As an 'axe man' is the regular or wood axe better for killing zombies?

[Pope Innocent the 69th]

The Wood Axe does considerably more damage and with high axe skill, athletics and the axe man trait it swings reasonably fast, I'm just wondering if it's overkill or if it's worth it at all?

[carl]

I would say the regular is significantly better, since it has less exertion, plus a faster swinggin speed. The wood axe is without a doubt overkill, and a bit too sluggish for multiple zomboids.

[Armagenesis]

Fire Axe is overall better for combat between the two. Keep wood axe for their intended purpose of chopping trees.

[Greb]

With the Axe Man trait, you can swing the Wood Axe a lot faster which can make it a more attractive weapon for combat than without it. It naturally does a lot more damage than a Fire Axe, much more damage and huge critical multiplier, especially on downed zombies. Better durability too. Can make it very appealing. I've been there, when the Zomboid devs finally fixed the Axe Man trait I took it and tried it out with the Wood Axe, expecting great things..

HOWEVER it's classed as a "heavy" weapon, granting it multi-hit capability even with multi-hit turned off, forcing it to be used two handed instead of one handed, and worst of all, making it require huge amounts of stamina with each swing. If you're using a Wood Axe, you'll want to be wearing light clothing because you'll overheat quickly, and you'll want to have fairly high, like 8+, Fitness so you can regenerate stamina quickly and reduce how much stamina it takes when you swing weapons. It also means using it when you are drowsy or worse is very ill advised, as you'll burn through loads of stamina swinging it around.

Wood Axe is absolutely amazing in low zombie population type situations, where you only need to hit a zombie every now and then, where you have a good chance of just killing it in a single blow, especially once your Axe skill starts getting higher. Despite its multi-hit function though, it's pretty terrible in prolonged engagements where you've got to swing over and over again, because it will drain you of stamina very quickly.

It's still a powerful weapon though. It also does the most damage against doors vs the two - some doors might take up to four hits with a Fire Axe, whereas a Wood Axe can reliably take them down in as little as two.

The Fire Axe is lighter and swings fast enough that using it with the Axe Man trait is actually pretty insane, especially with high Fitness to further increase your swing speed a bit and reduce the stamina cost, you can just swing away like a madman. It does less damage than the Wood Axe and doesn't hurt as much when attacking downed zombies or in critical hits, but its basic critical hit damage is usually enough to just one shot a zombie anyway - at around Level 6 Axe skill, you'll start one shotting zombies so often with it that it becomes a very strong weapon.

Especially in prolonged engagements, the Fire Axe is definitely a good weapon to have on you. It doesn't require as much investment, it can be used one handed in a pinch, is faster on the swing and uses less stamina, and is lighter and generally more common than the wood axe too - especially considering you can find them stuck inside zombies.

I'd stick to using the Wood Axe only for cutting down trees where its enhanced durability and condition loss chance, not to mention the fact the Wood Axe does almost double the damage to trees compared to the Fire Axe as well - and usually when you are cutting down trees, you don't need to worry too much about the weight of your weapon or how much stamina you're using by swinging it, compared to being in combat anyway.

I wouldn't even bother using the Wood Axe in combat unless I had the Axe Man trait unless it was a last resort kind of weapon, too.

That's just my opinion, though.

[GeoG85]

The Wood Axe has a slight delay in its attack, it'd take getting used to when using it.

Wood Axe works wonders on clearing trees of land though. The fastest clearing in the game I think.

Regular Fire Axes are good for damage mode and attacks. They can cut trees but they're marginally, evidentally slower than the Wood Axe. A Wood Axe would take like 3 swings to down certain trees while Fire Axes would take 5-7.

[Jethro]

I think I’m the only person in all of Zomboidland that saves every single kind of axe I find for chopping trees. They all just seem to break way too fast.

[Animalman]

Don't forget to compare it to the Pickaxe

which is also an Axe type;

I am no Axe Man fireman player, but i have used the Pickaxe for trees and zombie killing have always been satisfied. Especially with the unique noise it makes. DING. DING. PDING :)

[Jethro]

Originally posted by Beltneck:

Originally posted by Jethro:

I think I’m the only person in all of Zomboidland that saves every single kind of axe I find for chopping trees. They all just seem to break way too fast.

They last longer if you just attack the tree, instead of using the "chop" option from the dropdown menu.

Is this really a thing? I tried with a stone axe; whacked one like I was just attacking it, and another chopped normally and both seemed to damage the stone axe about the same amount. To be fair, it wasn’t much of a real test. I shall try again.

[Greb]

Originally posted by Jethro:

Is this really a thing? I tried with a stone axe; whacked one like I was just attacking it, and another chopped normally and both seemed to damage the stone axe about the same amount. To be fair, it wasn’t much of a real test. I shall try again.

Yeah, chopping a tree with the right click context sensitive option rolls a condition loss check on your weapon twice, so it's possible to lose two points of condition for your weapon every single chop if you're unlucky. It's a really good way to level up the Maintenance skill if you've got an abundance of axes, though.

It's slower but you'll cut more trees down in the long run if you attack the tree manually though.

This mod can help:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2880299874