The Hellfire portion...

Barbarians

The barbarian, a class whose melee capability thrashes even the likes of the warrior class. Inept with shields, they get only half the usual ac bonus. HOWEVER, without shields, they get bonus damage proportional to their vitality. In addition, they do extra damage with clubs and axes. Furthermore, with axes, they get built-in stability (faster hit recovery) and can hit up to three adjacent enemies at the same time.

My assumptions:

- Level 35 barbarians have +25 to all,

- Level 40 barbarians have +35 to all,

- Level 50 barbarians have +50 to all.

Axes are the way to go for barbarians, with built-in stability, higher damage and hitting 3 adjacent enemies.

	Of Haste has the third highest damage per unit time, after Of Peril and CC, but it has high to-hit (unlike the other two) and faster swing rate, making it the perfect weapon in combination with an undead crown/HOS.
	Of Blood is a combo in itself, so it is easier to use than Of Haste... though its damage is lower. Furthermore, it can be combined with Undead Crown (not HOS) for a total life steal of 5-17% of the damage which is VERY significant.
	The other two King's Axes cannot compare to the two previous ones as they offer not much more damage and little else.
	Messerschmidts Reaver simply cannot compare to a KAOH.
	Civerb's Cudgel... refer to warrior's part. CC is good but a pity, it is not an axe, so you can't hit 3 enemies. However, Bloodslayer can!!!
	Axe of Peril is new find for me. It has huge damage potential without penalty when combined with undead crown or HOS. Effects of low to-hit can be reduced by using Ring of Engagement or Gold jewels. Difficult to use but certainly powerful.
	A Jester's Axe of Swiftness is another new find. It has even greater damage potential than an Axe of Peril and does not take away life. However, it is more unstable and deals damages ranging from 0 to 3 times the damage shown. Again difficult to use due to insufficient to-hit.

MY PICK: King's Axe of Haste/Blood, with Jester's Axe of Swiftness/Axe of Peril (still testing them out) as backup.

Bards

Bards are ambidextrous, able to wield two weapons at the same time.

1. With two swords, the bard is able to hit up to three adjacent enemies with one blow.
2. With a sword/club combo, the bard is treated as using a club (ie x1.5 vs undead etc).
3. The faster weapon speed is considered when a bard uses two weapons.

For the first part of the analysis for bards, only King's swords will be covered as they are deemed by most people as the "best"weapons for bards. The double swords provide the bard with the ability to hit 3 enemies and gives a tremendous boost to to-hit. Uniques IMO is not as good as King's sword x2 combo, so i left them out (even the Shiratochi)...

My assumptions:

* of Blood and of Vamps are interchangeable but note that you can only have one of each.

Choosing the weapon combo for bard is a very bad headache...

Combos 5 to 9 are not good enough IMO. The added benefits of these combos cannot make up for loss of damage compared to combos 1-3. Furthermore, faster hit rate means better stunlocking. Heavens is just not as useful as Haste, Blood or Vamps at high levels and Slaughter only adds damage.

Comparing combos 1-4, combos 2 and 3 are weaker despite their higher damage. The life/mana stealing is simply too attractive to ignore. However, if you are going for high damage, Haste/Slaughter (combo 3) is certainly the way to go.

Compared to Haste/Heavens pales compared to Haste/Blood or Haste/Vamps as it merely adds a bit more damage while Blood/Vamps steals life/mana for you.

Blood/Vamps is the ultimate stealing machine... especially since it can combine with undead crown.

Haste/Vamps is a very fast combo as you can recover mana you used to telekill/stone-curse/fireball. With HoS/Undead Crown, you have no lack of life too. Mana shield bards will sure love this combo too.

Haste/Blood enables plain charging into melee mobs and thrashing everyone, dropping little life but is not as useful as Haste/Vamps on ranged levels.

MY PICK: Blood/Vamps combo for ease of play and Haste/Vamps (with undead crown/HOS) for the more conventional players... but do try out some of the weird weapon combos below:

However, the choices are not to be ended there for there are weird weapon combos which function as well if not better than a pair of king's swords. They are the Civerb's Cudgel, Jester's weapons and of Peril weapons. Below is damage analysis and a complete analysis of some of the better combos.

Civerb's Cudgel Combinations

Civerb's Cudgel Combinations	Rate	Average Damage per Second
		lvl 35	lvl 40	lvl 50
a) King's bastard of Haste	0.40	790.6	919.4	1146.9
b) King's bastard of Vamps/Blood	0.50	632.5	735.5	917.5
c) Jester's bastard of Swiftness	0.45	1055.6	1284.4	1688.9
d) Jester's bastard of Peril	0.50	1900.0	2312.0	3040.0
e) Jester's bastard of Bat/Leech	0.50	950.0	1156.0	1520.0
f) Silver bastard of Peril	0.50	950.0	1156.0	1520.0
g) Silver dagger of Peril	0.50	854.0	1060.0	1424.0

As seen from the table, Civerb's Cudgel in combination with King's Swords results in damage far greater than a pair of King's Swords. The only problem is that the ability to hit 3 enemies is lost and that damage is reduced vs animals (eg Lava Maws).

(1) In general, IMO, (a) and (b) pale in comparison to the higher damage of combos (c) to (g). However, the to-hit bonus of King's Swords will certainly come in useful.   The hasted effects of the KSOH will also be extremely helpful.

Correction: The King's Sword of Haste with the Civerb's Cudgel is one of the best combinations as it combines speed with high to-hit and great damage. It also offers a far more stable source of damage than the other seven combinations.

(2) Considering a bard at level 40, using the following combos:

Combinations	Weapon Damage	Character Damage	Damage per Blow	HP gain with HoS	Average Gain
Combo (c)	7-23	81-81	0-1878	0-93.9	28.9
Combo (d)	7-23	81-81	0-3756	-23-180.8	42.8
Combo (e)	7-23	81-81	0-1878	0-86.9	46.2
Combo (f)	7-23	81-81	530-626	8-20.0	13.9
Combo (g)	2-12	81-81	500-560	16-23.0	19.5

As seen from the table above, the Civerb's Cudgel-Jester's Sword combination is extremely powerful and capable of dealing spectaular damage. The problem however, is that the damage is unstable and there may not be sufficient to-hit fro hell/hell meleeing. Combo (e) [Jester's of Peril with CC] is certainly the best combo for damage but i'm not sure if it can exist. The Jester's Sword of Swiftness is also extremely powerful due to its increased speed. The Jester's Sword of Bat/Leech is excellent for filling up life/mana balls during melee.

(3) Combos (f) and (g) pales in comparison with the CC-Jester combos due to lower damage. However, the plus point is that there is an extra prefix slot for a weak prefix. Of Peril weapons is also a more stable source of damage than Jester's weapons.

Jester's Sword Combinations

Jester's Sword of <*>	Rate	Average Damage per Second
		lvl 35	lvl 40	lvl 50
King's Sword of Haste / <bat/leech>	0.40	615.4	702.1	855.4
King's Sword of Vamps / <swiftness>	0.45	547.0	624.1	760.4
King's Sword of Vamps / <bat/leech>	0.50	492.3	561.7	684.3

Though these weapon combo seems weaker than the CC combos, 4 advantages must be observed:

1. Double swords means the ability to hit three enemies (and thus gain 3x as much life/mana).
2. The actual damage done is between 0 to three times the value shown (due to Jester's).
3. There is no lack of to-hit due to king's prefix.
4. The damage done is generally a lot higher than that of a pair of King's swords.

Conclusion

IMHO, i think that for a bard, a pair of King's swords is not the most effective setup. The amount of to-hit will be excessive and the damage done is quite pathetic compared to the less-seen combinations:

(1) Civerb's Cudgel with Jester's Sword
Perhaps the highest damage potential possible for bards lies in this set of combination. A probable setback would be the lack of to-hit as neither weapon adds to-hit bonuses. The jester's swords can also only be found at lower character levels. However, with appropriate to-hit adders, even an unsuffixed jester's sword serves well.

(2) Civerb's Cudgel with King's Sword of Haste
The lowest damage combination among the three listed but still very powerful as it provides a steady source of damage as compared to the wide-ranging damage of the Jester's prefix. To-hit will also not be a problem due to the King's prefix.

(3) Jester's Sword with King's Sword
IMO the best 2-sword combo, it combines high to-hit with high damage.

Monks

The only useful weapon for a monk is the staff. Any other weapon has a far slower swing rate and thus less damage per unit time, so you might as well use your bare hands/feet.

Benefits of using a staff include ability to block (as though having a shield) and ability to hit 3 adjacent enemies. Other than a King's Staff of Haste, most other staves will do less damage than bare hands (per unit time) at high levels.

One ambiguous case is a Staff of Peril, which does the most damage but takes away an average of 12 hps per blow.

Note that an unarmed monk hit once every 0.35 seconds, which is the same as that of a warrior with a Hasted sword. However, with bare hands/feet, there is the problem of insufficient to hit and the wasting of at least two slots for prefix/suffix.

MY PICK: A King's/Emerald Staff of Haste, otherwise go unarmed.

Overview

The greatest fighter is no doubt is the barbarian (more than TWICE the damage of second placed character), with high damage and ability to hit 3 enemies.

Second will be the bard. Though she lacks blocking, she can deal more damage than the warrior and hit 3 enemies with one swing, making her a great melee fighter as well (comparable to warrior).

Next is the warrior, with good damage and blocking, though only against one enemy (hence only third).

Coming in fourth will be the monk with lower damage (still hits 3 enemies) but with blocking ability.

Fifth is the rogue, but her strength in ranged attacks makes up for her weaker melee ability. High to-hit is also a bonus as she will hit more often than her fellow companions.

Last of all (why am i not surprised?) is the sorceror, whose spell capacity can easily overwhelm fighters without lifting a sword.

Overall, a rather balanced game, though i would say that the game is a bit easier for the two classes at extreme ends of the spectrum... the barbarian (who tears through hell critter like knife to butter) and the sorceror (who can turn all monsters to dust with just a few clicks with the mouse).

Rogue  |  Sorceror   |  Warrior  |  Barbarian   |  Bard   |  Monk

Have fun playing!!!

Ice(BNR)

"Who needs to block when the enemies die with one swing?"

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