Vickas wrote on Jun 10
th, 2016 at 11:41am:
Well i was thinking SWF since i have a spinal tap,but i didnt tohught the option to go twf with bastards swords are rly effective since i dont see anyone using them for twf .the 15/5 pala ranger split seems very interesting overall i have to say
Bastard swords generally have a slightly higher die step, but a weaker crit profile. They aren't a bad option, but they aren't optimal at this time. The Spinal Tap is a nice weapon, though, and adds some effects that add DPS that offsets the crit profile.
You see fewer Bastard Sword users these days because crafted weapons have come back in epics and there is a good named Khopesh (Bleeding Edge). Prior to the Thunderholme pack, the CiTW weapons were what most folks were using for twf. That meant Balizarde, Nightmare (bastard sword), and Celestia, for the most part. The only decent named khopesh beyond alchemicals, were the drow weapons master blades. The lack of good named blades overshadowed the crit profile advantages of Khopesh.
Now you can generally use GS at 11, Alchemical (at 18), Drow Weapons Master (At 21), TF (starting at 22, but probably 24), LGS (At 26) and craft what you want and roll to cap. Using named blades in there where appropriate. That allowed folks to go back to min/maxing based on crit profiles. You see more of the Khopesh, Scimitar, Rapier emphasis from back when cap was 16 or 20. (Although, some enhancement trees make dagger, Short Sword, Staff, etc viable as well)
For you specifically, You can make a Tier 2 TF bastard sword with minimal effort (400 ingots, 300 comms of valor, 25 fire dragon scales, and 75 shadow dragon scales. If you need mats, I'm sure there is someone here who can hook you up on your server. If it is Khyber, PM me). It will have an ML of 26 and have whatever T1 feature you want and the Dragon's Edge at tier 2. Pair that with your Spinal Tap. (A Tier 1 blade with ML 24 can be made for 80 ingots and 60 Comms)
The TWF vs. SWF discussion is mainly because SWF lags a bit behind TWF in DPS. Not that SWF is not viable. It's just not optimal.
(P.S. Bastard sword has an advantage over Khopesh in S&B and SWF instances because it can act like a two handed weapon and proc glancing blows. That can be a small DPS boost)