Looking for a some clarification on using the Shove bonus action with the Shield Master feat.
The exact text reads as follows:
If you take the Attack action on your turn, you can use a bonus action to try to shove a creature within 5 feet of you with your shield.
The timing is not made clear since the purpose of the shove is also not made clear. "If you take the Attack action..." means that the this bonus action is used as part of an attack. So once you attack (hit or miss) you are free to make a follow-up shove attack that may knock your target prone, or move them a few feet away from you. This is all well an good but... if played this way it's not very useful as a feat since you are basically spending a bonus action for a chance to deprive your target of 50% of their movement speed. It's not worthless, but it's not a great value IMO.
If however the bonus action (specifically attached to the Attack action by the verbiage) can come before your attacks, you can use the shove to potentially knock the target prone before attacking them with your weapon - thus providing yourself with advantage for that attack.
Is the second method workable within the rules or am I expecting too much from the feat? I quite like the idea of charging into combat behind the shield, plowing into a target and knocking them down, then following up with a slash or jab...
It’s hard to say with a straight face that youve taken the Attack if you havent made at least one attack. Attack once, then go ahead and bonus shove, then follow up with the rest of your attacks if you have Extra Attack.
There used to be sage advice that you could take the bonus action first and lock in the action for later, but they have since reversed that opinion and officially (RAW and RAI) you must start the action first (which means making at least 1 attack/shove/grab).
Just a wild homebrew rework idea that popped into my head: maybe mix up the feat so it reads something like: “If you take the Attack action on your turn and shove with a shield you’re wielding, you can make one attack as a bonus action.”
Just a wild homebrew rework idea that popped into my head: maybe mix up the feat so it reads something like: “If you take the Attack action on your turn and shove with a shield you’re wielding, you can make one attack as a bonus action.”
Keep in mind this is a team game. Knocking an enemy prone may not directly benefit you. But it does benefit the rest of the melee members party who now have advantage on a prone target. Or the wizard who wanted to get away, and now the prone target has disadvantage on its OA against that wizard. And taking half of an opponent’s move away helps deny the enemy the position they want to take. Battlefield control isn’t necessarily about giving you an immediate advantage, it’s about helping the whole team.
Just a wild homebrew rework idea that popped into my head: maybe mix up the feat so it reads something like: “If you take the Attack action on your turn and shove with a shield you’re wielding, you can make one attack as a bonus action.”
Having a hard time imagining the edge case where this isn’t just better and more intuitive in every way. Bravo!
Keep in mind this is a team game. Knocking an enemy prone may not directly benefit you. But it does benefit the rest of the melee members party who now have advantage on a prone target. Or the wizard who wanted to get away, and now the prone target has disadvantage on its OA against that wizard. And taking half of an opponent’s move away helps deny the enemy the position they want to take. Battlefield control isn’t necessarily about giving you an immediate advantage, it’s about helping the whole team.
I 100% agree and this is why I said that it was not enitrely useless - it just wanted what I was wanting/expecting.
Having read some of these replies, and the rules for the Attack action (being able to split it up) I tink it makes sense that the first attack in the attack action MUST come first, thne the bonus action, than any other attacks you can make as part of the attack action.
I have used it plenty of times on my Battle master fighter, first attack trip attack, that failed. Ok shield shove, it works. Use rest of attacks to maul your baddie
The Shield Master feat lets you shove someone as a bonus action if you take the Attack action. Can you take that bonus action before the Attack action? No. The bonus action provided by the Shield Master feat has a pre-condition: that you take the Attack action on your turn. Intending to take that action isn’t sufficient; you must actually take it before you can take the bonus action. During your turn, you do get to decide when to take the bonus action after you’ve taken the Attack action. This sort of if-then setup appears in many of the game’s rules. The “if” must be satisfied before the “then” comes into play.
Jeremy Crawford had previously answered in favor of taking the bonus action anytime when taking the Attack action but has since revised his statement and offered futther clarifications about it on Twitter
@JeremyECrawfordAs with most bonus actions, you choose the timing, so the Shield Master shove can come before or after the Attack action.
@JeremyECrawford Clarification about bonus actions: if a feature says you can do X as a bonus action if you do Y, you must do Y before you can do X. For Shield Master, that means the bonus action must come after the Attack action. You decide when it happens afterward that turn
@JeremyECrawford In 2017, I changed the ruling on bonus action timing because the old ruling was illogical. The original ruling failed to account for the fact that X relying on Y is a form of timing. The new ruling corrects that oversight. The old ruling on bonus action timing didn't quiet questions on that timing. Instead, the illogical ruling fueled questions, and it even inadvertently led some fans to think our choice of words like "if" or "when" had super-precise meanings in bonus actions. They don't.
@JeremyECrawford Today's tweet is in response to my old tweet. I made this ruling about bonus actions last year, but the old Shield Master tweet slipped through the cracks. I'm rectifying that today.
Just a wild homebrew rework idea that popped into my head: maybe mix up the feat so it reads something like: “If you take the Attack action on your turn and shove with a shield you’re wielding, you can make one attack as a bonus action.”
Having a hard time imagining the edge case where this isn’t just better and more intuitive in every way. Bravo!
But in the above quoted wording, it doesn't specify if the shove with a shield counts as an attack or an action; since the normal combat replacement is simply to shove replacing one of your actions - the rules don't specify how that replacement shove is being performed.
Just a wild homebrew rework idea that popped into my head: maybe mix up the feat so it reads something like: “If you take the Attack action on your turn and shove with a shield you’re wielding, you can make one attack as a bonus action.”
Having a hard time imagining the edge case where this isn’t just better and more intuitive in every way. Bravo!
But in the above quoted wording, it doesn't specify if the shove with a shield counts as an attack or an action; since the normal combat replacement is simply to shove replacing one of your actions - the rules don't specify how that replacement shove is being performed.
No, the normal combat replacement is that shove is an attack made using the Attack action. If you have Extra Attack, you can attack and shove (in either order) or shove twice.
Default combat in 5E doesn't have a formal "Declaration" phase. You don't announce "I'm going to take the Attack Action" - you take the Attack Action by actually attacking. If you haven't attacked at least one then you haven't taken the Action.
It is a common house rule, though, to let people take the Bonus Action attack from Shield Master feat (and Polearm Master feat and similar) before attacking, in which case they have "locked in" taking the Attack Action.
But in the above quoted wording, it doesn't specify if the shove with a shield counts as an attack or an action; since the normal combat replacement is simply to shove replacing one of your actions - the rules don't specify how that replacement shove is being performed.
No, the normal combat replacement is that shove is an attack made using the Attack action. If you have Extra Attack, you can attack and shove (in either order) or shove twice.
Yup. You actually can't Shove as its own action (other than from the special Shield Master action, obviously), but rather only by replacing one of your attacks in the Attack action. It's for this reason that Familiars can't Shove or Grapple, because they have no Attack action. So in Saga's rewrite, there would be no ambiguity at all what the character was doing when they made an initial Shove, even if they did not have Extra Attack.
The Shield Master feat lets you shove someone as a bonus action if you take the Attack action. Can you take that bonus action before the Attack action? No. The bonus action provided by the Shield Master feat has a pre-condition: that you take the Attack action on your turn. Intending to take that action isn’t sufficient; you must actually take it before you can take the bonus action. During your turn, you do get to decide when to take the bonus action after you’ve taken the Attack action. This sort of if-then setup appears in many of the game’s rules. The “if” must be satisfied before the “then” comes into play.
Jeremy Crawford had previously answered in favor of taking the bonus action anytime when taking the Attack action but has since revised his statement and offered futther clarifications about it on Twitter
@JeremyECrawfordAs with most bonus actions, you choose the timing, so the Shield Master shove can come before or after the Attack action.
@JeremyECrawford Clarification about bonus actions: if a feature says you can do X as a bonus action if you do Y, you must do Y before you can do X. For Shield Master, that means the bonus action must come after the Attack action. You decide when it happens afterward that turn
@JeremyECrawford In 2017, I changed the ruling on bonus action timing because the old ruling was illogical. The original ruling failed to account for the fact that X relying on Y is a form of timing. The new ruling corrects that oversight. The old ruling on bonus action timing didn't quiet questions on that timing. Instead, the illogical ruling fueled questions, and it even inadvertently led some fans to think our choice of words like "if" or "when" had super-precise meanings in bonus actions. They don't.
@JeremyECrawford Today's tweet is in response to my old tweet. I made this ruling about bonus actions last year, but the old Shield Master tweet slipped through the cracks. I'm rectifying that today.
They need to stop requiring infinitive form verbs for requirements they expect to have already completed, just use past tense verbs for that. Why do they needless make things unclear like that? The bottom two tweets demonstrate not understanding this difference.
"That you take the Attack action on your turn." vs "That you have taken the Attack action on your turn."
Requiring "that you take" leaves the timing open ended and unspecified. Requiring "that you have taken" is clear as day that it means past tense and the action must already have been taken.
SagaT's version is flawless. That's for sure how it should have been written.
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I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
There used to be sage advice that you could take the bonus action first and lock in the action for later, but they have since reversed that opinion and officially (RAW and RAI) you must start the action first (which means making at least 1 attack/shove/grab).
This is always one of my favorite Sage Advice entries because he very clearly says you can do it whenever you want and then a few years later he "clarifies" that what he meant when he said that you can do it any time you want is that you can actually NOT do it anytime you want, but instead, you can do it only after the attack action has been completed.
Default combat in 5E doesn't have a formal "Declaration" phase. You don't announce "I'm going to take the Attack Action" - you take the Attack Action by actually attacking. If you haven't attacked at least one then you haven't taken the Action.
It is a common house rule, though, to let people take the Bonus Action attack from Shield Master feat (and Polearm Master feat and similar) before attacking, in which case they have "locked in" taking the Attack Action.
That can't be true or Bladesingers wouldn't be able to exist. When a level 6 Bladesinger casts a cantrip, they have to tell their DM before the spell is cast whether this is the Cast a Spell action or the Attack action, because they're not allowed to choose later - they can only cantrip and then attack if the cantrip was replacing an attack.
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Looking for a some clarification on using the Shove bonus action with the Shield Master feat.
The exact text reads as follows:
The timing is not made clear since the purpose of the shove is also not made clear. "If you take the Attack action..." means that the this bonus action is used as part of an attack. So once you attack (hit or miss) you are free to make a follow-up shove attack that may knock your target prone, or move them a few feet away from you. This is all well an good but... if played this way it's not very useful as a feat since you are basically spending a bonus action for a chance to deprive your target of 50% of their movement speed. It's not worthless, but it's not a great value IMO.
If however the bonus action (specifically attached to the Attack action by the verbiage) can come before your attacks, you can use the shove to potentially knock the target prone before attacking them with your weapon - thus providing yourself with advantage for that attack.
Is the second method workable within the rules or am I expecting too much from the feat? I quite like the idea of charging into combat behind the shield, plowing into a target and knocking them down, then following up with a slash or jab...
Taking the Attack action is the necessary condition that allows the bonus action. You can’t take the bonus action until you satisfy the requirement.
It’s hard to say with a straight face that youve taken the Attack if you havent made at least one attack. Attack once, then go ahead and bonus shove, then follow up with the rest of your attacks if you have Extra Attack.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
Yeah you have to attack first, then bonus action, works well if you have extra attack so you can spartan this.
There used to be sage advice that you could take the bonus action first and lock in the action for later, but they have since reversed that opinion and officially (RAW and RAI) you must start the action first (which means making at least 1 attack/shove/grab).
Just a wild homebrew rework idea that popped into my head: maybe mix up the feat so it reads something like: “If you take the Attack action on your turn and shove with a shield you’re wielding, you can make one attack as a bonus action.”
That would certainly clear things up quite a bit.
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Keep in mind this is a team game. Knocking an enemy prone may not directly benefit you. But it does benefit the rest of the melee members party who now have advantage on a prone target. Or the wizard who wanted to get away, and now the prone target has disadvantage on its OA against that wizard. And taking half of an opponent’s move away helps deny the enemy the position they want to take. Battlefield control isn’t necessarily about giving you an immediate advantage, it’s about helping the whole team.
Having a hard time imagining the edge case where this isn’t just better and more intuitive in every way. Bravo!
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
I 100% agree and this is why I said that it was not enitrely useless - it just wanted what I was wanting/expecting.
Having read some of these replies, and the rules for the Attack action (being able to split it up) I tink it makes sense that the first attack in the attack action MUST come first, thne the bonus action, than any other attacks you can make as part of the attack action.
I have used it plenty of times on my Battle master fighter, first attack trip attack, that failed. Ok shield shove, it works. Use rest of attacks to maul your baddie
There is a Sage Advice on this https://media.wizards.com/2020/dnd/downloads/SA-Compendium.pdf
The Shield Master feat lets you shove someone as a bonus action if you take the Attack action. Can you take that bonus action before the Attack action? No. The bonus action provided by the Shield Master feat has a pre-condition: that you take the Attack action on your turn. Intending to take that action isn’t sufficient; you must actually take it before you can take the bonus action. During your turn, you do get to decide when to take the bonus action after you’ve taken the Attack action. This sort of if-then setup appears in many of the game’s rules. The “if” must be satisfied before the “then” comes into play.
Jeremy Crawford had previously answered in favor of taking the bonus action anytime when taking the Attack action but has since revised his statement and offered futther clarifications about it on Twitter
@JeremyECrawfordAs with most bonus actions, you choose the timing, so the Shield Master shove can come before or after the Attack action.
@JeremyECrawford Clarification about bonus actions: if a feature says you can do X as a bonus action if you do Y, you must do Y before you can do X. For Shield Master, that means the bonus action must come after the Attack action. You decide when it happens afterward that turn
@JeremyECrawford In 2017, I changed the ruling on bonus action timing because the old ruling was illogical. The original ruling failed to account for the fact that X relying on Y is a form of timing. The new ruling corrects that oversight. The old ruling on bonus action timing didn't quiet questions on that timing. Instead, the illogical ruling fueled questions, and it even inadvertently led some fans to think our choice of words like "if" or "when" had super-precise meanings in bonus actions. They don't.
@JeremyECrawford Today's tweet is in response to my old tweet. I made this ruling about bonus actions last year, but the old Shield Master tweet slipped through the cracks. I'm rectifying that today.
But in the above quoted wording, it doesn't specify if the shove with a shield counts as an attack or an action; since the normal combat replacement is simply to shove replacing one of your actions - the rules don't specify how that replacement shove is being performed.
No, the normal combat replacement is that shove is an attack made using the Attack action. If you have Extra Attack, you can attack and shove (in either order) or shove twice.
Default combat in 5E doesn't have a formal "Declaration" phase. You don't announce "I'm going to take the Attack Action" - you take the Attack Action by actually attacking. If you haven't attacked at least one then you haven't taken the Action.
It is a common house rule, though, to let people take the Bonus Action attack from Shield Master feat (and Polearm Master feat and similar) before attacking, in which case they have "locked in" taking the Attack Action.
RAW, you can't but it makes more sense to do the shield bash first, so it's worth the effort to ask your DM if it's alright.
Yup. You actually can't Shove as its own action (other than from the special Shield Master action, obviously), but rather only by replacing one of your attacks in the Attack action. It's for this reason that Familiars can't Shove or Grapple, because they have no Attack action. So in Saga's rewrite, there would be no ambiguity at all what the character was doing when they made an initial Shove, even if they did not have Extra Attack.
dndbeyond.com forum tags
I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
They need to stop requiring infinitive form verbs for requirements they expect to have already completed, just use past tense verbs for that. Why do they needless make things unclear like that? The bottom two tweets demonstrate not understanding this difference.
"That you take the Attack action on your turn." vs "That you have taken the Attack action on your turn."
Requiring "that you take" leaves the timing open ended and unspecified. Requiring "that you have taken" is clear as day that it means past tense and the action must already have been taken.
SagaT's version is flawless. That's for sure how it should have been written.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
This is always one of my favorite Sage Advice entries because he very clearly says you can do it whenever you want and then a few years later he "clarifies" that what he meant when he said that you can do it any time you want is that you can actually NOT do it anytime you want, but instead, you can do it only after the attack action has been completed.
Oh Jeremy, you're such a rascal!
"Not all those who wander are lost"
That can't be true or Bladesingers wouldn't be able to exist. When a level 6 Bladesinger casts a cantrip, they have to tell their DM before the spell is cast whether this is the Cast a Spell action or the Attack action, because they're not allowed to choose later - they can only cantrip and then attack if the cantrip was replacing an attack.