Claidhs still work. Use berserk with mstrike.
Voln for beating up undead. Sunfist for beating up trolls. Voln got a makeover last year.
A shield is a must if you want to do the fancy shield tricks rather than just carving critters with a claidh. You might want to look at a maul as an alternative THW. Brawling if you want to use the fancy new unarmed combat system, which is required if you want to use Voln powers to make undead corporeal, but not otherwise.
You get 30 days to play with skills so you can try out the various shield/brawl/THW possibilities. You also get to change your stats up to 5 times in those 30 days.

Started a dwarf myself not awful long ago that uses THW.

1) If you use a claid, be sure to take your axidex (agility bonus + dex bonus) into account. You need what I believe is a combined bonus o 38 to swing a claid in 5 seconds, which means for both Giant and Dwarf you'd need nearly maxed stats. My dwarf swings a claid, so I set his agi/dex to grow to that bonus at around level 25 using a stat calculator - not the best for growth, but it'll make everything until cap much more bearable.

That said, the 38 agidex being near a Dwarf's max means you'll only ever ambush in 7 seconds, and your mstrikes are going to be kind of slow. If you can get ahold of a nice claid and plan on using it for most things, I don't think ambush is really necessary. You might get some eventually, but I wouldn't rush to fit it into an already tight training point schedule. If you go with a faster two hander like a maul, the ambush can help to make up for the lack of crit weighting from a claid.....with a claid pretty much any body part you can hit is going to fall off anyway.

2) Likewise, if you use a claid you can't fight undead. Like another poster suggested, I'd recommend also getitng a blessable maul if you plan on going this route. I went sunfist and have enjoyed it so far. The bonuses available are very good for warriors - +20 AS, +10 more AS and temporary crit weighting, temporary crit padding, and a TD booster. Also some skills that let you ignore wounds for tasks like climbing, which is nice. Not to mention sunfist allows you access to semi-private and always available like-level hunting grounds becasue of Warcamps. If you go this route you'll need to get a some ranks of Harness Power - the skills use mana and stamina to activate, and a relative lot of it. I plan on getting around 20-30 mana, which works out to about 6-9 ranks of harnss power for me.

3) THW is certianly not obsolete. In fact, THW also got 2 nice manuvers from the recent review (Whirling Dervish and Executioner's Stance). The shield skills just brought shield closer in line with THW, whereas before THW was far and away a better option.

4)My training so far has worked out to about:

3x armor
2x THW, Phyiscal Fitness, Combat Manuvers
1.5x dodge
1x multi opponent combat, survival, first aid
0.5x trading
4-5 ranks of harness power

So you should have a little flexibility - I have a bunch of tertiary skills that you could easily drop to roll the points into other areas if you choose.

53.


~Aulis
Forums Manager
QC'er

>So if I'm reading Rathboners post correctly, if I'm not planning on joining Voln or using the new unarmed system, theres no need for brawl at all? Is it required for warrior guild tackle?

It depends how much bonus and how much DS you want while tackling. Empty hands gives bonus for tackling, though as a THW user you get a freebie for the left hand to start with. You will lose the parry DS from your weapon if you put it away to get another +10 on your tackle and brawling will give you parry DS. You'd actually need TWC too to get as much DS from brawling as from holding a weapon.

I wouldn't train it for that reason alone, but its a little bit extra in favor of brawling if you wanted a secondary combat style.

3x armor 14/0
2x CMan, PT, THW, 12/9, 6/0, 9/3
1.5x dodge 8/4
1x percep,first aid, survival, mstrike 0/3, 1/2, 1/3, 4/3

Total 55/27

That's just possible straight out of the mangler, and easily possible a little down the line. If you wanted to add in brawling you'd need to do something like only 2x in armor to free the points for it, or wait till you have levelled a bit before deciding to pick it up rather than rounding out with some MIU/AS etc. ranks.

You'll also need some harness ranks if you are going with one of the evil societies.

<<<Sunfist is part of the dark side?>>>

I'm not sure where you got this impression, but it's not aligned with the "dark side" at all. It's neutral in regard to the Pantheon, but since it's sole mission is to eradicate the Grimswarm (an evil entity) it could arguably be considered good-aligned. Also, the society is Dwarven in origin, and it's HQ is located in Zul Logoth. All races are welcome, but it's clearly a strong choice for a dwarf, especially considering the Stamina requirements of many Sigils.

~ Heathyr and friends

<<<<I assumed this meant COL and Sunfist>>>>

Nah. I think he probably misspoke. Sunfist is a military organization. It may not be as altruistic as Voln, but there's nothing sinister going on. Whether such a group is "good" or "evil" largely depends upon which side of the battle you're on.

~ Heathyr and friends