SangoProduction
2020-12-01, 01:23 AM
The blacksmith’s shieldcraft has reached its pinnacle, allowing him to craft shields whose intricate details are too refined for anyone but him to truly master. The blacksmith does not lose his shield bonus to AC when attacking with a weapon wielded with his shield arm, and does not take two-weapon fighting penalties for his off-hand attacks when using a shield bash as one of his weapons when two-weapon fighting. This also negates the penalties from the Dual Wielding sphere.
So, from the sounds of this, it seems as though you can dual wield both a two-handed weapon, and a shield without any penalty. Is this your interpretation as well? Just as a sanity check.
Granted, I think most non-buckler shields actually require your hand regardless (barring magic), so that would only leave you with a buckler if you use a Greatsword, which can't bash.
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So, if you wanted to get full use out of this, you might opt for the Grandasa (2d4 dmg) as a main-hand weapon, and large shield + spikes (1d6 damage). So, overall, you are actually netting slightly positive damage relative to a Greatsword, and you get a shield bonus. And the added "cool factor" of not using the same weapon every time.
Taking Tower Shield Mastery talent from Equipment Sphere from Spheres of Might, you can benefit from a full +4 AC, 1d10 shield bash (with spikes), and only for -1 to attack penalties until level 5. That looks like a sweet deal, netting 10.5 average damage, which is a nice bump from 7 of Greatsword.
By level 5, you have no penalty, so you can dual wield tower shields, slightly upgrading your main hand, and enabling more shield enhancements. If only you weren't so strapped for cash.
From there, do the normal size shenanigans to boost size and thus die size and strength. And then normal weapon enchants.
But aside from that, what further optimizations can be done? I probably would never actually play it because martials are pretty one-note. But this was an interesting ability I found, and I wanted to see if it actually had potential.
So, from the sounds of this, it seems as though you can dual wield both a two-handed weapon, and a shield without any penalty. Is this your interpretation as well? Just as a sanity check.
Granted, I think most non-buckler shields actually require your hand regardless (barring magic), so that would only leave you with a buckler if you use a Greatsword, which can't bash.
-----
So, if you wanted to get full use out of this, you might opt for the Grandasa (2d4 dmg) as a main-hand weapon, and large shield + spikes (1d6 damage). So, overall, you are actually netting slightly positive damage relative to a Greatsword, and you get a shield bonus. And the added "cool factor" of not using the same weapon every time.
Taking Tower Shield Mastery talent from Equipment Sphere from Spheres of Might, you can benefit from a full +4 AC, 1d10 shield bash (with spikes), and only for -1 to attack penalties until level 5. That looks like a sweet deal, netting 10.5 average damage, which is a nice bump from 7 of Greatsword.
By level 5, you have no penalty, so you can dual wield tower shields, slightly upgrading your main hand, and enabling more shield enhancements. If only you weren't so strapped for cash.
From there, do the normal size shenanigans to boost size and thus die size and strength. And then normal weapon enchants.
But aside from that, what further optimizations can be done? I probably would never actually play it because martials are pretty one-note. But this was an interesting ability I found, and I wanted to see if it actually had potential.