Elegant Studded Leather is a great light armour piece you can get from a Counting House vault during Act 3 of Baldur’s Gate 3 (BG3).
Elegant Studded Leather
In Baldur’s Gate 3 Elegant Studded Leather is a great late-game light armour piece which works best on Bards, Rogues, or Warlocks. It offers an Armour Class of 14 which is the highest AC you’ll find on light armour. Secondly, the Ambusher perk grants the wearer a nice +2 bonus to Initiative rolls. Anything that can boost your character’s probability of going first on a combat encounter, gives you a chance to take down enemies before they can even hit you.
Additionally, the Elegant Studded Leather will give the wearer an Advantage on all Stealth Checks, which is helpful for all classes, but especially handy for sneaky Rogues. Finally, this armor piece offers a free cast of the Shield spell once per Short Rest, which is perhaps the most helpful bonus. Shield provides you with a new Reaction. When your character has been targeted by an enemy, and Shield has been cast, you will get a Reaction prompt which you can use to increase you AC by 5 before the hit. Moreover, it also protects you fully from any damage from Magic Missile.
Here are all Elegant Studded Leather features in BG3:
- Armour Type: Light Armour
- Armour Class: 14 AC
- Requirements: Light Armour Proficiency
- Rarity: Very Rare
- Location: Complete Return Rakath’s Gold quest to obtain the key to High Security Vault n°9 in the County House, Act 3.
- Weight: 5.85 kg
- Value: 2,000
- Bonuses:
- Classes with Light Armour proficiency: Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Warlock, Paladin
- Races with Light Armour proficiency: Human (Civil Milita), Half-Elf (Civil Milita), Githyanki, Shield Dwarf (Dwarven Armour Training)
- Companions Who Can Use This Armour: Lae’zel, Minthara, Karlach, Minsc, Jaheira, Halsin, Shadowheart, Wyll, Gale, Astarion
How To Get Elegant Studded Leather in Baldur’s Gate 3
To get the Elegant Studded Leather piece in Baldur’s Gate 3 you’ll need to visit the Counting House during Act 3, and complete the Return Rakath’s Gold quest in order to receive the key to High Security Vault n°9. In the southern area of the Lower City of Baldur’s Gate, down along the coast, you can find the Counting House. In order to get down into the vault area of the bank you’ll need to present a Bank Pass to Cashguard Captain Faril.
There are three different ways to get a Bank Pass in Baldur’s Gate 3:
- Purchase one from Head Clerk Meadhoney for a lot of gold.
- Succeed on an Insight check and a Persuasion check (both 18DC) when talking to Meadhoney to persuade him into giving you a pass.
- Steal a pass from the first room upstairs – while you’re there, read a note on the desk about something that happened in 1356. This is the code number for a later vault door you’ll need to get past.
Or, if you’re feeling aggressive, you can just aggro all of the guards and fight your way down. However, this isn’t really recommended. The pass will get you safely down to the Safes and Vaults area.
How to Get into the High Security Vaults
After you present your pass to Cashguard Captain Faril open up the gates and head down the stairs and go to the right. There will be a wooden door just ahead. Through that door and around to the right will take you past another set of guards. The gate here should already be open, but as you try to walk past the guards will stop and ask for your vault pass. Head down the stairs, take a left and you’ll come to a large, round vault door.
Click on this door to automatically move past it and enter a short passageway with a desk in the middle. The desk is unoccupied, so move past it to the large wooden door behind it. Beyond it you’ll find a much longer passageway, this one lined with vaults that each have a DC25 Sleight of Hand check. To find the Elegant Studded Leather piece, however, your goal is past all of this. Head all the way down the hallway and into a room where you’ll find a puzzle waiting for you on the floor in front of the last vault door.
Solving the Counting House Bank Vault Puzzle in Baldur’s Gate 3
Look up above the round vault door on the opposite wall and you will see four unlit light fixtures. The lights correspond to four numbers on the floor which have to be pressed in the correct order. If you stole the vault pass from the office upstairs, you’ll know that the pass-code for this door is 1-3-5-6.
We highly recommend unchaining your party for this puzzle because otherwise your party members may step on incorrect numbers and mess things up. Step on the top left ‘number’ 1, then walk over all the way to the right to step on the number 3. Then diagonally down one row to step on 5 in the middle. Lastly, move over to the right one more for number 6. The door will open, and you can step through and then click to move down the Passage.
Return Rakath’s Gold Quest
When you first enter the High Security Vault space a cut scene will trigger, showing Minsc and a false Jaheira robbing the bank. You’ll have to fight them. Afterwards, speak to Rakath Glitterbeard to be given the Return Rakath’s Gold quest. This quest will nicely tie into the storyline for recruiting Minsc. While you’re still down in the vault area, head towards the back and take a look around the vault Minsc smashed up. A Perception check will show you some sewer mud.
You can trackdown Minsc in one of two ways:
- Find the Sluice Valves in the Abandoned Cistern within the sewers. A successful Athletics check can unstick the valve and open the door. If that fails, you’ll have to use the temperature water level valves. Hit the water level valve first, then watch the upper icons until the Water Level is perfect. Then turn the Temp Valve. Wait until the icon reaches Perfect Warmth. This should successfully open the door.
- Go to a garden area directly north of the Steel Watch Foundry or directly west of the Lodge. There is a wooden door which says ‘Keep Out’ when you hover the cursor over it. Enter, have two party members press one plate each inside. This will open a different door which leads to Minsc.
Getting Rakath’s Gold Directly
When you enter this next area, there will be a fight after a cut scene. You’ll see the bag of gold being handed off to a Zhentarim contact. When the fight commences, they will try to run and escape. If you can, try to kill the Zhentarim contact before they get away and you can loot the bag of gold from them directly. Otherwise, you’ll have to find it at the Guildhall later, as we’ll explain below. If you are able to loot the bag of gold from them, you can immediately return to Rakath at the Counting House.
Recruiting Minsc Explained
The fight with the Stone Lord and his recruits is also where you finally have the opportunity to recruit Minsc. The most important thing here, if you want to recruit Minsc, is you must knock him out with a non-lethal hit only! Otherwise you will kill him and also loose the real Jaheira from your party if she joined previously.
Once the fight is over and you have killed everyone but Minsc, you’ll speak with him in another dialogue cut scene. You’ll have to convince the Emperor to extend the Prism’s protection to Minsc. This can be more easily done if Jaheira is in the party. Once recruited, he will run off to find Boo. Find and speak with him again, and then it’s off to the Guildhall to find Rakath’s gold.
Getting Rakath’s Gold from the Guildhall
If you weren’t able to kill the Zhentarim contact before they escaped from the sewers, then you’ll need to return to the Guildhall in order to get Rakath’s bag of gold back. The Zhentarim will be attempting to take over the Guild and if you want that bag of gold you need to find the Zhentarim who took it. Side with the Guild in the fight and once the coup has been put down you can get that stolen bag of gold.
Return Rakath’s Gold and Gain Elegant Studded Leather
Make your way back to the Counting House and all the way back down to the High Security Vaults. Speak to Rakath to return the gold. If you have high enough Persuasion or Intimidation you can take a shot a keeping half the gold. Just choose ‘You lost innocent people’s money’ the first time around. For either following dialogue option to be successful, you’ll have to then pass a 20 difficulty check.
Finally, pass the bag of either 10,000 or 5,000 gold to Rakath Glitterbeard. He will thank you with the gift of a key to one of the vaults. This vault is a wall safe which is on the back wall of the larger vault that Minsc and his crew originally smashed up. Open it up and you can finally claim your well-earned Elegant Studded Leather piece!
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