Weapon Damage guide

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Mikel123
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Weapon Damage guide

Post by Mikel123 »

Bear with me, this might get lengthy.

As a background, check out this basic guide: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=24145&p=221212

In that guide, I detail why it's good to have weapons that have a high variance in their rolls. Obviously the weapons with the fewest dice in their damage rolls have the highest variance. So let's look at dice rolls by weapon type:


Weapon Name dice
Double Axe (2-H) 1
War Fork 1
Kryss 1
Halberd(2-H) 2
Bardiche (2-H) 2
Two-handed Axe (2-H) 2
Large Battle Axe (2-H) 2
Battle Axe (2-H) 2
Spear (2-H) 2
Longsword 2
Short Spear (2-H) 2
Scimitar 2
Broad Sword 2
Cutlass 2
Executioner's Axe (2-H) 3
Axe (2-H) 3
Hammer Pick 3
Katana 3
Dagger 3
Bow (2-H) 4
Viking Sword 4
Club 4
Heavy Crossbow (2-H) 5
Crossbow (2-H) 5
Black Staff (2-H) 5
Gnarled Staff (2-H) 5
War Mace 5
Maul 5
Quarterstaff (2-H) 5
Mace 6
War Axe 6
War Hammer (2-H) 7

This is part of the reason why mace weapons are so bad: they happen to have a bunch of dice used in their damage calculations. In fact, the war hammer is the single most consistent weapon in the game, in terms of damage. The halberd, towards the other end of the scale, is much more random, leading to the possibility of a few lucky rolls in a row - which is not only mathematically beneficial (see linked post above) against armor, but is also beneficial against human players who are adept at staying alive through "normal" hits.

We can also look at both the average damage of a weapon, and it's upper-end rolls. Here's a table of a weapon's inherent damage values at the 50th percentile (average) and the 75th percentile:

Weapon Name AvgDam 75th percentile
Heavy Crossbow (2-H) 33.5 38.5
Halberd(2-H) 27 34.2
Crossbow (2-H) 25.5 29.6
Bow (2-H) 25 29.1
Bardiche (2-H) 24 30.4
Two-handed Axe (2-H) 22 27.8
Large Battle Axe (2-H) 22 27.5
Battle Axe (2-H) 22 27.5
War Hammer (2-H) 22 25.1
Black Staff (2-H) 20.5 23.7
Double Axe (2-H) 20 28.3
Viking Sword 20 23.6
Gnarled Staff (2-H) 20 22.7
War Mace 20 22.7
Maul 20 22.7
Mace 20 23.0
Executioner's Axe (2-H) 19.5 23.5
Axe (2-H) 19.5 23.5
Hammer Pick 19.5 23.5
Spear (2-H) 19 24.8
Longsword 19 23.9
War Fork 18 25.8
Short Spear (2-H) 18 22.9
Quarterstaff (2-H) 18 20.7
War Axe 18 20.4
Scimitar 17 21.6
Broad Sword 17 21.3
Cutlass 17 21.0
Club 16 18.5
Kryss 15.5 22.5
Katana 15.5 18.8
Dagger 9 11.3

What is this telling us? Well, for example... the War Fork does an average of 18 damage. But the top 25% of its rolls are >25.8 damage. This means the "good rolls" are even better than such weapons as the Viking Sword and even the War Hammer! Yes, 25% of the time, a War Fork will do more damage than a War Hammer. That is the power of variance.

OK, let's move on and start incorporating damage bonuses into the math here. Here's a table of each weapon, along with the average damage a GM-crafted weapon of this type would do in the hands of a Tank mage (100 STR, 0 Anatomy) and a Dexer (100 STR, 100 Anatomy):


Weapon Name GMTankDam GMDexDam
Heavy Crossbow (2-H) 30 34
Halberd(2-H) 25 28
Crossbow (2-H) 24 26
Bow (2-H) 23 26
Bardiche (2-H) 22 25
Two-handed Axe (2-H) 21 23
Large Battle Axe (2-H) 21 23
Battle Axe (2-H) 21 23
War Hammer (2-H) 21 23
Black Staff (2-H) 19 21
Double Axe (2-H) 19 21
Viking Sword 19 21
Gnarled Staff (2-H) 19 21
War Mace 19 21
Mace 19 21
Maul 19 21
Executioner's Axe (2-H) 19 21
Axe (2-H) 19 21
Hammer Pick 19 21
Spear (2-H) 18 20
Longsword 18 20
War Fork 17 19
Short Spear (2-H) 17 19
Quarterstaff (2-H) 17 19
War Axe 17 19
Scimitar 16 18
Broad Sword 16 18
Cutlass 16 18
Club 16 17
Kryss 15 17
Katana 15 17
Dagger 10 11

But what about those high-end weapons? Let's compare a GM weapon in the hands of a Tank to that of a +25 Vanquishing version:

Weapon Name GMTankDam +25vanqTankDam
Heavy Crossbow (2-H) 30 33
Halberd(2-H) 25 31
Crossbow (2-H) 24 26
Bow (2-H) 23 26
Bardiche (2-H) 22 28
Two-handed Axe (2-H) 21 26
Large Battle Axe (2-H) 21 26
Battle Axe (2-H) 21 26
War Hammer (2-H) 21 26
Black Staff (2-H) 19 24
Double Axe (2-H) 19 24
Viking Sword 19 24
Gnarled Staff (2-H) 19 24
War Mace 19 24
Mace 19 24
Maul 19 24
Executioner's Axe (2-H) 19 24
Axe (2-H) 19 24
Hammer Pick 19 24
Spear (2-H) 18 23
Longsword 18 23
War Fork 17 22
Short Spear (2-H) 17 22
Quarterstaff (2-H) 17 22
War Axe 17 22
Scimitar 16 21
Broad Sword 16 21
Cutlass 16 21
Club 16 20
Kryss 15 20
Katana 15 20
Dagger 10 13

Yes, amazingly, the difference between a 100gp GM-crafted halberd, and a 150,000gp +25 vanq halberd, is merely 6 damage per hit. (in testing, I found it to be closer to 4 damage, though this could be simply small sample size). In any case, that is what people are paying for: 6 damage per hit. For the smaller weapons, it's only 5 damage difference.

Moving on. Let's talk about swing speed. We know that swing speed is capped on the bottom end at 1.25 seconds, and on the top end of 10.00 seconds. The following is the rate of swing for each weapon at various common Stamina levels (25, 34, 100, 120):

Weapon Name Delay25dex Delay34dex Delay100dex Delay120dex
Heavy Crossbow (2-H) 10.00 10.00 7.50 6.75
Crossbow (2-H) 6.50 6.25 4.00 3.75
Bow (2-H) 6.00 5.75 3.75 3.25
Halberd(2-H) 4.75 4.50 3.00 2.50
Bardiche (2-H) 4.50 4.25 2.75 2.50
Two-handed Axe (2-H) 4.00 3.75 2.50 2.25
Large Battle Axe (2-H) 4.00 3.75 2.50 2.25
Battle Axe (2-H) 4.00 3.75 2.50 2.25
Viking Sword 4.00 3.75 2.50 2.25
Mace 4.00 3.75 2.50 2.25
Maul 4.00 3.75 2.50 2.25
Hammer Pick 4.00 3.75 2.50 2.25
War Hammer (2-H) 3.75 3.50 2.25 2.00
War Mace 3.75 3.50 2.25 2.00
Gnarled Staff (2-H) 3.50 3.25 2.25 2.00
Black Staff (2-H) 3.25 3.25 2.00 1.75
Longsword 3.25 3.25 2.00 1.75
Double Axe (2-H) 3.00 3.00 2.00 1.75
Executioner's Axe (2-H) 3.00 3.00 2.00 1.75
Axe (2-H) 3.00 3.00 2.00 1.75
War Axe 3.00 2.75 1.75 1.50
Club 3.00 2.75 1.75 1.50
Scimitar 2.75 2.50 1.50 1.50
War Fork 2.50 2.50 1.50 1.50
Broad Sword 2.50 2.50 1.50 1.50
Cutlass 2.50 2.50 1.50 1.50
Spear (2-H) 2.50 2.50 1.50 1.25
Quarterstaff (2-H) 2.50 2.25 1.50 1.25
Short Spear (2-H) 2.25 2.25 1.50 1.25
Wrestling 2.25 2.25 1.50 1.25
Kryss 2.25 2.00 1.25 1.25
Dagger 2.00 2.00 1.25 1.25
Katana 2.00 1.75 1.25 1.25

As you can see... only six weapons (plus wrestling) can hit that 1.25 sec/swing rate, even at 120 stamina. If you're shooting for 1.50 seconds per swing, you can attain that with many more weapons.

As for magic weapons... it's recently come to my attention that magic damage bonuses (ruin through vanquishing) are not considered part of the "base damage" of a weapon, and thus are not increased by Tactics, Strength, and Anatomy bonuses. Since all damage is halved before being applied to players (see Combat guide), the actual increase in damage by various magic weapon properties is:

GM: 2
ruin: .5
might: 1.5
force: 2.5
power: 3.5
vanquishing: 4.5

Tactics, being a % multiplier, adds more damage to heavy-hitting weapons than it does to light-hitting weapons. This ranges from +3.4 damage being added to halberd hits from a "supremely accurate" halberd, down to +1.1 damage being added per hit to a weak weapon like a "supremely accurate" dagger.

Finally, let's compare various enchantment bonuses to each other. What is better: a +20 kryss of power, or a +10 kryss of vanquishing? Consult the table below for average damages for each possible variant. The Kryss table is sorted by dexer damage, while the halberd table is sorted by tank damage.


kryss tank dex
+25 vanq 20 21
+20 vanq 19 21
+15 vanq 19 20
+25 power 19 20
+10 vanq 18 20
+20 power 18 20
+5 vanq 18 20
+15 power 18 19
vanq 18 19
+25 force 18 19
+10 power 17 19
+20 force 17 19
+5 power 17 19
+15 force 17 18
power 17 18
+25 might 17 18
+10 force 16 18
+20 might 16 18
+5 force 16 18
+15 might 16 17
force 16 17
+25 ruin 16 17
+10 might 15 17
+20 ruin 15 17
GM 15 17
+25 15 17
+5 might 15 17
+15 ruin 15 16
+20 15 16
might 15 16
+10 ruin 14 16
+15 14 16
+5 ruin 14 16
+10 14 16
ruin 14 15
+5 14 15
store 13 15

halberd tank dex
+25 vanq 31 34
+20 vanq 30 33
+25 power 30 33
+15 vanq 29 32
+20 power 29 32
+25 force 29 32
+10 vanq 29 32
+15 power 28 31
+20 force 28 31
+5 vanq 28 31
+25 might 28 31
+10 power 28 31
+15 force 27 30
vanq 27 30
+20 might 27 30
+5 power 27 30
+25 ruin 27 30
+10 force 27 30
+15 might 26 29
power 26 29
+25 26 29
+20 ruin 26 29
+5 force 26 29
+10 might 26 29
+20 26 28
+15 ruin 25 28
force 25 28
+5 might 25 28
+15 25 28
GM 25 28
+10 ruin 25 28
might 24 27
+10 24 27
+5 ruin 24 27
+5 24 26
ruin 23 26
store 23 26

Any other questions, please let me know - I have more things calculated out in tables, but wanted to stick to info I thought would be the most useful.

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Bobbik
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Re: Weapon Damage guide

Post by Bobbik »

That's an interesting study. I've done a similar quick research for my dexxer, based on the damage statistics from the UO wiki:

Image

So, now I wonder, should I choose Swords or Fencing... maybe I'll stick to Swords, though the War Fork is probably the best weapon in the game...

Rammar
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Re: Weapon Damage guide

Post by Rammar »

Straight damage per second is somewhat misleading. Weapon cycling ftw -- which means the hally is definitely the top of any scale... Buuuut, that depends on ping, ability to time, and requires wrestling (in general). Swords is by far the best in general though... Has the best damage (hally), fastest weap (kat), and most plentiful assortment of mid-range weaps that are free or close as can be. However, no one can argue with the DONK! of a warfork.

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Bobbik
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Re: Weapon Damage guide

Post by Bobbik »

I guess I'll have to learn cycling then : ) It's so much fun and I'm discovering it only today..

However, I wanna be a dexxer. Is there any sense to cycle a halbert, since I won't cast any spells (except some scrolls)? Is there any sense in cycling... Viking Sword, or a Hammer Pick (both speed 30, halbert is speed 25), while wearing a shield?

Rammar
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Re: Weapon Damage guide

Post by Rammar »

Bobbik wrote:I guess I'll have to learn cycling then : ) It's so much fun and I'm discovering it only today..

However, I wanna be a dexxer. Is there any sense to cycle a halbert, since I won't cast any spells (except some scrolls)? Is there any sense in cycling... Viking Sword, or a Hammer Pick (both speed 30, halbert is speed 25), while wearing a shield?
Not much point to cycling on a dexer unless you fail to maintain stamina (bad move) -- carry food and red pots always. Assuming you're just doing pvm (as i assume by the use of parry), then I wouldn't worry too much, go swords for the cheap weapons (esp. silvers). If you're pvping, you'll rarely if ever use the shield (pots > shield when you're one handed).

Just pick a skill and go for it. Parry can be trained in a few hrs if you have some help, and melee skills can be done in somethin like a day for a few k bandages. If ya don't like it, change it. Being new though (I assume), I'd put priority on cheap and easily obtainable weapons, and sell off any highly desirable ones instead.

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Bobbik
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Re: Weapon Damage guide

Post by Bobbik »

I'm not new, but since years till now I've just "explored" the game very casually and from time to time, and now I want to do some PKing of murderers and tournaments, again very casually. Probably I'll go with full-plate-dexer + hally cycling - its much more fun than simply "waiting to swing" - it feels like real dueling.

P.S.: On a second thought... effective cycling needs too much concentration which might be invested in potions and other stuff instead, so finally I might choose the War Fork and Archery to open and close battles, rather than Swords and Wrestling for Hally cycling. Besides, Hally and Bardiche are the only weapons worth cycling, and probably Hammer Pick, War Hammer and the Viking sword. But... cycling is just so much more fun...

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