Note: References to weapon speeds in this article are now redundant as they pre-date the release of Siege of Mirkwood. To quote from the dev notes: "One change that you may notice immediately is that weapon speeds have disappeared from weapon tooltips. Weapons still have speeds, but the speeds and damage have been standardized for different classes of weaponry (one-handed, two-handed, bow/crossbow, javelin, staves and rune-stones) per weapon level." Full dev notes on this change are at: www.lotro.com/gameinfo/devdiaries/532-developer-diary-combat-changes

One of the most confusing and oft-debated aspects of LOTRO game mechanics is the general question of whether faster or slower weapon setups are "better". Specifically, this usually revolves around a debate about dual-wielded weapons versus 2H weapons, but can also apply to a debate about whether guardians are better-served by 1H + Shield setups versus 2H weapons.

There are six main aspects to this debate:

• Which setup gives superior auto-attack damage during a short fight: fast or slow weapons?
• Which is the most important weapon statistic: Speed, DPS, Average Damage, or Max Damage?
• Which setup is more "power efficient"? In other words, which setup gives you the most damage per point of power expended?
• Which setup benefits all the "extra swings" and +damage bonus of your weapon-based active skills?
• What exactly is the interplay between the auto-attack ticks and cool-down timers?
• Do special damage types trump all of the preceding factors?

The most important weapon statistic depends on your class and your most-used skills

In many other MMOs, a weapon's listed DPS statistic was a good indication of overall performance and a good way to compare the relative value of different weapons. Unfortunately, this is not the case in LOTRO. DPS is a statistic that is almost a red herring in this game.

Instead, the stats that matter are Speed, the Average Damage of the listed damage range (which you must calculate for yourself), and both the Min and Max damage values of the listed damage range.

• Speed determines how often the ticks of your auto-attack cycle occur and how much delay occurs between queued active skills. Note that the effective Speed for dual-wielded weapons will be an average of both weapon's listed Speeds. (See Mechanics:Dual-Wielding for more information.)
• Average Damage is calculated by adding both numbers in the weapon's listed damage range and dividing the result by 2. Average Damage is the most important factor in determining how much damage most of your weapon-based active skills will do. Any skill that uses the keywords "main-hand" or "off-hand" in the skill's tooltip description is basing that damage component on the full listed damage range for the weapon in your main hand or off hand, and therefore the Average Damage of the weapon is the best indicator of how much damage will be done for each "swing" of main-hand or off-hand damage generated by that skill. The important point here is that a fast weapon will hit more often for a smaller average damage. However, your weapon-based attack skills will not deliver as much damage on a hit with a fast weapon as with a slow weapon because the skill will generally work off some multiplier based on the damage the weapon does with that hit. Since a slower weapon with the same DPS will hit harder on each hit, it will result in more damage from that skill.
• Min damage is the lowest value in the weapon's listed damage range. This value is important because it determines how much damage that weapon will do when it's equipped in your off-hand slot. (See Mechanics:Dual-Wielding for more information.)
• Max damage is the highest value in the weapon's listed damage range. This value is the most important factor in determining how much damage some of the Burglar's weapon-based active skills will do. Any skill that uses the keywords "max damage" for either the main-hand "swing" or the off-hand "swing" will use that max damage value every time the "swing" hits successfully. For these skills, a weapon with lower DPS but a higher Max value will generate more damage from such skills than a weapon with high DPS or high Avg Damage but a lower Max damage. Also, critical damage is based on your max damage value, so weapons with higher max damage values will crit for more than otherwise equal weapons with lower max damage values.

Slower, harder-hitting weapons are far more power-efficient

The faster your effective Speed, the faster your auto-attack animations execute, so there is less delay between the activation of your queued active skills. Since all active skills cost the same amount of power regardless of your weapon Speed, this means you will burn power at a much faster rate when using fast 1H or dual-wield weapon setups.

In short fights against single, normal "white" foes or easier, power consumption isn't much of an issue. In longer fights, however, against single "yellow" foes or harder, or against multiple foes, or against signature/elite foes, or in a location with fast respawns, you might be better served with a slow 2H weapon because your power will last longer.

The "extra swings" and +damage bonus of slower weapons are higher with slower weapons, but occur more rapidly with faster weapons

Depending on the weapon-based active skills that you tend to use most often, you might be able to generate more overall damage output by using a slower, harder-hitting weapon. In particular, this comparison applies to dual-wield setups versus 2H weapon setups:

• A dual-wield setup typically yields far more auto-attack DPS and shorter delays between the execution of your queued-up skills than comparable 2H weapons, so you have high auto-attack DPS and faster-occuring damage from your queued-up skills. (See Mechanics:Dual-Wielding for more information.)
• Many weapon-based skills have a +damage bonus value that increases with slower weapons. For example skill X might do +17 damage when you are equipped with a 1H weapon of Speed 2.0 or a dual-wield setup that yields an effective Speed of 2.0, but that same skill X might do +30 damage when you are equipped with a 2H weapon of Speed 3.6.
• Many weapon-based skills effectively generate multiple "swings". For example, skill Y might deliver 3 "main hand" swings of damage, each of which also has a +damage bonus as well. The total damage output of all these multiple "swings" can be much larger with a slow 2H weapon than with a fast 1H weapon. However, there are two addtional factors to consider:
  • Many of these same skills will add in one or more "off-hand" swings when you are dual-wielding, so the gap in damage might be less than if you examine the skill tooltip with only one 1H weapon equipped.
  • A faster weapon setup might actually let you front-load more of those "extra swings" in the same amount of time as a slower 2H weapon. For example, in a dual-wield setup you might be able to generate something like 6 "extra" swings in first 15 seconds of a fight, but a 2H weapon might generate perhaps only 3 "extra" swings in that same 15 seconds. So even though each 2H "swing" is more damaging than the same "swings" in a dual-wield setup, the total of the 3 slower "swings" might be less that the total of the 6 faster "swings".

The interplay of these various factors is the main reason for stating that "you might be able to generate more overall damage output by using a slower, harder-hitting weapon". There are no hard and fast-guidelines in this regard because so much depends on the particular weapon-based skills that you use most often. Your best bet is to equip your best dual-wield setup and look at the skill tooltips, then equip your best 2H weapon and look at the skill tooltips, then do some rough calculations and tests for yourself, remembering that you'll be able to fire off your attack chains faster with the dual-wield setup.

The auto-attack tick cycle seems to be independent of, but overwritten by, skill execution

This point deserves an article all of its own. The bottom line with regard to weapon choice is that faster weapons will ultimately add more auto-attack damage to your total damage output. See Mechanics:Cool-Down Timers for more information.

Special damage types might trump all of the preceding factors

This section is here mostly as a placeholder for further testing and refinement of this article. It's reported that weapons with special damage types such as "fire" or "light", etc. are so effective (versus certain mobs that have low resistance to that damage type) that they trump most or all of the factors described so far.

Based on Turbine's implementation of elemental damage types in previous games such as Asheron's Call and Asheron's Call 2, this could indeed be a very important consideration in weapon choice that could outweigh the preceding factors.

Early hypothesis on the effect of special damage types can be found in a page dedicated to that topic: Mechanics:Damage Types.

Some general rules of thumb for choosing a fast or slow weapon setup

The preceding sections explain why it can be sometimes complex to answer the question "which is better for me: 1H + Shield, 2H, or dual-wielding?" In general, however, there are some rules of thumb that are safe to apply to most situations. Be aware, though, that in edge cases there could be exceptions to these general guidelines:

• Guardians who are tanking for a group must rely on many active skills to generate as much threat as possible, particularly their shield-based skills. For this reason, a very fast 1H weapon + shield is often the preferred tanking setup not only for the shield mitigation (and the fact that you need a shield to use your shield-based attacks), but because the faster animation times of the 1H auto-attack ticks means less delay between your queued active skills. The faster you can fire off your active skills, the more front-loaded threat you can ultimately generate. Of course, the downside to this is that you'll also burn power at a faster rate, so you might have to pace yourself or rely on Blue fellowship maneuvers or on a Lore-master or Champion to replenish your power
• If you are fighting easy single foes ("white" or easier) that are not close together, you might kill faster with a dual-wield setup (if you're a class that can dual-wield), because you'll sneak in more auto-attack damage and because you'll be able to spam your skill executions faster. The main consideration here is whether you have time to regenerate your power fast enough between fights, because you'll burn energy faster this way.
• If you are fighting multiple mobs in a fast-respawning area, or harder single foes ("yellow" or harder), or signatures/elites of any sort, you might be better-served by a slow 2H weapon even if you can dual-wield. This is primarily because your power will last much longer and you are getting more damage per point of power spent.
• Burglars will generally do best with a dual-wield setup that focuses on weapons with a high Max value in their main-hand slot and a high Min value in their off-hand slot.
• Champions and Hunters that are dual-wielding will generally do best with a setup that focuses on weapons with a high Average Damage value in their main-hand slot, with the off-hand slot weapon choice being made according to the following two factors:
  • For fights that you expect to be short, putting the fastest weapon possible in your off-hand slot will make your effective Speed as fast as possible.
  • For fights that you expect to be long, putting a slower weapon with a high Min damage value in your off-hand slot will decrease your power burn rate and yield slightly higher auto-attack damage and "off-hand" damage "swings" from some skills.