Sadly I don't think there's any doubt that you are not holding your claws, so they will never work with two weapon fighting.. However! If you're looking for an appropriate alternative, the longtooth shifter has a bonus action bite attack.. It takes a lil more setting up, but I personally think It's a pretty cool combo.. Full werewolf.
That way you also don't have to try to do some weird weapon juggling just to get off a bonus action attack ^^.
Remember that the game is balanced (and thus designed) around the idea that multiclassing, feats and magical items are optional and thus not necessarily considered when designing new content... And given that you'd need to have the Duel Wielding feat in the first place to even begin to think of using claws to attack with an off hand attack...
Just to re-iterate, the feat is not necessary to employ claws in order to make the four attacks you're trying to make. Any clawbarian with Extra Attack and a pair of shortswords can make 3 attacks at 1d6+STR+Rage Bonus and 1 attack at 1d6+Rage Bonus. What you need the feat for is replacing one of the first three d6s and the latter d6 with a d8, and for gaining +1 AC in this setup.
EDIT: For completion's sake, without any feats, just a longsword and a shield, the clawbarian can also swing for 1 1d8 attack and 2 1d6 attacks, all with STR and Rage bonus, and be at +2 AC. This will also free up their bonus action. With just a greatsword, the clawbarian can swing for 1 2d6 attack and 2 1d6 attacks, which will deal more damage than 2 greatsword attacks, due to the STR and Rage bonuses applying to each attack individually.
Remember that the game is balanced (and thus designed) around the idea that multiclassing, feats and magical items are optional and thus not necessarily considered when designing new content...
Can I suggest this is silly? Optional doesn't just mean they might not be relevant, it also means they might be. This isn't exactly some esoteric confluence of mechanics that was impossible to foresee either. If you give characters two natural weapons, it stands to reason they might want to use the few existing mechanics around attacking with two weapons.
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My point is that people are WAAAAYYYYY too hung up on Exact Wording and Technical Language. 5th edition is written with the assumption that natural language is better for the game, and let each individual GM figure out what that means for the game. Sure, there's a few technical words here and there - the light property on melee weapons, for instance, is a technical term used in the game.
But is "held" really a technical word and intention? "Holding?" That's really stretching, imho. Casual, natural language is inexact. People are arguing about the definition of "in," for goodness' sake.
The simple fact of the matter is that, when 5e was published, there was a decision that only the text and what Crawford said mattered, not anyone else. Then, a year or two ago, Crawford's words were no longer canon - only what's written in the books and published as official errata. Any tweet from a writer is just what they would rule in their personal game, not Official Rules.
I frankly don't care about juggling weapons to pull off four attacks - rather, I think its a sign that people are reading too much into things and trying to make it an exercise of exact wording, which 5e doesn't do well.
My point is that people are WAAAAYYYYY too hung up on Exact Wording and Technical Language. 5th edition is written with the assumption that natural language is better for the game, and let each individual GM figure out what that means for the game.
I don't disagree with that sentiment, I just feel that it doesn't excuse the apparent lack of effort made. I guess it's my inner editor piping up, but I think we should be allowed to expect a bit better than what we're getting regardless of being able to do what we want anyway - particularly since in AL we're not able to just do whatever we want, uniformity is a core aspect of those games.
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*shrugs* If you want to go with AL rules? Well, from my experience in AL and with Crawford's now-unofficial tweets, natural weapons are counted as "being wielded" and don't count as being unarmed.
Wielded, if you look it it up in a dictionary, is literally defined as "being held."
So, mechanically speaking, natural weapons count as being held, despite them not literally being held in your hand.
Thus, AL would default to being able to use TWF with natural weapons once you have the Dual Wielding feat. Natural Weapons aren't light, so you need the feat to use TWF with them.
You master fighting with two weapons, gaining the following benefits:
You gain a +1 bonus to AC while you are wielding a separate melee weapon in each hand.
You can use two-weapon fighting even when the one-handed melee weapons you are wielding aren't light.
You can draw or stow two one-handed weapons when you would normally be able to draw or stow only one.
So why wouldn't they work for dual wielder in the final version given that they are two simple melee weapons that you are wielding?
For the record, there's no balance reason to stop the clawbarian from dual wielding claws with the feat, but the twf text in the phb that the feat's second bullet point references says you have to be *holding* weapons, and the bullet point only modifies the part about light weapons, not the holding - it remains RAW that in order to TWF, you must be *holding* weapons. That's what causes all the confusion and rules discussion.
But, as I assume this thread has mentioned - I merely skimmed it - by level 5 the point is moot. A clawbarian with the feat and Extra Attack can do this sequence without violating the RAW:
1) Dual wielding longswords, attack with first longsword during Attack action.
2) Drop second longsword, attack with claw twice.
3) Pick up second longsword.
4) Attack with second longsword as bonus action.
So there's no really good reason to force the Barbarian to actually have a second longsword to perform the above sequence. There are some mechanical differences, especially if only one longsword is magical, but come on.
In fact, even without the feat, the above sequence is legal with shortswords, so you can houserule the claws have the light keyword without any balance concerns.
There's absolutely a balance reason to stop the clawbarian from being able to make four attacks a round at level 5. It's four attacks with rage bonus on top. It's pretty obvious to anyone not trying to bend the rules in their favor that this feature was written with the rules clearly in mind - that these claws did not work with TWF, so they built the extra attack that you would have gotten from TWF into the feature.
Besides being absolutely ridiculous, constantly dropping and picking up your weapons off the ground in the middle of a heated battle is clearly an exploit of action limitations and should in no way be trotted out as the RAW standard for what you should be able to do. If it was intended there would not be a limit of one draw/stow per turn. It's like finding one loophole that allows you to avoid paying taxes and then asserting that you don't have to pay taxes in any other case either because your loophole is now the standard of how taxes should work.
I houserule and homebrew too much to want to go with AL rules (in fact, for me claws count as light). The point is, if there's going to be something like AL the notion of relying on natural language and having DMs interpret the rules as they see fit seems flawed. For AL, you want all DMs to use the same rules as much as possible. There are always going to be things slipping through the cracks and that's not the end of the world either, but that's a far cry from "designers don't have to pay these optional things any mind".
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You master fighting with two weapons, gaining the following benefits:
You gain a +1 bonus to AC while you are wielding a separate melee weapon in each hand.
You can use two-weapon fighting even when the one-handed melee weapons you are wielding aren't light.
You can draw or stow two one-handed weapons when you would normally be able to draw or stow only one.
So why wouldn't they work for dual wielder in the final version given that they are two simple melee weapons that you are wielding?
For the record, there's no balance reason to stop the clawbarian from dual wielding claws with the feat, but the twf text in the phb that the feat's second bullet point references says you have to be *holding* weapons, and the bullet point only modifies the part about light weapons, not the holding - it remains RAW that in order to TWF, you must be *holding* weapons. That's what causes all the confusion and rules discussion.
But, as I assume this thread has mentioned - I merely skimmed it - by level 5 the point is moot. A clawbarian with the feat and Extra Attack can do this sequence without violating the RAW:
1) Dual wielding longswords, attack with first longsword during Attack action.
2) Drop second longsword, attack with claw twice.
3) Pick up second longsword.
4) Attack with second longsword as bonus action.
So there's no really good reason to force the Barbarian to actually have a second longsword to perform the above sequence. There are some mechanical differences, especially if only one longsword is magical, but come on.
In fact, even without the feat, the above sequence is legal with shortswords, so you can houserule the claws have the light keyword without any balance concerns.
There's absolutely a balance reason to stop the clawbarian from being able to make four attacks a round at level 5. It's four attacks with rage bonus on top. It's pretty obvious to anyone not trying to bend the rules in their favor that this feature was written with the rules clearly in mind - that these claws did not work with TWF, so they built the extra attack that you would have gotten from TWF into the feature.
Besides being absolutely ridiculous, constantly dropping and picking up your weapons off the ground in the middle of a heated battle is clearly an exploit of action limitations and should in no way be trotted out as the RAW standard for what you should be able to do. If it was intended there would not be a limit of one draw/stow per turn. It's like finding one loophole that allows you to avoid paying taxes and then asserting that you don't have to pay taxes in any other case either because your loophole is now the standard of how taxes should work.
I agree that the dropping and picking up weapons is clearly an exploit.. But I dunno about the balance thing. Yea 4 attacks sounds like (and is) a lot of attacks, but in comparion it's only 1 attack more than any other character with multiattack, which is the entire feature of the claw barbarian at that level
There's absolutely a balance reason to stop the clawbarian from being able to make four attacks a round at level 5. It's four attacks with rage bonus on top. It's pretty obvious to anyone not trying to bend the rules in their favor that this feature was written with the rules clearly in mind - that these claws did not work with TWF, so they built the extra attack that you would have gotten from TWF into the feature.
Besides being absolutely ridiculous, constantly dropping and picking up your weapons off the ground in the middle of a heated battle is clearly an exploit of action limitations and should in no way be trotted out as the RAW standard for what you should be able to do. If it was intended there would not be a limit of one draw/stow per turn. It's like finding one loophole that allows you to avoid paying taxes and then asserting that you don't have to pay taxes in any other case either because your loophole is now the standard of how taxes should work.
I don't think you understand. The clawbarian can make 4 attacks at level 5, full stop. Nothing you can do can stop them unless you explicitly house rule a nerf that changes the RAW. If you ban the dual wielder feat, you can stop two of the attacks from using 1d8 instead of 1d6. But baseline, with no rules changes, any clawbarian with a pair of shortswords can make those four attacks.
There is no limit of 1 draw/stow per turn. The limit of 1 free draw/stow per turn is what enables the four attacks.
I don't think you understand. The clawbarian can make 4 attacks at level 5, full stop. Nothing you can do can stop them unless you explicitly house rule a nerf that changes the RAW. If you ban the dual wielder feat, you can stop two of the attacks from using 1d8 instead of 1d6. But baseline, with no rules changes, any clawbarian with a pair of shortswords can make those four attacks.
There is no limit of 1 draw/stow per turn. The limit of 1 free draw/stow per turn is what enables the four attacks.
A Barbarian 5 can use the Attack action with Extra Attack to make two weapon attacks (2 attacks, Attack1 and Attack2).
If one or more of those attacks was made with claws (CAttack1 and/or CAttack2), then a third attack using claws is unlocked (CAttack3). Those don't need to be different claws, the feature doesn't say anything about needing to alternate hands, your right claw can make both the triggering CAttack1 and the extra CAttack3.
If the other attack from you Attack is made with a light weapon, you can start to see how you'd be able to make a Bonus Action Two-Weapon Fighting attack with a different light melee weapon.... but wait, didn't you need empty hands to be claws? Wouldn't this take three hands? No:
Start of round: one empty hand (claw), one hand holding a Shortsword or other light melee weapon.
Absolute free action: drop one sword at end of round, doesn't require [Tooltip Not Found] because dropping is always free.
Quin is correct, this is indisputably a RAW way for the Barbarian to have four melee attacks per round at level 5. What is at stake is... can the Barbarian skip the Shortsword drawing/dropping shennanigans, and just do this with claws, once they've spent a feat on taking Dual Wielder?
If truth, beauty, and justice were on your side, yeah why not, it clearly is not much stronger than doing it with swords, and you've even spent a feat! In strictest reality, though, you are not "holding" your claws, only wielding them, so no.
To be fair it says that you are wielding weapons, not wielding in hand. Wield can mean to utilize. That is where you get sentences like "he wielded the influence of his office with poise and grace."
Even if it is in hand, the claws are in their hands. They're literally attached to their fingers and extend out from inside of them.
Actually, it isn't that simple. The game designers said it doesn't work because they don't have the light weapon property, then they added in a line specifically declaring them as simple, melee weapons after they had made the original ruling. Even then the original ruling never answered the question of dual wielder removing the need for a weapon to have the light property. That was left unanswered.
The discussion is now centered around that new line and it's interaction with the dual wielder feat. There has been no ruling on that by the game designers. Instead people are arguing about the definition of wield and in for what those exactly mean.
The answer of course is ask your dm, but the question of RAW is that it is unanswered. It is important for things like Adventurers League which is supposed to be strict RAW. Realistically, the taking of this feat just brings dual wielding barbarians to be on par with great weapon master barbarians in terms of damage. It doesn't provide an unfair advantage. It just allows for dual wielding to keep up with the main damage build used by barbarians.
Even in AL rules... the simple fact of the matter is that its never been clarified if Natural Weapons are wielded or not. This is a grey area. And the official rules for AL make it clear that the DM is empowered to make calls for such grey areas. Even Crawford has never clarified this issue.
In the end, even the AL is leaving it up to the DM. The people here can make the call in any direction they want, but that ruling is not official.
Actually, it isn't that simple. The game designers said it doesn't work because they don't have the light weapon property, then they added in a line specifically declaring them as simple, melee weapons after they had made the original ruling. Even then the original ruling never answered the question of dual wielder removing the need for a weapon to have the light property. That was left unanswered.
The discussion is now centered around that new line and it's interaction with the dual wielder feat. There has been no ruling on that by the game designers. Instead people are arguing about the definition of wield and in for what those exactly mean.
The answer of course is ask your dm, but the question of RAW is that it is unanswered. It is important for things like Adventurers League which is supposed to be strict RAW. Realistically, the taking of this feat just brings dual wielding barbarians to be on par with great weapon master barbarians in terms of damage. It doesn't provide an unfair advantage. It just allows for dual wielding to keep up with the main damage build used by barbarians.
Again it is very clearly spelled out - just because it is a simple melee weapon doesn't mean it is light. There are many simple weapons that do not have the light property. Of the 10 weapons listed in the players book only 5 have the light property so 50% The Claws class feature does not at any point call the claws a simple melee weapon with the light property. Which means it does not have it. The suggestion that "it doesn't say that they aren't so that means they are" is patently ridiculous so don't waste time going there.
That the dual wielder removes the need for the weapon to be light is both not in question and also immaterial because it still requires you to hold a weapon in each hand - Tell me do you hold your fingernails in your hand or are they just there, growing on your fingers? Fingernails are just smaller, non retractable claws. I understand that you want your loophole around the rules to be accepted, and you can try to twist word meanings as much as you like, but it is very clear to anyone that isn't a munchkin.
You can also achieve 4 attacks per round by taking Polearm Mastery.
Polearm Mastery applies to a spear or staff, even used in one hand.
Two-handed weapons are only held in two hands when being used to make an attack, so they don't interfere with use of claws anyway.
Unless you took a fighter dip for two weapon fighting style you'll also do more damage this way -- your full attack routine at Str 18 will be 1d10+6(halberd)/1d4+6(PAM)/1d6+6(claw 1)/1d6+6(claw 2) (total 39), while your best-case for two-weapon fighting is 1d8+6/1d8+2/1d6+6/1d6+6 (36). Plus you might get an additional reaction attack per round.
Yes, I think that people are missing that held is what stops the claws from working, not the light thing.
That's just your interpretation of the rules, not canon. Repeating the same argument isn't going to change minds.
The D&D team has never made this clear. Not even Crawford. There's bits that suggest that Natural Weapons should be considered as a wielded weapon, but it remains unclear, so its a grey area that should be addressed by individual DMs. And, before you complain, wielded literally means "held" too. So if natural weapons are considered wielded for mechanical purposes, they count.
You can also achieve 4 attacks per round by taking Polearm Mastery.
Polearm Mastery applies to a spear or staff, even used in one hand.
Two-handed weapons are only held in two hands when being used to make an attack, so they don't interfere with use of claws anyway.
Unless you took a fighter dip for two weapon fighting style you'll also do more damage this way -- your full attack routine at Str 18 will be 1d10+6(halberd)/1d4+6(PAM)/1d6+6(claw 1)/1d6+6(claw 2) (total 39), while your best-case for two-weapon fighting is 1d8+6/1d8+2/1d6+6/1d6+6 (36). Plus you might get an additional reaction attack per round.
With PAM you only get a bonus action attack if you only attack with that weapon.
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Sadly I don't think there's any doubt that you are not holding your claws, so they will never work with two weapon fighting.. However! If you're looking for an appropriate alternative, the longtooth shifter has a bonus action bite attack.. It takes a lil more setting up, but I personally think It's a pretty cool combo.. Full werewolf.
That way you also don't have to try to do some weird weapon juggling just to get off a bonus action attack ^^.
Just to re-iterate, the feat is not necessary to employ claws in order to make the four attacks you're trying to make. Any clawbarian with Extra Attack and a pair of shortswords can make 3 attacks at 1d6+STR+Rage Bonus and 1 attack at 1d6+Rage Bonus. What you need the feat for is replacing one of the first three d6s and the latter d6 with a d8, and for gaining +1 AC in this setup.
EDIT: For completion's sake, without any feats, just a longsword and a shield, the clawbarian can also swing for 1 1d8 attack and 2 1d6 attacks, all with STR and Rage bonus, and be at +2 AC. This will also free up their bonus action. With just a greatsword, the clawbarian can swing for 1 2d6 attack and 2 1d6 attacks, which will deal more damage than 2 greatsword attacks, due to the STR and Rage bonuses applying to each attack individually.
Can I suggest this is silly? Optional doesn't just mean they might not be relevant, it also means they might be. This isn't exactly some esoteric confluence of mechanics that was impossible to foresee either. If you give characters two natural weapons, it stands to reason they might want to use the few existing mechanics around attacking with two weapons.
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My point is that people are WAAAAYYYYY too hung up on Exact Wording and Technical Language. 5th edition is written with the assumption that natural language is better for the game, and let each individual GM figure out what that means for the game. Sure, there's a few technical words here and there - the light property on melee weapons, for instance, is a technical term used in the game.
But is "held" really a technical word and intention? "Holding?" That's really stretching, imho. Casual, natural language is inexact. People are arguing about the definition of "in," for goodness' sake.
The simple fact of the matter is that, when 5e was published, there was a decision that only the text and what Crawford said mattered, not anyone else. Then, a year or two ago, Crawford's words were no longer canon - only what's written in the books and published as official errata. Any tweet from a writer is just what they would rule in their personal game, not Official Rules.
I frankly don't care about juggling weapons to pull off four attacks - rather, I think its a sign that people are reading too much into things and trying to make it an exercise of exact wording, which 5e doesn't do well.
Claws are wielded, but they sure as shootin’ ain’t held.
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I don't disagree with that sentiment, I just feel that it doesn't excuse the apparent lack of effort made. I guess it's my inner editor piping up, but I think we should be allowed to expect a bit better than what we're getting regardless of being able to do what we want anyway - particularly since in AL we're not able to just do whatever we want, uniformity is a core aspect of those games.
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*shrugs* If you want to go with AL rules? Well, from my experience in AL and with Crawford's now-unofficial tweets, natural weapons are counted as "being wielded" and don't count as being unarmed.
Wielded, if you look it it up in a dictionary, is literally defined as "being held."
So, mechanically speaking, natural weapons count as being held, despite them not literally being held in your hand.
Thus, AL would default to being able to use TWF with natural weapons once you have the Dual Wielding feat. Natural Weapons aren't light, so you need the feat to use TWF with them.
There's absolutely a balance reason to stop the clawbarian from being able to make four attacks a round at level 5. It's four attacks with rage bonus on top. It's pretty obvious to anyone not trying to bend the rules in their favor that this feature was written with the rules clearly in mind - that these claws did not work with TWF, so they built the extra attack that you would have gotten from TWF into the feature.
Besides being absolutely ridiculous, constantly dropping and picking up your weapons off the ground in the middle of a heated battle is clearly an exploit of action limitations and should in no way be trotted out as the RAW standard for what you should be able to do. If it was intended there would not be a limit of one draw/stow per turn. It's like finding one loophole that allows you to avoid paying taxes and then asserting that you don't have to pay taxes in any other case either because your loophole is now the standard of how taxes should work.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
I houserule and homebrew too much to want to go with AL rules (in fact, for me claws count as light). The point is, if there's going to be something like AL the notion of relying on natural language and having DMs interpret the rules as they see fit seems flawed. For AL, you want all DMs to use the same rules as much as possible. There are always going to be things slipping through the cracks and that's not the end of the world either, but that's a far cry from "designers don't have to pay these optional things any mind".
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I agree that the dropping and picking up weapons is clearly an exploit.. But I dunno about the balance thing. Yea 4 attacks sounds like (and is) a lot of attacks, but in comparion it's only 1 attack more than any other character with multiattack, which is the entire feature of the claw barbarian at that level
I don't think you understand. The clawbarian can make 4 attacks at level 5, full stop. Nothing you can do can stop them unless you explicitly house rule a nerf that changes the RAW. If you ban the dual wielder feat, you can stop two of the attacks from using 1d8 instead of 1d6. But baseline, with no rules changes, any clawbarian with a pair of shortswords can make those four attacks.
There is no limit of 1 draw/stow per turn. The limit of 1 free draw/stow per turn is what enables the four attacks.
A Barbarian 5 can use the Attack action with Extra Attack to make two weapon attacks (2 attacks, Attack1 and Attack2).
If one or more of those attacks was made with claws (CAttack1 and/or CAttack2), then a third attack using claws is unlocked (CAttack3). Those don't need to be different claws, the feature doesn't say anything about needing to alternate hands, your right claw can make both the triggering CAttack1 and the extra CAttack3.
If the other attack from you Attack is made with a light weapon, you can start to see how you'd be able to make a Bonus Action Two-Weapon Fighting attack with a different light melee weapon.... but wait, didn't you need empty hands to be claws? Wouldn't this take three hands? No:
Quin is correct, this is indisputably a RAW way for the Barbarian to have four melee attacks per round at level 5. What is at stake is... can the Barbarian skip the Shortsword drawing/dropping shennanigans, and just do this with claws, once they've spent a feat on taking Dual Wielder?
If truth, beauty, and justice were on your side, yeah why not, it clearly is not much stronger than doing it with swords, and you've even spent a feat! In strictest reality, though, you are not "holding" your claws, only wielding them, so no.
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To be fair it says that you are wielding weapons, not wielding in hand. Wield can mean to utilize. That is where you get sentences like "he wielded the influence of his office with poise and grace."
Even if it is in hand, the claws are in their hands. They're literally attached to their fingers and extend out from inside of them.
Actually, it isn't that simple. The game designers said it doesn't work because they don't have the light weapon property, then they added in a line specifically declaring them as simple, melee weapons after they had made the original ruling. Even then the original ruling never answered the question of dual wielder removing the need for a weapon to have the light property. That was left unanswered.
The discussion is now centered around that new line and it's interaction with the dual wielder feat. There has been no ruling on that by the game designers. Instead people are arguing about the definition of wield and in for what those exactly mean.
The answer of course is ask your dm, but the question of RAW is that it is unanswered. It is important for things like Adventurers League which is supposed to be strict RAW. Realistically, the taking of this feat just brings dual wielding barbarians to be on par with great weapon master barbarians in terms of damage. It doesn't provide an unfair advantage. It just allows for dual wielding to keep up with the main damage build used by barbarians.
Even in AL rules... the simple fact of the matter is that its never been clarified if Natural Weapons are wielded or not. This is a grey area. And the official rules for AL make it clear that the DM is empowered to make calls for such grey areas. Even Crawford has never clarified this issue.
In the end, even the AL is leaving it up to the DM. The people here can make the call in any direction they want, but that ruling is not official.
Again it is very clearly spelled out - just because it is a simple melee weapon doesn't mean it is light. There are many simple weapons that do not have the light property. Of the 10 weapons listed in the players book only 5 have the light property so 50% The Claws class feature does not at any point call the claws a simple melee weapon with the light property. Which means it does not have it. The suggestion that "it doesn't say that they aren't so that means they are" is patently ridiculous so don't waste time going there.
That the dual wielder removes the need for the weapon to be light is both not in question and also immaterial because it still requires you to hold a weapon in each hand - Tell me do you hold your fingernails in your hand or are they just there, growing on your fingers? Fingernails are just smaller, non retractable claws. I understand that you want your loophole around the rules to be accepted, and you can try to twist word meanings as much as you like, but it is very clear to anyone that isn't a munchkin.
Club - Light
Dagger - Finesse, light, thrown
Greatclub - Two-handed
Handaxe - Light, thrown
Javelin - Thrown
Light hammer - Light, thrown
Mace -
Quarterstaff - Versatile
Sickle - Light
Spear - Thrown, versatile
Yes, I think that people are missing that held is what stops the claws from working, not the light thing.
Basic TWF needs you to (1) hold (2) in each hand two (3) light (4) melee weapons.
Dual Wielder removes (3) from the equation. But also adds two new requirements: that the weapons be one-handed, and that the weapons be wielded.
So you're left with needing to (1) hold (2) in each hand two
light(4) melee weapons that are (5) one-handed and that (6) you're wielding.Claws fail (1), with or without Dual Wielder. That's the problem, not the meaning of wielded (which I agree, they probably are wielded).
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You can also achieve 4 attacks per round by taking Polearm Mastery.
Unless you took a fighter dip for two weapon fighting style you'll also do more damage this way -- your full attack routine at Str 18 will be 1d10+6(halberd)/1d4+6(PAM)/1d6+6(claw 1)/1d6+6(claw 2) (total 39), while your best-case for two-weapon fighting is 1d8+6/1d8+2/1d6+6/1d6+6 (36). Plus you might get an additional reaction attack per round.
We're aware of that. We're talking about what happens after you have the Dual Wielder feat, which removes the Light property requirement.
That's just your interpretation of the rules, not canon. Repeating the same argument isn't going to change minds.
The D&D team has never made this clear. Not even Crawford. There's bits that suggest that Natural Weapons should be considered as a wielded weapon, but it remains unclear, so its a grey area that should be addressed by individual DMs. And, before you complain, wielded literally means "held" too. So if natural weapons are considered wielded for mechanical purposes, they count.
With PAM you only get a bonus action attack if you only attack with that weapon.