"Flaming Sword" and "Frost Spear" - a.k.a. Slashing vs. Piering Weapons

[Guru-Meditation]

Hi!

I was wondering what are the Pros & Cons of these two weapons?

Cost, proficiency, tech requirement and class requirements are all equal. So it boils down to "Slashing vs. Piercing" and "Flame Attack vs. Frost Attack"

In Flame vs. Frost i think it depends on the enemys you are most likely to face. But in the Slashing vs. Piercing i see a large advantage for Piercing, as 2 Firststrikes always seem to be way better then +10% versus Light Armor.

So, is there really such a general advantage to Piercing Weapons over Slashing Weapons, or am i missing something?

 

[Sezneg]

The underlying effects are adopted from the base weapons (spear vs sword), which are balanced around requiring metal vs wood.

The only reason to pick one of the magical variety vs the other is that fire damage and cold are more or less effective based on what you are attacking. Fire damage wrecks the Illians and Frozen, but orcs and some other unit types are resistant, or have access to buffs that make them resistant (assume any civ with fire mana access is going to have or eventually have resistance on their arcane unit's aura).