I recently started playing this game as a non-member, and while the simplicity of this game is refreshing, my old WoW habits are starting to rear their heads.

I rolled a warrior and, after playing as a slothful swinger for a few levels, decided to try out a dual-wield approach.

Specifically, I would like to know: do offhand weapons suffer an attack speed reduction, and a damage reduction, by virtue of being offhand?

Second, I have noticed my hitting for critical damage every now and then. Does the formula for that percentage include my agility?

I do believe this will determine whether or not I continue with my current build, so thanks in advance!

:: MahMahsBoi ::

Well, as far as the damage goes, assuming you have 2 identical weapons and dual wield, they will inflict the same amount of damage, as has been my experience.

Critical hits are struck 3% of the time, regardless of stats, so the more times you hit, the better chance of a crit, obviously. The only thing I know of currently that will actually increase the critical hit percentage are weapons, armor or jewelry.

I have heard that dual-wielding actually comes with the advantage that you will get more hits/second in on the target, however, while dual-wielding each weapon will be reduced slightly in speed. Of course, based on that, the only advantage of dual-wielding would be to increase your chances of critical hits, or just doing a buttload of damage in a short period of time, if the weapons are strong enough.

Oh yeah, and looking cool

Again though, I'm only inferring on what I have read thus far, as I myself am a noob to the game.

That information does help!

Now I'll just have to figure out if the warrior skills favor high-range damage (slow swings) more than attacks per second.

Also, where did you read this information? I doubted I would receive a developer's reply in a thread buried so deep in the forum, so I was hoping this post would be a stepping stone to where I can get more information.

Thanks again!

HDoL.eu
TheTownstons.com

This is wrong actually. When dual wielding weapons speed is actually increased, by 20% I believe. So if you were to use two weapons that have .50 speed when used alone or with a shield, when dual wielding these weapons each will have a speed of .40.

If you've ever gone to pvp you'll notice that a great deal of fighters use a 1h and shield combo, this wasn't the case 6 months or so ago, before the few shield skills were introduced, particularly Dark Conniption. Dual wielding was more dominant, with 2h users just behind that. The increased attack speed and damage output of a good dual wield combo is one reason for this.

To increase critical hit chance it takes items, unique and mythic quality, in the form of armor and weapons will increase critical hit chances. I'm entirely sure, but i think there might be some jewelry that will increase critical hit chance as well.

I would like to also note that +100% to critical hit chance doesn't mean you will get 100% critical hits. What it means is +100% to the base critical hit chance, which is 3%, so +100% would make the total 6%. I believe that the max is 18% total.

Its possible that critical hit chance may increase if your attack rating is more than double(or triple) that of a mobs defense rating. Mainly that idea comes from experience farming with higher level characters on lower level bosses for low level gear. Getting 80+% critical hits. But i've done no testing for normal levels using excessive agility, so I might just be crazy and the critical hits are only because I out leveled the boss. Although farming Rotgut with a 56 and 58(absolute max for RoC is 55) sees good increase in critical hits with pvp characters with higher attack rating than a standard pve toon would.

But since it likely takes a lot more attack rating that would be comfortable to accommodate other stats, I don't recommend using it as the theoretical advantage doesn't outweigh the actual disadvantages.

Hmm, just to put in my 2 cents, and to clear up some issues...

You get a bonus to attack speed for dual wielding. No penalties, this game doesn't use D&D mechanics . I've heard either 20% or 15%, no idea what the actual number is but it's substantial anyway.

Dual wielding still provides the highest, consistent single target dps in game. DC builds have the highest peak dps (again single target). This makes them good for boss runs. But anyway, if you plan on leveling as a fighter from 1-100, you'll want to use a fast 2h weapon. This is so you can make full use of cleave - cooldown is affected by weapon speed, and amount of damage depends on weapon used. Unfortunately, even when dual wielding cleave only takes damage from the one hand, so your cleave is impaired. Which is why fast 2hs work best.

Oh, and did I mention, aoe = kill fast = level fast. And cleave is basically a fighters only aoe skill. Which is why you'll want to make it as effective as possible. Well now there's MFB, but I dunno how effective that is for grinding, as I didn't get to use that when I lvld my toon.

About criticals - base 3% chance, and only affected by weapons/armour that have +crit% mods. I believe the max for rangers is +541%, for fighters +757% (I think), with level 100 t3 gear. That works out to 19.2% and 25.7%. I'm not sure if there's a cap on the crit%, I doubt it though. But ultimately raising crit% doesn't do that much to your overall dps, especially at low levels. My advice, raise base damage first, crit second.

Also, fighting mobs significantly lower level than you (i.e. names are coloured grey) grants you a whole heap of bonuses in terms of offense and defense, but you get no exp and barely any loot for yourself. One of these bonuses is just an increased crit chance, which is why you end up critting a whole heap on lower level mobs.



Pssst...some tips for leveling as a fighter - level with a group, it's faster, you get more loot, and it's simply more fun. Fighters aren't really designed for solo grinding like mages are. I remember back when I was grinding, I'd group with 4 other guys (mostly other fighters) in Hdol3 and just rampage through it for hours on end - good times.

Also, a trick I used to do. You'll notice after grouping a while that the max level limit to get exp from mobs is -4 of your current level. So a lvl 50 can get exp fighting a lvl 46 mob. Now remember - fighting mobs who are lower level than you grants you bonuses. What I used to do was group with friends who were exactly 4 levels under, set them as leader and you'll notice a significant difference in your killing speed . This also works the other way round, group with a friend whos +4 levels ahead, set myself as leader, I kill at normal speed while he kills significantly faster .

So, basically, the most efficient groups are ones where the highest level is only +4 levels of the lowest level. Set the lowest level as leader. Everyone benefits .

Sweetness.

I hardly play this game at all (hence the non-membership status), so playing in a group is largely infeasible.

I was hoping there would be some skills for dual-wielders along the lines of cleave, or some form of splash damage, but apparently they heavily favor weapons with a high-end damage.

Looks like I'll be experimenting with faster 2h weapons.

Thanks for the info!

.: MahMahsBoi :.

Well, there is the 1-hander with shield "Dark Conniption and I'm Rubber, You're Screwed combo.

Cleave and Butcher favor hard hitting 2H weapons, due to them being based on the actual weapon attack. Soul Rend's damage is skill/element based and has a weapon-based cooldown, so it favors 1h's as long as you have either the mana or mana-steal to support it. I believe My Flaming Buddy favors 1h, too, due to more proc chances, but I don't have time to login and check.

As such, you've got some pretty good skill options for either dual wielding or 2h weapons.

Ah, thanks for the clearing up of that issue, I've looked through a few fansites and some make it sound like there is a penalty to speed, but others say there is a bonus and again others state neither, so, since I an a pessimist, I always assume the worst. Good to know the info though. That was the only one answer I wasn't very sure of.

Mad Melee Mastery and 2-hand Swivel Action are your friends then.

For 1h users - a possibility is to use gaseous blast (ranger trainer) for your aoe needs, but really it's not as effective as cleave+2h at later levels.

Also there aren't really that many fast 2h weapons tbh . The only rb ones I can think of are Wake of the Devastator, Pink's Favourite Axe and eventually Death by the Slice. Imo dbts is the best 2h rb in game atm.

Btw make use of the open group feature, or peruse the group list. Usually doesn't take that long to get a group going, after a while you get to know the ones who play around same time as you, and end up grouping with them a lot .