2H Nirnhoned vs Infused weapon damage enchant for PVP

Kharner · August 2020

Nirnhoned seems to be the go to choice for most 2H pvp builds, but unless im doing my math wrong, wouldn't infused offer more total weapon damage?

Weapon 1:
Gold 2H weapon = 1571 weapon damage.
Nirnhoned 15% = 1806 weapon damage. 235 weapon damage increase.
Weapon damage enchant = 348 weapon damage, 50% uptime. 174 weapon damage average increase.
Total increase with Nirnhoned + weapon damage enchant = 409.
1980 total weapon damage.

Weapon 2:
Gold 2H weapon = 1571 weapon damage.
Infused = 30% enchant potency boost, 50% enchant cooldown.
Weapon damage enchant with infused = 452 weapon damage, 100% uptime.
2023 total weapon damage.

What am I missing here? Why isnt infused more popular in pvp?

thanks, im probably being dumb and doing something wrong or missing something key here.

catnamedwill · August 2020

You use Infused on backbar. The buff carries over to front bar.

Sergykid · August 2020

and the uptime isn't actually 100% uptime since you aren't constantly hitting your target like in pve. If u run behind a wall to heal or let dots tick, the enchant won't proc. for burst builds might be better but the difference is small

Urzigurumash · August 2020

I could be off on this, but as for playing 2h without an Infused Bow backbar as suggested above, I think the main thing is that the Weapon Damage enchantment only procs from Light Attacks, Heavy Attacks, and Weapon Skills which do damage. As such, you must open every engagement with one of those to take full advantage of the Infused trait. If you want the most damage possible on an opening Class Skill, Nirnhoned will perform better than Infused. As far as I know, on most builds Sharpened will give you slightly more damage than Nirnhoned on all abilities (not considering Onslaught, Corrosive Armor, etc), but since Nirnhoned buffs any damage-scaling Heals as suggested above, it is often preferred to Sharpened. In addition to not having to worry about the enchantment proccing before evading to heal to take advantage of Infused as suggested above, the flexibility of being able to use a Poison on your 2h (especially with an Infused Weapon Damage Bow backbar) and not having a useless trait recommends Nirnhoned.

Urzigurumash · August 2020

All that being said there are specific build+combo setups where Infused is the best trait for 2h, especially for 1v1, but not necessarily with the Weapon Damage enchantment. As said above the difference in Weapon Damage is small in the best case, and you'll probably have a higher average Weapon Damage with Nirnhoned in most cases.

ThePedge · August 2020

Especially as melee you can't keep Light Attacks up 100% of the time.

Depends on weapon types. 2H backbar like Bow or Resto you can used infused weapon damage glyph there.

Nirn offers higher max damage for burst windows.

Mortiis13 · August 2020

I usually use nirn maul with wpn dmg glyph as u don't attack 100% of the time especially when u need to kite, u loose a lot with infused.
On backbar I use poisons, most builds I create have atleast 1 defense skill on frontbar and 1 "offense" skill on backbar so I can proc it 80% of the time.

In duells infused is "better" but it's not worth for me to golden out a sec weapon for 40 more damage ^^
Also I still prefer infused plague glyph in duells to proc minor Defile on them with my stamcro

Kharner · August 2020

Thanks all, the points about needing to attack to keep it up make sense. Its basically useless when you need to LOS and break away from a fight.