What is better Swords or Axes?

I'm currently a W/N using swords. Not doing very good damange i'm thinking of switchig to Axe. Whats is better and what are the pro's and con's?

Well, I prefer swords myself, but axe's have several attacks that are very nice, the con is that they all take energy to use and as a warrior you only have 20 so you end up running out quickly, especially if you're using necro as a secondary. swords have several attacks that only require adrenaline so you can still use them and whatever spells you want. But it's really just matter of choice.

I prefer hammers over swords, I am a 13 str, 10 hammer, 1 healing Warrior.
I do quite well for myself.

I may go swords in the end, only because the skills way outdo the hammer skills. Its very hard to chain link any good skills in hammer because they all cost all of your focus.

From my (limited) experience I find that hammers have the highest damage when using no skills, followed by axes and then swords (yes speed has been accounted for). However, when using skills sword cranks out the most damage per second, followed by axes and then hammers. But! Hammers more interupt skills and they can blind. Axes have deep wound skills, which can be very handy in the right situation. So, as for whats best...depends on play style and situation. Buy one of each weapon and be ready to switch them around often.

Just a possible tip Ramus, you may wish to swap that to 12 hammer, 10+str, healing(unless you need some str skill I'm not thinking of)

With hammer at 10 instead of 12, you're missing out on 8.333%(is closer to 10% GW uses fuzzy math sometimes) of the base hammer damage. Which is going to be more than the 3% AP gained via strength.

Think of it like this,
Currently
92% hammer damage/13% armor penetration

Compaired to
100% hammer damage/10% armor penetration

You could then go one step further, and even with healing spec, use Judge's Insight.

Which in the end would look like

100% holy hammer damage/30% armor penetration

Food for thought

Hey guys I have a W/N I use the Axe but I am not sure how to distribute my points between either blood-death or curses and tactics and strength..:: plEASE HELP!!

THANK YOU

http://kagaonline.low-ping.com - [KAGA] - GW.GUILD

Axes have good attak, but have horrible minimum damage. I'd stick with swords if you want pure damage, but hammers are good

I used swords and axes, and IMO, axes are the better of the two. Axes have adrenaline intensive skills (actually not that many mana based attacks....), and they all add a healthy sum of dmg for a low price (elite skill cleave adds 22dmg for 4adrenaline). IMO, when using no skills, swords outdo the axe dmg because of their consistent dmg in the long run. However, combined w/ skills (cyclone, cleave, power strike, piercing attack, etc) I believe axes are better. Besides, Hundred Blades is not as good as some people make it out to be.

Why do you put so much into Strength? Unless you are using skills that require Strength, there is no reason to increase your Strength so much. I just think 13% armor penatration is not worth it.

For me, I am 12 Swordsmanship, 9 Fire, 6 Tactics and 2 Strength. This way I can almost fully make use of my second profession.

Just my opinion. Please correct me if im wrong about the Strength. Thanks.

For a nice chain go Mighty Blow, Devastating Hammer, Crushing Blow, Heavy Blow, and if you were a secondary elementalist finish with an aftershock.

Ramus try things like mighty blow strength attack staggering blow and heavy blow if you wanna chain link. Get your adrenaline to 7 use every move but save heavy blow till last and repeat.

As per the manual and Prima Guide:

"Strength also improves the effectiveness of skills that keep you alive, as well as those that inflict damage on your opponents"

Therefore, what that's saying is, Strength improves your attack skill effectiveness (amount of damage dealt). So if you only have 2 in Strength, you're not doing NEARLY as much damage as you could be. I myself have 11 in Strength.

To also answer the question started with this thread... I like Swords myself... very quick and powerful (no complaints)... but it all comes down to personal preference.

I would use whichever is better stat-wise.

If you found equal types, ie same bonuses etc, I would use swords, mainly due to gash, severe and final thrust.

No good against non-bleeders though, that's when you get the smash-smash out

Chaos axe looks coolest, go axes

Well I have heard people say swords for pve, axes for pvp. Butt I say it is realy what you like. I use axes and I am satisfied with cleave. I pump that baby out ever 4 seconds practicly. And cyclone axe + vigorous spirit + live vicariously + nice vampiric mod + surrounded by enemies= lots of health (around 30 or so each hit if your healing prayers are high). I know you are a W/N but I still love those 3 put together.

Oh also a nice combo is: Dismember (deep wound) + Axe rake (crippled, requires them to be suffering from deep wound) + Axe twist (weakness, requires them to be suffering from deep wound) followed by numorous cleaves = one pretty much dead enemy. They all require adreniline, (quite a bit at that) but I manage to get them off.

Ermm..he's a Warrior/Necro

IMO sword > for PvP axes > PvE

Swords have skills that are more usefull in pvp, Axes just deal massive damage, which i guess would be usfull in pvp, but i dont know

Hey, why is no-one telling it depends on your enemy? For instance, take your sword skills like sever and gash to an undead mission and they are pretty useless. Also, the end missions have lots of monsters that do not bleed, but can have a deep wound.

Also, 100 blades is elite, cyclone axe isnt...(though they are not exactly the same)

So I prefer axes there (u know that annoying Jades....). So whatever you choose dont sell the other weapon

Swords are faster than hammers, and you can make your opponent to bleed and use gash for deep wound. Tho 100 would be a nice skill, but it's so hard to get. Adrenaline recharges lil faster whit swords (they hit faster), so you can use the skills faster, also you can use a shield.
and btw, Axes are ugly! I prefer one of my glassy long sword, tho it makes 4-7 dmg, but it sure is cool D

Depends on playing style ENTIRELY.

I'll put them in order for usefullness in catagories.

Skill interupter? Hammer - Sword - Axe

Caster Killer (IE:Monk Killer) - Sword - Hammer - Axe

Conditions (Useful for the melee fragility mesmers, and for curse necros) - Axe - Sword - Hammer

PVE (Overall) - Hammer - Axe - Sword

PVP (Overall) - Sword - Axe - Hammer

Specific Builds:

N/W - Sword. Trust me. I play one of the toughest Meleemancers around, and Swords the only thing that'll do it. To get great combos with the sword you only need 2-3 sword skills, which gives me plenty of room for my lifetaps.

Mo/W - Your choice. My buddy likes Hammer, just because if anyone picks a fight with him in PvP he knocks'm flat on thier arse and runs off to keep casting, but that'd work with a sprint/hamstring combo, too.

R/W - Uncommon, but I reccomend Axe. Combine the many problems the axe causes (Deep Wound, Cripple, Bleeding) with other conditions (Poison) and throw in some dodges for good measure (Lightning Reflexes) and your all good.

Me/W - Axes, Most Definately. Fragility Warriors, though uncommon, are Very powerful, and all the conditions Axe's give are perfect for that.

E/W - Haven't seen any of these, so I wouldnt know.

As for thier reverses:

W/E - Hammer. Knock'm down and cast a quick (But powerful) spell. This is Great for Air, which has knockdown's and Blinds as well, and so the two match up perfectly.

W/N - I. Hate. Nec/Wars. They're a wast of potential. A good N/W is 10 times anything a War/Nec could be, and it's all because of MANA. Enough with the rant, though. I'd hafta say a Hammers/Curses build'd be the only Warrior I'd respect.

W/R - Pretty uncommon in the "tank" (read: Melee) catagory, and I dont really know what to say. Most W/R I've met are archers who use the warrior armor to thier advantage.

W/Mo - Ah, the ol' War Monk. The bane of players EVERYWHERE. Either you guys are the shiz, or you guys suck. I dunno which, cuz just when I'll start to hate your class as a whole, I'll meet one of you who redeem you, and then once i start to like you, I'll meet a streak of you who just plain Suck.

Again with the rant. Anyway, I'd hafta say Hammer - Back in the beta, I was in a guild with plenty of the "Redeemers" of the W/Mo's, and all of them whooped ass with a Beatdown Stick. I guess it's because during the short delays in taking damage while the enemy is in the fetal position, they regen some of the life they lost, putting them two steps ahead of thier foes.

W/Me - Once Again, Pretty Uncommon. Depends on the build entirely, and I dont know enough about mesmers to even pretend I know anything about mesmers.

Noticing a trend in the W/(X) catagory? Hammers Are Good. With the high AP thanks to Strength, each of your attacks is doing Muy Guapo damage. Pile that on top of any skills you brought, and you could be dealing somewhere between 40-80 a hit. Es Muy Bueno, Senor.

Hope my little Guide helped. If you ever wanna start a W/Ele, W/N, or N/W (The N/W especially) send me a PM. I'd be glad to help out with what little I know.

EDIT::: Minor spelling errors.

U do realise that axes have things like Disrupting Chop, Eviscerate & Executioners Axe.
that makes for a rather dead Monk since disrupting his healing will sort of stop that in a hurry & Once u drop him low enough an executioners axe to finish off.
also Eviserate drops his health by a nice chunk.
I thought ur guide as u call it was not very help full since u dont explain ur reasons.
Also u constantly insult other players because of their choice of character.
If they can make it work great for them.

Now Axes - Have higher top end damage than a sword but much lower end damage.
They have the most Adren skills out of all 3.
The attack speed is 1 attack per 1.3 seconds.
They have predominately deep wound attacks.
Swords - Have bleeding attacks.
Also 1 attack every 1.3 seconds.
Not very many adren skills but a very nice 4 adren skill that is not Elite and u
get it early in the game.
Hammers - Interrupt a lot and Knockdown.
Have 1 attack every 2 seconds.
No offhand item since its 2 handed, but top damage of all 3 weapons.

All have advantages & disadvantages but use what u feel works for u.

W/R here, and I use an axe, I have 3 adreneline based attacks and 1 power attack. Yes the low damage can be annoying, but it balances out when you turn around and hit for 70+ for damage. I actually hit for 107 damage the other day, but that is an exception and I have never hit that high since, or even close.
But as other have already said, its your choice or preference, try one don't like it refund your points and build up the other and give it a go.

Real men use hammers.

Yeah...I love when people seem to just make assumptions based on basic descriptions. I agree that 2 strength means not doing as much damage as you could be, but the difference between 2 strength and 10 strength is just 8% armor penetration.

Aside from the extra % armor penetration (which your 11 str gets only 1% more penetration than my 10 str), higher strength doesn't really help you unless you're using skills like Power Attack. I think 11 gets 1 more second out of sprint than 10, but there's hardly a noticable different between 13 seconds and 12 seconds on Sprint. Also, Galrath Slash with a 10swordsmanship does more damage than Power Attack with an 10strength, as does Thrill of Victory with a 10tactics. Pure Strike can't be blocked or evaded and does maybe 2 less damage with 10 sword than Power Attack (blockable/evadable) with 10strength.

As for skills that keep you alive, I guess Endure Pain would count since it gives like +200hp for 11 seconds with about 10 str, but I've yet to find that useful for staying alive...if you don't have more than that hp after 11 seconds, you'll die. >_> Sprint can help you stay alive, but if they haven't quit chasing you after 12 seconds, is 1 more second really gonna save you? Most the skills I have that would help save me require tactics (Healing Signet, "Watch yourself!") or Healing (Healing Breeze).

Increasing strength won't increase the variable in your swordsmanship skills, axe skills, hammer skills, or tactics skills, so it has no effect on the majority of your attack skills aside from preventing armor from reducing it quite as much.