One Handed or Two Handed

[Malsvir Ixen]

So I'm making a new build and the only way I can describe this warrior is that he is stepping out of the shadows in the most unapologetic way. He will wear Ebony Mail and heavy armor. He will use fire and fear spells to terrorize his victims. He will show his mastery of the night as a Vampire Lord.

I'm just unsure if I should go One Handed with either Harkon's Sword or the Mace of Molag Bal, or if I should go two handed and use the Ebony Blade, Bloodskal Blade, or custom made weapon. His major skills will be,

Illusion
Destruction (flame only)
Conjuration (Necromancy)
Heavy Armor
Smithing
Enchanting

Minor skills
Sneak
Restoration
One Handed or Two Handed

[Perplex]

One handed because you can not cast spells with a two hander. Unless you want to equip/unequip all the time.

[Malsvir Ixen]

Originally posted by Perplex:

One handed because you can not cast spells with a two hander. Unless you want to equip/unequip all the time.

I'd be doing that anytime I need to duel cast anyway.

[Ryhn]

two-handed for burst damage with great critical charge perk (double critical damage) and lvl 3 deep wounds (20% crit chance)

[Rez Elwin]

One Handed and Duel wield.

[Jo]

I prefer the power (and killcams!) of two-handed (not keen on the slow speed/lack of block though), but try to level up both and keep a good sword/shield in my inventory just in case I get "disarmed" by a Draugr Deathlord or something, or am facing a group of melee enemies and need more block and speed.. You'll soon discover which playstyle you prefer - also dependent on which weapons any followers use.

[jreese46]

I prefer one handed, both for magic purposes, and because 2h weapons in this game take forever to swing.

[258789553873]

Heh, in oldrim I'm playing a two-hander who uses necromancy and frost magic. It works quite well actually. Of course, he doesn't have spells he spams in combat. I only use frost magic for frost cloak and ranged damage. And he walks around with dead thralls now, so its not like I reanimate things often (other than the times the stupid thralls off themselves with a trap).

The guy I got that build from also posted another build which was a two-hander that used fire magic.

As for your build, I wouldn't use fire magic with necromancy. Undead things have a weakness to fire, but they're resistant to frost.

As for whether one-handed or two-handed is better? Who cares, its not like this game is much of a challenge anyway. Just keep in mind that if you're going two-handed, you're not going to be using a shield, so you need good armor. My own character has been doing fine with ebony, and he's not even wearing a full set (he wears the jagged crown instead of an ebony helmet).

As for your skillset, it seems a bit weird. Why use sneak when you wear heavy armor? And fear isn't exactly the best illusion spell (because it means you have to chase down stuff to kill it). Calm and frenzy are more popular for practical purposes, even for warrior builds. And also, you can get a perk that allows your fire spells to fear targets anyway. Though personaly, I've never actually used that perk, because I don't like having to chase things down (having to do that with deer is annoying enough).

[Malsvir Ixen]

Ebony Mail comes with built in Muffle. Combine that with the muffle skill in sneak and you have complete silence on your armor. Fire spells giving off a fear like effect is why I'm using it. Fear is the name of the game for this guy. He's coming out of the shadows in the most unapologetic way. Things are meant to fear him and run from him as he walks through dungeons or towns. Besides as a mass murdering psychopath, it's more entertaining to watch your victim cower in fear before you snuff out their life.

[Ambugaton]

Two handed actually isn't the best dps. Best dps is the burst damage with dual wielding, and you get an extra two enchantments. Keep a light weapon in the off hand because that's what your attack seed for special attacks is based on. If one of those enchantments is drain stamina you get indefinite power attacks. Works great until you amp the difficulty up and install something that actually lets your guy get staggered consistently, then groups can be a death trap. The fear idea would alleviate that to some extent (but man the illusion skills suck in the game, near end game fear and the like seem useless against a lot of enemies). With two handed the benefits are really the sweep and the stagger capacity, great against groups that can otherwise stunlock you into helplessness.

As far as needing good armor, at a certain point it doesn't matter. Your damage absorption gets capped (600 something armor rating) and with smithing you can get to that cap wearing just about anything before too long. It's really a matter of what perks you like better on the skill trees and what fits your RP better. For me my main plays the dual wielding berserker who runs into groups heedlessly, so the tower of strength perk for heavy armor (less stagger) is useful. But the trade off is, for example, windwalker, 50% faster stamina regeneration for light armor.

[voehringer_nitron]

Originally posted by Rez Elwin:

One Handed and Duel wield.

I'd like to wield a duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr. Hmm, maybe I should stick to TES figures. The Nerevarine and Bolvyn Venim.

[Rez Elwin]

Originally posted by voehringer_nitron:

Originally posted by Rez Elwin:

One Handed and Duel wield.

I'd like to wield a duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr. Hmm, maybe I should stick to TES figures. The Nerevarine and Bolvyn Venim.

Ah...right Dual Wield, didn't re-read my post.

[voehringer_nitron]

Ah, no big deal, just trying to have some fun. I've made mistakes too. Somebody quoted me in a reply in the Baldur's Gate forums and I realized I had used "then" instead of "than." I had woken up a short time before posting and I hadn't slept well either.

[Malsvir Ixen]

Duel wield maruze dagon's razor and Molag Bal's mace and either Insta kill em or make them submit to me.

[ZarahNeander]

I tend to die fast with 2h. I tend to die even faster with dual wield (at least 2h can block). Burst dmg is one thing but the dps of dead chars is excactly 0 (playing 1life)

So, good old S&B for me