Given that we generally refer, in D&D, to wielding natural weapons, and that the dictionary definition of wield is to "hold and use", I can just about accept that the language of the game could be interpretted as the natural weapons being held.
I can also accept that, given races which do not have hands exist and we accept that they may wield weapons in hand-like appendages, we must include hand-like appendages within the definition of "held in one/the other hand".
What I cannot and will not accept is that these natural weapons are held in a hand or hand-like appendage. A claw is not held in the claw, it is the claw. You don't hold your hand in itself. It "pushes the bounds of credibility"... Scratch that, it is an absolutely absurd attempt to twist the wording of the game way beyond the bounds of natural language and exploit it in a ridiculous fashion.
If you are going to twist definitions that far, you can make anything say anything. By the same "logic", I can use TWF if I am holding a dagger in my teeth.
The rule says both wield and hold. Both must be satisfied. I agree 100% that wield should be broadly interpreted to accept all natural weapons, worn weapons, magically brandished weapons, etc. But also, SEPERATE from wielding, TWF cares about weapons being held in hands.
That sucks, but it’s RAW. I mean, Merriam Webster has approximately 10 billion definitions for “hold”, only one of which specifies hands, but... TWF, by design, cares about “holding” a “weapon” in a “hand”, and “wielding” it. That all matters.
As mentioned by Chicken_Champ, the rules certainly do mention hold.
The Dual Wielder feat doesn't, but it does reference using TWF*, and the TWF rules clearly state (as I quoted above) "When you take the Attack action and attack with a light melee weapon that you're holding in one hand, you can use a bonus action to attack with a different light melee weapon that you're holding in the other hand".
* The Dual Wielder feat says "you can use Two Weapon Fighting even if", so that point of the great is clearly based on the TWF rules quoted above.
I will say... I posted above without re-reading TWF closely, and slightly misspoke. TWF never talks about "wielding" at all, it is the Dual Wielder feat that introduces that for the first time. Dual Wielder probably should have been worded "You can use two-weapon fighting even when the one-handed melee weapons you are holding aren’t light," to avoid this confusion.
Two-Weapon Fighting
When you take the Attack action and attack with a light melee weapon that you're holding in one hand, you can use a bonus action to attack with a different light melee weapon that you're holding in the other hand.
Dual Wielder
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.
Does Dual Wielder using "wielding" suggest that it's overwritten the "holding" requirement of basic TWF with a new "wielding" requirement? I don't really think so, it certainly doesn't say "you can use two-weapon fighting even when you aren't holding a one-handed melee weapon in each hand," so you'd have to read a pretty hefty amount of unwritten text to draw that conclusion. I just think that the PHB just isn't edited tightly enough to recognize when they're conflating different terms that shouldn't be used as synonyms, like "holding" vs. "wielding". But I at least see where Kotath is coming from now, that Dual Wielder doesn't just remove the Light requirement, but also changes the holding requirement to a wielding requirement, and that wielding should be understood to include natural weapons.
A few things.... since you're talking a bit about the dual wielder feat... Sorry but it doesn't work and it shouldn't.
Doesn't really matter how you try to twist the wordings but the fact is that "one-handed melee weapons" means it's a melee weapon that can be wielded in one hand, they're in a list in the equipment part of weapons. You can make melee weapon attacks with unarmed strikes, but they do not count as weapons. And, "melee weapon attacks" are not the same thing as an "attack with a melee weapon", the former being an attack that is made in melee as opposed to an attack using a weapon.
The monsters with similar abilities actually have the "multi-attack" trait, which let's them make several attempts for damage.
And as someone pointed out, you don't just make 1 attack in a turn, even if you only have 1 attack. It's supposed to be an average ability to get in this many damaging attacks in one turn and wielding a sword and shield this could mean blocking, pushing, elbowing and then swordystabby once. When unarmed you do the same, but it doesn't change the amount of successful damaging attempts really, unless you're trained in a certain way (for instance the monk gets an extra attack later on, meaning they now have more skill and moments to deal damage in a turn).
Also, the "dual wielder" unarmed style is in the game already, fighters can pick this weapon style which deals 1d6 damage normaly but if you don't wield a shield or sword, in other words you're able to fight with both hands, you instead deal a d8.
As for the comment about not being able to punch with any force once/second, sure you can, it's easy. Not for many seconds in a row, but landing two punches in a row under 2 seconds is not hard, I can do it and I didn't train very much on it. If you think hitting someone once takes more than a few seconds you're going to be in for a bad surprise if you ever get into a fight ;)
On a similar note in my military service I could fire two rounds, drop the mag and reload, and fire two new rounds in about 2 seconds as well, that had some more practice though. The point is you can actually do a lot more than you'd think in just 2 seconds... 6 seconds is a long time, especially with some adrenaline kicking in. But this is a game.
On a funnier note though, if you attack with your right arm, you would normally deal 1 base damage, but if you instead rip it off you could do a full 1d4 of base damage instead. All you need is a ring of regeneration and most of your problems are solved. Kinda.
A few things.... since you're talking a bit about the dual wielder feat... Sorry but it doesn't work and it shouldn't.
Doesn't really matter how you try to twist the wordings but the fact is that "one-handed melee weapons" means it's a melee weapon that can be wielded in one hand, they're in a list in the equipment part of weapons. You can make melee weapon attacks with unarmed strikes, but they do not count as weapons. And, "melee weapon attacks" are not the same thing as an "attack with a melee weapon", the former being an attack that is made in melee as opposed to an attack using a weapon.
The monsters with similar abilities actually have the "multi-attack" trait, which let's them make several attempts for damage.
And as someone pointed out, you don't just make 1 attack in a turn, even if you only have 1 attack. It's supposed to be an average ability to get in this many damaging attacks in one turn and wielding a sword and shield this could mean blocking, pushing, elbowing and then swordystabby once. When unarmed you do the same, but it doesn't change the amount of successful damaging attempts really, unless you're trained in a certain way (for instance the monk gets an extra attack later on, meaning they now have more skill and moments to deal damage in a turn).
Also, the "dual wielder" unarmed style is in the game already, fighters can pick this weapon style which deals 1d6 damage normaly but if you don't wield a shield or sword, in other words you're able to fight with both hands, you instead deal a d8.
As for the comment about not being able to punch with any force once/second, sure you can, it's easy. Not for many seconds in a row, but landing two punches in a row under 2 seconds is not hard, I can do it and I didn't train very much on it. If you think hitting someone once takes more than a few seconds you're going to be in for a bad surprise if you ever get into a fight ;)
On a similar note in my military service I could fire two rounds, drop the mag and reload, and fire two new rounds in about 2 seconds as well, that had some more practice though. The point is you can actually do a lot more than you'd think in just 2 seconds... 6 seconds is a long time, especially with some adrenaline kicking in. But this is a game.
The beast barbarian's natural weapon attacks do count as weapon attacks. Specifically simple melee weapon attacks. It is in the ability description.
And no one is talking modern weaponry so that is a complete red herring.
It specifically doesn't actually:
Claws. Each of your hands transforms into a claw, which you can use as a weapon if it’s empty. It deals 1d6 slashing damage on a hit. Once on each of your turns when you attack with a claw using the Attack action, you can make one additional claw attack as part of the same action.
It doesn't say it's a simple melee weapon, only that it can be used as a weapon. Also, the ability in itself already gives you an extra attack, which you could use even with a mix of weapons because of its wording RAW. In the sense that if you have extra attack, you could do one attack with a sword, one with a claw and it would get you an extra attack because of this. The RAI was probably that if you have both hands free, you could use two attacks, but RAW it's not written like that.
Also, saying it can be used AS a weapon, isn't the same as saying it IS a weapon. And even so, even if it is a WEAPON it is NOT a "One-handed melee weapon" just the same way that a thrown weapon isn't a ranged weapon just because it has range. Ranged weapons are a specific list of weapons, just like one-handed melee weapons are.
The Tabaxi race on the other hand specifically say it has:
In addition, your claws are natural weapons, which you can use to make unarmed strikes.
Since unarmed strikes are not weapons, they clearly can not use any dual wielding with their claws either.
Btw, the point of the modern weapon comment was, as I said, that you can do a lot of things in 6 seconds that you might not think is possible because the 6 seconds seem like very little time. It was more of a comment to earlier posts mentioning how you couldn't do certain things in a certain amount of time.
The beast barbarian's natural weapon attacks do count as weapon attacks. Specifically simple melee weapon attacks. It is in the ability description.
And no one is talking modern weaponry so that is a complete red herring.
It specifically doesn't actually:
Claws. Each of your hands transforms into a claw, which you can use as a weapon if it’s empty. It deals 1d6 slashing damage on a hit. Once on each of your turns when you attack with a claw using the Attack action, you can make one additional claw attack as part of the same action.
It doesn't say it's a simple melee weapon, only that it can be used as a weapon. ...
Not great to get self righteous without reading the feature language closely.
Form of the Beast
3rd-level Path of the Beast feature
When you enter your rage, you can transform, revealing the bestial power within you. Until the rage ends, you manifest a natural weapon. It counts as a simple melee weapon for you, and you add your Strength modifier to the attack and damage rolls when you attack with it, as normal.
One more thing to point out... "one-handed" isn't really a weapon property at all, and when you see it used in features and abilities, should probably be read with nothing more than common sense significance: not having the two-handed property. If something is a weapon, and doesn't have Two-Handed, it's "one-handed" by default.
If I were to walk through the analysis of TWF with claws, I really think you get about 99% there, but there's no escaping that you have to disregard "hold in one hand" to get all the way there to a Bonus Action attack.
Are natural weapons generally considered weapons? Yes, but not in a PHB-quotable way. Natural Weapons are linguistically a type of weapon, nothing says they aren't weapons, the MM calls them weapons, and recent SAC advice has suggested they should always be treated as weapons. There are no shortage of races that have a Natural Weapon entry which conflates Natural Weapons with Unarmed Strikes, and.... that's messy, because Unarmed Strikes are (supposedly) not weapons. But regardless, I'd say it's RAW that Natural Weapons are weapons, even if they happen to also be useable as Unarmed Strikes, and are benefiting from Monk feature or Tavern Brawler enhancements.
Are the Path of the Beast Barbarian's natural weapons specifically considered weapons? Yes, explicitly, due to the quoted language stating that they're simple melee weapons. Amusingly, the Barbarian's Claws can not be used as Unarmed Strikes, so don't go looking for Monk or Tavern Brawler synergy!
Is the Path of the Beast Barbarian's Claws weapon one-handed? Well... it isn't "Two-Handed", as discussed above. But, it's "a natural weapon" (singular) which is composed of "each of your hands", so that's problematic. But, the Claws entry itself then seems to contradict "a natural weapon" singular language, providing that each hand is "a claw" which you can use as "a weapon if it's empty" (singular). So.... clearly some poor editing going on, but by the time you get to the end of it, really feels like Claws lets you manifest two natural weapons, each of which are are a seperate Claw, not a single both-hands-Claws that requires both hands be kept open. Oof.... but I'm going to call that a Yes.
Is each claw of Claws "wielded"? I'd say yes, but only when that hand is empty. Holding an object in a claw hand precludes it from being used as a weapon, and "used as a weapon" is really the closest that I've ever found to a definition of "wielded" (in the context of weapons. Wielded for Shields would be "used as a Shield" instead.).
Is each claw of Claws "held in one hand"? Really starting to push the envelope to say yes. They're wielded with one hand. But wielding them assumes that you're holding nothing, so... I'm personally fine chalking "held in one hand" up as crappy language that the PHB uses which defeats its own purpose, and say that RAI, "held in one hand" was meant to be a synonym for "wielded in one hand", and that "wielded with one hand" is meant to mean "used as a weapon with one hand," and that a claw would satisfy that.... but I'm not going to call that RAW, held is held.
Again, to me, the RAW is clear on that point: if they are not held in one hand, they do not count for TWF.
I also feel the intent is pretty clear on this one: they have given an equivalent but (significantly) better version of TWF as part of the claw properties, which strongly suggests that it's there as a replacement because TWF doesn't apply.
Would it be game breaking to allow TWF with claws? Probably not, although it would be a significant power boost. It would definitely be a house rule, though, as it goes against both RAW and, IMHO, RAI.
While we are on this, I'd say that if I house ruled that claws could be dual wielded, I would probably do the same for most other natural weapons, too. If you can do so with claws, you can with the beast barb tail and bite, too, as well as Dragon Hide claws and many others.
In my opinion the class is already built around the idea that the martial arts fighter is using both hands, and feet, to the best of their ability to strike targets, often wearing armor or with incredibly tough hides. The "fighters" are built assuming they are using weapons when they are making use of their fighting skills. A fighter can wield a single or a two-handed weapon, or in some narrow cases may wield two light weapons if they forgo their shield.
I haven't played a martial arts fighting character. Do they get any modifiers if they are "monster" like animals such as Tabaxi (with retractable claws)? It seems this is a better point for discussion.
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A few things.... since you're talking a bit about the dual wielder feat... Sorry but it doesn't work and it shouldn't.
Doesn't really matter how you try to twist the wordings but the fact is that "one-handed melee weapons" means it's a melee weapon that can be wielded in one hand, they're in a list in the equipment part of weapons. You can make melee weapon attacks with unarmed strikes, but they do not count as weapons. And, "melee weapon attacks" are not the same thing as an "attack with a melee weapon", the former being an attack that is made in melee as opposed to an attack using a weapon.
The monsters with similar abilities actually have the "multi-attack" trait, which let's them make several attempts for damage.
And as someone pointed out, you don't just make 1 attack in a turn, even if you only have 1 attack. It's supposed to be an average ability to get in this many damaging attacks in one turn and wielding a sword and shield this could mean blocking, pushing, elbowing and then swordystabby once. When unarmed you do the same, but it doesn't change the amount of successful damaging attempts really, unless you're trained in a certain way (for instance the monk gets an extra attack later on, meaning they now have more skill and moments to deal damage in a turn).
Also, the "dual wielder" unarmed style is in the game already, fighters can pick this weapon style which deals 1d6 damage normaly but if you don't wield a shield or sword, in other words you're able to fight with both hands, you instead deal a d8.
As for the comment about not being able to punch with any force once/second, sure you can, it's easy. Not for many seconds in a row, but landing two punches in a row under 2 seconds is not hard, I can do it and I didn't train very much on it. If you think hitting someone once takes more than a few seconds you're going to be in for a bad surprise if you ever get into a fight ;)
On a similar note in my military service I could fire two rounds, drop the mag and reload, and fire two new rounds in about 2 seconds as well, that had some more practice though. The point is you can actually do a lot more than you'd think in just 2 seconds... 6 seconds is a long time, especially with some adrenaline kicking in. But this is a game.
The beast barbarian's natural weapon attacks do count as weapon attacks. Specifically simple melee weapon attacks. It is in the ability description.
And no one is talking modern weaponry so that is a complete red herring.
It specifically doesn't actually:
Claws. Each of your hands transforms into a claw, which you can use as a weapon if it’s empty. It deals 1d6 slashing damage on a hit. Once on each of your turns when you attack with a claw using the Attack action, you can make one additional claw attack as part of the same action.
It doesn't say it's a simple melee weapon, only that it can be used as a weapon. Also, the ability in itself already gives you an extra attack, which you could use even with a mix of weapons because of its wording RAW. In the sense that if you have extra attack, you could do one attack with a sword, one with a claw and it would get you an extra attack because of this. The RAI was probably that if you have both hands free, you could use two attacks, but RAW it's not written like that.
Also, saying it can be used AS a weapon, isn't the same as saying it IS a weapon. And even so, even if it is a WEAPON it is NOT a "One-handed melee weapon" just the same way that a thrown weapon isn't a ranged weapon just because it has range. Ranged weapons are a specific list of weapons, just like one-handed melee weapons are.
The Tabaxi race on the other hand specifically say it has:
In addition, your claws are natural weapons, which you can use to make unarmed strikes.
Since unarmed strikes are not weapons, they clearly can not use any dual wielding with their claws either.
Btw, the point of the modern weapon comment was, as I said, that you can do a lot of things in 6 seconds that you might not think is possible because the 6 seconds seem like very little time. It was more of a comment to earlier posts mentioning how you couldn't do certain things in a certain amount of time.
As was said in the post just before this one, you are only looking at claws specifically. The header for that feature specifies they count as simple weapons.
And the 'how many things can a real person do in 6 seconds' is irrelevant. First of all, there is an acknowledgement that fighting using two weapons gets more openings than just using one. Second, hurricane 'As many punches as you can in six seconds' attacks are not normal IRL since they have no real power behind them. Combination punches are a thing however. And talking about modern weaponry is of course completely silly. It would be like saying 'Well everyone blinks incredibly fast, but you are not allowed blinking attacks.'
Sure, it did, but this means that you're guaranteed to have proficiency with it, even with multiclassing into it and houserules that prevent getting all martial weapons and so on.
Using this as an argument means you could just as easily simply look into the feats notes which says "+1 AC bonus, wield heavier weapons, draw or stow two weapons at once" and I'd enjoy you trying to come with a good argument of why hands/claws are heavier weapons.
As for the rest of that, I'm not even going to comment on it if your whole point is not reading what I wrote, what I explained or anything else because frankly it's just rude.
It's clearly not meant to be used with double claw attacks because monsters have multiattack not dual wielding. There's no examples that provide a good reason for this to work, it's all about trying to twist the words as much as possible to gain some extra power out of something that isn't even remotely close to meaning or even hinting at what you're arguing.
House-rule what you want just don't say it's RAW when you have to twist 24 sentences in a weird way just to make it maybe mean what you say.
If I were to walk through the analysis of TWF with claws, I really think you get about 99% there, but there's no escaping that you have to disregard "hold in one hand" to get all the way there to a Bonus Action attack.
The real trick is actually making sure you have 4 arms, using this ability, ripping two of your arms of and using them as weapons. Then you could dual wield your own clawed arms and since you're using those arms to deal damage you'd get an extra attack + dual wield another extra attack.
There's plenty to be said about the both sides, but I'd like to point out something from a "Rule Mechanics" standpoint, and followup with RAW that explains RAI. As a note, making a "Melee Weapon Attack" has already been defined separately from "Making an Attack with a Melee Weapon." So an unarmed strike DOES benefit from a Barbarian Rage, but not from a Paladin Smite.
First and foremost: NO description or flavoring should EVER replace an effect or feature from another class or race! 5e convert is based around "Action Economy", not ability scores. For instance, a "One-Two combo" sacrifices strength for not overextending and leaving yourself open afterwards. So seeing a one-two that together does 1+STR makes sense. The mechanics are there to represent the flair. The flair can't define the mechanics.
As a DM, I've allowed a player to make mechanical alterations as part of the flair of the action. But ONLY by imposing a mechanic against them at the same time. For instance, if a player wanted to suplex an NPC, they'd need to do a grapple first. This gives up an attack. If they have the "extra attack" feature, they could then do the suplex. I'd then say they were both prone at the end of the attack. So long as the PC had half of their movement left, they could stand up. But then the NPC can use half of its movement on their turn to also stand up. In this example, neither side gained a mechanical advantage by the flair.
As far as RAW explaining RAI, you have to look at the situation, not just the character. An unarmed strike does the same amount of damage on a hit, regardless of the target's makeup. An unarmed strike does the same damage to a commoner that it does to a Bullette or to a knight in heavy armor. For most of the examples above, this this obviously hasn't been considered.
As far as using two weapon fighting, there is a formula where I would allow it with unarmed strikes, without going Monk. If you have both the Two-Weapon Fighting style AND the Dual Wielder Feat, you could attack with an unarmed strike as a bonus action Off-Hand attack. But unless you have the Unarmed Fighting fighting style or the Tavern Brawler Fear, they would still be 1+STR.
Pretty surprised this is a 3-page topic lol. I understand it is rules and wording and fists are not wielded etc. Am I the only one who thinks it a tad silly probably the one thing a regular soft human in the real world can do is throw 2 sloppy punches and it cannot be done in the fantasy world. I also understand it depends on DM etc. Just I could not swing efficiently any weapon even if it was light. I could throw these hands poorly though.
Hands, fists, feet, knees, elbows, etc can all be weapons in real life AND they're light. I would argue until blue in the face that if any class can make a second attack as a bonus action via TWF then that same logic applies to unarmed strikes. Like someone said above, a bonus action unarmed strike is an off-hand blow. It deals 1 damage, unless you have unarmed fighting style, then it's a 1d6, or 1d8 if you're not holding anything. NOT a game breaker. Who cares what RAW says. RAW doesn't always make sense. The nerds who wrote some of these rules clearly have never been in a real fight.
Hands, fists, feet, knees, elbows, etc can all be weapons in real life AND they're light. I would argue until blue in the face that if any class can make a second attack as a bonus action via TWF then that same logic applies to unarmed strikes. Like someone said above, a bonus action unarmed strike is an off-hand blow. It deals 1 damage, unless you have unarmed fighting style, then it's a 1d6, or 1d8 if you're not holding anything. NOT a game breaker. Who cares what RAW says. RAW doesn't always make sense. The nerds who wrote some of these rules clearly have never been in a real fight.
Thank you! I was going to type the same thing. I dont understand why people arguing over TWF with unarmed strikes. Unarmed Fighting is an already massive detriment to any class that can do it and is really only intended for those that want that Kung Fu/Street Fighter flavor for a character. Just let your player hit a 2nd or 3rd time with TWF. Whats the big deal? When you take into account that the spell caster is already going to out damage them by level 6, the actual dual wielding barb/fighter, hell even the pally with smite will do more damage. I mean the list goes on.
At the end of the day, you're playing a game that, presumably, you're the DM and you have a player who is already going to be a lot weaker than the others because of a specific flavor they're going for. So why would you want to punish them because "the rules say". I thought you're the DM? Don't you make the rules? You're just following a guide on how to run a game, use them as you like just don't get to whacky with it, like I did :P.
my 2 cents, unarmed fighting already blows, let the player who wants to do it run with TWF. Or would you rather have them running around with a vorpal sword beheading your creatures? Think about it...
Sure, that's a DM's prerrogative, but that DM better not have a Monk player on that table cause at that point they'll have to apply Divine Smite or Sneak Attack to a Monk's unarmed strike as well (without multiclassing).
I'm not saying you are wrong, but homebrewing class features can go bad really fast if you don't have the same consideration for ALL players on the table, that's the reason a DM follows the guide (rulebook), otherwise you bet I'd be having any attack with Heavy Weapon Master also knock a creature prone and no AoE spell would have a casting time of 1 action.
While one of the first rules in the game is that the DM can add, ignore or interpret the rules at their leisure for the campaign they run, thats not particularly helpful for trying to understand what the base rules are which everyone can work from. If you follow that rule to it's extreme people could use True20 rules or other systems and still claim its DnD because of the DM's prerogative to alter them as far as they like.
When people ask what the rules are on something, people do their best to tell them the literal Rules As Written (RAW) in official texts. If thats not available we try with Rules as Intended (RAI) which is often signified by flavour text or Developer tweets and comments. None of the people answering are trying to be pedantic rules lawyers and tell you you can't homebrew the rules to your personal liking in your own campaign.
If you don't like what the rules say, you're free to DM a game with your own homebrew rulings or, as a player, talk to your DM and ask them to homebrew a rule. But if people want homebrew or house rules outside the officially written content rather than to know what the official written content recommends, they'll ask in the HOMEBREW & HOUSE RULES forum sub.
Quite simply, the rules have been specifically erratad to note that unarmed strikes are NOT weapons. Paladin smites must be made with weapons in a melee attack and the developers have stated it was their intent to exclude unarmed attacks. The Dual Wielder feat specifies weapons and thus won't grant players +1AC.
Consider also that the rules on unarmed strikes do not require you to have free hands. You can be wearing a shield and holding a battle axe in the other hand but still make unarmed strikes with your action because they can be kicks, head-butts or various other forceful blows with the body rather than specifically your hands/fists. Even the Unarmed Fighting-Fighting Style doesn't specify that you must have free hands for the d6 damage, only that you cannot wield a shield or weapon for the d8 damage (which means you can still carry a pair of wands or items that can give you bonus actions and reaction options). Even if a player wields a two-hand polearm, great weapon or shortbow/longbow/crossbow they are presumed to be capable of merely holding the weapon with one hand for reloading or other one hand interactions that use the free interaction, bonus action or reaction.
Effectively, just saying that Two-Weapon Fighting rules allow unarmed strikes for the Bonus Action would mean that every single character and monster would be capable of doing this every single turn they can use their Bonus Action in Melee. A homebrew rule to allow unarmed attacks as bonus actions would have to further homebrew it to require a free hand and possibly even exclude heavy weapons.
Don't like RAW and want to homebrew or house rule to allow them? Sure, no-one will say you can't, they'll only say you can't call it official Rules as Written or Rules as Intended.
OK, so here we go.
Given that we generally refer, in D&D, to wielding natural weapons, and that the dictionary definition of wield is to "hold and use", I can just about accept that the language of the game could be interpretted as the natural weapons being held.
I can also accept that, given races which do not have hands exist and we accept that they may wield weapons in hand-like appendages, we must include hand-like appendages within the definition of "held in one/the other hand".
What I cannot and will not accept is that these natural weapons are held in a hand or hand-like appendage. A claw is not held in the claw, it is the claw. You don't hold your hand in itself. It "pushes the bounds of credibility"... Scratch that, it is an absolutely absurd attempt to twist the wording of the game way beyond the bounds of natural language and exploit it in a ridiculous fashion.
If you are going to twist definitions that far, you can make anything say anything. By the same "logic", I can use TWF if I am holding a dagger in my teeth.
The rule says both wield and hold. Both must be satisfied. I agree 100% that wield should be broadly interpreted to accept all natural weapons, worn weapons, magically brandished weapons, etc. But also, SEPERATE from wielding, TWF cares about weapons being held in hands.
That sucks, but it’s RAW. I mean, Merriam Webster has approximately 10 billion definitions for “hold”, only one of which specifies hands, but... TWF, by design, cares about “holding” a “weapon” in a “hand”, and “wielding” it. That all matters.
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
As mentioned by Chicken_Champ, the rules certainly do mention hold.
The Dual Wielder feat doesn't, but it does reference using TWF*, and the TWF rules clearly state (as I quoted above) "When you take the Attack action and attack with a light melee weapon that you're holding in one hand, you can use a bonus action to attack with a different light melee weapon that you're holding in the other hand".
* The Dual Wielder feat says "you can use Two Weapon Fighting even if", so that point of the great is clearly based on the TWF rules quoted above.
I will say... I posted above without re-reading TWF closely, and slightly misspoke. TWF never talks about "wielding" at all, it is the Dual Wielder feat that introduces that for the first time. Dual Wielder probably should have been worded "You can use two-weapon fighting even when the one-handed melee weapons you are holding aren’t light," to avoid this confusion.
Does Dual Wielder using "wielding" suggest that it's overwritten the "holding" requirement of basic TWF with a new "wielding" requirement? I don't really think so, it certainly doesn't say "you can use two-weapon fighting even when you aren't holding a one-handed melee weapon in each hand," so you'd have to read a pretty hefty amount of unwritten text to draw that conclusion. I just think that the PHB just isn't edited tightly enough to recognize when they're conflating different terms that shouldn't be used as synonyms, like "holding" vs. "wielding". But I at least see where Kotath is coming from now, that Dual Wielder doesn't just remove the Light requirement, but also changes the holding requirement to a wielding requirement, and that wielding should be understood to include natural weapons.
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A few things.... since you're talking a bit about the dual wielder feat... Sorry but it doesn't work and it shouldn't.
Doesn't really matter how you try to twist the wordings but the fact is that "one-handed melee weapons" means it's a melee weapon that can be wielded in one hand, they're in a list in the equipment part of weapons. You can make melee weapon attacks with unarmed strikes, but they do not count as weapons. And, "melee weapon attacks" are not the same thing as an "attack with a melee weapon", the former being an attack that is made in melee as opposed to an attack using a weapon.
The monsters with similar abilities actually have the "multi-attack" trait, which let's them make several attempts for damage.
And as someone pointed out, you don't just make 1 attack in a turn, even if you only have 1 attack. It's supposed to be an average ability to get in this many damaging attacks in one turn and wielding a sword and shield this could mean blocking, pushing, elbowing and then swordystabby once. When unarmed you do the same, but it doesn't change the amount of successful damaging attempts really, unless you're trained in a certain way (for instance the monk gets an extra attack later on, meaning they now have more skill and moments to deal damage in a turn).
Also, the "dual wielder" unarmed style is in the game already, fighters can pick this weapon style which deals 1d6 damage normaly but if you don't wield a shield or sword, in other words you're able to fight with both hands, you instead deal a d8.
As for the comment about not being able to punch with any force once/second, sure you can, it's easy. Not for many seconds in a row, but landing two punches in a row under 2 seconds is not hard, I can do it and I didn't train very much on it. If you think hitting someone once takes more than a few seconds you're going to be in for a bad surprise if you ever get into a fight ;)
On a similar note in my military service I could fire two rounds, drop the mag and reload, and fire two new rounds in about 2 seconds as well, that had some more practice though. The point is you can actually do a lot more than you'd think in just 2 seconds... 6 seconds is a long time, especially with some adrenaline kicking in. But this is a game.
On a funnier note though, if you attack with your right arm, you would normally deal 1 base damage, but if you instead rip it off you could do a full 1d4 of base damage instead. All you need is a ring of regeneration and most of your problems are solved. Kinda.
It specifically doesn't actually:
It doesn't say it's a simple melee weapon, only that it can be used as a weapon. Also, the ability in itself already gives you an extra attack, which you could use even with a mix of weapons because of its wording RAW. In the sense that if you have extra attack, you could do one attack with a sword, one with a claw and it would get you an extra attack because of this. The RAI was probably that if you have both hands free, you could use two attacks, but RAW it's not written like that.
Also, saying it can be used AS a weapon, isn't the same as saying it IS a weapon. And even so, even if it is a WEAPON it is NOT a "One-handed melee weapon" just the same way that a thrown weapon isn't a ranged weapon just because it has range. Ranged weapons are a specific list of weapons, just like one-handed melee weapons are.
The Tabaxi race on the other hand specifically say it has:
Since unarmed strikes are not weapons, they clearly can not use any dual wielding with their claws either.
Btw, the point of the modern weapon comment was, as I said, that you can do a lot of things in 6 seconds that you might not think is possible because the 6 seconds seem like very little time. It was more of a comment to earlier posts mentioning how you couldn't do certain things in a certain amount of time.
Not great to get self righteous without reading the feature language closely.
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One more thing to point out... "one-handed" isn't really a weapon property at all, and when you see it used in features and abilities, should probably be read with nothing more than common sense significance: not having the two-handed property. If something is a weapon, and doesn't have Two-Handed, it's "one-handed" by default.
If I were to walk through the analysis of TWF with claws, I really think you get about 99% there, but there's no escaping that you have to disregard "hold in one hand" to get all the way there to a Bonus Action attack.
Are natural weapons generally considered weapons? Yes, but not in a PHB-quotable way. Natural Weapons are linguistically a type of weapon, nothing says they aren't weapons, the MM calls them weapons, and recent SAC advice has suggested they should always be treated as weapons. There are no shortage of races that have a Natural Weapon entry which conflates Natural Weapons with Unarmed Strikes, and.... that's messy, because Unarmed Strikes are (supposedly) not weapons. But regardless, I'd say it's RAW that Natural Weapons are weapons, even if they happen to also be useable as Unarmed Strikes, and are benefiting from Monk feature or Tavern Brawler enhancements.
Are the Path of the Beast Barbarian's natural weapons specifically considered weapons? Yes, explicitly, due to the quoted language stating that they're simple melee weapons. Amusingly, the Barbarian's Claws can not be used as Unarmed Strikes, so don't go looking for Monk or Tavern Brawler synergy!
Is the Path of the Beast Barbarian's Claws weapon one-handed? Well... it isn't "Two-Handed", as discussed above. But, it's "a natural weapon" (singular) which is composed of "each of your hands", so that's problematic. But, the Claws entry itself then seems to contradict "a natural weapon" singular language, providing that each hand is "a claw" which you can use as "a weapon if it's empty" (singular). So.... clearly some poor editing going on, but by the time you get to the end of it, really feels like Claws lets you manifest two natural weapons, each of which are are a seperate Claw, not a single both-hands-Claws that requires both hands be kept open. Oof.... but I'm going to call that a Yes.
Is each claw of Claws "wielded"? I'd say yes, but only when that hand is empty. Holding an object in a claw hand precludes it from being used as a weapon, and "used as a weapon" is really the closest that I've ever found to a definition of "wielded" (in the context of weapons. Wielded for Shields would be "used as a Shield" instead.).
Is each claw of Claws "held in one hand"? Really starting to push the envelope to say yes. They're wielded with one hand. But wielding them assumes that you're holding nothing, so... I'm personally fine chalking "held in one hand" up as crappy language that the PHB uses which defeats its own purpose, and say that RAI, "held in one hand" was meant to be a synonym for "wielded in one hand", and that "wielded with one hand" is meant to mean "used as a weapon with one hand," and that a claw would satisfy that.... but I'm not going to call that RAW, held is held.
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Again, to me, the RAW is clear on that point: if they are not held in one hand, they do not count for TWF.
I also feel the intent is pretty clear on this one: they have given an equivalent but (significantly) better version of TWF as part of the claw properties, which strongly suggests that it's there as a replacement because TWF doesn't apply.
Would it be game breaking to allow TWF with claws? Probably not, although it would be a significant power boost. It would definitely be a house rule, though, as it goes against both RAW and, IMHO, RAI.
While we are on this, I'd say that if I house ruled that claws could be dual wielded, I would probably do the same for most other natural weapons, too. If you can do so with claws, you can with the beast barb tail and bite, too, as well as Dragon Hide claws and many others.
In my opinion the class is already built around the idea that the martial arts fighter is using both hands, and feet, to the best of their ability to strike targets, often wearing armor or with incredibly tough hides. The "fighters" are built assuming they are using weapons when they are making use of their fighting skills. A fighter can wield a single or a two-handed weapon, or in some narrow cases may wield two light weapons if they forgo their shield.
I haven't played a martial arts fighting character. Do they get any modifiers if they are "monster" like animals such as Tabaxi (with retractable claws)? It seems this is a better point for discussion.
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Sure, it did, but this means that you're guaranteed to have proficiency with it, even with multiclassing into it and houserules that prevent getting all martial weapons and so on.
Using this as an argument means you could just as easily simply look into the feats notes which says "+1 AC bonus, wield heavier weapons, draw or stow two weapons at once" and I'd enjoy you trying to come with a good argument of why hands/claws are heavier weapons.
As for the rest of that, I'm not even going to comment on it if your whole point is not reading what I wrote, what I explained or anything else because frankly it's just rude.
It's clearly not meant to be used with double claw attacks because monsters have multiattack not dual wielding. There's no examples that provide a good reason for this to work, it's all about trying to twist the words as much as possible to gain some extra power out of something that isn't even remotely close to meaning or even hinting at what you're arguing.
House-rule what you want just don't say it's RAW when you have to twist 24 sentences in a weird way just to make it maybe mean what you say.
The real trick is actually making sure you have 4 arms, using this ability, ripping two of your arms of and using them as weapons. Then you could dual wield your own clawed arms and since you're using those arms to deal damage you'd get an extra attack + dual wield another extra attack.
There's plenty to be said about the both sides, but I'd like to point out something from a "Rule Mechanics" standpoint, and followup with RAW that explains RAI. As a note, making a "Melee Weapon Attack" has already been defined separately from "Making an Attack with a Melee Weapon." So an unarmed strike DOES benefit from a Barbarian Rage, but not from a Paladin Smite.
First and foremost: NO description or flavoring should EVER replace an effect or feature from another class or race! 5e convert is based around "Action Economy", not ability scores. For instance, a "One-Two combo" sacrifices strength for not overextending and leaving yourself open afterwards. So seeing a one-two that together does 1+STR makes sense. The mechanics are there to represent the flair. The flair can't define the mechanics.
As a DM, I've allowed a player to make mechanical alterations as part of the flair of the action. But ONLY by imposing a mechanic against them at the same time. For instance, if a player wanted to suplex an NPC, they'd need to do a grapple first. This gives up an attack. If they have the "extra attack" feature, they could then do the suplex. I'd then say they were both prone at the end of the attack. So long as the PC had half of their movement left, they could stand up. But then the NPC can use half of its movement on their turn to also stand up. In this example, neither side gained a mechanical advantage by the flair.
As far as RAW explaining RAI, you have to look at the situation, not just the character. An unarmed strike does the same amount of damage on a hit, regardless of the target's makeup. An unarmed strike does the same damage to a commoner that it does to a Bullette or to a knight in heavy armor. For most of the examples above, this this obviously hasn't been considered.
As far as using two weapon fighting, there is a formula where I would allow it with unarmed strikes, without going Monk. If you have both the Two-Weapon Fighting style AND the Dual Wielder Feat, you could attack with an unarmed strike as a bonus action Off-Hand attack. But unless you have the Unarmed Fighting fighting style or the Tavern Brawler Fear, they would still be 1+STR.
Pretty surprised this is a 3-page topic lol. I understand it is rules and wording and fists are not wielded etc. Am I the only one who thinks it a tad silly probably the one thing a regular soft human in the real world can do is throw 2 sloppy punches and it cannot be done in the fantasy world. I also understand it depends on DM etc. Just I could not swing efficiently any weapon even if it was light. I could throw these hands poorly though.
Hands, fists, feet, knees, elbows, etc can all be weapons in real life AND they're light. I would argue until blue in the face that if any class can make a second attack as a bonus action via TWF then that same logic applies to unarmed strikes. Like someone said above, a bonus action unarmed strike is an off-hand blow. It deals 1 damage, unless you have unarmed fighting style, then it's a 1d6, or 1d8 if you're not holding anything. NOT a game breaker. Who cares what RAW says. RAW doesn't always make sense. The nerds who wrote some of these rules clearly have never been in a real fight.
The RAW discussion forum cares what RAW says.
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Thank you! I was going to type the same thing. I dont understand why people arguing over TWF with unarmed strikes. Unarmed Fighting is an already massive detriment to any class that can do it and is really only intended for those that want that Kung Fu/Street Fighter flavor for a character. Just let your player hit a 2nd or 3rd time with TWF. Whats the big deal? When you take into account that the spell caster is already going to out damage them by level 6, the actual dual wielding barb/fighter, hell even the pally with smite will do more damage. I mean the list goes on.
At the end of the day, you're playing a game that, presumably, you're the DM and you have a player who is already going to be a lot weaker than the others because of a specific flavor they're going for. So why would you want to punish them because "the rules say". I thought you're the DM? Don't you make the rules? You're just following a guide on how to run a game, use them as you like just don't get to whacky with it, like I did :P.
my 2 cents, unarmed fighting already blows, let the player who wants to do it run with TWF. Or would you rather have them running around with a vorpal sword beheading your creatures? Think about it...
Sure, that's a DM's prerrogative, but that DM better not have a Monk player on that table cause at that point they'll have to apply Divine Smite or Sneak Attack to a Monk's unarmed strike as well (without multiclassing).
I'm not saying you are wrong, but homebrewing class features can go bad really fast if you don't have the same consideration for ALL players on the table, that's the reason a DM follows the guide (rulebook), otherwise you bet I'd be having any attack with Heavy Weapon Master also knock a creature prone and no AoE spell would have a casting time of 1 action.
Its the RULES & GAME MECHANICS foum sub. It literally deals with the Rules As Written.
While one of the first rules in the game is that the DM can add, ignore or interpret the rules at their leisure for the campaign they run, thats not particularly helpful for trying to understand what the base rules are which everyone can work from. If you follow that rule to it's extreme people could use True20 rules or other systems and still claim its DnD because of the DM's prerogative to alter them as far as they like.
When people ask what the rules are on something, people do their best to tell them the literal Rules As Written (RAW) in official texts. If thats not available we try with Rules as Intended (RAI) which is often signified by flavour text or Developer tweets and comments. None of the people answering are trying to be pedantic rules lawyers and tell you you can't homebrew the rules to your personal liking in your own campaign.
If you don't like what the rules say, you're free to DM a game with your own homebrew rulings or, as a player, talk to your DM and ask them to homebrew a rule. But if people want homebrew or house rules outside the officially written content rather than to know what the official written content recommends, they'll ask in the HOMEBREW & HOUSE RULES forum sub.
Quite simply, the rules have been specifically erratad to note that unarmed strikes are NOT weapons. Paladin smites must be made with weapons in a melee attack and the developers have stated it was their intent to exclude unarmed attacks. The Dual Wielder feat specifies weapons and thus won't grant players +1AC.
Consider also that the rules on unarmed strikes do not require you to have free hands. You can be wearing a shield and holding a battle axe in the other hand but still make unarmed strikes with your action because they can be kicks, head-butts or various other forceful blows with the body rather than specifically your hands/fists. Even the Unarmed Fighting-Fighting Style doesn't specify that you must have free hands for the d6 damage, only that you cannot wield a shield or weapon for the d8 damage (which means you can still carry a pair of wands or items that can give you bonus actions and reaction options). Even if a player wields a two-hand polearm, great weapon or shortbow/longbow/crossbow they are presumed to be capable of merely holding the weapon with one hand for reloading or other one hand interactions that use the free interaction, bonus action or reaction.
Effectively, just saying that Two-Weapon Fighting rules allow unarmed strikes for the Bonus Action would mean that every single character and monster would be capable of doing this every single turn they can use their Bonus Action in Melee. A homebrew rule to allow unarmed attacks as bonus actions would have to further homebrew it to require a free hand and possibly even exclude heavy weapons.
Don't like RAW and want to homebrew or house rule to allow them? Sure, no-one will say you can't, they'll only say you can't call it official Rules as Written or Rules as Intended.