Can I use the Two Weapon Fighting bonus action attack while only holding one weapon? [closed]

Question

Here's the situation. A level one Tabaxi fighter has claws and a mace. He intends to attack with both weapons. Using claws as his off hand attack. He is fighting a monster that has resistance to slashing. His friend attacks with a slashing weapon and he sees that it barely damaged the monster. On his initiative he attacks and does standard damage with the mace. Realizing this, he uses his free action to "draw" the mace from his primary hand to attack with it as a bonus action using his off hand.

Is this legal RAW?

Answer 1

No. The rule (PHB, page 195) for fighting with two weapons says:

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 atlack with a different light melee weapon that you're holding in the other hand.

None of the upgrades for two weapon fighting remove the part where it says "different weapon", so you need to actually attack with two different weapons.

Also, keep in mind that by default you have to use two light melee weapons to qualify for two-weapon fighting, and the Mace is not light. So your Tabaxi probably can't use two-weapon fighting with it at all.