Curious about how DK class abilities are treated for crit chance and for damage

tinythinker

I can't find a solid, complete guide, but, I read in different places that:

1. "[Abilities like] Searing Strike, Lava Whip, the initial damage from Burning Talons and Stonefist = weapon crit / can do sneak damage / go against armor mitigation."

2. "[Abilities like] Fiery breath / Inferno / Ash cloud = spell crit / cannot do sneak damage / go against spell resist."

3. That some DK abilities use weapon crit but spell damage, which is why many DKs don't use Inner Light. Not sure if that is right as it seems to conflict with #1 and #2.

Would that mean that the DoT from Burning Talons counts for spell crit/damage? What about the DoT from something like Searing Strike? Is it all melee or just the initial damage?

Is there a good resource for this kind of thing or maybe a simple formula? Not sure why this kind of info isn't clearly stated in the tooltip or maybe in a much needed mechanics section of the official game page.

guybrushtb16_ESO

tinythinker wrote: »

Is there a good resource for this kind of thing or maybe a simple formula? Not sure why this kind of info isn't clearly stated in the tooltip or maybe in a much needed mechanics section of the official game page.

It has been said before that the magicka/stamina/melee crit/spellcrit system is unneccessarily convoluted and completely unintuitive, but I don't think it will change at this point anymore.

Aynway, the only real reason I can think of why they would have kept the tooltips so utterly devoid of any relevant information is that the devs thought too many numbers would overstrain the casual demographic they aimed for, so they apparently just went with the same old overcomplicated system and just didn't tell anyone. I know that sounds stupid, but that's what it is.

To answer your question: the system only divides between roughly "spell like" and "melee like" (seriously, how stupid is that system?!), but the lines between those are incredibly blurred and you kinda have to decide on a case by case basis. AFAIK, burning talons is completely spell crit based, whereas searing strike is actually melee crit for the initial hit and then spell crit for the dot, because reasons...

dylanjaygrobbelaarb16_ESO

Generally any class ability around 5 m is weapon crit and others spell crit dot is spell crit. Not true 100% but seems to be the rule of thumb. But some require intuition, I'll bet chain pull is weapon because its a weapon u shoot out... Its bad for templars too

r.jan_emailb16_ESO

As far as I know, it works like this:

Class skill below 8 meters: weapon crit, spell damage/magicka (against armor)
Class AoE skills: spell crit, spell damage/magicka (against spell resistance)

Weapon skills magicka: Weapon damage, magicka, spell crit
Weapon skills stamina: Weapon damage, stamina, weapon crit

Ultimate: spell damage and magicka or stamina

Dots that come from a fire effect (burning) profit from spell power and spell cirt (maybe also magicka).