armor spikes

[Diomeneus]

"An enhancement bonus to a suit of armor does not improve the spikes’ effectiveness, but the spikes can be made into magic weapons in their own right."

"Defending

A defending weapon allows the wielder to transfer some or all of the sword’s enhancement bonus to his AC as a bonus that stacks with all others. As a free action, the wielder chooses how to allocate the weapon’s enhancement bonus at the start of his turn before using the weapon, and the effect to AC lasts until his next turn. "

does this mean i could make my shield spikes magical and give them the defending properties so as to increase my AC?
I realize that armor is cheaper to increase magically but when your looking at 25k for the next armor upgrade I would just as soon get the +1 enhancement and then defending on the armor spikes to increase my AC that way.

 

[Darklone]

Yupp, would work. But you need to use the defending weapon. So no fighting with the sword and holding the shield with the defending spikes... nonono.

 

[Legildur]

Yes you could, but as per the FAQ, you would need to be wielding the shield in order to benefit from the defending property. This would mean incurring the attack penalties for two-weapon fighting, even if you never made an attack with the shield.

The other issue is, that unless you have a feat or other ability, attacking with the shield (or wielding it to gain the defending bonus) would mean losing the shield bonus to your AC.

Edit: Darklone just alerted me (his reponse was posted as I was typing). I was basing this on the assumption that you would still be attacking with a primary weapon.

 

[Diomeneus]

well damn! lol
thanks

 

[Hypersmurf]

does this mean i could make my shield spikes magical and give them the defending properties so as to increase my AC?

Remember, you just quoted the rules for armor spikes, not shield spikes.

You can have Banded Armor with +1 Defending Spikes, but you cannot have a Light Steel Shield with +1 Defending Spikes; you would, rather, have a +1 Defending Light Spiked Steel Shield. In the case of a shield, it is not the spikes that become a magic weapon; rather, it is the spiked shield.

In fact, you don't even need the spikes with a shield; the shield itself can be made into a magic weapon in its own right. You can have a +1 Defending Light Steel Shield with no spikes involved. (Note that the enhancement bonus to attack and damage has no effect on the shield's shield bonus.)

-Hyp.

 

[AntiStateQuixote]

Two words: Improved Shield Bash

Er, hm, three words.

And Two Weapon Fighting.

Ok, six words.


Try again.

Two Feats: Improved Shield Bash and Two Weapon Fighting.

 

[mvincent]

Yes you could, but as per the FAQ, you would need to be wielding the shield in order to benefit from the defending property. This would mean incurring the attack penalties for two-weapon fighting, even if you never made an attack with the shield.

The term "wielding" is subject to some interpretation in D&D. Many D&D authors use it to simply mean holding, as in:
"... It bestows one negative level on any evil creature attempting to wield it. The negative level remains as long as the weapon is in hand and disappears when the weapon is no longer wielded."

I typically interpret "wielding" as meaning "capable of threatening with", but one does not need to take TWF'ing penalties to threaten with an off-hand weapon (in fact, the Rules of the Game says that AoO's do not take TWF penalties at all):
"If, after you made two-weapon attacks with your sword and torch, a foe later provokes an attack of opportunity from you that same round, you can strike that foe with your longsword with no two-weapon penalty at all."

The above is written by the same author that wrote this in the 3.0 FAQ:
"Using a weapon of defending works just like the Expertise
feat. (You have to use an attack or full attack action.) You can’t
use the weapon like a shield; if you hold the weapon in your off
hand and claim an Armor Class bonus for it, you take all the
penalties for fighting with two weapons, even if you don’t
actually attack with the weapon."

These two clarifications seem to contradict each other, so we might have reason to doubt the 3.0 clarification (or at least, it's application to 3.5). I believe the 3.0 intent is still valid, but it's application might be altered a bit in 3.5.

 

[nute]

I realize that armor is cheaper to increase magically but when your looking at 25k for the next armor upgrade I would just as soon get the +1 enhancement and then defending on the armor spikes to increase my AC that way.

I would say mechanically yes - although you would suffer the penalties for two-weapon fighting, since you are actively using the armor spikes, even if you're not attacking with them.

If you were holding a +5 longsword and a +3 defending longsword, and only attacking with the +5 while using the +3 as defense? I'd rule that as two-weapon fighting. The Defending property implies using the weapon itself as defense with an untyped bonus.

Personally I think this was a mistake and it should give a Shield bonus, and that Shield bonuses should stack.

 

[Moon-Lancer]

thats silly. twf has one point, to gain an extra attack with a second weapon. Your not getting an extra attack so you dont take the penalty. Thats the balance of the feat and the -2.

Raw though, its a isse without a clear answer.

 

[mvincent]

thats silly. twf has one point, to gain an extra attack with a second weapon. Your not getting an extra attack so you dont take the penalty. Thats the balance of the feat and the -2.

I agree. For 3.5; I would keep the intent of the 3.0 FAQ (i.e. you have to take an attack action* during your turn, and the defending weapon must be wielded), but discard the TWF'ing penalty if the extra attack is not used.

*Edited for clarity