Per Shield Brace: You can use a two-handed weapon sized appropriately for you from the polearm or spears weapon group while also using a light, heavy, or tower shield with which you are proficient. The shield’s armor check penalty (if any) applies to attacks made with the weapon.
Would using a two-handed weapon this way eliminate the ability to "drop" a hand off the weapon for spell casting/lay on hands/drinking a potion/ other?
Might be a RAI vs RAW situation.
Shiled Brace on d20pfsrd.
You take a hand away from the weapon. It stays a two-handed weapon and it doesnìt float in the air, so you need to use one hand to keep it.
A light steel (or wooden) shield’s weight lets you carry other items in that hand, although you cannot use weapons with it.
You can't do that with a heavy wooden or steel shield.
So, apparently, you can grab your two-handed weapon with the light shield hand and free your weapon hand for spellcasting.
While doing that, you would be unable to use the weapon.
Each time you switch the weapon back and forth, you use a free action, and using shield brace is a no-action. Your GM can decide that freeing the weapon so that it is held in a hand, then switching hand, using the now free hand to take a standard action, and then switching your grip again are too many free actions and not allowing you to regrip the weapon and use shield brace.
That is the RAW, AFAIK.
Shield Brace wrote: You’ve mastered the art of balancing a polearm’s weight against a shield’s stability. This is the intro text, not the rules text. But it's pretty clear both from that and from the name of the feat - "Shield brace" - that the intended visualization was supporting the two-handed polearm on a part of the shield in order to attack while still wielding the shield.
Your shield hand would still be occupied by wielding the shield so you wouldn't be able to use that to grab your polearm, in order to free the other hand to do something.
You can always hold a two-handed weapon in one hand. It is only wielding a weapon that requires both. Shield Brace does not change this. But, if you are wearing a heavy or tower shield, one hand will be fully occupied by the shield and the other hand would likely need to hold the weapon. If you need a free hand on top of that, then if you are using a light shield, you can still carry items in the same hand as your shield and could therefore simply transfer the weapon to your shield-hand and drink as normal. Diego Rossi asserts that a GM could rule a free action limit for holding a weapon with your light shield hand and transferring it back for a proper weapon grip, but while this is technically true, in practice it is not done as it tends to rather undermine the entire point of light shields if the GM is presenting such severe limits on free actions whenever you try to hold something in the hand wielding a light shield. However, a light shield is typically unpopular for this purpose regardless as you could simply use the buckler with an Unhindering Shield feat instead, which allows you full use of your shield-hand while retaining the benefits of the shield. As such, if you are using Shield Brace, I assume you will be using a heavy or tower shield.
In that case, you cannot hold a weapon in your shield-hand, but seeing as these weapons are spears and polearms, you could declare that you will be holding the shaft of the spear with your shield-arm's elbow while dropping the butt of the spear or polearm to the ground. This is not an unreasonable maneuver, but it would likely mean, however, that you receive no shield bonus to AC while doing this because your shield-arm cannot move so as to intercept blows while you are essentially folding your shield-arm to your chest and thus bracing your spear/polearm with your shield and elbow to remain upright and stable against your torso as you quickly repurpose your weapon's hand. There are no firm rules to state one way or another whether or not you can do this, but it seems a reasonable enough action to me. You would need to ask your GM, however, to see if they would permit it.
Other than that, you would likely need a prehensile tail or similar to hold your weapon while you drink/cast/etc. Typically, switching an object from a hand to your prehensile tail and vice-versa is a free action, much like switching an object from one hand to another.
There is also the Glove of Storing for such needs, but it costs 10,000 gp and is therefore usually a last resort.
What it comes down to is that although you can drop a hand of the weapon you still need to use at least one hand to hold the weapon. So, unless you have another free hand you do not have a hand available for other purposes.
Tom Sampson wrote: Diego Rossi asserts that a GM could rule a free action limit for holding a weapon with your light shield hand and transferring it back for a proper weapon grip, but while this is technically true, in practice it is not done as it tends to rather undermine the entire point of light shields if the GM is presenting such severe limits on free actions whenever you try to hold something in the hand wielding a light shield. While normally I would not limit the ability to hold a weapon with the light shield hand, I am more dubious when we are speaking of a polearm or a long spear.
The light steel shield description says: "A light steel shield’s weight lets you carry other items in that hand", and the heavy steel shield says "A heavy steel shield is so heavy that you can’t use your shield hand for anything else." The wooden versions refer to the steel versions' text, keeping the same limit.
So, apparently, the weight carried by your shield arm matters (but your strength doesn't, go figure).
That, and the encumbrance of a two-handed polearm or spear, makes me think about imposing more stringent limits on switching the grip between hands in this specific situation.
The maneuver you propose is even worse, as you are letting go of the weapon while keeping it upright with your elbow, then gripping it again and having it ready to attack, all through free actions.
You need to take a specific feat (Quick draw) to do something similar as a free action when the weapon is in a scabbard, which is designed to keep the weapon in a readily accessible place. A weapon kept upright by the elbow of your shield arm is way less accessible.
Shield Brace feat on AoN
Note that there's a red ring around the PFS icon, a sign that there's an issue.
FYI the PFS note reads, When using the Shield Brace feat, treat the polearm or spear as a one-handed weapon. More specifically, when calculating the damage the weapon deals, it uses your Strength bonus instead of 1.5 times your Strength bonus, and it counts as a one-handed weapon when determining extra damage from the Power Attack feat. You may use Two-Weapon Fighting and other feats as if the polearm were a one handed weapon.
Hopefully that helps your Home GM make a decision.
that pfs ruling is clearly a nerf they added to the feat, if it was considered using one hand then the feat would have mentioned it to begin with, as it does in so many other places where that happen. the half off str and power attack alone make a big deal enough for it to be mentioned.
that aside OP, you should probably go for a Clawhand shield for a caster with shield brace. it makes things so much easier and help when grappled (which would suck in ether casting or two-handed weapon fighting) .
Azothath wrote: ...
FYI the PFS note reads, When using the Shield Brace feat, treat the polearm or spear as a one-handed weapon. More specifically, when calculating the damage the weapon deals, it uses your Strength bonus instead of 1.5 times your Strength bonus, and it counts as a one-handed weapon when determining extra damage from the Power Attack feat. You may use Two-Weapon Fighting and other feats as if the polearm were a one handed weapon.
Hopefully that helps your Home GM make a decision.
Feat requirements are shield proficiency, Shield Focus or Fighter 3rd.
Discussing Game Balance aspects:
The requirements are not much of a problem for most melee types, particularly defensive shield users.
the clarification defines 'how' it works clearing things up, addresses two issues, opens up possibilities at the cost of 2hnd damage bonuses. It does take a different tact than the above suggestions.
Allowing better damage options along with better AC options isn't the best Game Balance. Better AC still using the weapon in hand with a bit less damage seems balanced to me for feat #2 in a feat chain. You could compare it to fighting defensively, combat expertise, or use Shield Brace while fighting defensively. The TWF option makes it useful for Dex or shield bashing fighters. By 11th level we are looking at +4 to +6 AC with 2hnd weapon use and then adding fighting defensively. It is a balanced mix & the more I think about it the more I like it.
Will it fit your Home Game? That is up to your GM, campaign, and group.
we're ain't at the homebrew or game balance section, this is the Rules section.
And the rules are very clear:
If it doesn't say it stop being a two handed weapon. then it doesn't, and it uses ALL the 2 handed rules beside the ones it specifically call out to change.
If it say it work with a shield held in the other hand all together it does.
Save the homebrewing and society nerfing for their own section of the board.
Fighter's have it hard enough to scale up to casters as is, the extra feats are HIS *spellcasting* balance.
Each feat break the rules up to it and allow you to do something you just can't do without it. this is not a bug in the balance, it's a feature!
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side note, you got the requirements wrong, the proficiency and shield focus are a must, then you ether need to have bab +3 or 1st level fighter. it is meant to be easier for fighters to gain.
Azothath wrote: Azothath wrote: ...
FYI the PFS note reads, When using the Shield Brace feat, treat the polearm or spear as a one-handed weapon. More specifically, when calculating the damage the weapon deals, it uses your Strength bonus instead of 1.5 times your Strength bonus, and it counts as a one-handed weapon when determining extra damage from the Power Attack feat. You may use Two-Weapon Fighting and other feats as if the polearm were a one handed weapon.
Hopefully that helps your Home GM make a decision.
Feat requirements are shield proficiency, Shield Focus, BAB +3 or Fighter 1st. (correction) the rest is a side discussion as noted by the opening.
Diego Rossi wrote: Tom Sampson wrote: Diego Rossi asserts that a GM could rule a free action limit for holding a weapon with your light shield hand and transferring it back for a proper weapon grip, but while this is technically true, in practice it is not done as it tends to rather undermine the entire point of light shields if the GM is presenting such severe limits on free actions whenever you try to hold something in the hand wielding a light shield. While normally I would not limit the ability to hold a weapon with the light shield hand, I am more dubious when we are speaking of a polearm or a long spear.
The light steel shield description says: "A light steel shield’s weight lets you carry other items in that hand", and the heavy steel shield says "A heavy steel shield is so heavy that you can’t use your shield hand for anything else." The wooden versions refer to the steel versions' text, keeping the same limit.
So, apparently, the weight carried by your shield arm matters (but your strength doesn't, go figure). But you and I know full well that if a player were to come to the table with a character using a heavy wooden shield made of darkwood (which weighs half the normal weight), we would not rule that they can now carry other things in their shield hand just because their heavy wooden shield weighs the exact same as a regular light wooden shield. So the weight-based explanation is largely treated as flavor text rather than any source of mechanical guidance, really. I simply regard a heavy wooden shield as being physically a tad larger with a larger grip to boot and that is why the hand is no longer free to hold other things.
And besides, the average combatant using shield brace would likely have a strength score of 18 or higher at which point their monstrous strength would no doubt facilitate grasping such large objects easily, if we're looking for verisimilitude. That is also the reason why I am not troubled by the notion of grasping an entire polearm with a prehensile tail.
Quote: That, and the encumbrance of a two-handed polearm or spear, makes me think about imposing more stringent limits on switching the grip between hands in this specific situation.
The maneuver you propose is even worse, as you are letting go of the weapon while keeping it upright with your elbow, then gripping it again and having it ready to attack, all through free actions.
You need to take a specific feat (Quick draw) to do something similar as a free action when the weapon is in a scabbard, which is designed to keep the weapon in a readily accessible place. A weapon kept upright by the elbow of your shield arm is way less accessible.
Realistically speaking you are just dropping the butt of the pole to the ground and passing it to your left hand except instead of holding it with your left hand you just fold your shield-arm against your chest and grasp the spear or polearm that way. It's not a particularly difficult maneuver and it would still be more readily accessible to your weapon hand than a sheathed weapon in a scabbard since you would only need to open your shield arm and grab the pole to hold it in your weapon hand again.
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