I love using a mace on my warrior so much it's the only weapon he uses. The finishers are great especially when you bash them in the face or knock their head off.

Bet that Mace of Molag Bal is a lot of fun!

I find that there are very few unique artifacts I like. I don't really find any of the Daedric ones interesting, except maybe the shield, but it's a heavy shield so I won't be using that. The ones you get from the Jarls are ok, but too generic anyway. I like the ones you can craft via mods, particularly jsus swords has a really nice Ancient Norse sword, so that may be what finally tips the decision in favor of the sword. Although, there are some nice axes too.

Yeah, if you are going for an historically accurate Viking, then I guess you are right, swords and axes but no hammers. I love Tolkien/AD&D (1e) dwarves myself and of the 10 race choices in Skyrim, the one that comes the closest to dwarves would be the Nord, so my Nords follow more of a dwarf culture and use hammers whenever they get the chance and axes the rest of the time.

Swords were expensive and difficult to make. To be "accurate" an axe would be much more likely.

Sure, axes were likely the most popular Viking weapon, but they did use swords as well. I'm not the one who wants to be a historically accurate Viking though. That's the OP. I'd rather be a traditional fantasy dwarf with a shield and one handed hammer. But that is not available, so I play my Nords with two handed hammers as the closest approximation available in the TES universe. Wish there was a skyforge steel hammer available.

EDIT: Back in the eighties when I used to play D&D, my favorite character was a dwarf named Hrothgar Goldwall.

Never picked that one up on my warrior. I prefer an Ebony enchanted with flame.

The base damage difference is pretty negligible.

Look at special abilities, specifically what you have to "invest" in:
-Swords get critical hits
-Axes get bleed

Axes are worthless because the perk system is dumb. The damage doesn't scale and is completely limited to perk level which means it becomes worthless. The critical hit chance is a damage multiplier that automatically scales with base damage increase.

Does it really matter? No. I go with axes all the time just because I think it looks cool.

You can always do what I did and choose to perk the one-handed tree the most, my Orc is skilled with both axes and swords and just a couple of perks in archery, there are some rather nice kill cams for axes along with swords. I found that you need to switch gears when swapping a sword out for an axe while in combat, you need to be up in their face for an axe to make contact, where as with a sword you can stay just outside their range and still manage to clip them.

If you're concerned that a heavy shield will not get the armor boost from the perks in the light armor tree, don't be. It does get the 25% bonus from Custom Fit, maybe even Matching Set. While shields are classified by their weight, they are not tied to a specific either armor skill, only Block. Another note, taking Quick Reflexes perk will help against those Two-Handed enemies, makes it super easy to bash, or dodge, their devastating power attacks. As for Sword vs Axe, I can't really add much, as about everything has already been said. I personally always prefer swords, mostly due to being a big fan of The Legend of Zelda.

I'm partial to the two handed swords myself, but I miss the glory days of the spear and dai katana in Morrowind

*snip

I started out always wanting a good sword with shield, but then I found an ebony axe and smithed it up and love it. Also use Mace of Malog too which I smithed up. Someone mentioned up thread they had an ebony mace - where can that be found?

I go with Swords. The extra critical chance from Bladesman is awesome, plus I have a mod that lets me sheath my 1-handed sword on my back. I look like a boss.

battles axes rule all but if you're talking hand axe then drop the shield and put another axe in it..if you use both dual flurry perks along then you wont need to block

My Nord Warrior uses a Mace+Shield, and it's brutal. Swings slower than a Sword or Axe, but does higher damage and staggers the crap out of my opponents, opening them up for even more brutal hits. Mace of Molag Bal (Legendary)+Spellbreaker (Legendary) are my favorite. I also have 3/3 Bone Breaker, and with the 75% Armor Ignore, i can actually hurt the Dragons from the Deadly Dragons mod on hardcoe/Master. Hitting them with a sword or axe is like poking at them with a toothpick.

(Dragons do not have armor- so bone breaker is not doing anything, just FYI)

War axe bro, you won't regret it.

Use an axe so you can axe people questions!