Hello,
I actually did do a search for this question, but most of the answers are kind of vague (this includes answers from the wiki). So here it is:
My current adventurer is Legendary +* in every combat skill due to wrasslin' with dingoes and hacking a bunch of things to death. In my travels I came upon a Masterfully Crafted Iron Battle Axe that has served me quite well. However even with my Legendary Status in axe-wielding my axe still consistently bounces off of goblin iron armor. Which forces me to cut off their limbs and watch them bleed to death.
I stormed a Necromancer tower recently, and on one of the dwarf zombie corpses I found the first Steel equipment in my current world (new world, no abandoned forts yet). Fortunately for me it turned out to be a Steel Battle Axe, just normal quality though.
Now I naturally assumed that my Masterfully Crafted Iron Battle axe should be much better than a normal quality Steel Battle Axe (since the Wiki says Masterfully crafted gives a 12x multiplier to hit damage or something). But through extensive testing (hacking apart goblins), it turns out the Steel Axe has no problems tearing right through small iron breastplates and helmets. So does being made from Steel automatically makes the weapon way better than a Masterfully crafted version of the previous metal? Which weapon would serve me better in this case? I would rather not carry two Battle axes around with me.
Much thanks.