It means you can don the shield as a swift action, while you are using a move action to move. If you do not move, drawing a quickdraw shield is still a move action.
The phrasing follows the equivalent part about drawing a weapon:
If you have a base attack bonus of +1 or higher, you may draw a weapon as a free action combined with a regular move.
Note that this "move-and-equip"-rule also applies to readying a shield:
If you have a base attack bonus of +1 or higher, you can ready or drop a shield as a free action combined with a regular move.
This makes quickdraw shields seem incredibly useless.
However, even though it is not explicitly stated, I believe these two things are mutually exclusive, i.e. you draw either a (single) weapon, or ready a (single) shield as part of a single move action. This is backed up by the part about Two-Weapon Fighting allowing to draw two weapons at once, as a shield can also be (used as) a weapon.
The quickdraw shield then has the advantage of enabling you to move whilst drawing a weapon and strapping on your shield, at the expense of your swift action.
As to your example, a quickdraw shield does not help you in the first part, since you are not drawing a weapon as part of a move action. In any case: you can't attack in that round, since you will need to move (using your converted standard action, as you have already used your move action) in order to draw the shield as a free (or swift) action. In your notation:
- Sheathe 2H weapon (move action)
- Move, while donning the quickdraw shield (2nd move action & free action)
- Bring 1H weapon from my gloves (free action)
The other way around, the quickdraw shield DOES help. You can put away your shield as a swift action AND draw your 2H-weapon as a free action during the same move, which leaves you with a standard action to clobber your foe.
- Stow 1H with the gloves (free action)
- Move, while stowing the quickdraw shield and drawing 2H weapon (move action, swift action & free action)
Yes.
The actual rules for this are oddly worded, but the notation is pretty simple.
In general, there are two formats for "things that increase your AC." The most common format is the one attached to armor:
[your AC equals] 11 + Dex modifier
or Draconic Resilience:
your AC equals 13 + your Dexterity modifier.
Note that there is no "plus" at the beginning of the formula. These items set your AC to a specific value.
The other format is that used by shields and class features that increase your AC above its base value:
Defensive fighting style:
You gain a +1 bonus to AC.
Or a shield:
Wielding a shield increases your AC by 2.
These are phrased in terms of increasing, rather than setting your AC. They are preceded by the phrase "increases" or a plus sign.
So, it's pretty simple. You get one thing that sets your AC, and any number of things that modify it (except where restricted by other rules, like the rules stating you can only use one shield).
A fighter could very easily have an AC like this:
[15 + Dex Mod] (half-plate) [+2] (shield) [+1] (defensive fighting style)
For a total AC of 18 + Dex Mod.
But he couldn't add a chain shirt to increase his AC, because both that and the half-plate set his AC to a fixed value.
The same applies to Draconic Resilience. You can stack it with a shield, because a shield increases AC. And you can further stack on the Shield spell, giving you a (temporary) total of [13 + Dex Mod] [+2] [+5], or 20 + Dex Mod.
But you can't combine Draconic Resilience with Mage Armor, because both Mage Armor and Draconic Resilience are trying to set your AC to a fixed value.
Some things Draconic Resilience stacks with:
Some things it does not:
RAW
The rules for AC are on page 14 of the Player's Handbook, or page 9 of the Basic Rules.
The relevant part is this:
Without armor or a shield, your character’s AC equals 10 + his or her Dexterity modifier. If your character wears armor, carries a shield, or both, calculate your AC using the rules in chapter 5. Record your AC on your character sheet.
[...]
Some spells and class features give you a different way to calculate your AC. If you have multiple features that give you different ways to calculate your AC, you choose which one to use.
The rules called out above appear to be these:
Wielding a shield increases your Armor Class by 2. You can benefit from only one shield at a time.
If you wear light armor, you add your Dexterity modifier to the base number from your armor type to determine your Armor Class.
(and so on, for each type of armor)
The rules are sloppy here. Technically, they don't give you a calculation for AC when wielding a shield and no armor. And they never explicitly call out what is or is not a "way to calculate your AC."
With that said, we can use examples to build the intent of the designers.
It's pretty clear that you don't have to choose between a shield and plate. It's also pretty clear that a shield shouldn't set your AC to 2.
Finally, it's pretty clear that wearing a chain shirt with half plate shouldn't set your AC to 28 + 2 * Dex modifier (max 2).
It seems obvious then, that a "calculation" is something that sets your AC to a value plus other modifiers.
If something just adds on to (or increases) your AC, you continue to use whichever calculation is most favorable plus the new modifier.
Best Answer
Impossible to say
We have, effectively, three points of information. First,
the entry on the disarm variant rule states that
and the entry on the battlemaster’s disarming attack lets you
So the question becomes whether or not a shield is an item that you “hold” or is in your “grasp.” To answer that, we have two more points to consider:
The entry on shields says
While weapons don’t usually require an action to draw, as the Use an Object action states that
shields instead require their own separate action to “don,” as indicated by the “donning and doffing armor” table on page 146.
These last two imply but do not state completely opposite answers to the question of whether or not a shield is a held item that can be disarmed. Neither one of them explicitly or conclusively says one way or the other, but “carried in one hand” suggests that the shield is merely held, while “donning” and taking extra time to do so implies that the shield is strapped on.
We do not have enough information to definitively state an answer one way or the other.