2H vs Dual Wield

2 Handed weapon's are currently the best choice if you are picking melee damage,

why: all except 2 abilities use only 1 of 2 weapon's at a time, this leaves dual wielder's with half the power or twice the cost to cause the same, in addition 2 handed weapons can link up to 5-6 socket's together while dual wielder's have 2-3 on each that are separated.

so the only part that keep's 2 handed weapons from being completely dominant is the attack speed which they can obtain with ease through the extra link's and all the attack speed buffing gem's such as multistrike or faster attack's etc.


commonly when you compare a person who uses a heavy 2 handed weapon against a person with 2 light weapons you expect the heavy weapon to be very slow, in addition to dealing heavy damage when hitting a target, small and light weapons are supposed to be fast but allowing the player to move quickly around....

take a look at this and tell me that this is a slow 2 handed weapon... why would anyone pick dual wield when abilities completely support 2 handed over dual wielding ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHO-Gmi83BE

0.08 attack speed with a 2 handed mace.... not to mention that speed...


note: just noticed this is the wrong forum to post this in, could someone delete/move this thread ? :)

And then there was Dual Strike, dealing as much as or more than any comparable 2H weapon.

i honestly hope that 2 handed weapon's wont dominate that much when the pvp season start's... that would truly be sad....

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Autocthon wrote:

And then there was Dual Strike, dealing as much as or more than any comparable 2H weapon.

dual strike is 1 ability which i mentioned and no it does not deal more than any other ability, try and compare it with double strike, heavy strike etc. which is made for 2h weapons

the other ability that uses both weapons is cyclone... and that is it then all the abilities that dual wielder's benefit from, take a look at the countless melee abilities made for 2h or single weapon usage :/

not to mention i cannot see anything that would justify that speed+damage shown in the video linked above. he is doing that in merciless and all trash die's instantly not to mention rare's will die within a split second as well, leveling or farming would beyond easy and fast, you don't need any run speed at all if you can endlessly blink...

imagine arena.... with that damage and once you have a few frenzy's saved...

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Modchristian89 wrote:

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Autocthon wrote:

And then there was Dual Strike, dealing as much as or more than any comparable 2H weapon.

dual strike is 1 ability and no it does not deal more than any other ability, try and compare it with double strike which is made for 2h weapons

2H weapons (baseline) have roughly 1.5x the base damage of a 1H weapon, and have flat phys rolls roughly 2x as strong as 1H weapons.

So, we'll be generous and say a 2H weapon does twice as much damage as a 1H weapon, and we'll say they have the same speed.

Dual strike double dips on ALL flat damage modifiers from your other gear slots, which means in teh worst case it's 200% of a 1H weapon, vs the 280% damage of double strike wit ha 2H weapon.

Best case, you double all the flat damage you have access to, which will close the gap and put them on par with one another with favor going to 2H

dual whield has dodge and very strong passiv notes ( you can reach 75% dodge)
on top of that you have a more! (attackspeed multiplier) which scales with all other attackspeed modifers and you you get stats from 2 weapons (i.e. global crit from daggers=

dual whield is more offensive than 1+shield and more defensive than 2h weapons

so just saying 2h weapons are superior is wrong

While I am not all into the technicalities... I do have to say that 2H seems to be the way to go over dual wield. Although it is still fun to design an OP dual wield build, it definitely takes more planning and is more of a challenge.

While I am not all into the technicalities... I do have to say that 2H seems to be the way to go over dual wield. Although it is still fun to design an OP dual wield build, it definitely takes more planning and is more of a challenge.

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Modchristian89 wrote:

the other ability that uses both weapons is cyclone... and that is it then all the abilities that dual wielder's benefit from, take a look at the countless melee abilities made for 2h or single weapon usage :/

Keep in mind that you hit twice per spin when using only one weapon, while you hit once per spin with both weapons while dual-wielding.

Dual Wield should be slightly weaker on average than 2h due to free block. And Dual Wield should be stronger than 1h + Shield.

But in the end, it all comes to playstyle. Dual Wield can use a throw-away offhand to get boosts to a mainhand attack like Doublestrike while keeping the offhand global boosts, and the innate block and attack speed boost Dual Wield gives. 2H have Staves as a defensive option for block, or maybe they'll get lucky on a roll for other defensive-style options.

And then there's Dual Strike, which can have insane damage, but main and offhand need to both be awesome(Which means you need to find two awesome pieces compared to one in a 2H's case).

It's all about what you build, what gear you have, and how you play. I really don't think any one style lags behind another if you play it to each style's strengths and play it to your build's strength.

The only downside I can see(And it may be a legit concern) is how 2h users will always have two 6L options(Weapon and body armor), while dual wield or 1h+ shield get one 6L and two individual 3L. The extra 6L for a 2h user can make all the difference for some builds.