How exactly do you use polearms?

[Saryn]

New to the game and really want to use polearms. But I am not exactly sure how these should be used. I mainly fight with Saber's and Longswords at the moment, but my skill with polearms is about the same level as my swords (around 13-14). I have a few questions specifically but any advice helps.

1. Are they meant to break super quick? I have the durability loss reduction perks but I still break a billhook quite fast.
2. How are you meant to fight and defend with them? I just started dodging most of the time with them to avoid durability loss and when it comes to offense I only stab and back off. I don't really land this most of the time since they just block it with a shield or their weapon. I also noticed the left and right swings they have are insanely slow and i almost never land them unless the enemy I am fighting just sorta decides to make dial up noises when I swing and just let me hit them. Combos have also felt a bit hard to pull off compared to other weapons.

[Nezuko Pizza Delivery]

Just use a mace, every other melee weapon sucks compared

[Mouse Rat]

it's a wooden stick with a metal thing on the top.
if you use it like a metal sword you will break it.

you need to gain space and use the pointy bit to stabby stab.
which isn't necessarily easy.

i'd put dollmaker on it just in case to force enemies to walk.. then you can keep them at bay easily by having the longer range.
and keep stabbing

[Frostbeast]

Use poisen on your weapons. The true way to fight. Any poisen can be apllied on weapons or arrows/bolts. Sleep arrows? Works too. But, i stick to the good old damage poisen.

[Pork-free Bacon (Michael)]

I tried to play a full polearms run but they are weak without master strike +with the illusion of reach rather then them actually being able to hit things at a distance.

But I found a trick is that stabs with weapons like the poleaxe are hard to block for NPCs so I've found stabs are the way to really kill things quickly with them.

But in saying that in harder fights I just found myself falling back on longsword as it does everything better.