Some help for a noob

[Skandranon]

Ok, so now I am wielding an axe in my off-hand and a sword in my main. I have leveled the axe to the same level as my sword, but I noticed that often it hits for only 1/4-1/3 damage as compared to my main hand. I thought that it was only a matter of missing much of the time, not lower damage? My axe is actually somewhat higher in DPS and about the same in pure stat damage, so this is weird... unless of course there is an explanation.... I am beginning to think that maybe until much higher levels I might be better off with a nice 2-hander. Now, I am mowing down everything with no problem up to lvl 29 as long as it is one-on-one (I am 26) and have taken down some lvl 30s too without dying (but using a pot), but it seems like a nice 2-hander might be even better at least for now? Enlightenment is appreciated.
[right][snapback]104358[/snapback][/right]

A two-hander might be better, but not for your auto-attack. To get two one-handers down to equal the damage of a two-hander in terms of auto-attack, Blizzard had to raise the miss rates to 24% for both hands as well as cutting the damage of the off-hand weapon in half. Equipping an appropriately leveled two-hander at this point shouldn't result in more auto-attack damage: you'll see bigger numbers and fewer misses, but you'll also swing a lot less frequently. Ultimately if you're just looking at auto-attack, things will work out just about the same.

Outside of auto-attack damage, however, warrior skills do, in general, favour two-handers. Overpower, for example, inflicts weapon damage plus a static modifier. If you're dual-wielding, "weapon damage" is the damage range of the weapon in your main hand: if you're using a two hander, "weapon damage" is the damage range of the two-handed weapon, which is always going to be larger than that of a one-handed weapon of approximately the same level. Slam, Cleave and Mortal Strike benefit from two-handers in the same way. As you reach higher levels, such special attacks will constitute an increasing amount of your damage: the difference will be small now, but greater in the future.