Shield Master POLL: Rules as Fun!

I voted that the shove comes after the attacks because that mimics the cinematic inspiration for this feat.
Picture for a second a hero pressing her attack against an enemy, and at the end of an attack routine, finishes by knocking that enemy to the ground and staring menacingly over their prone body while each take a breath.
It’s cool, it’s fun, it’s heroic. To me, that’s what this feat is supposed to be.

OB1 said:

I voted that the shove comes after the attacks because that mimics the cinematic inspiration for this feat.
Picture for a second a hero pressing her attack against an enemy, and at the end of an attack routine, finishes by knocking that enemy to the ground and staring menacingly over their prone body while each take a breath.
It’s cool, it’s fun, it’s heroic. To me, that’s what this feat is supposed to be.

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Then there's the cinematic inspiration for this feat.
Picture for a second a hero slamming into their opponent with their shield and knocking them off balance/down lessening the opponents defense and then landing one or more solid blows with their weapon.
Its cool, it's fun, it's heroic. To me, that's what this feat is supposed to be.


Edit:Your picture isn't wrong but its definitely not the only way to see it.

Yardiff said:

Then there's the cinematic inspiration for this feat.
Picture for a second a hero slamming into their opponent with their shield and knocking them off balance lessening the opponents defense and then landing one or more solid blows with their weapon.
Its cool, it's fun, it's heroic. To me, that's what this feat is supposed to be.

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Cool. That sounds like they used one of their attacks to knock them off balance and another to stab them.

The feat, to me, uses the relentless barrage of sword swings to catch the enemy off balance, allowing for a quick flourish to knock them down at the end as they’ve been so focused on the primary attacks.

That’s why you can do it extra as a bonus. Without the string of attacks setting it up, it uses one of your attacks instead.

But I’m not arguing how anyone should rule it at their table, just how I see it, how I would rule it, and why I voted the way I did.

OB1 said:

Cool. That sounds like they used one of their attacks to knock them off balance and another to stab them.

The feat, to me, uses the relentless barrage of sword swings to catch the enemy off balance, allowing for a quick flourish to knock them down at the end as they’ve been so focused on the primary attacks.

That’s why you can do it extra as a bonus. Without the string of attacks setting it up, it uses one of your attacks instead.

But I’m not arguing how anyone should rule it at their table, just how I see it, how I would rule it, and why I voted the way I did.

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My problem with your setup is that it reads as if you get advantage (uses the relentless barrage of sword swings to catch the enemy off balance) on your shield attack which the mechanics don't give it. The way I set it up you get advantage because of the opponent be off balance/down.

But as you say, your table your playstyle.


Having the shield master shove when you want you can have either of our scenarios.

dnd4vr said:

You are thinking along the right lines but incorrect on some of your points.

1. The shove from shield master need not knock the opponent prone, you can push them away, too.
2. With TWF, if you use your attack to shove, you don't get the bonus action to attack because it requires an attack with a light melee weapon. A shove is not an attack with a weapon of any sort.
2b. If you have extra attack, you can shove (attack), attack (extra attack), attack (TWF bonus) though.

Also, with Shield Master you had two added, although not stellar but certainly useful when the time comes, features.

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1. Push 5 feet is a much narrower effect of Shove compared to knock prone. It's situationally useful, has rider effects defined by the DM, and will rarely provide more benefit than "advantage on all melee attacks until start of next turn and half movement speed until end of next turn" without a situational ruling from the DM.

2. I specified the Dual Wielder feat, which explicitly removes the Light weapon requirement. Beyond that, your argument here is essentially that it doesn't work at level 4 or for variant humans before level 5. It's a pretty rotten feat if it's only better at level 4.

2b. This is the scenario I'm presenting. Using a RAW reading, Shield Master is required to do Attack + Shove and Dual Wielder/Two Weapon Fighting is required to do Shove + Attack. However, given that Shove + Attack is better in a vacuum because the shove can benefit the character doing it, Dual Wielder is the better option for a shoving character.

Of course, if you're going for RAW readings, you get to entertain the argument that a shield is an improvised weapon and, therefore, Dual Wielder allows you to actually attack with a shield, making Dual Wielder the better shield user overall. Sure, you need Tavern Brawler to get proficiency to hit, but the additional +1 to AC on top of the sheild's +2 is really pretty ridiculous even in the face of evasion.

Sure, Crawford says that wasn't the intent and some later tweets avoid answering at all, but when Crawford uses the "I" word, you pretty much know that the RAW support the more absurd reading. That is, of course, why a flat strict RAW reading is a bad idea in general.

Bacon Bits said:

1. Push 5 feet is a much narrower effect of Shove compared to knock prone. It's situationally useful, has rider effects defined by the DM, and will rarely provide more benefit than "advantage on all melee attacks until start of next turn and half movement speed until end of next turn" without a situational ruling from the DM.

2. I specified the Dual Wielder feat, which explicitly removes the Light weapon requirement. Beyond that, your argument here is essentially that it doesn't work at level 4 or for variant humans before level 5. It's a pretty rotten feat if it's only better at level 4.

2b. This is the scenario I'm presenting. Using a RAW reading, Shield Master is required to do Attack + Shove and Dual Wielder/Two Weapon Fighting is required to do Shove + Attack. However, given that Shove + Attack is better in a vacuum because the shove can benefit the character doing it, Dual Wielder is the better option for a shoving character.

Of course, if you're going for RAW readings, you get to entertain the argument that a shield is an improvised weapon and, therefore, Dual Wielder allows you to actually attack with a shield, making Dual Wielder the better shield user overall. Sure, you need Tavern Brawler to get proficiency to hit, but the additional +1 to AC on top of the sheild's +2 is really pretty ridiculous even in the face of evasion.

Sure, Crawford says that wasn't the intent and some later tweets avoid answering at all, but when Crawford uses the "I" word, you pretty much know that the RAW support the more absurd reading. That is, of course, why a flat strict RAW reading is a bad idea in general.

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1. I never said pushing away was better than knock prone or implied it, I simply stated that you do not have to knock your opponent prone. If you shove them away 5 feet after you have attacked, for instance, you can move without granting an OA at all from that target (unless it's reach is 10 feet or greater).

2. True, Dual Wielder removes the Light weapon requirement, but it only changes it to include non-Light weapons as well. A Shove is not a "weapon" attack and so will not grant you the bonus attack from TWF. In fact, although labeled a "special attack", it is actually an ability check. That was my point and was clarified in the SAC. If a DM wants to interpret it otherwise, that is up to the table, but that isn't how our DM does it at least nor my interpretation either.

2b. We do play that a shield is an improvised weapon and a player took Tavern Brawler and Dual Wielder, gaining a lot of benefits, but then again he used two feats to get them so the DM was okay with it.

Actually, once you have Extra Attack, you don't even need Dual Wielder. You can: shove (Attack action), weapon #1 (Attack action), weapon #2 (TWF Bonus action). You can even use light weapons, making Rogue sneak attacking likely always available if you have it.

Since you were arguing about the Shield Master shove having to be last, then sure, once you get to a certain point there are better options when it comes to purely shoving.

But although it is listed first in the features of Shield Master, the fighter I played wanted it more for the benefit to Dex saves (in which he was NOT proficient!) and resisting AoE spell damage better when he made it, the shove was tertiary at the time. For me, because of the additional benefits and not requiring Extra Attack, that was why I felt Shield Master is better for shoving that TWF which couldn't even attack and shove at all until Extra Attack was gained (again, our table doesn't consider the shove a weapon attack).

If you don't care about the extra features of Shield Master much, if you allow the shove to count as a weapon attack for TWF, and if you have the Dual Wielder Feat so said shove has the "Light" condition removed as well, then sure Dual Wielder/TWF is better at simply shoving. But, that is a lot of if's and wouldn't fly at our table anyway.

Bacon Bits said:

Sure, Crawford says that wasn't the intent and some later tweets avoid answering at all, but when Crawford uses the "I" word, you pretty much know that the RAW support the more absurd reading. That is, of course, why a flat strict RAW reading is a bad idea in general.

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I agree a lot with you on JC's answers to some of the tweets I've read. He is purposefully ambiguous often times and challenges the question with one of his own instead of just giving a ruling. Honestly, even though a lot of players might not like my responses, I wish I could answer for him--at least then you would get a straight response all the time!

I'm surprised there are only 5 votes for no feats.

Yardiff said:

I'm surprised there are only 5 votes for no feats.

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I suspect the overlap of people who play without feats and people who read these forums is probably fairly small.