Reinforced, Impenetrable and-or Nirnhoned?

SimonBelmont

Is anyone able to explain why I never see the Nirnhoned trait mentioned in PvP Build Guides? Does Reinforced simply offer more of both physical and spell resistance?

Many PvP Build Guides suggest Reinforced on Large Armor (Head, Chest, Legs) and Impenetrable on Small Armor (Shoulders, Hands, Waist, Feet). That makes sense...I guess.

But what about Nirnhoned? Does it have any place in PvP, as an Armor Trait?

Lughlongarm

-Reinforced simply gives more resistances on heavy armor pieces(gap is probably very small on belt and hands).

-Impen offers more value defense when it comes to light and medium pieces.

Nirnhoned is just a wasteful trait ATM and should be changed. Not to mentioned the cost of crafting the Nirnhoned trait.

SimonBelmont

Lughlongarm wrote: »

-Reinforced simply gives more resistances on heavy armor pieces(gap is probably very small on belt and hands).

-Impen offers more value defense when it comes to light and medium pieces.

Nirnhoned is just a wasteful trait ATM and should be changed. Not to mentioned the cost of crafting the Nirnhoned trait.

I wasn't specifically talking about Heavy, Medium or Light. But you're right about Reinforced on the Large Heavy Armor Pieces.

Considering how much we're already expected to pay to upgrade all our gear, I consider the cost of adding Nirnhoned to armor to be irrelevant.

Can anyone elaborate on why Nirnhoned is not used in PvP? (or is it?) Math please.

Kartalin

SimonBelmont wrote: »

Considering how much we're already expected to pay to upgrade all our gear, I consider the cost of adding Nirnhoned to armor to be irrelevant.

Can anyone elaborate on why Nirnhoned is not used in PvP? (or is it?) Math please.

Nirnhoned is better in certain cases since it increases armor by a flat number rather than a percentage. Heavy cuirass? Definitely want reinforced, but it’s only marginally better than nirnhoned. Same for pretty much all heavy pieces I believe (maybe not waist/hands). For medium and light though, and possibly shields, I believe nirnhoned comes out a little ahead.

Best place to test this is in UESP’s build editor where you can easily change gear traits and immediately see the net change.


Edit: regardless I think outside of a reinforced cuirass, I would use either impen or well fitted on most anything else, especially in no cp (and divines in specific cases). You have a little more flexibility in cp regarding crit resist and impen.

Waffennacht

The reason typically is, the amount added of resistance on small pieces is out weighed by the mitigation provided by impenetrable.

So let show exact numbers: (I think these are correct)
Reinforced 16% of that pieces armor value added
Nirnhoned 253 flat value armor added
Impenetrable 124 critical damage mitigation.

For a light armor arm piece I think its resistance is around 700 (lets just assume it is for now)
Reinforced gives you around 100 more resistance (.15% mitigation)
Nirnhoned gives a flat .37% mitigation
Impenetrable gives a flat 2% critical damage mitigation.

As you can see impenetrable will give you a ton more overall mitigation than the others on a light gloves.

Even if my numbers are off for the base resistance, you could still quadruple the base number for light armor gloves and impen will still provide more mitigation.

The only reason it wouldnt is if your opponent is running malacath. And it is popular. In this scenario then Nirnhoned is the better option. (But its too specific of a situation to usually make the investment worth it)

Edit: logged in and got the numbers

MashmalloMan

Waffennacht wrote: »

The reason typically is, the amount added of resistance on small pieces is out weighed by the mitigation provided by impenetrable.

So let show exact numbers: (I think these are correct)
Reinforced 16% of that pieces armor value added
Nirnhoned 253 flat value armor added
Impenetrable 124 critical damage mitigation.

For a light armor arm piece I think its resistance is around 700 (lets just assume it is for now)
Reinforced gives you around 100 more resistance (.15% mitigation)
Nirnhoned gives a flat .37% mitigation
Impenetrable gives a flat 2% critical damage mitigation.

As you can see impenetrable will give you a ton more overall mitigation than the others on a light gloves.

Even if my numbers are off for the base resistance, you could still quadruple the base number for light armor gloves and impen will still provide more mitigation.

The only reason it wouldnt is if your opponent is running malacath. And it is popular. In this scenario then Nirnhoned is the better option. (But its too specific of a situation to usually make the investment worth it)

Edit: logged in and got the numbers

Most people barely stack crit to begin with in pvp. You start with 10% at base, lets assume you're dealing with a 5/1/1 Med or Light user, thats 15%. Add in 12% Major Crit buff (which some people don't even bother with). Maybe 1 piece of your armor set unfortunately has 3% crit on 1-4 piece. Thats a total of 30% crit chance.

.3 * 2 = 0.6%

So in that scenario, you're mitigating 0.6% of the damage you take as crits. This is obviously impossible to figure out an average for since some people will be in 5-7 pieces of heavy and avoid the Major Crit buff entirely. For them, they maybe have 15-20% crit chance? So even less.

Now look at the meta (before U30), Malacath Band is on almost every other player, so you're not even taking crit damage to begin with meaning it's completely wasted.

So yeah, the value for what you get (0.6% in my example vs 0.3% in your example) seems larger, but it could be less, it could be more, it could be completely irrelivent and it's tied to RNG which is why it can justify a higher comparable value.

I personally think Impen has been dead since they created Malacath (pre U30) and gave everyone base -20% crit damage resist. Even if someone does crit you, with absolutely no impen and no crit damage buffs, you're going to only take 1.3x damage, not like in pve where you can stack beyond 2x crit damage at a rate of 70% crit chance. So even if you had 5 pieces of impen, that 1.3x is now 1.2x. It's not much different for something that might not even be applicable to the person you're fighting.

Then again, if everyone goes this route, maybe crit builds in pvp will be a thing at some point. Well fitted is my personal fav to avoid some damage completely at a cheaper cost. Sprinting cost reduction is just a small bonus.

Kartalin

It’s not necessarily crit builds but the nightblades from stealth that you need the crit resist for. Plus non crit builds still end up with 20-25% crit so there’s still going to be consistent crit hits being made against you in a fight.

Sahidom

Reinforced is better than Nirnhoned on medium and heavy; whereas, Nirnhoned is better than Reinforced on light armor.

A Reinforced heary chest offers better crit damage mitigation than Impen., and probably true for the other large heavy armor pieces.

It seems Impenetrable is more efficient trait on the small pieces since they've given a free Impenetrable base value across the board.

L_Nici

Nirnhoned never had a place on armor. Which is why Nirncrux for armor is dirt cheap, no one ever uses it, no matter if PvE or PvP.

xylena_lazarow

The effectiveness of impen is dependent on what sort of crit stats are in the meta and the likelihood of being one shot comboed by crit builds. Meanwhile, there's simply no downside to stacking armor.

geonsocal

I'm probably about 10 updates behind, but, i'm still going infused on large armor pieces and a mix of well-fitted, divines, sturdy and impenetrable on small pieces depending on the particular toon build...

actively blocking and roll dodging at the right times is a good thing...

taugrim

I go heavy on Well-Fitted personally. Running out of Stamina in any build — magicka or stamina — significantly limits your options for defense and mobility.

The problem with stacking Impen is that not everyone builds for crit chance / crit damage, given that players get a base 20 percentage point reduction for crit in PVP (i.e. crit damage ratio is 1.3x base in PVP).

If you're trying to boost your survivability, look at armor, either as set bonuses or via weight.

YandereGirlfriend

Nirnhoned needs to provide a different bonus entirely as the current situation of having two skills that both buff the same stat (Armor) is completely asinine.

Giving Nirnhoned a bonus such as +25%* to the per piece armor bonuses/penalties of the given weight would be a far more interesting option. It would be sort of like the Divines trait for your armor weight passives rather than for your Mundus Stone selection.

*+25% is just a ballpark figure that could be tuned tighter through testing.

Goregrinder

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Nirnhoned needs to provide a different bonus entirely as the current situation of having two skills that both buff the same stat (Armor) is completely asinine.

Giving Nirnhoned a bonus such as +25%* to the per piece armor bonuses/penalties of the given weight would be a far more interesting option. It would be sort of like the Divines trait for your armor weight passives rather than for your Mundus Stone selection.

*+25% is just a ballpark figure that could be tuned tighter through testing.

Yeah it's a little convoluted. If they wanted Nirnhoned to be a defensive trait when it comes to armor, they should make it decrease the damage you take from procs and dots or something.

CaperGuy

YandereGirlfriend wrote: »

Nirnhoned needs to provide a different bonus entirely as the current situation of having two skills that both buff the same stat (Armor) is completely asinine.

Giving Nirnhoned a bonus such as +25%* to the per piece armor bonuses/penalties of the given weight would be a far more interesting option. It would be sort of like the Divines trait for your armor weight passives rather than for your Mundus Stone selection.

*+25% is just a ballpark figure that could be tuned tighter through testing.

That would be interesting. Medium Armour toons would be busted OP though cause of no penalties.

Wing

summation?

take something like well fitted and simply avoid all the damage in the first place. or divines and kill them before you take the damage.

ResidentContrarian

Wing wrote: »

summation?

take something like well fitted and simply avoid all the damage in the first place. or divines and kill them before you take the damage.

^ This is what you want. Especially since on live, armor is buggy.