Weapon choice

Version 0.28: This article may not be up to date for the latest stable release of Crawl.

Crawl presents the player and character with a potentially bewildering array of weapon choices. However, when all the dust clears and the parade of short swords, demon whips, and clubs has passed by, weapons have six main properties:

• Damage: How much damage, on average, the weapon does per strike.
• Accuracy: How likely the weapon is to actually hit.
• Speed: How long you must wait after attacking before you can act again.
• Handedness: Whether the weapon requires one or two hands to use.
• Skill: How fast your species can learn to use the weapon.
• Special: Some weapon types have unique traits that distinguish them from the others.

A player simply wants to pick the weapon that has a combination that deals the most damage in the shortest amount of time, to the largest set of monsters, on average.

Properties

Each of these properties is briefly described below:

Damage

The approximate formula for a weapon's damage is as follows:

   Damage = 1d(base damage × strength bonus) × skill bonus + (to-damage enchantment + slaying)

When you examine a weapon, the damage number it gives you is the base damage. The strength multiplier increases by 2.5% per strength. The flat Slaying bonus comes from rings of slaying and some artefacts, and stacks with the enchantment on your weapon. The skill bonus multiplier is based on your Fighting and Weapon skill; when both are maxed out it averages around a 2× multiplier (though this amount is rather variable). Finally, your weapon's brand adjusts your damage even further; see the appropriate Brand page for details.

Speed

A weapon's speed, or more accurately its attack delay, is as follows:

   Delay = base delay − weapon skill/2

A weapon's base delay is given in the form of deca-auts (1.1, 1.5, etc). The game tracks most actions in terms of auts. When unaffected by Haste, Slow, or similar effects, an unmodified, unskilled, unarmed attack takes 10 auts - the same time it takes for most monsters and most species to take most actions. Wielding a weapon will multiply this by the base delay % given in the weapon's description. A short sword, for example, has a base delay of 1.1 (11 aut), meaning an attack with a short sword and no Short Blades skill will take slightly longer than throwing a punch or walking a tile.

Fortunately, you can reduce the time it takes to make attacks by training the skill appropriate to the weapon you wield. Every 2 skill you gain reduces the delay by 0.1 deca aut, down to the weapon's minimum delay. Most weapons' mindelay is either 0.7, or it's base delay divided by two (rounded down), whichever is smaller. Rapiers have a mindelay of 0.5, while arbalests and triple crossbows have a mindelay of 1.0. The Speed brand and status effects such as Haste can make attacks even faster, but never below a minimum of 0.2.

Accuracy

Accuracy is one of the more complex attributes of a weapon, being affected by the base type, weapon skill, Slaying bonuses, and dexterity. It is important to choose accurate weapons in the very early game. Later on, accuracy becomes a secondary consideration - reasonable accuracy comes with weapon skill which comes with sane weapon delay.

Handedness

There are two categories of weapons here: one-handed or two-handed. The difference is simple; one-handed weapons can be used along with a shield, while two-handed weapons can't.

While shields do provide significant amounts of defense, they take quite a bit of skill to train, and many of the most powerful melee and ranged weapons are two-handed. Your species' size and aptitudes should be taken into account.

Kobolds and Spriggans, being small, will find certain weapons being two-handed, and the largest impossible to wield. Meanwhile, Formicids can wield two-handed weapons with a shield. Other big species don't have that luxury, though also are not as encumbered by a shield.

Skill

Each species has an aptitude for each of the skills in Crawl; taking advantage of the skills you're good at will allow you to become powerful faster, greatly increasing your chance of survival. Unless you're intentionally trying to challenge yourself, you should usually try to wield weapons suited for your species.

Cross-training

One aspect of weapon choice is that training in most weapon types makes it easier to use certain other weapon types. Training in one type grants a bonus equal to 40% of your skill experience in the second type. Cross-training skills are linked as follows:

• Short Blades and Long Blades crosstrain each other
• Axes and Staves crosstrain Polearms and Maces & Flails
• Maces & Flails and Polearms crosstrain Axes and Staves
• Throwing and Slings crosstrain each other

While it's impractical to rely on cross-training alone for general use of a weapon, finding a particularly good weapon of a type you have cross-trained for (for example, an artefact rapier when you are training Long Blades) will enable you to use that weapon with some proficiency should the situation call for it. This will let you more easily take advantages of certain brands for certain obstacles, like a flaming edged weapon when fighting a hydra. Whether or not this is advantageous depends largely on your playstyle -- it is perfectly possible to defeat most threats with a plain weapon.

Special

Most weapon types have certain traits that distinguish them from the others:

• Short Blades: Although they do low damage, they attack extremely fast and give a large bonus to Stabbing.
• Long Blades: Deal moderate-to-high damage and are often branded.
• Axes: Moderate damage, but cleaving makes axes excellent for crowd control.
• Maces & Flails: Moderate-to-high damage, are common, and giant spiked clubs offer immense damage to large species.
• Polearms: Although they only deal moderate damage, these weapons all have an innate reaching attack.
• Staves: Mundane staves deal moderate damage, but take very low skill to master. Magical staves are, of course, best for casters.

Unarmed Combat: A Special Case

Of course, you don't have to wield a weapon to kill foes; it's perfectly feasible to beat things to death with your fists. Whether or not doing so is particularly worthwhile largely depends on your build.

Unarmed combat relies heavily on skill. For as long as you can train it, the UC skill will increase damage and reduce delay. Unarmed strikes are on par with Short Blades, and a great deal stronger at a high skill level. Many Transmutations are designed to give bonuses to unarmed combat. Finally, several mutations, such as a Troll's Claws, are geared towards aiding unarmed strikes.

Fighting weaponless gives up any potential benefits from having a weapon, such as brands and anything extra that comes with any artefact weaponry you might find. In addition, unarmed heavy skill investment is also a detriment; especially for species who are not profient.

Combining these: Small or Large Weapons?

In the simplest terms, every player wants to maximize their weapon's damage divided by delay. However, considerations from every which way have to be made. The first of which comes with weapon size.

Fast Weapons

Short blades, whips, and demon whips (sacred scourges) are the only weapons that have a mindelay of 0.5 (or less). The speed brand also reduces attack delay, though rather rare outside of short blades.

Their chief advantage is that fast weapons are boosted more by flat bonuses. Enchantment, slaying bonuses, and various brands (electrocution, pain, and distortion) apply extra damage, regardless of how much the weapon itself deals. Unfortunately, they are also effected by a flat penalty - i.e, high-AC. As enemies get tougher, and as stabing becomes less reliable, fast weapons become relatively weaker.

But on the plus side, fast weapons are accurate, and already start with a low base delay. And with a good (or even decent) brand, a demon whip is easily good enough to finish a 3-rune game with.

And while not as fast, the other demon weapons (demon blade and demon trident, and their holy versions) have superior mindelays and the raw damage/time to compete with other end-game weapons.

Big Weapons

"Strong but slow" weapons are as powerful as their size should suggest. Sharing a mindelay of 7, weapons like executioner's axes, bardiches, triple swords, and, if you can wield them, giant spiked clubs, are obviously attractive. Vorpal, Freezing, and Flaming are universally good brands, and these high base damage weapons benefit the most. Holy wrath, amazing in the extended game, falls under the same boat. Their damage is excellent for punching through monsters' armour.

However, the biggest weapons require a massive skill investment, taking anywhere from 18-24 skill to reach mindelay. They are also all two-handed. Shields contribute a lot to your overall defense, though going without means you don't need to invest in the shields skill. And with the exception of giant clubs, the strongest weapons are all quite rare; it might be best to bide your time with a battleaxe, great sword, or dire flail as you train up your skill, anyway.

Medium Weapons

Just because they have the same mindelay, doesn't always mean that the biggest are best! Weapons like the broad axe or eveningstar are perfectly passible. While still quite rare, weapon-wielding monsters in the Orcish Mines or Vaults may spawn with some of these. The double sword and lajatang remain more elusive, though share the same (dis)advantages.

Smaller weapons are faster and more accurate for large portions of the game. Having an attack delay below 1.0 is incredibly important; this means that regular speed monsters can not hit you twice per action. Most characters can also wield them with a shield.

Finally, the weaker end of these weapons are simply more common in the Dungeon. Even if you can't find that broad axe, there will most likely be a war axe or flail somewhere in the early dungeon.

Weapon Schools: Advantages and Disadvantages

Short Blades

Highest aptitudes: +3 (Kobold), +2 (Merfolk)

Advantages

• Daggers and short blades often spawn with strong brands: electrocution, venom, and speed.
• Fastest weapons in the game, particularly quick blades. They perform excellently with slaying bonuses or might.
• Very good for stabbing, especially daggers.
• All one-handed.
• Crosstrains with Long Blades.

Disadvantages

• Dismal base damage -- benefits less with multipliers like strength and skill, weaker against armour.
• Quick blades are quite rare, even at the end of the game.

Best Choices

• If you can find one, the Quick blade is clearly the best.
• Daggers are the best weapon for stabbing.

The best brands are electrocution, pain, and distortion (if you can mind the side effects), and any short blade is good with them. Kiku and Lugonu can provide the latter brands to any weapon.

Long Blades

Highest aptitudes: +2 (Barachi, Minotaur)

Advantages

• Fairly common in the mid- and late-game; demon blades are easily found.
• Can crosstrain from short blades, which many players may have from the early game.

Disadvantages

• Fairly rare in the early Dungeon.
• Cuts off hydra heads.
• Double and triple swords are particularly rare.

Best Choices

• Demon blades and double swords are fairly interchangable, and are great one-handed weapons for those who find them.

Maces and Flails

Highest aptitudes: +2 (Minotaur), +1 (Barachi, Hill Orc, Tengu)

Advantages

• Fairy common.
• Can go fast or slow, with demon whips or eveningstars, respectively.
• Whips are a good starting weapon.
• None cut off hydra heads.
• For large races, giant spiked clubs have highest base damage in the game.

Disadvantages

• No cleaving or other special abilities.

Best Choices

• Demon whips or sacred scourges have a superb min delay and good damage output.
• Eveningstars are also very good weapons but are quite rare. They will outdamage demon whips against heavily armoured opponents.

Axes

Highest aptitudes: +3 (Hill Orc), +2 (Minotaur)

Advantages

• All axes can cleave to hit multiple opponents.
• Battleaxes are quite good two-handed weapons, and are fairly common in early Dungeon.

Disadvantages

• Somewhat weaker compared to single-target weapons.
• Taking advantage of Cleaving is often risky.
• All cut off hydra heads.

Best Choices

• Depending on character aptitudes, both routes (broad axe + shield or executioner axe) are feasible.
• Vampiric axes are especially strong due to cleaving.

Polearms

Highest aptitudes: +4 (Merfolk), +2 (Minotaur)

Advantages

• Spears and tridents are excellent weapons early on.
• Crosstrains to both Maces & Flails and Axes.
• All polearms have inherent reaching; great with summons and certain other spells.

Disadvantages

• Nothing good for small races, since they are two-handed or unwieldable for them.
• Few races are particularly good with them (Merfolk are a notable exception)
• Lower base damage than most other weapon types.

Best Choices

• Tridents are an excellent starting weapon and the most broadly useful of the common polearms.
• Halberds and glaives both struggle with high delay, though enough skill can make them more usable.
• Demon tridents (and trishulas) are the best polearms due to their combination of low min delay, shield, and damage output.
• Bardiches are extremely slow, but have enough damage output to make up for it. If you find a nice branded or randart one, consider it as a keeper.
• Scythes are just outright terrible.

Staves

Highest aptitudes: +2 (Minotaurs)

Advantages

• Staves deal great damage for their low skill requirements.
• Can have the speed brand.
• Magic staves also enhance your spells.

Disadvantages

• Only two choices in normal weapons: lajatangs and quarterstaves, and they are both two-handed
• Enhancer staves are two-handed for smaller species.
• In order to get use out of an enhancer staff you also have to train Evocations and a spell skill.

Best choices

• A staff of conjuration with good Evocations and Conjurations deals high AC-checked damage, if you have already invested in that school.
• A lajatang is a respectable weapon that requires comparatively little skill investment. It is by far the strongest non-artefact weapon that can have a speed brand.
• Quarterstaves are good accurate starting weapons.

Ranged Weapons

Ranged weapons work a little differently from other weapons - while they do allow you to hit things from a distance, they require ammunition to do so. Once you're out of ammunition, a bow is nothing more than a hunk of wood that is less effective at bludgeoning things to death than your fists. As such, many ranged weapon specialists carry a secondary melee weapon for use in close quarters.

Throwing weapons

Highest aptitude: +1 (Kobold)
Ammunition: Stones, Boomerangs, Javelins, Large rocks, Darts, Throwing nets

Advantages

• Do not require wielding a launcher, especially useful for followers of Ashenzari or those wielding distortion weapons.
• Boomerangs always return and javelins pierce through enemies.
• Large rocks are one of the most powerful ranged options for large species.
• Curare-tipped darts are extremely powerful and remain useful for as long as there are enemies not resistant to poison.
• Crosstrains with Slings.

Disadvantages

• Weapons smaller than javelins are unlikely to have much killing power.
• Javelins are too large for small species.
• Curare darts are useless against poison-resistant monsters. Other specialized darts require skill in Stealth to be effective.

Useful notes: The various throwing weapons present in Crawl are a somewhat unconventional ranged option. Many of them are more useful for softening up targets before engaging them in melee. Stones and boomerangs in particular are most often thrown by early-game characters that still have low weapon skills. That said, javelins are a powerful option that a reasonable investment in the Throwing skill can make quite viable, and large rocks are devastating when thrown with enough skill, though only ogres and trolls are large enough to make use of them.

Throwing nets and darts, unlike most weapons, are used to support other forms of combat by disabling monsters. They can create opportunities to stab your opponents, disable dangerous enemies, or give yourself time to flee.

Slings

Highest aptitude: +2 (Spriggan), +1 (Deep Dwarf, Formicid)
Launchers: Hunting slings, Fustibali
Ammunition: Stones or sling bullets

Advantages

• All can be used effectively with a shield.
• Can use common stones as ammunition, though sling bullets do more damage.
• Fastest of the ranged weapons.
• Can often be found on early dungeon floors.
  • Very effective in the early dungeon even without any skill.
• Crosstrains with Throwing weapons.

Disadvantages

• The weakest of the offensive ranged weapons.

Useful notes: While they have trouble damaging heavily armored opponents, slings are quite effective against other foes. Slings are best used by the smaller species, but larger characters can also make effective use of them, especially as an early dungeon ranged weapon. Prior to their removal, Halflings had an impressive +4 aptitude in Slings; making them viable even in the late game.

Bows

Highest aptitude: +3 (Deep Elf), +2 (Spriggan)
Launchers: Shortbows, Longbows
Ammunition: Arrows

Advantages

• Shortbows are among the fastest ranged weapons.
• Longbows are slower, but have a lot more power.
• All centaurs carry shortbows, making them one of the most common ranged weapons.
• Can easily replenish arrow supply from centaurs.

Disadvantages

• Somewhat inaccurate.
• Smaller characters cannot use longbows.
• Disallow the use of a shield.

Useful notes: Bows, while somewhat inaccurate, are as fast as slings and have more power, allowing them to more easily deal with tougher enemies. Most archers will wish to eventually upgrade to a longbow, with increasing weapon skill easily compensating for the reduced speed and accuracy.

Crossbows

Highest aptitude: +2 (Kobold)
Launchers: Hand crossbows, Arbalests, Triple crossbows
Ammunition: Bolts

Advantages

• Very powerful and accurate.
• Yaktaurs all carry arbalests, making it easy to find one that's at least halfway decent.
• Orcs and kobolds may also carry crossbows.
• Hand crossbows may be used with a shield.

Disadvantages

• The slowest ranged weapons - minimum delay cannot be reduced below 1.0.
• Crossbows are very rare until yaktaurs start showing up.
• Arbalests and triple crossbows disallow the use of a shield.

Useful notes: Crossbows are probably the most difficult ranged weapon to make effective use of, as they are rare for the first half of the game. Bolts are somewhat common, but can still be hard to find on occasion. As such, Hunters or Arcane Marksmen that start with a hand crossbow will probably want to make sure they have a decent backup weapon in case of ammunition shortages.

Hand crossbows are quite powerful and accurate for a one-handed weapon, though they are still quite slow. Arbalests and triple crossbows are even more powerful, though they are also even slower. Triple crossbows in particular require a skill of 26 to reach the minimum delay of 1 aut, so most characters that wish to use two-handed crossbows should probably stick with arbalests, which are pretty strong on their own (as the yaktaurs found in the later parts of the game will happily demonstrate).

History

• 0.28 removed long blade's riposte. The XP costs for high-level skills were reduced, and the base delay of the biggest weapons in the game was also lowered.
• 0.27 greatly increased the penalty for wearing shields, affecting all one-handed weapons.
• 0.24 removed tomahawks as well as blowguns and needles, replacing them with darts and boomerangs.
• 0.19 added riposte for long blades.
• 0.15 introduced several new ranged weapons: greatslings, hand crossbows, arbalests, and triple crossbows.
• 0.12 introduced cleaving for axes and innate reaching for polearms.
• Prior to 0.12, there were two additional forms of handedness: hand-and-a-half weapons and double weapons. These each received further penalties when wielded with a shield, but were otherwise one-handed weapons.