Crossbow expert explicitly allows you to fire a hand crossbow with a bonus action while attacking with a one handed melee weapon. Any general rules surrounding the ammunition property that prevent using a crossbow with an occupied hand are overwritten by the feat's specific rule allowing it. You can't do that with swift quiver since they both require a bonus action. War caster is useful for maintaining concentration and will allow you to cast with a weapon in both hands but again you can't cast, attack, and fire the crossbow in a single round unless you're using a reaction cast time spell such as absorb elements.
The specific rule in number 3 does not overrule the general rule about ammunition requirement, and it’s not a contradiction either because you technically still can fire the hand crossbow after making an attack, as long as it’s already been loaded from the round before.
At this point the argument becomes largely technical and semantic but for the sake of continuing the discussion:
The ammunition property specifies that "Drawing the ammunition from a quiver, case, or other container is part of the attack (you need a free hand to load a one-handed weapon). " It makes no provision for preloading ammo. It follows therefor that if you can attack with a one handed crossbow while holding a weapon in the other hand then you can also load it since that is part of any attack involving an ammunition weapon and the one handed crossbow is an ammunition weapon.
At this point the argument becomes largely technical and semantic but for the sake of continuing the discussion:
The ammunition property specifies that "Drawing the ammunition from a quiver, case, or other container is part of the attack (you need a free hand to load a one-handed weapon). " It makes no provision for preloading ammo. It follows therefor that if you can attack with a one handed crossbow while holding a weapon in the other hand then you can also load it since that is part of any attack involving an ammunition weapon and the one handed crossbow is an ammunition weapon.
But CBE doesn't let you "attack with a one handed crossbow while holding a weapon in the other hand". That text is absent from the feat - specifically, the "other hand" notation. Frank already gave you the text and he was spot on, but I'll repeat it, since it doesn't seem to have sunk in.
When you use the Attack action and attack with a one-handed weapon, you can use a bonus action to attack with a hand crossbow you are holding.
At this point the argument becomes largely technical and semantic but for the sake of continuing the discussion:
The ammunition property specifies that "Drawing the ammunition from a quiver, case, or other container is part of the attack (you need a free hand to load a one-handed weapon). " It makes no provision for preloading ammo. It follows therefor that if you can attack with a one handed crossbow while holding a weapon in the other hand then you can also load it since that is part of any attack involving an ammunition weapon and the one handed crossbow is an ammunition weapon.
This has been discussed at length for many many years and Sage Advice has a piece on it already. If you want to rule differently in your games you’re more than welcome 🙂
For additional reference, the Loading property doesn’t have anything to really do with loading the crossbow at all, all it does is restrict the attacks per round.
The Ammunition property is what required you to load and have a free hand to grab the ammunition. The crossbow expert feat does nothing to ignore this property.
You can fire a LOADED hand xbow as a bonus action but loading that hand bow is either going to take 2 hands+time or significant time and concentration to do it one handed - especially in combat. This is the reason pirates and even gunfighters in the 1800s carried multiple weapons. If you want to carry multiple hand bows and grab and fire one each round as a bonus action ok but not the same one.
Its the Ammunition property, not the loading property that requires two hands.
The specific rule in number 3 does not overrule the general rule about ammunition requirement, and it’s not a contradiction either because you technically still can fire the hand crossbow after making an attack, as long as it’s already been loaded from the round before.
At this point the argument becomes largely technical and semantic but for the sake of continuing the discussion:
The ammunition property specifies that "Drawing the ammunition from a quiver, case, or other container is part of the attack (you need a free hand to load a one-handed weapon). " It makes no provision for preloading ammo. It follows therefor that if you can attack with a one handed crossbow while holding a weapon in the other hand then you can also load it since that is part of any attack involving an ammunition weapon and the one handed crossbow is an ammunition weapon.
But CBE doesn't let you "attack with a one handed crossbow while holding a weapon in the other hand". That text is absent from the feat - specifically, the "other hand" notation. Frank already gave you the text and he was spot on, but I'll repeat it, since it doesn't seem to have sunk in.
This has been discussed at length for many many years and Sage Advice has a piece on it already. If you want to rule differently in your games you’re more than welcome 🙂
For additional reference, the Loading property doesn’t have anything to really do with loading the crossbow at all, all it does is restrict the attacks per round.
The Ammunition property is what required you to load and have a free hand to grab the ammunition. The crossbow expert feat does nothing to ignore this property.
You can fire a LOADED hand xbow as a bonus action but loading that hand bow is either going to take 2 hands+time or significant time and concentration to do it one handed - especially in combat. This is the reason pirates and even gunfighters in the 1800s carried multiple weapons. If you want to carry multiple hand bows and grab and fire one each round as a bonus action ok but not the same one.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.