Is 2 weapon style worth switching to?

inkblowout

Hey I'm in the middle of ToB and I had a question of 2 Weapon Style, is it the best fighting style to play because I never really tried it? (It was either 2 handed/Single & Shield Melee or Ranged weapons in BG1 and BG2:SoD) And I never really touched on 2 weapons so I was wondering if it's even worth playing and would switching Minsc and Mazzy to dual wield weapons be beneficial for the party?

Minsc - Currently wielding Warblade +4. Could be wielding 2 maces (Mace of Disruption/Jerrod's Mace & Skullcrusher)

Mazzy - Currently wielding Tansheron's Bow. Could be wielding 2 short swords. (Short Sword of Mask & Cutthroat)

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Current Party Comp's weapon proficiency looks like this for reference....

CHARNAME Paladin - 2 Handed Swords w/ Carsomyr

Sarevok - 2 Handed Swords w/ Psion's Blade

Minsc - 2 Handed Swords & Dual Wielding Maces

Mazzy - Shortbows w/ Dual Wielding Short Swords

Viconia - War Hammer w/ Crom Faeyr

Imoen - Shortbows w/ Gesen's Bow & Quarterstaff's w/ Staff of Magi

Daevelon

As far as i know ToB is the best part of Baldur's Gate for abandon the 1h+shield style because a low AC is not so useful anymore, but it's not your case. That said, switching from 2h weapons to dual wield depends on your playstyle.
For example: Is Minsc attacking from distance while other characters are tanking? He doesn't have big HP bonuses from Constituion, so maybe is better to keep him distant using a 2h weapon.
Mazzy could be a great dual wielder, but i would prefer her to use a bow.
In your party configuration i would rather make Sarevok a dual wielder than Minsc; he is a great tank with high HP and AC and more APR for his Death Bringer Assault is not bad at all (but not essential with GWW)

dunbar

Although waddling around in several tons of random ironmongery is indeed less essential to your success in ToB I would consider it a bit too late to switch someone to dual-wielding. Unless of course you had the foresight/luck to carry over from SoA one or both of the only two weapons that increase apr when equipped in the off hand. Even then you still need time and XP to add sufficient proficiency pips into dual-wielding in order to avoid painful penalties.

somethingsnazzy

There are four (five with UAI) really powerful offhanded weapons.

Two (three with UAI) increase your attacks per round, applying to the main hand. This is really amazing early on but becomes somewhat useless with whirlwind. It can be really powerful on a thief with assassinate.

One, Crom Faeyr, increases your strength to 25, dramatically increasing your damage and THAC0. Someone should absolutely dual wield this in their offhand.

The final powerful offhand weapon is the Defender of Easthaven. The 20% damage reduction, coupled with hardiness, gives 60% damage reduction, making it better than any shield.

There are almost no shields, however, that are universally good late game and only a handful that are situational, such as the Shield of Balduran, Fortress Shield and Dragon Scale Shield. You also only get -4 AC against missiles with the two proficiency points. So you might as well put your points into two weapon and switch to shields when the situation arises. AC matters less in ToB; besides, you should mostly be tanky from spells, summons and abilities.

As for two-handed weapons... there are probably four or five worthwhile weapons. Carsomyr and Ravager for sure. Gram the Sword of Grief, Staff of the Ram and Ixil's Spike are all solid as well. So, depending on how you build out your party (if you have a paladin, how many ranged characters you have), you could probably get away with all 2H weapons and be just fine.

It might be too late, however, to really get the proficiencies necessary to two weapon without keeper though.

*edit* Your offhand only ever attacks once per round. So while it increases your damage, it isn't a significant increase, particularly when coupled with bonus attacks fighters obtain or that you get from improved haste. With whirlwind, offhand damage is negligible. Try to only use offhands that add to your main hand. For example, Crom Faeyr on someone that has 15 strength will give a bonus of 14 damage to your main hand.

sarevok57

Daevelon said:

As far as i know ToB is the best part of Baldur's Gate for abandon the 1h+shield style because a low AC is not so useful anymore, but it's not your case. That said, switching from 2h weapons to dual wield depends on your playstyle.
For example: Is Minsc attacking from distance while other characters are tanking? He doesn't have big HP bonuses from Constituion, so maybe is better to keep him distant using a 2h weapon.
Mazzy could be a great dual wielder, but i would prefer her to use a bow.
In your party configuration i would rather make Sarevok a dual wielder than Minsc; he is a great tank with high HP and AC and more APR for his Death Bringer Assault is not bad at all (but not essential with GWW)

i think it depends on what difficulty you are playing on for the effectiveness of AC in ToB, i play on insane with double damage enabled and every single AC point i can get all the better, even if enemies only have a 20% chance to miss, that 20% miss chance can be the difference of victory or defeat, but usually i can get my ACs to around -15 for my melee guys and when your AC is that low, it is actually quite noticeable

but based on the fact that inkblowout has 3 guys using two handed swords, his ACs probably arent all that great to begin with, and with that fact, if inkblowout already has 3 guys using two handed swords, he wont see an AC difference if switching over to two weapon fighting style

it also depends on the frequency of greater whirlwind, if greater whirlwind is being used quite frequently, then it won't really matter, because the main advantage of two weapons is the extra attack per round

also, another advantage of dual wielding is the bonuses the weapons would transfer over to the wielder ( like cromfayer's strength boost, or defender of easthaven's damage resistance boost, ect.) but when it comes to pure damage potential greater whirl winding with two handers will deal more damage ( with the except of cromfayer perhaps)

also @inkblowout depending on how many levels/actual game your characters have left, you might not even have enough time to gain enough proficiency points to make dual wielding feasible, except minsc starting with 2 points in mace and two points in two weapon style, you only need one more point to max out 2 weapon style, mazzy, will need 9 levels to gain 3 points in two weapon style, and sarevok will need 9 levels for two weapon style to max, and then another 6 levels on top of that to only be specialized in a single handed weapon and THEN another 9 levels after THAT to be a grand master in it for a total of 24 levels ( so unless you started building sarevok as soon as you got him to dual wield he will never be able to max out those proficiencies)

also to note with the above, at best without grinding i can hit about 6.8 million XP per character by the time i finish ToB ( to the point right before i go and fight off mellisan in the throne of bhaal ) so with that being said Minsc might only hit level 30 and sarevok and mazzy might only hit level 34/35ish so there is that to consider ( unless you want to grind all the way to the 8 million XP cap, then minsc can hit level 34, and sarevok/mazzy can hit level 40)

so with that all being said, my advice: give 'er gas, there really is no wrong way to play the BG games, and if you don't like dual wielding, you can always resort back to what you are doing now, or when you finish this run, you can always start a new run where your main guy can be a dual wielder and see how you like it

inkblowout

sarevok57 said:

Daevelon said:

As far as i know ToB is the best part of Baldur's Gate for abandon the 1h+shield style because a low AC is not so useful anymore, but it's not your case. That said, switching from 2h weapons to dual wield depends on your playstyle.
For example: Is Minsc attacking from distance while other characters are tanking? He doesn't have big HP bonuses from Constituion, so maybe is better to keep him distant using a 2h weapon.
Mazzy could be a great dual wielder, but i would prefer her to use a bow.
In your party configuration i would rather make Sarevok a dual wielder than Minsc; he is a great tank with high HP and AC and more APR for his Death Bringer Assault is not bad at all (but not essential with GWW)

i think it depends on what difficulty you are playing on for the effectiveness of AC in ToB, i play on insane with double damage enabled and every single AC point i can get all the better, even if enemies only have a 20% chance to miss, that 20% miss chance can be the difference of victory or defeat, but usually i can get my ACs to around -15 for my melee guys and when your AC is that low, it is actually quite noticeable

but based on the fact that inkblowout has 3 guys using two handed swords, his ACs probably arent all that great to begin with, and with that fact, if inkblowout already has 3 guys using two handed swords, he wont see an AC difference if switching over to two weapon fighting style

it also depends on the frequency of greater whirlwind, if greater whirlwind is being used quite frequently, then it won't really matter, because the main advantage of two weapons is the extra attack per round

also, another advantage of dual wielding is the bonuses the weapons would transfer over to the wielder ( like cromfayer's strength boost, or defender of easthaven's damage resistance boost, ect.) but when it comes to pure damage potential greater whirl winding with two handers will deal more damage ( with the except of cromfayer perhaps)

also @inkblowout depending on how many levels/actual game your characters have left, you might not even have enough time to gain enough proficiency points to make dual wielding feasible, except minsc starting with 2 points in mace and two points in two weapon style, you only need one more point to max out 2 weapon style, mazzy, will need 9 levels to gain 3 points in two weapon style, and sarevok will need 9 levels for two weapon style to max, and then another 6 levels on top of that to only be specialized in a single handed weapon and THEN another 9 levels after THAT to be a grand master in it for a total of 24 levels ( so unless you started building sarevok as soon as you got him to dual wield he will never be able to max out those proficiencies)

also to note with the above, at best without grinding i can hit about 6.8 million XP per character by the time i finish ToB ( to the point right before i go and fight off mellisan in the throne of bhaal ) so with that being said Minsc might only hit level 30 and sarevok and mazzy might only hit level 34/35ish so there is that to consider ( unless you want to grind all the way to the 8 million XP cap, then minsc can hit level 34, and sarevok/mazzy can hit level 40)

so with that all being said, my advice: give 'er gas, there really is no wrong way to play the BG games, and if you don't like dual wielding, you can always resort back to what you are doing now, or when you finish this run, you can always start a new run where your main guy can be a dual wielder and see how you like it

Well the good part is that I don't have to worry about building up the proper proficiency points in minsc (I just need one more proficiency point in Mazzy in 2 weapon style to be complete.) And I'm in the middle of watcher's keep at the moment and I still have to visit Amkethran and meet Balthazar so I still have halfway (or more than halfway) to go to complete ToB. So I have time to get the proper level for Mazzy (and they are currently in the 20-24 level range, Viconia's level is 26.) I'll try it for a bit, the problem I face is that I really didn't care about it at the time so I'm just wondering if the weapons I have in inventory is even good for ToB. I mean the only weapons in SoD that are decent that I currently Equip is Carsomyr, Crom Faeyr and Gesen's Bow.

sarevok57

in ToB there is a +5 version of each weapon, so if they have abilities that you like it might be worth dual wielding

infact if you got the fallen star ore ( i think it's called? ) from saradush and get the storm star mace from watcher's keep, you can have a pretty good mace set up with minsc

when it comes to short swords, im not really a fan because they deal piercing damage, and some stronger enemies will be immune to piercing damage, but for the most part i guess you could be alright

for me, the only time i dual wield is when im playing as a swashbuckler, i prefer the weapon and board but again that's only because i play with double damage and giving an enemy any disadvantage when it comes to hitting my characters i take

InKal

in my opinion it depends.
first - HLAs
For two handed weapon user GWW is better than Critical Strike+Imp. Haste. So, if you already gave a lot of GWWs to your fighter - don't switch. If you preferred Crit.Strike you can eventually switch Carsomyr to Foebane+Purifier for example.
second - party composition
If the gal/guy you planning switching is your main damage dealer - don't switch. In ToB you can first dispel with Carsomyr and then you can vorpal with Silver Sword. GWW+Silver Sword is the strongest attack against everything not immune to vorpal hits.
Your party looks like switching could be fun, hehhe, my english lol

gorgonzola

my 2 cents
about gww nothing interferes with switching to a 2handers while you use them, the +1 apr with off hand or 25 str bonus are really useful in the rest of the day, and given the advantages of 25str on thac0 and dmg probably is better to use crom and shield as you gww anyway, you gain also something as AC.

there are 1h weapons that give passive benefits, like the weapons that grant immunitiy to level drain or immunity to disabling effects, in some situations is good to weld them in OH, or even to stack the effect of 2 of them.

on a pure fighter, like Mazzi, i usually try to reach GM in at least 2 weapons and if I want him (her) to use both ranged and mlee to find place for the 3 pips (2 are somehow enough) is a problem. Rangers have already 2 free pips so why not?

about Minsk con never forget that there is a belt that rises it for a long time each day, i feel that many people underrate how that belt can be useful with low con fighter types. you can use it each day and clear a full area or dungeon before the effect vanishes. i am not sure, but possibly the effect is not dispellable.