Shield opinions

chantellw

chantellw

Artisan
i am making a punch grip shield out of corrugated plastic. Looking for opinions on shapes. I am a celestial Templar if that comes into play when deciding on shape. What's your favorite shape and why? Have pictures?
 
I rock a 18" diameter center grip round that Lost_Nation designed and made several years ago. It's a double layer of blue camp pad over coroplast, with a 1/2" aluminum bar backing the handle to keep it from ripping out. 1" open cell around the outside edges as a courtesy both in case of accidental contact and so as not to tear up weapon edges. It fights great, very light and well balanced, since our system's requirements mean that we don't need a weighty shield to help absorb the force of blows.

Don't mind the look, I'm repainting it at the moment.

http://imgur.com/UsCK4kd.jpg

http://imgur.com/yU3RtDW.jpg

http://imgur.com/NUPN0W1.jpg
 
I'm a big fan of punch style shields. A general word of advice is to be careful about fighting too aggressively with a center grip shield, they can toe the line when it comes to the charging rule, and sometime other players can feel pushed by the shield.

Punch Shields can be a little tricky for scholars and templars. If you make some sort of shield boss or foam cover for your knuckles there isn't much room to hold spell packets in your shield hand (cauliflower), and it can be difficult to pull the packets with your throwing hand. Quite a few folk will use some other method for holding spell packets, perhaps a bracer with elastic loops or something similar.

For corrugated plastic I recommend making the core of the shield two layers and rotating the second layer 90° so that the actual corrugations run perpendicular to each other for strength. Roughing up the surface with coarse sand paper will allow for better adhesion, I like to use dap gel formula. As Muir said a layer of blue camp pad over the surface and 2 layers over the edges have kept our shields plenty safe for Alliance combat.

As for shape, circles are the easiest to cut and line up, also fairly traditional for shield construction. I'm experimenting with a couple of smaller kite/teardrop shapes currently, and might even try something like a traditional zulu shield style soon.

I'd be happy to draw you up a pattern or two in AutoCAD if you had some designs that you'd like to try. :)

-Josh C
 
Unless you are a sucker for elaborate designs, the circular shape is the way to go. It keeps the center of mass balanced where your grip is, which makes it the most responsive to move in any direction to intercept a strike, particularly if you rotate your wrist at all when using it, as well as being the most stable when it gets struck. If you decide to go with something more stylized, my recommendation would be to give it rotational symmetry, rather than a teardrop or kite shape.
 
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