Weapon Choice

[crennen]

I'm curious what you all think about weapon choice. I have the option of bonding to a perfect 4x morning star to get flares, or acquiring a 4x heavy crit weighted mace and bonding w/o flares.

[Back]

I went perfect forged with 1625 (possible double) flares. Getting enchanted from 4 to 5x soon. With the higher AvD and 1605 I thought 1625 flares were the way to go.

[crennen]

Atm I have so much AS that the AvD hardly matters. What I am not getting is crits. +260 end rolls a ton but few crits.

[Back]

I rock the handaxe and I get plenty of one shots. I know nothing about crits.

Someone else here should be able to enlighten you on the best crit table.

[Donquix]

a perfect would have the +3 avd, and morning stars on average have a couple of points more on their AVD compared to a mace. we'll call the combined AS different 5 for the sake of argument.

Morning stars have a .05 DF more across the board. except on unarmored and soft leather, which is .025

lets look at scale armor...it's in the middle for the DFs compared to chain/plate.

mace DF = .225
morningstar DF = .275 w/ perfect = ~.29

if you routinely generate a 250 endroll...

MACE
150*.225 = 33.75 points of raw damage + the 10ish for heavy weighting = ~44 crit damage (baring creature resistances, etc.)

MORNINGSTAR:
155*.29 = 43.5

so compared to the perfect, you're really only getting like 1 extra point of crit damage. The mace would do slightly better (by comparison) on plate and slightly worse (by comparison) on chain.

But, with the morning star you get the guiding light flares as well, and you have the option of cheaply enchanting it. Every +5 enchant would yield another 1 point or so in damage.

In favor of the mace though, it's slightly faster (if you mstrike this might come into play) and is easier to aim being smaller if you're targeting attacks from the open.

[crennen]

Thanks a lot for the replies. I plan on eventually aiming from the open so that gives me something to think about. The uncontrolled puncture/crush while aiming with a star gives me pause but over all seems good.

[Donquix]

Morning stars are aimable in the open as well, just maces are easier.

The puncture/crush is only an issue against puncture immune mobs which, while relatively common, are still in the minority. And puncture has very very cheap criticals to the eye/head for death, and super cheap knockdown crits on the leg.

[Bhuryn]

Morning stars are aimable in the open as well, just maces are easier.

The puncture/crush is only an issue against puncture immune mobs which, while relatively common, are still in the minority. And puncture has very very cheap criticals to the eye/head for death, and super cheap knockdown crits on the leg.

well, puncture to the head/neck requires rank 6, crush to the head/neck is only 5. Puncture to the eyes only requires a 4 but crush is 7.

I switched to mauls cause I got tired of punctures to the head not killing my targets =P.

[Donquix]

It's the leg knockdowns i love, it's something stupid like rank 3 is a knockdown. Hilarious on those giants if you can't reach the head.

like lol...10 damage and a knockdown, gg

Of course i may be bias, i have a very different hunting style from crushing things like Gallagher with a watermelon :)

oh forgot to mention also in favor of the morning star, it will get more benefit from arm of the arkati.

I don't know how if it's additive or multiplicative with the perfect bonus...i'm assuming multiplicative but i really don't know. at the very least it will be another little bit in favor of the morningstar. Not a huge difference (.375 damage difference in morning star and mace on a 250ish endroll) but closes the gap even more in favor of the star as far as raw damage output is concerned.

I'd go with the morning star just because it's a lot cheaper. You could get the 4x perfect, drop another like 5m on it and get it player enchanted to 6x, then you have a 6x perfect versus a 4x heavy weighted for roughly the same investment. as i'm assuming the 4x mace is in the 5-8m range while the star + enchant will run you 6-7m (all be it with a lag time)

[Mechwarrior1]

Use a morning star if you are going ohb/shield. Get a perfectly forged one if you can. I use a 7x dcw perfect star myself.