Dark-kin can and Ss'erressen do have natural armor as a racial feature.

How does this stack, or work with class features like Unarmored Defense from Barbarian or Monk?

Do they overlap for the most benefit or is it one or the other?

By the standard 5e rules, they stack. Not sure if any changes might come for Arcanis 5e regarding this matter.

So.. because one is a racial natural armor bonus and feature, it doesn't conflict with the unarmored defense class feature? Thats what i'm getting when i read them. I'm just confirming.

Edit:

They do not stack. http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/feature ... nuary-2016

Interesting, this change was made at the beginning of the year as previously this wasn't the case. Glad you brought this up and serves me as a reminder to check the rulings more often than once a year

It should be noted though that a Dark-kin's bestial hide isn't Natural Armor (as per the definition of the 5e D&D rules, though it does appear to fit more inline with the Sorcerer's Draconic Resilience).

Hmm, I wonder if this means the Arcanis gawdz that be will re-take a look at Dark-kin's Bestial Hide or keep it as concurrent to the 5e ruling you just linked.

When written, Bestial Hide was meant to reflect the sorcerer's feature.

If I had to guess, this rule clarification is meant to reduce the no armor wearing, high AC crowd. I mean just as a first level black talon monk in 5th ed, with the racial natural armor, an dex of 16 and a wis of 14, my AC would be 18! 18 is platemail level of defense. So going off the armor in the players handbook 16-18 is very decent AC.

Which is why I was skeptical if they stacked, it seemed to good to be true, and it was.



Hm. Are you saying, you think they will change the racial natural armor benefits for Arcanis 5th edition because of this rules change? Or just commenting on its original intention?

Compliance with 'core rules' as much as possible should occur with the campaign book.

I would think a rules sidebar in the campaign book saying "Bestial Hide follows all the rules for the Sorcerer's Draconic Resilience to reflect the infernal source of the ability" may appear.

I hear ya. Prior reading this ruling, my Dark-kin Barb was running around with AC 19 (Bestial Hide, 14 Dex, 16 Con, +Shield). Now, he'll be a 17 w/shield. Not too shabby for someone wearing no armor at lv. 1.

That being said, Dex based Ss'ressen are still pretty BOSS *nods*

Both the dark-kin and ss'ressen racial features are modeled after the Draconic Resilience class feature so they work that way. They don't stack with any other forms of armor but do work with shields. When the full 5e Arcanis book is released, these class features may be revised but currently that is how they work.

Commenting on the original intention. I wrote Bestial Hide to reflect the wording of Draconic Resilience, because with 5e math you can't have race adding to AC; it throws everything off and makes that race too powerful.