Some terrible ideas, I play a stam build in PvP with continuous, plus a dk minor brutality coupled with my major brutality I hit nearly 6k weapon damage as of now I happily run nirnhoned over anything else, give me another 10% weapon and spell damage and help buff my build and every other stam brawler thats stomping everything else out even faster. People really saying “nirnhoned is rare so it should be stronger!” Thankfully they don’t balance based on rarity or the lore collectors and master anglers would be slaughtering everyone.

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

It definitely needs a buff. 25% increase to that weapon’s damage would balance it with precise and infused for staves and bows, but the problem is that it would be too strong on 2h and dual wield main hand. IMO the way to solve this is to change it from a % to a flat value of Weapon + Spell Damage.

This would be similar to how the Warrior and Apprentice Stones work (and in general Mundus stones and weapon traits share the same values, Thief = Precise, Defending = Lady, Sharpened = Lover). However I also think that Warrior and Apprentice are too weak at 238 damage. To be balanced with other options, this would need to be closer to 350, or at least 300, for both Nirnhoned weapons and Mundus Stones. This would make them very close to the Thief/Precise for most builds, and Shadow could be reduced to around 11-12% to bring it in line with the rest.

This is from a PVE point of view, I’m not sure how the relative power of Nirn/Infused/Sharp/Precise is in PVP currently.

I also think that if any trait should be slightly better than others, it’s Nirnhoned. It’s the hardest to research, most expensive to craft, and doesn’t appear on most dropped gear so it requires researching and transmuting.

I agree on the first point - it appears that currently nirnhoned is balanced for 2h, where the 15% equates to ~235 damage. This follows the apparent balancing rule of weapon trait being close to equal in value to a mundus stone (similarly sharpened matches the lover and precise matches the thief). However this falls down in the case of bows and staves which have a lower base damage so will always be worse off with nirnhoned. Dual wield is a bit funny it is balanced if both weapons were nirnhoned, but if you do something like nirnhoned main hand and sharpened/precise/infused off hand you are actually getting more "value" due to how weapon/spell damage is determined from dual wield weapons. Having a flat value of 238 (to match mundus) would solve this. Like all other traits this would need to be halved for one handed weapons.

Regarding the relative balance between the different traits/mundus/trait - currently these follow the standard values that ZOS have implemented for sets across the board. In this case both mundus and weapon trait are set at being worth ~2x a normal set line bonus. I haven't checked them all but I think this is true for any that have a direct equivalent. I don't think they should be deviated from this relationship.

So really this is a question of the relative worth of critical chance vs spell/weapon damage and if the established relationship (129 damage vs ~3.8% crit chance in a set line) is "balanced". I agree that thief/precise are stronger for PvE. But this is the same as Mother's Sorrow being stronger than a hypothetical set that gives 3 standard lines of 129 spell damage and then 300 spell damage as the 5 piece. However, in PvP, due to lesser availability of crit damage buffs and a further reduction from impen, the reverse would be true. As such to increase the values gained from set/trait/mundus for damage so they are comparable to effect to crit in PvE would lead to an even greater imbalance between them in PvP.

So currently we have an outcome where one type (crit) is better in PvE and the other (damage) is better in PvP, which I think is fine given the alternative. There is no way that balance could be achieved between these two stats in both PvE and PvP unless some sweeping changes were made to either or both of PvE and PvP to make criticals of equal effectiveness in both modes (which would turn the meta on its head in whichever mode was changed).

If they gonna buff nirnhoned, even by tiny bit, without significantly buffing invigorating, it would be simply put: silly...

Lixiviant wrote: »

So, I've noticed I've researched all traits except for Nirnhoned. But, I'm wondering if it is even worth it anymore? Does anyone use this trait on anything in 2020?

You still want to research nirnhoned because there are a lot of great crafted sets that require 9 traits researched to make.