Duel Wield vs. Sword and Board

[pixiegirl721]

Ok built a human Divine Avenger lvl 6.

I have a +2 Holy Longsword and a Retribution Longsword which is a +1 Holy, True Law, Pure Good..

My Stats currently are
STR 16
DEX 17
CON 10
INT 10
WIS 13
CHA 15

Do I want to duel wield these or use them with a shield and if with a shield which sword would give me the better hit and damage?

[Angelus_dead]

Do I want to duel wield these or use them with a shield and if with a shield which sword would give me the better hit and damage?

At your level it would probably be best to use just a single weapon, which could either be one of those longswords, or a staff/falchion/whatever. In the future if you get feats in TWF, ITWF, and GTWF you could dual-wield, but you won't get there for a while. Because your dex is so high you should certainly go for GTWF.

Currently Retribution will do more damage against most mobs, and only have a slightly higher chance of missing. If you notice yourself missing significantly, you should instead change to a +4 Longsword.

[pixiegirl721]

thanks for the advice..

[Macartur]

For what its worth, you can set both as weapon sets.

Sword and board likely 90% of the time until you get the feats to TWF in proper fashion, but you can still keep the TWF pair ready to swap to in a situation where you judge the - in AC is worth the extra swing. For example in places where your mobbed by low threat baddies like kobolds or *EVIL* your in a party with lots of hold/dance/ect from casters letting you swing away.

[esoitl]

Are those your base numbers or are you including items?

If those aren't base numbers you won't be able to qualify for GTWF unless you can hit a base DEX 17. The way I approached the TWF/S&B argument was how much was I going to lose from my casting feats to get the TWF feats and stat points.
I didn't feel it was worth taking such a hit to do so, ergo I'm planning to stay S&B sacrficing the TWF DPS for feats like Maximize, Empower and Quicken to supplement my melee capabilities.

You could feat it out to have
TWF :: ITWF :: GTWF :: Empower :: Maximize :: Quicken
and still have one feat to play with, two if you're Human. This is still missing Power Attack, Improved Critical, and Toughness as well which are all feats I'd like a melee to have....

Depends on how much you plan on casting and how much you plan on being melee. I notcie you do have a CON 10 which is very low for a melee, even a self-healing melee and I will assume by staying pure your AC is going to be on the low side, even using a shield which could land you in some serious hot water if you try to lower it further by going TWF.

[iruka41]

You could feat it out to have
TWF :: ITWF :: GTWF :: Empower :: Maximize :: Quicken
and still have one feat to play with, two if you're Human. This is still missing Power Attack, Improved Critical, and Toughness as well which are all feats I'd like a melee to have....

I wanted to have them all so I went 17FvS/2Mnk/1Ftr.
Yeah... I lost 9th spell and couple spell slots but... I got,
TWF/ITWF/GTWF/PowerAttack/ImpCrit/Toughness AND
Extend/Quicken/Empower/Maximize

[Fetchi]

I wanted to have them all so I went 17FvS/2Mnk/1Ftr.
Yeah... I lost 9th spell and couple spell slots but... I got,
TWF/ITWF/GTWF/PowerAttack/ImpCrit/Toughness AND
Extend/Quicken/Empower/Maximize

Don't forget about Tier 3 PRE's...