Enshrouded Best Two-Handed Weapons Ranked for Update 8!

Latest Update: August 6, 2026 – Categories: Enshrouded

Wondering which two-handed weapons are truly the best, or which builds and strategies will help you maximize your damage and survivability? This is the complete guide to Legendary Greatswords, Hammers, and Axes, plus essential Barbarian skills, gear combos, and Strength scaling to dominate the frontlines in Enshrouded!

On April 21st, Enshrouded Update 8 officially lands, bringing huge changes to the game’s core mechanics. Read more with our updated guides down below!

🏹 Related

• NEW Enshrouded 1.0 Features!
• Enshrouded 1.0 Release Date
• NEW Enshrouded Skill Planner Tool Released!
• Ultimate Enshrouded Beginner Guide

In this guide, we aim to explain how two-handed weapons work, what makes them effective, and give you the five best for Enshroudeds’ current patch.

Table of Contents

Enshrouded Two-Handed Weapons Overview

Two-handed weapons are commonly used for melee players who value damage over survivability. Unlike a one-handed weapon, you won’t be using a shield. Thus, you build for all-out damage. The strength of the two-handed weapon is its built-in cleave or area (AOE) damage. Two-handed weapons have unique attack chains that differ from one-handed weapons, often providing area of effect damage with each swing. As you swing, you have a large arc, hitting multiple enemies at a time if they are in range. This weapon is a great choice for players who love aggressive playstyles and want to maximize their melee attack potential.

The Two-Handed weapon scales in effectiveness with the Strength stat. You can also increase melee damage with food, armor, and accessories. Certain consumables provide bonus damage to melee attacks, offering percentage-based boosts that enhance your overall damage output beyond just skill and gear effects. Most Two-Handed players use a combination of the Barbarian Tree and Warrior skill tree as their primary ways to boost stats and damage.

The two major downsides to the Two-Handed weapon are stamina cost and ranged enemies. Many of your abilities, like the newly added Whirlwind Crescendo, require a massive stamina cost to activate. Performing consecutive melee attacks can trigger powerful area-of-effect abilities like Whirlwind Crescendo. Thus, if you don’t have high stamina regeneration, a large rested bonus via comfort, and consumables to get back stamina, you won’t be able to block, sprint, or dodge.

Most weapons are acquired through random drops from bosses or loot chests, rather than crafting. Many of your best options come from farming specific locations, marking chest spots, and rotating through bosses to maximize legendary weapon drops.

The way to deal with range targets is through a couple of skills that were added via your grapple. You can either pull flying creatures to you (Banshees and Vultures), or leap to targets. Once you unlock these skills in the center tree, you target an enemy and a grapple icon appears, which you can then activate the skill. Be aware, this will also require a ton of stamina, so not excessively sprinting and swinging are important. Below, we talk about the Two-handed playstyle and compare it to one-handed so you can make the best choice when picking a weapon and investing skill points.

The Two-Handed Playstyle

Two-handed weapons come in three variations: Axes, Hammers, and Greatswords. They offer the highest “cleave” damage in the game, allowing you to hit multiple enemies with a single swing. While slower than Wands or Swords, their high Parry Power and staggering potential make them the go-to choice for the Barbarian and Warrior archetypes.

The gameplay around the Two-Handed playstyle is being aggressive, closing the distance, and killing targets to get a buff via the Blood Warrior skill. With Battle Heal skill and Gemini Rings, you can stack life leech, giving you back health while dealing damage. This is the best way to deal with playing almost exclusively in melee range.

In Update 7, the inclusion of the “Soaked” mechanic has also made Shock-based Two-Handed weapons, like the Chieftain’s Hammer, viable for extreme burst damage. The Wet and Soaked debuffs lower your stamina and stamina regeneration. Therefore, you want to be aware of being wet, and dry off with a heat source at your base or torches in dungeons or while exploring.

Two-Handed vs. One-Handed: Pros & Cons

How to Get Two-Handed Weapons

Two-Handed weapons can be crafted, obtained via drops, or found in specific quest. Choosing the right weapon for your build is crucial, as it maximizes your damage, synergizes with your armor and skills, and greatly improves your overall combat effectiveness. Players can craft basic armor and weapons early in the game to support their two-handed weapon builds.

Most of the best items come from Chest or killing high level bosses. You cannot craft max level Two-Handed weapons, but only lore weapons up to level 39. Thus, you should spend some time grinding in your current location and marking maps. As your level increases, you gain access to better weapons and more skill points, which helps optimize your build and progress through tougher zones. If you take a look at the picture above, you can find the gold chests and mark them which give the highest chance of legendary weapon drops. The best area is the northwest after you’ve upgraded your

Therefore, you want to log in, set up flame altars near these chests, and make a rotation killing bosses, opening gold chests, and finding that perfect weapon with your ideal trait. Note, since update 7, the chest will take a long time to respawn and the log out and log in trick will not work. Thus, do a sweep of the chest locations then do other gameplay before checking some hours later. We have a guide on this chest farming here.

Enshrouded Best Two-Handed Weapons Ranked

Below are the best two-handed weapons ranked from best to worst, for Enshrouded.

1. Champion’s Axe: highest survivability built in and fast swing speed.
2. Guard of the North Sword: high critical and guaranteed drop with the quest.
3. Horned Greatsword: Greatsword with retaliation damage built in.
4. Frost Smasher: highest burst damage with two brutal bonuses and all blunt damage.
5. Chieftain’s Hammer: made for the new soaked mechanic and shock damage.

1. Champion’s Axe (The Immortal Berserker)

Champion’s Axe Bonuses and Features:

• +10% Cutting Damage
• Brutal: 20% Increased critical strike damage
• 5% Health leech
• Precise: 5% Critical Strike Chance
• 5% Health leech

The Champion’s Axe is the best two-handed weapon for survivability with two bonuses to health leech, critical, and critical damage. These bonuses synergies will the Battle Heal skill in the tank tree which heals you for 5% of your health whenever you critical with a melee weapon. The two most important factors for maximizing this passive healing are high health, and high critical. Both of which Champion’s Axe has. With two additional bonuses for built-in health leech, the resulting effect is massive, consistent, self-healing while attacking.

These bonuses stack on top of each other and you can even add one or two Gemini Rings into the equation. Gemini Ring has a 7% life leech chance and restores 50% of health as life. With a massive critical, you get back huge health, even seeing numbers in the thousands. This combo counters the major downside to playing with a two-handed weapon, you will take a lot of damage without a shield playing in melee range.

The Axe is also the preferred weapon for a two-hander because of it’s swing speed. With the new skill Whirlwind Crescendo, your axe only needs three swings to activate “spin-to-win.” While the tooltip reads all weapons have a 0.7 attack speed, the animations are rather different. Moreover, the Greatsword requires four attacks, thus giving you less reliability when trying to do passive AOE damage with this skill.

The only downside to using the Champion’s Axe is less damage than say the Frost Smasher. However, when testing the weapons, the passive two bonuses to health leech makes up for it, keeping you in the fight rather than smashing potions or fleeing. This is why we rank Champion’s Axe as the best and think you should try to hunt for it!

The Champion’s Axe works best on the Barbarian Build for Enshrouded.

2. Guard of the North Sword (The Shock Specialist)

Guard of the North Sword Bonuses and Features:

• +10% Magic Shock Damage
• Precise: 5% Critical Strike Chance
• Brutal: 20% Increased critical strike damage
• +10% Magic Shock Damage
• Precise: 5% Critical Strike Chance

The Guard of the North Sword is great for the new patch due to two Shock bonuses and double precise traits. This gives you a big bonus to critical chance and shock damage. Additionally, you can obtain this Sword in a specific location, clear on the north end of the map in the Cromville Throneroom.

As you enter the Throne Room, take a left and you’ll discover the Sword sitting in the corner shining orange just waiting for you to take it. This gives you a guaranteed drop, without the need to farm chest for hours to get a good weapon. You’ll need Flame Altar level 9 to reach this area unless you somehow cheese the flying mechanics and hop over the clouds.

With high base damage, location drop, and bonuses to critical, the Guard of the North is your first choice when entering the last area in Veilwater Basin. However, it doesn’t rank number one because of no health leech and shock damage which is more designed for the Soaked debuff mechanic and doesn’t fit the overall builds weapon traits.

The Guard Of The North Sword works best on the Greatsword Build for Enshrouded.

3. Horned Greatsword (The Defensive Juggernaut)

Horned Greatsword Bonuses and Features:

• +10% Piercing Damage
• 20% Retaliation: return melee damage
• Precise: 5% Critical Strike Chance
• 20% Retaliation: return melee damage
• 5% Stamina Leech

The Horned Greatsword is the third best on this list because of its unique bonuses to stamina leech and two bonuses to Retaliation. With retaliation, you deal return damage to melee attackers, automatically killing them while you’re swinging a massive four-button chain attack to activate Whirlwind. You can also add the Counterstrike skill from the Trickster line. This gives you another chance to reflect even more damage. The result is that you reflect back massive amounts of damage to your highest threat enemies in melee.

Stamina leech is also a helpful bonus due to the changes to regeneration. While some have been reverted, the Two-Handed weapon requires a lot of stamina to use it’s skills. One new skill, Upward Slash Attack, which is helpful for taking out flying targets, uses 25 stamina each swing. While this doesn’t seem like a lot, you can blow through your entire stamina pool quickly taking on annoying Banshees and Vultures. The same goes with the two Grapple skills in the center tree, though those cost 50 stamina each!

We recommend the Horned Greatsword with the Counterstrike skill as the best Two-Handed weapon choice. That’s because it promotes passive damage while you are chaining together a four-swing attack to trigger Whirlwind. We would rank it higher if it had no piercing bonus and health leech.

4. Frost Smasher (The Critical Crusher)

Frost Smasher Bonuses and Features:

• +10% Blunt Damage
• +10% Blunt Damage
• Brutal: 20% Increased critical strike damage
• +10% Blunt Damage
• Brutal: 20% Increased critical strike damage

If you want the highest damage possible, then the Frost Smasher is your best two-handed weapon choice. This weapon gives three lines of Blunt and two bonuses to brutal. While you will have a lower critical rating, when you land one, it will be brutal (no pun intended).

Another strength of the Frost Smasher is the Blunt Damage bonuses. Other weapons on this list have shock, frost, or some other bonuses that don’t align with their base damage. The Frost Smasher gives you blunt damage bonuses, and the weapon deals blunt, which helps with stuns. Therefore, you want have to mix and match skills to increase the weapons optimal damage potential. Simply take the two passives in the Warrior tree to increase blunt damage, and watch for monster criticals!

The downside to the Frost Smasher is no life leech bonuses. You can counter this by obtaining two Gemini Rings from Moth’s Grove which will give you two bonuses of health leech. Since the weapon has high burst, your consistency with self-healing will fade but replaced with massive burst healing randomly. This makes combat a bit more inconsistent which is why we rank it fourth on the list.

5. Chieftain’s Hammer (The Ruthless Executioner)

Chieftain’s Hammer Bonuses and Features:

• +10% Blunt Damage
• Vicious: 20% Backstab damage
• Precise: 5% Critical Strike Chance
• Ruthless: 30% increased critical strike damage against soaked enemies
• +10% Magic Shock Damage

A niche but powerful hammer that excels when built around the new Update 7 mechanics called Soaked and Wet. When you are submerged into water you gain the soaked status effect for 30 seconds. After 30 seconds you gain Wet. Your stamina regeneration is lowered by 30% while Soaked or Wet, but this can be mitigated through two Skills: Wet Dog and Soaked Dog found in the Athlete skill tree.

The real strength of the Chieftain’s Hammer comes when you add a Gem of Currents to this weapon which can apply the Soaked status effect while you are weapon. Now when you hit a target, you might do shock damage but also debuff them which enables the 30% critical damage bonus trait called Ruthless.

The obvious downsides to this are complexity and stamina regen. This soaked debuff setup is much better on staff and wand which don’t require a ton of stamina to operate. Plus, it’s overly complex for most players. However, the Chieftain’s Hammer is easy to obtain through drops and if you have a gem of currents around, this is a powerful combo until you get a better weapon.

Best Gear & Skills for Two-Handed Builds

Selecting the best skills is crucial for optimizing two-handed builds in Enshrouded, as the right combination enhances combat effectiveness, survivability, and overall performance.

The best gear set for the Two-Handed Weapon type is the Sunpiercer set, which is recommended for maximizing the effectiveness of the greatsword build. This set gives you two-handed melee damage, critical chance, and critical damage and it can be crafted at the Blacksmith.

There is a new gloves introduced in update 7 called Greatsword Gauntlets. This gives 21% Greatsword damage which is 3% more than Sunpiercer but is specific to using a Greatsword. You can find these gloves in the Goldrock Saddle In, in Veilwater Basin at the northeast part of town.

When it comes to skills, below are the best options for increasing Two-Handed Damage:

• Two-Handed Specialization (Barbarian): Use to unleash a powerful Special Ability after generating enough Focus.
• Heavy Hitter: Increases the attack speed of all Two-Handed Melee weapons by 10%.
• Barbarian (Barbarian): gain one strength for each flame level. Best way to increase base damage of all skills.
• Barbarian’s Path (3 levels, 1 point each) – Two-Handed Melee weapon damage is increased by 5%. 5% damage per level.
• Blood Rage (Barbarian): when you kill a target, you gain 20% increased melee damage for 10 seconds. You character will glow red and you’ll hear a sound with top left showing a buff icon. This is obvious, but you want to start combat out by finding the weakest target and killing it to maintain this buff. Often, even boss fights have one or two ads that you can kill to get huge damage bonus.
• Double Jump: this utility skill is key for mobility and survivability, allowing you to quickly reposition or create space during greatsword combat.
• Whirlwind Crescendo: this ability is crucial for dealing area damage with the greatsword, making it a core part of any two-handed build.
• Ranger (Ranger): this seems like an odd skill but it gives 5% critical and tons of other juicy stats. Plus, you don’t have to go too far into the skill tree to reach the Ranger bonus. Leave this for end-game when you have tons of spare skill points. Alternatively, if you are strong enough forgo the Ranger skill line and take crafting nodes and perks or Rebound for more stamina sustain.
• Veteran (Warrior): 10% increased critical strike chance.
• Titan Edge (Barbarian): specific to Greatswords but a 10% damage bonus that sticks with others.
• Weapon Type Bonuses: take these depending on your weapon type:
  • Slasher for Cutting
  • Brute for Blunt
  • Thrust for Piercing
• Element Type: if you have a shock, fire, etc. you can increase that damage via the Wizard skill bonuses. It will be a small benefit, but not if you want to max out shock damage.

For synergy, consider incorporating a bow into your build. Bows complement two-handed weapon strategies by providing ranged control and dexterity scaling, allowing you to manage enemies from a distance before engaging in melee attacks.

When preparing for combat, consumables like Fried Rice and Grilled Crab Meat are essential for boosting damage and health in a greatsword build, ensuring you maintain high performance during tough encounters.

Two-Handed Weapon Scaling and Damage

Understanding how two-handed weapon scaling works in Enshrouded is key to maximizing your damage output and building a truly devastating melee character. Two-handed weapons, such as the enshrouded greatsword, scale primarily with your Strength stat, meaning that every point you invest in Strength and related skill points directly increases the heavy damage you deal with each swing. Unlike one handed weapons, which may offer faster attack speed and more versatility, two handed weapons trade speed for raw power, allowing you to hit enemies for much more damage per attack.

Best Consumables for a Greatsword Build

To get the most out of your powerful greatsword build, you’ll want to stock up on the best consumables that boost your damage output, survivability, and stamina. Fried Rice is a top pick for melee players, as it provides a significant increase to melee damage, letting you hit as much damage as possible with every swing. Grilled Crab Meat is another essential, offering a hefty boost to your health pool, which is crucial for surviving in close-quarters combat.

Rooibos Tea is invaluable for maintaining your stamina, allowing you to perform more whirlwind crescendo attacks and keep up the pressure on your enemies. Don’t overlook the Open Sandwich either: it’s a simple but effective consumable that grants extra damage, making your greatsword attacks even more lethal. By combining these best consumables with the right armor and skills, you’ll create a powerful greatsword build that can handle any challenge the game throws at you.

Utility and Healing in Combat

Survivability is just as important as raw damage in any greatsword build, and that’s where utility and healing come into play. Health regeneration is a must-have, allowing you to recover from damage over time and stay in the fight longer. Mana regeneration is also important, especially if your build relies on abilities like whirlwind crescendo or other greatsword attacks that consume resources.

Potions and bandages are your go-to tools for emergency healing during tough battles, while life leach effects let you drain health directly from enemies as you deal damage. By balancing your focus between damage output and utility, you’ll ensure your greatsword build can handle extended fights and recover quickly from setbacks. Prioritizing both health regeneration and mana regeneration will keep you swinging and using abilities, making you a force to be reckoned with in any encounter.

Conclusion and Final Tips

Building the best greatsword build in Enshrouded is all about understanding the interplay between weapon scaling, parry power, and consumables. By investing your skill points wisely into Strength and Constitution, and selecting skills that boost your damage output and survivability, you’ll create a powerful greatsword build capable of taking on the toughest enemies in the game. Don’t forget to equip the right armor and keep your inventory stocked with the best consumables to maximize your effectiveness in battle.

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