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Two Handed Or Dual Wield?Follow
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I was just wondering why anybody uses a 2h weapon, I looked at some of the DPS for weapons and the highest for a 2h weapon is 138 DPS from Cataclysm's Edge while the highest DPS from a One Handed weapon is 126 DPS from Warglaive Of Azzinoth, which with 2 of them equuiped is 252 DPS, so lets think about this, 138 DPS or 252? Anyways so what's the point then of having a 2h weapon when you can get almost double the damage from 2 one handed weapons?
The Warglaives of Azzinoth are legendary weapons, whereas there is no level 70 legendary two-hander currently. They are the weapons of the main antagonist of the plot of our current episode (well, some may argue that it's actually Kael'thas for the current episode, and for the overall Warcraft saga, it's Sargeras) and are to be basically unparalleled.
Secondly, if dual-wielding weapons, the offhand weapon does 50% of its base damage, so it's not 252 DPS, but a quarter less (I'm not looking at them right now, but I'm assuming equal DPS on each).
Thirdly, just because the best dual-wielded weapons are better than than the best two-handed weapon doesn't mean that in every situation, a lower set of one-handers is better than a lower 2-hander. And nothing's stopping a warrior from dual-wielding the Warglaives once a warrior gets them, and using a 2-hander before that.
Fourth, dual-wield scales better from bonus AP, while 2handers, being slow, have more base damage and concurrently benefit special attacks more. Depending on your style of play and if you play in PvE and PvP, you may choose one or the other.
I'm a bit busy right now, but if someone could go much farther into detail on the situational pros and cons of both DW and 2H, I'd appreciate it.
Secondly, if dual-wielding weapons, the offhand weapon does 50% of its base damage, so it's not 252 DPS, but a quarter less (I'm not looking at them right now, but I'm assuming equal DPS on each).
Thirdly, just because the best dual-wielded weapons are better than than the best two-handed weapon doesn't mean that in every situation, a lower set of one-handers is better than a lower 2-hander. And nothing's stopping a warrior from dual-wielding the Warglaives once a warrior gets them, and using a 2-hander before that.
Fourth, dual-wield scales better from bonus AP, while 2handers, being slow, have more base damage and concurrently benefit special attacks more. Depending on your style of play and if you play in PvE and PvP, you may choose one or the other.
I'm a bit busy right now, but if someone could go much farther into detail on the situational pros and cons of both DW and 2H, I'd appreciate it.
And the warglaives you were looking at were the fake Artifact-Quality ones.
The real ones do about 110dps.
The real ones do about 110dps.
Scholar
38 posts
FatMidget wrote:
I was just wondering why anybody uses a 2h weapon, I looked at some of the DPS for weapons and the highest for a 2h weapon is 138 DPS from Cataclysm's Edge while the highest DPS from a One Handed weapon is 126 DPS from Warglaive Of Azzinoth, which with 2 of them equuiped is 252 DPS, so lets think about this, 138 DPS or 252? Anyways so what's the point then of having a 2h weapon when you can get almost double the damage from 2 one handed weapons?
You will also need a lot more hit rating as dual weild, 2h can focus more on other stats.
Yeah really. When I dual wielded I missed alot. I'm 2 handed now and I never miss.
FatMidget, since you mentioned you were new to the game, I will avoid the flaming and try to explain it to you.
There's a situation for each approach. In certain situations wielding two one-handed weapons instead of one two-handed weapon might be better. Usually dual-wielding means a steady and sustainable damage output. Two-handers hit slow, but hard. Maximum damage on two-handed weapons is usually much higher than that of one-handed weapons. So when a two-handed weapon crits, it really hurts. This makes the two-handed weapons useful for PvP where it's all about killing your opponent fast.
While dual-wielding might be just as fast as the two-hander, the two-hander might crit and chop off a lot of health from the opponent, maybe even enough to kill him instantly. The same is nigh impossible to do with a dual-wield build.
Now, attacks are divided into three groups in this game.
1.) On next swing.
2.) Casting time.
3.) Instant.
Heroic Strike, the basic attack of the Warrior, is a 'on next swing' attack. It adds some extra power to the next swing you do with your weapon. If you have a weapon with an attack speed of 2.4 seconds, Heroic Strike will hit every 2.4 seconds, provided you keep using it.
Slam, another core ability of the Warrior, has a casting time. You activate the attack and it counts down from 1.5 seconds (correct me if I'm wrong here) and then your character performs the attack. Usually such attacks puts the weapon's normal swing time on pause, but if you time it right, you can get off a Slam just before your weapon is about to swing again, thus doing two attacks at the same time (again, correct me if I'm wrong - I don't remember if Slam pauses the auto-attack).
Mortal Strike, a talent in the Arms talent tree, is an instant attack. You press the button and the attack is performed immediately. It doesn't reset the swing time of your weapon either, so with practice you can get off an instant attack along with an auto-attack at the same time.
Since the Warrior has so many instant attacks at his disposal, using a bigger weapon is usually an advantage. The higher your weapon's maximum damage is, the more damage all attacks will do. With a lot of instant attacks at your disposal you can do a lot of damage quickly.
It's the difference between doing 2,500 or 1,200 damage with a Mortal Strike crit. If your opponent has 2,500 health left, but is in the process of healing himself, the big weapon will kill him before he can heal himself, but the one-handed weapon will only chop off half his health, allowing him to complete the heal before you can finish it.
There's a situation for each approach. In certain situations wielding two one-handed weapons instead of one two-handed weapon might be better. Usually dual-wielding means a steady and sustainable damage output. Two-handers hit slow, but hard. Maximum damage on two-handed weapons is usually much higher than that of one-handed weapons. So when a two-handed weapon crits, it really hurts. This makes the two-handed weapons useful for PvP where it's all about killing your opponent fast.
While dual-wielding might be just as fast as the two-hander, the two-hander might crit and chop off a lot of health from the opponent, maybe even enough to kill him instantly. The same is nigh impossible to do with a dual-wield build.
Now, attacks are divided into three groups in this game.
1.) On next swing.
2.) Casting time.
3.) Instant.
Heroic Strike, the basic attack of the Warrior, is a 'on next swing' attack. It adds some extra power to the next swing you do with your weapon. If you have a weapon with an attack speed of 2.4 seconds, Heroic Strike will hit every 2.4 seconds, provided you keep using it.
Slam, another core ability of the Warrior, has a casting time. You activate the attack and it counts down from 1.5 seconds (correct me if I'm wrong here) and then your character performs the attack. Usually such attacks puts the weapon's normal swing time on pause, but if you time it right, you can get off a Slam just before your weapon is about to swing again, thus doing two attacks at the same time (again, correct me if I'm wrong - I don't remember if Slam pauses the auto-attack).
Mortal Strike, a talent in the Arms talent tree, is an instant attack. You press the button and the attack is performed immediately. It doesn't reset the swing time of your weapon either, so with practice you can get off an instant attack along with an auto-attack at the same time.
Since the Warrior has so many instant attacks at his disposal, using a bigger weapon is usually an advantage. The higher your weapon's maximum damage is, the more damage all attacks will do. With a lot of instant attacks at your disposal you can do a lot of damage quickly.
It's the difference between doing 2,500 or 1,200 damage with a Mortal Strike crit. If your opponent has 2,500 health left, but is in the process of healing himself, the big weapon will kill him before he can heal himself, but the one-handed weapon will only chop off half his health, allowing him to complete the heal before you can finish it.
Please "talk up" if your comprehension white-shifts. I will use simple-happy language-words to help you understand.
Mazra wrote:
It doesn't reset the swing time of your weapon either, so with practice you can get off an instant attack along with an auto-attack at the same time.
Pardon my noobness, and this sounds like a really dumb question:
I know getting off an auto-attack and instant attack at the same time is good, but what's wrong with getting the instant attack off in between auto-attacks if the auto-attack doesn't reset from the instant attack?
I.e.:
Auto-attack - Mortal Strike - Auto-attack
Instead of:
Auto-attack - Wait - Mortal Strike/Auto-attack
Pinkbullet, there's nothing wrong with that. It wasn't my intention to make it sound as if getting off two attacks at the same time was the way to go.
Double-hits only really shine in PvP where two crits on top of each other can make even baby Jesus cry salty tears of pain.
Double-hits only really shine in PvP where two crits on top of each other can make even baby Jesus cry salty tears of pain.
Please "talk up" if your comprehension white-shifts. I will use simple-happy language-words to help you understand.
Try out an Improved Slam build with at least one point in Mortal strike. Get Quartz swing timer to place your slams just after you swing. On your initial charge hit slam, you'll do your initial swing, Slam, then Mortal Strike = 3 attacks before your second swing = at level 70 with a decent weapon you can be doing 6k-ish damage before your second swing. Honestly it's the easiest way to pwn with average gear.
Edited, Jan 27th 2008 11:14pm by angiie
Edited, Jan 27th 2008 11:14pm by angiie
slam doesn't pause your weapon swing, it resets it, and is pretty much a huge NO to use when you don't have imp. slam.
You mention MS but fail to mention BT (the bread and butter attack of the fury tree). After a point, BT will outdamage MS regardless of what kind of 2h'er you have as it doesn't scale AS WELL as BT with gear upgrades.
the general view on this is:
2h is better for burst damage, you crit a few times, your target is dead.
dw'ing is better for sustained damage. Sure, a good 2h warrior can out-dps a fury warrior with similar gear, but it's fairly uncommon to see that (unless you count their DW debuff and etc.)
Another view is
2h is pvp dps (mainly bc of MS [and now also BT])
dw'ing is pve dps
You mention MS but fail to mention BT (the bread and butter attack of the fury tree). After a point, BT will outdamage MS regardless of what kind of 2h'er you have as it doesn't scale AS WELL as BT with gear upgrades.
the general view on this is:
2h is better for burst damage, you crit a few times, your target is dead.
dw'ing is better for sustained damage. Sure, a good 2h warrior can out-dps a fury warrior with similar gear, but it's fairly uncommon to see that (unless you count their DW debuff and etc.)
Another view is
2h is pvp dps (mainly bc of MS [and now also BT])
dw'ing is pve dps
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