Best sword/shield combo?

[Negatron]

Currently using a Claymore+10 and Balder Shield+4, str is 24 and been putting points into str,end and vit. What are the best endgame options I should focus on acquiring?

[MVP]

Medium or great shield? Do you plan on taking str to the soft cap?

[Kyleeon]

Short answer: There is no "Best sword/shield combo". Almost everything works to beat the game.

Also, the Claymore and the Balder Shield are both very player-friendly equipment that can easily carry you through the game. Claymore scales with both STR and DEX, so try to level both of them to 40 (Which is the soft cap for both of them) and the shield has very good stability. I think you're fine with your current gear

[Nellvan]

My favorites are:

Silver Knight Shield; best stability of all medium shields and really good allround magic resistances.

Greatshield of Artorias if you want to go for heavy stuff; super-stable, negates status effects from blocked attacks.

Weapons... yeah the "best" is the one you like best. Look at everything you find, try those with STR and those with STR/DEX scaling, maybe you find something else you really like. Claymore is rather popular so you could absolutely just stick to that. (Never tried it myself so far.)

You still have a whole lot of options open.
If you raise STR to 40 first, you could still switch to pure STR weapons without wasting levels. If you want to keep the Claymore or other STR/DEX weapons, you'll want to raise DEX too, as Kyle said.

[bandit]

I personally like the Crest Shield, it has amazing magic defence at +5 and the stability on it isn't bad either.

[Dashiell]

Originally posted by Joseph Stalin:

nobody else likes the iron curtain shield?

ftfy

[enkfayeh]

My favorite combo so far is Balder Side Sword + Silver Knight Shield.

[Shifty Mario]

for shields:
heater->tower/caduceus kite->balder->silver knight for straight up physical and stability. Weight is 2, 3, 4, 5. Personally I went with silver knight since it doesn't use a slab. Balder at max is 1 point of stability from silver knight if I remember.

other shields: crest (high magic), dragon crest (high fire), iron round (heavy deflect in PVE), blood (increase status resistance), black knight (very high fire)

greatshields work too but they're a bit heavy: black iron (high fire), greatshield of artorias (insane stability), giant (decent lightning), stone (high magic), havel's (THE WALL)

for swords: Not ultras, not curved greats. Those weapon work best 2H. Greatswords, like that claymore, are very versatile and work very well 1H or 2H.

[Bones]

Whatever you like/whatever you like.
Heater, grass crest, red and white round, silver knight, black knight, balder, crest and havel's are my favorite shields. You might notice havel's is the only greatshield on that list because of it's alternate ability. Swords are just preference. My favorites are balder side sword, claymore, longsword, silver knight, black knight greatsword, painting guardian, murakumo, iaito and manserpent sword. Whatever you use make sure it makes sense together. If I invade you using a gold tracer with havel's shield I'm going to crap myself laughing before I kill you.

[Bones]

Originally posted by Joseph Stalin:

lOVE THE IRON CURTAIN SHIELD OR GTFO CASUL!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U06jlgpMtQs

[Coconut Cream]

zweihander

[luh grunch]

an upgraded demon's greateaxe has some of the best strength scaling, you can start seeing it beyond +10. other than that, silver knight shield +5 makes a decent medium shield. for greatshields, your best bets are artorias' and the tower shield. or you can use havel's everything proof shield.

[Killroy]

Depends on Build. I normaly do a faith build.
Therefor I use a Bastard sword, with chaos.
The shield depends, normaly I just use the bloodshield, or a greatshield.

[Sage The Bearded]

My favorite sword in the game is the Man-Serpent Great Sword and using that with a shield carried me handily through the game. The moveset is amazing, the damage is good, the strength scaling is A at +10. I also used the Iron Curtain Great Shield, but I used the Crest Shield for a long ass time too. It was pretty amazing. I had a ton of fun with it, and I felt like a true badass just tanking blows that would normally knock other people on their asses and destroy their stamina. Not very great in PvP, but for PvE, it was fantastic.

[Bones]

Nice necro. I'm not sure OP cares anymore.

[Negatron]

In fact, i'm 1/16th carebear, and still care very much.