My character is a light armored dumner that strictly uses claymores, and uses restoration and a little destruction and conjuration.

I am finally at the point where I have over 50 armorer, azura's star, university access, and black soul gems to get good souls early.

I am trying to decide on a good enchantment for it. There is always the straightforward fire/frost/shock with soultrap combo. If I went that way I was wondering if I should go for a longer duration since I have slower swings. I am also trying to think of any other enchantments that may be good besides the standard elemental trio. So I could use some help here as this is my first character able to make AND maintain enchanted weapons so this is kind of new. I already have done a lot of clothing enchants though so I know some of the basics.

When I had a character that used claymores, I quite liked the quick and nimble style of dancing right at the edge of melee range where I could hit my foe, but he could not hit me.

Fighting right at the edge of melee range, I found that my absorb health enchantment was constantly breaking lock (absorb life requires you to stay in melee range) as my character moved in and out of melee range. Therefore, I decided that absorb life and my style of claymore fighting was not a good mix.

I would recommend enchanting a permabound claymore. No weight and great damage.

What I would enchant with is very simple: Shock for 2 seconds + soul trap for 2 or 3 seconds. Simple, effective and works on most foes. I like the 2 second damage duration on claymores.

Another creative alternative is to add Demoralize at max magnitude x 1 second. This will cause any foe except undead to 'dance', confused between 'charge' and 'run away' animations, effectively immobilizing them almost in place. It is not very helpful when fighting crowds, but can be fun and even overpowered for 1 vs 1.

Although not directly related to your question, I recommend you get Azura's Star to help with recharging.

I have played with a weakness to poison and a timed soul trap as an enchantment.

Soul Trap, fire, light.
Soul Trap, well you know...
Fire, most enemies will be vulnerable to fire, plus, with the expert blade move, nothing says awesome like watching your foe fly backwards in the air while on fire.
Light, Light in a small area for one second, equals cool light show whenever whacking someone.

i like to enchant my main weapon with damage health. it's more expensive per point than fire, frost, or shock but is less prone to resistance.

also, have you tried damage (or even drain) speed? in morrowind i used to always enchant my weapons with paralyze for a duration slightly longer than a weapon swing. they don't allow "paralysis" enchantments in oblivion, per se, but according to uesp.net you can achieve the same effect by reducing their speed to 0. from their http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Speed:


i'm not sure what the maximum amount of speed is that you could damage/drain at once, though.

if you never use sneak attacks then acadian's demoralize trick amounts to the same basic thing, you should see which one is less expensive. but if you do use sneak attacks, this trick would be well worth your while, if it can be pulled off. (i'm going to have to test this myself... maybe tonight).

You could also use damage/drain strength+burden to great effect with a claymore pairing it with Acadian's "Sword-dancer" strategy. Put a drain strength enchantment powerful enough onto the sword, and you'll be able to over-encumber your foes, allowing you to freely decimate them while they can only just sit there and stare at you. With this, you are also not under obligation to drain it completely, like with speed. The disadvantage is this: NPCs hardly carry anything around with them besides their weapons and armor, so you are probably going to need to give them some extra weight in order for this to work (hence the addition of burden). Take off their strength and add a bunch of extra poundage to them, and before you know it they are over-encumbered and completely helpless! The effect won't be as instantaneous as, say, the demoralization dance, but it is another creative way to root your foes to one spot so you can wail on them without them ever being capable of returning the favor.

As an added bonus of drain strength, it means your opponent does less melee damage to you in the bargain.

What I like to do when enchanting two handed weapons is put area effects on it. Nothing big, just the minimum 10 feet. I consider two handed weapons to be more of "berserker" type, and the area makes fighting groups more efficient. I'm assuming that you aren't going for sneak attacks since you are using a claymore. Also, it could be my imagination but it seems like when you kill an enemy with an area effect the body goes flying farther.

i use enchantment to make my own weapons. i use two paths. One Shock + Frost damage + Soul Trap 3s. The Second Fire + Damage Health + ST 3s.

On the last latest trip to Rockmilk Cave, I found a double headed glass battle axe. In Terminator 2, The T100 (Arnie) smiled like a loony when he found his weapon of choice. Well, that was what it was like. beautiful, mean, good mass to damage ratio. Enchanted with Shock = Frost +ST 3s. In Oblivion, one of the City gates, I came upon a set of creatures, 2 Seducers and a Clanfear. Well out came the axe, and about 10 swings later, i have quivering bloody daedra sushi all over the path. *Smile*

Consider multiple paths of damage for different applications.

I think I will make a shock blade for now, and when I get another elven or better claymore I will make a fire blade for killing those filthy zombies.

Now the question is whether or not it would be a good idea to add weakness to shock to the enchantment mix, and how should I go about implementing it?

Do you put weakness on the enchantment before or after shock? And if I put a 2 second shock damage on it how long should the weakness last?

Another thought is drain health 100pts for 1 Second. I know I won't 1-hit things often at level 9, but if I use the blade's damage to bring their health down they would die when I dealt a blow that got them down to 100 or lower.

Any other ideas are still welcome.

If you put Weakness on it, make the duration long enough that it lasts at least until your next hit, because it won't count on this hit.



Another possibility is my personal favorite, Absorb Health (Restoration).

I like to put Disintegrate Armor/ Disintegrate Weapon/ Shock on my weapons. That way, you hurt casters and the Dremora and Daedra alike. Bandits and Marauders always have armor too, so the ability to weaken it to worthless comes in real handy in longer fights.