This is a question thread, as I am currently trying to debate between Dual Wielding or 2-Handed Weapons for a new character.

I'm not great at number crunching, but looking through the strategy guide, it seems to me that 2-Handed Weapons would be more powerful than Dual Wielding. Now, that's not supposed to be the case, so I am assuming that I am not considering all of the information.

According to the Skyrim strategy guide, equivelent weapons (I.E.: Steel Sword v. Steel Greatsword), the damage output seems to favor the 2-Handed Weapon by double, sometimes more. For instance, a Steel Sword does 8 damage, while a Steel Greatsword does 17 damage, which is double +1.

So, the way I see it, if I were to have 2 Steel Swords, that'd be 16 damage per swipe, as opposed to 17 damage per with the Steel Greatswords.

Now, obviously the Steel Swords are lighter - so is that where the difference comes in to play, that even when dual wielding, the 2 Steel Swords will attack faster, thus dishing out more damage? I'm not sure how exactly the attack speed of a weapon is calculated, I only know that the heavier the weapon, the slower it is, but not necessarily to what degree. I.E. the Steel Swords have a weight of 10, where the Steel Greatsword has a weight of 17, so I don't know how those stats translate to in game effect.

So... what is it that I am missing here in the calculations regarding Dual Wielding vs. 2-Handed Weapons? I just did a little practice run through to test some things, and this was the first time I've ever used 2-Handed Weapons, and I felt more powerful with the Greatsword as opposed to the Dual Wield swords I typically use. But perhaps that has to do with buffing all my points into Health, to more properly "tank" and sit there and take blows, when typically I am dividing my points between Magicka and Health, something I would be doing with my official build.

Well, it must be a weight/speed issue. I think that you could get in 3 hits while dual wielding in the time it takes to get a single two-handed strike in. Adding enchanting to the mix would also help because your +15 fire damage on each sword will register more than a single enchanted great sword or hammer considering you would hold (LT+RT) for dual wield flurry attacks. On another note, you can't block using dual blades.

I prefer dual wielding if i had to chose as you can hit multiple targets

I believe two-handed weapons can too. Well, there's a perk for that anyways.

This depends. Are your weapons enchanted? In all of TES series, even the NPC's would tell you that you can unload an enchantment faster with a dagger. This is why mages tend to carry daggers in TES4 Oblivion.

If enchanted: A dagger will always outperform any weapon in the game. But ALWAYS, this is situational.

If were talking about sneak attacks, a Dagger gets a better attack bonus of 15 times normal damage (with the perk). However, can you sneak up close enough? Are there 5 guys in a room which makes it impossible to get a sneak attack? I would rather have a 2 Hander than can always deliver steady damage in this situation.

Also. If you are using Elemental Fury (shout), then your dagger will chew up everything. However, you cannot use enchantments with it. Is your target a beast? A warrior? What magic resists does it have?

Fire enchanted weapon does nothing against a fire elemental. You need to carry around 4 different daggers now.

Duel wielding is nice in this regard, because you can smack an enemy with one hand, then capture the soul with the off-hand. Very efficient for filling soul gems.

In the end. Pick what you will have more fun in. I've been playing Bethesda games for many many years, and I eventually make a variety of different characters. After playing a sneak/ranged I go for close combat brute force, then I go to using a mage. You will play many different types of characters throughout the life of this game, and that is the greatest thing about it.

So what I'm saying is... your question is not really important in regards to what you should make first. And if your just talking about which is "better" that is not a question than can be answered. It is like, is ketchup better on my burger, or is mustard better? No real answer, and not worth the time to think about it.

My opinion.

Overall, Dual Wielding for Raw Damage.

But Two-handed weapons are better in more tactical situations. Most Two-handed weapons can stun-lock enemies with good bash and power attack timing. Combine this with some Beef Stew, and Two-handed fighting is incredibly potent. Plus, the Daedric Greatsword is probably the coolest looking weapon in the game.

can you block with two-handed?

I know you can't block with dual

Yes. Blocking is kind of Overrated though. It's not nearly as necessary as it was in Oblivion, where blocking any attack resulted in a massive Recoil. If you're using a Two-Handed weapon, it behaves more like you're Halfswording. Bashing to keep the enemy off balance and (Eventually) Disarm, while laying down strong attacks in the gaps.

You have to use the double dual-wield attack (left and right click together) for your dual-wield damage to equal a single swipe with a two-handed weapon.

Overrated?!? Even using 'adept difficulty" some high level enemies can kill you in 2-3 hits. Unless you start smithing overpowered items, I don't see armor alone protecting you from a strong melee attack.

I think DW will have a slightly high damage output, though it is more dependant on stamina for the tripelstrike powerattack. 2-handed will have more damage per hit but is slower(and can do some minor blocking).

Overrated didn't mean to imply useless. Did you only read that bit? I'm simply saying it's not as "Necessary" as it was in Oblivion. A blocked strike in Oblivion mean the enemy suffers 2-3 seconds of Recoil, Blocking in Skyrim simply means your enemy deals less damage and attacks a little slower. Especially noticeable with daggers, enemies attacking you while blocking can just continue to lay down blows.

For 2 handed users, you're better off just not getting hit, where as Shield users can block all damage with sufficient skill.

As true as that is I hate this move. With the duel fury your swings are ALOT faster. With swords and duel fury you can chew threw things like a weed wacker on steroids. Using the two trigger move is a huge waste of time unless your finishing a combo or something. Right right, left left, right right, left left....thats how i play my duel weilder and it destroys anything. I play on expert and feel like not upgrading my swords just because i don't want to get Overpowered to soon.

Blocking with weapons is nearly as good as blocking with shields. In fact, the difference is so small that you invest the same amount of points (4) in Shield Wall to reach the block cap of 80% damage reduction.

The only advantage a shield user has is the left side of the Blocking tree. Using a single weapon, you can still use all the right side skills (power bash, deadly bash etc).

I prefer dual-wielding for the speed. Per strike, a two-handed weapon probably beats it out, but all things being equal (perks, enchantments, etc.), the speed puts dual-wielding over the top. My Orc warrior (heavy Orc armor) has his Orc war axes smithed up to legendary (with all three "bleed" damage and the 5 "armsman" perk points, and most of the rest of the non-specific perks except for Paralyzing Strike), and it's hard to imagine causing much more damage than he was dishing out.

Yeah. 2 handers hit harder per hit, but duel is so fast, it's ridiculous. I wonder where spears would fall on the damage scale. I wouldnt mind if the spears were the equivalent of an axe 1 handed or 2 handed.

Thanks for the replies everyone!

Tho im certainly not new, I've been playing since release, but my characters have all dual wielded, so until now, I've be er had anything to compare it to.

I felt like I was more effective in combat with the 2-Handed Weapons in this "practice run" but I wouldn't be surprised if part of that was being able to take more punishment, seeing as how I was putting all points into health (previously, my builds distributed points in a Magicka, Health, Magicka, Stamina, Magicka, Health, Magicka, Stamina pattern). I also had a ton more kill cams.

Also, so I don't create a new thread (hopefully I can get a good response), can I be an effective (tho by no means as good as possible) tank by putting half my points into Health (the other half, Magicka), wearing Heavy Armor (no helm, I'll have a hood), and all 5 points into Juggernaut, but not others (i won't have a full suit), as well as using Alteration for Shield spells? Master difficulty.

More general response to 2H vs. dual wield, I find dual wield massively overrated, especially for my playstyle. Dual wield completely loses block, but far more painful to me the loss of reach, and lack of mobility when power-attacking. 2H you can hide behind a pillar, begin powerattack and move into position so it connects as the enemy sees you. Dual wield does theoretically much higher damage, but it never seems to work out unless its a dual wield dagger attack from stealth. A lot of melee enemies have good reach, so you can misjudge and do a dual wield power attack hitting only air, while they pound you. Worse is archers/casters who like to backpeddle once engaged. 2H has longer reach, and can move forward during both normal and power attacks. Dual wield has terrible problems trying to stay on a mobile, ranged target. Also 2H can efficiently toggle between weapon, healing, and misc abilities. Without mods (which don't work that well) dual wield has a painful time switching without pausing the game, which feels awkward.

You can armor cap with 3 heavy armor pieces and a lot of perks in heavy armor (5 in juggernaut may even be excessive), but it could be frustrating to start. If you have a heavy armor char on Master with 50/50 health/mana, don't be surprised if you die a lot. Draugr Deathlords and Death Overlords with Orcish/Ebony bows will absolutely 2-shot you, and Death Overlords might manage a one-hit kill. Forsaken encampments can be almost as bad, with briarhearts and ravagers dual wielding and leveled archers putting down support fire. At 30-40 Master difficulty groups can hit quite hard, even armor capped. My 600-700 health character now can get below half health if I get too cocky on forsaken encampments, and if Draugr get a full Fus-Ro-Dah on you an archer can simply shred you.

For the heavy armor "tank" build, what is your offensive strategy? Pure melee, mix of spells and melee, other?

Two handed=meat softner, duel wield=meat grinder. Take your pick.

So not much stamina, huh? Doesn't stamina affect how much damage a character gives and takes?

Bah! My Orc dual-wielder had no need to block. Nothing stood in his path . . . for long.

No stamina affects how much you can carry and the amount of power attacks you can do.

Mix of spells and melee.

It's a Shadow Knight type build, so a mix of Necromancy and melee.

I was playing a build already, but want to tweak it a bit, but basically, use Illusion magic to get my enemies fighting each other, raise zombies when they die to grab aggro, and then rush in and beat them down with what has typically been Dual Wield swords, but now contemplaying a Two Handed Weapon instead.

Before rushing in, I'd cast a Shield spell on myself for added protection.

I was playing this way, and it was fun, but often times I would find myself getting 1 or 2 shotted, and I felt like HEY! I'm a Heavy Armor guy, I should be able to take more damage than that!

But I realized a couple things that I wanted to look into changing:

My point distribution was Magicka > Health > Magicka > Stamina > Magicka > Health > Magicka > Stamina which was fine, but it definitely meant I wasn't focusing on Health, so I've thought about changing it to either Magicka > Health > Magicka > Health in an even 50 / 50 split, or doing something like Magicka > Health > Magicka > Health > Magicka > Stamina, or maybe even flip it and go Health > Magicka > Health > Magicka > Health > Stamina

The other thing was Restoration... all those Draugrs that you mentioned do cause trouble, and I can't manipulate them with Illusion. I can, however, manipulate them with Restoration with Turn Undead spells. So I thought about putting a little more emphasis on Restoration as well.

So I'm trying to figure out both whether or not I want to use Dual Wielding or Two Handed Weapons (it's typically been Dual Wield to this point), and just what kind of point distribution I need to give myself an effective tank mage.