You need to fight for everything you earn in Valheim. You begin with next to nothing and are expected to work your way up to the challenge of facing down monsters more than double your size while even a cold night can mean your death. In those early hours, you will be stringing together basic bits of wood and stone to make whatever crude tools and weapons you can manage to craft. But, after you overcome that initial hump, a wide selection of weapons opens up to you.
There are several different types of weapons — such as axes, swords, and bows — but they are far from equal in terms of power. The best of the best are special weapons with their own unique names and abilities, but that kind of power isn’t just handed to you. These will cost you some of the rarest materials you can find in Valheim but are the only ones worthy of a true Viking. Here are all the best weapons you can get in the game, and what materials you’ll need to find in order to make them.
Further reading
Abyssal harpoon
What we consider to be the best weapon in all of Valheim is also the only harpoon the game has to offer, at least at the moment. It is a one-handed weapon that you throw at your target and can then draw back toward yourself, almost like a certain axe from another Norse-inspired game. This is perfect for hunting any creature that has a tendency to run away, dragging sea creatures out of the water to die on dry land, or if you’re working on your Scorpion impression from Mortal Kombat. It isn’t the strongest weapon in terms of pure damage, but we find it the best overall due to its range, utility, and just how fun it is to harpoon something and drag it around. It pairs great with a stronger melee weapon too if you use it to pull in a target and then switch.
Crafting the Abyssal harpoon costs 30 pieces of Chitin, eight fine wood, and three leather scraps. Chitin is collected by mining abyssal barnacles out in the ocean near islands.
Frostner
The Frostner axe is basically the most Viking weapon in the entire game. It is classified as an axe but is as big and thick as a hammer. It does a nice amount of blunt damage, but the real use of this weapon comes in it also inflicting frost and spirit damage, as well as causing a ton of knockback to any enemy unlucky enough to get hit by it. Between the damage of the initial hit, the frost dealing damage over time, and the stagger it causes, there are very few enemies that can stand up to the might of Frostner. What’s the downside? This bad boy is considered the most expensive weapon to make in the entire game, but as an end-game goal, it will be worth all the time it takes to get.
Frostner needs 30 silver, five Ymir Flesh, 10 ancient bark, and five freeze glands. Ymir Flesh has to be purchased from the merchant Haldor in the Black Forest, while freeze glands and silver must be collected in a mountain biome.
Abyssal razor
The other Abyssal weapon might seem like a step down since it is just a knife, but the razor is much more powerful than you might expect. Yes, the normal damage looks like it wouldn’t be worth much even when you factor in how fast knives attack, but this blade is ideal for all you stealth players out there. If you can sneak up on a foe and hit them with a backstab, the Abyssal razor will deal 10 times as much damage. If you pair it with some armor that buffs your stealth, you can become more of a Viking assassin than Eivior from Assassin’s Creed Valhalla.
The Abyssal razor is also one of the cheaper weapons on this list. You’ll need 20 Chitin, four fine wood, and two leather scraps.
The Porcupine
OK, so this weapon doesn’t have the most intimidating name of all time, but the Porcupine lets its stats do the talking. This massive ball of spikes on a stick deals both blunt and piercing damage and is remarkably fast to swing for its size. Between the two damage types, it is one of the top weapons in the game already just based on raw numbers, but also being one-handed and cheap almost makes the game too easy if you go for it early. Unless an enemy is at range, there’s no problem the Porcupine isn’t capable of dealing with.
If you want one of your own, gather up 20 iron, five fine wood, 10 linen thread, and five needles. Needles can be harvested from Deathsquitos in a plain biome, and linen is made by using flax on a spinning wheel.
Draugr Fang
For all your archers out there, or if you just like having a strong ranged option to open up combat with, there’s no competition when it comes to which bow is the strongest in Valheim. The Draugr Fang has massive piercing damage, but the unique effect is what makes this bow something even strictly melee-focused characters should consider picking up. No matter what type of arrow you have equipped with this bow, it will automatically deal poison damage. No need to craft special poison arrows! It is also very accurate, so a skilled archer can do a lot of work with this bow before the enemy even has a chance to get close.
Crafting this top-tier bow will be expensive. You need 10 silver, 10 guck, 10 ancient bark, and two deer hide. Guck is located in swamp biomes and is the green goo you will see on the side of trees.
Stagbreaker
OK, now we’re talking heavy, two-handed weapons. If you just want to go full berserk and smash things for the highest amount of damage possible, get yourself a Stagbreaker. This giant blunt weapon has only one main downside, and that is the long attack and recovery speeds. Granted, if your swing connects, it won’t matter most of the time, especially with the insane knockback power and splash damage this huge hammer dishes out. There are few things as satisfying in Valheim as slamming down your Stagbreaker while getting mobbed by enemies and clearing them all out in just a couple of hits.
You can make yourself a Stagbreaker quite easily, too. All you need is 20 core wood, five deer trophies, and two leather scraps.
Huntsman bow
Aside from the named weapons, most of which can’t be made until far later in the game, there are some good options to hold you over until you reach that point in the game. The Huntsman Bow, as an example, is much easier to make than the Draugr Fang and can hold its own for a long time if you keep upgrading it. There’s not much else to say except that this is the best non-unique bow in the game.
A Huntsman Bow costs 20 iron, 10 fine wood, 10 feathers, and two dear hides to craft.
Silver sword
There are no unique swords in the game yet, but the best one we’ve found if you’re fond of the traditional sword is a nice silver sword. It has a high slashing damage stat, which you probably could’ve guessed, but what puts it above the rest of the mid- to late-game swords is the extra spirit damage it inflicts. That, plus being relatively cheap to make, make it the obvious choice for your trusty blade.
Make a silver sword by rounding up 40 silver, five iron, three leather scraps, and two wood. Again, silver can be mined in the mountain biome.
Blackmetal Axe
Our last pick is another cheap option to help tide you over until you’ve gotten your hands on a unique weapon, this time the blackmetal axe. Just like the silver sword, this weapon is nearly on the level of a unique weapon but falls short for one main reason. Obviously, it doesn’t have a unique name, but what this axe lacks is any form of defense. This weapon has zero parry force, so it offers no protection whatsoever. Thankfully it is one-handed and has insane slashing damage, but taking this axe into battle means you have to have a shield equipped if you hope to survive more than a few encounters. But if you love dealing high DPS, you can do way worse than this.
Forge yourself a blackmetal axe with 20 blackmetal bars, five linen thread, and six fine wood. Blackmetal bars are forged in a blast furnace from blackmetal scraps that drop from any kind of Fuling found in the plains biome.
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