Animated shield and touch AC

[kbob]

As the title suggests, does animated shield affect touch AC? I don't see any rules on it so I assume, no. However, logically, it makes sense to me which caused me to wonder if I may have missed anything. Insight?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Shield bonus never applies to touch AC as a general rule.

Some specific rules make exceptions to that, but animated shields make no such exception. Things that do include:

The feat Shield Ward (PH2) allows you to apply your shield's AC bonus to your touch AC.

The feat Parrying Shield (LoM) allows you to apply your shield's AC bonus to your touch AC. This and Shield Ward won't stack, as they're completely redundant regarding AC bonuses.

The spell Shield (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/shield.htm) applies against incorporeal touch attacks, as it's a force effect and blocks things that would otherwise pass through a physical shield.

[King of Nowhere]

exactly. by RAW, an animated shield does not contribute to touch AC.

However, since a big floating shield is something that seriously hamper attempts to touch you, and the shield is not in contact with your body, then houseruling that it does contribute to touch AC would not be unreasonable.

[MrSandman]

It's one of those things in D&D that you need a feat for them to work somewhat similarly to real life.

[fallensavior]

Floaty shields are already silly and OP and don't make any sense. Don't encourage them.

[heavyfuel]

Yeah, it might not make sense by RAW, but animated shields are completely overpowered and you really shouldn't make them any stronger than they are. In fact, nerfing/baning them is very reasonable.


It's one of those things in D&D that you need a feat for them to work somewhat similarly to real life.

There's a reason 5e (maybe 4e as well) stopped with the whole "touch AC is different" deal. Kinda makes sense, if a Ray of Enfeeblement hits a metal plate, why is the fighter behind this metal plate weakened?

[ManicOppressive]

Yeah, it might not make sense by RAW, but animated shields are completely overpowered and you really shouldn't make them any stronger than they are. In fact, nerfing/baning them is very reasonable.


Man, I could not possibly more strenuously disagree. Animated Shields are good because regular shields are just so terrible. Animated shields still have ACP, arcane failure, etc. which prevents them from being a casual catch-all for non-martial builds, and they still top out at 6 AC for a +1 Animated Tower Shield. (25,000 GP.) That's the same price as Bracers of +5 Armor, in a similar slot, with significant downsides. (From there, the scaling is just Enhancement and isn't cost-effective vs basically anything until you run out of slots to stack AC in.)

IMO any houseruling should be focused on mega-buffing all other shields to make them worth ever considering.

Also, side-note, is there anything preventing a melee opponent with a spare hand from reaching out and grabbing your animated shield?

[heavyfuel]

Man, I could not possibly more strenuously disagree. Animated Shields are good because regular shields are just so terrible. Animated shields still have ACP, arcane failure, etc. which prevents them from being a casual catch-all for non-martial builds, and they still top out at 6 AC for a +1 Animated Tower Shield. (25,000 GP.) That's the same price as Bracers of +5 Armor, in a similar slot, with significant downsides. (From there, the scaling is just Enhancement and isn't cost-effective vs basically anything until you run out of slots to stack AC in.)

IMO any houseruling should be focused on mega-buffing all other shields to make them worth ever considering.

Also, side-note, is there anything preventing a melee opponent with a spare hand from reaching out and grabbing your animated shield?

Depends on your point of view. If literally every character in the entire game has the same item, a +1 animated mithral heavy shield (druids will take a darkwood shield, and wizards/sorcerers will take a feycraft one), then I'll say the item is most definitely overpowered.

Mithral/Darkwood shields don't have ACP and can be used without proficiency. So yes, every character will have them. Even non-martials. Especially non-martials, since they probably have more wealth to spare.

The same price as a +5 bracers of armor, but a much much better bonus to AC. A run-of-the-mill Mage Armor already grants +4 to AC and lasts all day at higher levels where animated shields are commonplace. Whereas the animated shield grants with magic makeupvestment grants a +5 shield bonus, which is much less common since the Shield spell only lasts 1min/lv.

The animated shield is still part of your equipment (SRD: "protecting her as if she were using it herself"), so reaching out and grabbing it is as effective as normal disarming is, that's to say, not very effective.

If sword and board suck (it doesn't, especially with the advent of ToB) then we shouldn't make it "better" by letting everyone have a shield and benefit from it. We should just make shields better, likely by compressing feat-chains into single feats.

[Talanic]

I houseruled in that if you were proficient with a shield, you could use it to intercept incoming attacks. Intercepted attacks hit the shield itself, acting like a half-damage sunder attempt before being reduced by shield hardness, feats, etc.

And I would figure that any kind of energy flow that constituted a touch attack (any ray, etc) would, on hitting an animated shield, simply ground itself through the force used to keep the shield tethered to its bearer. In other words, no touch AC.

[Fizban]

We arguing about animated shields? I hate them as much or more than the next guy, but the fact of the matter is that until the level when the difference between 25k and 49k stops mattering, the animated property is effectively either -2 AC or something you paid for (though that's a mighty underpriced nonstandard bonus). That's not a big enough penalty as far as I'm concerned, 'specially when people already think anything less than two hands is garbage- but then I've also nerfed Mage Armor and Shield both down to +3 and instituted a whole bunch of other little AC bonuses and shield feats to whittle away at that problem. Also put a minimum ACP for non-proficient users of +4 and greater armor so you can't just stack reducers and get away with it: +3 is the most you get without proficiency or penalty in my world.

As for shields and touch AC, I'm pretty sure the problem is that touch AC was originally conceived of for things like Alchemist's Fire and Disintegrate (the original save or die version), where all you have to do is paint the target to do the job. Even Ray of Enfeeblement is more of a "point the curse at that guy" thing. But then they went nutso on ray spells and "ranged touch" damage spells, most of which are never described as the sort of grenade, doom laser, or intangible curse that the category was made for, and instead are described as tiny little beams or blobs that would splash harmlessly off a shield.

Unfortunately as bogus as that whole situation is, giving shield bonus vs touch attacks only makes the PCs more powerful. Most monsters don't use shields, but many monsters do rely on touch attacks with low bonuses in order to hit PCs: giving PCs a massive touch AC boost just means a bunch of monsters are screwed without actually fixing the underlying problems in those damage spells, while also making a number of spells and effects which actually should bypass shields require editing to work properly.

[Troacctid]

If you accept that a laser beam or a gentle poke can't be deflected by a normal shield then I don't see why it would be deflected by an animated one.

[Psyren]

I would challenge the viewpoint that just because the shield frees up your hands doesn't mean it's not touching you or otherwise impacting you in some way. After all, by explicit RAW animated shields still apply all the other limitations that "held shields" do:


A character with an animated shield still takes any penalties associated with shield use, such as armor check penalty, arcane spell failure chance, and nonproficiency.

To me this passage means they're in contact with your body in some way, and therefore that they can "conduct" enemy touch spells just like armor and regular shields can. Otherwise your training and the shield's penalties wouldn't matter.

I always visualized an animated shield as floating "along" your body to maintain it's magic, rather than flying completely free.

[King of Nowhere]

Depends on your point of view. If literally every character in the entire game has the same item, a +1 animated mithral heavy shield (druids will take a darkwood shield, and wizards/sorcerers will take a feycraft one), then I'll say the item is most definitely overpowered.


Problem is, everyone but fighters and monks and rogues will have a non-animated shield anyway.

Clerics will get big shields because they don't need melee attacks, so why not get a cheap boost to AC (unless they are using some of those cleric trip builds with spiked chain and size increase, of course)? wizards have mithril bucklers, because they have 0% spell failure and so they are a free boost to AC. Druids will get a wooden shield, when they are in animal form it melds with them anyway and otherwise it is a free boost to AC. All of the more powerful classes get benefits from regular shields anyway.
The only classes that cannot use shields regularly because they need both hands are martials (because you need a two-hander to deal significant damage), rogues that use twf or archery, and monks, for it interferes with their class abilities.

Now, monks are screwed either way, because the game hate monks apparently. but fighters and rogues can get an animated shield and be fine. animated shields only help lower tier classes stay competitive at what they do.

So, I disagree that animated shields are overpowered. Of course it's one of those bonuses that everyone wants to have - same like deviation, natural armor, resistance, enhancement... but it makes the game a bit more balanced between those who don't need both hands to do their job and those who do.

[ManicOppressive]

Personally, my actual solution to this is a feat that allows shield users to apply their Strength mod, 1.5x when fighting defensively, to their Shield bonus to AC; obviously doesn't work with animated shields. That and a few other feats have really stoked Sword-and-Board in my setting.

Also I flat doubled the base AC from shields. It makes a wall of tower shield Hobgoblins a legitimately terrifying threat to a low-level party again, and that's worth it on its own.

[Eldariel]

One of the problems is that it's just too tasty a Magic Vestment target. Easy +8 AC on level 12. Kinda silly, to be honest; PF version (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/animated/) is much more in line with what should work.

[sleepyphoenixx]

The problem with animated shields isn't that they're too cheap, it's that they're one of the very few AC options beyond basic armor that are actually considered affordable/worth buying.
Some of the time at least, plenty of people don't bother until very late because they're still not cheap.

All the other "standard" options (enhancement bonus, Rings of Protection, Amulet of Natural Armor, etc)?
The overwhelming community consensus is that they're not worth buying - you either get those from buffs or you don't get them at all.
It's so bad that buying those items is considered a noob mistake ffs.

Of course making them cheaper runs into the problem of stacking bonuses being too high, so the only real options are to offer custom items that grant a shield AC bonus or rebalance AC prices entirely (which has its own issues).
Or you can just deal with people buying animated shields.

[Fizban]

PF version (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-armor/magic-armor-and-shield-special-abilities/animated/) is much more in line with what should work.
Note also that the PF version is isn't anything new- Arms and Equipment Guide had Dancing shield at a +3 cost, but with no cooldown and the significantly more powerful "treat the shield bonus as a cover bonus" line. Of course staple spells Stone Shape and Wall of Stone can generate cover easily (and more reliably than trying to block creatures who would smash through if they couldn't attack you), but that cover doesn't move with you, etc.


All the other "standard" options (enhancement bonus, Rings of Protection, Amulet of Natural Armor, etc)?
The overwhelming community consensus is that they're not worth buying - you either get those from buffs or you don't get them at all.
It's so bad that buying those items is considered a noob mistake ffs.
Only in games that run at a power level where this is true, is it true. In games where the standard options are in fact standard, animated shields are questionable- though as I've said myself, they're not a problem until high enough levels that the cost becomes trivial (or you can ignore it via Magic Vestment).

[Psyren]

I'm not seeing a big difference between the PF and 3.5 versions of animated shields to be honest. Both versions free up your hands, both versions don't allow you to ignore penalties for shield use, both versions stay in your square, and you can cast Magic Vestment on both in lieu of paying to boost the shield permanently.

[Fizban]

It requires an action to loose, only floats for four rounds, and has a four round cooldown after that. The AC bonus doesn't apply until your turn, costs you an action, and will stop applying soon after. As opposed to the 3.5 version which is just look ma no hands all upside. Considering how charge happy and full attack or bust 3.5 op is, the PF version is a pretty significant cost until you combine it with something that gives extra move actions, dunno about PF builds though.

AaEG's using a standard action, same as a dancing weapon.

[Psyren]

Combat rarely lasts longer than 4 rounds anyway I find, so the duration and cooldown typically won't matter. The action cost might, but only at the beginning of combat. I consider those differences pretty minor.