Is it possible to make a useful PVE Battlemage?

SkillzMFG · August 2014

So when I started playing ESO I started playing it as I would play any other ES game... Which is basically a Battlemage - Sorcerer that wears Heavy Armor for extra survivability equpied with a sword and shield, and ofc a Destro Staff for those long-ranged battles. Now, I realise I have to sacrifice some of the DPS to gain survivability and that's totally cool with me, BUT what I encountered was something way different... I am COMPLETELY INCAPABLE of doing veteran dng's because I can't dish out NEARLY enough damage as a fully-light armored Sorcerer and I even have most of my attribute points on Magicka(around 35) and the rest is on stamina, I have the Mage boon AND I'm a vampire so I get extra Magicka regen and still don't have enough mana to deal nearly enough DPS as they can. On the other hand my survability is good(even tho I have no attributes on Health) I can easily take on VR12 and I'm VR4. I'm good in PVP but in PVE I'm completely useless. So my main question is: Is it possible to make a useful PVE Battlemage that wears Heavy Armor and uses Sword&Shield/Destro Staff or do I have to go Hybrid and have mix of Light and Heavy armor(or just completely erase everything and go generic full LA Sorc)?

Ashur_Breakblade · August 2014

the problem comes with spells that give light armour wearers equal/ more armour than standard heavy. Personally I would say that a heavy armour wearer will generally have less damage as you are going for more of a tank role, which aren't there to do huge damage in an mmo. also magicka regen and spell crit etc will always give huge boosts to magic damage in light armour, so again for the largest damage you can get, light armour is the way to go with magic. Currently resto staff has a damage increase passive for all spells too.

Basically it depends entirely how much damage you want to do. If your main role isn't tank but you still want mainly heavy, some light should help with damage and resource management but you won't get all possible damage.

Currently, light armour resto casters are pretty powerful, and in general terms of pve their power benefits far exceed the small loss of survivability you would encounter by ditching the heavy.

IxSTALKERxI · August 2014

The best thing about light armor is 21% spell cost reduction. Without it you'll drain your magicka too fast. In my opinion this 1 passive is more valuable then all the heavy armor passives combined. The regeneration from the new heavy armor passive update is a joke in comparison to spell cost reduction.

I use One hand and shield & 7 light armor and cast spells while holding block. One hand and shield skill line provides all the damage mitigation you need. If you need more though you can get 600 armor from each of the 3 jewelry slots.

Koshchei · August 2014

As much as I want to use it on my DK, there isn't a lot to recommend about heavy armour right now, other than appearance.

With the way that things presently work, I'm not entirely sure how Zenimax can fix things without making heavy armor game-breakingly powerful (i.e. you regen health so fast that you don't need a healer OR you take a % based damage reduction to the extent that you don't need a healer)

The Elder Scrolls Online

Is it possible to make a useful PVE Battlemage?

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