Im making a bolt ace that's centered around hand crossbows but my AC is a little lacking for the difficulty level of the campaign from what my GM has told us. So my question is, what shields can I use while still being able to fire and reload the hand crossbow?
In my opinion, reloading is iffy because I kinda doubt you could do that kind of fine manipulation with a hand also holding a shield.
However, since you can hold items, one could argue to use a Free Action to shift the hand crossbow to the shield hand, reload with your free hand and shift back.
But yeah, bucklers all the way. You just can't bash with them. That is their only downside. And there are 3rd party feats for that too...
I'd go Hand Crossbow with a Light Shield;
While your hand is free with a Light Shield for reloading, you cannot wield a weapon with your shield hand, meaning a Light Crossbow would incur a –2 penalty on attack rolls.
A Hand Crossbow would be more suitable.
I would say buckler, but you're supposed to be keeping yourself out of melee anyway.
Im making a bolt ace that's centered around hand crossbows but my AC is a little lacking for the difficulty level of the campaign from what my GM has told us. So my question is, what shields can I use while still being able to fire and reload the hand crossbow?
Light shield, Buckler and Ring of Force Shielding should work as has been pointed out already. Buckler and light shield can hold during firing or hold the the weapon while your free hand reloads. Ring can be off and on as free actions so it never inhibits your crossbow actions. But your best bet is to use your mobility at levels 1-5 to simply stay at range and fire your shots and never be in melee. Since your only using a standard action to shoot you can use your move action to try to make sure nothing ever gets into melee. This will of course not be perfect and depends a lot on how your party works together and what other classes are in it.
By 5th level you should have enough gold and loot to get a decent AC. This all assumes your starting at level 1.
Pricey, but a ring of Force Shield would work just fine :) LINK
> LINK ADDED
For cheap options, bucklers and light shields will work just fine. Heavy shields will not work.
More expensive options don't really require a hand slot to use, but something like a ring of force shield or simply a shield spell will help your AC.
Thanks everyone, looks like it'll be a light shield till I have the gold for a ring of force shield.
For the creation cost of a ring of force shield, you could buy yourself a +2 buckler and have the same benefits with 1 more AC.
Difference being you can bash with the force shield, but i dont see how you can increase it's +2 AC bonus.
While light shields specifically state you can hold objects in that hand that does not equate to that hand being free. With no free hand you can't load any type of crossbow. Any shield larger than a buckler won't work here.
Per RAW, your light shield hand is allowed to hold anything you can hold in your non-shield hand. Which is all you need to load the light crossbow.
I disagree with your interpretation, there. I have always read that as meaning while you can hold something in your hand, holding is not operating.
However, you can shoot, but not load, a light crossbow with one hand at a –2 penalty on attack rolls.
This line from the PRD quoted above supports that notion. A light shield is not a buckler, which talks about what happens when you wield and operate things with the hand on the arm with buckler.
For the OP, GreyFox95, I believe a light shield could be used while firing the crossbow, with the stated penalties for using only one hand, but not be used to reload. In which case, the buckler is the best practical choice.
Since the AC bonus provided by a light shield is the same as a buckler, the difference between them is with a buckler, you can use the hand to wield or hold things, and with the light shield, you can shield bash or hold things.
Shield hand holds the crossbow while the free hand performs the "fine manipulation". Seems pretty clear-cut to me.
So you think I can hold a doorknob with the light shield hand, but I can't turn it? Or I can hold a water pump handle, but I can't pump it? Or I can hold a water hose? But I can't squeeze the trigger to spray the water or move the hose back and forth to wet the ground?
An answer of "Yes" is pretty much exactly how I would rule those questions in my game, based on RAW.
Personal experience with a cumbersome heavy object hung or strapped to arm certainly supports the first three. The last example is the one where real world experience would most clearly suggest overriding the rules. To me, however, it is the one that comes closest to modeling an actual attack action, the one thing we know without any question is prohibited.
I infer from the rules that they mean something else other than just "holding" when they talk about things such as "taking two hands to reload". I admit ambiguity. You clearly have a different interpretation. That's fine.
It seems that you understand my reasoning but have a different take on the base assumptions. I think I understand your reasoning, and agree it is consistent. Until something else shows up to clarify the ambiguity allowing us to take different interpretations on those base elements, we will likely to continue to disagree on this. It does not seem game breaking to me either way.