# Wurm Combat Guide #

So you want to fuck shit up? This guide will help you get into fighting shape in as quick as possible. This guide assumes the server you are playing on starts you off at 1 Fighting Skill and no equipment.

## Things to Consider ##

Like with anything Wurm related, skilling is a long and time consuming process. Once you finish hunting you will probably not want to wander around hunting for quite some time. Because of this, it's probably in your best interest to plan out what you want your role to be when you reach 70 FS. You can get a chunk of your weapon skill, stance and shield skills out of the way if you consider this as you hunt. Here's some terms you will need to know before you get started.

* **FS** Fighting Skill
* **BL/WL** Black light (evil gods), White light (good gods)
* **CR** Combat Rating. Higher levels increase your chance to hit and make yourself harder to hit.
* **Swing Timer** How quick you attack, cannot

### Weapons ###

#### Melee ####

Wurm Unlimited has many weapons to choose from, but sadly the balance of these weapons are nonexistent due to several mechanics in the game. Long story short, "dagger" style weapons are worthless because they cannot attack quick enough and most of their damage is lost from DR resulting in miniscule/no wounds on the target.

Optimal weapons depend on whether you are fighting in a PVE or PVP setting. Two Handed weapons are kings of PVE. Damage output lets you bypass natural armor and kill mobs quickly to ensure minimal damage taken and quickest exp gains for FS. Here are the most effective two handed weapons:

* **Huge Axe** King of PVE, dragon slaying and horse crushing. Does the largest single hit damage in the game outside of artifacts.
* **Large Maul** Like the Huge Axe but slightly worse. Does Mauling damage which will glance off of heavy armor mobs less.
* **Steel Polearm** Not a very common weapon, but it's quick as a dagger in aggressive stance and puts out heavy damage in comparison to one handers. (Can be made out of any metal as of 1.6)
* ***Spears*** *Does 1.5x to 2x damage to players mounted on a horse. This is a nice benefit, but in PVP it is more useful to just kill the horse instead, and spears do not do extra damage to horses themselves.*

*Note: Always use two handers in aggressive stance to shave an entire second off their swing timers. Two handers, especially the huge axe, have terrible defence which means you need to kill mobs as quick as possible*

In PVP, defence is more important and the prevalence of archery means a shield is practically necessary for any situation. Because of this, one handed weapons are more practical to use. Only two are really common in PVP:

* **Longsword** The parry rate on this weapon is so high, it's practically a second shield. Sadly, the damage is pitiful for the rate it attacks, making you rely on having buddies to actually put out enough damage to kill mobs.
* **Maul (Medium Maul)** Extremely high damage + normal parry rates + mauling damage makes this the safest choice for PVP. Also doubles as an effective sledgehammer for breaking down walls.
* ***Sickle*** A harvesting tool which coincidently has the highest potential DPS in the game. The devs recognized this and decided to slap a 2 Combat Rating (more on this later) debuff to """"fix"""" the mistake, making it impractical to use. Also can't parry shit.*

These are just suggestions, as you can definiately kill players/monsters with axes and so on. You will just have to deal with several disadvantages.

#### Archery ####

Bows are separated by 3 subtypes, with different minimum and maximum ranges for each. Bows allow players to kill monsters well above their level with the ability to plink away at mobs. Furthermore, skill gain is related to the damage dealt by your arrows, meaning any animal you find in the wild can potentially be worth killing.

| Bows | Min | Max |
| -------- |:---:|:---:|
| Shortbow | N/A | 5 |
| Bow | 5 | 10 |
| Longbow | 10 | 20 |

Along with the different type of bows, there are also two types of arrows:

* **Hunting Arrows**
* **War Arrows**

The difference between the two is simple. Hunting Arrows are more accurate, meaning it will be easier to successfully hit a creature. War Arrows do more damage at the expense of accuracy. My suggestion is to stick to War Arrows, as skill gain is proportional to damage dealt, but at low levels hunting arrows are easier to create.

### Armor ###

Armor varies in several ways. Lighter armors impede movement speed less (they don't speed up swing timers like a common rumor states), and penalize archery/spells less. Heavier armors make you move slow, are heavy which results in greater stamina loss, and deduct more damage. All the armor rates also have different glance rates towards different types of damage, result in even less damage taken.

Certain armors are stronger/weaker against certain type of damage. This translates to different glance rates for different types of damage. Mauling attacks against studded leather will more likely "miss" and pierce/slash attacks will more likely connect. In a theoretical matchup, 1 plate user with a hammer vs a studded user with a hammer on equal footing will almost always result in the studded leather user winning.

There are only three common types of armor worth talking about.

| Armor | Movement Speed | Damage Reduction (70QL) | Strong | Weak |
| --------------- | :------------: | :---------------------: | :----: | :----------: |
| Studded Leather | 85.38% | 45.95% | Crush | Pierce/Slash |
| Chainmail | 80.35% | 50.50% | Slash | Crush/Pierce |
| Platemail | 63.01% | 64.15% | Pierce | Crush/Slash |

*Note: Face armor has been removed, plate helms are no longer absolutely necessary in combat.*

### Shield ###

Shields allow you to block arrows, block attacks and bash enemies for a brief stun. There are 6 types of shields, 3 wooden and 3 metal, but the only difference is the material and size. Larger sizes allow for a larger radius in deflecting arrows, but small shields are still able to do the same. Metal shields take less damage from use depending on the metal used, while wooden shields are easier to make and improve with the abundance of trees. Choice comes down to personal preferrence.

### Fighting Stance ###

Your fighting stance determines how you fight... obviously. More specifically, Defensive increases parry rate at the expense of swing speed and increased stamina drain. Aggressive gimps your parry rate for increased swing speed and an unconfirmed minor damage increase. Normal is normal. The skill level of your coresponding stance is checked to determine if a hit you land does full damage or not, among other minor things.

Picking a fighting stance is easy. If you are using two handed weapons, use aggressive to cut 1 second off your swing timer. If you are using 1 handers, use normal. Defensive is used only for tanking.

### Religion ###

There are 4 gods by default in Wurm Unlimited, and while they all have their unique boons and spell lists, I'll just keep the descriptions brief.

* **Magranon** God built around combat. Has increased skillgain with combat skills, 25% damage buff at 40 faith/favor, and the chance to keep skills/items on death. This guy hits hard and can dominate trolls for combat pets.
* **Fo** Druid built around healing and buffs. Has many spells to help with combat compared to Magranon. Can boost damage on charmed pets (crocodiles usually), heal wounds on self with spells, wild animals ignore Fo priests and their favored terrain is grass. These guys are seriously annoying to kill.
* **Vynora** Probably the weakest combat priest of all the gods, but ironically is essential for combat as she has all the best enchants in the game. Ideal as an alt for a carebear to assist the village fighters.
* **Libila** Only choice for BL and a damn good one in general. Lacks the combat boost of Magranon but gains access to drain health/stamina, can double their strength with Hell Strength while raising zombies as pets. Mycelium and drains help them keep their health up, making priests good as tanks or warriors. Also the only faction that can enchant their bows with bloodthirst or get easy access to Path of Hate.

### Meditation Path ###

Two main choices here, possibly only one if you are a WL kingdom with no easy access to Mycelium.

* **Path of Hate** Main benefits here is the once a day 50% damage buff and the power that makes guards ignore you. They are a great choice for PVP as they get their main ability early on compared to...
* **Path of Insanity** Their main feature is a defence buff that reduces the size of your wounds that starts small and maxes out at 30% at path level 11. They can also cure diseased wounds caused by libila's rotting touch, or teleport to a random spot on the map to avoid death.
* **Path of Love** Nothing too beneficial for direct combat, but it's a great complement to a Fo priest who sits back and heals/refreshes soldiers with spells and enchanted grass.

### Enchants ###

Usually you don't have to worry about this stuff until later in the server lifetime. Regardless, here's information about the different enchants that can go on your equipment.

#### Weapon Enchants ####

* **Bloodthirst** Adds a flat damage increase that scales according to how many creatures you kill with the weapon. Caps at around %30 bonus damage at 10000 power, but this level is so high you are very unlikely to reach it. Only damaging enchant that can be placed on bows.
* **Flaming Aura/Frostbrand** Leave a seperate wound based on a portion of the original wound. Both do the same thing except one uses a fire graphic and the other uses a frost graphic. It's not true elemental damage contrary to popular belief.
* **Rotting Touch** Libila's combat enchant. This one leaves an infection wound but unlike FA/FB it doesn't create a seperate wound. Increases damage in proportion to the power of the cast and also leaves the unique "infection" condition. These wounds get drastically worse every healing tick unless it's taken care of. Insanity path users can clean these wounds.
* **Venom** Leaves poison wounds on the enemy. May cause a chance of instant death as with fog spider wounds but the consensus is that the enchant isn't great especially for the favor cost.
* **Life Transfer** Heals a portion of damage on self whenever you inflict damage. The king of PVE enchants and not a bad choice for PVP either, high favor cost of 120 though. Damage enchants beat it in a 1v1 PVP situation.
* **Demise Enchants** Increases chance to hit against designated entity. Can be countered with a spell such as Libila's Scale. Human's Demise cannot be countered.
* **Nimbleness** Adds 1 point of CR per 30 cast power on the weapon.
* **Wind of Ages** Reduces swing timer slightly, up to 0.5 reduction at 100 power. Useless since leveling weapon skills reduces the timer already and you can never go under a 3 second timer.

Ideal setup would be Nimbleness + Damage Enchant, Libila may have issues getting these enchants so they may do BoTD + Rotting Touch instead. Training weapons should be Nimbleness + Life Transfer if possible.

#### Armor Enchants ####

* **Aura of Shared Pain** This reflects a portion of the damage inflicted on that piece of armor back to the enemy. This can get kind of ridiculous like reflecting poison wounds back onto the enemy dishing it out.
* **Web Armor** This drains stamina (and according to sources, debuffs the enemy's swing timer) when struct by the enemy. Underrated and the easiest enchant to obtain for Blacklighters.

You can stack more enchants but you have to consider that you need decent rolls on your enchants which takes time. Enchants have a chance to shatter your weapons. Enchants lose power over time, requiring maintenance. You should start out with the most important enchants before throwing Circle of Cunning on your left glove and so on.

### Role ###

All the above choices should relate to what you want to do in PVP. Even healers should have something to fall back on in case the front line gets routed. In my experience there are two major builds:

* **Tank** Their loadout would be a longsword + shield and plate/chain armor. Their job is to taunt uniques into attacking them, or holding spirit guardians/tower guards attention during siege events. Fo and Insanity would be my first choice due to the low amount of damage you deal, though Magranon may help if your teammates let you die a lot. Have a pal to pick you up in a cart whenever you need to evacuate.
* **Warrior** Their loadout would likely be a Maul + shield, or even a two hander, while wearing chainmail or studded leather. Their main objective is to flank enemies focused on your tanks and to be agile enough to dive in and out of combat effectively. Magranon and Insanity or Hate is the ideal choice to maximize damage.
* **Libila** Libila priests can choose to be either role, tanking with Drain Health or fighting with Hell Strength. Spread Mycelium on the battlefield to get heals in during lulls in combat.

Some might consider archer/healer a role in itself, but I disagree. There is no reason a Fo healer can't do damage/tank in case the situation demands it. Archery is also mostly for preventing players from escaping your wrath rather than outright kills. Being fluid with these roles will be more effective than purely focusing on one of these skills.

## Kill Shit ##

### First 20 Fight Skill ###

At 1 FS and crappy QL weapons, it will take forever to even kill a basic cat. Before you go out hunting, you will want to train in your village for a short time while crafters work on getting you stronger gear.

#### Fighting Dummy ####

Everyone hates the fighting dummy, and rightfully so since training with him is insanely lame. However, his benefits outweigh the cons. Most people will tell you to take a low ql shaft and go to town on him to reduce the damage you due resulting in less repairtime. Before you do that, with the 1.6 update bringing us unique effects with metals a new opportunity has arisen. Try making a 1 ql Lead weapon of your choice and use it, lead reduces the damage of the weapon by 50% in exchange for more poison damage. This reduction in damage allows you to grind up some weapon skill (up to 20) while you work on fight skill. Dual wield to make it go even quicker, but remember to constantly check the damage on the dummy. The repair timers for it may be long, but it gives a lot of Mind Logic skill which will help you be able to pilot carts early on.

#### Archery Target ####

Now that you have 20 FS, you're ready to go fight now right? Well... maybe. Archery is exceptional for hunting, allowing you to kill anything with enough arrows at any FS level. I strongly recommend making a hundred or two arrow shafts to shoot at an archery target. When you got the shafts in order you should create one longbow and one shortbow. The reason for this is that archery skillgain from this method stops if either two things happen, **you reach 30 skill in a particular bow** or **you reach 40 overall archery**. My suggestion would be to grind 20-25 skill in longbows then switch to shortbows.

#### Hunting ####

After all this is done, it's time to grab your gear and head out hunting. Make sure to bring large stacks of cotton to reduce downtime. Also make sure to hunt in a large cart, it gives a CR penalty if fighting from in it but the storage and speed is much better than the CR bonus from fighting on horseback. If you took up archery you can also carry much more arrows for training, or bring alts around if you are a priest and can't apply healing covers.

Check the wiki of every different mob you wish to fight to check its fight skill. As you get stronger, increase the difficulty to keep up with the skill gain. Archery skill is tied to damage dealt so weaker mobs give more/easier skill gain, so feel free to plink cows to death even if you are high level. Fighting on foot will be easier than fighting in the cart so disembark for stronger enemies, and stay in the cart if you are doing archery. Always have an escape route planned if you start taking too much damage and keep your equipment QL up.

Mobs with effects like greenish or raging will give you **much** more experience if you can handle it. This is where archery can come in handy. Ignore champions as even a champion rat will be too much for you alone even at higher fight levels.

### Basic Combat ###

Always use manual combat.

#### Aiming ####

Every body part has a different effect when wounded, aiming lets you choose. Head does more damage, arms *supposedly* damages enemy parry rate/hit chance, legs slow the enemy, torso is normal. Just aim for the head in PVE, even against trolls. In PVP, aim for the head for damage and the legs if the bitch runs.

#### Focus ####

Focusing grants a buff of 1 CR if successful, and can occur multiple times. This increases your hit chance while making you harder to hit. Essential in PVP to gain an advantage, or to match the power of enemies higher level than you. Don't spend too much time focusing as it can fail and it takes time. Focus levels may also be spent along with stamina for special attacks.

#### Special Attacks ####

As you gain weapon skill you gain access to special attacks which vary in effects and difficulty depending on weapon, aiming location and even the kingdom template you are in. They cost a lot of stamina, and zero stamina usually means death so try and get a special attack out at the beginning of a fight if you really need to use one. In my opinion the only special attack worth a damn is attacks with the **vomit** effect, which causes the enemy player to drain their hunger/thirst bar which slows their stamina regeneration. Most players forget to carry food so a vomit attack on a platemail fag will basically gurantee their death if they don't get on a horse or cart. Everything else takes too much time and resources for little gain.

#### Shield Bashing ####

Shield bashing is a sub skill and ability that lets you attempt to push an enemy over after a brief timer. This stuns the enemy for a time depending on their weight, armor and other unconfirmed variables. Shield size doesn't matter.

Shield bashing is a slow skill to level, so either grind it as you make your grind to 70 FS or save it for later.

#### PVP Tips ####

Aim for the weakest armor piece the enemy has, if you can't tell just aim for the head. Start off focusing for a round or two then determine if you want to try and make the enemy vomit or not.

Mobility matters and is your main advantage against plate users. Always try to get behind the enemy when you get the chance, and stand still when you are attacking. If a fight starts going south for you, start retreating to recover and fight again. If the enemy does the same to you, take out a shortbow and knick their legs.

Never let the enemy have higher focus than you.

If getting shot at by arrows, place the shield graphic on your screen over the archer and either stand still for a pick up or move into cover.

Medium maul + large metal shield + platemail + hell horse cart + longbows is the most common loadout on our servers.

## Making Your Fort ##

The most common mistake people make is putting down a deed and building their houses before even thinking about the defensive value of the deed. A flat base with only 1 layer of wall can be broken into with as little as two guys, no matter how many spirit guardians or tower guards you have. In fact, you should never count on NPC guards to protect your property from more than a single player or the odd bear. When finding a spot to call home consider a couple of things beforehand.

### Location ###

Deeds right next to water are extremely popular. It makes sense since boats are easy ways to travel and the water source is nice for the time before you place a well. However, these locations let even small groups of players harass your deed with an easy escape route. If you want to be near water, consider building on a cliff nearby, or constructing land bridges to limit unwanted access to your deed.

### Terraforming ###

Perhaps the simplest way to deter attackers is to place your deed ontop of a slope that requires enemies to climb in order to reach your walls. This has multiple benefits such as slowing down the enemy, draining their stamina quicker and preventing horse and cart access to your deed. A minimum slope of 40 will both require players to climb and stop horses/carts from climbing the hill. From here you can further impede the enemy by changing the slope terrain to slower terrain like sand. Another tactic would be digging to rock around the slope and making tunnel entrances to prevent players from raising the slope with dirt (make sure to reinforce the walls inside.

### Walls ###

1 layer of walls around your perimeter is typically never enough. The more layers you have, the more time you have to rally defenses and repair walls. Another good strategy is to use buildings as part of your perimeter which will allow you to have aesthetic and effective tall walls. Add a flat roof so you can shoot arrows at attackers for extra fun.

### Token ###

Your deed token should never be on flat ground if you desire a defensive deed. Either put it in a tower, in a big hole or on top of a big slope. My preferred method, although ugly, is a big hole as the enemy has to fall into the hole to drain the deed. From here they are constantly slowed due to hurting, and being attacked from all sides by players and your guards. The speed penalties ensure they will never get back out without losing most/all of their stamina, which almost gurantees their death.

## Fucking Their Fort ##

Assuming your enemy isn't retarded and didn't make their deed flat with only 1 layer of walls, you should try using catapults to destroy the walls from afar. If catapults are unavailable, the only real method is to have people lure away defenders while maulmen take care of walls. Once an opening appears, the meat grinding begins. A tank goes in first, grabs agro then the warriors flank around to quickly eliminate players and NPC guards. An FOB should be nearby for healers to save soldiers that cart drivers evacuate. In the end a siege, as most of Wurm PVP, comes down to numbers. If the enemy vastly outnumbers you, pull back to a safe location rather than losing moral after a total wipe.

## Helpful links ##

Literally every guide is outdated so keep that in mind.

* **https://www.wurmpedia.com/index.php/Guides:Mastercheifs_Guide_to_PvP** outdated like every guide but still has useful information. Ignore his loadout suggestions.
* **https://www.wurmpedia.com/index.php/Guides:Tactics** Information on PVP deed building and sieges.
* **https://forum.wurmonline.com/index.php?/topic/52768-fortifications-for-dummies/** More information on building defensive deeds.
* **https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vleppxC7I-qIZ3IXKBzRLoENsm9YT5cAf0JoAVsyu0I/edit** More recent guide for Wurm Online, probably better than this shitty guide.
* **https://forum.wurmonline.com/index.php?/topic/142401-wu-datamining/** Some autist datamining on his test server. Pretty good though his swing timer calculations are off (medium maul is still 5 seconds in aggressive.)

## Special Thanks ##

* **Discord Fags** For being the retarded, impatient faggots every server
* **Mapfags** For dealing with the screeching retards who constantly demand 1:1 remakes of WoW and 20k 20k maps
* **Autohotkey** For making this game fun
* **Fart emote** For making boat trips even more awful
* **Proxy Paige** For making the best gloryhole video in the universe, too bad about your retarded tattoo though