bel wrote:Maybe over a +0 unbranded weapon (though I have my doubts about that too). But surely you don't enchant your venom dagger? In that case, it's better to use a "real" weapon and enchant it.
I do if I'm not playing a melee bruiser, if I am using conjurations as my primary damage source, and the venom dagger as a backup weapon, I definitely enchant it (the only melee weapon that would be better untrained is an electric dagger, and those are pretty uncommon)
Also if I'm playing an enchanter, of course I enchant it up (I'm going to be doing mostly dagger stabbing, it may as well have a brand). In any other case, probably not.
Seriously though, a +0 venom dagger is better than a surprising number of weapons, I would use a +0 venom dagger (against a non-resistant enemy) over:
- Code:
A +4 trident
A +3 flail
A +2 war axe
A +1 morningstar
A +2 scimitar
A +2 broad axe
A +0 dire flail
A +1 halberd
Once you tack on a brand, some enchantment, and/or some training, of course all those weapons outpace a venom dagger pretty quickly.
Part of that is that venom dagger's strongest use (hit a couple times then retreat) is something that I do out of habit anyway, typically I'm going to be doing a running retreat style fight a lot of the time (rather than an outright retreat to a holdout point) because I'd frequently rather not take the time to lure every piddly enemy all the way back to a choke point, when I can kill a few on the way at very little additional risk (that's my laziness showing through) two hits to max poisoned will take out most early-to-midgame stuff, and you can walk away while they die from it, and hit them again to reapply if needed.
Also I like adding (cheap) stabbing to most builds (most spellcasters and some non-spellcasters have ways of getting some weak stabs in here and there for little XP, which pairs well with a strong dagger like venom) so I probably use daggers in the early-to-mid game slightly more frequently than most.