an idea... (in General)

so currently the elven stiletto is not a favorite weapon... or really even a weapon anyone looks at to use beyond early character development at all... so I had an idea to up it's value... how about letting people double wield the ES... no other item just ES and it could hit 2 times per round this way... and you would not use a shield... I'm sure it would still not be the highest demand weapon, but it might cause a little increase in weapon usage... just a thought... I'm sure I'll hear about how dumb I am for bringing this topic up because it has been suggested before, however the ES is a pointless weapon for most people currently and I think it could cause a little demand for them...

I support any change that improves the ES :)

Dual-wielding weapons has been shot down many times before, but I still like the ideas of:

1. Improving crappy weapons
2. Adding the strategy decision of shield vs 2nd mediocre weapon

Yes.

How about all the "crappy" weapons i.e. elven stiletto and smaller, that are one-hand weapons can all be dual wielded. All "crappy" weapons would have a weight factor of .01 to 1.00 meaning that percent of the offhand damage is added to the attack of the main weapon. The stiletto being one of the largest "crappy" weapons might have a .05 weight factor, meaning not that much extra damage, but something like a dagger could have a 0.90.

You could have the off-hand weapon confer some percentage of ability to the main weapon without having it actually add to your damage.

Like: If you wield an ES on your off-hand, you get a certain percentage of vorpalness on your main weapon.

Then of course you'd need to either:

-boost useless weapons by giving them innate abilities (best) or
-introduce new types of weapons

The abilities given by weapons could range from a small bit of Evasion to a boost of AC. Extra PTH...things like that. You'd have to give up using a shield to use an off-hand weapon so in a way it could be balanced.

I think a simple double wield on that weapon would be a perfect way to improve its usefulness...

CB already has DW.

It's Bloodlust.

With no 'on hit' abilites, there's no point to introducing DW, unless it's to provide more damage.

In which case BL does that already, and DW would have to compete directly with BL.

Plus you have to spend more NW, and use up more ENC.

Why should you use an ability for it... just let people DE the ES... to make it useable.... I think it would work nice if it does a double hit with a mild penalty on the second hit...

DW not DE...

How would it work?

Both hitting with thier own Bast Chance to hit? Both haivng extra hits from Weapon PTH? ToA/GoM/MC PTH?

In essence, you've just given the player a 100% (or how ever smaller bonus, from any off hand penalty), with absolutly no cost or drawback.

"Now, we could make twoweapon a Skill, but then we'd get rid of Bloodlust and only people who could afford to upgrade two weapons would have that choice. I think it's better the way it is." -Jonathan

nobody should be using an ES anyway. Even at the lower levels where perhaps a katana or exec would be decent enough, the ES is a joke. Like the tulwar, whip, and main gauche. Just cuz it's considered rare enough to disenchant doesn't mean it was ever intended to be any good (GoM anyone?)

/me brandishes A Whip [9x300] (+184)

/me skewers Nemerizt with a base ELB

I will warn you, I can do a full 4.6k damage per hit with this whip. I only have 4.1 mil str too.

So hatchet you are saying the point of the ES is to suck... all I'm saying is let us improve this weapon.... make the weapons skill double wield... we could make the primary weapon is the only weapon affected by skills the other weapon is for double hit damage only...

I think the Elven Stiletto should stay the way it is, this way the Vorpal Blade won't decrease in value.

Let's assume Tank damage is based around 2H Damage, and call this 100%.

1H Weapon Damage is slightly less (smaller base damage), and I'll assume this to be 90% of 2H Damage.

This is off set by higher base chance to hit (and extra hits are just extra damage), and less penalties with Shields.

OK. As there's no 'on hit' stuff in CB, number of hits don't matter, it's all just damage.

Add in DW as a base ability, and lets give it a 50% damage reduction on the off hand.

You've just made DW do;

90% + 45% or 135% damage. 35% more than a 2H Weapon, and now made them all obselete. On top of that, you've just skewed the damage balance between Tanks and Mages, with Mages now 35% (I'm assuming they are currently equivalently balanced) behind Tanks.

You could inflict further penalties on DW damage, until they come to around the 100% of 2H, but then, you'd never use DW, as you could use a 2H weapon, with half the NW and ENC cost of two (gimped) 1H's.

So we off set this extra 35% damage by making DW a skill, and requiring it to be trained (much like Achery off sets Bow's better damage over other Ranged Weapons).

At only doing 135% total damage, DW sucks versus the 75% extra damage BL gives. And as they now compete for the Skill slot, no one, ever, would ever, ever, train DW.

So you pump DW damage up to 175% total to get it to equal BL on a 2H weapon.

No one trains DW anyway, as you can get the same effect using BL and a 2H Weapon, with half the NW and ENC cost.

So you don't give DW any Penalty, and it does 200% damage. But is a skill.

No one trains BL any more, and you've made BL and all 2H wepaons obselete.

Bottom line, we already have DW extra damage, without requiring a second weapon, and introducing DW would either make it, or it's peers, utterly obslete.

An Elven Stiletto was never meant to be a viable end game weapon.

The analogy which GentlemanLoser gives is a very good one. While Dual Wield might be a nice idea to add, it would be very difficult to balance.

The balance between Tanks themselves would already be tough not having to think about Mages as well. Also, _if_ Dual Wield would be an addition to Carnage Blender, I would certainly want to see AC being severely hindered by it, or defense in general.