ok, basically I'm after a very powerful sword for day to day use. I'm not after one of the ones that make them weak to a spell for the next hit. Everything I want has to be done in one hit. Now, something like this

soul trap for x seconds
Weakness to magic 100% for x seconds
fire damage x amount for 1 second
frost damage x amount for 1 second
shock damage x amount for 1 second
drain health x amount for 1 second

things can be changed to suit if I get advice for making it better. My main question is, how long does it take for the fire, frost, shock and drain to be outputted from the weapon? does it take 1 second for each? and if so, does that mean I have to change the length of the soultrap and weakness accordingly?

To make the topic more open, post your ideas of the best weapon you could possibly achieve.

Weakness to magic will never work in one hit. Just like weakness to the elements, it only counts on subsequent hits.

It works better if Soul Trap is at the end, rather than the beginning. Then you can make the duration on the Soul Trap the same as for the other damages, and be guaranteed to trap the soul. The effects go off in order and if they all have the same duration, they end in the same order, so it's possible, if Soul Trap is at the beginning and has the same duration, that it will have switched off a fraction of a second before the damage that makes the kill is recorded.

And yeah-- that specific set-up (or the same sort of thing with absorb or drain health) is, IMO, the simplest and most practical melee weapon enchantment. Absorb's handy, but it's a bit of a charge-hog. Drain is the most charge-efficient and can actually give you a huge boost, since any time the drain takes the opponent's HP to 0, that's a kill.

Honestly, drain health is so effective that I rarely use it-- to me, it just spoils part of the challenge.

There are some other absorb/damage/drains that can be useful-- things like strength or speed or blade-- but some of them aren't available easily (like drain attribute), some don't exist at all (like damage skill) and all in all, at least in my opinion, they're just not as consistently effective as elemental damage plus drain health.

Umm... actually, Soul Trap has to be first, not last. Check wiki for details. Even with 1 sec duration, souls are still trapped IF the enemy dies that hit.

Also, weakness effects have to be last as they are applied in reverse order (opposite from Morrowind, in fact). I mean, you need to realize that you are giving something a weakness (or multiple weaknesses) on one attack, so you have to hit it with whatever it is now weak to with subsequent attacks. The enemy isn't weak to something until you give it the weakness with an attack, so this makes perfect sense.

You cannot do "everything in one hit" as you seem to want to do. TES doesn't work that way. Same with spells; the idea of a "nuke" spell doesn't really work in TES. The whole system is designed to force characters to use small effects over multiple attacks.

However, as I said, the order DOES matter a lot. You can read details on the wiki, including the discussion threads for weakness effects..

Finally, note that drain fatigue (or absorb fatigue) coupled with drain/absorb health is excellent (plus weakness to magic, of course) because after a few hits the enemies begin collapsing rather than being able to run (or attack, for that matter).

I'd suggest something like the following:

Soul Trap 1 sec
Absorb Health 3 pts
Absorb Magicka 3 pts
Absorb Fatigue 3 pts
Weakness to Magicka 100% for 3 secs

You can also add Invisibility on Self (or Chameleon) if you really want to be crazy-killer.

Based on what you are asking for, you might try this:

Fire damage xx for 1 sec
Shock damage xx for 1 sec
Frost damage xx for 1 sec
Damage health xx for 1 sec

Don't forget to add the obligatory soul trap for a second.

Having four types of damage instead of one does a couple things for you:
- You can achieve more damage overall because it is more efficient charge-wise to use smaller amounts of several types than loads of one type.
- No matter what your foe may be resistant or immune to, some of your damage will get through. This is consistent with your desire for a day to day single reliable, powerful blade.

The 'best' type of enchantment depends on the weapon and playstyle of the character. Your question was easy because you were pretty specific in stating your purpose.

That wasn't my experience.

I originally tried listing it first, per the wiki, and it didn't always work. It certainly works most of the time, but not always, or at least not in my experience. Then I changed the duration to x+1 and it always worked, but at a higher charge cost. Then I tried putting it last (or after the damage, at any rate-- still before weaknesses, when applicable) and at the same duration as the damage and it always works.

My experience too, is that Soul Trap must be listed first, and the duration must be one second longer than the longest duration of any damage enchants. It works perfectly for me every time, it's the other way that causes me problems.

Hmmm.......

It definitely works if the duration is one second longer-- that was what I did for quite a while. The problem with that, to me, was just that it used up that extra charge for the extra second, which just sort of bothered me (even though Soul Trap is relatively cheap). But the entire reason I switched to an extra second was because I found that with it listed first with the same duration, it didn't always work, so I just stuck with the extra second of duration. Then, one day, just to see, I tried it after the damage and with the same duration and found that it worked, and that's what I've done ever since, and it works every time.

:shrug:

Based on the above soul trap comments, I don't want to suggest what the answer is because I don't know. Let me instead, simply report what I see in my game for consideration:

I just pulled up Buffy's game to verify things.

She has three effects on her bow, all for one second each, and in the following order: Drain speed, Fire damage, Soul trap. I note specifically that soul trap is for only one second, and is the last effect listed on the bow.

Her bow has never let her down when it comes to trapping a soul when it should. She does carry Azura's Star and her 'souls trapped' stat is 2,103.

I haven't tested other possibilities, but I know Buffy's bow works magnificently enchanted the way it is.

Well, just to add info, I always list Soul Trap first as per the wiki, and always for 1 sec, and it always works fine.

If you think about it, it has to work okay this way because of the way magic is applied. It's the same reason why damage effects are not multiplied for weaknesses within the same spell and only get multiplied with the next spell.

The only thing I could imagine might have an impact would be wearing armor and having less than 100% spell efficiency. I wouldn't think that would matter, but I suppose it might. I never wear armor except for training, so I can't say what happens in "real" combat.