Shield of Balduran

Shield of Balduran
Item
Other names	Shield of Balduran +3
Type	Medium shield
Cursed	❌
Cursed	❌
Magical	✅
Magical	✅
Enchanted	3
Weight	4 lb
Acquisition
Obtained from	Deidre – Adventurer Mart
Combat
Combat type	Protection
Armor class	-4 bonus
Special
Combat abilities	Reflects beholder rays
Special	Strength: -1
Requirements
Strength	12
Not usable by	Bard Druid Mage Monk Shaman Thief Kensai Sorcerer
Other
Item value	16,000
Technical information
Item code	WA2SHIEL

The Shield of Balduran is an enchanted and magical medium shield +3 in Shadows of Amn which weighs 4 lb and offers an armor class bonus of 4. It reflects the rays of beholders. The only disadvantage of wearing this shield is that it lowers the strength of the wielder by one point while in use.

“	This shield was worn by the hero Balduran. It is part of a set of weapons and armor that was stolen from the museum in the city of Baldur's Gate.	”
— Shield of Balduran

Acquisition

• Sold by Deidre at the Adventurer's Mart in Waukeen's Promenade, Athkatla

Technical Mechanics

The shield reflects certain beholder rays back at their source. It implements this using Opcode 197 "Bounce Projectile". The shield bounces two projectiles, No. 208 and 320, which are exclusively used by the gauth, beholder and Magic Golem.

In the unmodded basic and EE games, the most frequently fired projectile by a gauth or beholder is the "Cause Serious Wound" beholder blast ray, which is projectile No. 208, and will bounce off the shield, and return the blast to the source.

There are some other beholder blast projectiles that are not bounced by the shield, such as the Anti-Magic Ray.

However, most harmful eye rays such as the Paralyze Ray, Death Ray, Disintegrate Ray etc. are reflected back to the source with the shield equipped.

See the creature article pages for Gauth or Beholder for more projectile and eye beam blast information.

Gameplay

It is highly advisable to bring this shield before embarking to the Underdark. While the Cloak of Mirroring will prevent a few of the rays from striking you, and Chaotic Commands to protect the psyche and intellect, their "Anti-Mage ray" has a Dispel Magic component. Items that grant immunity to some of the innate beholder blasts and especially charm immunity and instant death effects (such as Death Ward) are needed to be able to survive and destroy them without this shield. The battles become much more difficult and complicated when exposed to multiple beholder blasts, with varied detrimental effects.

The Cloak of the Sewers is a more affordable alternative to handle the beholders as part of the Cult of the Eyeless quest, but its Mustard Jelly polymorph time is limited, requiring one to perhaps rest multiple times in order to clear the entire lair should one want to.

Trivia

Players often refer to this item as the "Shield of Cheese", as it trivializes the threat from Gauths, and to a lesser extent, Beholders. Even worse, the unmodded game artificial intelligence does not give a beholder a means to recognize that its rays are being reflected back at themselves, and so it is somewhat overpowered, and reduces the game challenge level. See Mod Content below for a method to revise this.

Notes

• Baldur's Gate:
  Enhanced Edition
  Siege of Dragonspear (2016)
  This icon indicates content in the Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition campaign that's only available if Siege of Dragonspear is installed.Baldur's Gate:
  Siege of Dragonspear (2016)
  This icon indicates content from the Siege of Dragonspear campaign of the Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition. Though not obtainable via normal means, this shield is part of the Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear game code.

Achievements

Main article: Achievements

In Balduran's Image

Don the sword, shield, helm, and plate of Balduran.

Bugs

• Baldur's Gate II:
  Shadows of Amn (2000)
  This icon indicates content from the original Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn campaign. In the original Shadows of Amn, the description falsely states the shield's weight as being 5 lb; this is fixed in the Baldur's Gate II: Enhanced Edition.
• Baldur's Gate II:
  Shadows of Amn (2000)
  This icon indicates content from the original Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn campaign. Also, the list of classes that can't use the shield is incomplete.

Gallery

Korgan fights against a group of beholders under the protection of the Shield of Balduran.

A Death Tyrant fies the Anti-Magic Ray at a PC with the Shield equipped. This ray ignores the shield, and the target has all dispellable magic removed.

The same tyrant has had the Death ray, Paralyze ray. and multiple Cause Serious Wounds rays bounced back. The creature seems to ignore this and continue blasting eye rays until it kills itself.

Minsc has been avoiding most affects from a Death Tyrant, Hive Mother and Elder Orb with the Shield. Eventually, the Elder Orb is able to remove Minsc with an Imprisonment spell. Farwell brave one, and Boo too.

Mod Content

This section is about unofficial content that is only available via fan-made mods.

Installation of the Sword Coast Stratagems Mod and the "Smarter Beholders" component changes how beholders react to the Shield of Balduran. The beholders can now use their telekinesis power to steal the Cloak of Mirroring and the Shield of Balduran. They don't do it in the first couple of rounds, then they have a 1/3 chance per round (per beholder). The idea isn't to make the items useless but to block the move of just giving them to one person and sending them in. If it annoys you, you can turn it off at the console: set DMWWDisableBeholderTheft to 1.

Note: SCS has a number of lines of code that look for the Shield of Balduran and the Cloak of Mirroring on detected targets using either the "HasItem" or "HasItemEquipped" identifiers - but some code is applied inconsistently. This means that it is possible to not actually equip the Shield (but only possess it) and induce the beholder to change its eye ray use. This could mean that it looks for a different target or attacks in melee - The telekinesis power will only trigger if the item is equipped.

^{[verification needed]}

SCS also has another component that is optional, that allows the Shield of Balduran to be removed from the game entirely, if you should wish to take away the temptation to use such an item in gameplay, making it lactose free from cheese.

Mod content gallery

Beholder's Telekinesis Ray steals the Shield of Balduran from PC. An Anti-magic ray follows, both in the same round. A text message display says "The beholder has used its telekinesis power to snatch the Shield of Balduran from your arm"