Between the bridge and the harbour orc fight, there are crates which always contain a staff, a one-handed sword, and an upgraded bow.
Yeah, that's a fairly new change as those items (minus the staff) used to be on the ground on the opposite side of the orc battle. I was glad to see they were moved, and hopefully it remains that way by launch. With the way things change I'm not sure I want to hedge my bets on that, though.
Right now, weapon specialization only does 10% extra damage per point. Switching your Spec from 2H to 1H means that if forced to use that 2H weapon to fight, you don't do much damage. I don't think it affects your accuracy.
It's just damage (and 10% blocking per point for shield). But, don't forget, you can start a character with two points in (example) shields at character creation. That's 20% blocking, and you can find a +1 block buff on a piece of armor on your way to the orc battle. You can also get enough XP to level up by the time you're in the orc battle at the Cyseal gates (and can even assign points mid-battle).
I'm not sure anyone wants to build a dedicated sword & board character and hear
"it's just 30% chance to block.. completely pointless, you won't miss it for a few fights, just use the two-hander..". I know I wouldn't be excited about that.
