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[Jarold]

Im currently a one handed shielder at lvl 30. My stats are...

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21 str.
15 agi

Power Strike - 7
Iron Flesh - 7
Shield - 5
Athletics - 5
Weapon Master - 5

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Great Helmet
Mail Hauberk
Mail Mittens
Mail Chausses

Arabian Cavalry Sword
Heavy Round Shield

Im planning on using this same build/equipment next gen but im not sure if its exactly good, any suggestions?

[Vibe]

It is good. You could also go something like 18/18 if you want more speed.

[Bjord]

It is good.

It is known, Khaleesi.

[Digglez]

arab sword is too slow for general infantry, get something faster like NCS/KAS, italian, Scimi or Grosse Messer.  The advantage of sword is reach AND speed, and you've just tossed one of those out the window.

[Teeth]

Arabian cavalry sword can definitely work well in battle. Holds and wiggles are key. The speed is only a disadvantage in a 1 vs 1, where the 1h animations are easily solid enough to make due with 95 speed. In a group vs group fight situation, that reach and cut damage is awesome. Especially because people continously underestimate the reach of the 1h rightswing. I can play the range game against most Danishes and flamberges with 102 reach, flamberge mostly because it is so slow. The possibilities with 105 reach are endless.

Too bad it looks shit. Really shit.

[Vodner]

The biggest problem I had with the ACS is that its overheads love to bounce off the ground, leaving your briefly stunned. Other than that, it's a pretty nice battle weapon.

[isatis]

hum first you should have  7ps not 8 minor error

but you should maybe try another built like 24/15 which give you an amazing 8 ps with 5 ath 5 shield and 5 wm

try using ligther armor to be faster and hit like a tank!

[rustyspoon]

Not a fan of 21/15. You gain the ability to take an extra hit, but the trade-off is slow movement speed and a weak shield.

I find the sweet spot with a MW Heavy Round Shield is 6 shield skill. With 6 athletics you don't have to worry about 2-handers circling around you.

Strength: 21
Agility: 18
Hit points: 60
Skills to attributes: 8
Ironflesh: 2
Power Strike: 7
Shield: 6
Athletics: 6
Weapon Master: 2
One Handed: 125

[Turboflex]

If your are a smart player and position/face well, you don't need extra athletics. Athletics are a bit like training wheels, they give you more margin for error when it comes to footwork, but if you're not making those errors in the first place why do you need it? Also I don't think you need more than 5 shield, by the time your shield is broken there will be new shields to pick up all over the ground.

Take Rustyspoon's build to cut down Iron flesh and wep master for extra stats, but try 24/15 instead of 21/18.

In mail armor you're not getting the same advantage from iron flesh that someone in plate does, and I guarantee you will enjoy 8 PS, really makes a difference in killing heavy armor guys (and ripping through lights).

Another sword you might wanna try is Nordic War Sword. It is very fast,  it's a bit shorter than the top swords which actually gives it better sweetspots, so you glance less.

[rustyspoon]

If your are a smart player and position/face well, you don't need extra athletics. Athletics are a bit like training wheels, they give you more margin for error when it comes to footwork, but if you're not making those errors in the first place why do you need it? Also I don't think you need more than 5 shield, by the time your shield is broken there will be new shields to pick up all over the ground.

Take Rustyspoon's build to cut down Iron flesh and wep master for extra stats, but try 24/15 instead of 21/18.

In mail armor you're not getting the same advantage from iron flesh that someone in plate does, and I guarantee you will enjoy 8 PS, really makes a difference in killing heavy armor guys (and ripping through lights).

Another sword you might wanna try is Nordic War Sword. It is very fast,  it's a bit shorter than the top swords which actually gives it better sweetspots, so you glance less.

Funny, I say the same thing about strength.

The differences between 18 str and 24 str are minimal, especially when considering held attacks, speed bonus and the low initial damage values of 1-h weapons. Poles and 2h benefit from PS much, much more than 1-handers.

The benefits of high athletics are:

1. You get to pick your fights. You won't ever be stuck somewhere you don't want to be.
2. It's hard for people to surround you. With my 7 athletics and light armor on NA, I can run backwards faster than most people run forward.
3. Surprise hits. I can close distance between opponents much faster than they expect. Great for right swings and stabs.
4. Moving around people's defenses. It becomes pretty easy to circle around other shielders and hit around their shield.

Now, the point about you being able to pick up another shield when yours breaks. First you have to survive the breaking of your shield and you have to survive the process of finding another one. If you're fighting two people and your shield breaks, you'll get another hit on you before you can even block. Then if you manage to kill those guys, you'll still have to find yourself another shield. With higher shield skill, your shield will pretty much never ever break. Couches can't even break my shield unless someone else beat the shit out of it first. Also, higher shield skill lets you block faster. Shields already block slower than manual blocks. A higher shield skill makes it easier for you to react to chambers.

[Turboflex]

Funny, I say the same thing about strength.

The differences between 18 str and 24 str are minimal, especially when considering held attacks, speed bonus and the low initial damage values of 1-h weapons. Poles and 2h benefit from PS much, much more than 1-handers.

The benefits of high athletics are:

1. You get to pick your fights. You won't ever be stuck somewhere you don't want to be.
2. It's hard for people to surround you. With my 7 athletics and light armor on NA, I can run backwards faster than most people run forward.
3. Surprise hits. I can close distance between opponents much faster than they expect. Great for right swings and stabs.
4. Moving around people's defenses. It becomes pretty easy to circle around other shielders and hit around their shield.

Now, the point about you being able to pick up another shield when yours breaks. First you have to survive the breaking of your shield and you have to survive the process of finding another one. If you're fighting two people and your shield breaks, you'll get another hit on you before you can even block. Then if you manage to kill those guys, you'll still have to find yourself another shield. With higher shield skill, your shield will pretty much never ever break. Couches can't even break my shield unless someone else beat the shit out of it first. Also, higher shield skill lets you block faster. Shields already block slower than manual blocks. A higher shield skill makes it easier for you to react to chambers.

I guess we could say it's just a style difference, your AGI emphasis is more defensive and duelist, mine is more offensive and geared for fast killing in heavy fights.

I use a 38 cut 1h axe which basically hits like a greatsword, quite a bit harder than a 33 cut italian sword.

I don't mind fighting outnumbered, ping-ponging between opponents is absurdly effective once you get the timing and footwork down. With 8 PS I can drop them fast whilst doing it. Generally when you are surrounded by 3 random people, they usually don't work very well together anyways, giving you lots of openings.

Easy to get surprise hits even with 4 Athletics, just lull someone in a certain direction and reverse it quickly, people rarely react in time regardless of your athletics.

I rely on either my axe to bust a shield, or use holds/feints. Only a bad/inexperienced shielder who hasn't learned how to face properly will let you swing around them.

I guess the OP needs to think about what his style is and tailor build accordinly.

[Teeth]

The differences between 18 str and 24 str are minimal, especially when considering held attacks, speed bonus and the low initial damage values of 1-h weapons. Poles and 2h benefit from PS much, much more than 1-handers.

I disagree. There is a huge different between 6 and 8 ps. Regardless of your class, 2 ps is still worth 16% more damage. It will still take you 16% less hits to kill even with a torch. There is also a damage bonus for the 6 more strength, this is absolute, so 1h benefits just as much from this as 2h. Especially because the low base damage from 1h, having high ps is important to minimize the chances of glancing.

The mentioned held attacks and speed bonuses will stack with your ps. So doing a perfectly maneuvered held hit will get even more bonus with more powerstrike. Still the increased speed bonus from having more athlethics does not at all make up for less powerstrike, it is not that significant.

[rustyspoon]

I disagree. There is a huge different between 6 and 8 ps. Regardless of your class, 2 ps is still worth 16% more damage. It will still take you 16% less hits to kill even with a torch. There is also a damage bonus for the 6 more strength, this is absolute, so 1h benefits just as much from this as 2h. Especially because the low base damage from 1h, having high ps is important to minimize the chances of glancing.

The mentioned held attacks and speed bonuses will stack with your ps. So doing a perfectly maneuvered held hit will get even more bonus with more powerstrike. Still the increased speed bonus from having more athlethics does not at all make up for less powerstrike, it is not that significant.

Real world maths comin' at ya!

Let's assume you have an opponent with 21 str, 7 IF and 55 body armor. That gives him 70 hp.

Now for the builds of the attacker.

Build 1 has 6 PS and 123 WPF.
Build 2 has 8 PS and 123 WPF.

The three weapons being used are a MW Italian Sword (33 cut), a MW broad 1-handed battle axe (38 cut) and a MW Military Hammer (31 blunt)

Not counting held attacks or speed bonus, it will take the guy with 8 PS 3-8 hits to kill your opponent with an italian sword. So, an average of 5.5 hits.
Not counting held attacks or speed bonus, it will take the guy with 6 PS 4-14 hits to kill your opponent with an italian sword. So, an average of 9 hits.
The damage for 6 ps here is probably more of a statistical fluke. The damage must have just hit a threshold with this combination of armor and hp. Following trends it should be closer to 6.5-8 hits on average.

Not counting held attacks or speed bonus, it will take the guy with 8 PS 3-5 hits to kill your opponent with a hammer. So, an average of 4 hits.
Not counting held attacks or speed bonus, it will take the guy with 6 PS 3-6 hits to kill your opponent with a hammer. So, an average of 4.5 hits.

Not counting held attacks or speed bonus, it will take the guy with 8 PS 3-6 hits to kill your opponent with an axe. So, an average of 4.5 hits.
Not counting held attacks or speed bonus, it will take the guy with 6 PS 3-8 hits to kill your opponent with a hammer. So, an average of 5.5 hits.

This also doesn't include damage bonus from movement. If you added that in, damage results would be even closer. The initial weapon damage and damage type is FAR more important than the amount of PS you're stacking ESPECIALLY for 1-handers. So, the amount of point investment you're putting in to pump you to 8 PS has a VERY small effect on damage. That is why I always say balanced builds are king. This also doesn't account for the fact that the build with lower PS probably has higher WPF, bringing damage values closer again.

With 2-handers and poles, you'll see a much larger difference with stacking str, but mostly only on cut weapons.

As an added point, if you can block decently you destroy people using a 6/33 spear build. Just sayin'.

[Bjord]

I'd be happy demonstrate on you, rusty, when I reach lvl 33 with my 24/18 swashbuckler and get 8 ps.

[Turboflex]

Rusty, when you add holds and speed bonus it stacks with PS, so it should increase the spread between 6 & 8 because everything is magnified, not lower this spread...

Also even if that italian sword hit a "fluke" threshold, it still shows how tough a time a finesse low damage slash weapon has with guys at 55+ armor. Usually it's better vet players wearing 55+ armor too (Kuyak weight armor + gloves heirloomed tops 55+), and it gets tougher to lay 4-5+ (assuming hold + speed bonus) hits on them when they maybe need to hit you 2-3 times with a beefy 2h or polearm. If 8 PS can cut that that down to 3 hits, that's at the very least 33% better at killing hard targets, a significant difference in a tough fight on a chaotic battlefield.