Axes | Elden Ring Wiki

all kinda mid tbh

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Where's the hunter axe from Bloodborne?!

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I wish they kept the twinaxes moveset when using both of these... it's such a missed oportunity

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Short,no hyper armor when two handed,terrible powerstance.Only good damage with specific weapon in some builds.I have no word to say now………

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Is it just me or is the powerstance moveset kinda lame?

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Warped axe doesn’t show up in the infusion lists.

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I kinda wish the crescent axe from ds1 was here, like why not? most weapon types have a really long version, and they've made the weapon before so it can't be super difficult. I honestly don't care if it has ds1 textures, bad dmg or something else stupid, give me my long boy back in his true form.
and before anyone say "Oh NoO iT BaD FoR pvP BalANce"... it's an axe, not dual spears, or any other crutch (though I guess I could say stormhawk is kind of a crutch too because of the WA)

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Axes having identical poise damage as curved swords is cursed

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Hoping for a faith axe in the DLC

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FromSoft, I don't know how far into the DLC you are, but please: Give us a throwing axe AoW. It can just be a reskin of Spectral Lance's mechanics if you want, I just desire something for when my Axes poise is not enough to trade heavys / when the Handaxe runs afoul the foes with bigger collision than hitboxs. Please, you give axes so little at times.

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It sucks that the powerstance moveset is probably the worst in terms of efficiency because it's easily the best looking animation-wise. Satisfyingly weighty and vicious looking.

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Remember the moveset of the winged knight twin axes?

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warped axe and rippled axe have the good moveset

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These weapons make really good counter attack weapons due to their faster speed and poise damage.

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Endure, Twinblade Talisman, and dual wielding make a good setup for these

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i REALLY hate the r2 and rolling attacks on these

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I had a dream. And in that dream I found an Axe of Eochaid in DLC with unique R2s and the weapon skill that throws axe with telekinesis that spins around and comes back with 2 follow up options.

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Idk but a way to improve this weapon class might be to enhance the hyper armor of running attacks so that axes can trade with other weapons despite their bad range.

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Elden ring axes are a huge downgrade compared to the axes of their previous games.
Even if you could put corpse piler on them they would still be weak and terrible. Moveset is also bad,people can swing real axes much better than that.

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I've gotta say, axes are probably the most boring weapon in terms of variety. Their unique somber weapons are: hoarfrost stomp (one of the most versatile ashes) a stormcaller ash with lightning, and a less trash version of Tibia's Summons.

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My favorite weapons. I don’t care if they’re “not optimal” or “too slow,” they’re just the right ratio of heft-to-weight for me.

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Warped axe isn't on the max upgraded table?

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Warped axe isn't on the max upgraded table?

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They only need to copy DS2 moveset to make them good.

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A crappy weapon class with an even worse power stance moveset. Such a shame

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Do y'all remember ds3 where this class was actually good? Yeah long time, eldenring basically made what was good in ds3 bad and then buffed the new stuff the game introduced oh and can't forget katanas, we don't want weaboos crying, do we?

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i want a super thicc axe like the dozer axe from demons souls

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There should give the first L1 hyperarmor or just more poise for the axe and hammer dual wields, or just either speed it up a bit or make it so both hits are confirmed in a single L1 (I have no idea if both hits connects because hitting anyone with that moveset is like hitting a fly with a small nail)

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My favorite thing about axes in ER is when I was tired of the trash moveset (seriously, these are from the same developer that made the Hunter Axe), so I equipped a second one. Surprise! It really can be worse

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In the words of the famous Dark souls PVPer Eustace Bagge: "Chop,chop,chop, Down ya go!"

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Very mediocre in pvp but for pve axes are pretty amazing. They've received constant buffs ever since the game released. Give them a try in pve if you haven't yet especially the warped axe or rosus' axe

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Use a straight sword. These are hot garbage.

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If From wants axes to be a decent weapon class, they have to stop trying to balance them like straight-swords. Increasing the attack speed is better than no buff at all, but it doesn't really help with the main weaknesses of axes, being their lack of range, stagger and poise. In previous games they had high damage and stagger, to the point where they could stunlock, but were balanced by their slower speed, and somewhat predictable moveset.

In Elden Ring, axes are supposed to specialize in using charged attacks, but they have no hyper-armor that would enable them to properly use this feature. The most reliable way to use charged attacks (excluding Iron Cleaver's amazing R2) without fear of getting staggered is in conjunction with War Cry, which requires a lot more setup to deal damage, compared to other weapons that are much faster and have more range.

The hyperarmor that the mace has on its charged R2 attacks, that's what the entire axe class needs. Hammers can keep their higher poise break, but there is no reason axes shouldn't have just as much hyperarmor on their regular charged R2s. It wouldn't make them significantly stronger in pvp, but would make them feel much more intuitive to play in general. The powerstanced moveset also needs a lot more hyperarmor, not more speed. As long as they keep trying to buff the speed, without touching the hyperarmor, axes are always going to function as worse straight-swords.

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Why are ppl so tilted about this weapon class? It ain't half as bad as you think. Even the celebrant's cleaver can clear the haligtree with ease.

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They should bring back the dual wield axes moveset from Ds3. That would make power stanced axes a lot more viable, probably

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definition of mediocre, even flails have innate bleed

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Axes and straight-swords in Souls are kind of like Vegeta and Goku. No matter how hard axes train and struggle, straight-swords will always get the most positive attention/glory from the creator.

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axes are worse hammers and still need to be buff in some area to make them stand out. only specific axes with the non generic moveset are worth using.

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the ones that use the stock axe moveset are kinda meh, but the cleavers and other variants are awesome though

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Why is Warped Axe missing from all of the views on this page aside from "Base"?

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Pretty pathetic weapon class overall, even the Rosus axe, the longest axe in the games range is just terrible. Iron cleaver is the only one that’s somewhat viable imo.

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why the r2 so slow tho

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I miss the Dragonslayer Axe from DS2 and DS3... It looked so nice...

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the quick axes are really really good now, but the slower axes like rosus or the battle axe could really use a bit more poise damage to give them something over straightswords.

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I don't get what the complaints are about. Idk about pvp, but in pve, axes are probably the best light weapons with the highest dps. Especially the warped axe. Better than straight swords or katanas.

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I wonder why there's no faith based axes

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Contending with colossal weapons for worst category overall. Colossals at least have reach and one-hit potential with jumping attacks... Hammers and flails are generally, if slightly, better but especially in PvE where strike damage is universally awesome and they do more posture damage. Axes are truly the worst of both worlds: stubby reach, middling stagger/posture damage, awful powerstance moveset, barely any better single moveset, slow enough to not combo without storm stomp, no thrust attacks, no chase down ability. In terms of having nothing going for them, they have it all!

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It's weird that powerstancing hatchets uses the same moveset as other heavier axes even they are lighter and attack faster in single wielding.

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Dual wielded axes uses the animations like it's heavier than a greataxe. I'd even argue it's perhaps even slower than that because of the lack of range and distance you have to go through to pull off an attack with a damage worse than any other weapon on an enemy.
Also dual axe attack slides forward on the first dual attack because they realised too late it was such a bad animation it had to have more range or they just thought they could get away with another soul-series with bad axe animations.

To make it even worse the dual greataxe moveset is faster, more range, more damage, more poise damage and the only downside being weight if you even care about that. Greataxes also doesn't have a stupid animation where you hit with your left weapon first with a missed attack on the ground and then uses the right weapon afterwards with no range to boot to the ground. It's a bigger chance you hit yourself on the foot than an actual player with axes.

They also dumped the first hype on seeing Stormhawk Axe for the first time when seeing the npc Nepheli using it against Godrick. It should have been the only axe in the game with both axes count as one armament instead of giving us two axes to upgrade. Favoring over Straight Swords once again due to Ornamental Swords existing.

Which... Why are Straight Sword allowed to dual wield and hit both swords at the same time while retaining excellent range and axes are not? Katanas are more balanced in that way they actually hit like the axe does with one swing and then the next afterwards, but Straight Swords, spears, curved swords and so many others don't follow this rule. This makes two-handing obsolete in these class except for the axe-class where it's better two-handed than dual wielded because no one saw a Berserker in movies and thought they were dumb as rocks and only slammed axes to to the feet of their foes.

Also the biggest laziness of this dual wielding axes is it is EXACLY the same animation as dual wielded maces and flails. So no love was given to either maces, flails or axes in this game. So if you thought you could dual wield the other alternatives such as maces or flails sorry to disappoint you. They have the same issue except they can at least do a bit of damage.

On top of that Occult Forked Hatchet does less damage than Occult Scavenger despite using same amount of attributes and one having less range, worse speed and design. That is at 99 arcane and 25 dexteriy in case you're wondering. Occult Forked Hatchet should deal more damage.

Anyways axes, maces, flails are the most neglected class and I wrote this on axes because I have the biggest issue with them of them all. They've neglected axes in every single god damn soul-series type of game and it's annoying. Lastly axes have 0 unique ash of wars in both Greataxes or Axes while Swords have Stormblade.

Screw this neglection to 3 classes and give me that sweet Fromsoft love you give Katanas, Curved swords and Straight swords. (-_-)

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Something that annoys me about axes is the way your character holds them. Imo it should be over the shoulder 1 handed and the DS2 sideways at the hip stance for 2 handed. Right now it just looks goofy sprinting around holding one of these the same way you hold a damn dagger

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**** it, just give axes poise on like every r1 or r2. have that be the axe thing. you don't need to stack poise to have poise with axes, so you can actually utilize the cool charged attacks and be a proper berserker build

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Axes now reliably hit rats and dogs. They still can whiff, point blank, against erdtree avatars, but it's nowhere near as bad as pre-1.08.

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To OP 13h Dec. Speed increase of 22% is only for a given number the frames. The speed of the first hit is still the same, with the speed of frames from 1st to 2nd hit being increased by 22%. That's the first L1. The second L1 follows the same pattern but with 19% speed increase.

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They're still are kinda weird crossbreeds between hammers and straight swords, while not being as good as either.

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Hidden buff in patch 1.08 : all axes have more Attack Rating it seems. The speed increase in the powerstance moveset is 22% according to Chrightt on YT.

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To 07 dec OP. Axes are not faster than straight swords. Sorry.

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The cleavers got a good speed buff, the warped and ripple are still slow and irrelevant.

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i think to separate axes from everything else, they should use the old DS3 combo system where the r1 chain was infinite

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I know axes are faster now, but are they also faster with dual wielding. Haven´t found a video that compares and i don't see much off a difference in game.

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This patch finally gave Axes a nichee. Before 1.08, using an Axe was a handicap as the hammer does everything better. And now finally the charge attack is faster than the Greataxe charge attack. Like, what a joke it took them so long to fix this weapon class

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Before the latest patch they used to share the same swing speed as hammers. Now they're noticeably faster, which is fair imo considering hammers poise break a lot faster.

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I knew I wasn't going crazy. The attack speed has been increased significantly.

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As of 1.08 they are now faster than straight swords!

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Axes in DS3 have better range, however can't apply pressure at all as even warcry R2's can be interrupted with regular attacks from light/fast weapons. In contrast, Elden Ring axes have much worse range and significantly less stagger. However, both warcry and "wild strikes" grant hyper-armor that actually works and scales with your poise. Charge attacks also do a lot more damage compared to DS3, which can be further enhanced with talismans.

I'm of the opinion that axes are actually stronger in Elden Ring compared to DS3. However, they could definitely use some improvements, particular to their abysmal range and poise damage. Their poise damage and AR should always be higher than straight-swords and other faster weapons, because the latter are generally more versatile, especially at endgame where you can only afford 1-2 hits before you're forced to dodge.

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straightswords but bad

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need a poise damage buff to be even remotely viable for pvp. I struggle to poise break people in regular armor

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i have played with axes in pve and pvp for every game in this series except Demon Souls. The verdict:

Dark Souls 1 - Underwhelming for pvp but good in pve. I'll always remember taking the golem axe into the tomb of the giants and whipping people off the cliffs there.

Dark Souls 2 - Surprisingly great for pvp and pve. Good range and ability to pressure opponents with the running attack. Also low stat requirements on most so they fit into just about any build.

Dark Souls 3 - A straight downgrade to straight swords, but still a decent combat option. The r1 has range and is great for roll catching and there are a couple of axes that have specialized skills like shield chip to deal with turtles or insane damage for their weight. They underperform overall because they have no move that can apply pressure on opponents.

Elden Ring - Possibly the worst weapon class in the game. Damage and stagger is almost identical to straight swords, which have lower weight, better range, and superior moveset. The dual wielding option is possibly the worst way to play pve and pvp with any melee class (I have tested flails yet). The L1s on dual wield axes actually come out slower than the L1 on dual wield great axes, imagine that. The Stormhawk axe gets an honorable mention for having an absolutely insane ash of war (seriously, keep one of these in your inventory if you ever get stuck on an elevator) but it's so short ranged that your whole strategy is going to involve surprising your opponent or baiting them to be in range for a trade which doesn't work well against people with pokes or spells. Right now axes are right down there with hammers for worst class in the game (also maddening considering DS3 buffed hammers to be niche and decent). I'd give hammers the nod over hammers because at least they do strike damage and their charge attacks have heavy stagger build up.

Also, the hunter's axe and shinobi axe in BB and Sekiro respectively have more use than axes in Elden Ring.

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*pulls out copy of DS2*
Back in my day axes were actually good

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Straight swords are trash, relatively speaking.

Axes are trash, objectively speaking.

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The short sword literally has more range than every single basic axe, as well as most of the basic hammers. Tested it against Erdtree avatar, the giant gargoyles, dogs and rats. I'm not even counting the straight-sword guard counter, which is massively better, just the regular R1s.

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I miss DS3 axes. Better moveset, better War Cry animation, just so much more fun to use. The greataxes in ER are, well, great, especially after 1.06, but the normal axes just can't stack up to the glories of days past

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Patch 1.06: Fixed a bug when dual wielding Axe and Greataxe which caused additional effects from Spells, Weapon Skills and Items to not be applied correctly

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straight swords are faster, have better range, better moveset, similar damage & same poise break. 240 motion value on square off.
katanas are faster, have better range, better moveset, similar damage & same poise break. 240 motion value on unsheath.

what's the point with axes? even with their built in bonus on wild strike, with the slow heavy combo (has 230 motion value), cannot outdamage above.
axe need a huge buff or the other weapon classes needs to be nerfed down to axe level.

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axes have higher damage with wild strikes and charged attacks compared to straight swords, that's about it. range, speed. moveset & stagger is mediocre though, this weaponclass really needs a buff.

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I found a lot of success by using celebrant axe MH with beast roar combined with highland axe OH with sword dance. Beast roar gets some dammage boost from the highland axe and talismans (the troll roar and shard of alexander talidmans) makes it incredibly deadly. Doin about 700-1k damage in pvp with a single roar. And the special heavy attack from the celebrant cleaver do catch off guard a lot of people. Theres definetly a lot of potential with 1h axes in elden ring. If you didnt like 1h axes yet in elden ring i highly recoomend this build.

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I've found the best way to utilise this weapon class in PvP is to stack poise and hence 2H them instead of powerstancing. 2-handing also comes with the added benefit of faster atk speed which is much needed when this game is dominated by pokes. For AoW, use something that has good hyperarmor or range to make up for its bad moveset

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If there is anything DS2 did right, it was giving the axe class a decent moveset.

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Is there a way to effectively powerstance axes/hammers without having to stack 99 bajillion poise?

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