I feel a bit silly asking as I really can't think of anything myself, but is there anything to know about a character with a shield? I know it can be disarmed, but are there any other caveats that would be good to know? I'm not trying to be a bash specialist and am just using it basically for the AC bonus.
Typically, you want to have a large bonus on your weapon's attack that helps to make up for the lack of 2 handing.
The swashbuckler is pretty much designed around this- it gives you extra damage equal to your swashbuckler level, but only when 1 handing a single weapon. The bonus puts you on par with a 2 handed power attack by a full martial with good strength. Thus, you can feel secure while using your buckler.
Another thing you could do would be to play a brawler. Their flurry attack, unlike with monks, can be used with shields (you lose out on the scaling bonus to AC...but shield AC is usually better; just drop the shield if you have to worry about touch AC). So, just get a nice monk/close weapon in your other hand, and deal TWF style damage (with the added bonus that you get TWF damage while only having to buy 1 weapon). Note- this works well as a 2 level dip for other classes.
Well, sword and board is mechanically pretty bad.
The extra defense is nice, but your damage will lag behind and pathfinder is a game about killing the enemy before they can kill you. Because while you may not get damaged, the enemy may not be attacking you.
If you want to use a shield, using a shield two-handed or TWF with a shield (as your main weapon) and something else using the Shield Master feat is a good way to go about it.
You can also be kind of cheesy and dual wield shields, so as to avoid any penalty from TWF with the shields.
Typically, you want to have a large bonus on your weapon's attack that helps to make up for the lack of 2 handing.
The swashbuckler is pretty much designed around this- it gives you extra damage equal to your swashbuckler level, but only when 1 handing a single weapon. The bonus puts you on par with a 2 handed power attack by a full martial with good strength. Thus, you can feel secure while using your buckler.
Another thing you could do would be to play a brawler. Their flurry attack, unlike with monks, can be used with shields (you lose out on the scaling bonus to AC...but shield AC is usually better; just drop the shield if you have to worry about touch AC). So, just get a nice monk/close weapon in your other hand, and deal TWF style damage (with the added bonus that you get TWF damage while only having to buy 1 weapon). Note- this works well as a 2 level dip for other classes.
Any particular advice for a paladin? That decision is pretty much locked in place. As is, the bonus from smite alone I think qualifies for your general feedback.
Eh, Claxon I think that the traditional view of sword and board is becoming a bit behind the current material.
As I said, brawlers can do TWF with a single weapon and still use a shield through their flurry. Take it as a 2 level dip, and then go into a TWF friendly class (like ranger or slayer, which can continue the TWF feats without the need for high dex) and you can go around flurrying with a nice weapon instead of having to shield bash.
With butterfly swords and nine ring swords as martial weapons, you do not have to sacrifice style or power.
a one-handed weapon will suffer a 5 pt damage gap vs a 2h weapon by level 4, and probably ten points by level 10-15, solely due to Increasing Str scores and Power attack.
This is extremely noticeable. You will really have to optimize your offense to overcome this damage gap. Paladins and rangers overcome this because their damage bonus isn't reliant on the weapon.
The best way to handle this is to have the shield available, but only use it when you must. A quick draw shield is the solution to this. This way, you can use your main weapon two handed for the greater Str and Power Attack bonus, or equip the shield to do so.
The bastard sword and katana are literally made for this kind of fighting style. A falcata also works well.
at higher levels, serious shield adherents start mixing in shield feats, like SHield Bash and Shield Master, along with a TWF feat or two, to do some extra damage when taking a full attack routine.
Look at the shield as an option you have, but not one you have to use all the time, and you should be good.
==Aelryinth
Ah, for a paladin (and not doing the brawler dip thing)... you could go with a quick draw shield and get the quick draw feat. I doubt you can go with very many shenanigans like 2 handing and then getting the shield (I would imagine that is the kind of thing that gets lengthy rules threads about it), but it provides you options.
Grab a long sword/scimitar, and decide whether you want more offense or defense that round. If you are smiting, then don't worry about the damage too much and just tank (you are a threat enough anyway).
Either that, or go with the daring champion cavalier. I know suggesting a different class is rather rude, but it is rather similar to paladin with its challenges, and this archetype gets the swashbuckler-y bits that encourage sword and board.
Also- shroudb- there is a reason why we forget about that. ACP of most shields drops to 0 once you get into masterwork (which is easier to get with shields than weapons). Since you are discussing finesse TWF, then there are pretty much no shield that such a build would want to use that would actually encounter this problem after the first couple of levels.
Any particular advice for a paladin? That decision is pretty much locked in place. As is, the bonus from smite alone I think qualifies for your general feedback.Typically, you want to have a large bonus on your weapon's attack that helps to make up for the lack of 2 handing.
The swashbuckler is pretty much designed around this- it gives you extra damage equal to your swashbuckler level, but only when 1 handing a single weapon. The bonus puts you on par with a 2 handed power attack by a full martial with good strength. Thus, you can feel secure while using your buckler.
Another thing you could do would be to play a brawler. Their flurry attack, unlike with monks, can be used with shields (you lose out on the scaling bonus to AC...but shield AC is usually better; just drop the shield if you have to worry about touch AC). So, just get a nice monk/close weapon in your other hand, and deal TWF style damage (with the added bonus that you get TWF damage while only having to buy 1 weapon). Note- this works well as a 2 level dip for other classes.
If a paladin uses a shield I would suggest he go sword and board TWF. I dipped a few fighter levels(maybe 3) to get the feats in faster. Getting the smite damage on the shield bash is just another source of damage so that will be a good thing.
I see shields more often on characters who cast primarily, though some high AC builds use them as well. It always seems to reduce DPR, though in many cases it is a good tradeoff. I haven't played a Paladin since 3.0 but they do seem to have a much better smite now. If the rest of the group isn't all that optimized I wouldn't worry at all, if they are highly optimized on the other hand you may feel you need more damage to be relevant.
Well, sword and board is mechanically pretty bad.
The extra defense is nice, but your damage will lag behind and pathfinder is a game about killing the enemy before they can kill you. Because while you may not get damaged, the enemy may not be attacking you.
If you want to use a shield, using a shield two-handed or TWF with a shield (as your main weapon) and something else using the Shield Master feat is a good way to go about it.
You can also be kind of cheesy and dual wield shields, so as to avoid any penalty from TWF with the shields.
Sword and Board is mechanically pretty bad for Paladins, since it stops you from using Lay on Hands.
Sword and Board is amazing for Rangers and Slayers, and to a lesser extent anyone who invests in shield related Feats.
Buckler, light shield, heavy shield, or tower shield ?
Most used shields have acp of -2, masterwork drops it to -1.
(Most used in my experience that is)As for the pali thing, when I opened the thread it was before the op wrote that he is snb pali. Obviously he isn't going finesse.
So apart from the general: use the shield as a toolbox and switch to twohanding a weapon when not needed that most people have posted the only other relevant thing I can think is enchantments like arrow catching and etc to help the group since he obviously tries to tank
Light shields, the basic version of the shield that is a light weapon, and thus the one that gets used in TWF, has an ACP of -1.
The quickdraw light shield has -2...but that is not quite as important for dex based TWF builds (no weapons to 2 hand, and light shields in general leave your hand open for things like grabbing potions or wands)
And Rynjin- light shields and bucklers leave your hand open. So you should still be able to lay on hands with them, as far as I am aware.
Not a tower shield. <---This is not the shield you want.
If going with TWF then I would say a light shield as a caster since you can still cast spells per RAW. Some GM's allow spellcasting with heavy shields, but that would be up to the GM.
Well, sword and board is mechanically pretty bad.
The extra defense is nice, but your damage will lag behind and pathfinder is a game about killing the enemy before they can kill you. Because while you may not get damaged, the enemy may not be attacking you.
If you want to use a shield, using a shield two-handed or TWF with a shield (as your main weapon) and something else using the Shield Master feat is a good way to go about it.
You can also be kind of cheesy and dual wield shields, so as to avoid any penalty from TWF with the shields.
Sword and Board is mechanically pretty bad for Paladins, since it stops you from using Lay on Hands.
Sword and Board is amazing for Rangers and Slayers, and to a lesser extent anyone who invests in shield related Feats.
Yar. I can attest to this.
Same. This character has so far made it through 7 levels of Age of Worms without dying!
I agree that sword and board can work, but it generally requires some pretty specific choices to make work well.
Slayer/Ranger work well because they have outside damage bonuses and they get access to bonus feats (looking at you Shield Master) that make it awesome. It's also a counter-intuitive build in that your shield IS your main weapon. It is not a backup weapon like many people imagine it being.
I never thought this would create so many responses. :)
The build is a level 16 angelkin aasimar. She's wearing celestial plate and shield so I'm not dealing with many of the downsides of plate or a heavy shield.
Attack wise, with a Sun Balde, while smiting, she's doing +34. If need be, boots of the battle herald are there. Damage wise, she's doing 1d10+30. If it's undead, it gets ridiculous since the Blade doubles damage. I'm keeping an AC hovering around the very high 30s to mid 40s depending on the situation.
I'm not trying for optimal, per se. I'm just checking for any gotchas to using a shield. I appreciate the other advice, regardless.
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Too many players complain they ate not having fun because someone else does more damage. Many individual think they are not the masses and can accept better defense as the trade off. After several games of doing suboptimal damage next to the 2 handed user, many end up falling into the crowd of feeling jealous of the 2 handers, especially if they are not shield bashing themselves. Remember it is always better for the 2 hander as their move and single attack is not hampered, but your move and single attack denies that extra shield bash damage.
If you like the extra ac, you may want to take an extreme shield from the 3.5 book races of stone. It is an exotic shield (but the boom says fighters may swap out their tower shield proficientcy for it) that gives +3 ac but no attack penalty, compared to the tower shield with +4 ac and -2 attack.
Have you considered warpriest for the holy warrior role but extra feats? You could take only 4 levels and lose only 1 bab while netting a bunch of stuff. Warpriests can even qualify as their full bab for feat prerequisites so that dies not slow you down too much, though it does delay your power attack progression I think.
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I'm disappointed. I was hoping this would be about a Shield made from timey-whimey stuff.
The Sun Blade is the perfect weapon for a shield build, since you don't have to blow EWP on it.
You want your Shield to be a +5 Mithral Quick Draw Spiked Shield of Bashing, with +5 Defender (108k gp). Add Defiant or Guardian or anything else as you like.
If you are defending in full attack mode and have Shield Master, You can be at +11 AC (assuming a light shield) and nigh unhittable, and still attacking with a +5 weapon.
If you really need the damage, you can stow it and go two handed as you need to.
==Aelryinth