>>639647
There is slander going on, regurgitated by CCs, sometimes Reddit, and even the Discord, that Inferno Metal is "inconsistent".
Usually that's caused by not reading the description properly and thinking it gets only 10 seconds of uptime per Burn (or even worse - 8, I saw that being claimed as well), when realistically, in most scenarios, you get 18 seconds of uptime for every burn you inflict.
The simple truth is that the set's uptime is not a problem, as just S11 with nothing but Rocketboo can achieve 70% Burn uptime against fire-vulnerable level 70 bosses.
It's slightly lower for fire-neutral targets, but it's still around 65%.
The game values and weights CRIT Rate% and in-combat ATK% identically, so when you're looking at 18% in-combat ATK from Woodpecker, that's less than 65% of IM value.
S11's rotation is also kind of self-correcting in regards to Inferno Metal.
The damage is distributed between BAs and CAs and her burst is finished with her Ultimate. CAs generate a lot of Burn buildup, so in most cases you will just have IM cover a huge chunk of your burst, quite often the entirety of it.
Meanwhile while Woodpecker might provide 18% ATK boost easily outside of the burst, during the burst it requires landing EX. Which is not always available, nor is it optimal, as EX is very sidegrade-ish to S11's BA damage and is more valuable as an Anomaly/Decibel buildup tool.
It can be used decently well for damage at the very start and at the very end of the burst, but in the middle of the burst it's often suboptimal.
So you're basically looking at on average higher-value set that allows you to go for your most optimal routes at all times vs a weaker set that also requires you to make your rotation worse.
i.e. it's not even close.
Two considerations, though.
Uptime does becomes a problem in specific content like Tower or some of the HZ stuff, where the anomaly buildup is deliberately reduced. You wouldn't really min-max this kind of content most of the time, but it's there.
Another consideration is account economy.
The most reasonable justification for not running IM on S11 is the fact it's a set that's only currently viable on her, CRIT Burnice and DPS Lighter, with the later two being even more off-meta than S11 herself is.
Both Eve and Burnice can reasonably make use of 2xInferno, but that's about it.
Meanwhile, Woodpecker is something probably more than a half of the cast can run.