Best Companion Gear Traits?

Personofsecrets · November 27

I long assumed that Quickened would be the best trait for companions since one can setup a type of situation where they are always using damage dealing skills.

From what I've found in searching, it seemes like Quickened isn't actually used that much and players instead focus on Aggressive, especially for damage dealing.

Is there any resource that shows exactly how Aggressive beats out Quickened by running the numbers and doing tests? I'd like to review such work.

fred4 · November 27

All I'll say is that Quickened stacks additively with Telvanni Efficiency, yielding up to ~80% combined cooldown reduction. This gets the cooldown of some skills down below the magic 2s mark, wearing all but one Quickened. Since I presume companions operate on the same 1s global cooldown as players, e.g. they cast 1 skill per second, getting skills down to just below a round number, 2s, 3s, or whatever it may be, is probably significant.

Telvanni Efficiency reducing the coodown by 50% and Quickened being additive effectively doubles the strength of that trait when wearing that set, which IMO if you want to use companions for "serious" combat you absolutely should. I had to put that in airquotes, though. Take them into veteran DLC content and they still die to AOE. Not even the Vanish skill on a 50% uptime will save them and they stop actively fighting when using that skill anyways. Best uses for companions are IMO as a tank in certain fights, or possibly as a healer, or dead while wearing Pearlescent Ward and gaining the damage reduction from that set, which is 33% when you solo with a dead companion.

Personally, whatever companions bring in terms of damage or utility is offset by the fact that they dodge roll backwards when they have aggro, isolating the mob that's attacking them. This means you don't get clean trash pulls where you pull everything together, but you have to run after your companion and finish that mob afterwards. They're basically a waste of time in most cases and I mean that quite literally.

freespirit · November 27

I have a mix of traits on Bastian, the only quickened item, the gold ring we got a couple of years back.

I have him using a sword and shield, which completely removes the "dodge rolling backwards" scenario.

He is set up mainly for tanking which I have to say as long as I keep a bit of an eye on him he does really well.

I use Bolstered and Vigorous traits + the one quickened, his health is 33k and he can take quite a few hits, I always run heals on my DD's so I can chuck them his way when needed.

He is not even in full purple gear and I would refute that companions are totally useless, i run vet dungeons just with him, something I would struggle to do completely solo!

I have had people comment on how amazed they are he does so well, particularly on WB's when there are only a couple of players about. 🙂

LootAllTheStuff · November 27

@freespirit : Which of Bastiaan's skills do you use in which slots?

fred4 · November 27

freespirit wrote: »

He is set up mainly for tanking which I have to say as long as I keep a bit of an eye on him he does really well.

Indeed. If you can live with the latter, great, but that's just it. They need babysitting. Personally that does my head in and feels counterproductive...

I always run heals on my DD's so I can chuck them his way when needed.

...because I tend to heal almost exclusively from damage when soloing, e.g. Puncturing Sweeps, Swallow Soul / Sap Essence, Pale Order, Crit Surge, Brawler (the skill) shield, and so on.

He is not even in full purple gear and I would refute that companions are totally useless, i run vet dungeons just with him, something I would struggle to do completely solo!

Companion tanks are very good at blocking. They never fail and never run out of stamina. For certain fights, such as 2-hander bosses, this is ideal. Ulfnor in Fang Lair is an example. At least on normal mode...

My reference fight for solo tank testing is the first boss in vet Shipwright's Regret, with or without hard mode. Companions of all types fail in that fight, because there is an AOE component. They don't move. They are basically not rounded. Very strong in one regard, but without movement skills or mechanics knowledge.

I have had people comment on how amazed they are he does so well, particularly on WB's when there are only a couple of players about. 🙂

I'll admit you can have fun with that and especially Telvanni Efficiency makes companions far more active and useful than they would otherwise be. On the other hand, if you already have solo builds, I find those are better than any companion build. World bosses are not hard. The only ones that are a real problem are those that have a healing mechanic.

freespirit · November 27

@LootAllTheStuff not able to get to my PC atm will let you know later. 🙂

Personofsecrets · November 27

Is there a spreadsheet for companion builds that can help figure out what their damage would be?

freespirit · November 27

@fred4, it's way less than babysitting.

Aoe's can be a problem but Bastian usually responds to being recalled

With the WB's I'm talking more recent content, I can indeed solo all the base game ones, there's a couple in West Weald, I haven't mastered yet.... should mention these fights are neither short nor pretty but if the job gets done, I'm fine with that.

The thing that helps me most is if he keeps aggro for at least long enough for me to reduce the hp of whatever I am fighting, my keyboard skills and arthritis mean even a little assistance can be the difference between winning and losing.

Btw I have no idea about Telvanni Efficiency, never used it, is it a set? 🙂

LootAllTheStuff · November 27

Telvanni Efficiency is a craftable set in High Isle. The location is pretty easy to find, too.

Personofsecrets · November 27

freespirit wrote: »

@fred4, it's way less than babysitting.

Aoe's can be a problem but Bastian usually responds to being recalled

With the WB's I'm talking more recent content, I can indeed solo all the base game ones, there's a couple in West Weald, I haven't mastered yet.... should mention these fights are neither short nor pretty but if the job gets done, I'm fine with that.

The thing that helps me most is if he keeps aggro for at least long enough for me to reduce the hp of whatever I am fighting, my keyboard skills and arthritis mean even a little assistance can be the difference between winning and losing.

Btw I have no idea about Telvanni Efficiency, never used it, is it a set? 🙂

How do you recall them on PC?

Bastian was holding Nazaray who wasn't taking any damage due to standing in it's protective circle. I wasn't really sure how to deal with that.

Chilly-McFreeze · November 27

Personofsecrets wrote: »

freespirit wrote: »

@fred4, it's way less than babysitting.

Aoe's can be a problem but Bastian usually responds to being recalled

With the WB's I'm talking more recent content, I can indeed solo all the base game ones, there's a couple in West Weald, I haven't mastered yet.... should mention these fights are neither short nor pretty but if the job gets done, I'm fine with that.

The thing that helps me most is if he keeps aggro for at least long enough for me to reduce the hp of whatever I am fighting, my keyboard skills and arthritis mean even a little assistance can be the difference between winning and losing.

Btw I have no idea about Telvanni Efficiency, never used it, is it a set? 🙂

How do you recall them on PC?

Bastian was holding Nazaray who wasn't taking any damage due to standing in it's protective circle. I wasn't really sure how to deal with that.

Y + right mouse button

SoulAffliction · December 2

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Is there a spreadsheet for companion builds that can help figure out what their damage would be?

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/620245/companions-basics-traits-and-mechanics

Necrotech_Master · December 2

SoulAffliction wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Is there a spreadsheet for companion builds that can help figure out what their damage would be?

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/620245/companions-basics-traits-and-mechanics

this here is probably one of the best companion resources

quickened is definitely not the most ideal trait, it kind of is for healer companions so their heals are up more frequently, or for tanks to keep heals/buffs up (though the tanks also benefit from the dmg reduction or max hp traits too)

for dps if they are using dots, quickened is actually bad because they could be overcasting dots potentially (the companion version of poison arrow has a dot that lasts almost the same duration as the cooldown of the skill, adding quickened will make them overcast this skill and overwrite the dot before it expires, it will be more effective on "burst" dmg though like their version of meteor or the sniping silver)

for the dps companions i usually prefer a mix of +dmg, +crit, and +penetration traits

Personofsecrets · December 2

Thanks to @SoulAffliction for sharing this resource.

@Necrotech_Master , as the write up states, thete may be some good hypothetical builds for damage which use quickened. That said, maybe it isn't the easiest thing to come up with. For example, I didnt realize that companions dont get ult from skill casts.

Necrotech_Master · December 2

my understanding with companions is that their ult just auto generates, basically from the light attacks while in combat

the trait that increases ult gen i think increases the amount of ult they get per tick, generally not worth it since the ults are kind of bad in most cases (most of their dmg is mediocre or has long cast times)

as i noted quickened is alright if your focusing on "burst" such as starfall (mages guild) and sniping silver (fighters guild)

another very big thing with the companions for dealing decent dmg and keeping up their skills is just order of the skills in their bar, as that is basically their prioritization order (with slot 1 being first cast and slot 5 being last cast)

Zodiarkslayer · December 3

If you want yo use a companion as a DPS, which you shouldn't, then the first thing to do is think about penetration.
You have to calculate how low you can debuff a Boss's armor, and fill up the rest with Shattered pieces. Only then use Aggressive pieces.

Quickened helps with uptimes of skills, but unlike players, companions do not weave light attacks. They will light attack once per GCD, if all skills are on cooldown. Which means that regular rotation thinking is out of the window. Basically the higher the light attack damage is, the lower becomes the usefulness of Quickened trait. And that can be done by using Shattered plus Aggressive.

As for skills, it depends. You need to calculate what damage a skill does per cooldown+cast time and then take the five highest ranking skills. Depending on which skills have been unlocked this might mean no class skills at all are used.
Wether a skill is burst or DoT is irrelevant, as long as the cooldown is longer than the effect time plus cast time.
This is not including execute skills, because they not only have a really long cooldown, but are also taking up a bar slot while doing nothing for 80% of the fight.