Warhammer Vermintide 2 Weapon Stats, Damages & Combos

An overview: Combo structure and attack properties of all weapons. This guide is there to help you get familiar with new melee weapons. It might cover topics that feel advanced, but it’s written with the intent to be understandable for brand-new players, too.

To get the most out of a weapon, you need to know which attacks and attack combos are appropriate for which situation: What do I do against groups? What do I do against armored enemies? For this, the guide contains one cheat sheet for every weapon, outlining which attacks it has, what they’re good at, and how they chain into each other.

Warhammer Vermintide 2 Melee Weapon Stats, Damages Combos

It also includes info on how good the weapon’s defense is, and tells you if it has any other special up- or downsides that you should be aware of. Because knowing your weapon’s potentials and limits will help you make better decisions in-game, such as: Can I contribute if we aggro this patrol right now? Do I have a chance of reaching and reviving my downed teammate in the middle of that horde, or do we need to cut our losses? Should I be fighting this monster, or should I let a teammate do it, because I am better suited to creating space? Answering these questions always depends on your build, and for a large part on the strengths and weaknesses of your chosen melee weapon.

In the beginning of the guide, you will find explanations on how you read the weapon cheat sheets, and what all the attack property icons mean. As an example, you will also find the Torch’s moveset here. After that, you will find the remaining 52 melee weapons, ordered by hero.

Lastly, you will find links to related resources that I found useful.

Explanations

Attack boxes

This is the most common type of attack, a slash. The arrow indicates the direction in which the weapon is swung. Naturally, downward slashes are suited for landing headshots. Horizontal slashes are useful for cleaving through multiple enemies, if the attack is able to. Upward slashes seem impractical at first, but they often have better effects to make up for it (higher damage, increased crit chance, bonus damage-over-time effects, etc). Also, with proper practice, headshots can even be landed with upward slashes. Refer to the further resources section for a tutorial that covers this.

This represents a stabbing attack. Stabs are always directed towards the center of your screen. Stabs are typically single-target attacks that can damage armored enemies. Many of them also deal increased headshot damage. The dotted line indicates from where your character stabs their weapon, but this direction makes no noticeable difference in combat. It is only included so that you can tell different stabbing attacks apart.

This represents a bash, which can normally only be performed with shield weapons. Since all shield bashes work the same, I will spoil their properties already: They always hit every enemy in front of you, dealing low damage but good knockback, especially to enemies directly in front of you. A valuable self-defense tool for dense horde situations.

Combo structure

After performing any attack, you can follow up with either a light attack (green) or a heavy attack (red). Colored arrows point towards the attacks that will be performed as a follow-up. So every attack box will have both an outgoing green and red arrow. You can also block after attacking, which resets your combo. From there you can start over or perform the push attack (blue).

For visual clarity, arrows going back to the first light and heavy attacks are not drawn. Instead, you will see an outgoing arrow that ends in a circle. This does not mean that your combo ends, it’s as fast as going to any other attack. So the weapon in this example could perform the following loop: [Heavy 1 > Light 2 > Heavy 1 > …] forever, without stopping or slowing down.

Rarely, a weapon has a special attack that can be performed with a different keybind (the game calls it Weapon Special). You will find its box next to the push attack, indicated by a purple arrow.

Icon Glossary

Attack boxes will be accompanied by all kinds of icons, summarizing what this attack is good at. Use this information to plan your combos: If you want to fight hordes, try to find cleaving attacks that link into each other. And to fight armored elites, look for armor-piercing attacks linking into each other.

On the left side of the attack name, you will generally find icons telling you how well the attack cleaves. On the right side, you will find icons telling you what type of damage it deals. And if a heavy attack has special mechanics related to charging it, you will find icons below its name.

If only a single weapon uses a unique icon, it will be skipped here, and only explained in that weapon’s details text.

Cleave Properties

This attack is able to cleave through multiple non-armored units, but gets stuck on armored enemies (Including maulers, the elite chaos enemy with a huge axe and head armor). Note that there is still a cleave limit: If a group of enemies is too densely packed, you will only hit some of them.
This attack is realistically able to cleave through at least one armored unit and continue hitting more enemies after it. This is an uncommon but amazing property. Usually these swings still get stuck on chaos warriors, monsters and lords.
This attack itself may only hit one enemy, but it causes an explosion centered on that enemy, which hits all other enemies around it. The explosion can hit an infinite number of enemies, since it has nothing like a cleave limit.

Damage Properties

This attack deals damage to armored units. If the icon is grey, the damage is so small that it is clearly overshadowed by other attacks from the same weapon, so you might want to use those instead.
This attack completely bypasses shields held by enemies. Naturally, if the attack also happens to deal armor damage, this is great for dealing with shielded stormvermin.

This attack applies a burn damage-over-time effect. Sienna’s careers may have talents synergizing with these. Note that damage-over-time effects fully stack, so you can use multiple of these without losing any of their damage.
This attack applies a bleed damage-over-time effect. There is not much synergy here. Again, note that you can stack as many of these as you like.

Heavy Charging Properties

Holding this heavy attack increases its damage to an even larger value than usual. Keep in mind that any heavy attack without this icon does not do this: Normally, their damage is always the same, no matter if you release them directly or keep the button pressed for a while.
This heavy attack can be charged forever, since your character will never let go of it automatically.

This heavy attack can be charged forever, and while doing so your character will be in a blocking state. This block works as usual, meaning that it uses your amounts of stamina and block cost reduction, synergizes with class talents related to blocking, and the parry trait.

Blocking infographic

Lastly, every cheat sheet summarizes the defensive ability of the weapon: The center number is the amount of stamina shields that it has (Note: 3 stamina shields = 6.0 stamina). Every weapon has a frontal block angle, typically 90°, as displayed in light blue. Enemy attacks coming from this angle cost way less stamina to block than attacks outside of it. The numbers in the top and bottom show how the block cost is modified in- and outside of the weapon’s effective blocking angle, so lower is always better. Keep in mind that you can improve the available stamina shields, the block costs, and the effective blocking angle with properties on your equipment.

Some weapons only lose half a stamina shield when pushing, instead of a full shield like all the others. This greatly improves your defense by allowing you to dig your way out of otherwise fatal situations. These weapons will be marked with this icon.

And on the topic of blocking, here is what’s special about shield weapons: Obviously, they generally have improved blocking stats as you will see in their infographics, and are the only type of weapon that may have shield bashes in their moveset. Furthermore, unlike all other weapons, they also allow you to block ratling gun bullets and the rat ogre’s overhead attacks. And their push strength is also improved, being able to stagger a lot of elite enemies that otherwise wouldn’t care. And lastly, the delay until your stamina recovers after pushing is halved when using a shield weapon.

Example weapon: The Torch

The Torch can only be equipped temporarily by finding it on certain levels. You can protect yourself with it, as it can block like an average weapon and has reasonable cleave and stagger. And while its damage is laughably low, it at least applies burns on every hit. On its light attacks, the burn only ticks once, but on the push and heavy attacks it is stronger. The weapon special key can be used to drop the Torch, switching back to your actual melee weapon.

Markus Kruber

Greatsword

Greatswords trade attack speed for cleaving ability. If you can spare the stamina, use push attacks against armored enemies: They deal twice the armor damage as your heavy attacks, so without push attacking it’ll take a while.

Same as: Saltzpyre’s Greatsword

Halberd

The halberd has high range and damage, but is awkward to use without practice, since its attack properties are so wildly mixed. For a single-target attack, Light 2 has low damage, so try to avoid it whenever possible. The Halberd’s push attack has the unique mechanic of letting you choose which light attack to follow up with, by varying how soon you input it.

Sword

With an extra stamina shield and good cleave, this weapon will make you feel well-protected. You might yearn for faster armor damage, however.

Same as: Sienna’s Sword

Executioner Sword

A fan favorite due to its straightforward attack pattern and high damage. Barely any weapon in the game can compete with the armor damage on its heavy attacks, and they even come with 20% bonus crit chance. Plus, the Executioner Sword has an increased damage modifier for headshots. What’s not to love? Well, maybe the fact that it attacks even slower than the Greatsword. But still, there is a trick to help you land these heavy attacks: You can stand far back, because while releasing a heavy attack, Kruber sprints forward.

Note on armor cleaving: The lights can just barely cleave through an armored enemy. The push attack usually can’t, unless you increase your cleave (e.g. Mercenary’s Limb-Splitter talent).

Great Hammer

Here comes another slow heavy-hitter! This one’s heavy attacks don’t only cleave armored enemies, but even knock them around quite well, buying you a lot of space. And while everything is tumbling around, weaving in a light attack can make short work of an important target.

Same as: Bardin’s Great Hammer

Mace

A well-rounded weapon with a lot of stamina. It bears similarities to the Sword, but the key difference is that it trades the cleaving heavy attacks for single-target strikes with much higher armor damage.

Same as: Bardin’s Hammer, Saltzpyre’s Skull-Splitter Hammer

Sword and Shield

A standard shield weapon. Its anti-armor combo is hidden behind the push attack, but with 5 shields you probably have the stamina to spare.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Sword and Shield in the further resources.

Mace and Shield

Compared to the Sword and Shield, this one’s cleaving attacks are better at staggering, but worse at actually killing groups. This one has an even larger effective block angle. Again, its armor damage is mostly hidden behind the push attack. And its push attack also has the unique mechanic of letting you choose which heavy attack to follow up with, by varying how long you hold it.

Same as: Bardin’s Hammer and Shield, Saltzpyre’s Skull-Splitter & Shield

Mace and Sword

DLC: Back to Ubersreik

If you felt like all previous weapons were too slow, you will be happy about this addition. Its heavy and push attacks using both weapons are outstanding, whenever you have the time or stamina to use them.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Mace and Sword in the further resources.

Tuskgor Spear

DLC: Winds of Magic

Very strong on the defense, due to its extra stamina shield, 180° effective block angle, and good stagger on its cleave attacks. Its armor damage is rather low, and its horde clearing speed suffers from being unable to chain many cleave attacks. This weapon is quite mobile while attacking however, and while holding its Heavy 1, Kruber even has 10% increased run speed.

Spear and Shield

DLC: Forgotten Relics

This shield weapon has the unique ability to attack while keeping its guard up. Landing these special attacks costs half a stamina shield, but can be especially useful against dangerous enemies such as berserkers. Its cleave attacks have good base damage, but keep in mind that Heavy 2’s direction makes it unsuitable for cleaving.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Spear and Shield in the further resources.

Bretonnian Longsword

DLC: Grail Knight Career

A high-damage all-round weapon that requires some getting used to. To get infinite cleave or single-target attack loops, alternating light and heavy attack inputs is required. This can feel odd at first, but produces opportunities to use the weapon’s charge-block ability frequently.

Bretonnian Sword and Shield

DLC: Grail Knight Career

Compared to the Sword and Shield, this one has an easier time accessing its armor-piercing attacks, but ends up with a weird horde combo: Light 1, a sword attack, followed by two shield bashes knocking the horde everywhere. With this weapon you also have the unique option to use Light 3 quickly instead of your push attack, which can be done by releasing left click after pushing with it, and then tapping it again.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Bretonnian Sword and Shield in the further resources.

Bardin Goreksson

Great Hammer

A slow and heavy weapon whose heavy attacks can cleave AND knock around armored enemies. After staggering a group of enemies with a heavy attack, weaving in a light attack can destroy the most dangerous enemy.

Same as: Kruber’s Great Hammer

Great Axe

This one is practically the same as the Great Hammer, with one important difference: Its heavy cleaving attacks kill groups of enemies much quicker, but in return they stagger fewer enemies and lose the ability to cleave through armored ones.

Axe

This weapon has single-target armor piercing attacks exclusively, which will make you feel like a god against elites, but vulnerable during hordes. Its light and push attacks all come with 10% bonus crit chance.

Same as: Saltzpyre’s Axe

Hammer

An all-round weapon with extra stamina available. This bonus stamina comes in handy to start your horde combo with a push attack. Its heavy attacks deal as much single-target damage as the Axe’s.

Same as: Kruber’s Mace, Saltzpyre’s Skull-Splitter Hammer

War Pick

Against hordes, the light attacks can buy you lots of space, while the push and heavy attacks deal impressive single-target damage against both flesh and armored targets. Overcharging its heavy attacks raises this damage to completely absurd levels, and makes Bardin sprint. To judge whether the overcharge is complete, look out for his arm tilting upwards.

Axe and Shield

Unlike many other shield weapons in the game, this one has really good armor damage. When facing groups, get used to inputting a heavy attack after pushing, instead of executing a push attack.

Hammer and Shield

If the Axe and Shield’s single-target light attacks are not your thing, this one might be more to your liking, as its lights 1 and 2 have good group stagger. Its armor damage is hidden behind the push attack, however. The push attack also has the unique mechanic of letting you choose which heavy attack to follow up with, by varying how long you hold it.

Same as: Kruber’s Mace and Shield, Saltzpyre’s Skull-Splitter & Shield

Dual Axes

Compared to the single-handed axe, using this weapon is less risky: Its attack speed is higher, and Bardin moves much faster while swinging it. As an exchange, it loses one stamina shield, and deals less damage per second to both flesh and armored targets.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Dual Axes in the further resources.

Dual Hammers

DLC: Back to Ubersreik

These alternative dual weapons have significant differences to the Dual Axes: A lot of their attacks are good at staggering groups, and they have double the available stamina. In return, their attack and movement speed is not quite as fast, and armor can only be damaged by heavy and push attacks.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Dual Hammers in the further resources.

Same as: Saltzpyre’s Paired Skull-Splitters

Cog Hammer

DLC: Outcast Engineer Career

The Cog Hammer has a very similar moveset to the War Pick. It attacks quicker and its heavy attacks deal even higher armor damage. And on top of that, the heavy attacks also have an increased headshot modifier. Sadly though, you are unable to overcharge them.

Kerillian

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for almost all of Kerillian’s weapons in the further resources.

Sword

Unlike the other Sword weapons, Kerillian’s is not an all-round defensive weapon: Its cleave combo is short, and it has no increased stamina. Instead, its selling point are the impressive single-target heavy attacks: They deal high flesh and armor damage, attack very fast for heavies, and even have 10% bonus crit chance.

Dual Daggers

To use this rapid single-target weapon, you should get used to two things: Firstly, headshotting with rising slashes (See section Further information for an explanation). Secondly, controlling enemies by shoving them around, as your blocking ability is abysmal, but compensated by reduced push costs. The push attack and lights 3 and 4 come with 10% bonus crit chance.

Dual Swords

High attack speed and good cleaving ability makes this one of the safest horde clearing weapons around. It even activates Swift Slaying consistently, as Lights 3 and 4 come with a whopping 25% and 50% bonus to crit chance, respectively. In return, dealing with armored enemies will take forever.

Sword and Dagger

This weapon combines the last two entries into one, giving you the ability to access any of their upsides, but requiring a bit of memorization to use correctly. It also comes with cheap pushing like the dual daggers, while having worse block costs as a downside. And all its single-target attacks have 10% bonus crit chance.

Note: Even though it makes no sense, Heavy 1 hits like two cleaving swords, while Heavy 2 hits like two armor-piercing daggers, and not a mix of both.

Glaive

While the Glaive’s light attacks are simple and effective, its heavies are quite odd: The quick armor-piercing overhead slash can only be accessed after Heavy 1, by inputting a light attack. The effort is worth it, as the resulting damage is enormous.

Greatsword

In typical Greatsword fashion, the light attacks have great cleave, and they also come with 10% bonus crit chance (And the push attack even with 25%). Heavy attacks are, again, where it gets weird: Inputting a heavy attack always gives you Heavy 1, even after itself. But inputting light attack after Heavy 1 gives you the horizontal cleave.

Elven Spear

This spear’s range and attack speed make it perfect for constantly poking at heads from a safe distance. And if things get too close for that, its 180° effective block angle helps keeping you protected. But if enemy groups become too dense you might become uncomfortable, as its cleaving attacks can not be chained into each other.

Elven Axe

DLC: Back to Ubersreik

All the single-target damage you’d ever want in one weapon, but no cleave at all. And while attacking, your movement speed is extremely low, at least for elf standards. For self-defense, you will need to rely on your dodging ability, which remains quite good. The push attack comes with 20% bonus crit chance.

Spear and Shield

DLC: Winds of Magic

Kerillian’s only shield weapon, and a rather well-rounded one as well. Its cleave attacks are decently accessible, and its best armor damage moves can be accessed after a push attack, which shouldn’t be a problem on a career with +100% stamina regeneration speed.

Note: Unlike the other shield weapons, this one does not improve your stamina recovery delay after pushing.

Briar Javelin

DLC: Sister of the Thorn Career

This ranged weapon can be aimed by holding right click, and then thrown. While not aiming, it acts like a melee weapon, though one that cannot block at all. Lights 3 to 5 have higher attack speed than the previous ones, and Light 5 even applies an additional bleed, meaning that opening with Heavy 1 and then going into lights leads to much better burst damage than spamming all lights.

Victor Saltzpyre

Rapier

For a starting weapon, the Rapier has a surprising amount of extra mechanics. Unlike Saltzpyre’s other weapons, it has very good defense, considering its built-in block cost reduction and halved push costs. Its base damage is low, but its headshot multiplier is huge, especially against super armor. This makes Light 3’s trajectory impractical, so using a block cancel after Light 2 and going into a Push Attack is often a good idea, enabled by the low push cost.

Overcharging its heavy attacks roughly doubles their damage, which leads to a small increase in damage per second. The weapon special shoots a pistol without requiring ammo. The shot deals big damage at close range, but has a sharp fall-off and becomes almost useless at around Witch Hunter Captain’s career skill range. The pistol can be shot while continuously blocking, which is especially valuable against berserkers.

Falchion

This is Saltzpyre’s closest equivalent to a standard sword. Its cleaving attacks deal increased headshot damage, while Light 3 and the heavy attacks don’t, but have big base damage instead.

Axe

A purely single-target weapon with only standard defense, which is risky against hordes. But the damage potential is great. The light and push attacks have 10% bonus crit chance.
Same as: Bardin’s Axe

Greatsword

The opposite of the Axe: Great cleaving attacks, but struggles with armor damage, as its best single-target damage comes from the push attack.
Same as: Kruber’s Greatsword

Flail

Each of the Flail’s light attacks is good at what it does specifically, so you should get used to accessing the right ones at the right time. The heavy attacks, on the other hand, just do it all! A great weapon for beating up skaven patrols.

Axe and Falchion

DLC: Back to Ubersreik

The light attack’s properties vary wildly, but with how good the attack speed is, you can still often get away with spamming them. If you need to create more space against hordes, use the push attack, as it has improved cleave and also gets followed by the lights that cleave. For single target damage, it is possible to land double headshots with your heavy attacks.

Note: Even though it makes no sense, both your weapons suddenly have the same properties when heavy attacking.

Bill Hook

DLC: Winds of Magic

This weapon’s special attack pulls any single enemy towards you, staggering them. This even works on chaos warriors, hookrats and attacking berserkers, just not bosses. Landing it costs half a stamina shield, which is cheap enough to bully any of these enemies for a long time. The special attack can also be weaved into your melee combos at any point, so loops like [Special > Heavy 2 > Special …] are possible for safe takedowns. Due to its few cleaving attacks, the weapon tends to struggle against hordes, however.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Bill Hook in the further resources.

Flail & Shield

DLC: Warrior Priest of Sigmar Career

Like the standard Flail, you want to access the correct lights at the right times, which works differently because their order is swapped, with a new shield bash in the middle. And this weapon’s heavy attacks do even more things at once, as they also block for you while charging.

Reckoner Great Hammer

DLC: Warrior Priest of Sigmar Career

This hammer is able to bash everything around just as you’d expect, just be aware that it mixes up the attack properties of lights and heavies on every third attack. So you can either mix them in your combo routes, or use the weapon special attack to reset your combo and restart with Light/Heavy 1. The special attack itself is quite underwhelming however, and you’d miss out on Heavy 3, one of the heaviest hitters in the entire game. Light 3 and Heavy 1 come with 10% extra crit chance.
Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Reckoner Great Hammer in the further resources.

Paired Skull-Splitters

DLC: Warrior Priest of Sigmar Career

These hammers come with lots of stagger on your cleaving attacks and an extra stamina shield. But compared to the warrior priest’s other options, their armor damage is a little bit lacking, so pick your other weapon accordingly.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Paired Skull-Splitters in the further resources.
Same as: Bardin’s Dual Hammers

Skull-Splitter & Blessed Tome

DLC: Warrior Priest of Sigmar Career

Holding this weapon’s heavy attacks or weapon special charges up the book. This charge can either be stored for later, or used up by releasing a heavy attack for increased effects: Heavy 1 gains a forward dash and a little bit of damage, while Heavy 2 gains a large explosion around the attacked enemy, dealing damage to and staggering nearby enemies, based on their distance from the explosion. This helps to replace the missing cleave attacks in the weapon’s moveset. All of its light attacks have 10% bonus crit chance.

Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Skull-Splitter & Blessed Tome in the further resources.

Skull-Splitter & Shield

DLC: Warrior Priest of Sigmar Career

A shield weapon whose first lights can stagger groups well, but whose armor damage is mostly hidden behind the push attack. The push attack also has the unique mechanic of letting you choose which heavy attack to follow up with, by varying how long you hold it.
Same as: Kruber’s Shield and Mace, Bardin’s Shield and Hammer

Skull-Splitter Hammer

DLC: Warrior Priest of Sigmar Career

An all-round weapon with extra stamina, which can also be useful for starting your cleave combos with push attacks. Its heavy attacks deal as much damage as the Axe’s.
Same as: Kruber’s Mace, Bardin’s Hammer

Sienna Fuegonasus

Sword

A decent defensive weapon, given its extra stamina and good cleaving attacks. Killing armored units may take a while, however.
Same as: Kruber’s Sword

Mace

A heavy-hitting weapon whose lights and heavies both start with single-target attacks, and then go into cleaving ones. So to quickly take down armored targets, get used to constantly block-cancelling your combos. Against groups, you have the option to use [Push Atk > Light 3 > Light 4], which has good attack speed but costs stamina. Alternatively, you could also loop heavy attacks, which deal far more damage into groups, but also attack much slower. Adding some more attack speed into your build, or looping Heavy 2 and Light 3 instead can help with this.

Fire Sword

A weapon defined by a single one of its attacks: Heavy 1, which actually works exactly like a shield bash, having infinite cleave, and being unable to headshot. It also applies a strong burn to all affected enemies and strongly staggers them, creating lots of space for you and your allies. You can repeatedly cast Heavy 1 by block-cancelling, or alternatively loop it with Heavy 2 or Light 1.

Dagger

The Dagger’s Heavy 1 is a shield bash like the Fire Sword’s, also having infinite cleave and applying a stagger and a burn. The burn is much weaker though, since it only affects enemies in the center, and only ticks once on any enemy after the first. The dagger’s light attacks are much more spammable than the Fire Sword’s, attacking faster and all cleaving through enemies (even Light 3, despite being a stab). Just keep in mind that this weapon has no real way of dealing armor damage besides Heavy 2, which is sadly only accessible after Heavy 1. The Dagger can also push with reduced costs, but has a reduced effective block angle in return.
Note: You will find useful movement speed tech for the Dagger in the further resources.

Crowbill

DLC: Back to Ubersreik

The crowbill is purely a single-target weapon with decently high attack speed. It generally isn’t well-suited for self-defense due to never cleaving, but a popular choice for quickly dealing killing blows to larger enemies to gain temporary health from the appropriate level 5 talent.

Flaming Flail

DLC: Winds of Magic

This one’s attack properties vary wildly, so getting the most out of it requires some practice. The explosion caused by Heavy 1 deals little damage and does not apply the burn, but its area stagger can be quite helpful. Keep in mind that the explosion does not count for generating temporary health with stagger talents at level 5, however.