How much worse is Tentacular Dread than other similar abilities?

MurkyWetWolf198

Compared to things like Curse, Blastbones, Shalks, etc. how much worse is it’s dps?
Edit: For NON-BEAM builds lol, I understand it takes crux. I’m thinking of frost builds with Winter’s Embrace subclass and whatnot

ESO_Nightingale

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

Also, I’m asking for non-beam builds, specifically frost builds taking winter’s embrace and whatnot

Tried it. Horrendous. Tentacular Dread does not do enough damage to justify how long it takes to generate 3 crux and you have very limited crux generation options. Chilling Soul and Runeblades. I couldn't do above like 86k but a lot of that is due to lag.

ESO_Nightingale

Soarora wrote: »

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

The reason why it would be a lot worse is because the crux it consumes don't increase its damage that much. The crux also increases the debuff that it places on enemies, but that would have to be increased significantly in order to pay off.

On top of all that, it also means you can't use Cephaliarch's Flail, which is arcanists' best spammable in most cases.

Essentially we're comparing a build using Ceph Flail as a spammable and Fatecarver as a crux spender to a build using any other spammable that builds crux (Runeblades or scribed abilities) and Tentacular Dread as a crux spender.

I don't have a parse or math to prove this, the numbers are just pretty far compared to the much better option of Fatecarver.

It would be nice if there was a second option to Fatecarver. Not sure if this is a PTS conversation, even if it's relevant to someone being curious about arcanist skills for upcoming subclassing.

Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m asking, how does it perform? With math, or parses, please. Obviously I know it’s worse than beam, I’m asking for a comparison between OTHER classes. How does it perform compared to curse, shalks, etc. with the Winter’s Embrace subclass?

It’s more of a debuff than a damage skill and you’d need crux to spend to make the debuff stronger. Could be interesting to try on a frost build though since it does frost damage.

P.S. I for one like your polls.

already tried it. it does not feel good whatsoever.

Major_Toughness

Are you a bot? What are all these threads.

Soarora

It’s not? It’s not comparable to any of those. The problem is its competing with ceph flail and fails because it makes the rotation more complicated for less damage.

Varana

You shouldn't care about how much damage it does. It consumes crux, which you want to spend on Fatecarver instead, and the other morph builds crux to spend on Fatecarver. It doesn't matter how much damage Tentacular Dread does.

MurkyWetWolf198

Major_Toughness wrote: »

Are you a bot? What are all these threads.

Not a bot, just slow day at work. I think the polls and questions make feedback easier to understand, at least for me it does

MurkyWetWolf198

Also, I’m asking for non-beam builds, specifically frost builds taking winter’s embrace and whatnot

tsaescishoeshiner

The reason why it would be a lot worse is because the crux it consumes don't increase its damage that much. The crux also increases the debuff that it places on enemies, but that would have to be increased significantly in order to pay off.

On top of all that, it also means you can't use Cephaliarch's Flail, which is arcanists' best spammable in most cases.

Essentially we're comparing a build using Ceph Flail as a spammable and Fatecarver as a crux spender to a build using any other spammable that builds crux (Runeblades or scribed abilities) and Tentacular Dread as a crux spender.

I don't have a parse or math to prove this, the numbers are just pretty far compared to the much better option of Fatecarver.

It would be nice if there was a second option to Fatecarver. Not sure if this is a PTS conversation, even if it's relevant to someone being curious about arcanist skills for upcoming subclassing.

MurkyWetWolf198

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

The reason why it would be a lot worse is because the crux it consumes don't increase its damage that much. The crux also increases the debuff that it places on enemies, but that would have to be increased significantly in order to pay off.

On top of all that, it also means you can't use Cephaliarch's Flail, which is arcanists' best spammable in most cases.

Essentially we're comparing a build using Ceph Flail as a spammable and Fatecarver as a crux spender to a build using any other spammable that builds crux (Runeblades or scribed abilities) and Tentacular Dread as a crux spender.

I don't have a parse or math to prove this, the numbers are just pretty far compared to the much better option of Fatecarver.

It would be nice if there was a second option to Fatecarver. Not sure if this is a PTS conversation, even if it's relevant to someone being curious about arcanist skills for upcoming subclassing.

Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m asking, how does it perform? With math, or parses, please. Obviously I know it’s worse than beam, I’m asking for a comparison between OTHER classes. How does it perform compared to curse, shalks, etc. with the Winter’s Embrace subclass?

MurkyWetWolf198

Quoted post has been removed

I’ll stop making new ones, jeez. And here I thought the point of forums was to communicate with player base and devs, but oh no, god forbid I ask some questions.

Anyways, would still like some data about Tentacular dread please, anyone

Joy_Division

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

Quoted post has been removed

I’ll stop making new ones, jeez. And here I thought the point of forums was to communicate with player base and devs, but oh no, god forbid I ask some questions.

Anyways, would still like some data about Tentacular dread please, anyone

You are allowed to make as many threads as you want as long as they are not redundant and ask legitimate questions about the PTS process.

As for Tentacular Dread, the above comments already laid out the essentials. It consumes Crux and competes with Beam, which is mathematically the highest DPS. If you're spamming the single target Runeblades to generate Crux just to cast a single Tentacular Dread, you're losing a lot of AoE/cleave damage besides.

I believe ZOS intended this to be the PvP morph because Beam is not very good in PvP. It is supposed to serve as a source of delayed Burst damage similar to the skills you describe in the OP.

The damage is OK, but an Arcanist player has to ask themselves do they want to blow their crux generation for 6Kish damage to an opponent that has 35K health, when a key source of Arcanist survivability is using that Crux for healing with their shield.
The answer is only Vs. bad players who do not pose a threat. (using tentacular dread also loses a bar slot since Arcanists will probably use Rune Blades for crux generation). A sorcerer doesn't have to weaken their defense for casting Curse. It is too high of an opportunity cost and why Arcanists struggle quite a bit in open world PvP.

In short, for PvE it is much easier and stronger to use Beam. ZOS stated during Arcanist development that Beam was it's signature mechanic ,so it is not surprising that is the highlight of the class's best performance. It would be rather lame to have a signature skill, only for it to be out-perfomed by something else.

For PvP, Beam isn't good so that opens the door for other possibilities. But Dread comes with a high opportunity cost that just makes it easier and better to use proc sets for damage and use the Crux for defense.

Soarora

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

The reason why it would be a lot worse is because the crux it consumes don't increase its damage that much. The crux also increases the debuff that it places on enemies, but that would have to be increased significantly in order to pay off.

On top of all that, it also means you can't use Cephaliarch's Flail, which is arcanists' best spammable in most cases.

Essentially we're comparing a build using Ceph Flail as a spammable and Fatecarver as a crux spender to a build using any other spammable that builds crux (Runeblades or scribed abilities) and Tentacular Dread as a crux spender.

I don't have a parse or math to prove this, the numbers are just pretty far compared to the much better option of Fatecarver.

It would be nice if there was a second option to Fatecarver. Not sure if this is a PTS conversation, even if it's relevant to someone being curious about arcanist skills for upcoming subclassing.

Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m asking, how does it perform? With math, or parses, please. Obviously I know it’s worse than beam, I’m asking for a comparison between OTHER classes. How does it perform compared to curse, shalks, etc. with the Winter’s Embrace subclass?

It’s more of a debuff than a damage skill and you’d need crux to spend to make the debuff stronger. Could be interesting to try on a frost build though since it does frost damage.

P.S. I for one like your polls.