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• PC/Mac: EU megaserver for maintenance – September 9, 22:00 UTC (6:00PM EDT) - September 10, 16:00 UTC (12:00PM EDT) https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/682784
Sorcerer review and Update 47
Zyaneth_Bal
✭✭✭✭✭
Decided to put some of my feedback into a separate discussion for visibility. Then expanded to cover all sorcerer skills.
Everyone is welcome to post their feedback and suggestions on sorcerer here.
Dark Magic
Concerning u47 on pts:
Bound aegis change absolutely must be reversed. Ward and all shields in general already can’t compete with other sources of healing and defense on live. This is compounded by the fact that ward already lost it’s healing, a change that came far too late when ward was no longer as strong compared to new subclassing options. Then daedric summoning lost 5% max magicka too, nerfing shields even further, and now another 8% max magicka is being taken away. Now shields are so bad that even with all desire to severely handicap oneself just to use them they will no longer even reach the floor of healing to even allow one to play at all. Of course I am talking about pvp because these changes are really irrelevant for pve. Not to mention that max resource is not a desired stat to say the least, for any sort of content or gameplay. Daedric summoning’s max stats’ contribution to damage is extremely minor (but if anything damage here needs solid buffs instead of nerfs), so the only purpose these changes serve are to nerf a group of skills that is dead already. Additionally this bonus is unique and cannot be substituted through other means and if bound armaments is slotted than the class is left without a source of major resolve which is unthinkable!
Attention should be directed at other skills and passives of daedric summoning instead.
Has been addressed, however, shields as an option in general are in dire need of buffs.
EDIT: added formatting to make it readable, added a comment on overload as I forgot it initially
Edited by ZOS_GregoryV on 23 July 2025 02:22 Everyone is welcome to post their feedback and suggestions on sorcerer here.
Dark Magic
This line only be occasionally seen used in pvp.
Daedric Summoning
- Crystal weapon and fragments are ok, although fragments could use it’s damage type changed to shock, possibly apply concussed on hit too because a slight buff would not be out of place. With frags crystal weaver has zero value, compared to other burst skills’ secondary effects, grim focus provides a large amount of passive damage on live and major prophecy/savagery on pts, molten whip also gives a chunk of passive damage. To put fragments more in line with these skills that provide buffs on top of burst, it could get a bonus effect too like granting a short buff on cast (could be anything like spell/weapon damage, damage done/done by this skill, crit chance. Additionally, frags doesn’t actually proc that much more often than grim focus to justify such a big tooltip damage difference and the proc is still random while grim focus is easily tracked and can even store up to 2 charges now. Skill can potentially be moved to storm calling.
- Dark exchange is bad and there are a few reasons why:
First one being cast time. There should be no need to explain how big of a disadvantage it is especially in pvp.
The skill is immensely outdated, basically an artifact. Cast time remained since release when sorc had much more mobility compared to other classes and could gain distance to cast it safely, this hasn’t been the case for many years already. Same idea was fulfilled by exchange instantly restoring a large amount of resources. Now however a portion is restored over time making it lose a lot of value if spammed. Mobility is extremely common nowadays, not to mention that bash has a range of about 10m when streak’s is only 15m. These facts put together mean that to use exchange safely you have to cast streak several times already burning through much more resources than exchange restores. And I don’t have to tell how strong and important blocking is and casting exchange leaves you completely vulnerable.
Second reason is that it’s simply weaker and provides less benefits than other sustain skills:
Netch is extremely loaded, other than restoring resources it’s free to cast, provides major sorcery/brutality, provides a unique 5% damage buff or cleanse and it benefits from all of it’s line’s passives.
Rune focus provides major resolve, heals and also benefits from it’s line’s passives.
Siphoning strikes restore both resources on demand instantly, additionally restore some resources and health passively. Health cost is easily covered by hots making it another advantage. Also benefits from line’s passives.
While dark exchange is the only skill here with a cast time and a long one. It only provides a measly minor berserk that is extremely easy to gain from other sources (everyone has it from monomyth passively now anyway). It heals a bit if you finish casting it, which will only serve to cover part of the damage you take while casting. Not to mention that healing only reaches a sufficient value due to blood magic, without it exchange’s own healing value is pretty underwhelming. - Dark magic passives are quite bad.
Unholy knowledge is fine and basically act like a cost reduction glyph.
Blood magic is only ok with crystal weapon but otherwise barely procs at all.
Persistence might only be good for tanks in pve. For all other purposes it’s just too weak and not fitting. Also already loses some value paired with unholy knowledge and generally fits sorcerer rather poorly due to block mitigation not applying to damage shields.
Exploitation is plain inferior to similar passives like hemmorage, blessing of the mountain.
Personally, I would prefer it to be replaced by a different non damage focused passive entirely and minor prophecy be added to one of storm calling’s skills or passives like surge or expert mage or energized. If it was moved to a passive then it would need to have an activation condition and grant the buff to the whole group just like exploitation does to retain it’s utility. - And negate while strong in it’s niche has extremely limited use. It is situational in group pvp only and has no possible use in pve at all.
- There are actually 3 more active skills in dark magic that have been dead for so long that most players forget about them and see dark magic as a line with 3 skills.
They are so bad and out of touch to be honest that suggesting any change would mean creating a new skill from scratch, so there’s a number of way to go about it. Most straightforward one seeming to be to remake them into some kind of actually useful support/utility tools and move crystal shards to storm calling.
This line is not used in pvp at all, and is only used as a flavor line by pve dds who want to use pets, handicapping themselves in the process.
[*] Storm atronach is a decent ultimate in group pve due to major berserk it provides. Has decent aoe damage but the single target morph (greater atro) is weaker than charged atro even in single target.
[*] Familiar and twilight are bad, a simple and precise description. They are boring and not interactive, nothing more than passive damage. Their damage is also quite low which is only compounded by the fact that most of their damage has been moved to daedric prey over the years. They have no additional effects, active skills are underwhelming too: familiar has a weak dot, tormentor’s skill is so bad that it’s literally never worth casting. Healing morphs have same the same problem of providing nothing but a bland heal. But being pets makes them even worse because pets die easily leaving the player without a burst heal which is grave.
Very importantly pets take up two skill slots. At the same time they are barely worth one.
And of course pets being extremely easy to kill and having a resummon cast time makes them inherently bad for pvp.
[*] Daedric prey comprises too much of the pets’ low damage, removing the option as a dd to use pets without it.
Haunting curse like the base skill is much weaker than some of it’s counterparts. It’s damage is the average of both hits of deep fissure but fissure provides major and minor breach which is incredibly strong while curse doesn’t have a single additional effect.
A possible solution would be to raise damage of the base skill. Additionally reduce prey’s buff to pets making it stand out more as a separate skill and not just as a buff, haunting curse might also receive some minor secondary effect.
[*] Regenerative ward is far too weak of a shield to use regardless of it’s secondary effects that are quite minor anyway, the heal isn’t even noticeable and only works with pets which is another great disadvantage.
Hardened ward was very strong in pvp in u45 due to it’s heal, however, with u46 and the influx of power caused by subclassing it no longer would be. It would at least stay competitive with plentiful sources of healing. At equal value shields are inherently weaker than healing because shields can’t crit, block doesn’t work with them on, and healing scales with offensive stats while shields mostly scale with max stats that is the inferior scaling stat which means that by building to use a shield player already sacrifices power in other departments, additionally most shields don’t have any secondary effects. So the nerf to hardened ward came far too late when it was no longer needed which resulted into ward falling behind severely. To make matters worse, expert summoner was simultaneously cut by half, which nerfed ward even further. Even though any of these nerfs were no longer needed with subclassing when damage and healing spiked.
Now both morphs of conjured ward require solid buffs again to be viable. Base skill’s shield value needs to be buffed significantly, possibly to the level of current hardened ward. Then hardened ward increase in size further maybe gain some minor named buff while conjured ward would retain it’s current effects while healing would be increased to what hardened ward used to have and would not have any conditions.
Additionally want to point out that shielding playstyle as a whole is currently dead. Hardened ward only became useful again (until the nerfs) due to a series of buffs while all other shields have been forgotten and don’t compare to hardened ward and even that is not viable anymore.
[*] Bound aegis is fine as it is on live and should only get attention after all other skills in the line have been addressed.
Bound armaments, however, needs buffs. It functions exactly the same way as grim focus but deals a lot less damage, on top of it costs more, has no secondary effects (got one on pts which is good) and comes from a much weaker line.
[*] Daedric summoning passives also require attention.
Rebate got an minor buff and is still very weak. It’s value needs to be increased significantly.
Power stone is fine.
Daedric protection is fine.
Expert summoner was unjustifiably nerfed and requires to be buffed now. It is on of the very few max res passives and is very important for conjured ward that is already not viable (alongside other shields). Not to mention that expert summoner is absolutely negligible when not stacking max stats, and even when one does it is still weaker many other passives.
Storm Calling
[*] Storm atronach is a decent ultimate in group pve due to major berserk it provides. Has decent aoe damage but the single target morph (greater atro) is weaker than charged atro even in single target.
[*] Familiar and twilight are bad, a simple and precise description. They are boring and not interactive, nothing more than passive damage. Their damage is also quite low which is only compounded by the fact that most of their damage has been moved to daedric prey over the years. They have no additional effects, active skills are underwhelming too: familiar has a weak dot, tormentor’s skill is so bad that it’s literally never worth casting. Healing morphs have same the same problem of providing nothing but a bland heal. But being pets makes them even worse because pets die easily leaving the player without a burst heal which is grave.
Very importantly pets take up two skill slots. At the same time they are barely worth one.
And of course pets being extremely easy to kill and having a resummon cast time makes them inherently bad for pvp.
[*] Daedric prey comprises too much of the pets’ low damage, removing the option as a dd to use pets without it.
Haunting curse like the base skill is much weaker than some of it’s counterparts. It’s damage is the average of both hits of deep fissure but fissure provides major and minor breach which is incredibly strong while curse doesn’t have a single additional effect.
A possible solution would be to raise damage of the base skill. Additionally reduce prey’s buff to pets making it stand out more as a separate skill and not just as a buff, haunting curse might also receive some minor secondary effect.
[*] Regenerative ward is far too weak of a shield to use regardless of it’s secondary effects that are quite minor anyway, the heal isn’t even noticeable and only works with pets which is another great disadvantage.
Hardened ward was very strong in pvp in u45 due to it’s heal, however, with u46 and the influx of power caused by subclassing it no longer would be. It would at least stay competitive with plentiful sources of healing. At equal value shields are inherently weaker than healing because shields can’t crit, block doesn’t work with them on, and healing scales with offensive stats while shields mostly scale with max stats that is the inferior scaling stat which means that by building to use a shield player already sacrifices power in other departments, additionally most shields don’t have any secondary effects. So the nerf to hardened ward came far too late when it was no longer needed which resulted into ward falling behind severely. To make matters worse, expert summoner was simultaneously cut by half, which nerfed ward even further. Even though any of these nerfs were no longer needed with subclassing when damage and healing spiked.
Now both morphs of conjured ward require solid buffs again to be viable. Base skill’s shield value needs to be buffed significantly, possibly to the level of current hardened ward. Then hardened ward increase in size further maybe gain some minor named buff while conjured ward would retain it’s current effects while healing would be increased to what hardened ward used to have and would not have any conditions.
Additionally want to point out that shielding playstyle as a whole is currently dead. Hardened ward only became useful again (until the nerfs) due to a series of buffs while all other shields have been forgotten and don’t compare to hardened ward and even that is not viable anymore.
[*] Bound aegis is fine as it is on live and should only get attention after all other skills in the line have been addressed.
Bound armaments, however, needs buffs. It functions exactly the same way as grim focus but deals a lot less damage, on top of it costs more, has no secondary effects (got one on pts which is good) and comes from a much weaker line.
[*] Daedric summoning passives also require attention.
Rebate got an minor buff and is still very weak. It’s value needs to be increased significantly.
Power stone is fine.
Daedric protection is fine.
Expert summoner was unjustifiably nerfed and requires to be buffed now. It is on of the very few max res passives and is very important for conjured ward that is already not viable (alongside other shields). Not to mention that expert summoner is absolutely negligible when not stacking max stats, and even when one does it is still weaker many other passives.
A solid line, used as a complementary line in pve by dds and as a utility line in pvp. Could still use some changes to be made into a self-sufficient damage line. Currently it lacks high damage active skills and cannot be used as main or only damage line. This issue can be fixed by moving crystal shards to storm calling from dark magic. Whatever skill is replaced and how it is changed will depend on home dark magic line is reworked. This change would allow storm calling to be a complete damage line while
retaining some utility and dark magic can be made into a full support/utility because crystal shards being one of the moat iconic sorcerer skills and it’s main source of damage is out of place in a support line. It is literally the only damage skill there and it is wasted on a line that has no damage passives. This leads to crystal shards being impossible to use effectively for damage because it means sacrificing a full damage line for just one skill and support builds have no use for it. Then crystal shards and fragments’ damage should be changed to shock to match the line’s theme. Additionally to put it more in line with similar burst skills like grim focus and molten whip that provide buffs on top of burst, crystal fragments could get a bonus effect too like applying concussed status effect on hit or granting a short buff on cast (could be anything like spell/weapon damage, damage done/done by this skill, crit chance would complement surge). Crystal weapon already has a secondary effect but it damage could use a slight boost to put it more in line too.
Now to review current skills:
Overload is a nice skill that has it's uses. Damage is decent, energy overload helps sustain but power overload could use a damage buff.
Power overload boosts range and damage slightly and is typically a pve morph because extra sustain is not needed in groups otherwise one can't rely on ultimate to sustain in pve for various reasons. While I say pve morph it's use is actually extremely limited: either use light attacks as a an opener at 500 ultimate which is mostly used for dummy parsing and even then it's now much less relevant with subclassing. The second use is a new one with Rakkhat's Voidmantle mythic, where it enables strong overload ha bursts and otherwise allows it to perform at a decent level. However, in this case overload's viability is wholly reliant on Voidmantle.
To make power overload and overload in general an actual option to be considered I suggest a boost to power overload's damage. Another possible solution could be to make overload benefit from weapon passives but then power overload still doesn't gain much as a morph compared to energy overload, so maybe it could apply concussion too then or receive some other very minor buff that would make it more distinct.
Another thing that must considered that overload has been plagued by a number of bugs for years, the kind of bugs that disrupt gameplay and severly harm the skill's overal performance. This must be worked on.
[*] Mages’ fury is by far the weakest execute that has the lowest trigger threshold at the same time. It has been power crept to the point where even when reaching the painfully low threshold of 20% health it’s not worth casting. It’s damage is so low that it is never worth slotting.
It is a delayed execute that used to match the “delayed burst” idea that sorcerer has initially been designed around. However, this playstyle has no longer been possible for many years due to abundance of healing effects and power creep of sorc’s delayed burst skills.
There are two ways of dealing with the skill:
Fist one is where it retains the function of delayed burst. Then the skill simply needs all of it’s tooltip values increased: damage, execute threshold and debuff’s duration has to be reverted to 4s because with 2s duration explosion can only go off if it’s triggered on the next global cooldown basically making the same as any other execute and not delayed.
I find it necessary to separately point out that sorc’s “delayed burst” no longer exists, however, it’s always mentioned in dev notes whenever mages’ fury is concerned and is used as a justification for nor buffing a dead skill and even nerfing it further. This is completely out of touch. The only place where the skill was ever used is in battlegrounds to steal kills from other teams when there were 3 but now there’s only 2 teams and bo one to steal kills from. This certainly could not be called a real function or a well-performed role. Delayed burst is currently performed with different skills and none of them come from sorcerer class because of the baseless obsession over sorcerer’s “delayed burst” and keeping it weak.
The second way of dealing with mages’s fury is to remove the delay altogether and remake it into an ordinary execute. Then it would still require a huge damage buff and it’s execute threshold to be raised. Then it's travel time would need to be reduced significantly because it's way too easy to dodge and it would no longer justified by the delayed effect. To make it stand out endless fury morph could receive some additional effect and lose the useless aoe part to become a good single target execute while mages’ wrath would remain aoe.
[*] Hurricane is a good skill and does not need any changes. It really fits storm calling’s role.
Boundless storm is supposed to be the magicka/shock based option but it has fallen behind hurricane. It’s damage is much lower and it’s radius is only 5m rendering it useless as a damage skill even though all melee skills have had their range increased to be at least 7m.
In order to make the skill desired again and to reinforce it’s identity it can grant a shock themed buff or debuff. Have a higher chance to apply concussed similarly to arctic blast. Or applying a buff or a debuff that increases shock damage dealt/taken. One of those and simultaneously have it’s damage and more importantly radius increased significantly. Another option would be to remove the dot part and instead make it deal damage in a wide radius on cast similarly to how it worked during two tests of vengeance campaign and apply a buff/debuff mentioned above. Then the skill’s cost would have to be reduced as it would be meant to be cast much more often.
[*] Lightning splash has finally received a buff in form of self synergy. But it could use a little more power to make it more desirable and competitive in the era of subclassing. I propose greatly increased chance to apply concussed which would nicely play into them of shock damage. Maybe some more distinction between it’s two morphs could be made.
[*] Surge is fine as it is. However, a great idea would be to move the exploitation passive here and make it be applied to all group members. Surge’s duration and cost can be reduced although this is not needed.
[*] Bolt escape is still a great mobility too but (next suggestion will certainly cause an uproar although there really is no reason for that) I propose it’s range be increased to 20m up from 15m (once again a very small increase) to make up for abundance of speed buffs and increased range of melee abilities. At the very least it should allow dark exchange slightly more viable again.
Streak remains a good stun, although it’s stun can be problematic to benefit from with high latency (also bolt escape is particularly prone to failing to be cast)
Ball of lightning is the inferior morph that is only taken when a player chooses to use a stun other than streak. Could use a slight buff, maybe in a form of a minor named buff.
[*] Storm calling passives are good but, personally, I would love disintegrate passive to be reintroduced (possibly added to energized) as it used to be fun and strongly promoted sorcerer identity.
As I already mentioned exploitation could be baked into one of the passives in this line.
In my opinion it would be a great and fun feature to make many of strom calling skills apply concussion as I have suggested for a number of them (increased chance or damage of concussion/sundered could be added to one of the passives like energized too) as it would play into underrepresented shock theme and work similarly to other elemental skill lines winter's embrace and ardent flame to actually make use of respective status effects. Consussion received an addtional effect not long ago that makes subsequent procs deal 15% increased damage to concussed target. Currently sources of shock damage and concussion are so few that this bonus is almost impossible to make use of. My suggestion would also make use of this interuction which I think could be fun.
retaining some utility and dark magic can be made into a full support/utility because crystal shards being one of the moat iconic sorcerer skills and it’s main source of damage is out of place in a support line. It is literally the only damage skill there and it is wasted on a line that has no damage passives. This leads to crystal shards being impossible to use effectively for damage because it means sacrificing a full damage line for just one skill and support builds have no use for it. Then crystal shards and fragments’ damage should be changed to shock to match the line’s theme. Additionally to put it more in line with similar burst skills like grim focus and molten whip that provide buffs on top of burst, crystal fragments could get a bonus effect too like applying concussed status effect on hit or granting a short buff on cast (could be anything like spell/weapon damage, damage done/done by this skill, crit chance would complement surge). Crystal weapon already has a secondary effect but it damage could use a slight boost to put it more in line too.
Now to review current skills:
Overload is a nice skill that has it's uses. Damage is decent, energy overload helps sustain but power overload could use a damage buff.
Power overload boosts range and damage slightly and is typically a pve morph because extra sustain is not needed in groups otherwise one can't rely on ultimate to sustain in pve for various reasons. While I say pve morph it's use is actually extremely limited: either use light attacks as a an opener at 500 ultimate which is mostly used for dummy parsing and even then it's now much less relevant with subclassing. The second use is a new one with Rakkhat's Voidmantle mythic, where it enables strong overload ha bursts and otherwise allows it to perform at a decent level. However, in this case overload's viability is wholly reliant on Voidmantle.
To make power overload and overload in general an actual option to be considered I suggest a boost to power overload's damage. Another possible solution could be to make overload benefit from weapon passives but then power overload still doesn't gain much as a morph compared to energy overload, so maybe it could apply concussion too then or receive some other very minor buff that would make it more distinct.
Another thing that must considered that overload has been plagued by a number of bugs for years, the kind of bugs that disrupt gameplay and severly harm the skill's overal performance. This must be worked on.
[*] Mages’ fury is by far the weakest execute that has the lowest trigger threshold at the same time. It has been power crept to the point where even when reaching the painfully low threshold of 20% health it’s not worth casting. It’s damage is so low that it is never worth slotting.
It is a delayed execute that used to match the “delayed burst” idea that sorcerer has initially been designed around. However, this playstyle has no longer been possible for many years due to abundance of healing effects and power creep of sorc’s delayed burst skills.
There are two ways of dealing with the skill:
Fist one is where it retains the function of delayed burst. Then the skill simply needs all of it’s tooltip values increased: damage, execute threshold and debuff’s duration has to be reverted to 4s because with 2s duration explosion can only go off if it’s triggered on the next global cooldown basically making the same as any other execute and not delayed.
I find it necessary to separately point out that sorc’s “delayed burst” no longer exists, however, it’s always mentioned in dev notes whenever mages’ fury is concerned and is used as a justification for nor buffing a dead skill and even nerfing it further. This is completely out of touch. The only place where the skill was ever used is in battlegrounds to steal kills from other teams when there were 3 but now there’s only 2 teams and bo one to steal kills from. This certainly could not be called a real function or a well-performed role. Delayed burst is currently performed with different skills and none of them come from sorcerer class because of the baseless obsession over sorcerer’s “delayed burst” and keeping it weak.
The second way of dealing with mages’s fury is to remove the delay altogether and remake it into an ordinary execute. Then it would still require a huge damage buff and it’s execute threshold to be raised. Then it's travel time would need to be reduced significantly because it's way too easy to dodge and it would no longer justified by the delayed effect. To make it stand out endless fury morph could receive some additional effect and lose the useless aoe part to become a good single target execute while mages’ wrath would remain aoe.
[*] Hurricane is a good skill and does not need any changes. It really fits storm calling’s role.
Boundless storm is supposed to be the magicka/shock based option but it has fallen behind hurricane. It’s damage is much lower and it’s radius is only 5m rendering it useless as a damage skill even though all melee skills have had their range increased to be at least 7m.
In order to make the skill desired again and to reinforce it’s identity it can grant a shock themed buff or debuff. Have a higher chance to apply concussed similarly to arctic blast. Or applying a buff or a debuff that increases shock damage dealt/taken. One of those and simultaneously have it’s damage and more importantly radius increased significantly. Another option would be to remove the dot part and instead make it deal damage in a wide radius on cast similarly to how it worked during two tests of vengeance campaign and apply a buff/debuff mentioned above. Then the skill’s cost would have to be reduced as it would be meant to be cast much more often.
[*] Lightning splash has finally received a buff in form of self synergy. But it could use a little more power to make it more desirable and competitive in the era of subclassing. I propose greatly increased chance to apply concussed which would nicely play into them of shock damage. Maybe some more distinction between it’s two morphs could be made.
[*] Surge is fine as it is. However, a great idea would be to move the exploitation passive here and make it be applied to all group members. Surge’s duration and cost can be reduced although this is not needed.
[*] Bolt escape is still a great mobility too but (next suggestion will certainly cause an uproar although there really is no reason for that) I propose it’s range be increased to 20m up from 15m (once again a very small increase) to make up for abundance of speed buffs and increased range of melee abilities. At the very least it should allow dark exchange slightly more viable again.
Streak remains a good stun, although it’s stun can be problematic to benefit from with high latency (also bolt escape is particularly prone to failing to be cast)
Ball of lightning is the inferior morph that is only taken when a player chooses to use a stun other than streak. Could use a slight buff, maybe in a form of a minor named buff.
[*] Storm calling passives are good but, personally, I would love disintegrate passive to be reintroduced (possibly added to energized) as it used to be fun and strongly promoted sorcerer identity.
As I already mentioned exploitation could be baked into one of the passives in this line.
In my opinion it would be a great and fun feature to make many of strom calling skills apply concussion as I have suggested for a number of them (increased chance or damage of concussion/sundered could be added to one of the passives like energized too) as it would play into underrepresented shock theme and work similarly to other elemental skill lines winter's embrace and ardent flame to actually make use of respective status effects. Consussion received an addtional effect not long ago that makes subsequent procs deal 15% increased damage to concussed target. Currently sources of shock damage and concussion are so few that this bonus is almost impossible to make use of. My suggestion would also make use of this interuction which I think could be fun.
Concerning u47 on pts:
Bound aegis change absolutely must be reversed. Ward and all shields in general already can’t compete with other sources of healing and defense on live. This is compounded by the fact that ward already lost it’s healing, a change that came far too late when ward was no longer as strong compared to new subclassing options. Then daedric summoning lost 5% max magicka too, nerfing shields even further, and now another 8% max magicka is being taken away. Now shields are so bad that even with all desire to severely handicap oneself just to use them they will no longer even reach the floor of healing to even allow one to play at all. Of course I am talking about pvp because these changes are really irrelevant for pve. Not to mention that max resource is not a desired stat to say the least, for any sort of content or gameplay. Daedric summoning’s max stats’ contribution to damage is extremely minor (but if anything damage here needs solid buffs instead of nerfs), so the only purpose these changes serve are to nerf a group of skills that is dead already. Additionally this bonus is unique and cannot be substituted through other means and if bound armaments is slotted than the class is left without a source of major resolve which is unthinkable!
Attention should be directed at other skills and passives of daedric summoning instead.
Has been addressed, however, shields as an option in general are in dire need of buffs.
EDIT: added formatting to make it readable, added a comment on overload as I forgot it initially
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s3dulo✭✭Yep. Out of 3 skill lines sorc has maybe 5 good abilites and a couple good passives. It's truly in a sad state. It needs a boost to the shock damage passive as well. Somewhere in the 8-15% range.7 -
Zyaneth_Bal✭✭✭✭✭Yep. Out of 3 skill lines sorc has maybe 5 good abilites and a couple good passives. It's truly in a sad state. It needs a boost to the shock damage passive as well. Somewhere in the 8-15% range.
Indeed, personally, I'd want desintegrate to be put there. It's more interactive than just a flat value.1 -
Tannus15✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭Honestly I wish I knew what kind of feedback would be most helpful and most likely to be heeded from the dev team.
@ZOS_Kevin are we wasting our time with suggestions?
should we just be trying to highlight the issues with the current iteration or will that be taken as non-constructive negative whinging?
I honestly don't know how to approach putting together a post that won't be taken as bashing the changes or ignored as someone who is just having a whinge because we don't like change or something.
Do the dev team take on board our suggestions and take them seriously, or are they just taking the problem and coming up with their own solution as the experts in the room?19 -
madmufffin✭✭✭✭✭As I mentioned in the thread for re-rolling all the base classes to be more role specific in nature, Sorc is just in a dreadful state. Has the weakest passive for ele type damage with it only being 5% and no benefit to status effect, a basically useless recovery passive, the worst execute in the game by huge margins, and no actual spammable. Just feels really gross and is heavily carried by the one reverse execute passive. Aggressively nerfing Aegis on top of it was just the cherry on top.11
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Spearblade✭✭✭✭The only reason I remain a Sorcerer at this point is because I like the class fantasy of being a spellblade type character (which has become more dubious lately, other classes may fit the theme better now) and Beacon of Oblivion (I use this set for everything (DPS) except PVP).
I also really, really enjoy Crystal Frags, but I haven't had the ability to use it since Subclassing released. It's in an objectively terrible skill line. I also enjoyed Bound Armaments, but it's also in an objectively bad skill line and is completely outclassed by Grim Focus (even after nerfs).
I'm also holding out hope for an Elementalist type build being good someday.
I'm actually at a point where I believe that the Champion Point system should be fleshed out in a BIG way and Class skill lines lose their passives entirely. Let me pick what I want to make my build tick.Edited by Spearblade on 14 July 2025 22:573 -
Drackolus✭✭✭I have a little rework outline in a spreadsheet, but the basics are to move all max stat stuff to Dark Magic, adding a passive that boosts magic damage based on max magicka, physical damage based on max stamina, and healing done based on max health. Made Daedric Summoning a full pet tree and made the morphs of abilities fit into roles better, like making Twilight Matriarch heal instead of damaging while in combat. I also have Daedric Prey deal oblivion damage when the target is hit by any pet, up to once per second, meaning it works well with any pet build but gets diminishing returns, since pets typically hit once every 2 seconds. Also made one morph be a taunt with major breach. I was also toying with Bound Armaments be a weapon pet that hits when you do, so it fits it's role as an attack booster while also sticking to the pet theme.
A lot of those are based on the philosophy that all skill lines should be useful for any role, and that they should have a cohesive mechanical and stylistic theme.2 -
AtriaKhorist✭✭✭✭Zyaneth_Bal wrote: »Steak remains a good stun, although it’s stun can be problematic to benefit from with high latency (also bolt escape is particularly prone to failing to be cast)
Mmmm, Steak.
Thank you for the morning chuckle, and good post. Full on agree.
Grim Focus Permaglow is still a problem: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/641376/grim-focus-permaglow4 -
BlackLabel✭✭✭I don’t understand why ZoS continuously nerfs max mag sorc builds. They have been slowly reducing max mag over several patches. But don’t care that shields require max mag!
Please revert the bound aeges nerf ZoS!1 -
Zyaneth_Bal✭✭✭✭✭
lolAtriaKhorist wrote: »Zyaneth_Bal wrote: »Steak remains a good stun, although it’s stun can be problematic to benefit from with high latency (also bolt escape is particularly prone to failing to be cast)
Mmmm, Steak.
Thank you for the morning chuckle, and good post. Full on agree.
well, typos are unavoidable when one fixes a whole class (only took like 1-2h btw)
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Zyaneth_Bal✭✭✭✭✭Forgot overload initially (rip), now added a comment for it too and a tiny bit more on storm calling in general.Edited by Zyaneth_Bal on 15 July 2025 13:400
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Yudo✭✭✭✭If they want to touch overload, how about fixing the LA bug first, instead of fixing the HA no one asked for.4 -
Lebensf0rm✭✭✭I really like these high-effort brainstorming posts, and I hope this sort of thing is something the devs look at. Here are my own thoughts about potential Sorcerer reworks.
Dark MagicDaedric Summoning- Crystal Shard: I don’t think this skill needs to be moved; I think there are ways to keep the original classes competitive without assigning each tree a role like the DLC classes. I think it would be more fun to make the actives and passives from the base classes that are lagging behind stronger and more flexible. Frags is a solid skill that needs some combination of an extra effect and help from passives to end up in more PvE and PvP builds. Something like a short window of Major Berserk or a smaller, unique % damage done bonus would be both powerful and incentivize higher CPM play, which stops it from playing nice with the Fatecarver meta in PvE.
Crystal Weapon is the morph that I think needs a lot of work, as there isn’t much reason to slot it anywhere for any role. If they want tanks to use it, it needs much higher armor reduction and/or a unique % damage taken debuff. If they want DDs to use it, I think looking into adding a strong DoT caused by light attacks akin to Pyrebrand or Werewolf Berserker’s bleed could make it useful. - Dark Exchange: I think Zyaneth has identified some clear weaknesses of this skill and its morphs compared to other sustain skills like Netch and Siphoning Attacks. Given the channel (which feels terrible), it’s in need of buffs rather than nerfs. Minor Force and Minor Berserk are easily sourced in both PvE and PvP, so I don’t see why both morphs can’t provide these and some important major buff like Brutality/Sorcery or Savagery/Prophecy. The skill would end up somewhat loaded with these changes, but I think that’s a fair trade for an interruptible skill you have to cast every 20s.
- Encase: I actually like where Vibrant Shroud is at. It’s a skill that has a lot of utility. Shattering Spines, on the other hand, is unfortunately a victim to some huge QoL changes. In PvE, Tanks now have AoE pulls in Leashing Burst and Void Bash, and the various chains now taunt. In conjunction with high utility snares like Razor Caltrops, there really isn’t a need for an AoE root; trash enemies simply don’t get far enough away to make it out of cleave, especially in optimized groups. And the only real need for AoE roots in PvP seems to be setting groups up for bombs, which Burning Talons just does better (with an awesome synergy). I think one way to make Shattering Spines unique and competitive in the niches where it’s outclassed would be to make it an AoE pull like Leashing Burst but with an added effect akin to Vicious Death or Plaguebreak: enemies pulled in are briefly marked somehow, and when they die they “shatter”, dealing some sort of strong AoE damage. Another idea relevant to “shattering” could be an AoE pull that also applies Major Breach (or perhaps both Breaches), eliminating the need to source the debuff(s) from elsewhere.
- Rune Prison: I don’t think there’s a single use case in which this skill isn’t totally outclassed by another. Rune Cage is like Shattering Rocks but substantially worse, especially when factoring in the resource return from Helping Hands. Defensive Rune’s ability to stun an attacker with their own attack is unique, but single target hard stuns are really only useful in PvP, and in PvP you typically want direct control over hard stuns so you can be certain of your burst damage being unblocked. I think some sort of change to Rune Cage to bring it more in line with Shattering Rocks (like making it unavoidable and increasing the damage done with the target breaks free) would give it more PvP utility. Unfortunately, I think defensive Rune probably needs a total rework. A single target rune that doesn’t stun, but dramatically increases the damage a target takes from status effects and the chance of status effects being applied to them could get a lot of mileage in both PvE and PvP.
- Daedric Mines: Enemies can’t be hit by more than one mine at once, so Daedric Tomb ends up as a very expensive, very weak skill to use in trash packs, especially with abilities like Fatecarver in the environment. That’s about it for that morph. To be an effective AoE delayed burst tool, Daedric Tomb would have to work something like Proximity Detonation, but throwable. Even then, it might need some extra effect or strong scaling with the amount of targets hit to compete. Daedric Refuge is clunky. I like the idea of a shield for your group, but if it’s going to cost 5400 mag, I’d like to see it work like a version of Bone Shield that scales with either health or mag, as well as some some sort of additional effect, since it finds itself competing with shield-scribed Ulfsild’s Contingency.
- Negate Magic: I think this skill would get used more frequently with buffs that meet needs on each side of an AoE burst scenario. The buff I have in mind is some sort of shared healing/damage received within the bubble: allies in an Absorption field would share some percentage of the healing each ally in the bubble receives, and enemies in a Suppression field would share some percentage of the damage each enemy receives. I wouldn’t mind having to spend more ult on this ability for that kind of damage mitigation/increase.
- Passives: I also like where Unholy Knowledge is at. Cost reduction just feels good. Blood Magic getting the max resource buffs from Bound Armor is an odd choice, but I’ll take it; higher max resources benefit all playstyles. Persistence is great for tanks in PvE and PvP more generally, especially with burst damage going up like it has.. Exploitation is where major work has to be done, as others have pointed out. Hemorrhage is definitely the model: the Minor Prophecy needs to be paired with some sort of substantial buff. I’m unsure what the buff should be, however. Applying a unique armor reduction or damage taken debuff with critical damage could be interesting and useful in both PvE and PvP.
Storm Calling- Summon Familiar/Twilight: The damage morphs of the summons should probably be more potent and have less of their damage tied to Daedric Prey, as Zyaneth says. The burst heal from Unstable Clannfear just isn’t good enough to be worth using two bar slots on. To be worth it, I think the clannfear would have to work like Spirit Guardian when it’s alive, and it’s active ability should do something like block for you for a short time. Twilight Matriarch would need something like passive Minor Mending and a Major Vitality aura on its active to be worth two whole bar slots.
- Daedric Curse: Daedric Prey probably needs pet/no pet versions to keep it flexible in PvE. The burst from Haunting Curse should be stronger if burst damage is all you’re going to get out of it, given where Grim Focus and Scorch are at.
- Conjured Ward: Just give the magsorcs their shield that heals back.The damage in PvP with subclassing and Monomyth together is very high, and mag specs in general seem to be suffering.
- Bound Armor: I like where Bound Aegis will be after the buffs announced during week 2 of this PTS cycle. However, Bound Armaments will still be much weaker than its most obvious counterpart (Grim Focus) with an increased sundered chance. Would love to see Grim Focus unnerfed or slightly modified to incentivize more active use and Bound Armaments be buffed to be comparable somehow.
- Passives: Given the diminishing returns from multiple sources of -% damage taken and the wide availability of both Major and Minor Protection, the value of Daedric Protection either needs to be increased or converted into an armor bonus.. Expert Summoner is somewhat weak and bland. A substantial cost decrease for subsequent casts of skills from the Daedric Summoning tree similar to Gravelord’s Reusable Parts could be nice, especially if this line’s skills were all good enough to be worth using somewhere. Flat cost reduction like a cost reduction glyph after using a Daedric Summoning Ability could also be quite good, and plays more nicely with subclassing.
- Passives: Starting with this line’s passives because I think it’s where the biggest opportunity for fun, impactful changes lies. I see two passives worth changing: Capacitor and Energized. Capacitor and the line in general would benefit from increased chance to apply concussion and increased damage from the concussion effect, similar to Warden’s Glacial Presence. I think that Energized’s change should be pretty major. In short, Energized would be more useful and encourage more use of Storm Calling’s active abilities if reimagined as a lightning-themed analogue of Burning Light with a few differences. This new Energized would only gain stacks for its damage proc from physical or shock damage, but apply its damage to the target and all targets within melee range of it with guaranteed concussion. The ubiquity of Fatecarver in the PvE meta is a sign that there needs to be other ways of doing high AoE damage in longer encounters, and I see the proposed change to Energize as one way for another line to potentially meet the need for more AoE damage with a more active playstyle (something many beamed-out DDs long for).
- Overload: Outside of fixing bugs and making the LAs feel less clunky, I don’t think this skill needs to be touched right now.
- Bolt Escape: I think this skill and its morphs are roughly fine as they are. A distance increase would be nice, given how much mobility in PvP has increased.
- Mage’s Fury: This skill is fairly weak as an execute, and seems to see the bulk of its use in Battlegrounds for finishing off enemies that are already basically dead. I think one way to make it more useful without playing with its base values or delay would be to make it apply full stacks of the new Energized proposed above based on how low the target's health is (e.g., a target takes Mage’s Fury’s damage and a guaranteed Energized proc at 25% health, two procs at 15%, and three at 5%, or something like that).
- Lightning Form: I’d love to see Hurricane unnerfed some, but otherwise I think the skill is in a good place. Boundless Storm, on the other hand, is too weak. Zyaneth is onto something with one of their ideas: a thematically appropriate buff would be giving it a melee range (7m) AoE around that caster that does shock damage with increased concussion chance similar to Artic Blast. This would also play nice with the proposed Energized change above.
- Lightning Splash: Outside of providing a synergy, this skill isn’t doing a whole lot. I think it would be cool to see at least one of this skill’s morphs work like a hybrid of Twisting Path and the Essence Thief proc: the caster gains Major Expedition for a short time after moving through their own puddle, as well as some sort of damage buff. This would fit with the mobility encouraged by the rest of the line, as well as give the skill some needed power.
- Surge: Critical Surge is fine where it is. I would like to see a much more powerful Power Surge, however.. I rarely see this morph used, and would be more interested in seeing it work as a pure damage skill instead of an AoE heal. Perhaps Grave Lord’s Sacrifice is the model: make it work like that, but for all class skills.
4 - Crystal Shard: I don’t think this skill needs to be moved; I think there are ways to keep the original classes competitive without assigning each tree a role like the DLC classes. I think it would be more fun to make the actives and passives from the base classes that are lagging behind stronger and more flexible. Frags is a solid skill that needs some combination of an extra effect and help from passives to end up in more PvE and PvP builds. Something like a short window of Major Berserk or a smaller, unique % damage done bonus would be both powerful and incentivize higher CPM play, which stops it from playing nice with the Fatecarver meta in PvE.
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Zyaneth_Bal✭✭✭✭✭Lebensf0rm wrote: »I really like these high-effort brainstorming posts, and I hope this sort of thing is something the devs look at. Here are my own thoughts about potential Sorcerer reworks.
Dark MagicDaedric Summoning- Crystal Shard: I don’t think this skill needs to be moved; I think there are ways to keep the original classes competitive without assigning each tree a role like the DLC classes. I think it would be more fun to make the actives and passives from the base classes that are lagging behind stronger and more flexible. Frags is a solid skill that needs some combination of an extra effect and help from passives to end up in more PvE and PvP builds. Something like a short window of Major Berserk or a smaller, unique % damage done bonus would be both powerful and incentivize higher CPM play, which stops it from playing nice with the Fatecarver meta in PvE.
Crystal Weapon is the morph that I think needs a lot of work, as there isn’t much reason to slot it anywhere for any role. If they want tanks to use it, it needs much higher armor reduction and/or a unique % damage taken debuff. If they want DDs to use it, I think looking into adding a strong DoT caused by light attacks akin to Pyrebrand or Werewolf Berserker’s bleed could make it useful. - Dark Exchange: I think Zyaneth has identified some clear weaknesses of this skill and its morphs compared to other sustain skills like Netch and Siphoning Attacks. Given the channel (which feels terrible), it’s in need of buffs rather than nerfs. Minor Force and Minor Berserk are easily sourced in both PvE and PvP, so I don’t see why both morphs can’t provide these and some important major buff like Brutality/Sorcery or Savagery/Prophecy. The skill would end up somewhat loaded with these changes, but I think that’s a fair trade for an interruptible skill you have to cast every 20s.
- Encase: I actually like where Vibrant Shroud is at. It’s a skill that has a lot of utility. Shattering Spines, on the other hand, is unfortunately a victim to some huge QoL changes. In PvE, Tanks now have AoE pulls in Leashing Burst and Void Bash, and the various chains now taunt. In conjunction with high utility snares like Razor Caltrops, there really isn’t a need for an AoE root; trash enemies simply don’t get far enough away to make it out of cleave, especially in optimized groups. And the only real need for AoE roots in PvP seems to be setting groups up for bombs, which Burning Talons just does better (with an awesome synergy). I think one way to make Shattering Spines unique and competitive in the niches where it’s outclassed would be to make it an AoE pull like Leashing Burst but with an added effect akin to Vicious Death or Plaguebreak: enemies pulled in are briefly marked somehow, and when they die they “shatter”, dealing some sort of strong AoE damage. Another idea relevant to “shattering” could be an AoE pull that also applies Major Breach (or perhaps both Breaches), eliminating the need to source the debuff(s) from elsewhere.
- Rune Prison: I don’t think there’s a single use case in which this skill isn’t totally outclassed by another. Rune Cage is like Shattering Rocks but substantially worse, especially when factoring in the resource return from Helping Hands. Defensive Rune’s ability to stun an attacker with their own attack is unique, but single target hard stuns are really only useful in PvP, and in PvP you typically want direct control over hard stuns so you can be certain of your burst damage being unblocked. I think some sort of change to Rune Cage to bring it more in line with Shattering Rocks (like making it unavoidable and increasing the damage done with the target breaks free) would give it more PvP utility. Unfortunately, I think defensive Rune probably needs a total rework. A single target rune that doesn’t stun, but dramatically increases the damage a target takes from status effects and the chance of status effects being applied to them could get a lot of mileage in both PvE and PvP.
- Daedric Mines: Enemies can’t be hit by more than one mine at once, so Daedric Tomb ends up as a very expensive, very weak skill to use in trash packs, especially with abilities like Fatecarver in the environment. That’s about it for that morph. To be an effective AoE delayed burst tool, Daedric Tomb would have to work something like Proximity Detonation, but throwable. Even then, it might need some extra effect or strong scaling with the amount of targets hit to compete. Daedric Refuge is clunky. I like the idea of a shield for your group, but if it’s going to cost 5400 mag, I’d like to see it work like a version of Bone Shield that scales with either health or mag, as well as some some sort of additional effect, since it finds itself competing with shield-scribed Ulfsild’s Contingency.
- Negate Magic: I think this skill would get used more frequently with buffs that meet needs on each side of an AoE burst scenario. The buff I have in mind is some sort of shared healing/damage received within the bubble: allies in an Absorption field would share some percentage of the healing each ally in the bubble receives, and enemies in a Suppression field would share some percentage of the damage each enemy receives. I wouldn’t mind having to spend more ult on this ability for that kind of damage mitigation/increase.
- Passives: I also like where Unholy Knowledge is at. Cost reduction just feels good. Blood Magic getting the max resource buffs from Bound Armor is an odd choice, but I’ll take it; higher max resources benefit all playstyles. Persistence is great for tanks in PvE and PvP more generally, especially with burst damage going up like it has.. Exploitation is where major work has to be done, as others have pointed out. Hemorrhage is definitely the model: the Minor Prophecy needs to be paired with some sort of substantial buff. I’m unsure what the buff should be, however. Applying a unique armor reduction or damage taken debuff with critical damage could be interesting and useful in both PvE and PvP.
[*]Passives: Given the diminishing returns from multiple sources of -% damage taken and the wide availability of both Major and Minor Protection, the value of Daedric Protection either needs to be increased or converted into an armor bonus.. Expert Summoner is somewhat weak and bland. A substantial cost decrease for subsequent casts of skills from the Daedric Summoning tree similar to Gravelord’s Reusable Parts could be nice, especially if this line’s skills were all good enough to be worth using somewhere. Flat cost reduction like a cost reduction glyph after using a Daedric Summoning Ability could also be quite good, and plays more nicely with subclassing.
[/list][/spoiler]
Storm Calling- Passives: Starting with this line’s passives because I think it’s where the biggest opportunity for fun, impactful changes lies. I see two passives worth changing: Capacitor and Energized. Capacitor and the line in general would benefit from increased chance to apply concussion and increased damage from the concussion effect, similar to Warden’s Glacial Presence. I think that Energized’s change should be pretty major. In short, Energized would be more useful and encourage more use of Storm Calling’s active abilities if reimagined as a lightning-themed analogue of Burning Light with a few differences. This new Energized would only gain stacks for its damage proc from physical or shock damage, but apply its damage to the target and all targets within melee range of it with guaranteed concussion. The ubiquity of Fatecarver in the PvE meta is a sign that there needs to be other ways of doing high AoE damage in longer encounters, and I see the proposed change to Energize as one way for another line to potentially meet the need for more AoE damage with a more active playstyle (something many beamed-out DDs long for).
- Overload: Outside of fixing bugs and making the LAs feel less clunky, I don’t think this skill needs to be touched right now.
- Bolt Escape: I think this skill and its morphs are roughly fine as they are. A distance increase would be nice, given how much mobility in PvP has increased.
- Mage’s Fury: This skill is fairly weak as an execute, and seems to see the bulk of its use in Battlegrounds for finishing off enemies that are already basically dead. I think one way to make it more useful without playing with its base values or delay would be to make it apply full stacks of the new Energized proposed above based on how low the target's health is (e.g., a target takes Mage’s Fury’s damage and a guaranteed Energized proc at 25% health, two procs at 15%, and three at 5%, or something like that).
- Lightning Form: I’d love to see Hurricane unnerfed some, but otherwise I think the skill is in a good place. Boundless Storm, on the other hand, is too weak. Zyaneth is onto something with one of their ideas: a thematically appropriate buff would be giving it a melee range (7m) AoE around that caster that does shock damage with increased concussion chance similar to Artic Blast. This would also play nice with the proposed Energized change above.
- Lightning Splash: Outside of providing a synergy, this skill isn’t doing a whole lot. I think it would be cool to see at least one of this skill’s morphs work like a hybrid of Twisting Path and the Essence Thief proc: the caster gains Major Expedition for a short time after moving through their own puddle, as well as some sort of damage buff. This would fit with the mobility encouraged by the rest of the line, as well as give the skill some needed power.
- Surge: Critical Surge is fine where it is. I would like to see a much more powerful Power Surge, however.. I rarely see this morph used, and would be more interested in seeing it work as a pure damage skill instead of an AoE heal. Perhaps Grave Lord’s Sacrifice is the model: make it work like that, but for all class skills.
Thanks for great input. Here's what I think on some of your suggestions as well as some stuff I haven't covered in the initial post with additional thoughts and ideas.
Dark magic-
I agree that fragments need an additional effect.
- I like your suggestions for crystal weapon as it's meant to be a pressure option rather than burst, maybe it could indeed gain a dot but I don't feel it would suit this ability. Instead it's debuff could stack which would reinforce it's identity as a pressure skill and maybe make it potentially usefull for supports/tanks. Imo it's also a bit more interactive than a bland dot or damage taken debuff.
I wasn't ready to touch the dead skills at the time beacuse it's a lot more work lol - As for shattering spines I rly like the idea of enemies shattering on death similar to plaguebreak, could really see use in pve fights with lots of adds and the concept itself sounds like a lot of fun.
- Rune prison was only ever used for one patch when it was made both unblockable and undodgeable which was a bit to much indeed but then it was ruined completely as if in retaliation by making it dodgeable while adding a long delay before the effect taking and a visible effect on top making it impossible to get stunned with.
Besides the delay rune cage acts similarly to shattering rocks with one small condition that makes a world of difference: shattering rocks deals damage when the stun completes while rune cage deals damage if the stun lasts the full suration which virtually never happens. The dealy needs to be ruduced significantly to make it on par with javelin in use that is also less conspiquous visually. so account for that too. Then damage should be done when the stun ends and not if it lasts the full duration because this condition is impossible to fulfill. Additionally it could gain a debuff on top to make it more unique and account for the fact that it doesn't benefit form any of the passives.
Defensive rune is bad by definition as you said because you have no control over the timing of the stun and not even the choice of target. Needs to be reworked. I think it's redundant as a stun, so should be remade into a buff/debuff. For instance, while the effect holds heal when dealt damage (could be an ordinary hot or some other effect) and apply a debuff to attackers (anything is possible: reduce damage, increase damage taken etc) or something along those lines. Otherwise can be made into a straight up buff of sorts. - Daedric mines is hard. I think there's no saving this one, has to be completely scrapped and replaced by something different entirely.
- Persistence is indeed good for tanks but that's it. I'd like for it to be more more universally applicable. Not to mention that as I said it fit sorcerer poorly due to the fact that block mitigations doesn't apply to damage shields, so this passive feels counter intuitive.
- Personally, I dislike max stats being moved to dark magic when ward is in daedric summoning, to make it worse now 2 lines have max stat buffs split among them.
- Nice suggestion for Negate, I second it. Additionally, to reinforce it's identity and make it more useful for supports I propose that Absorption field cleanses ALL debuffs in the area, both aoe and single target.
- Indeed dark magic can probably be made into another damage tree with it's functionalities being a mix of damage and support/utility but in my opinion that would require more work than making it into a full support/utility tree. Another thing to consider is that storm calling needs crystal shards to become a full-fledged damage tree unlike a secondary complementary choice it is now.
Daedric summoning
For Daedric summoning passives:- Yes, you are right of course, Daedric protection is indeed quite weak in actual combat, I overlooked this. Your suggestion is agreeable too. But many other lines have same flat armour bonus and it basically has the same value, so maybe it could grant a mix of armour and something else, or just bake the armour into rebate as that one is extremely weak on it's own. And add a new passive.
- Expert summoner s way too weak even for max resource builds that basically don't even exist anymore, it's value needs to be buffed then to support max res builds and put expert summoner more in line with other highest level passives add a secondary effect scaling with max resources, like increase armour/damage/recoveries or even shield strength to support shields based on your highest resource.
Storm calling- I agree that this line is in great need of a distinct and interactive damage passive. In my opinion the new passive should be something completely unique rather than resembling burning light. Disintegtrate used to fulfill this role perfectly and I believe that it can once again.
I disagree with your idea on lighting splash for the same reason, major expedition would make it too similar to path of darkness.
Edited by Zyaneth_Bal on 17 July 2025 00:471 - Crystal Shard: I don’t think this skill needs to be moved; I think there are ways to keep the original classes competitive without assigning each tree a role like the DLC classes. I think it would be more fun to make the actives and passives from the base classes that are lagging behind stronger and more flexible. Frags is a solid skill that needs some combination of an extra effect and help from passives to end up in more PvE and PvP builds. Something like a short window of Major Berserk or a smaller, unique % damage done bonus would be both powerful and incentivize higher CPM play, which stops it from playing nice with the Fatecarver meta in PvE.
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Spearblade✭✭✭✭Lebensf0rm wrote: »I really like these high-effort brainstorming posts, and I hope this sort of thing is something the devs look at. Here are my own thoughts about potential Sorcerer reworks.
Dark MagicDaedric Summoning- Crystal Shard: I don’t think this skill needs to be moved; I think there are ways to keep the original classes competitive without assigning each tree a role like the DLC classes. I think it would be more fun to make the actives and passives from the base classes that are lagging behind stronger and more flexible. Frags is a solid skill that needs some combination of an extra effect and help from passives to end up in more PvE and PvP builds. Something like a short window of Major Berserk or a smaller, unique % damage done bonus would be both powerful and incentivize higher CPM play, which stops it from playing nice with the Fatecarver meta in PvE.
Crystal Weapon is the morph that I think needs a lot of work, as there isn’t much reason to slot it anywhere for any role. If they want tanks to use it, it needs much higher armor reduction and/or a unique % damage taken debuff. If they want DDs to use it, I think looking into adding a strong DoT caused by light attacks akin to Pyrebrand or Werewolf Berserker’s bleed could make it useful. - Dark Exchange: I think Zyaneth has identified some clear weaknesses of this skill and its morphs compared to other sustain skills like Netch and Siphoning Attacks. Given the channel (which feels terrible), it’s in need of buffs rather than nerfs. Minor Force and Minor Berserk are easily sourced in both PvE and PvP, so I don’t see why both morphs can’t provide these and some important major buff like Brutality/Sorcery or Savagery/Prophecy. The skill would end up somewhat loaded with these changes, but I think that’s a fair trade for an interruptible skill you have to cast every 20s.
- Encase: I actually like where Vibrant Shroud is at. It’s a skill that has a lot of utility. Shattering Spines, on the other hand, is unfortunately a victim to some huge QoL changes. In PvE, Tanks now have AoE pulls in Leashing Burst and Void Bash, and the various chains now taunt. In conjunction with high utility snares like Razor Caltrops, there really isn’t a need for an AoE root; trash enemies simply don’t get far enough away to make it out of cleave, especially in optimized groups. And the only real need for AoE roots in PvP seems to be setting groups up for bombs, which Burning Talons just does better (with an awesome synergy). I think one way to make Shattering Spines unique and competitive in the niches where it’s outclassed would be to make it an AoE pull like Leashing Burst but with an added effect akin to Vicious Death or Plaguebreak: enemies pulled in are briefly marked somehow, and when they die they “shatter”, dealing some sort of strong AoE damage. Another idea relevant to “shattering” could be an AoE pull that also applies Major Breach (or perhaps both Breaches), eliminating the need to source the debuff(s) from elsewhere.
- Rune Prison: I don’t think there’s a single use case in which this skill isn’t totally outclassed by another. Rune Cage is like Shattering Rocks but substantially worse, especially when factoring in the resource return from Helping Hands. Defensive Rune’s ability to stun an attacker with their own attack is unique, but single target hard stuns are really only useful in PvP, and in PvP you typically want direct control over hard stuns so you can be certain of your burst damage being unblocked. I think some sort of change to Rune Cage to bring it more in line with Shattering Rocks (like making it unavoidable and increasing the damage done with the target breaks free) would give it more PvP utility. Unfortunately, I think defensive Rune probably needs a total rework. A single target rune that doesn’t stun, but dramatically increases the damage a target takes from status effects and the chance of status effects being applied to them could get a lot of mileage in both PvE and PvP.
- Daedric Mines: Enemies can’t be hit by more than one mine at once, so Daedric Tomb ends up as a very expensive, very weak skill to use in trash packs, especially with abilities like Fatecarver in the environment. That’s about it for that morph. To be an effective AoE delayed burst tool, Daedric Tomb would have to work something like Proximity Detonation, but throwable. Even then, it might need some extra effect or strong scaling with the amount of targets hit to compete. Daedric Refuge is clunky. I like the idea of a shield for your group, but if it’s going to cost 5400 mag, I’d like to see it work like a version of Bone Shield that scales with either health or mag, as well as some some sort of additional effect, since it finds itself competing with shield-scribed Ulfsild’s Contingency.
- Negate Magic: I think this skill would get used more frequently with buffs that meet needs on each side of an AoE burst scenario. The buff I have in mind is some sort of shared healing/damage received within the bubble: allies in an Absorption field would share some percentage of the healing each ally in the bubble receives, and enemies in a Suppression field would share some percentage of the damage each enemy receives. I wouldn’t mind having to spend more ult on this ability for that kind of damage mitigation/increase.
- Passives: I also like where Unholy Knowledge is at. Cost reduction just feels good. Blood Magic getting the max resource buffs from Bound Armor is an odd choice, but I’ll take it; higher max resources benefit all playstyles. Persistence is great for tanks in PvE and PvP more generally, especially with burst damage going up like it has.. Exploitation is where major work has to be done, as others have pointed out. Hemorrhage is definitely the model: the Minor Prophecy needs to be paired with some sort of substantial buff. I’m unsure what the buff should be, however. Applying a unique armor reduction or damage taken debuff with critical damage could be interesting and useful in both PvE and PvP.
Storm Calling- Summon Familiar/Twilight: The damage morphs of the summons should probably be more potent and have less of their damage tied to Daedric Prey, as Zyaneth says. The burst heal from Unstable Clannfear just isn’t good enough to be worth using two bar slots on. To be worth it, I think the clannfear would have to work like Spirit Guardian when it’s alive, and it’s active ability should do something like block for you for a short time. Twilight Matriarch would need something like passive Minor Mending and a Major Vitality aura on its active to be worth two whole bar slots.
- Daedric Curse: Daedric Prey probably needs pet/no pet versions to keep it flexible in PvE. The burst from Haunting Curse should be stronger if burst damage is all you’re going to get out of it, given where Grim Focus and Scorch are at.
- Conjured Ward: Just give the magsorcs their shield that heals back.The damage in PvP with subclassing and Monomyth together is very high, and mag specs in general seem to be suffering.
- Bound Armor: I like where Bound Aegis will be after the buffs announced during week 2 of this PTS cycle. However, Bound Armaments will still be much weaker than its most obvious counterpart (Grim Focus) with an increased sundered chance. Would love to see Grim Focus unnerfed or slightly modified to incentivize more active use and Bound Armaments be buffed to be comparable somehow.
- Passives: Given the diminishing returns from multiple sources of -% damage taken and the wide availability of both Major and Minor Protection, the value of Daedric Protection either needs to be increased or converted into an armor bonus.. Expert Summoner is somewhat weak and bland. A substantial cost decrease for subsequent casts of skills from the Daedric Summoning tree similar to Gravelord’s Reusable Parts could be nice, especially if this line’s skills were all good enough to be worth using somewhere. Flat cost reduction like a cost reduction glyph after using a Daedric Summoning Ability could also be quite good, and plays more nicely with subclassing.
- Passives: Starting with this line’s passives because I think it’s where the biggest opportunity for fun, impactful changes lies. I see two passives worth changing: Capacitor and Energized. Capacitor and the line in general would benefit from increased chance to apply concussion and increased damage from the concussion effect, similar to Warden’s Glacial Presence. I think that Energized’s change should be pretty major. In short, Energized would be more useful and encourage more use of Storm Calling’s active abilities if reimagined as a lightning-themed analogue of Burning Light with a few differences. This new Energized would only gain stacks for its damage proc from physical or shock damage, but apply its damage to the target and all targets within melee range of it with guaranteed concussion. The ubiquity of Fatecarver in the PvE meta is a sign that there needs to be other ways of doing high AoE damage in longer encounters, and I see the proposed change to Energize as one way for another line to potentially meet the need for more AoE damage with a more active playstyle (something many beamed-out DDs long for).
- Overload: Outside of fixing bugs and making the LAs feel less clunky, I don’t think this skill needs to be touched right now.
- Bolt Escape: I think this skill and its morphs are roughly fine as they are. A distance increase would be nice, given how much mobility in PvP has increased.
- Mage’s Fury: This skill is fairly weak as an execute, and seems to see the bulk of its use in Battlegrounds for finishing off enemies that are already basically dead. I think one way to make it more useful without playing with its base values or delay would be to make it apply full stacks of the new Energized proposed above based on how low the target's health is (e.g., a target takes Mage’s Fury’s damage and a guaranteed Energized proc at 25% health, two procs at 15%, and three at 5%, or something like that).
- Lightning Form: I’d love to see Hurricane unnerfed some, but otherwise I think the skill is in a good place. Boundless Storm, on the other hand, is too weak. Zyaneth is onto something with one of their ideas: a thematically appropriate buff would be giving it a melee range (7m) AoE around that caster that does shock damage with increased concussion chance similar to Artic Blast. This would also play nice with the proposed Energized change above.
- Lightning Splash: Outside of providing a synergy, this skill isn’t doing a whole lot. I think it would be cool to see at least one of this skill’s morphs work like a hybrid of Twisting Path and the Essence Thief proc: the caster gains Major Expedition for a short time after moving through their own puddle, as well as some sort of damage buff. This would fit with the mobility encouraged by the rest of the line, as well as give the skill some needed power.
- Surge: Critical Surge is fine where it is. I would like to see a much more powerful Power Surge, however.. I rarely see this morph used, and would be more interested in seeing it work as a pure damage skill instead of an AoE heal. Perhaps Grave Lord’s Sacrifice is the model: make it work like that, but for all class skills.
Given the amount of effort that people have, and continue to put into these feedback threads, it'd be nice to see more ...acknowledgement from ZOS. Many threads are whiny and wholly unhelpful in identifying issues, or proposing fixes. Those that go beyond, or far beyond- should have the ZOS ouroboros symbol from staff. Give it a like. A thumbs up. Read receipt. Something...4 - Crystal Shard: I don’t think this skill needs to be moved; I think there are ways to keep the original classes competitive without assigning each tree a role like the DLC classes. I think it would be more fun to make the actives and passives from the base classes that are lagging behind stronger and more flexible. Frags is a solid skill that needs some combination of an extra effect and help from passives to end up in more PvE and PvP builds. Something like a short window of Major Berserk or a smaller, unique % damage done bonus would be both powerful and incentivize higher CPM play, which stops it from playing nice with the Fatecarver meta in PvE.
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madmufffin✭✭✭✭✭Dark Magic being the Sorc equivalent of Earthen Heart is the best route forward for balancing the class imo. Give it the class' utility and debuffs and try to push tank and dps into the other two lines. Without discussing the disastrous nature of the passives, swapping surge and crystal shard seems to most easily remedy the issue. Changing frags damage type to shock would just be a cherry on top.2
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Zyaneth_Bal✭✭✭✭✭madmufffin wrote: »Dark Magic being the Sorc equivalent of Earthen Heart is the best route forward for balancing the class imo. Give it the class' utility and debuffs and try to push tank and dps into the other two lines. Without discussing the disastrous nature of the passives, swapping surge and crystal shard seems to most easily remedy the issue. Changing frags damage type to shock would just be a cherry on top.
Indeed, that is my opinion as well. To shape lines the follwing way: storm calling as damage/utility, daedric summoning as damage/tank and dark magic as utility/support. This seems like the easiest and most plausible route.0 -
madmufffin✭✭✭✭✭Zyaneth_Bal wrote: »madmufffin wrote: »Dark Magic being the Sorc equivalent of Earthen Heart is the best route forward for balancing the class imo. Give it the class' utility and debuffs and try to push tank and dps into the other two lines. Without discussing the disastrous nature of the passives, swapping surge and crystal shard seems to most easily remedy the issue. Changing frags damage type to shock would just be a cherry on top.
Indeed, that is my opinion as well. To shape lines the follwing way: storm calling as damage/utility, daedric summoning as damage/tank and dark magic as utility/support. This seems like the easiest and most plausible route.
And then buff the ever loving bajesus out of mage's because that skill is ass lol4 -
gc0018✭✭✭I suggest only focus on one of the skill lines. Zos don't have resource to fix all three. With subclassing, one skill line is enough for a class.Images not allowed, sad0 -
Decimus✭✭✭✭✭
✭Why exactly is there an entire thread dedicated to buffing what are already the strongest offensive & sustain skill lines in the game? I'm sure ZOS has the data of skill line picks... half the player base is streaking around with Storm Calling already (which also happens to have the strongest passives for damage in PvP). This by the way is not a call to nerf Streak (I love using the ability on way too many of my builds), but rather that they should probably look at other mobility skills that almost no one picks (e.g. Apocryphal Gate, Shadow Image etc).
Dark Magic on the other hand is extremely underrated for sustain and on a meta sorcblade Crystal Frags very often outperform Merciless Resolve in damage done, while also offering cost reductions & Blood Magic heals. This is due to the buff the skill received in previous patch where it can now proc while on the back bar as well, resulting a lot more frequency in which you can cast it.
The real strength of this skill line however lies in the sustain aspect of it. It is absolutely wild to call Dark Exchange a bad ability because it "has a cast time" when the same ability also:- Provides a burst heal (8/10k Base Tooltip+Blood Magic passive 3-4k~).
- 3600 Stamina (20 seconds of Warden Netch or 15 seconds of Templar Rune instantly)+additional 240/second for 10 seconds or 4500 Magicka instantly (26 seconds of Warden Netch or 18 seconds of Templar rune instantly)+additional 150/second for 20 seconds.
- Minor Berserk (+Minor Force currently)
Furthermore, I can't even remember the last time I would die due to an interrupted Dark Deal or Conversion - you can use this skill freely when:- high health (just provides you free CC immunity if you get interrupted there),
- after streaking through opponents or away from them on a flat field
- with Light Weaver passive
- when CC immune
...it sounds to me like the poster is trying to cast this in the face of opponents while at low health and not CC immune, which screams of resource mismanagement - you should always save enough magicka to be able to Streak+Dark Deal or heal up, eat a CC and then Dark Deal.
Bash is also not "10m range" as mentioned by the poster of this thread, it is 7m like any melee ability. You can test this in less than 10 seconds by walking up to a target dummy while bashing & seeing when Surprise Attack, Rending Slashes, Whip etc become available. This is 7m, the same range where your bash starts connecting. If the poster is getting his dark deals/conversions interrupted after streaking, I would recommend not streaking uphill where the distance covered by streak is greatly reduced. Streak does not need 20m range to fix an "issue" that can simply be fixed by adjusting the gameplay.
...if I got ragebaited, my bad - had to set the record clear though. There's a whole lot of other nonsense here, but let's move on to the things I actually agree with:
Exploitation passive - yes, it's weaker than other classes' alternatives... but you have to look at the passive line in general, which is currently extremely strong for sustain, especially for block builds.
Mage's Fury - this execute is weak and the duration nerf to 2 seconds was unnecessary... in fact, I think it could've used a duration increase, not a decrease as the ability is dodgeable (application only) and cleansable after all.
Rune Prison & morphs are weak, I can agree with that - the damage should function similar to Shattering Rocks, both morphs should damage & Rune Cage should apply a useful debuff to target as well in order to be worth slotting.
While talking about Rune Prison we have to mention that Arcanist also has a similar delayed CC ability (just undodgeable rather than unblockable) that pretty much no one uses due to it doing no damage and being easy to counter. Adding some damage to it would make it a lot more desirable.
Other than that, sorcerer skill lines are more than fine and all of them see use in PvP (yes, even Daedric Summoning).Edited by Decimus on 20 July 2025 12:324 -
Lebensf0rm✭✭✭Why exactly is there an entire thread dedicated to buffing what are already the strongest offensive & sustain skill lines in the game?
Because they are essentially absent in PvE content, which is why the bulk of the suggestions here focus on increasing Sorc's PvE viability. Skill lines should be legitimately viable in both environments, and not just in niche cases (e.g., needing to streak to door in vAS or running an MK sorc). And even in PvP, I wouldn't call Storm Calling the strongest offensive line. Surely Animal Companion and Assassination are stronger.Dark Magic on the other hand is extremely underrated for sustain and on a meta sorcblade Crystal Frags very often outperform Merciless Resolve in damage done, while also offering cost reductions & Blood Magic heals. This is due to the buff the skill received in previous patch where it can now proc while on the back bar as well, resulting a lot more frequency in which you can cast it.
Again, there are no "meta sorcblades" in PvE, and no one is using Frags in PvE because Dark Magic is very weak. And even if Frags can outdamage Merciless proc for proc, Merciless is giving you weapon damage and bonus crit chance (at least on the live server), and can heal you in melee range.The real strength of this skill line however lies in the sustain aspect of it. It is absolutely wild to call Dark Exchange a bad ability because it "has a cast time" when the same ability also:- Provides a burst heal (8/10k Base Tooltip+Blood Magic passive 3-4k~).
- 3600 Stamina (20 seconds of Warden Netch or 15 seconds of Templar Rune instantly)+additional 240/second for 10 seconds or 4500 Magicka instantly (26 seconds of Warden Netch or 18 seconds of Templar rune instantly)+additional 150/second for 20 seconds.
- Minor Berserk (+Minor Force currently)
Even if Dark Deal isn't a bad skill, Netch is free, cleanses you, gives you 5% crit damage, and can provide and extra 5% damage done on top of activating Flourish. Plar rune heals you (potentially for a lot if you stand in it) and can be used to activate Sacred Ground on top of providing Major Resolve. I think Dark Deal lags behind both of them.There's a whole lot of other nonsense here
I'm sure there is /sOther than that, sorcerer skill lines are more than fine and all of them see use in PvP (yes, even Daedric Summoning).
Again: a skill line's utility should not be limited to PvP. Even so, I don't think PvPers are going to complain about more skills and morphs being good within trees that are already good.
Edited by Lebensf0rm on 21 July 2025 01:567 -
ZhuJiuyin✭✭✭✭✭Typically when Sorc discusses improving PvE, someone will suddenly start complaining about Sorc's PvP advantage. The most memorable thing for me was when IA was first released, Sorc's pets would be killed by most bosses' area attacks, and when many Sorcs responded to this, some people actually criticized these responses, because Sorc's pets would be killed in PvP, so Sorc's pets should not be alive in IA.
Now fast forward to the subclass version, even though Dark Magic is one of the least used skill lines on the log, there are still some people who claim that Dark Magic is good and complain about Sorc's PvP advantage, even though Sorc no longer has a PvP advantage in U46, and is even at a disadvantage."是燭九陰，是燭龍。"──by "The Classic of Mountains and Seas "English is not my first language,If something is ambiguous, rude due to context and translation issues, etc., please remind me, thanks.9 -
Blackrim✭✭✭Yep. Out of 3 skill lines sorc has maybe 5 good abilites and a couple good passives. It's truly in a sad state. It needs a boost to the shock damage passive as well. Somewhere in the 8-15% range.
I think the idea of buffing everything to be on par with animal companion makes it easy to play how you want to play.
I support this1 -
hoangdz✭✭✭Actually, Sorc skills are so good that a pure Sorc build can still compete with subclass ones. Dark Magic is the best sustain skill line in the game for brawler builds, while Storm Calling is one of the best mobility/damage lines. Daedric Summoning is a B+/A tier line, but with the buffs to BA next patch, we might see it bumped up to A+/S tier.
Sorc doesn't really need a lot of rework. Most of the rework should be done for passives (mainly reworking the Rebate passive and possibly adding 1-2 small stat buffs on top of existing ones) and fixing up some outdated skills.Edited by hoangdz on 21 July 2025 11:252 -
YandereGirlfriend✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭Give Defensive Rune Major Evasion for 20 seconds and now we are cooking with a previously completely dead skill.0 -
Major_Toughness✭✭✭✭✭Quoted post has been removed
What's the justification for buffing the already strongest ability in PvP (Streak)? Other than "it would be nice".
It would also be nice to be able to store three bow procs, but I think we can unanimously say how out of touch that suggestion is, yours is the same.Edited by ZOS_GregoryV on 23 July 2025 00:46MAKE AZUREBLIGHT GREAT AGAIN
PC EU > You2 -
Lebensf0rm✭✭✭Major_Toughness wrote: »Quoted post has been removed
The movement speed cap isn't that hard to hit nowadays. Both Expeditions are easy to source on top of Celerity being a free 10% movement speed. Most PvP players are wearing mostly medium armor, giving them another substantial (12% at 4 pieces) bonus to sprint speed. In conjunction with the melee range increase to 7m for all classes, I don't think Streak is as effective as a pure movement tool as it used to be, especially with its ramping cost.
Streak is far from the game's strongest ability, at the very least because its utility falls off dramatically in smaller spaces. Condescending and wrong at the same time is a bad look.Edited by ZOS_GregoryV on 23 July 2025 00:467 -
Major_Toughness✭✭✭✭✭Lebensf0rm wrote: »Major_Toughness wrote: »Quoted post has been removed
The movement speed cap isn't that hard to hit nowadays. Both Expeditions are easy to source on top of Celerity being a free 10% movement speed. Most PvP players are wearing mostly medium armor, giving them another substantial (12% at 4 pieces) bonus to sprint speed. In conjunction with the melee range increase to 7m for all classes, I don't think Streak is as effective as a pure movement tool as it used to be, especially with its ramping cost.
Streak is far from the game's strongest ability, at the very least because its utility falls off dramatically in smaller spaces. Condescending and wrong at the same time is a bad look.
So do you not have the same expedition, because it's so easy to get, plus a 15m gap from streaking? How does that mean Streak isn't as effective when you can maintain a 15m gap at all times, and melee range is 7m.Edited by ZOS_GregoryV on 23 July 2025 00:45MAKE AZUREBLIGHT GREAT AGAIN
PC EU > You1 -
Lebensf0rm✭✭✭@Major_Toughness
There's a brief delay before you actually teleport when casting Streak, and a player that isn't CC'd is going to be moving at a rate of at most 6.6 m/s (if the UESP move speed calculations are correct). A player moving at that speed only needs to move for 2 seconds to be squarely within melee range. A character fleeing using Streak is going to run out of mag using successive casts well before a character sprinting at the speed cap runs out of stamina (and they'll be caught sooner if they stop streaking and sprinting to reapply buffs). And if you're streaking through your opponent as sorcs commonly do, the net distance between you and your opponent is going to much less than 15m; they'll be moving quickly enough to be able to melee you in no time.
A small range increase is only going to buy players an extra second or so. It's not that big of a deal; You're very stuck on what is ultimately a very minor hypothetical change. It's also true that it might just be annoying for players who have used Streak forever and are accustomed to the current distance, even if it's beneficial. Maybe the solution to Streak being less useful in a high speed environment lies elsewhere, especially in the era of subclassing (though Magsorc's distinct playstyle is hard to emulate without two or all three of sorc's lines).Edited by Lebensf0rm on 22 July 2025 20:353 -
ZOS_GregoryVmodGreetings all,
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-Greg-Edited by ZOS_GregoryV on 23 July 2025 02:22The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited - ZeniMax Online Studios
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ZhuJiuyin✭✭✭✭✭I compared Crystal Fragments, Proc-Crystal Fragments, Force Pulse, and Relentless Focus.
To avoid the influence of other sets, I chose Ansuul + Tide-Born, and used the weapon Lightning Staves without Enchanting. The skill line chose Dark Magic, Daedric Summoning, and Assassination.
My test method is to use 1Force Pulse→1Crystal Fragments as a cycle, and if Proc-Crystal Fragments and Relentless Focus are available, they are used first.
As you can see, the maximum damage of Relentless Focus (33982) is greater than the 33602 of Proc-Crystal Fragments, and Relentless Focus is easier to use and does not need to rely on randomness.
Not to mention, if the status effect is taken into account, the damage ratio of Relentless Focus will be higher, because Overcharged causes less damage than Diseased. Even if the critical hit rate of Proc-Crystal Fragments+Overcharged is 100%, the total damage is still much lower than Relentless Focus+Diseased
In addition, the damage ratio of Force Pulse is 8.5%+8.1%+7.8%+burning (2.5%)+chill (1.4%)+Concussion (0.4%)=28.7%
And Crystal Fragments+Proc-Crystal Fragments+Overcharged is 38.1%, which is less than 10% higher than Force Pulse, and this is the case when Proc-Crystal Fragments are included.
If we only count the single damage, the maximum damage of Crystal Fragments+Overcharged is 19550+2918=22468
And the damage of Force Pulse is 5823+5756+5792+burning(2062)+chill(2869)+Concussion(1559)=23861
The maximum damage of Force Pulse (although affected by the chance) is still higher than Crystal Fragments, and don't forget that Crystal Fragments has a casting time of 0.8 seconds.
It is obvious that the Dark Magic line is in urgent need of a significant buff. The current damage of the strongest skill in the line is even lower than that of the general skills, not to mention that Crystal has a casting time of 0.8 seconds, and Proc-Crystal is very unstable."是燭九陰，是燭龍。"──by "The Classic of Mountains and Seas "English is not my first language,If something is ambiguous, rude due to context and translation issues, etc., please remind me, thanks.6