Sorcerer Needs Support Capability

Goldtistic · May 2022

This probably isn't the best time to bring up an idea for a positive Sorcerer change with how hard the other classes are suffering but...

Sorcerer support sucks. The best they have to offer is the Exploitation passive, which is almost always granted by some DPS in group with how common Sorcerer is as a class. Sorcerer healers are almost never ran with how trash the heals are, Twilight Matriarch is a decent burst heal but Sorcerer has no class specific Heal Over Time which I find absolutely criminal. I think a basic step would be to look at some of the skills and their morphs and find which ones are really similar to eachother, like Empowering Ward or Shattering/Restraining Prison.

The first change I would make is to overhaul Empowering Ward. It's niche, pretty bad, and the buff is already covered in a larger area by Wardens.
Empowering Rune
Radius: 12 Meters
Duration: 15 seconds
Cost: 5000? Magicka
Inscribe the symbol of Oblivion beneath your feet, empowering you and allies within it. You and allies within the rune gain Minor Resolve and Minor Force, increasing your Armor by 2974 and your critical damage done by 10%.

While this poorly made draft definitely requires some tweaking, I think granting group Minor Resolve and Minor Force is unique and would in some form grant Sorcerer healers and support a bit more attention. While not entirely necessary due to how common the use of Tzogvin's Warband or Barbed Trap is, having a Sorcerer with this skill in group would allow people to further prioritize more damaging DoTs. (This skill was directly influenced by Terra Magicus in Elden Ring. Call this one Terra Magicka, if you want

.) It would be a no-brainer to give this ability empower for the duration, but that would take away from Necromancers.

The next change I would make to Shattering Prison, as it is quite literally a skill that nobody uses. It does mediocre damage and costs a lot.

Steadying Shards
Radius: 18 Meters
Duration: 5 seconds
Cost: 4000 Magicka
Call forth Daedric shards from the Earth to find allies and stabilize the ground beneath them, rendering them immune to knockback and disabling effects for 5 seconds.

I acknowledge that this skill would be absolutely cancer in pvp if spammed in a group, so the duration may have to be reduced with the cost increased. However, in a PvE situation I could see this being used reactively on a support or healer to stop your group from being stunned by a slip up in mechanics like Orbs in Cloudrest, or meteor while fighting the Havocrel during the Oaxiltso fight in Rockgrove.

the1andonlyskwex · May 2022

I'm confused. You start by complaining that Sorcerers don't have a heal over time, and then you offer solutions that don't actually heal.

As for your specific ideas:

Empowered Ward is one of Sorcerer's only current support spells (because of group minor intellect), so it seems like an odd target for replacement. Otherwise, I guess Empowering Rune looks okay, but it's not really providing anything people won't be getting elsewhere (see Combat Prayer and Barbed Trap).

On the other hand, Steadying Shards is just broken. You even admit as much, calling it a "cancer" for PvP and basically describing its purpose in PvE as a way to bypass mechanics.

Lastly, Sorcerer's heal over time is Power Surge, which is actually pretty good.

ESO_Nightingale · May 2022

"Inscribe the symbol of Oblivion beneath your feet, empowering you and allies within it."

i really like this idea but i think it should be on a reworked morph of daedric mines since it kinda works in a similar way. sorc healers really should have some form of group support (as should healer dk). and i think giving minor force to a skill like this is really neat, i'd love if such a wanted buff was more accessable from specific supports. empowered ward should give allies minor intellect and endurance like how refreshing path and shrooms give it going into next patch.

i made a tooltip for how i think it should work

essentially it becomes similar to how ring of preservation works except it heals less (about the same as the HoT for budding seeds) but offers minor force. this was also a pretty quick draft. so it's also likely to be a bit unbalanced.

another way i could see this being used is if the rune acted like twilight remedy, but like, not bad. so you can place it on the ground like trap, but instead of it doing anything to an enemy, allies in the area could activate a synergy to gain minor force for 20 seconds.

Goldtistic · June 2022

the1andonlyskwex wrote: »

I'm confused. You start by complaining that Sorcerers don't have a heal over time, and then you offer solutions that don't actually heal.

As for your specific ideas:

Empowered Ward is one of Sorcerer's only current support spells (because of group minor intellect), so it seems like an odd target for replacement. Otherwise, I guess Empowering Rune looks okay, but it's not really providing anything people won't be getting elsewhere (see Combat Prayer and Barbed Trap).

On the other hand, Steadying Shards is just broken. You even admit as much, calling it a "cancer" for PvP and basically describing its purpose in PvE as a way to bypass mechanics.

Lastly, Sorcerer's heal over time is Power Surge, which is actually pretty good.

I totally forgot about having a heal, putting a neat heal on the Rune skill and having it replace a morph of Daedric Mines would probably make some sense. I imagine something that heals for slightly less than Budding Seeds but more than Ring of Preservation would be fair. Also yea, no clue what I was thinking with Steadying Shards, maybe should have gone a different direction like a group-wide minor resolve.

Goldtistic · June 2022

I really gotta think before posting, group resolve would be pointless because of combat prayer. Maybe a short duration of a unique amount of armor, like what crystal weapon provides as a debuff except as a buff.

Mr_Stach · June 2022

I was putting together a list of all Ground AoE healing skills and was kind of surprised that Sorc doesn't have any, yes power surge is there, but most other classes have a similar type of ability and a Ground AoE heal.

Maybe ZOS should just bite the bullet and make Deadric Rune or maybe Restraining Prison an AoE Heal.

Just an Idea

theendoftheriver · June 2022

I'm not sure this is necessary. Power surge can do decent heals.

Mr_Stach · June 2022

Sure Power Surge by itself does fine, but I feel like Sorc's Healing Kit could be improved. But I'm also not a big Sorc Player, so Mileage will vary I guess

Kaelthorn_Nightbloom · June 2022

I have 200 days played with Power Surge. The 3 second interval makes it very bad for both PvE and PvP.

3 million healing Deathmatch:

On par with Echoing Vigor? Ouch.

If they changed the interval from 3 seconds to 1 second, it would tick faster and have more opportunity to heal players. The 33 second duration is nice but I'd rather have a 10 second duration Power Surge that heals once a second.

Faulgor · June 2022

change Empowered Ward to

Absorbing Ward
Grant a damage shield that absorbs x damage to you and up to 5 allies for 6 seconds. When the shield absorbs damage, you restore y of your highest resource.

change one of the Encase morphs to

Soul Prison
Applies Minor Breach to enemies in the area. When an enemy inside the area dies, trap their soul, healing allies in the area for x health over y seconds.
Allies can also activate the Soul Rush synergy, granting Minor Force for z seconds.

Both should fit into the Conjuration/Mysticism theme of Sorcerers. It's strange that there are no proper skills to shield your party (DK shields are pitiful), which are really just a pro-active heal and should be balanced accordingly.
Sorcerers are the de-facto masters of Conjuration, Enchanting and Mysticism in TES lore, so I also wondered why they don't have a superior Soul Trap skill. Putting this to use as a support skill seemed appropriate.

Malyore · June 2022

Mr_Stach wrote: »

Sure Power Surge by itself does fine, but I feel like Sorc's Healing Kit could be improved. But I'm also not a big Sorc Player, so Mileage will vary I guess

I think surge is a fantastic self heal personally. In pve you ideally get 3k health per second with the crit morph. I'm pretty sure that's higher than most other heal over times. But power surge, the group heal, is very eh, at least on paper, to me. 2k health every three seconds is not very effective imo. I get it's supposed to just be a off on the side extra bit, unlike the crit variant that can act as a main heal. But when making a sorc healer I feel I'm struggling for finding a good rotation and even skills to slot. Having to try out mend wounds for a first time when I made a sorc healer haha.

Browiseth · June 2022

i wouldn't change skills myself per say, but rather add additional effects to sorc's passives. so there's energised(?) which currently gives like 10% magicka recovery, i'd also add to it so it reads:

Energised:
Increases magicka recovery by 5/10%
Using a storm calling ability restores 50/100 stamina or magicka to you and nearby allies based on your highest resource. This effect can occur once every 5 seconds.

Also, for expert summoner:

While you have a daedric summoning ability active, your max health is increased by (i forget how much lol)
Allies standing within 5/10 meters of one of your daedric summoning pets have their own max health increased by (the same amount)