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Thread: Shield bashing and AOO
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2024-03-31, 06:04 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2023
Shield bashing and AOO
My gripe with my DM: I'm carrying a spiked shield as a cleric and have a wand in my other hand. Can I use the shield as a weapon, since it is often my only weapon, as as a primary attack and thus be able to make attacks of opportunity with it?
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2024-03-31, 06:12 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2015
- Gender
Re: Shield bashing and AOO
In the SRD under both Weapons and Armor:
Shield, Heavy or Light: You can bash with a shield instead of using it for defense. See Armor for details.
Spiked Shield, Heavy or Light: You can bash with a spiked shield instead of using it for defense. See Armor for details.
Masterwork Weapons: [snip] Even though some types of armor and shields can be used as weapons, you can’t create a masterwork version of such an item that confers an enhancement bonus on attack rolls. Instead, masterwork armor and shields have lessened armor check penalties.
Shield, Heavy, Wooden or Steel: You strap a shield to your forearm and grip it with your hand. A heavy shield is so heavy that you can’t use your shield hand for anything else.
Wooden or Steel: Wooden and steel shields offer the same basic protection, though they respond differently to special attacks.
Shield Bash Attacks: You can bash an opponent with a heavy shield, using it as an off-hand weapon. See Table: Weapons for the damage dealt by a shield bash. Used this way, a heavy shield is a martial bludgeoning weapon. For the purpose of penalties on attack rolls, treat a heavy shield as a one-handed weapon. If you use your shield as a weapon, you lose its AC bonus until your next action (usually until the next round). An enhancement bonus on a shield does not improve the effectiveness of a shield bash made with it, but the shield can be made into a magic weapon in its own right.
Shield, Light, Wooden or Steel: You strap a shield to your forearm and grip it with your hand. A light shield’s weight lets you carry other items in that hand, although you cannot use weapons with it.
Wooden or Steel: Wooden and steel shields offer the same basic protection, though they respond differently to special attacks.
Shield Bash Attacks: You can bash an opponent with a light shield, using it as an off-hand weapon. See Table: Weapons for the damage dealt by a shield bash. Used this way, a light shield is a martial bludgeoning weapon. For the purpose of penalties on attack rolls, treat a light shield as a light weapon. If you use your shield as a weapon, you lose its AC bonus until your next action (usually until the next round). An enhancement bonus on a shield does not improve the effectiveness of a shield bash made with it, but the shield can be made into a magic weapon in its own right.
Shield Spikes: When added to your shield, these spikes turn it into a martial piercing weapon that increases the damage dealt by a shield bash as if the shield were designed for a creature one size category larger than you. You can’t put spikes on a buckler or a tower shield. Otherwise, attacking with a spiked shield is like making a shield bash attack. An enhancement bonus on a spiked shield does not improve the effectiveness of a shield bash made with it, but a spiked shield can be made into a magic weapon in its own right.⚣ Tanuki in the Playground. ⚣
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2024-04-01, 10:15 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2023
Re: Shield bashing and AOO
But it says everywhere that one can use shield bash as an offhand attack and that's why my dm disallowed the AoO. He sucks
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2024-04-01, 11:02 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2015
- Gender
Re: Shield bashing and AOO
⚣ Tanuki in the Playground. ⚣
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2024-04-01, 11:21 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2019
Re: Shield bashing and AOO
It's a 3.0-3.5 update mistake. Off-hand weapons no longer exist. It's a legacy term taken out of context to make understanding the two weapon fighting rules easier. In 3.5 off-hand weapons don't exist outside of those rules.
In 3.0 when creating a character you would designate a main hand and off-hand and it would be permanent unless you got the ambidexterity feat. This off-hand would always have a -4 penalty and only ever receive ½ your STR modifier. 3.5 doesn't do this.
So when the shield bash rules state you make an off-hand attack, it's referencing rules that don't exist anymore (even though the term and rule is defined in the glossary, it's never applied anywhere). Thus, you can make shield bash attacks with any hand in 3.5 and it doesn't have to only be during TWF full attack.
Edit: also note how TWF never tells you to designate a primary hand or an off-hand. If we want to base the game on RAW, TWF doesn't actually work and can only be used with shield bash attacks because those are the only weapons that would be off-hand attacks.Last edited by Darg; 2024-04-01 at 11:31 AM.