I'm debating this issue right now. I play on hard, and generally come close to a completionist style run.
In this run I chose to side with the templars for the first time and found myself having more difficulties with mages than any melee opponents. I use tactical only for short moments, and generally let the companions run themselves, if that makes a difference.
I sided with mages first time around and I might be a 2H Templar....doesn't seem right. It's good to be Champion they say.
TBH, 2H seems a little underwhelming, the tree is rather bloated, and the damage offset of going 2H over SnS isn't really enough compared to the trade off in survivability lost (Turn the Bolt is great, and Bear Mauls the Wolves + Turn the Blade are both good). SnS swings faster for faster stamina regeneration, and it's damage skills are on a much shorter cooldown. The only real weakness I've found with SnS is it's lower damage per hit is more susceptible to being mitigated by Armor, but bringing a rogue with sunder effects to your party will usually mitigate that, as well as stacking a little bit of Armor Pen.
Similarly, Payback Strike and Lunge and Slash allow for greater time on target, clearing CC and gap closing, respectively, while the 2 Hand tree has to rely on other trees to get CC breaks and gap closing.
My first playthrough was a tanking focused champion, but I'm planning on making a DPS focused SnS Reaver here for a new playthrough. I don't necessarily think SnS is -more- dps than 2H, but it's more efficient points and gear-wise for it, and allows for more flexibility.
Feranel,
I had noticed the damage output of SnS wasn't much lower than 2h. But a much higher survival rate in comparison more than offsets that. I'm also trying to take into account who else would be in my party, should I choose SnS or 2h, champion, Reaver, or Templar.
In a templar-sided run, do you face off against more mages, or more melee, or is there no significant difference to the enemy composition (compared to a mage-sided run)?
Feranel,
I had noticed the damage output of SnS wasn't much lower than 2h. But a much higher survival rate in comparison more than offsets that. I'm also trying to take into account who else would be in my party, should I choose SnS or 2h, champion, Reaver, or Templar.
In a templar-sided run, do you face off against more mages, or more melee, or is there no significant difference to the enemy composition (compared to a mage-sided run)?
You'll run into more venatori mages siding templars than you will the Templar bolt-caster-abomination things you fight in a mage side run, but you're just as likely to get punched in the face by a giant melee dude in both runs, though I think Venatori Assassins are weaker than Templar Shadows, so you have less worry of getting obliterated by stealth units.
Templar is fun for comboing groups of mobs, and is good against casters when you can close with them. Champion lets you pop walking fortress and ignore mage CC for 8 seconds while you press the attack however, so you will have an easier time chasing down casters. Honestly as warrior i find the best tactic for dealing with the one or two mages is to charge the melee and round them up, and go tactical mode and have my party focus fire the caster, one or two archers can usually obliterate a venatori mage in, well, one or two shots.
Edit: I see you were asking who to bring, sorry. I gave all my warriors SnS with a focus on dps, and just kinda rotate them all through, Cas is good againts rifts and casters, I didn't bring blackwall as much due to issues with overriding taunts, but Bull does great as an SnS Reaver.
Imo twohander is more fun but it requires a pretty well planed build and equipment. A lot of its usefullness comes through crit because you want to spend points in all the "on crit" passives. Another crucial part is stamina recovery and that's why I think Reaver isn't very good. Ring of Pain drains too much and without it the damage of Devour and Dragon Fury is lackluster. I'm running with 2H Templar because of the aoe stun (30% damage passive on stunned targets) and a beast ability against barriers.
My gear is focused on crit (~25%) and low cooldowns (15% trinket). Using 2H Dragon Greatsword full masterwork with fade-touched silverite (5 guard per hit) and short list perk armor from hissing wastes with 5 hit hidden blade masterwork. This procc on 2H is insane (~850 damage per hit, roughly 4k per procc). Of course it's not a rogue with more or less bugged scaling and you won't 5-sek nuke high dragons but it's fun.
Playing on nm and it's really easy after Haven. But the game has serious balance issues anyways.
TBH, 2H seems a little underwhelming, the tree is rather bloated, and the damage offset of going 2H over SnS isn't really enough compared to the trade off in survivability lost (Turn the Bolt is great, and Bear Mauls the Wolves + Turn the Blade are both good). SnS swings faster for faster stamina regeneration, and it's damage skills are on a much shorter cooldown. The only real weakness I've found with SnS is it's lower damage per hit is more susceptible to being mitigated by Armor, but bringing a rogue with sunder effects to your party will usually mitigate that, as well as stacking a little bit of Armor Pen.
Similarly, Payback Strike and Lunge and Slash allow for greater time on target, clearing CC and gap closing, respectively, while the 2 Hand tree has to rely on other trees to get CC breaks and gap closing.
My first playthrough was a tanking focused champion, but I'm planning on making a DPS focused SnS Reaver here for a new playthrough. I don't necessarily think SnS is -more- dps than 2H, but it's more efficient points and gear-wise for it, and allows for more flexibility.
i got to agree, i did not read ur full post (just 2 line), but 2H warrior is more challenging then KE & Rouge, i was 2H Templar & finished it
Two-hander is pretty fun, s&s can get stressful with the stupid AI causing your ranged companions to run into melee, often leaving a lone survivor tank chipping away slowly and practically living on guard alone. I've completed s&s (and dagger rogue) on nightmare and two-handed on hard mode. I was able to effectively tank on my two-handed after lvl 16, once I took out the first two dragons in Emprise and got some dragon mats and fade-touched silverite for my gear. Also, make sure to unlock your tier 3 gear at the vendors, especially if you run a two-hander. I went with champion on the s&s, and never specialized on the two-hander as I felt like the specializations are underwhelming and I was having too much fun with my regular spec. Grappling chain for mages and combat roll for dragons (not sure of the actual name atm) are incredibly useful for either spec. I feel the tac cam is useless. The reason I prefer two hander is If I can't personally go in and nuke the **** out of the place, it's very difficult to micro manage the companions. Left to thier own devices, they aren't exactly stellar performers. (I need to give props to Viv though, with her KE awesomness).
Really, until you decide to specialize, you'll more than likely want to try both s&s and two-handed out. There's no reason not to.
Avoid 2 handed is my advice, when a KE all rogues all mages can dish out more damage than a 2 handed warrior, yes even a W&S warrior will do more dps than a 2 handed one you know something is wrong.
two hander is massively broken nto the good makes game easy broken
all of teh detonators of thander are busted and bugged
Retour en haut