Vampiric Or Sundering?

Honestly, I was hoping someone would post some numbers or something, but it seems it was not to be. So, I had to do it myself. The results were that with AoHM and Asuran Scan (max ranks in both), the sundering does slightly more damage than the vampiric. However, if the ranks aren't max (or close to it), the vampiric wins out slightly in damage. Furthermore, even under such ideal circumstances, the sundering only wins out in primary target damage; the vampiric beats it against adjacent foes. Plus it has a healing factor about 3/4 of the time (HoF is up for 21 sec then down for 9 while it recharges), unless you're hitting multiple foes (at which point you're definitely getting more health than you're losing).

The advantages aren't much, but why not go with the best?

On a related note, anyone got a perfect vampiric scythe snathe they'd be willing to part with?

I pretty much always use a zealous scythe if I'm running Melandru. For that matter I usually use a zealous scythe anyway, but when energy management is an issue it helps cover the shortfall from Mysticism.

Ok, I went back and did a little more number crunching, and I discovered something very interesting. The advantage of a sundering scythe over a vampiric scythe when they are paired with AoHM and Asuran Scan is actually greatest at low ALs. In other words, the higher the enemy's armor, the more effective a vampiric mod is relative to a sundering mod. At a hypothetical 140 AL (not sure if anything actually has that much armor), a vampiric scythe manages to outdamage the sundering scythe at the only thing it's good for; single target damage.

In case anyone is interested, here's the crunchy goodness.

Assuming 16 scythe mastery, max ranks in Kurzick and Asuran titles
Raw Damage (not crit) = 9 to 41 = 25
Raw Damage (crit) = 41*1.41 = 57.81
Crit rate = 22.3%
Raw Damage = 25*.777 + 57.81*.223 = 32.317
Damage Rating = 5*(20/2 + 2) + 2*(16-[20/2 + 2]) + 32 = 100
Armor Effect = 2^( [DR-AL(1-AP)] /40)
Damage Multipliers = 1.75*1.15*1.2 (asuran scan, inscription, and customization)
Effective Damage (Vampiric) = RD*DMulti*AE + 5
20% chance of sundering with sundering scythe
Effective Damage (Sundering) = RD*DMulti*(AE[sunder]*.2 + AE[nosunder]*.8)

60 AL
-----
Vampiric = 161.0893229
Sundering = 163.3051579

70 AL
-----
Vampiric = 136.2549521
Sundering = 138.4624405

80 AL
-----
Vampiric = 115.3718187
Sundering = 117.4247525

90 AL
-----
Vampiric = 97.81126668
Sundering = 99.60579866

100 AL
------
Vampiric = 83.04466145
Sundering = 84.5100929

110 AL
------
Vampiric = 70.62747604
Sundering = 71.71883062

120 AL
------
Vampiric = 60.18590935
Sundering = 60.87796688

130 AL
------
Vampiric = 51.40563334
Sundering = 51.68815546

140 AL
------
Vampiric = 44.02233073
Sundering = 43.89625724

Interestingly, as the armor increases, the vampiric mod becomes better, because the constant 5 lifesteal from it becomes a larger and larger percentage of the overall damage. Sundering scythes have no such edge, so while they are penetrating more armor as time goes on, this only serves to delay the inevitable. 100% of the weapon is still doing less damage, instead of 94% or 95% of it. Eventually, the armor-ignoring 5 lifesteal outweighs the benefits of occasional 20% armor penetration (remember, it only happens 1/5 of the time).

Of course, the more damage multipliers you stack on, the better sundering mods do, because of the synergy between damage multipliers and armor penetration. By contrast, using less multipliers, lower title ranks, or having lower scythe mastery makes the vampiric mod better, because the constant 5 life-steal becomes a slightly larger factor in damage.