A Guide for DAoC Hunters

Your two melee options are spear and sword. Here’s Mirvana again to help you decide which one to use:

“Weapon type depends on several things:

Answer these questions:

1) Do you...
A. fight mostly tanks/assassins or other classes that stand and fight?
B. fight mostly casters/archers or other classes that turn and run/kite?

2) Do you...
A. have limited access to high end gear for templates?
B. have unlimited access to high end gear for templates?
C. what's a template?

3) Do you...
A. solo mostly?
B. group mostly?

4) Do you...
A. fight mostly in melee?
B. fight mostly at range?

5) You are a...
A. Norse or Dwarf
B. Kobold or Valkyn
C. Frostalf

If you answered mostly B you should go spear.
If you answered mostly A you should go sword.
If you answered C at any point in this quiz, just quit the game now.

Sword takes less money to template, has it's advantages in a face to face fight (evade stun chain), works well with high str races, and it's a favorite of pure melee (High sword, High BC spec) hunters.

Spear takes more money to template, has it's advantages against runners (rear stun) unless you're good at run-through positionals, works well with high dex races, and makes sense to use if you're going to use bow (for which you will need high dex anyway).

Also, spear allows for an extra damage type (Slash/Thrust) compared to just Slash for swords. Obviously both can be made into LWs if this is TOA we're talking about.”

 

Other things to consider: sword styles have more to-hit bonuses making them land more often. People have claimed higher miss rates with spear, but the evidence is not conclusive. Spear has more defensive penalties than sword and uses more endurance, however it has similar growth rates and is based on both str and dex (50/50), so high-dex classes may be able to achieve a higher weapon skill than they would have with sword. From my personal experience, sword performs more consistently than spear (plus landing the stun chain is wicked-fun when you manage it).

If you spec sword, these are styles the to use:

Anytime: Polar Rift
Evade back up: Frost Cut – Niord’s Fury
Rear: Ragnarok
Side: No side chain now :(

If you spec spear, these are the styles to use: 

Anytime: Whirling Spear
Evade back up: Return Thrust – Extended Reach
Rear: Razor’s Edge – Odin’s Wrath
Side: Perforate – Gungnir’s Fury

If you go sword, go 50 sword. Use dragonfury with matching LWs.

If you go spear, go 44 spear. Use bloodfrost battle spear with matching LWs.

These were tested by Zyzyg (VN handle). Much thanks.

SWORD

n00b anytime chain
0.10 Whirling Blade
0.40 Stabbing Blade

anytime
0.65 Draw Out

anytime
0.94 Polar Rift

Evade reactionary
0.93 Frost Cut
0.98 Niords Fury

Evade reactionary
0.45 Assault
0.72 Baldur's Fury

Evade reactionary
0.94 Reinforcement
0.95 Rush

Evade reactionary
0.98 Ice Storm
0.94 Sif's Revenge

Front positional
0.68 Northern Lights
0.95 Aurora

Rear positional
0.93 Ragnarok

SPEAR

Any time styles and chains
0.03____1 Thrusting Spear
0.04____2 Dazzling Spear

0.58____6 Engage
0.86____15 Wounding Thrust

0.38____10 Lancer
0.74____25 Lunging Thrust

0.00____12 Dismissal(detaunt)

0.87____34 Whirling Spear


Evade Chains
0.87____4 Return Thrust
0.87____8 Extended Reach

0.65____18 Stab
0.81____29 Raze


Side chain
0.68____21 Perforate
0.90____50 Gungnir's Fury


Back chain
0.76____39 Razor Edge
0.91____44 Odin's Wrath