SRD said:Unarmed Attacks: Striking for damage with punches, kicks, and head butts is much like attacking with a melee weapon, except for the following:
Grappling Requirements
The rules don't go into much detail about when you're capable of making grapple attacks. Common sense, however, suggests a few minimal requirements.
Because grappling involves grabbing and holding a foe, you need both hands to do it.
Since most shields in the D&D game are strapped to your forearm, you can let go of the shield and use your shield hand for grappling. You can grab or hold a foe with a buckler strapped to your arm at no penalty. A light shield imposes a -1 penalty on grapple checks you make offensively. A heavy shield imposes a -2 penalty. You can't initiate a grapple while using a tower shield. Your shield doesn't affect any grapple checks you make defensively (such as check to escape a foe's hold).
Fangor the Fierce said:Says in the Grappling Requirements, you do need both hands...
The Stupid Article said:Because grappling involves grabbing and holding a foe, you need both hands to do it.
Since most shields in the D&D game are strapped to your forearm, you can let go of the shield and use your shield hand for grappling. You can grab or hold a foe with a buckler strapped to your arm at no penalty. A light shield imposes a -1 penalty on grapple checks you make offensively. A heavy shield imposes a -2 penalty. You can't initiate a grapple while using a tower shield. Your shield doesn't affect any grapple checks you make defensively (such as check to escape a foe's hold).
Creatures that lack manipulative appendages can make grapple attacks if they have body parts they can wrap around foes or some means of clamping down on a target. For example, a snake can grapple by biting and wrapping its body around a foe.
Once again, another WotC source that needs to be completely ignored in any serious rules discussion.
atom crash said:I've been wondering for some time if the Rules of the Game series is proofed by game designers for rules discrepancies. Or are the installments just proofed for spelling, then turned over to the Web staff to be posted? Hmmm.
There's been a number of wierd, bad, awkward rulings creeping into "official" sources via RotG and the FAQ, and it troubles me.
The RotG articles are (IIRC) actually written by a game designer: Skip Williams.