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View Full Version : Can I Hold my Greatsword in One Hand?



Zovc
2009-09-25, 09:17 PM
Let's say I'm a Battle Sorcerer holding a Greatsword. Am I able to Cast Burning Hands while holding my Greatsword, or do I have to drop it in order to cast my spell?

Ledeas
2009-09-25, 09:19 PM
Let's say I'm a Battle Sorcerer holding a Greatsword. Am I able to Cast Burning Hands while holding my Greatsword, or do I have to drop it in order to cast my spell?

Dont you need 2 hands to cast Burning Hands. I thought it was thumbs touching, fingers out in a fan, to create a 120 degree arc?

Pharaoh's Fist
2009-09-25, 09:19 PM
You can hold it in one hand. It's a free action to take a hand off.

Zovc
2009-09-25, 09:22 PM
You can hold it in one hand. It's a free action to take a hand off.

Just to be clear, is it a free action to put my hand back on the sword?

KellKheraptis
2009-09-25, 09:24 PM
Just to be clear, is it a free action to put my hand back on the sword?

If it's not, then I guess every real-world swordsman is wasting a LOT of actions...given that in order to properly spin a sword you have to remove at least one hand and then put it back on the pommel/handle/non-sharp blade section to continue centripetal motion. Hardly always efficient, but sure makes people think twice before closing :P

DragoonWraith
2009-09-25, 09:31 PM
A spinning object does not have centripetal motion, it has tangential motion. There is centripetal acceleration keeping it in a circle, but a properly spinning object should not gain any any translation.

Hat-Trick
2009-09-25, 09:38 PM
*Drags the casualty out of the way*

Yeah, you can hold a greatsword in one hand, if your DM says otherwise, you might as well be playing a videogame.

SparkMandriller
2009-09-25, 10:02 PM
Are video games well known for not letting people manipulate things while carrying large swords or something?

You're kinda losing me here bro.

Dark Herald
2009-09-25, 10:09 PM
video games are known for being bad at responding things that are creative or unique, and not letting you do things that you should be able to do, just because they hadn't been programmed in.

you can hold a greatsword in one hand, you just can't attack anyone with it.

DragoonWraith
2009-09-25, 10:12 PM
Are video games well known for not letting people manipulate things while carrying large swords or something?

You're kinda losing me here bro.
Morrowind is the only one I can think of, where you had to ready "spellcasting hands" separately from drawing a weapon, and couldn't have both. It kinda sucked. Oblivion fixed this (among other things, while simultaneously ditching everything that made Morrowind so wonderful...).

Leewei
2009-09-25, 10:13 PM
I'd say Free Action to drop it from one hand, Move Action to re-ready it, or can be re-readied as part of another Move Action.

ShadowFighter15
2009-09-25, 10:17 PM
I'd just say taking a hand off and putting it back on are both free actions; either of them would only take a fraction of a second if the person's used to doing it. I don't remember any rule stating that a character only gets one free action a turn.

SparkMandriller
2009-09-25, 10:32 PM
Morrowind is the only one I can think of, where you had to ready "spellcasting hands" separately from drawing a weapon, and couldn't have both.

Oh, trust Bethesda to come outta nowhere with terrible game design and ruin me. D:

Tetsubo 57
2009-09-26, 07:30 AM
A spinning object does not have centripetal motion, it has tangential motion. There is centripetal acceleration keeping it in a circle, but a properly spinning object should not gain any any translation.

I love you.

daggaz
2009-09-26, 07:35 AM
You can remove a hand from a 2handed weapon as a free action, cast a spell, then replace it again as a free action. Otherwise, it makes no sense whatsoever to have "quarterstaff" on the wizards weapon proficiencies, something that goes back to at least 2.0. This exact question has been answered by wizards and on the QandA thread here multiple times.