I was reviewing the new armor and realized that maybe I need to look at the new sets from the perspective of the people that will actually be using them. I happen to know a Wood Elf Nightblade, a Nord Dragon Knight, and a High Elf Templar that were agreeable to doing this interview.
We will start with the Wood Elf Nightblade, Akatsuki Kojou and see what insight he can give us on the gear sets that appear to be stamina DPS based.
Me: Akatsuki Kojou, Have you had a chance to review the gear on the PTS?
Akatsuki Kojou: Call me Kojou, and yes I have.
Me: First off Kojou, what do you think of the crafted sets? Are there any that interest you?
Akatsuki Kojou: Out of the 3 new sets the only one that is even remotely usable for me is the Noble's Conquest. I suppose I could change my morph of lethal injection to the Poison Arrow interrupt and get some additional healing and DPS, but even for the 8% gain in DPS when I interrupt I would be giving up a lot of other better bonuses on other sets that I could wear 5 pieces of. I would be better off crafting Hundings Rage for stamina DPS. The new changes to Night Mother are also of interest. I like that they changed the second bonus to from Spell Critical to Weapon Damage. I think 3 of this (Night Mother) + 5 Hundings Rage will be the *crafted* standard for stamina builds until they get better "drop" sets.
Me: OK and the "Dropped" sets?
Akatsuki Kojou: I like the Sheer Venom and the Toxic Defiance sets a lot. It fits with my "Poison Master Archer" archetype, but I am extremely disappointed that none of the sets come with jewelry.
Me: No jewelry? Why do you think that is an issue?
Akatsuki Kojou: Currently I wear a combination of Morag Tong (4 pieces of medium armor + a necklace) and Hawks Eye (3 pieces of medium armor + 2 rings) and I can have a bonus to attack damage with my bow and a bonus to poison damage with the Morag Tong. Since my bow attacks are poison based I get the benefit of both.
Me: Ah I see. So because you need 2 rings you can't wear 5 pieces of Morag Tong and 5 pieces of Sheer Venom together, so you would have to give up some of your DPS.
Akatsuki Kojou: Exactly.
Me: What about Toxic Defiance? That one looks pretty strong.
Akatsuki Kojou: Same problem. I like the idea behind the Powerful Assault and the Shield Breaker, but the latter will only be good with a group since your DPS won't be very high against players that are not using shields and I like to run solo a lot.
Me: So having jewelry for your set bonuses is really important to your build. What about the new Jewelry sets. They look pretty strong.
Akatsuki Kojou: They do, but I really hate the fact that they only have up to 3 piece bonuses. If I use dual wield then I either have to use a crafted piece to match crafted armor, or waste a slot where I could be getting another bonus. I suppose I could equip 2 weapons of one type and 3 jewelry pieces of another, but then that wastes the slot I use for my bow since that would only be one piece.
Me: Do all of these changes and not having jewelry for the dropped sets feels like it was intentional to reduce the number of gear set bonuses you can have?
Akatsuki Kojou: That's how it feels.
Me: What about Molag Kena? That one looks very powerful?
Akatsuki Kojou: It does, but I think I will only use the 1 piece bonus.
Me: Really? Why is that?
Akatsuki Kojou: As a stamina build I will have additional costs to roll dodge and no regen when I block, so I don't think I can really afford the additional resource cost for the 2nd bonus. If I get 2 pieces I will give it a shot, but my initial feeling is that I may run into situations where I will run out of stamina and I won't be able to dodge or block so therefore I will be dead unless I can get away in the 2 or 3 cloaks I have enough magicka for. I will have to be very careful with how I use my stamina after the next patch. Not to mention my stamina regeneration bonus that I get from my shadow passive was cut in half.
Me: Sounds like Nightblade Stamina builds took a bit of a nerf in the next patch.
Akatsuki Kojou: Yes they did.
Me: Ok well thank you for your time Kojou.
Akatsuki Kojou: You're Welcome.
Next we have Hasagawa Kodaka a Dragon Knight Tank to review the tanking gear.
Me: Hasagawa Kodaka, so lets start with the crafted sets. What are your impressions?
Hasagawa Kodaka: I really like the Armor Master a lot. I think it in combination with Footman and Engine Guardian will be a very strong choice.
Me: Really, why?
Hasagawa Kodaka: With the change to stamina regeneration while blocking us tanks will have to find other ways to mitigate damage while *not* blocking, so the Armor Master allows me to increase my mitigation by casting Immovable so I don't necessarily have to block all the attacks. Immovable also gives me 5 seconds where I can't be stunned, so I don't have to block to prevent that either.
Me: That sounds like you have a plan for tanking after the next patch.
Hasagawa Kodaka: Yes. I think I will be ok. I think it is the stamina DPS's that will really be taking it in the chin over this change in stamina regeneraton while blocking thing.
Me: So recasting immovable will cost a lot of stamina. How do you think you will be able to keep it up?
Hasagawa Kodaka: Every time I cast immovable I have a 10% chance of getting the engine guardian to give me a resource boost. 1/3 of those will be stamina. I think the Engine Guardian will become the required equipment for tanking. I also will be using Igneous Shield to give me 5% stamina back with the Helping Hands passive which also gives me another chance to get help from the Engine Guardian.
Me: What about the other sets?
Hasagawa Kodaka: The Redistribution set is kind of interesting, but I think I would only consider it if it healed up to 3 Allies. Just healing one for 2000 every 3 seconds isn't a good enough bonus for me to consider. I can't say I would be interested in the Nobles Conquest since bashing is my interrupt, which costs stamina and the other set bonuses do nothing for mitigation.
Me: What would you change about the Nobles Conquest to make it more interesting?
Hasagawa Kodaka: Have it also refund me the cost in stamina of a bash on a successful interrupt.
Me: Any the "dropped" sets?
Hasagawa Kodaka: Tormentor is not particularly interesting because I don't typically charge while tanking. Reactive is a good option because it would reduce my damage while affected by an immobilization, but I would prefer the Armor Master and not be immobilized. Leeching and Jolting seem like good PvP options, but I wouldn't use them for PVE tanking. I may try the Imperium as the bonus to the group seems strong, but at only a 6% chance and a 15 second cool down it may not happen enough to be worth it.
Me: And the Black Rose?
Hasagawa Kodaka: <Laughs> That one seemed like a good choice, but in the latest iteration of the PTS it was changed to increase the Constitution passive by 50% which doesn't amount to much of a bonus.
Me: What does the Constitution passive do exactly?
Hasagawa Kodaka: It increases health recovery by up to 28% and gives up to 346 Magicka and Stamina each time you are hit with a cool down of 4 seconds.
Me: So it essentially increases health recovery by 14% and gives 173 Magicka and Stamina every 4 seconds when you are hit?
Hasagawa Kodaka: Yup. That is extremely lack luster for a 5th piece bonus.
Me: What about the additional spell and weapon damage?
Hasagawa Kodaka: I don't do DPS.
Me: What would you change?
Hasagawa Kodaka: Get rid of the bonus to damage, and change the increase to Constitution to 100% for a start. Really the whole Constitution passive is weak. I think the cool down should probably be shortened to 2 seconds (with 5+ pieces of heavy armor) since we are not getting any stamina regeneration while blocking. That will at least help compensate tanks for the loss in stamina without enabling "permablocking" for players that do not wear heavy armor. This would make it a good set for non-Dragon Knight tanks who don't have the Engine Guardian.
Me: Do you share Kojou's feeling about Jewelry?
Hasagawa Kodaka: Even more so. I use the Footman jewelry. Whatever I wear will be with 5 pieces of Footman. I don't think the Generic set jewelry they are offering is worth giving up Footman for.
Me: And the Lord Warden set?
Hasagawa Kodaka: I would only wear it if they changed the Constitution passive and the Black Rose set like I mentioned earlier. I think I would then have good enough resource management to give up the Engine Guardian.
Me: Thanks for your time today.
Hasagawa Kodaka: You're very welcome. May I have seconds at the buffet?
Next we will talk to Minamiya Natsuki and get the perspectives of a Magicka Templar.
Me: Minamiya Natsuki, you've heard the questions that I asked the previous 2 adventurers, so we will try to keep this brief and just go through the same and start with the crafted sets. You're thoughts?
Minamiya Natsuki: I agree with Hasagawa Kodaka about healing up to 3 allies on the Redistribution set. I wouldn't even consider the others.
Me: And the Dropped sets?
Minamiya Natsuki: I like some of the options for Magicka users that will be available. I could see running anything but the Phoenix.
Me: Really? Whats wrong with the Phoenix?
Minamiya Natsuki: I have to die to get it's affect which is something I try not to do as a healer so it seems counter intuitive. Also 3 seconds of not healing my party could be a problem during some fights, but I suppose that would be better than getting picked up off the floor and costing DPS, but again I would prefer not to die and get the benefit of something else. Also the 10 minute cool down seems a bit long. Most boss fights are shorter than that in PVE, so I think 5 minutes might make it enticing enough for someone to give it a shot. At least then an adventurer would get the use of it once in every fight.
Me: Any favorites?
Minamiya Natsuki: Resource recovery on a lot of the sets seems to be limited, so I will have to run a few more dungeons and such to be sure how much recovery I need vs healing and DPS, but right now I am leaning towards the Scathing Mage. My spell crit is typically high enough that I should be able to get it to activate the spell damage increase a lot, which should increase my healing and DPS.
Me: Jewelry?
Minamiya Natsuki: Same opinion as Hasagawa Kodaka except I use the Healer.
Me: Molag Kena?
Minamiya Natsuki: I will definitely use the 1 piece bonus. I may have to forgo the 2 piece if I am running as a 100% healer, but I could see it being very useful with DPS.
Me: Thanks for your time today. By the way are you feeling ok?
Minamiya Natsuki: Since this interview has been quite long I've reached stage 4 vampirism and need to feed. May I go now?
Me: Of course.
<Sounds of screams heard in the background>
There you have it a complete review of sets by 3 different adventurers in Tamriel. I hope this was helpful for some of you folks in forum-land.
Edited by kojou on August 28, 2015 10:14PM Playing since beta...