Dark Souls 2: Bleed mechanic research

So I decided to try to see just how viable bleed damage was in this game so I took my my character and dropped a soul vessel to pump it's stats.

Now the enemy I chose to test on was the big red phant scythe weilder in the lost bastille at the no mans warf entrance since they had light armored, skin exposed and high in health.

My stats here were as followed:



20/20/20/2/20/99/11/6/11 with 180 Bleed BNS (note that I had kings crown on which added some faith and int. Also this is with the blood covenant ring on)

Bleed Flamberge +10 143 + 231 (374) Bleed effect, 3 hits 200 bleed damage.
Bleed Claws + 10 172 + 230 (402) Bleed effect, 3 hits 200 bleed damage.
Notched Whip + 10 200 + 144 (344) Bleed effect, 3 hits 200 bleed damage.
Full Moon Sickle 107 + 140 (247) Bleed effect, 4 hits 200 bleed damage.
Bleed Falchion + 10 115 + 230 (345) Bleed effect, 4 hits 200 bleed damage.
Falchion + 10 80 + 144 (224) Bleed effect, 5 hits 200 bleed damage.
Falchion + 6 69 + 143 (212) Bleed effect, 6 hits 200 bleed damage.
Bandit's Knife 67 + 140 (207) Bleed effect, 6 hits 200 bleed damage.
Morning Star 67 + 140 (207) Bleed effect, 6 hits 200 bleed damage.
Work hook 67 + 140 (207) Bleed effect, 6 hits 200 bleed damage.
Chariot Lance 67 + 140 (207) Bleed effect, 6 hits 200 bleed damage.

So 200 bleed damage seems to be pretty consistent, I will say now every weapon performed with 200 bleed damage from my testings.

No blood covenant ring equip

Notched Whip + 10 200 + 94 (294) Bleed effect, 3 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Flamberge + 10 143 + 171 (314) Bleed effect, 3 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Claws + 10 172 + 170 (342) Bleed effect, 3 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Falchion + 10 115 + 170 (285) Bleed effect, 4 hits to inflict bleed
Full Moon Sickle 107 + 90 (197) Bleed effect, 5 hits to inflict bleed
Bandits Knife 67 + 90 (157) Bleed effect, 6 hits to inflict bleed

Going back to my normal build at SL 150, my stats were as followed:

50/20/20/2/40/20/40/6/11 with 88 Bleed BNS (note that I had kings crown on which added some faith and int. Also this is with the blood covenant ring on)

Bleed Claws + 10 172 + 143 (315) Bleed effect, 3 hits to inflict bleed
Notched Whip + 10 200 + 96 (296) Bleed effect, 3 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Falchion + 10 115 + 143 (258) Bleed effect, 4 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Flamberge +10 143 + 144 (287) Bleed effect, 4 hits to inflict bleed
Full Moon Sickle 107 + 94 (201) Bleed effect, 5 hits to inflict bleed
Bandit's Knife 67 + 94 (161) Bleed effect, 7 hits to inflict bleed
Morning Star 67 + 94 (161) Bleed effect, 7 hits to inflict bleed
Work hook 67 + 94 (161) Bleed effect, 7 hits to inflict bleed
Chariot Lance 67 + 94 (161) Bleed effect, 7 hits to inflict bleed

No blood covenant ring equip


Notched Whip + 10 200 + 46 (246) Bleed effect, 3 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Claws + 10 172 + 83 (255) Bleed effect, 3 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Flamberge + 10 143 + 84 (227) Bleed effect, 4 hits to inflict bleed
Bleed Falchion + 10 115 + 83 (198) Bleed effect, 4 hits to inflict bleed
Full Moon Sickle 107 + 44 (151) Bleed effect, 6 hits to inflict bleed
Bandits Knife 67 + 44 (111) Bleed effect, 7 hits to inflict bleed

So after going through this mess of notes I really don't know what to conclude. I'm pretty sure the Bleed effect and scaling bonus are not additive since the whip and claws are still 3 hit infecting with ~250 if you add them but further up you can see that the bleed falchion +10 never did better than 4 hits and it was well above 300 at some point. I feel like it is more focused on the base bleed stat since you can see that the low bleed weapons that are 67 + 140 (207) are bleeding after 6 hits but a Falchion that is 115 + 83 (198) was bleeding in 4. I will have to get more titanite to upgrade more items to get some better results, but for now this will have to do.

I have no idea what Bleed BNS is supposed to be doing in all this. Maybe they have some sort of system that explains how much stamina reduction the bleeder takes but I can't figure that out on enemies lol

Some random notes:

Lacerating Knife took 3 hits to bleed, doing 200 damage on my 20 dex build, with and without the bleed ring.
Heide Knight Sword gets a strangely strong bleed infusion bonus, getting 153 compared to a broadsword getting 112.
If you infuse claws with poison, your attack rating actually goes up.