Larian Studios Forums Divine Divinity (English) Help/Tips/Tricks Advice on weapon specialisation for warrior

Hello. Just started Divine Divinity (GOG download). So far excellent game IMO. I have some questions about weapon specialisation for my warrior.
It seems to me, thus far in Aleroth, that axes seem to be better generally than swords. The first dungeon is full of axes (which I cannot use yet) and also axes seem to drop quite a bit more than other weapons and seem to have better stats. I get the feeling the game is telling me to use axes!!
Any advice from experienced players? Are axes a good choice for specialisation; or should I go with swords?

The game is actually pretty biased towards swords (there are many more potentially good swords consistently in the game than other weapon types). There are lots of axes in the Aleroth catacombs, but not many after that.

Warriors tend to have plenty of skill points to spare, especially relying on spell books for mage skills, so it wouldn't hurt to have two weapon expertise skills. By the time you can meet the requirements for the better axes, though, there should be plenty of swords around. I stashed the axes in a chest in Joram's house, and eventually used them to trade with, after finding better merchants.

Free skills, and spell books you can buy

At least in the disk version of the game, with one level in Sword Expertise or Augment Damage (the starting skills for the male warrior), if you save the game and reload you will have level 2 of these skills. This works for other class and gender combinations, as well, but they have to put the first skill point in each skill themselves.

"The game is actually pretty biased towards swords "

Thank you Raze that helps a lot. I too have the catacomb axes stashed in Aleroth - in Mardaneus' house where I dropped a teleporter stone until I find a merchant. I just raided General Alix's armoury and there's lots of claymores there; but I want a one-hander on account of the bonuses a shield can carry.

How do those early axes from the catacombs compare to swords and other weapons requiring similar stats?

Can you recommend an early game merchant?
Thanks again.

After playing with a sword for awhile and maxing that expertise, I never really checked out the damage or bonuses on any of the axes I had stashed. I used crappy stuff to trade for potions, and when I found a spell book or charm to buy and didn't have any suitable loot on me I usually grabbed the heaviest repaired equipment I had available (armour and shields) to trade with first. Most of the weapons I stash were sold off in bulk before I headed to the wastelands near the end of the game.

North of the army barracks and Rivertown Watch building is Stormfist Castle, east and north of there is Ars Magicana (ie to the far east of the Cursed Abbey), where you can find some better merchants.

Thanks again Raze

Mostly I use a weapon that have a special damage on it and that can be a Sword, but also a Axe or a Spear, Mace or Staff! But Mostly I prefer a one-hand weapon so my shield can give extra boosts
(like Frost, Poison dam, Fire dam, Spiritual dam, Death Blow, etc ...)

With my last gameplay I used frequently a Bow, so a shield wasn't so important for me, but I wear a shield all the time because I found early in the game a very nice one-hand sword : "Bastard Sword of the Brain", not sure if I buy it or find it somewhere ...

Have Fun with Divine !! It's a Masterpiece ! You will see it become very very addictive !!

Hi Joram
Thank you for your reply. Like you I too want to use a shield for the extra boosts.
You say you used different weapons and I wonder did you put skill points into all of them?

I am finding out what you mean when you say this game is addictive.
(have you played Diablo; they say that is also addictive)

I read about your hardcore adventure; congratulations on successfully completing it; sounds like you got a lot from that experience.

all the best

Hi Siddham,

for me such a hardcore adventure give me a really more thriling fantastic time !!
Playing like that is always dangerous when some enemy bosses can hit me with one strike and a nearby death experience is immediately a reality ... or more worse, there's a change my hero is stone-dead, at once !!

Last gameplay I used mostly a Bow, so I put points in Bow Expertise (total 4 points) and because of some great Swords, I put also 4 points in Sword Expertise. No points in other kind of Weapon Expertises ... or maybe 1 or 2 points in Axe Exp. is possible (but I think not).

I never played Diablo. I will have a look on internet to see if this game can hold my attention .
Maybe I can surf to GOG to see if they have this game?

The only class I didn't play in DD with hardcore is a Mage and I think I gonna try that

Have a good time

Hi Joram

I have tried to play Diablo2 a coupler of times but found it boring. So far as I could tell it is pure hack & slash - beat-up, gather-up and level-up. Also it's not on GOG and wont be - I would think. But two games on GOG I do think are good and similar to DD are Sacred and Two Worlds.
Have you any other favorite games?

Hi Siddham,

like you can guess I most of all love the Divinity games ( Divine Divinity, the whole Dragon Knight Saga - played the whole Ego Draconis already! - and less Beyond Divinity ...)

I never played Sacret. Maybe ever? I take a look at this game to see if Sacret is "my cup of tea"
I have bought in 2010 a few new RPG's (Two worlds II, Arcania, Risen, the DKS) for my Xbox, but my largest problem is "Time"!!

Played Risen (I think my hero is now level 10 or 12) for a month or three. In the meantime I start up playing DD again, this time "hardcore style". My first two hero's got killed, my third survived.
Now, eight months later I wish to begin with the DKS.
But waiting on nightmare mode now (DKS on Xbox) I probably begin soon first Two Worlds II or Arcania or go further with Risen. The first tiem I start with risen I don't like it very much, but after a second (or more!) try I begin to find this game a real challenge and I like "challenges"!

But NO wonder if I begin again DD !! .... it's a SOOOO addictive RPG !
I can hardly believe it myself!

But I've the feeling I gonna love Two Worlds II, if only because of the Crafting system, the Magic system and the Alchemy system I read about it many times over and over again (and buy the game).
I also have Oblivion (Xbox - I'm not the person who wish to "modding games"), but this game, I'm afraid, is making dust for years because I prefer first to play for a really long time all the other games I mentioned above (I have to play and probably REplay some of them over and over again!).

And my other genre of games I play sometimes are pure "puzzle games" or strategic games (less).
But my one and only genre of computer games whitch I started with years ago are adventure (puzzle) games like Myst I, II(=Riven, my favorite of the Myst's!) and III (IV and V I have, but never play it for long), the Black Mirror, NiBiRu, Syberia I and II (beautiful) and more ....

Hi Joram

I will be getting DKS too and Risen and.....!!


I played and liked Gothic 1 and some of Gothic 2 (which I look forward to going back to eventually…as you say…time!!). I have G3 but my rig does not run it so well so I am waiting to play it in the future. I also really liked Deus Ex – but I didn’t like the second game at all. I liked and finished Morrowind but have never gotten far in Oblivion. I played Syberia and I am looking forward to the Myst series; and I also want to play the Krondor games - what a great resource we have in GOG!! There’s so many games there I want to play

I wouldn't simply say swords are best...(no doubt the actual unique swords you find are superior, though). Mace expertise is inherently better, in my opinion. It causes 50% more damage added than sword mastery, and the to-hit that swords give is usually hugely redundant, especially for a warrior. I believe some poster in that "Aric's Warrior Guide" thread came to the same conclusion.

The question is, can all those extra modifiers you get on unique swords beat 50% more damage? I say that the only usefully unique things you can get on a weapon are the drains (and freeze, but that's broken). The elemental damage is useless in the extreme: divide the avg damage by the proc rate=pathetic, and only spirit always procs, I believe, but almost everything is highly resistant to it; the stat bonuses/charm slots you will get in absurd excess from your other gear; the stun proc might be useful if u have the skill maxed, but deathblow is useless; so 50% more dmg is lookin' pretty good I think. Besides, a good mace can have good charm slots and all the important modifiers, I think, if you could find such mace. Also, the base dmg of maces is inherently better than that of 1-handed swords i believe (probably because maces can ONLY be 1-handed, unlike swords/axes). Speed is something I have no clue about, except that I remember thinking that the sword mastery speed was wasteful when I played (atk speed can't go below "0").

I would imagine that if you could find a rank 5 morningstar (if i remember, the best mace) with good modifiers, it'd be WAY better than the sword of the gods, unless you're having trouble hitting things, which a warrior should not. Now, does anyone know where to find such a morningstar....? lol
It should also be noted that I haven't tried this in practice.

OK...analysis complete lol

Of course, I have no solid idea 'cuz i haven't played in god knows how long. I'd like to hear others' opinions, though.

My last warrior was a mace-user. I crafted my own maces with DAD's item editor. Obviously that's a cheat but I tried to keep it balanced - I basically just tweaked the mace modifiers to match the modifiers on similar level swords I had found (there are many, many, unique swords, but almost no unique maces). Didn't increase the damage or speed or charm slots or anything like that. My final one I called Lucifer (The Morning Star) haha, so clever I know.

Hi,

by me the weapon that have (frost) are not brocken. But I only see Orcs that are weak against frost (the "frost" gives also damage to them). Freeze them and use poison damage and they're fast killed!

There are indeed no so much good unique maces. In the catacombs beneath Aleroth you can find a mace with good radom stats, but with the fixed name "Bat of Striking"

If you wish to kill some kind of enemies fast, go also certainly for a (good) bow + skill "Elemental Arrows" ! It's great against lots of enemies! Especially mostly all Lizards and also the Imps in the Wastelands! I used this skill often and put at least 3 points in this skill as fast as I can.
And of course "Poison Weapon" is great against Orcs and many more, like the Assassins!

Mostly I take the weapons that sweets my build best and that are not the weapons with the highest damage values!
I like the special damages on weapon and charmslots too, especially:
mana drain & life drain
poison dam, frost, fire damage, lightning dam

And since the spell "Freeze" don't work by, for example Josephina, try to hit her with a weapon with 'frost' and it works fine: a frozen Josephina!

Joram, as for bows, I'm not sure that those bow skills are necessarily a good thing, because (I believe) they overwrite the damage and effects of whatever bow you're using; with a good bow, it'd be better just to shoot.

I guess I won't go into frost and poison weapon...

Also, I seem to remember magical effect slots sometimes being used to increase the physical dmg of a weapon (like a Rank 5 only having 2 effects, but doing unusually high dmg), so this mace thing might be foolish. Still, 50% more...

I never see something that increase the physical damage of a weapon in Divine Divinity ! Only increasing your Strength give more damage because your hero becomes stronger.
DD has charms, but only to give your hero more resistances (fire, lightning, poison, spirit), more vitality or mana, more strength, agility, intelligence or constitution.

Divinity II Ego Draconis HAS "enchantments" you can put in weapons (and more) to increase the physical or magical damage !
Maybe you disarrange both games?

I've always considered swords the best weapons by far... you can find the Blade of Chaos very early in the game (which can be the best sword in the game!).

I'm now replaying and found a good claymore early with Stun(4) and Deathblow(4) enchantments... combined with Freeze, this made it very easy to take out the entire Orc camp at only level 20. With Deathblow(4), you can sometimes kill Elite Orc chiefs in one hit...

I had DeathBlow(3) on my Sword Of The Gods, found late in the game. However, DeathBlow shakes the screen, which I disliked; had this happened more frequently, I would have had to re-load a previous save.


In DD there are no direct damage boosting bonuses you can see listed on an item, but if an item has the best available damage range for a weapon, it will tend to have fewer bonuses, while weapons with lots of bonuses tend to have lower damage.

Ah well that definitely makes sense. I'm guessing that weapons like the Sword of the Gods and the Sword of Chaos can assume the damage of a number of different base weapons (broadsword, bastard sword, etc)?

The best damage range you can get on looted one handed swords is 71-100 (purchased bastard swords can get up to 81-110 IIRC). I'm not sure about two handed swords (I used the two handed bastard sword from the knight by the castle for quite awhile, but before and after that used one handed swords).
With potentially very good swords you can get the best damage range as well as a lot of other bonuses (my Nobleman's Sword had 4 skill bonuses, for example, as well as vitality and a couple stat bonuses). With lower quality weapons the trade-off may be more noticeable if you reload a few times.