Light weapons are rubbish

[Lostedge]

When creating a knight/barbarian/fighter ignore light weapons or any class except rogue as they are rubbish:
a) They do low damage
b) Their cooldown is almost equal to heavy weapons
c) There are very few light weapons
d) There are fewer light weapons that add bonus damage depending on your Strength

[Saice]

I think a lot could be fixed just by knocking a second off of the cool downs for light weapons across the board. They would still do less damage per hit but there DPS would start to get closer to Heavy weapons over the course of a fight.

[Phitt]

Except that none of this is true.

a) Their damage per second is equal to that of heavy weapons. Naturally light weapons deal less damage per hit, but...
b) With a much faster cooldown. For example some of the best light weapons like the Assassin's Dagger (cooldown 2.8) or the Boneblade (3.4) are much faster than the best heavy weapons like the Ancient Claymore (5) or Bane (6.3).
c) Nope, there are about as many light weapons as there are heavy weapons.
d) All light weapons with the exception of daggers deal bonus strength damage. Daggers get a bonus for dexterity, so no problem there either.

[Shadowlordx]

So I'll quote my reply from another thread:

There's also the Serpent Blade:
13-39 +dex (note: attribute dmg is added as (attrib-10)/2+min dmg= new min dmg, attrib-10+max dmg = new max dmg, so say 6 dex is = to 3-6 dmg for 4.5 dmg added to average dmg)
3.5 cooldown
+15 Acc
DPS(Avg DMG/CD)= 7.4 + dex/3.5

compare to Moonblade:
10-31 +dex
2.8 cd
+10 acc
DPS = 7.3 + dex/2.8

compare to Fist Dagger:
9-27 + dex
2.7 cd
DPS = 6.7 + dex/2.7

compare to Meteor Hammer:
24-72 +str
4.5 cd
+20 acc
DPS = 10.6 + str/4.5

compare to Bane:
27-82 + str
6.3 cd
DPS = 7.8 + str/6.3

compare to Cutlass:
12-36 + str
3.3 cd
DPS = 7.2 + str/3.3

compare to Sickle Sword:
15-46 + str
4.5 cd
+5 acc
DPS = 6.8 + str/4.5


Assuming max in Light Weapons or Heavy Weapons:
Serpent Blade: 26-78 + dex, DPS = 14.8 + dex/3.5
Moonblade: 20-62 + dex, DPS = 14.6 + dex/2.8
Fist Dagger: 18-54 + dex, DPS = 13.4 + dex/2.7
Meteor Hammer: 40-142 + str, DPS = 21.2 + str/4.5
Bane: 52-164 + str, DPS = 15.6 + str/6.3
Cutlass: 24-72 + str. DPS = 14.4 + str/3.3
Sicklesword: 30-92 + str. DPS = 13.2 + str/4.5

Take the DPS values with a grain of salt however, if you're not fast at clicking or spend tons of time dodging a mob such that you're not maximizing you're time spent on cooldown you're mileage will vary. If you are hitting attack every time a weapon comes off cooldown however, low cooldown weapons scale much better with the attribute which increases their damage. On the other hand, low cooldown weapons with lower damage will get reduced more as a percentage of their DPS by armor than slower hitting higher damage weapons.

A couple things to note: as light weapons you can dual wield with 25% less dmg on a rogue or 40% less on all classes. For Rogue: Dual Wielded Damage for Moonblade + Serpent Blade (Fist Dagger might outdo Serpent Blade at high dex values, although I suspect they would need to be extremely high to beat the Serpent Blade's bonus accuracy) = ~25.8 + dex/3.5 + dex/2.8 which pretty clearly beats meteor hammer in terms of dps (though the hammer can be used with a shield) and blows bane way out in terms of dps, also the damage is quite comparable to meteor hammer when not considering cooldowns (fixed to take account of the 25% dmg drop for dual wield), 40-122.5 vs 40-142, but dual wielded weapons will get twice the attribute bonus and twice the armor decrease. Dual Wielded Cutlasses(Technically 1 Cutlass and a Bonesaber, very similar damage to the cutlass but slightly better, though I can't remember exact stats) on a Barb might end up outclassing Rogue with Moonblade + Serpent Blade (The Barb will have a dps of ~29.7 + 2(str-15)/3.3 at level 15, although the accuracy a Barb will have will be horrendous compared to a Rogue), but the base damage of the weapons isn't to blame here.

The particularly relevant thing here is that a Barb dual wielding may actually be the strongest dps possible (though with terrible accuracy compared to a rogue), particularly ignoring armor, although dual Venomfang Picks(9-27 + str, 4.5 cd, -20 armor) are almost certainly the strongest weapon combination in the game vs armor.

Now if you aren't dual wielding, can't get two venomfangs versus armor, the results are a bit mixed, though I would argue the early game heavy weapons only beat out light weapons versus armor and have similar/less dps (and damage) otherwise, but for end/late game you should really be comparing dual-light versus 2 hander + shield, and in this case dual light generally compares quite favorably to heavy weapons (Cutlass + Bonesaber has a DPS of ~29.7+ 2(str-15)/3.3 at level 15 for Barb versus 23.6 + (str-15)/4.5 dps for Meteor Hammer; if you say but you can't maximize the cooldowns, double sicklesword is 26.6 + 2(str-15)/4.5 dps though Meteor Hammer probably comes out ahead due to the increased accuracy, but the damage calculations favor double sickle sword (the one exception is if armor > attribute damage bonus, in which case since for dual wield armor is doubly effective versus it, but in that scenario for 20 armor or greater venomfang picks have an effective base damage of 29-47 + str, 4.5 cd, which is for a barb a dps of 32 + 2(str-15)/4.5.

[minmay]

I've found heavy weapons to be utter garbage in comparison to light weapons. Backstabbing is very easy to set up against almost everything if you pay attention to the monster AI or just have invisibility, and the damage is already comparable or better without backstabbing, so...

[sapientCrow]

subjective of course and numbers do not actually translate into real game settings.
Since most of the battles involve strafing and waiting a bit heavy weapons win in real game if there is added accuracy factored in.

I think weapons have this open ended style to them. However light and heavy are fairly close number wise.
I am mid game now and I am using 1 light weapon champion and one heavy weapon champion. End game Heavy ends up being really great but start and mid game and even into late game light is awesome. If you bee line it to the places where the awesome ones are.
Daggers need some love though as do rogues and dex based style playing.

If we could just mod the base we could alter this stuff.
I would love to change the cool downs some and add attributes to some gear (like Rogue gear)

Basically for simple strafing heavy wins. However a good balanced party with all the proper cds popping off in succession is the best.
My first playthrough was a duel wielding max dodge Rogue and heavy weapon Barbarian frontline. Between to 2 I was never on cooldown. Of course by the end my rogue was never on cd with 2 dex based light weapons. Some of those forced up close and personal fights the Rogue saved me a lot.

[imaginer]

Don't forget about the special attacks. I did over 900 damage to a boss with Bane's special attack once when I got a crit with it. Even without a crit, it's huge damage.

[Komag]

don't forget that faster attacks also helps keep an enemy stunned if you have a good rhythm

[steelsoldier]

Since light weapons can be used more often it also means that they are much more accurate in the long run since you hit more times and you will be performing more attacks and with higher accuracy due to the characters being specced into dexterity

[minmay]

Don't forget about the special attacks. I did over 900 damage to a boss with Bane's special attack once when I got a crit with it. Even without a crit, it's huge damage.

A special attack from Bane also puts the character on cooldown for 12.6 seconds.