What is a melee weapon in Fortnite and how to deal damage with it

Earlier this week in Fortnite Season 8, Epic Games released a new set of Punchcard quests along with two fresh NPCs. These NPCs are Dire and Ragsy, both of whom should be familiar to veterans of Fortnite. With Dire specifically, fans are a bit confused on how to complete one of their early challenges. It states that players are required to deal damage to wildlife with a melee weapon. The problem is that players aren’t exactly sure what a melee weapon is defined as in Fortnite.

In traditional video games, a melee weapon is described as a blunt object that players use with their hands to deal damage to an enemy or structure. Something like a wrench, crowbar, baseball bat, etc. have all been considered melee weapons in other video game titles. However, in Fortnite, the melee weapons work a little differently.

Melee weapons in Fortnite

For starters, the main melee weapon in Fortnite is going to be a player’s ever-so-reliable Pickaxe, or Harvesting Tool. The Pickaxe is something that every player spawns into Fortnite with and has been in the game since the beginning. While its primary use is for cutting down trees or other structures and objects for materials, players can also use it to deal damage.

A single hit with a Pickaxe to an enemy deals 20 damage. This isn’t horrible but the issue is that players likely don’t survive long enough to deal enough damage to kill an enemy. Though, it’s a reliable option if an enemy doesn’t have a weapon and the player is out of bullets, for example. Any Pickaxe in Fortnite will deal the same damage, no matter if it splits into two separate tools or how it looks.

Currently, the Pickaxe is the only melee weapon in the game. In the past, there have been items like the Lightsaber and Infinity Blade that have counted as a melee weapon, but those are long gone. So to complete this specific Dire Punchcard quest, players need to find some wildlife, whip out their Pickaxe and start dealing damage. Wildlife is found all over the Season 8 map but more commonly at Stealthy Stronghold in the northwest part of the map.