Well, I'm one of the guys who only pvp's but dragged my ass through the vet arenas to get the necessary stuff. But I'd have really rather not.
Just because I forced myself to grind vet vate 30 times doesn't mean I'm proud of my stupid vate staff and want to keep using it. I hate that it felt like I had to in order to compete in this meta.

I don't oppose proc sets per se, especially because we've seen with the upcoming test that ZOS qualifies a lot of sets as proc sets. What I do dislike about them currently is that players are barely forced to choose between survivability and damage as proc stacking allows them to have both. This just feels counterintuitive and quite limiting in terms of finding viable playstyles.

Augusten15 wrote: »

I understand that letting proc sets do most of the work for a player in PvP is frustrating. My issue with folks hoping that they will be stripped from the game is simple though. Dungeon sets and solo arena drops are extremely difficult to obtain for specific builds and can takes weeks of grinding and/or preparation if not more. I'm aware it's not like this for every proc set but if you've ever had to farm a dungeon for multiple weapons and a jewelry set, you know what I'm talking about. As a PvPer, I had to "learn" PvE by researching builds I never imagined using just to solo and grind Vate. Mythic jewelry takes time and grinding to complete which is usually a big part of any MMO should you want to be a top tier player. In my opinion, a large amount of the people complaining about these sets and pieces are unwilling to put in the work to reap the benefit and would rather s*** on them in the forums hoping the game will conform to their desires.

If PvP is stripped down to maxing stats, the custom builds people create, research, and hunt for are essentially wiped out and PvP combat is left with who has the higher quality gear and can make the most of their 12 hotkeys. Every class will have a BiS build that uses the same skills and gear. We will be left will screams for class and ability nerfs that can't be countered by strategic gearing.

So I hope this can resolve the desync issue in Cyro but I'd caution to be careful what you wish for if you're hoping it becomes permanent. Gearing in this game is a huge draw as you can customize your PvP experience given you're willing to put in the work.

I think a nice middle ground solution would be to make the most popular proc sets harder to obtain. Reduce drop rates in dungeons, increase difficulties in arenas, make more solo content (group arenas you can buy runs for are simply pay-to-win if the highest difficulty can be beat with 3 people), maybe add a trait or two so crafted gear isn't so accessible and more rewarding.

Anyways, that's my 2 cents. Flame away if it improves the quality of your day.

I have probably cleared the latest arena on vet atleast 20 times at this point trying to get the sets I wanted to try out. I have put in the effort and I have no problem telling you that these sets are overperforming and need to be changed. Just because an item is hard to get doesn't mean it needs to be the best. It also doesn't need to be a proc. It can be something else. It doesn't need to be an unpurgable aoe dot that deals 2k damage per second, applies major breach, minor magickasteal and costs nothing to use.

Proc sets wouldn't be an issue if stat sets gave equivalent damage, but they don't.

1. Proc sets need to not be improved by buffs. There damage should be what you see is what you get.

2. Heavy armor needs a damage debuff per piece that applies to weapon/spell damage and proc damage. Survivability needs to come at a drastic cost to damage output.

3. Malacath needs an additional debuff added to it and should not buff proc damage.

4. Increase stat sets to have the same damage capability output of procs.

I like the idea of proc sets offering build diversity. I hate the fact that they are buffed by Malacath, that shouldn't be a thing. Are there some sets that are over tuned a little? Yeah possibly. I think the relationship between Malacath and procs should be addressed first and see what that does.

Sets like Crimson are debatable for me. It scales of Malacath but can also be blocked and/or dodged. Should the damage and heal work on enemies that are stunned? No it shouldn't. When fighting a WW the other night they were timing their Crimson proc with the fear. That shouldn't be a thing. Tooltip should say does not affect immobilized/stunned/feared enemies. That's just my opinion though. And it probably should have a max enemy number.

There's also the problem of really bad class imbalance. I think a lot of players on weaker classes will naturally gravitate to procs to hopefully give them an edge. But then the stronger classes start running them too lol.

I don't think the heavy armor/proc/malacath meta will change much next patch. Procs may get weaker by a small margin due to the new CP, but as of now are still buffed by malacath and you will still be easily able burst people down in heavy armor with 40k health and 40k resists with all the procs you desire.

Fawn4287 wrote: »

Trying to justify the strength of proc sets because of having to do a few hours of grinding a set (most of which can be done on normal anyway) to have almost the same if not more killing potential and exponentially more survivability than someone who has grinded for literal years learning to play PvP in stat based gear is just ludicrous. The reason most proc sets and DLC classes are so strong is because they need to sell new content plus ZOS hates small scalers beating large groups, so they give the the lesser skilled large group players an easy ‘pay to win’ option which proc sets and DLC classes are.

All the ability to manage resources, kite and line up a burst means donut when you have multiple 40k health players procs ticking away on you for more than you heal for. For the opposite playstyle the inability to properly resource manage and heal you can choose to be carried by running high health regen, 40k health or crimson and a health based heal critting for 13k a pop.

But pvp shouldn't only cater to small scale players in stat builds. ZOS has to find a balance that caters to all the play styles. If someone is playing a stat based build right now then that is simply their choice. ZOS doesn't hate small scalers, every play style should be viable. May have to fight procs with procs. The better player should still win I would think.

Sets like Alessian I don't have any issue with because that's one less damage proc to watch for. As for health based healing, my stamplar's resolving vigor heals for more than my 38k hp warden pve tank's polar wind. No its not an instant heal but its still more healing in a very short duration. Not sure about the WW one as I don't have a WW but it seems like most potent.

Goregrinder wrote: »

SshadowSscale wrote: »

I do not mind proc sets that give you stats at all since that is still dependant on the player to use the stats he gets to kill his enemy but the free damage sets are stupid and then zos decided it would be smart to nerf statbased sets and buff procs..... most idiotic change ever.... for real damage and healing procs should be deleted because they add nothing to the game except a toxic meta

Yup. If the damage only happens when the player manually casts certain spells and abilities in a specific order, then we're all good regardless of how their stats were padded. The player still has to land their burst combo correctly and connect with enough damage to kill someone.

But sets that say "hey man you relax, kick your feet up...take a break, I'll do some damage for you....go bake a cake or read a book, I got you!" are the sets that raise the skill floor too close to the skill ceiling, and are no good. They're essentially training wheels for people who don't know how to land burst combos. Like aim assist for console shooters. It's the game literally assisting the player in doing damage without the player having to provide any input.

Now the problem isn't the proc sets themselves, because I am a firm believer of having as many playstyle choice available to players, proc sets being one of them. The problem is that there are no direct counters to proc sets available right now, so people try to counter proc sets with other proc sets and it becomes a game of players moving their characters in position, so the game can deal damage for them.

If you get dotted, you can either out heal the damage and wait for them to wear off, OR you can purge them. Or you die. Purging them requires you to slot a purge ability on one of your bars or run a set that can purge for you (proc purge). So purge is a direct counter to negative effects. Defile is a direct counter to health recovery. Then you have counters to movement speed, stat recoveries, even reduction in health abilities, etc. But there needs to be an ability or potion or poison or something that can counter proc sets, so players who choose to run non-proc sets can run a proc-set counter.

Something that gives immunity to proc set damage or effects for like 4 seconds or something that disables a players proc set activation for like 8 seconds or something.

Some proc already have their own counters.

For exemplo

1- grodthar
- 5 sec proc - 5 sec disable
- area effect 8 meters - does not affect you when you are outside the area

2 - zaan
- 6 sec proc - 15 sec disable if I remember
- must proc by light attack 33% chance
- tether effect 8 meters

3- Crimson
- proc after 2 sec - 10 sec disable
- area effect 8 meters
- delay damage everybody can see and is really easy to avoid

All this procs are really easy to avoid and they are the procs that most people are complaining about.

If you are dying for this type of proc sets the problem are not the procs the problem is you wana to stay immovable in front of something so easy to avoid.

UntouchableHunter wrote: »

Goregrinder wrote: »

SshadowSscale wrote: »

I do not mind proc sets that give you stats at all since that is still dependant on the player to use the stats he gets to kill his enemy but the free damage sets are stupid and then zos decided it would be smart to nerf statbased sets and buff procs..... most idiotic change ever.... for real damage and healing procs should be deleted because they add nothing to the game except a toxic meta

Yup. If the damage only happens when the player manually casts certain spells and abilities in a specific order, then we're all good regardless of how their stats were padded. The player still has to land their burst combo correctly and connect with enough damage to kill someone.

But sets that say "hey man you relax, kick your feet up...take a break, I'll do some damage for you....go bake a cake or read a book, I got you!" are the sets that raise the skill floor too close to the skill ceiling, and are no good. They're essentially training wheels for people who don't know how to land burst combos. Like aim assist for console shooters. It's the game literally assisting the player in doing damage without the player having to provide any input.

Now the problem isn't the proc sets themselves, because I am a firm believer of having as many playstyle choice available to players, proc sets being one of them. The problem is that there are no direct counters to proc sets available right now, so people try to counter proc sets with other proc sets and it becomes a game of players moving their characters in position, so the game can deal damage for them.

If you get dotted, you can either out heal the damage and wait for them to wear off, OR you can purge them. Or you die. Purging them requires you to slot a purge ability on one of your bars or run a set that can purge for you (proc purge). So purge is a direct counter to negative effects. Defile is a direct counter to health recovery. Then you have counters to movement speed, stat recoveries, even reduction in health abilities, etc. But there needs to be an ability or potion or poison or something that can counter proc sets, so players who choose to run non-proc sets can run a proc-set counter.

Something that gives immunity to proc set damage or effects for like 4 seconds or something that disables a players proc set activation for like 8 seconds or something.

Some proc already have their own counters.

For exemplo

1- grodthar
- 5 sec proc - 5 sec disable
- area effect 8 meters - does not affect you when you are outside the area

2 - zaan
- 6 sec proc - 15 sec disable if I remember
- must proc by light attack 33% chance
- tether effect 8 meters

3- Crimson
- proc after 2 sec - 10 sec disable
- area effect 8 meters
- delay damage everybody can see and is really easy to avoid

All this procs are really easy to avoid and they are the procs that most people are complaining about.

If you are dying for this type of proc sets the problem are not the procs the problem is you wana to stay immovable in front of something so easy to avoid.

Two of the sets you mention are very overtuned right now. The only thing holding Za'an back from being the meta at the moment is the required crit to proc. In a non Malacath meta this set would be insanely strong. Downtime on a set is also not nessicarily a counter. There are a ton of strong sets with long downtimes that are really strong. Mechanical Acuity, Balrogh's and Clever Alchemist are all really good examples.

Crimison is also not very easy to avoid. Especially in a large scale pvp environment which is where it is mainly used. Hitting 4-6 people is enough to heal you to full without and often times you can just run into a zerg and it doesn't matter who blocks or not. This set also isn't stopped by a negate and defile doesn't really take it's toll since it can technically scale infinitely. All you need to do is to stand there and block. You can line of sight and hit people with it, while they can't damage you.

That's also not mention the Unfathomable Darkness, the 2h weapon, and the destro from vateshran hollows are all unpurgable dots. All three of these sets quickly became the meta this winter. All three of these sets have no true counter. The 2h requires being within melee range but usually if you are comboing off this sword you are in melee range and this proc is proccing off a medium attack which is ccing the enemy. The destro is supposedly kitable or stops after line of sight is broken but there is an insane number of obstacles that don't break this beam. Especially in BGs. Unfathomable isn't the best in group pvp but is really strong in 1v1s. This is even without the hurricane bug.

You sir are living in a land of delusion if you believe that procs have counterplay. Most of them don't. They are free damage meant to make killing veteran players easier for newer players but in reality all they do is create a meta where veteran players can stack more survivability and sustain and to create PVP characters that are essentially Trial Bosses. It drags out fights because nobody dies and it creates a meta that is actually really hostile for newer or less experienced players as they are forced to ride the meta or die to these god like builds.

From what I have seen the loss of procs has really even the playing field. Only three sets on the list come from dungeons meaning pretty much all of the meta sets are readily accessible for newer players, they are more stat based which makes playing easier as players don't need to invest as much into sustain and a lot of the overtuned sets leveraged by really good players are not available to them. The Major/Minor buffs were brought into check, we don't have everybody and their grandmother running arround with BRP Dual Wield Major Protection Stam builds. Sure some classes are really overtuned atm, some classes really lack a complete kit but this test is probably the single most well balanced Cyrodil we have seen in years.

Augusten15 wrote: »

I understand that letting proc sets do most of the work for a player in PvP is frustrating. My issue with folks hoping that they will be stripped from the game is simple though. Dungeon sets and solo arena drops are extremely difficult to obtain for specific builds and can takes weeks of grinding and/or preparation if not more. I'm aware it's not like this for every proc set but if you've ever had to farm a dungeon for multiple weapons and a jewelry set, you know what I'm talking about. As a PvPer, I had to "learn" PvE by researching builds I never imagined using just to solo and grind Vate. Mythic jewelry takes time and grinding to complete which is usually a big part of any MMO should you want to be a top tier player. In my opinion, a large amount of the people complaining about these sets and pieces are unwilling to put in the work to reap the benefit and would rather s*** on them in the forums hoping the game will conform to their desires.

If PvP is stripped down to maxing stats, the custom builds people create, research, and hunt for are essentially wiped out and PvP combat is left with who has the higher quality gear and can make the most of their 12 hotkeys. Every class will have a BiS build that uses the same skills and gear. We will be left will screams for class and ability nerfs that can't be countered by strategic gearing.

So I hope this can resolve the desync issue in Cyro but I'd caution to be careful what you wish for if you're hoping it becomes permanent. Gearing in this game is a huge draw as you can customize your PvP experience given you're willing to put in the work.

I think a nice middle ground solution would be to make the most popular proc sets harder to obtain. Reduce drop rates in dungeons, increase difficulties in arenas, make more solo content (group arenas you can buy runs for are simply pay-to-win if the highest difficulty can be beat with 3 people), maybe add a trait or two so crafted gear isn't so accessible and more rewarding.

Anyways, that's my 2 cents. Flame away if it improves the quality of your day.

I do think there should be rewards and motivations for people to acquire gear that makes them interesting / effective builds in any environment (PvE and PvP). That's fine and tried and tested RPG / Fantasy staple.

The issue is the gearing philosophy ZOS uses, basically playing the game for players and giving them bonuses that aren't tied to their character builds. This goes counter to most games I have played. Those games gear would do things like "increase ice damage by 15%" or "add critical chance with two handed weapons" or "add X amount to this stat" which were perfectly fine because they only modified very specific actions a player still had to actually do and forced a player to specialize (i.e., yes you can do extra ice damage, but you better be able to do good ice damage in the first place and now someone else's fire damage will be better). You might get X points in a single stat, but a player still had to actually make connect with attacks based on that specific stat to see any benefit. And at the end of the day, these gear sets never overshadowed the actual abilities and spells players used, merely augmented (some of) them.

The design of many sets ZOs gives out, stuff like Earthgore or Thews of the Harbinger strike me as effects that would be reserved for very powerful and high level (and thus limited use) magics in any other RPG game out there (ESO's version of an ultimate). By themselves they are decisive in defining players builds and the outcomes of fights. That's poor design; I don;t care how long it took for someone to farm the gear (read 15 minutes on a dungeon that was mildly challenging 3 years ago). I feel like I am fighting gear sets with gear sets, not classes or players.

I want gear to allow use to specialize our builds and make them distinctive, it would be a great way to legit introduce actual build diversity. Players would probably over-specialize in a particular niche (for ex. the classic "fire mage") that would at the same time create weakness/holes in their overall build. But ZOS doesn;t do that. I'm going to slot my Vateshran destro that will do large damage regardless of my stats/class/build, amp that with Malacath (flat bonus to all damage), with my Overwhelming Surge set (AOE damage doesn;t care about my class/stats activates whenever I use any class skill or put on my eternal Vigor which automatically gives me a strong health boost whenever my health dips below 50%). Does it even matter that I'm a Templar or Necromancer? Nope.

This is why your idea of a middle ground to make gear hard to get won;t work. People will eventually get that gear (and it might not even be hard to get because of power creep) and so fights will be decided less by player strategy or skill and more by powerful gear sets that overshadow traditional gameplay.

Goregrinder wrote: »

SgtNuttzmeg wrote: »

UntouchableHunter wrote: »

Goregrinder wrote: »

SshadowSscale wrote: »

I do not mind proc sets that give you stats at all since that is still dependant on the player to use the stats he gets to kill his enemy but the free damage sets are stupid and then zos decided it would be smart to nerf statbased sets and buff procs..... most idiotic change ever.... for real damage and healing procs should be deleted because they add nothing to the game except a toxic meta

Yup. If the damage only happens when the player manually casts certain spells and abilities in a specific order, then we're all good regardless of how their stats were padded. The player still has to land their burst combo correctly and connect with enough damage to kill someone.

But sets that say "hey man you relax, kick your feet up...take a break, I'll do some damage for you....go bake a cake or read a book, I got you!" are the sets that raise the skill floor too close to the skill ceiling, and are no good. They're essentially training wheels for people who don't know how to land burst combos. Like aim assist for console shooters. It's the game literally assisting the player in doing damage without the player having to provide any input.

Now the problem isn't the proc sets themselves, because I am a firm believer of having as many playstyle choice available to players, proc sets being one of them. The problem is that there are no direct counters to proc sets available right now, so people try to counter proc sets with other proc sets and it becomes a game of players moving their characters in position, so the game can deal damage for them.

If you get dotted, you can either out heal the damage and wait for them to wear off, OR you can purge them. Or you die. Purging them requires you to slot a purge ability on one of your bars or run a set that can purge for you (proc purge). So purge is a direct counter to negative effects. Defile is a direct counter to health recovery. Then you have counters to movement speed, stat recoveries, even reduction in health abilities, etc. But there needs to be an ability or potion or poison or something that can counter proc sets, so players who choose to run non-proc sets can run a proc-set counter.

Something that gives immunity to proc set damage or effects for like 4 seconds or something that disables a players proc set activation for like 8 seconds or something.

Some proc already have their own counters.

For exemplo

1- grodthar
- 5 sec proc - 5 sec disable
- area effect 8 meters - does not affect you when you are outside the area

2 - zaan
- 6 sec proc - 15 sec disable if I remember
- must proc by light attack 33% chance
- tether effect 8 meters

3- Crimson
- proc after 2 sec - 10 sec disable
- area effect 8 meters
- delay damage everybody can see and is really easy to avoid

All this procs are really easy to avoid and they are the procs that most people are complaining about.

If you are dying for this type of proc sets the problem are not the procs the problem is you wana to stay immovable in front of something so easy to avoid.

Two of the sets you mention are very overtuned right now. The only thing holding Za'an back from being the meta at the moment is the required crit to proc. In a non Malacath meta this set would be insanely strong. Downtime on a set is also not nessicarily a counter. There are a ton of strong sets with long downtimes that are really strong. Mechanical Acuity, Balrogh's and Clever Alchemist are all really good examples.

Crimison is also not very easy to avoid. Especially in a large scale pvp environment which is where it is mainly used. Hitting 4-6 people is enough to heal you to full without and often times you can just run into a zerg and it doesn't matter who blocks or not. This set also isn't stopped by a negate and defile doesn't really take it's toll since it can technically scale infinitely. All you need to do is to stand there and block. You can line of sight and hit people with it, while they can't damage you.

That's also not mention the Unfathomable Darkness, the 2h weapon, and the destro from vateshran hollows are all unpurgable dots. All three of these sets quickly became the meta this winter. All three of these sets have no true counter. The 2h requires being within melee range but usually if you are comboing off this sword you are in melee range and this proc is proccing off a medium attack which is ccing the enemy. The destro is supposedly kitable or stops after line of sight is broken but there is an insane number of obstacles that don't break this beam. Especially in BGs. Unfathomable isn't the best in group pvp but is really strong in 1v1s. This is even without the hurricane bug.

You sir are living in a land of delusion if you believe that procs have counterplay. Most of them don't. They are free damage meant to make killing veteran players easier for newer players but in reality all they do is create a meta where veteran players can stack more survivability and sustain and to create PVP characters that are essentially Trial Bosses. It drags out fights because nobody dies and it creates a meta that is actually really hostile for newer or less experienced players as they are forced to ride the meta or die to these god like builds.

From what I have seen the loss of procs has really even the playing field. Only three sets on the list come from dungeons meaning pretty much all of the meta sets are readily accessible for newer players, they are more stat based which makes playing easier as players don't need to invest as much into sustain and a lot of the overtuned sets leveraged by really good players are not available to them. The Major/Minor buffs were brought into check, we don't have everybody and their grandmother running arround with BRP Dual Wield Major Protection Stam builds. Sure some classes are really overtuned atm, some classes really lack a complete kit but this test is probably the single most well balanced Cyrodil we have seen in years.

Yep, there is no direct hard counter to procs other than "well...just roll doge out of Grothdarr man!..." which is not a direct counter. A direct counter would be a way to stop a proc from happening or reduce it's effectiveness, neither of which currently exist in ESO, and that is the real problem. And I'm also surprised he did not mention Unfathaomable, that set is hitting like a truck right now without the player needing to do anything at all...ZOS takes the wheel for you and say "alright bud, go take a 5 minute break I got you loop!".

You don't have grodthar up all the time. The set is disabled for 5 sec.
You are not seeing everybody running grodthar. So grodthar is not meta anywhere.

People are saying proc sets are meta, but when we discuss the sets and the situations we see that the procs and any other sets can be Meta depending of the situation.

You said you are surprised because I didn't mention Unfathomable. Why I shouldn't?

This sets is not meta for me.

You will never run this set if you play 1vX.
You will never run this set if you play ball groups.
You will never will run this set in BG unless you are the kind of player to look for duels in bgs.

Maybe you would say that it is a good set for duels, ok it is you opinion but for me it is not a good set for duels.

So why I should mention a set that I don't use and don't give any problem in when I fight somebody using it.

Meta in my opinion it is dswing and Executioner.

EVERY stamina players it is running it.
And the answer is: because the class abilitys are not so good. We can discuss about that the fact is dswing and Executioner it is the meta with or without procs. And we don't have one especially proc set that is meta in Cyrodill.

If somebody think that exist one é especially proc set that is meta put here on the table and let's discuss about that.

But I must say one thing, in bgs when we have a coordenated group that knows how play with procs it is really hard to deal with.

In my opinion we could have at least a no proc BG. So you can choose if you wana play procs or not.