Weapon swap

To weapon swap refers broadly to the action of changing your current weapon set, usually by pressing F1 to F4. This has a range of applications.

Enchanting

One basic application is to keep your normal weapon set on one swap, and keep another weapon with an of Enchanting upgrade, and switch to the Enchanting weapon when it is time to cast a long lasting enchantment such as Elemental Attunement or skills that benefit largely from even an extra second such as Aegis or enchantment-based speed boosts.

Energy

Swapping up or swapping down to hide energy is a necessary skill in mitigating energy denial. If you are likely to be the target of energy denial, keep a weapon with a Brawn over Brains inscription and a shield. Instead of using a shield there is a quest reward from the quest Cities of Ascalon which can give you -2 energy when you don't meet the requirement for it. This makes you able to hide even more energy. The weapon set with a shield, which is the most common choice, will grant a total of -5 energy while equipped, and if your primary set has +10, +12, +15, or +17, you are able to hide up to 22 energy by switching to the low energy set. Energy that is hidden in this way cannot be destroyed by foes using skills like Energy Burn or Debilitating Shot or by using skills like Purge Signet. This can also be used to prematurely end hexes with an 'ends if target foe's energy reaches zero' clause such as Malaise.

Offense

Another highly useful application is having an offense swap to be used for casting anything. A good example would be a Fire Magic Elementalist using a Fire Magic Wand with a Wrapping of Memory, and an Aptitude not Attitude Inscription, and a Fire Magic Focus with a Focus Core of Aptitude and a Forget Me Not inscription for a combined double 20% chance to both cast Fire Magic skills faster, and have them recharge faster. This is usually referred to as a '40/40 swap'. Weapon swapping by martial professions mainly occurs exploit weaknesses in Ranger or Warrior armor by not using or using weapons enhanced by elemental mods respectivel; the benefit of the latter may be non-existant however, due to utilization of Sentinel's Insignias which may be discovered through communicating with your team's Elementalist or test hitting the opponent yourself in which case Sundering or Vampiric weapons may be more desirable to increase damage output. Furthermore, for martial classes especially Warriors, usage of Vampiric or Zealous mods causes the damage type of the weapon to become obvious to the opponent thus alternating between a various combination of irregular damage type weapons i.e. Piercing Axe/Battlepick, Colossal Pick and Jitte with standard weapons enhanced by Vampiric/Zealous, Sundering and Elemental mods regularly in battle prevents the target shield-swapping effectively.

Defense

Players often commonly use a defensive swap to be used while under attack. To complement an offensive swap, a one handed Martial weapon with an "of Defense" (or "of Fortitude") upgrade and a shield with an "of Fortitude" upgrade grants an additional 30 health and 13 AL (or 60 health and 8 AL), even if you do not meet the requirement of the shield. +13 AL sets are a better choice for reducing damage, while a +60 health set is more useful in surviving in situations that have already pushed the player to low health, such as during spikes or while under health degeneration. The shield can also be further inscribed for extra defense against certain damage types, like Piercing or Lightning or reduce the duration of debilitating conditions such as Blind, Daze and Cripple. It is not uncommon for players to carry shields inscribed against each type of damage and condition in their inventory and to switch the equipped shield depending on the incoming damage type or what conditions they about to be afflicted with. To bypass the four weapon slot limitation, shields may be accessed by opening the more compact All Bags Panel (default hotkey: "F9") rather than the usual Inventory Panel (default hotkey: "I"). Additionally shield skin/color codes maybe mentally assigned for further ease of shield switching but this may also require re-modding/re-dyeing/alternating between sets of shields to avoid counter-swapping by melee opponents. Alternatively, a simple "reduces physical damage" mod may be applied on shields for a more affordable, general-purpose defense but this method of protection is often significantly inferior.

Faster resurrection

Using a Wand and Focus each with a 20% chance of halved cast time can improve the cast time of spells like Resurrection Chant or Flesh of My Flesh, even if you do not meet the requirements in Healing Prayers or Restoration Magic.

Notes

• Weapon swaps are queued, like any other action; if you want the swap to take place sooner, press <escape> to clear the queue.

Bug.Sometimes after a swap, weapons do not return to their originally placed inventory slot. This happens frequently when interchanging two-handed sets with sets that include single-handed and/or off-hand weapon. (Developers have said that this is an unintended consequence of other design choices.) You can prevent this from happening with the following one-time work-around:

1. Enable all the relevant weapon sets.
2. Place each weapon in its desired slot (e.g. in an Equipment Pack).
3. Ensure that each set includes an off-hand weapon (even if it uses a two-handed weapon); ideally, choose an off-hand from one of the other sets.
4. Cycle through the enabled sets, e.g. F1→F2→F3→F4. If an item pops into the wrong slot, stop and move it back.
5. Repeat until items return to their desired slot.