Sword or greataxe for WAR?

[silverfang]

Hi.

I read on a strategy guide that Great Axe was the best choice for WAR.
I do have some questions about it.

Currently I have sword skill ~ 32 with Sword, for great axe I'm only around 16.

If I go after a monster, I deal roughly as much damage with my sword as with the great axe (Sword have 12 in attack, great axe have 24). Sometimes I make perhaps 5-6 more damage with GreatAxe. Will a skill of 32 with Great Axe make twice much damage/blow as sword if equal skill?

I realise that with a GreatAxe you possibly will deal more damage during critical hit. On the other hand it hits twice as slow. It is also more troublesome if you miss with a Great Axe, with sword you "spread out" the damage more, even if you miss 2 out of 10 you have to miss only 1 out of 10 for GreatAxe to make it even.

I wonder if there is any % of miss each weapon have, or is it divided equally no matter what weapon you have? I was thinking that perhaps with Sword you miss twice as often as with great axe?

[Cade]

Use whatever you feel is better. It won't matter until after lv. 30, where a Gaxe's damage really picks up...

[Desmar]

A sky high attack won't neccecarily improve your damage. Damage done is relative to your strength & your weapon damage. Attack & Defense are relative to the % of max damage that you can deal. For instance lets say you have 100 attack, 10 str, and 10 weapon damage (these numbers are not realistic but are easier to use). But the basic premise is your max damage is close to what your Str + Weapon damage is. If you attack something w/ say 100 def and you have 100 att you would do roughly half of your potential max damage. So your average hit would be in the 8-12 range. I believe there are also certain random factors that cause variances from 1-25% in certain values but you would need some testing or loose lips at square to confirm that.

Edit: So in essence go for what gives you the most damage at the least delay. But keep both lvled for future party versatility.

[silverfang]

Thanks for the answeres..However I'm not sure if I got your calculations correct.

I have 18 in STR.
Weapon of 12 in attack = 30 possible damage - DEF
Weapon of 24 in attack = 42 possible damage - DEF

So what would the reason to go with Great Axe if you only make 50% more damage, not atleast 100% ?

You also mention that it depends on what DEF the enemy have, since it probably scalable from your example, it shouldn't matter much for my calculations, or?

[Cloudzero]

axes are probably better because the cap to your axe is much higher than everything else. Reach that cap, and youmay be doing more dmg than with a sword.

[Desmar]

There are a few damage variances that aren't visual kind of like 'invisible' stats. The str/damage stuff isn't very accurate, the point I was making was that your Attack vs. their defense will give you a % of the max damage, defense itself will not directly reduce the damage. Usually to get hit for 1 or 0 damage your defense has to be substantially higher than your opponents attack.

You can use boost and raise your attack 100-200 over what it says (even higher at higher levels) but the effect is usually only going to be visible versus stronger enemies.

But using a 2h weapon your damage is quite a bit higher than a 1h sword which helps out early on, and later on so its a good idea to raise it. However if you plan on swapping classes to an Advanced Job later on like Dragoon (Polearm) or Dark Knight (Scythe), then swapping to a weapon that suits that class as a Warrior might be a good idea as it will make soloing the first 10-12 lvls of that class really smooth & Profitable.

[Tobold]

It all depends what role you want to play, now and in the future. You can be either a "tank", or a "damage dealer". The main job of a tank is to take hits. So a one-handed sword (or axe) is much prefered, as it allows you to carry a shield. If you want to be the damage-dealer, go ahead and use 2-handed great axe or any other 2-handed weapon.

As "tank", your warrior could become a paladin later. As "damage-dealer", he could become Dark Knight.

[JamesX]

As a warrior it is fairly easy to cap at least 3 weapons.

Depending on what you wish to go you may want to specialize one way or another.

When I say focus I mean make sure you maxe that skill out, it doesn't mean you ignore everything else - you should have 3 or 4 weapon skills maxed.

Future Class - Focused Skill
Warrior - Then max out Both Axe and Great Axe
Paladin - Shield and 1-H Sword, Great Sword (very Secondary)
Dark Knight - Great Sword, Scyth
Samurai - Spear
Dragoon - Spear, Sword

If you plan to play a Mage class after you turn 30 (for one reason or another) I would suggest you use a Club or Great Club once in a while, but since the good ones are usually WHM only or Mage Only, only do this to max out skills and not for actual heavy combat.

[Omena]

Pre-leveling a weapon skill isn't really that important. It only helps you in the very beginning of your new class, but makes the previous one harder. I suggest you use the weapon(s) that your job is best with. In the case of a warrior that would be great axe and one handed axe. You'll notice that you can raise your axe skills much higher than your sword skills.

[Himura-san]

Hmmm.... This is a question I should have asked a long time ago... I recently leveled my warrior to lvl 53. Up until level 30, I used mainly Axe, Sword, and Great Sword... used the 1-handed weapons more often beacuse I tank a lot. In my opinion, it was a HUGE mistake not to level my Great Axe. This weapon is extremely useful and is almost a "must" for warriors to use, with one of the main reasons being Shield Break. I have finally gotten my Great Axe skill level up to where it should be... was reallly really painful trying to catch up since you miss so much with mobs your own level.

Just based on my peronal opinion, how the leveling order for weapons as a War:
1. Great Axe
2. Axe
3. Scythe
4. Polearm
5. Great Sword (they just look cool :p)
6. Sword
Scythe and polearm are actually kind of a tie to me =) Swords really kind of suck at higher levels... In general though, I would keep as many weapons maxed out as possible to have a wide array of weapon skills for skillchaining.

At this level, I tank a lot less, actually on very rare occasions as my subs really don't suit tanking anymore (Mnk and thf). If you enjoy tanking, I'd reccomend a Ninja sub =) (I am starting to hate tanking and hitting for 0 due to all the debuffs ) Spendy tho.... Oh, and after level 30, it's nice to be a warrior as everyone has moved onto new jobs. I enjoy the versatility most I think.... but it takes so much time leveling so many subs :dead: (still need to start sam and my nin is only 13)

Hope this helps!

[krycis]

When I was leveling my WAR, I leveled four weapons to max every level. I had bought the shiniest new weapon as soon as I could for each of them. I ran around with a sword, shield, great axe, spear and an axe at all times. I could renkei in any party and often would change weapons on the fly to/and change the renkei order (or keep it the same). I became a renkei master early because of this. That's one of the reasons I thought I'd be the best fit for using SAM. =)

I do however have to go back and level my spear, it's stuck at WAR32 level.

[raexn]

I'm with Tobold.

Every melee job has atleast one or two weapons that their A+ to B in. Its best to keep the top two maxed at all times as most intelligent pt leaders look for you to be using your jobs most certified weapon. I started using GreatAxe at low lvls and didn't like it, but now at lvl30 i can't live without it and Sturmwind (=

Its great getting those 500dmg hits in there every once in awhile.
Have to take into consideration your sub too. If you're using a mnk sub like myself, you're going to be getting counter attacks in with your GreatAxe which will(in a way) cut down your delay times as well as war's lvl 25 ability of double attack. I tend to keep 3 or more weapons capped at all times, but when i hit lvl 25 i realized i'm keeping them capped for future jobs. And when you get those future jobs you're going to start at lvl1 anyways, so why not wait til that job to raise the weapon skill? Less space to take up in your inventory, more money to spend on your current job. Everyones got their own opinion on the matter. But as Krycis said, you will become a renkei master with that amount of weapons on you all the time. Its inevitable.

Good luck

[Rico]

Moving to the right place.

[RiceCooker]

Originally posted by JamesX
As a warrior it is fairly easy to cap at least 3 weapons.

Depending on what you wish to go you may want to specialize one way or another.

When I say focus I mean make sure you maxe that skill out, it doesn't mean you ignore everything else - you should have 3 or 4 weapon skills maxed.

Future Class - Focused Skill
Warrior - Then max out Both Axe and Great Axe
Paladin - Shield and 1-H Sword, Great Sword (very Secondary)
Dark Knight - Great Sword, Scyth
Samurai - Spear
Dragoon - Spear, Sword

If you plan to play a Mage class after you turn 30 (for one reason or another) I would suggest you use a Club or Great Club once in a while, but since the good ones are usually WHM only or Mage Only, only do this to max out skills and not for actual heavy combat.

Samurai - Spear??? would SAM be best with a great katana?? or is penta thrust too pimp?

im using a great axe with my war dammit i miss so much.... any tips guys? im lvl 13 at the moment fighting ITs at valkurms lizards and moving on to snipers and mi miss a hell of alot and even when i do hit i hit for jack all.... my shield break attack does like 20dmg.... thats pretty poor when the PLD was doing like ruffly 17dmg with his sword thats one handed

[Lone Dragon]

I've heard the sam board say that spear is somewhat of a novelty,
they should always lvl GK.