2 Handed needs to be buffed. Entire style is rather terrible atm

Maximis_ESO

I have to agree with the OP. I can see that he has done a lot of extensive research in regards to speed and damage of weapon and I would have to agree. Having played the game for months in beta and since the launch I can draw from my own experience that 2 hand does seem to have a really big disadvantage and I will add my 2 cents.

Cleave - One of many bad abilities in the 2 hand skill line. People talk about it being an AOE tree but it is far from. The damage is very low and in the beta it used to be even lower! They said they significantly increased the damage but it is still terrible and not worth using. People say it is great for the damage shield but try it out, it isn't. The shield is good but it is taken off in 1 hit from the mobs that you get the absorb shield from making almost completely useless.

Charge - One of the best abilities in the 2 hand skill line when morphed for increased damage from distance traveled it does quite a bit.

Uppercut - A high damage ability that does all physical damage that has a counter productive effect off a knockback and stun/knockdown. It is very easily countered, can't be canceled and you can't move the attack to avoid hitting a target that is blocking. All of this makes the ability worthless in PVP and in PVE also difficult to use because often times NPC's block and you can't avoid launching the attack.

Reverse Slash - This ability is useful but only when the target is in range of dying from a regular swing of your weapon from my personal experience. It seems to be a lot worse than the execute that the Nightblades get which is disappointing.

Momentum - Worthless POS ability especially with overcharge being so damn low. If I get a really nice 2 hand weapon and it does high damage then this ability is ***. I don't get the full effect and its a waste of space on my bar because overcharge is so low. Really disappointed in the morphs for this ability as well.

Since I have played the game I have noticed several things:

- Devs haven't done hardly anything with 2 hand since I have been playing the game which is coming up on a year.
- A bow that does 30 less damage than my 2 hand sword has a harder hitting heavy attack.
- Duel wield and one hand are far more DPS which is ridiculous.
- Who ever said you can bash an enemy to death easy with a 2 hand hasn't done it with a sword and board.
- 2 hand becomes less and less effective as you progress through VR.


There are a lot of problems with this skill line. Most of the skill lines are fun and have utility and useful abilities but most of the two handed abilities are disappointing. You can't even truly AOE with the 2 hand. The passive for splash damage is a joke. 25% to 1 target! Are you serious!? Like I mentioned above, cleave is a darn joke in the damage range.

Every person using a two hand in VR I have asked them how they like it, there response was the same as mine. Its fun but it is weak. One person didn't say its good or bad but just depends on how you play. I'm planning on putting up a poll just to see what people think about it. I'm assuming most will say it doesn't need a buff because they haven't given it a try but level it up to 50 and try it our in the VR it becomes difficult to use as a heavy armor melee fighter type.

I'm very surprised we didn't see more work done in the 1.1 patch notes for the 2 hand skill line. Thanks for listening and remember, I have been playing for almost a year. Most of the experiences I have had are very similar to what the OP has mentioned. Anyone defending it saying that it is fine hasn't played it enough and/or hasn't played with the other skill lines enough.

Maximis_ESO

Maximis_ESO wrote: »

I have to agree with the OP. I can see that he has done a lot of extensive research in regards to speed and damage of weapon and I would have to agree. Having played the game for months in beta and since the launch I can draw from my own experience that 2 hand does seem to have a really big disadvantage and I will add my 2 cents.

Cleave - One of many bad abilities in the 2 hand skill line. People talk about it being an AOE tree but it is far from. The damage is very low and in the beta it used to be even lower! They said they significantly increased the damage but it is still terrible and not worth using. People say it is great for the damage shield but try it out, it isn't. The shield is good but it is taken off in 1 hit from the mobs that you get the absorb shield from making almost completely useless.

Charge - One of the best abilities in the 2 hand skill line when morphed for increased damage from distance traveled it does quite a bit.

Uppercut - A high damage ability that does all physical damage that has a counter productive effect off a knockback and stun/knockdown. It is very easily countered, can't be canceled and you can't move the attack to avoid hitting a target that is blocking. All of this makes the ability worthless in PVP and in PVE also difficult to use because often times NPC's block and you can't avoid launching the attack.

Reverse Slash - This ability is useful but only when the target is in range of dying from a regular swing of your weapon from my personal experience. It seems to be a lot worse than the execute that the Nightblades get which is disappointing.

Momentum - Worthless POS ability especially with overcharge being so damn low. If I get a really nice 2 hand weapon and it does high damage then this ability is ***. I don't get the full effect and its a waste of space on my bar because overcharge is so low. Really disappointed in the morphs for this ability as well.

Since I have played the game I have noticed several things:

- Devs haven't done hardly anything with 2 hand since I have been playing the game which is coming up on a year.
- A bow that does 30 less damage than my 2 hand sword has a harder hitting heavy attack.
- Duel wield and one hand are far more DPS which is ridiculous.
- Who ever said you can bash an enemy to death easy with a 2 hand hasn't done it with a sword and board.
- 2 hand becomes less and less effective as you progress through VR.


There are a lot of problems with this skill line. Most of the skill lines are fun and have utility and useful abilities but most of the two handed abilities are disappointing. You can't even truly AOE with the 2 hand. The passive for splash damage is a joke. 25% to 1 target! Are you serious!? Like I mentioned above, cleave is a darn joke in the damage range.

Every person using a two hand in VR I have asked them how they like it, there response was the same as mine. Its fun but it is weak. One person didn't say its good or bad but just depends on how you play. I'm planning on putting up a poll just to see what people think about it. I'm assuming most will say it doesn't need a buff because they haven't given it a try but level it up to 50 and try it our in the VR it becomes difficult to use as a heavy armor melee fighter type.

I'm very surprised we didn't see more work done in the 1.1 patch notes for the 2 hand skill line. Thanks for listening and remember, I have been playing for almost a year. Most of the experiences I have had are very similar to what the OP has mentioned. Anyone defending it saying that it is fine hasn't played it enough and/or hasn't played with the other skill lines enough.

EDIT:

Just want to know if the DEVS are looking into this matter or not? I know the OP brings a lot of good facts to the table in terms of weapon damage, 3x3 set bonus set up, and weapon attack speed. With the ability to have damage meters we are able to test abilities and their output to help provide feedback to better balance the game. @ZOS_GinaBruno

ArRashid

to sum it up so far:
- Absorb shields need to be fixed to apply armor, resist and block BEFORE your bubble gets utterly destroyed by enemy sneezing at you. That would "Fix" half Cleave's problem

- Increase Cleave's instant damage, shorten it's DoT effect (aka WAY faster ticks over some 2 sec at max) or FIX DoT stacking (instead of useless overwriting - this affects half AoEs in the game since they all have some kind of looooooooong DoT)

- Increase Reverse Slash's basic damage. (or we really have no other choice than to run away and charge back in to "dps" whole boss fight)

- give us some USEFUL momentum's morphs... both choices are literally *** right now and so it's not worth putting a skill point in either of them.

- fix Axe bleed. Give it 0.5 ticks over 2 seconds at max, not a 10 sec DoT that's overwriting itself like stupid. Noone plays with axes because of that.

- Increase heavy attack damage by A LOT. I know you put "weapon damage" on really retardedly low soft cap so even dual wield users can get to it, so we can't get decent damage with 2h even if we stacked Surge, Momentum and flawless Dawnbreaker (I think cap slaps you in the face with even just ONE of them), but I think heavy attack damage doesn't obey such rules. Why not have heavy 2h attack natively do AT LEAST 50% more damage than other weapons? Paired with Bound Armaments bonus to heavy attack damage could finally make AT LEAST sorc 2h playable.

Drekor

Sinoby wrote: »

Reavan wrote: »

One thing i hate is my bows light attacks hit for 170' and my 2h same quality same level hits for 130.
That and you can argue the bow fires faster.

Yeah, what's up with that? I found it out yesterday when realising my bow light atacks deal a lot of damage comparing to "weapon damage" of the bow itself. So I compared my 102 dmg bow to 124 dmg 2H. Light atacks of bow were 147 on normal mobs (from close range), while 2H were cere close to 125. I have fully maxed out 2H with all morphs maxed out, and just reachd lvl 36 with bow. Shouldn't melee 2H weapon deal considerably more damage than ranged?

Wild guess here but probably because bow attacks are "spells", they are reflected just like any other spell projectile so it's possible bow is going based on spell resist vs armor for 2h.

oxygen_boarderb16_ESO

I'm glad that I'm not the only one. I've been struggling with trying to get a decent dps for VR Dungeons using 2h.

I don't really have anything further to this thread. 2H line right now feels like a very power trash/world boss skill line that loses its shine in dungeons.

My Trash/world combo is

Critical Charge -> Brawler -> Uppercut -> Critical Charge -> Executioner

One thing to note, is, stealthing uppercut can hit for around 1000 single target. I just find, if I want to boost my dps in a single target boss fight, I have to remove most of my 2H abilities and if that's the case, I might as well just switch out the 2h for something that gives me more stats/enchants to boost my Templar lines.

And I literally have no idea with that, I just wanted to play as a med/hvy 2H templar. I've leveled all the armor lines and most of the weapon lines, so its not a big deal. I just like the play style.

Lokart

I've read the entire post, and you make some points, but in my case (I'm Vet4 at the moment) I use 2H when I'm in a bad situation, because it always saves my life.
With bow, or shield that I also tried out, I had to be careful on how to engage the combat (especially with bow), but with with 2H I can just run into packs of 3 mobs and ravage them. If I fail with bow, I immediately switch to 2H to end the combat easily.

Haven't tried Vet dongeon, but it is true than in levelling dongeons I had some hard times in melee combat.

But please stop complaining about 3x3 sets... Staves and bows also suffer from this loss.

oxygen_boarderb16_ESO

Lokart wrote: »

I've read the entire post, and you make some points, but in my case (I'm Vet4 at the moment) I use 2H when I'm in a bad situation, because it always saves my life.
With bow, or shield that I also tried out, I had to be careful on how to engage the combat (especially with bow), but with with 2H I can just run into packs of 3 mobs and ravage them. If I fail with bow, I immediately switch to 2H to end the combat easily.

Haven't tried Vet dongeon, but it is true than in levelling dongeons I had some hard times in melee combat.

But please stop complaining about 3x3 sets... Staves and bows also suffer from this loss.

Yeah that's the problem, 2H seems to be mostly a world/trash exclusive weapon.

Lokart

What I find is a problem is the Unbalance between Swords bonuses and the two others.

I like Mauls and I would like to play it, but I can't. The armor reduction stays the same amount from low to high levels, and the creatures/players have more and more armor so it becomes useless...
They should change it to a percentage of armor reduction, or make it a fixed amount that increases as you level.

For Axes, well... the dot is really weak and it doesn't even work on certain creatures (Skeletons, dwemer...)

It would be more interesting to have a whole set of weapons and change them in fonction of the fight you're facing to be optimised. But here we are stuck with Swords, because the others are "meh"

SirPuppingtonVonHat

So how would you guys fix it/make 2H better?

beravinprb19_ESO

SirPuppingtonVonHat wrote: »

So how would you guys fix it/make 2H better?

Momentum needs better morphs. Reverse Slash needs to do less damage when the target is on low health, but a lot more when the target is on full health. Cleave could use a damage buff. Uppercut is useless, and I would trade it for something else. Heavy Weapons need the bleed changed to last 3 or 4 seconds, and the armour reduction should be percent based. Battle Rush should activate when attacking an enemy on a low health, and not when / if you get a killing blow. Forceful Impact should be 15%/30%, or allow it to hit a third target.

Armitas

SirPuppingtonVonHat wrote: »

So how would you guys fix it/make 2H better?

There are a lot of peripheral things that could be tweaked but I think at the core it needs a core element that distinguishes it. When you take a look at DW vs 2 hander one comes to the a priori thought that one will be faster with less damage and the other will be slower with more damage. But then you see the listed weapon damage between DW and 2 hand and wonder where the advantage is when the speed seems so detrimental.

I think it needs a more evident difference. In skyrim the difference was that you could block with a 2 hander. I don't think that is what it needs but in skyrim you could certainly identify with the intent of the 2 hander which does not seem to be the case here. When you think DW you think speed, so what do we think of when we think about a giant 2 handed weapon? I personally think crit. If you got hit with this thing it would most certainly be a critical hit. Maybe what it needs to distinguish it self is an intrinsic critical hit chance or a greater critical hit multiplier. That would make it stronger, more distinguishable, and the critical hits would help smooth over the slow dps when you have to block or avoid.

reagen_lionel

I think there should be a passive that increases the base damage of 2h weapons that is upgradable. The passive effects to 2hands should all be on them by default. (mace crushes armor, axe bleeds, sword slight crit increase since the damage bonus passive would be in its own passive now and through all 2hand weapons)

The current passive should instead increase these effects greater for the different 2 hand weapons. So if you wish to specialize in a certain weapon you can.
(the current passive should also morph depending on the weapon you use. It would make it more complicated. But it would make the selection of the 2hands more deeper, the same should be done with one handers in my opinion. A person who is used to using a mace should not be able to use a two handed sword with the exact same efficiency if he/she's never held one. Destruction staffs have kind of a similar system to this already just implemented differently)

Cleave needs a significant damage bonus to its initial hit. the bleed needs a faster tick with the damage it has now, or a longer tick with more damage.

Charge is fine to me.

Momentum can stay the same (since it gets an inherent boost from the 2h damage passive when its upgraded)

Uppercut is fine.

The splash damage passive should have a more significant increase in the damage it spreads.

Reverse Slash can stay the same for the same reason as Momentum.

Battle Rush is fine

In addition the secondary effects of the weapons should scale with the level of the player the same way all the existing base damage of weapons do. (and all bleeds for that matter).

With the introduction of the base damage passive addition, it should in turn make all 2 handed abilities stamina requirment increase by a certain % with each addition. So one can have a bit of choice for more damage with more stamina in thier abilities or use abilities without the passive base damage increase skill.

(so in short, 2 hands will take a bit longer to master with the changes, much longer than the one handed weapons (since if you implement the passive for each individual weapon, you can potentially double the training exp for that passive by dual wielding the same weapon) but they will be pretty powerful, stronger than one handed stuff for sure, but slower. But when they swing, it hurts. Like a two hander should..)

beravinprb19_ESO

reagen_lionel wrote: »

Battle Rush is fine

With all due respect, I disagree with this. As it is at the moment, Battle Rush is worthless for boss fights and in PvP. I want the stamina regeneration in combat, when I need it the most, and not after I've already bested my foe. Besides, in group situations, it basically means we need to go out of our way to get the "last hit" so we can get this passive to work.

Kathleen.Flynn02b14_ESO

I'm a boring DK, and I used 2H almost exclusively until recently. I think I switched to mostly 1H and shield around VR 8 or 9. So, 2H isn't entirely hopeless. I do like 1H better. I think the problem might be that shield bash is pretty awesome.

Zanderscotxub17_ESO

I dont know how everyone tests but on my alt I have a dk 2h and I test in cyrodiil at pre VR for stat boost and equal numbers. When I test momentum with igneous weapon I went way over soft cap . When I just did momentum I went way over soft cap. When I spoke to another player with legendary 2h he says stat alone from weapon takes you way over soft cap.

Lets not kid ourselves the problem is how 2h relates to soft cap.

I see two options...

A. Have 2h inherit a higher soft cap. I would say 30% higher

B. Increase splash significantly and add splash to all attack, making a 2h a aoe option and leaving soft cap alone.

These are the only to option I see as logical. Something needs to changed 2h when spec perfect still falls on it face compared to it 1h cousins.

SirPuppingtonVonHat

Personally, I would rather see 2H abilities have higher scaling with weapon damage and have momentum increase damage by a percent like Flawless Dawnbreaker does. I'd also play around with the passives a little bit and give all the abilities a little something extra as well.

reagen_lionel

SirPuppingtonVonHat wrote: »

Personally, I would rather see 2H abilities have higher scaling with weapon damage and have momentum increase damage by a percent like Flawless Dawnbreaker does. I'd also play around with the passives a little bit and give all the abilities a little something extra as well.

yeah thats essentially what most of my previous post was about.

beravinprb19_ESO wrote: »

reagen_lionel wrote: »

Battle Rush is fine

With all due respect, I disagree with this. As it is at the moment, Battle Rush is worthless for boss fights and in PvP. I want the stamina regeneration in combat, when I need it the most, and not after I've already bested my foe. Besides, in group situations, it basically means we need to go out of our way to get the "last hit" so we can get this passive to work.

I understand if you disagree with that. I find battle rush fine however, especially with the passive works I mentioned in my previous post, so weither you work specifically for aoe or single target damage. Battle Rush essentially works better indirectly as a result. You dont really have to go out of your way to to get the last hit. And with the boost to the execute ability we have (reverse slash), can keep us going in battle with little down time. Which works real good in trash battles, pvp and general group play. For using our two hand, our main resource is stamina as well as for dodging and blocking.

However making it too easy to use would make 2hand a bit over powered. So I think it should remain as is. If you find yourself low on stamina in mid fight. Find an opponent to execute to get that stamina regenerating back quickly in admist the rush is an appealing concept and tactic to me.

lindechene

I share the feeling and am about two respec and place all points I had in 2hand in bow and dualwield.. .main is one hand and shield

From level 1 to maybe 40 I found that 2hand was fun to play for groups of 3 and up. I liked that cleave gave me some armor. But now at V5 I just do not survive any group of of 3 and more mobs.

In fact it is even simpler to kill groups of 5 mobs with one hand and shield than with 2hand. Even at lower levels it was more efficient to stun or petrify up to 3 enemies and focus one after the other down.

Its a pity that there is no real area damage melee tree.

My suggestion:

Make all 2 hand attacks hit all enemies that are in range.

All meaning really ALL light and heavy attacks and skills. Then it would be an interesting option.

SirPuppingtonVonHat

Hmmm...what if Uppercut were removed, and was replaced with an upgraded version of Forceful that allowed you to turn all melee attacks into an AoE as a toggle?

reagen_lionel

SirPuppingtonVonHat wrote: »

Hmmm...what if Uppercut were removed, and was replaced with an upgraded version of Forceful that allowed you to turn all melee attacks into an AoE as a toggle?

Nah. I really like uppercut for single target damage and the CC it does. I would perfer that as an additional skill. As I'd think all the weapon specific skill lines could use an expansion.

beravinprb19_ESO

SirPuppingtonVonHat wrote: »

Hmmm...what if Uppercut were removed, and was replaced with an upgraded version of Forceful that allowed you to turn all melee attacks into an AoE as a toggle?

In my opinion, it would be better off as a high damage single target that you can use on full health enemies. When you get them low, you then switch to Executioner to finish them off. That said, weapons are so far behind class skills right now that its not even funny.

Sakiri

reagen_lionel wrote: »

SirPuppingtonVonHat wrote: »

Personally, I would rather see 2H abilities have higher scaling with weapon damage and have momentum increase damage by a percent like Flawless Dawnbreaker does. I'd also play around with the passives a little bit and give all the abilities a little something extra as well.

yeah thats essentially what most of my previous post was about.

beravinprb19_ESO wrote: »

reagen_lionel wrote: »

Battle Rush is fine

With all due respect, I disagree with this. As it is at the moment, Battle Rush is worthless for boss fights and in PvP. I want the stamina regeneration in combat, when I need it the most, and not after I've already bested my foe. Besides, in group situations, it basically means we need to go out of our way to get the "last hit" so we can get this passive to work.

I understand if you disagree with that. I find battle rush fine however, especially with the passive works I mentioned in my previous post, so weither you work specifically for aoe or single target damage. Battle Rush essentially works better indirectly as a result. You dont really have to go out of your way to to get the last hit. And with the boost to the execute ability we have (reverse slash), can keep us going in battle with little down time. Which works real good in trash battles, pvp and general group play. For using our two hand, our main resource is stamina as well as for dodging and blocking.

However making it too easy to use would make 2hand a bit over powered. So I think it should remain as is. If you find yourself low on stamina in mid fight. Find an opponent to execute to get that stamina regenerating back quickly in admist the rush is an appealing concept and tactic to me.

The problem with that tactic I have is targeting mid combat. 2h melee feels "floaty" to me. Not sure why it does and dw doesnt though.

pknecron

reagen_lionel wrote: »

The main thing I find an issue with 2 hands. is that no matter what weapon you have, they all share the same base damage. So you have a battleaxe with the same base damage as a dagger you would have except one swings slower. It really defeats the purpose of even using a 2hand. Yes you get passives that increase 2hands weapon effectiveness but why should you get a passive to make a 2hand sword better than a dagger?

SNIP

A 2h of the same level and quality does MORE base damage than any 1h weapon.

Utildai

Are you sure your doing it right? Every two handed weapon swinger I see destroys me in damage. I'm a Temp using 1H and Shield... I can't do near the damage they do swinging a two handed weapon.

Axer

Utildai wrote: »

Are you sure your doing it right? Every two handed weapon swinger I see destroys me in damage. I'm a Temp using 1H and Shield... I can't do near the damage they do swinging a two handed weapon.

As a templar, if you swing either a 1handed sword n board, dual wield, or a two hander..

No matter what , your doing it wrong.

Templar dps is achieved best by spamming biting jabs. Not weapons, not even close.

And tho yea if I just use sword n board vs two handed, I do far more dps with sword n board. (Pretty simple how to also: Pierce armor + spam shield bash). So whatever your seeing is an issue with your playstyle, not the weapon skill balance.

All melee weapon skills are very weak compared to the better class skills. Only one evne really comparable is destro staff - and thats as it uses magicka.. All stamina skills are just plain inferior.

Axer

pknecron wrote: »

A 2h of the same level and quality does MORE base damage than any 1h weapon.

Not if you duel wield. Duel wield adds both to your weapon damage. Tho its full main hand and a percentage of you off hand, either way it always add up to more then any two hander in the game. And it simply hits harder, due to stronger passives.

reagen_lionel

Axer wrote: »

pknecron wrote: »

A 2h of the same level and quality does MORE base damage than any 1h weapon.

Not if you duel wield. Duel wield adds both to your weapon damage. Tho its full main hand and a percentage of you off hand, either way it always add up to more then any two hander in the game. And it simply hits harder, due to stronger passives.

And in addition they hit faster. And all 2hands attacks have some sort of build up, for damage that is about equal or less than the other weapon skills.

Rhythmic

Yees,2h is soooo weak.
http://youtu.be/i_w5VRaP854

*sarkasm*

Armitas

Rhythmic wrote: »

Yees,2h is soooo weak.
http://youtu.be/i_w5VRaP854

*sarkasm*

@Rhythmic The video doesn't work. I am assuming it is a video of you doing good dps with a two hander? Could you give us some parses on a mammoth? Mammoths are probably the best training dummy we have, it's not affected by the fighters guild, has enough health for sustained dps, and it's so slow that you can avoid taking any damage so you don't need a tank or healer or even blocking. (no stealth hits)

For reference the best I can get is 550 on a mammoth. I still have a bit of room left if I respec searing strike, thief stone gets fixed, and I find a good poison glyph for dual damage types (fire and poison), and craft forges. Minimum 450, typical 470, max 550. If you are beating that let us know your build. I'm using Burning Embers (searing strike), Flame Lash (lava whip) and executioner and all the weapon buffs. (was V9 at the time)

(470 is still low compared to others. I talked to a DK who was getting 600 from dual wield. )
(I am not saying 470 is the benchmark for the 2hander but that 470 is the highest I have knowledge of.)

Falmer

You can't simply compare DPS across the weapon types, they do different things.

The damage shield I get off cleave, which can be pretty much spammed means 100 less health damage for a handful of stamina points, of which I always have plenty of.

The uppercut means single targets don't have much of a shot.

Dismissing 2 handed just because it doesn't have a higher damage output is really missing the whole concept behind many of its abilities.