TWC OHE Bard - Flares, or crit weighting?

[TheOne]

I'm using two handaxes and not sure if I should go for a crit weighted weapon, or a 5x flaring one. I'm GoS. Anyone with an opinion out there?

[Suppressed Poet]

Either will do - whichever you like.

Have your sonic in your main hand and train in air lore + mstrike for the flares. Ideally you want to collect a variety of off-hands. A few flaring (certainly one fire for troll camps, a blessable, and a crit weighted. Pick the off hand to what you are hunting.

The beauty of having a sonic is you can change the weapon base to what you are hunting. Sometimes you will want fast weapons for frequent flares and other times you will want hard hitting smack-in-the-face handaxes and falchions.

In summary, I wouldn't confine your choice to just one.

[Zelas]

I'm gonna back up poet here. I'm a twc handaxe bard but will often change weapons based on the ASG of what i'm after. Falchions are better vs lighter armor. When i'm with a wizard I'll go double daggers for a 1 sec rt. And hell, when I want to mess around I'll sing up a sonic blackjack or whip. Since you are in GoS you do get heavy crit weighting with sigil of major bane vs. hated enemies. All else equal I'd go for crit weighting since it works every strike, unlike flares, and will put critters in stun more so you have time to work. Experiment and enjoy.

[Drakefang]

I prefer flares and if going with flares, I suggest short swords, but axes work fine since you have em.

Putting your sonic in your main hand accomplishes more overall flares because your first hand misses more rarely. However, it's weightless. My understanding is the RT formula works best having the lightest weapon in your off hand. I use my sonics in my off hand because of this weight issue. PLUS, it's quite typical for some bards to have a higher amount of strength bonus over Dex bonus...your higher enchant sonic will counter the drop off in AS with your off hand, too.

There's nothing wrong with crit-weighting. I just find flares to be more appealing for me. Mixing it up with your non-sonic is maybe a good tactic. I just switched again, myself, to twc ohb. Pure bards are fantastic for soloing and quick fries but I just couldn't make it work supporting a group like I do night in and night out.

[Buckwheet]

If it was me, I would find a fast gem eater and use a sonic dagger with lots of haste/ air lore.

[TheOne]

Buck - Can you explain a gem eater to me? I've seen them mentioned before but wasn't sure what they are.

Drake - I noticed the same thing in the RT formula about the offhand needing to be lighter, but most of the time I can swing the same RT with my sonic in my main hand. IDK if it's because I have so much dex/agi or what.

It makes since to swap them around depending on what i'm hunting, just dunno what I should go for first or if I should even stick with handaxes. I guess I need to experiment with different combinations to achieve different RTs and see what works best for what.

[Androidpk]

http://www.krakiipedia.org/wiki/Gem-eating_weapon

[TheOne]

What does one of those run?

[Ardwen]

Get kroderine weapons and kill with the hadted dispel flares, with two of them the flares will happen regularly, especially if you also cast spells on the mobs

[Androidpk]

Get kroderine weapons and kill with the hadted dispel flares, with two of them the flares will happen regularly, especially if you also cast spells on the mobs

That sounds like it would be pretty fun in a grimswarm camp. 1614 + mstrike = zoinks!

[DaCapn]

Since gem eaters were mentioned, anyone know the approximate lifetime of flares/weighting/bless per gem? I know that there's some value dependence but I've got no idea if it's ~50 or ~250 swings.

[TheOne]

Give me yours Ardwen?

[Ardwen]

win the one I saw in the may maze run!