Belegedan of Landroval asks:
I’d like to play a melee class that uses a 2-handed weapon for leveling, but does not have pets. My Guardian uses Sword + Shield; and my Burg and Hunter both dual-wield. I’ve been told that Champions should dual-wield as well.
Captain and lore-master are pet classes, which I really don’t want to play. (I’d consider Captain, but I’m heard on the roundtable that they should level with their Herald pet rather than banners.)
Can I level my Guardian or my Champion with a 2-hander, or am I losing out? Am I missing a class I should be considering?
Alright, good question!
In order to answer this question I’m going to lay out and weigh out the advantages and disadvantages of the questions’ parameters as they apply to Captains, Champions and Guardians.
Setting Down The Shield: Guardians With 2-Handers
When using a 2-handed weapon instead of the more widely accepted “sword and board” setup, the Guardian loses the following things:
- Mitigations from the shield’s Armour value and –Ranged damage modifier
- The ability to block
- Catch a breath self heal (it’s a block response skill)
- The ability to handle medium and large groups of enemies effectively
In return the Guardian gains:
- More damage
- Greater speed in dealing with small groups of enemies
The losses and gains for a guardian using a 2-handed weapon vs 1-hander and shield equate to the guardian being able to deal with small groups of enemies much faster and with relative ease and thus is a fine tool for leveling as long as due caution is exercised and too many enemies are not pulled into action. I’d recommend still keeping the old sword and board setup handy for when things get ugly.
Me Give You Two Swords For That Big One: Champions with 2-Handers
Champions are the only class in the game that are truly optimized for using either two 1-handed options (dual wielding or sword and board) or a 2-handed option (insert 2-handed weapon of choice save for halberds). In all setups, Champs still have their full arsenal of skills available to them.
As far as DPS goes there’s an ages-old debate on whether dual-wielding or 2-handed weapons do more… but there is no conclusive evidence that either one is better than the other. The only obvious difference that is undeniable is that using a 2-handed weapon results in better critical damage (so if you like big single numbers this is the hands-down way to go). Dual-wielding is arguably better for sustained damage and offers a higher-pace of play and a more responsive feel.
Given all of this, there’s really nothing list in terms of pro’s and con’s. Either play style is perfectly acceptable for a Champion.
I Can Carry My Own Banner, Thanks: Captains w/o Heralds
Captains bear the rather unique distinction of being THE 2-handed class. Yes, I know, they CAN use a “sword and board” setup and I’m not saying don’t ever do it. But the class is optimized around the 2-handed style of play and that fact is emphasized by the class’ exclusive access to Halberds (previously the slowest and hardest hitting of all weapons in the game before normalization). However, one of the parameters in the original question was to not be a pet class, which the captain in all technicality is… However, they do have full functionality w/o pets via use of “standards” (herald’s banner less the herald) which captains can plant on the battlefield to provide themselves and allies with various forms of inspiration (in game terms, Buffs).
To further complicate things, Belegedan is looking more in terms of how the class levels, not
necessarily the end-game aspect. Because while captains will seldom use their pets in the end-game scene, they are a huge helper in the leveling process. It is possible to level just fine without a herald but it doesn’t come without pros and cons.
By using a Standard instead of a Herald while leveling the Captain loses out on:
- An Off-tank (and thereby the ability to handle larger groups)
- A heal via the herald skill, Lend Will (soon to be changed dependent on herald but still relevant)
- A Stun, something Captains have very little of, via Coordinated Attack
- Bait/Human Sacrifice for that one really tough mob blocking that one item you need to pick up.
- Mobile banner buff, must keep replanting the standard as the battle moves.
The advantages using a Standard are:
- Higher Damage from the Captain itself (to offset the loss of the herald)
- Higher Morale (possibly power as well)
- No silly herald to run off and pull that distant group of elites.
- Style points for being a Do-it-yourselfer
In Conclusion…
Despite my personal bias and love for the captain… I have to admit that given all the conditions of the original question that the Champion is best suited for the desired style of play.They suffer no obvious drawbacks and as a result the need for any sort of adapting to a different style is non-existent save for the fact that it’ll play just a smidge slower in terms of skill use. So there you go… If you want to use a 2-hander and not have a pet following you around and do it effectively, play a Champion.
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September 2, 2010 at 8:16 am
Another (if not even THE) advantage of a Standard: It does not get damaged by mobs, it has no morale (like e.g. the Runekeepers pet rock
). No sudden loss of the buff because someone got in the way of AoE damage.
September 2, 2010 at 8:16 am
With my champ, Degana, I tinkered for a long time with a two-handed weapon vs. dual-wield. I found that most recipes for 2H weapons had a giant +morale (sometimes almost 200, which for a level 40 is huge). When I got my legendary weapon, however, it quickly became a bad idea to use a 2H, because the loss of stats from the off-hand weapon was not made up in the one extra legacy of the 2H. That may change again later when I get my level 65 weapon, because I may be able to get close to maxing my stats without an off-hand, in which case the extra legacy will be better. Everyone does agree that DW champs do better AoE, but lots of champs like to bring a 2H to the Moors. Lots of pros and cons, but both are viable options.
September 2, 2010 at 11:02 am
If by stats you are meaning might, vitality, and agility, the 2h weapons are the only ones with actual stat bonuses for legendary items. The 1h never comes with stats are far as I’ve experienced (almost 58 on beta now!). By trading in a 10-20 dwarf tools, I ended up once with a level 55 great sword that had +17 might, +17 vitality, and +17 agility! Pretty much beats anything I could find for the offhand, besides maybe one item in a Moria quest reward (Likmund’s sword I believe?).
I noticed I had a hard time holding aggro with dual wielding because the damage numbers are not as high with a 2h. In the end, I don’t think there is a major difference between the two though!
September 2, 2010 at 8:34 am
Very nice write-up and you’re spot on with the Champ comments. Turbine has balanced DW and 2H quite well with Champs giving each a distinct flavor without sacrificing DPS. It’s more about aesthetics and what feels right as opposed to anything else. I completely agree with Elb here.
September 2, 2010 at 9:00 am
I would say this, but yeah Champ is the way to go for those criteria!
Having tried both I can’t say I favour dual or 2 handers exclusively, both have their moments. Using a 2 hander also gives you slightly better power maintanence in longer fights when tanking in Glory stance, which I shall be doing in BG tonight… gulp :-O
September 2, 2010 at 9:02 am
I would still recommend the captain even with a herald.
I think OP is worried that he would need to pay attention to the pet and manage both pet and his character to work in synergy. While this is true for Loremaster’s pets the herald requires little attention.
September 2, 2010 at 12:17 pm
Aeled – good supposition – its very true that pet management is a concern. I levelled a warlock in that other game and found myself either bored if the pet was tanking or annoyingly distracted if I had to repeatedly re-direct firepower from the pet.
I will roll keep an open mind, and roll a Captain as well as a Champ and see how the Herald works, and also play with “I Can Carry My Own Banner, Thanks” ala Xhii, below.
September 2, 2010 at 3:13 pm
I’m glad you’re going to give the captain a shot anyways! it’s an awesome class and now I’ve got some more captain questions sitting on my “desk”, as it were, so the next “Ask Elb” you see is likely to be focused on certain aspects of the captain class itself
September 2, 2010 at 9:03 am
I was expecting “roll a Captain, and when you get tired of the halberd roll another captain and use a sword
”
In all honesty though I think you lay it out very well. I will add that I am purely a banner Captain ever since they were implemented way back when and still find them more useful then heralds ever were. Granted Heralds are getting a buff with F2P but Captains can be quite fun without having to be played as pet class.
September 2, 2010 at 3:11 pm
I was tempted to say that, Doc. Truly was… And I also became a full time Standard using captain the day they came out (except when leveling new captains in the low to mid levels).
But alas, I had to be true to fact and consider all Criteria and name Champion the better option…
September 2, 2010 at 10:07 am
I also went that “I Can Carry My Own Banner, Thanks” route with my captain, it seemed to me that the herald was a useless waste of space even with all the herald-buffing traits on, so I just made myself the best banners (some giving ~20% more raw damage to the captain) and soloed my way to the cap.
September 2, 2010 at 10:39 am
Great write-up. I am thinking of rolling a guard/champ soon due to the fact that they are my only classes that have not passed 50.
My hopefully easy to answer question is, doesn’t a 2-h use less power per damage, so you can afford to use the more “powerful” strikes? ( I’d be using out of power stance either way).
September 2, 2010 at 11:21 am
I can only really answer for a champ, but Yeah 2-h is more power efficient, but in fervour stance with the added ICPR that brings you won’t notice a difference between dual and 2-h much during levelling and general play, unless you spam swift strike and its a long fight.
But Glory stance tanking, and later endgame fights, unless you have power reduction legacies, you would feel dual wielding sap your power very fast.
September 2, 2010 at 12:19 pm
Thanks, Elb, for a great write-up! And thanks also to all the commentors.
September 2, 2010 at 12:22 pm
Great discussion. I have yet to roll a capt, so can’t comment on that class yet. But my first Main back in the SOA days was a Champ. I found that the speed of the 2handers was so slow that my damage was not high enough. I know that stat was removed, but I have never really experimented with a 2 hander. I agree with Geld that with dual wield it you generally get better stat bonus, I ran the LI and the Galadhrim Sword (running that club from SG now, can’t remember its name) for a while and I could not beat those stats with any 2 hander I saw.
However, I am leveling a 65 third age 2H axe with some decent stats, for use in the moors. For the primary reason that it improves critical hits. I think big hits mean more in the moors.
Eitherway Champs are a great class and I don’t think you can go wrong.
September 2, 2010 at 6:30 pm
Great summary Elb!
@Dreadhed, I think 2-handers are better for the moors because of the potential spike damage from the bigger crits compared to DW. I’m a DW champ myself mainly because I prefer the faster attack speed but as Elb pointed out, a champ with a 2-hander is a really good choice!
It’s hard not to envy those SS of the 5 – 8k remorseless crits of the 2-handers
October 24, 2010 at 7:43 am
My lvl 57 Champion has used two-handed weapons almost from the beginning; started concentrating on that style at about lvl 15 and never looked back.