When would I want to use 2h weapons for dps characters?

[Arrrtyom]

Disclaimer: I'm only at floor 4,though I'm playing on epic difficulty.

For Maeve and Boron, isn't dual wielding better than using 2h weapons? Both of them have a buff that gives elemental damage per hit, so dual wielding means you get 1.5x the elemental damage from those. Dual wielding also allows for more stats and double the enchantments. And for Boron, faster attack speed = more rage from basic attacks. There is a problem of armor penetration, but right now I get more armor pen from my double 1h crossbows than a 2h crossbow. I know that 2h melee weapons have amazing cleave and aoe clear, but it seems like the only melee dps (Boron) is better suited d for dual wield.

For the mages, are spirit stones ever worth it? They have amazing stats and all but their attack speed is really bad. Maybe I could use them late game when Whisper gets like 15 mana regen or something (I don't know), but right now the only way to go seems to be mana on hit with wands if I want more mana?

Even for Aeric, I don't see the point of having more skill power and crit chance on spirit stones if his dps is going to take a dump. Sure I can do more damage with skills, but I could do the same by auto attacking with sunpower wands no?

Side question: Boron's cleave skill doesn't seem to work with dual wield or 1h weapons? I'm not sure what the cleave cone is like for that skill. 2h weapons have innate cleave already so I really can't tell

[Panterich]

In general:
1H deal more DPS when dual wielded correctly and Armor is fully penetrated
1H hit faster, so on-hit procs are more frequent
2H deal more Damage
2H melee have Cleave
2H ranged have longer reach (Range)

So..
>> When would I want to use 2h weapons for dps characters?
When your DPS with 2H is higher than with 1H that you have (i.e. no good pair of 1H).
When you face enemies with high Armor (that is common for Epic)
When you don`t need frequent on-hit procs. Like you don`t have rings with on-hit mana gen (or you don`t need so much) or you don`t have on-hit slow/daze chance etc.
When you want to do a first hit on ranged enemies before they hit you as most ranged enemies have a range of 1H weapons.
When you sidestep a lot - actively moving and changing targets between attacks to maximise resulting damage. Works best with both next points.
When you kite. Slow and strong attacks favors this tactic.
When using bleed as it uses Damage as its base instead of DPS. Using 2H with bleed to 1-hit 2-3 enemies (so they bleed at the same time) will result in much higher dps than using any 1H.

A good 2H (good stats and good augment) will always be better than dual 1H without good augments - sometimes you either can`t have those or you don`t want to. Kind of situational.

As a sidenote, there are moderately good 2H fixed weapons for Maeve throughout many parts of the game so you can save some crafting resources for other champions.

>> for Boron, faster attack speed = more rage from basic attacks
Iirc attacks with 2H weapons should give 2x rage. I may be mistaken so read tooltips carefully and consider doing some tests on training dummy if you play Boron or Rakhem.

>> are spirit stones ever worth it? .. their attack speed is really bad
Attack speed has no influence on skills. So yeah, in late game with good mana regen they may become much more attractive. At floor 4 dual wands are the way to go.

>> Even for Aeric .. crit chance
TL:DR you can safely ignore crit chance with elemental damage (and Aeric doesn`t do physical)
CC for elemental damage should be perceived as linear multiplier. +10% crit chance will result in +10% dps, same as +10% atk.spd or +10% dmg. In most cases CC is quite "expensive" on item stat rolls.If you can swap it for anything you value as much as +10% dps - do it. The only exception may the case when you have a boost for crit damage.

>> more damage with skills, but .. same by auto attacking with sunpower
Sometimes damage may not the best solution. Doesn`t relate to your main question though, because correct 1H with daze/stun and sunpower may do wonders, just as skills do.

[Arrrtyom]

Nice, thanks for all the explanations. For Boron I believe each attack gives the same amount of rage or something (this isn't his cleave skill, which does give 2x rage to 2h weapons). I only tested it once so I could be wrong as well. But anyway I do prefer weapons with higher attack speed so I'll probably stick to dual wields for now. I'll be sure to use the kite and bleed strat for 2h weapons some time though, sounds fun.

Would you know if we're able to select targets for skills like Maeve's air arrows and Boron's throwing axes? Sometimes I'd like to use them all on one target but the game doesn't seem to let me. Edit: nevermind I found the answer in another post,apparently it's multi target by default. Would be good if we could target the same enemy imo, so you'll have to choose whether to inflict status effects on 4 enemies or just aim the same enemy and kill it straight

[Panterich]

Cleave skill for Boron is good (needed) for early game if you plan on using skills, and so the difference between 1H and 2H should be smaller at that time for him. But once you can equip him with 'mana per hit' gear his Cleave skill becomes less needed, and 1H weapons may be preffered. There is another kind of problem with 2H. There are no fixed stat melee 2H weapons that you look at and call 'Awesome'.

Multi target skills still need line of sight to target (and to hit) enemies. In some cases you can reposition a champion before using a skill so that he can`t see more than one enemy. In that case it will hit only one target with all projectiles. Btw note that Maeve's air arrows are not very good dps wise after you pass early game - they are best for blinding and for that you want to hit many targets. Boron is kind of an exception there as you mainly want his axes to focus targets. Definitely would be a good thing if you could choose 1 target with those skills or just click on random spot for default targeting.