Why is it not just "stamina crit" & "magicka crit"?

guybrushtb16_ESO

While reading through some more threads on tamrielfoundry, I found that the system behind skills right now is horribly convoluted and awkward; skills in general seem to employ a more or less random (or at least arbitrarily assigned) combination of scaling off weapon damage, melee/spell crit etc.

Then it occured to me: why is it not actually a system that is intuitive, makes sense, and is in line with the itemization found in the game? What does the current system do better?

dracobains_ESO

"convoluted" EXTREMELY!

I have been trying to find out information about which skills scale with stam/magika in order to determine just where i need to put points. It is horribly confusing but there seems to be a small segment of the community well informed and tight lipped. This has been a serious issue since day one.

What started me trying to discover this information is I noticed a few players were hitting significantly harder than i did with the exact same bow abilities. Beings I was using legendary V12 I couldn't glean any reason for it. Then you have that ambiguous description on stamina pools increasing weapon damage. It is like someone decided to make this system to keep as many people in the dark as possible and whether by design or incidental, this leaves only those at Zen and their inner circle, friends in the know about how to tap each and every skill and get the most for points spent. Without dueling or test dummies there isn't any credible way to test anything either.

I don't get it and am at a loss for any reasonable rationale for this. If anyone can offer some explanation on the inner workings of stam/magika weapon and spell power and how these effect abilities I would love to read it. All the secrecy with game mechanics is beyond annoying and makes me very distrustful.

McDonuts

Skills in the class lines/trees use magicka and spell power for their scaling. Skills in the non-staff weapon lines/trees use stamina and weapon power for their scaling. I have heard mixed things on staff weapon lines, and have not tested them for myself. Skills in the armor lines/tress have fixed scaling, as far as I know. I am unsure about the guild and misc lines, but would assume that whatever resource (magicka or stamina) the skill costs is what it would scale off of also.

For bow skills, you will want to increase weapon power as much as possible (jewelry enchants, buffs, item set bonuses), as it gives the largest dmg increase to skills. Then increase stamina for a bit more damage, and the ability to fire more skills before running dry. If you have them available, some skills (such as Surge for Sorcs, and Heated Blades for Dual Wield) increase weapon power, adding even more damage to your bow attacks and skills. Might of the Guild (from Mages Guild line) gives you a damage boost (10-20%) to the next attack (within 8 seconds) after using a Mages Guild skill. Add that all together and you can get a substantial damage boost (even if it is only for 1 or 2 shots).

The other thing that hasn't been touched on is Weapon Crit. If people have that to a substantial amount, or are drinking crit potions, some/most of their attacks will be doing about 50% extra damage.

NakedSnake

Yup it can get pretty confusing as there is a distinction made between ranged damage and mele damage.
All ranged class abilities are magicka based which in tern increases your spell damage but some class abilities like concealed weapon are considered mele and are governed by stamina which increases your weapon damage. Staff fast and heavy attacks are stamina based while staff skills although based on magicka are governed by weapon damage. Bow attacks use stamina but the effects from those attacks like poison use spell damage.
Hope that clarifies things a little.

PBpsy

NakedSnake wrote: »

Yup it can get pretty confusing as there is a distinction made between ranged damage and mele damage.
All ranged class abilities are magicka based which in tern increases your spell damage but some class abilities like concealed weapon are considered mele and are governed by stamina which increases your weapon damage. Staff fast and heavy attacks are stamina based while staff skills although based on magicka are governed by weapon damage. Bow attacks use stamina but the effects from those attacks like poison use spell damage.
Hope that clarifies things a little.

Nope. Concealed Weapon is a Class skill and always scales with magicka and is not affected by weapon damage unless that weapon adds some damage bonus. You can test that by removing your weapons so that Weapon damage is 0. You will see that there is no change in effectiveness(aside from passives). Concealed weapon does however crit with Weapon crit not spell spell crit since it is a melee skill. As a magicka based character one can go without weapons trough most solo content if he sticks to guild,world and class skills.

NakedSnake

Gotcha. Concealed was one that was a bit confusing. Now I see why.
So scales off spell damage, but since it is considered mele is governed by weapon crit. What a hot mess, although this does seem like a nice way of maintaining balance.

GwaynLoki

dracobains_ESO wrote: »

"convoluted" EXTREMELY!

I have been trying to find out information about which skills scale with stam/magika in order to determine just where i need to put points. It is horribly confusing but there seems to be a small segment of the community well informed and tight lipped.

Fear not, for I have infiltrated this small group of conspirators and brought to you the fruit of my exploits. Haha, sounds funny even to me. Giving you the quote I have been throwing around on forums now repeatedly.

"Class skills = max magicka + spell damage + spell crit (exception below)

Class melee range skills = melee crit not spell crit

Melee weapon skills = weapon damage + max stamina and melee crit

Staff weapon skills = weapon damage + max magicka and spell crit"

from here http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/how-much-visible-damage-does-spell-damage-give/ #15

PBpsy

GwaynLoki wrote: »

dracobains_ESO wrote: »

"convoluted" EXTREMELY!

I have been trying to find out information about which skills scale with stam/magika in order to determine just where i need to put points. It is horribly confusing but there seems to be a small segment of the community well informed and tight lipped.

Fear not, for I have infiltrated this small group of conspirators and brought to you the fruit of my exploits. Haha, sounds funny even to me. Giving you the quote I have been throwing around on forums now repeatedly.

"Class skills = max magicka + spell damage + spell crit (exception below)

Class melee range skills = melee crit not spell crit

Melee weapon skills = weapon damage + max stamina and melee crit

Staff weapon skills = weapon damage + max magicka and spell crit"

from here http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/how-much-visible-damage-does-spell-damage-give/ #15

...and no one will ever hear from @GwaynLoki again. You just don't give away the secrets of the TESO mafia.

guybrushtb16_ESO

GwaynLoki wrote: »

"Class skills = max magicka + spell damage + spell crit (exception below)

Class melee range skills = melee crit not spell crit

Melee weapon skills = weapon damage + max stamina and melee crit

Staff weapon skills = weapon damage + max magicka and spell crit"

from here http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/how-much-visible-damage-does-spell-damage-give/ #15

Also, as of 1.4:
Melee Class skills with initial hit and dot components = first hit weapon crit + spellpower; dot = spell crit + spellpower

Bow skills with initial hit and dot component = all weapon crit + stamina, unsure about weapon damage component for dot

Fighter's guild skills = stamina + spellpower + unsure about crit

It seems almost every combination exists in some form now, and for some of them, I must admit I never would have guessed them. Seeing as the game strongly encourages you to make choices relevant to weapon crit/spell crit for sets and gear, I do think it could do a way better job at explaining what those stats do for you.

GwaynLoki

guybrushtb16_ESO wrote: »

It seems almost every combination exists in some form now, and for some of them, I must admit I never would have guessed them. Seeing as the game strongly encourages you to make choices relevant to weapon crit/spell crit for sets and gear, I do think it could do a way better job at explaining what those stats do for you.

I actually think the devs could have done a better job on designing their system. There's a lot of stuff that simply doesn't make any sense and/or harms certain builds.

Troponin

McDonuts wrote: »

Skills in the class lines/trees use magicka and spell power for their scaling. Skills in the non-staff weapon lines/trees use stamina and weapon power for their scaling. I have heard mixed things on staff weapon lines, and have not tested them for myself. Skills in the armor lines/tress have fixed scaling, as far as I know. I am unsure about the guild and misc lines, but would assume that whatever resource (magicka or stamina) the skill costs is what it would scale off of also.

With the new changes, I don't believe this is true. I am pretty sure I read that they had to nerf some ultimates because they were scaling too well with stamina. There were a couple class skills for the NB, I think, that also do magicka damage that were scaling with stamina now as well.

The biggest issue now is, I have attempted to go with a stamina build, and although I am hitting hard, I am extremely limited on what I can do with class skills due to resources. This leads me to believe the system is still messed up. So you get stuck using one or the other, or your damage lacks extremely.