few enemies types that are programmed to ignore your melee and head straight for your back line but they are mercifully quite rare.

Nenio doesn't really come come online until about L6-L7. When she gets Haste she becomes very useful and when she gets Phantasmal Killer she becomes indispensable. After that she becomes a monster. Ember is better early game because of her OP Slumber hex.

Ember, Nenio and Woljif can all get Mage Armour and Mirror Image. These are your go to defence spells for these characters. Mirror Image in particular is the big one.

Lann is rarely molested in my experience. He's usually far enough back, he's got just enough AC and does just low enough damage per shot to push him down the AI aggro priority list.

[Phil]

What would be the point in Armour if the characters who can't use Armour didn't suffer from not having it.

Casters aren't supposed to be resilient, that's why we have Melee specialised builds, either with Armour or lots of Dodge (or Wis/Cha to armour via Monk etc.)

[seeker1]

So, except for Lann, the issue with all the others is arcane spell failure. Yes, Ember too is an arcane caster. If you don't want to "eat" the spell failure chance:

1. some armor has properties that reduce it (e.g. mithril, etc.)
2. there are cloth/robes "armor" without it (not much, but you gotta find it, and sometimes they have magical AC bonuses)
3. there are feats that help reduce it

In general, I hate having even a 10% chance of spell failure, but I've found some decent leathers for Woljif that, combined with those feats, still keep him at 0%. Plus, of course, for him I'm usually looking for stuff that augments stealth and skills.

Bottom line ... look for all the other stuff that augments AC for them ... rings and bracers of protection, notably, but then bear in mind what does and doesn't stack.

[Darakkuu]

Also, to add regarding Mage characters dealing little damage at the beginning - that is by design.
At that start mages are much better and versatile while supporting team. You should consider them to be your "Ultimate moves", with them standing behind your warriors/archers and supporting them a little bit, while waiting for perfect opportunity to completely turn the tide with one or two correct spells(like cast Grease to make half of the enemies disabled and easy to kill with reach attacks, or use some touch spell to kill high AC target that others will struggle with).
Then, later mages get more spells and spellslots and their ability to interfere with flow of the battle will become more and more pronounced with each level. But, for damage dealer build you gonna need correct metamagics to maximize the damage.

[PuppYofDOOM]

Originally posted by Archmage_Bael:

between Lann, Ember, Woljif and Nenia, a lot of these companions are really hurting for AC.

I'm level 6 and they some really low ACs. Especially Ember and Nenia who have an AC of 12 and get hyper targeted. In fact the AI just takes AoO and goes through my entire party to get at them, and because my roll RNG is really bad, I miss all the AoO, the enemy gets into my backline, and kills them easily with consistently high rolls.

Lann has higher AC though so he's harder to hit, but with +14 base attack bonuses on mobs its still not really enough. They all have high attack bonuses, and I don't have enough equipment I can buy to improve AC.

The entire equipment inventory is completely and utterly barren. no necklaces, belts, rings, boots, or gloves anywhere.

So basically might as well not take Ember or Nenia around at all because they die before they can get any attacks off. Especially Nenia. Her hexes never hit at all, and her ice cantrip does like 3 damage. Using spells or scrolls only does like 12 damage or so per hit to enemies with like 70 HP. I have more success with tanks and rogues with Lann in the back than I do actually using any spellcasters.

I'd love to use spell casters, but my issues with spellcasters right now are :

-Their AC is low and they get hyper focused by the entire mob
-They never overcome spell reisistance
-they have too few charges to do meaningful damage during long drawn out fights
-enemy always (and I mean always) pass the DC checks with consistent 16+ dice rolls


So yeah, I'd love to use these characters I'm constantly hearing about how utterly broken Nenia and Ember are, but so far all they've done is drag me down.

I had to build Camellia into a pseudo-healer/buffer from the recommended hexer build just to add some survivability. Having a hard time finding ways to increase AC to meaningful levels.

Taking dodge for +1 AC wont cut it. I need at least 10 more AC on these characters. Might as well take some light armor proficiency for the spellcasters....

Ac is given by feats and buffs. Giving a belt of dex to them helps. There are bracers of armor. Buffs like false life cape of wasp aid are invaluable. That said ember can be tanky even. You just need some more understanding of what the game has to offer.

[Knightmage Bael]

Originally posted by Darakkuu:

If you playing on higher difficulties(like Core) you NEED to use buffs on top of regular char's AC for them to be properly defended. Like the Lann you mentioned. Thanks to being Monk(and his stats) even without much of multiclassing, he is amazing tank/melee archer. But you need those buffs to support him.
Maintaining them will become trivial after you get mythic that prolongs their duration up to 24 hours.

yeah problem is I get like....one bless, which is it.

The other buffs I see are like DC and throwing saves against particular kinds of effects that aren't related to AC, and the AC is more the problem here. Plus those are all single target anyway, so if I use them on one companion, the AI just avoids them and attacks someone else.

So I feel like all the buffs are useless because I don't get any AC or damage reduction out of them. The attack bonus buffs are nice though, but I don't have many different kinds. Just bless.

Originally posted by PuppYofDOOM:

Ac is given by feats and buffs. Giving a belt of dex to them helps. There are bracers of armor. Buffs like false life cape of wasp aid are invaluable. That said ember can be tanky even. You just need some more understanding of what the game has to offer.

Yeah the problem is finding it. All I find are breastplates.

I have slots for two rings, bracers, gloves, boots, undergarment, headwear, facewear, necklace, and a belt, and all I ever find are weapons, shields, and breastplates lol.

Unless I'm missing all the other pieces of equipment. I'd buy some but all the equipment I see is for unarmed melee strikes.

[Darakkuu]

For AC stacking on unarmored allies you have Mage Armor, Barkskin and Shield of Faith. They all stack, and together give you +8 ac at low levels and even more at high ones.
Then, against especially high hitting enemies, you should protect you allies with Displacement(or atleast Blur), halfing enemies chance to hit you. And then you can (and against some enemies on high difficulties advised) to give Protective Luck hex to your main tank(or sometimes to other characters, if you can't avoid them being focused and need every defence you can muster).

---Added---
Oh, yes, also Haste. It gives you additional AC as well.

[Bishop]

You don't really need armor anyway. Use magic armor or armor bracers early, then replace with archmage armor at some point (though only Woljif really needs it being melee and all).
Later there will be that weird weabu armor (hachimaki? whatever it's called) that even casters can wear and it's generally better than magic armor, while let's your casters keep their bracer slot open.

[darkholyPL]

First of physicall armour is kind of pointless in this game. Best AC comes from spells.
Second, who told you Woljif can't wear armour? He can wear light armour, and with a feat you wont suffer spell failure chance, tho there are light armours in the game that don't give an arcane fail chance.

[Khloros]

as probably already mentioned, its because its really not worth putting on armor since mage armor and archmage armor is in the game. you can give your self 10 AC for like 5+ hours and get all the bonus of no armor.

If there was a armor equivalent mythic feat for actually putting on armor, that would be super. Like effortless armor or something, makes it so you have have all the dex bonus of not wearing armor but have armor on.

[Drake]

For arcane caster you can also get 8 levels of hellknight signifer, with the arcane armored spellcasting feat, you can wear a mithral heavy plate with no arcane failure chance.
That the best option is to use mage armor spell + archmage mythic armor feat + the shield spell. You'll get a heavy armored mage with no encumbrance and arcane failure.

[Don Quijote]

After playing on unfair many times i always equip Ember with light (+2 morale bonus to dex ) or medium (elemental carnage) armor and take arcane mastery for her. The first case, if she have to penetrate high touch AC, the second armor (from Wintersun trader) gives her a huge damage bonus

[Knightmage Bael]

Originally posted by Khloros:

as probably already mentioned, its because its really not worth putting on armor since mage armor and archmage armor is in the game. you can give your self 10 AC for like 5+ hours and get all the bonus of no armor.

If there was a armor equivalent mythic feat for actually putting on armor, that would be super. Like effortless armor or something, makes it so you have have all the dex bonus of not wearing armor but have armor on.

mage armor is only giving me 2 points of AC.

how do you get 10 from it?

Originally posted by darkholyPL:

First of physicall armour is kind of pointless in this game. Best AC comes from spells.
Second, who told you Woljif can't wear armour? He can wear light armour, and with a feat you wont suffer spell failure chance, tho there are light armours in the game that don't give an arcane fail chance.

The game did.

all armor is just red boxes one after the other on the inventory screen. shouldn't rogues have light armor proficiency by default?

[Bishop]

Woljif can't wear armor that's true. His class is considered arcane caster, he has no access to light armor like other rogues.