One-Handed (Skyrim)

''The art of combat using one-handed weapons such as daggers, swords, maces, and war axes. Those trained in this skill deliver deadlier blows.''

"You're like me, eh? Don't fancy those clunky two-handed weapons."

- Hold Guard

One-Handed is a skill in and is one of the six skills that falls under The Warrior play-style. One-Handed directly affects the damage the player deals with one-handed weapons. The perks obtained in this skill tree only affect one-handed weapons. Due to a glitch, this includes the Ebony Blade, and Headsman's Axe, both of which are Two-Handed weapons.

The One-Handed tree gives the player the opportunity to increase their damage output through wielding two one-handed weapons simultaneously. This is referred to as "dual-wielding". While this potentially doubles damage output, it also removes the ability to block any attacks. It is advisable, though not necessary, to back up a dual-wielding playstyle with defensive skill trees, such as Heavy Armor or Restoration. Alteration can also hold advantages using various forms of mage armor.

Despite not adding towards the One-Handed skill, unarmed attacks do benefit from some One-Handed perks, including the Dual Wielding perks. Perks from other skills that affect one-handed weapons (Such as the Backstab perk from the Sneak skill) do not seem to affect unarmed attacks, however.

One-Handed weapons
The following are the weapons that benefit from this skill:

Craftable weapons
This is a list of One-Handed weapons that can be crafted by the player at a Forge..


 * Dagger - Iron, Steel, Orcish, Dwarven, Elven, Glass, Ebony, Daedric, Dragonbone.
 * Mace - Iron, Steel, Orcish, Dwarven, Elven, Glass, Ebony, Daedric, Dragonbone.
 * Sword - Iron, Steel, Orcish, Dwarven, Elven, Glass, Ebony, Daedric,Dragonbone, Nord Hero.
 * War Axe - Iron, Steel, Orcish, Dwarven, Elven, Glass, Ebony, Daedric, Dragonbone,Nord Hero.

Non-Craftable Weapons
This is a list of weapons the cannot be crafted by the player. They are either received as a quest reward or looted throughout the world. They may or may not be unique.


 * Dagger - Alessandra's Dagger, Blade of Sacrifice, Blade of Woe, Bloodthorn, Borvir's Dagger, Keening, Kahvozein's Fang, Mehrunes' Razor, Nettlebane, Rundi's Dagger, Shiv, Skyforge Steel, Valdr's Lucky Dagger, Dragon Priest Dagger.
 * Mace - Mace of Molag Bal, Rusty Mace.
 * Sword - Amren's Family Sword, Ancient Nordic, Bolar's Oathblade, Blades Sword, Ceremonial Sword, Chillrend, Dawnbreaker, Dragonbane, Drainheart Sword, Eduj, Falmer, Forsworn Sword, Gauldur Blackblade, Ghostblade, Grimsever, Hjalti's Sword, Imperial, Nightingale Blade, Red Eagle's Fury, Red Eagle's Bane Scimitar, Silver, Skyforge Steel, The Pale Blade, Queen Freydis's Sword, Windshear
 * War Axe - Ancient Nordic, Falmer, Forsworn, Notched Pickaxe, Okin, Poacher's Axe, Skyforge Steel

With very few exceptions, many of these can be upgraded at a grindstone.

Perks
The following are the perks that become available to select as the skill is leveled up.

Skill Effect on One-Handed Weapon Damage
The One-Handed skill directly increases the damage dealt with One-Handed weapons. For each skill level, weapon damage increases by 0.5%. This increase is multiplicative with bonus damage from the Armsman perk and weapon improvements.

Fortify One-Handed Enchantments
One-handed weapons receive increased attack power from boots, bracers, necklaces and rings enchanted with the Fortify One-Handed enchantment. However, Daggers are uniquely unaffected by these enchantments.

Training

 * Amren (Common): Whiterun
 * Athis of The Companions (Expert): Jorrvaskr
 * Chief Burguk (Master): Dushnikh Yal in The Reach

Books and quests
The following books also increase the player's skill: The following miscellaneous quests increase the One-Handed Skill:
 * 2920, Morning Star, v1
 * Fire and Darkness
 * Mace Etiquette
 * Night Falls on Sentinel
 * The Importance of Where
 * Retrieve Amren's family sword for Amren in Whiterun. This also increases Block.
 * Retreive Hjalti's sword for The Ghost of Old Hroldan at Old Hroldan Inn. This also increases Block.
 * Find Rjorn's Drum for Giraud Gemane in The Bard College in Solitude. This also increases all other combat-oriented skills such as Heavy Armor and Smithing.

Leveling One-Handed

 * Gaining progress towards the next skill up is determined by the base weapon damage and not the number of hits or the damage done. Thus, the best weapon to use for leveling is a base Daedric Dagger, due to its damage and speed. Drinking Fortify One-handed by 75% potions, using Fortify One-handed enchantments, smithing weapons to legendary and multiplying their damage by x5, or sneak attacking by x15 does not benefit the leveling. Also as these methods damage the target faster, using these are not advised while leveling One-handed. These findings are based on extensive controlled environment testing and are accurate.
 * One of the fastest ways to level up is to equip a plain Daedric Dagger, Amulet of Talos, obtain the Blessing of Talos, use the Elemental Fury shout, then hammer the attack button against Shadowmere. The player will dish out a good 3 to 4 swings per second while the shout is active.
 * Leveling from 94 to 95 is done in 170 hits with Daedric Dagger and takes approximately 3 minutes if the player is hitting Frost or Shadowmere, and much more if they are hitting an enemy. Thus it is advised to put this hard to level skill on the player's training priority list.
 * Due to Mehrunes' Razor having a small chance to instantly kill any creature, the player should not use this weapon if they plan to level the skill by attacking followers.
 * When the player comes across the bear while escaping Helgen at the beginning of the game the player's companion (Hadvar or Ralof) will not progress forward so an easy way to rank the player's one handed skill is to attack him. He will never die in this way. Doing this while the player is crouched behind him will also rank their sneak skill as well. The player can also do this in the first room in Helgen Keep if they went with Ralof. Right as the heavily armored Imperial dies, they should loot the key and Ralof is stuck until they decide to open the gate.
 * Hitting immortal characters when they kneel due to near death condition, doesn't count against leveling. It's better to let them to recover, or even heal them if the player is planning to level by this method.
 * Becoming Harbinger of The Companions will allow training to expert level with Athis, the player can also have him as a follower which allows all the gold spent training to be returned (take it from his inventory).'
 * Arguably, the most important perk is the Armsman, for it increases the player's damage by 20% per rank.
 * Another way how to level One-Handed skill is to conjure an Atronach or Familiar and kill him over and over again.
 * Be aware that attacking a summoned Atronach may cause it to attack the player in return. Also as with regular Atronachs found in the open world, summoned ones can damage the player and any surrounding NPCs when they explode on death.
 * Attack a follower, wait for their health display to disappear, repeat. Lower level skills will benefit most from this (also works with bows and two-handed weapons).
 * A good way to train the One-Handed skill is to first set the game difficulty to Master. Then summon a Spectral Assasin after finishing the Dark Brotherhood questline. Kill the Spectral Assasin and wait for 24 hours. Summon him again and rinse and repeat. The Spectral Assasin might start to attack the player but if they are at a high enough level, it will not matter.