Sorcerers were over nerfed... again

Emma_Overload

Septimus_Magna wrote: »

Emma_Eunjung wrote: »

As long as you don't mind doing only 2500 DPS (not a typo!), you can use my "Electric Turtle" build that focuses on regen and mitigation to solo pretty much anything in Craglorn, including overland world bosses and delve bosses. Features of the Electric Turtle include:

1) 5 Heavy + 2 Medium armor for max mitigation and a bit of stamina regen.

2) 5 pc. Footman's Fortune and 5 pc. Willow's Path for mitigation and 15% extra regen, respectively.

3) 1H + S are 2 pc. Seducer for the magicka regen. Defensive trait on sword.

4) All jewelry enchanted with gold spell cost reduction glyphs. All armor enchanted with Magicka glyphs with Divine trait.

5) Structured Entropy, Thundering Presence, Lightning Splash, Encase for CC ( I use Shattering morph) and Defensive Posture for the mitigation passive. Use whatever Ultimate you want.

6) Put whatever you want on your off bar: Endless Fury finisher, Resto heals, whatever.

7) Hold down block and use Lightning Splash, whichever morph you prefer, to wear your enemy down over a long period of time. Do a heavy attack whenever you can.

8) Keep Thundering Presence up constantly and spam Entropy whenever you need a healing. Notice in the pic I don't even have any potions, lol.

9) If you're curious about stats, I've been using 31 Magicka + 31 Health mostly, but I recently swithced to 62 Magicka.

10) Atronach Mundus stone is essential for the magicka regen.

11) NO FOOD! I use VR10 purple DRINK for the 3 stat regen.

Three things you WON'T find in this build:

1) Goofy pets.

2) Nerfed Surge heals.

3) Expensive wards.

I made this build as a reaction to all the Sorc nerfs just for fun, but it actually works well, just very SLOWLY, lol.



BTW, I've also been experimenting with Daedric Curse as a damage spell, as "Skarath of the Many" discovered recently:

Ive tried similar build on the pts but there are a couple important issues with HA sorc builds. Lightning splash does very little damage because you will have low spell damage, crit and penetration. Even with a spell damage build Lightning Splash only does about 2,5k dps. This will be even less with HA which means fights will last very long and will be very boring. Also not having a strong ward is a big disadvantage, you have no reliable way to prevent you health from dropping except for blocking.

Personally I think it wont be effective to wear heavy armor and do magic damage, the damage output is simply to low.

You're right, of course! I was able to take this build all the way past the first boss and trash mobs at Veteran Spindleclutch, but it totally failed when I got the second boss, Blood Spawn. With such a low DPS, I was only able to get Blood Spawn's health down to around 80% before I got insta-crushed by his rage mechanic.

I've gone back to Medium Armor for now

Nightreaver

Erock25 wrote: »

The problem with surge healing is dots and small attacks taking up the cooldown, and it should be addressed somehow. His suggestion of 6 target max is acceptable as long as it is within ZOS power to implement this.

I wouldn't think it would be that difficult. One of the things ZOS stated with the implementation of 1.6 is that secondary effects would only affect up to 6 targets. When Surge was first introduced to 1.6 the healing element was a secondary effect. They could just classify it again as a secondary effect so it would only affect 6 targets and done, fixed.

@pppontus What weapon trait were you using?

Guessing after today's update that DPS with Nirnhoned trait equipped will go down while DPS from Light armor will go up with the fix to Light Armor.

Fayaburn

Joy_Division wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

byrom101b16_ESO wrote: »

Jar_Ek wrote: »

Whether sorcerers have been needed or are about the same misses the point somewhat. The people posting on this, and other threads, are essentially advocates for sorcerers. The goal of all should be to point out the weak points in the sorcerer class design and to offer suggestions on possible fixes. This means pointing out stamina, tank and healer shortfalls, weak points with regards to a number of abilities and highlighting the issues with, for example, pets.

I would equally expect NB, DK, and Templar advocates to do the same...
And if we had class forums and nominated player class advocates, then these threads could become productive rather than poisonous.

This is what Gil.Galad did - then the thread was hijacked by the 'Sorcs are fine and here's a few seconds of me on my Sorc dpsing a target dummy to prove it' routine by a very small handful of people.

They have successfully and repeatedly steered the conversation away from the holistic whole as you and the OP have laid out and refuse even when asked directly to answer on these issues.

Apparently, saying 'Sorc is fine because I'm a top player in a top guild so you're opinion is irrelevant' is enough proof to make your case for these individuals.

A well rounded evidence based argument eludes them for some reason...

Me... I prefer facts and intelligent analysis, so the OP has my vote, and my personal observations playing my Sorcerer agree with his take on the problems pretty closely.

@byrom101b16_ESO You've gone on and on about Gil.Galad's contributions and I'm sorry, but I've looked at his whole post history, and there is nothing scientific or groundbreaking about any of his posts or topics. Your whole arguments against anyone providing real life parse information (that shoots down your whole Sorc is bad theory) is that Gil.Galad broke down every deficiency of the class and parses do not show these deficiencies.

I can sum up Gil.Galad's contributions to the Sorc discussion for you even....

Sorc has poor group utility and flexibility
-True to an extent. We are poor healers and possibly the worst tank in 1.6 as well. The one thing good ol Gil forgets to mention is that we do our DPS from range which is a big boost in a lot of fights. I fully admit that we bring less in terms of buffs to a raid, but I will say that Negate is still useful although far from mandatory.

He presents a terrible sorc vs temp survivability comparison in spellscar
- This is a ridiculous comparison and means nothing. He is comparing heals per second with surge and fails to realize how powerful and survivable he could be using dmg shields instead. This is just a player failing to realize what the new tool we must use to survive is.

Skill balancing

- He then goes on to make some skill balancing suggestions, all of which are fairly minor and are pretty acceptable IMO. Negate getting the major dmg reduction buff just like VoB and Nova makes sense. His other changes don't really affect much besides his change to Surge healing. The problem with surge healing is dots and small attacks taking up the cooldown, and it should be addressed somehow. His suggestion of 6 target max is acceptable as long as it is within ZOS power to implement this.


And basically that is it. Please enlighten me to what I am missing about either the above information that I paraphrased or some other of Gil.Galad's posts that have this groundbreaking and definitive information that supersedes all real world parses from other players. Also please note that I do not intend to denigrate Gil.Galad's work. He provided good feedback on PTS and his post was thorough. I just don't see why you are building him up to be the voice of reason against actual in game proof.

What you, PPontus, and the other "sorc DPS is awesome so the class is fine" advocates are missing is that Gil, myself, and many others have been pointing out the sorcerer has many poorly designed and inefficient skills that make them awkward to play and rob the class of the sort of flexibility that others offer.

I don't care what screenshots PPontus posts, the surge skill is probably the most terribly designed skill in the game. If we play like PPontus we have at least 3 minor dots up at all times all but guaranteeing making the heal component of this skill worthless. It is more than 3 times as expensive as entropy, the latter, incidentally, by merely slotting it will increase my health by 8%!!! as well as grant me access to Mage's guild passives, as well as another DoT for Valkyn, etc., etc. Surge is just badly designed because the heal function of the spell is totally unreliable and no screen shot from PPontus will change that.

When I see responses saying just use conjured ward, these completely miss the point. How is it acceptable to have a terribly designed skill just because there is a different skill that performs *part* of the function of said terrible skill. Go ahead and cast conjured ward...but it doesn't give the damage boost of surge It also fails to replace the survivability sustain that heal morph of surge skill is designed to do and did before 1.6.

When I play on my Templar or DK, I have a hard time choosing which skills to put on my bar because those classes have so many good ones. With my sorc, I have not even bothered unlocking like half of them since the update.

• I have never been in a raid or dungeon group where someone said, "I think it would be helpful if I used encase." However useful you might think that skill is, just go ahead and take a glance at Talons from the DK skill line.
• In Cyrodiil, I noticed some people are trying to be cute with the Rune prison morph that paralyzes the attacking. Yes it is cute. So I simply break free and then chase down your bolt escaping build until you are half way across the map or dead. At least DKs who slot petrify - an instant cast that attains the same desired effect - will threaten an opponent more than once with a long duration stun.
• I know some theory-crafters are excited about the possibilities with bound armor because it adds 8% to the sorc's mana pool. First of all, this ignores the whole problem that the ostensible function of this spell, to provide damage mitigation, utterly fails because the amount it offers is a pittance (not to mention that I can slot Thunderous Presence instead that only take up 1 slot and provides a useful DoT as well). Secondly, it is a toggle, which means a sorcerer has to devote two valuable skill slots to maintain it. Thirdly, what exactly are most Sorcerers getting with that? A sorcerer who has 28K magicka, a reasonable amount atm, is getting 2240 bonus magicka - enough to cast, what, one and half spells. Now (assuming 2500 spell damage) your velocious curse does 7279 damage instead of 6990. Whoop-de-do. How about just replacing the skill with something actually useful that is not a toggle?
• The sorcs in my Sanctum raid group are still using spell symmetry instead of Dark Exchange. Why does this skill even exist? You know what sorcerers are in ESO? Mage's Guild dropouts because their versions of Mage's guild spells are strictly worse.
• Players in Cyordiil still run through my mines instead of avoiding them. As I still ignore the enemy mines in DSA, I don't blame them. So another high cost spell, that is cumbersome to use, that fails at it's intended effect, area denial. Unfortunately a common theme with the sorc class line.

And this does not even consider that someone who does not want to play a pet build will have even less slots to consider.

What this means is that many sorcerers in Cyrodiil run the same build! And the only PvE distinction is pet or non-pet. I don't care what DPS screenshots are out there, these numbers do not change the reality that this class has so many poorly designed and inefficient spells. When I play my templar, out of the 15 class skills, I actually want to use 14 of them (healing ritual is really the only loser). My templar build is going to be different than the other templars I run across and fight. But when I run my sorcerer and fight other magicka- sorcs, it is very much a mirror image: we all have a restoration staff and use Conjured Ward, Mage's Fury, Crystal Frags, Crushing Shock, Velocious Curse, Bolt Escape, Healing Ward, Harness Magicka. We all use these skills because they are so much better, efficient, and versatile than the many plague our skills lines.

And no DPS screenshot will diversify out builds. In fact, quite the opposite as those sorcs struggling trying to use it's bad skill lines will mirror those builds that pull competitive DPS.

I totally agree with you concerning our class design flaws.
I tried to go over every skill and passive our class offers us in order to explain that in detail here :
forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/1633923

MADshadowman

Patch 2.0.1 is out!

No sorc changes.

Thanks for that.

byrom101b16_ESO

Joy_Division wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

byrom101b16_ESO wrote: »

Jar_Ek wrote: »

Whether sorcerers have been needed or are about the same misses the point somewhat. The people posting on this, and other threads, are essentially advocates for sorcerers. The goal of all should be to point out the weak points in the sorcerer class design and to offer suggestions on possible fixes. This means pointing out stamina, tank and healer shortfalls, weak points with regards to a number of abilities and highlighting the issues with, for example, pets.

I would equally expect NB, DK, and Templar advocates to do the same...
And if we had class forums and nominated player class advocates, then these threads could become productive rather than poisonous.

This is what Gil.Galad did - then the thread was hijacked by the 'Sorcs are fine and here's a few seconds of me on my Sorc dpsing a target dummy to prove it' routine by a very small handful of people.

They have successfully and repeatedly steered the conversation away from the holistic whole as you and the OP have laid out and refuse even when asked directly to answer on these issues.

Apparently, saying 'Sorc is fine because I'm a top player in a top guild so you're opinion is irrelevant' is enough proof to make your case for these individuals.

A well rounded evidence based argument eludes them for some reason...

Me... I prefer facts and intelligent analysis, so the OP has my vote, and my personal observations playing my Sorcerer agree with his take on the problems pretty closely.

@byrom101b16_ESO You've gone on and on about Gil.Galad's contributions and I'm sorry, but I've looked at his whole post history, and there is nothing scientific or groundbreaking about any of his posts or topics. Your whole arguments against anyone providing real life parse information (that shoots down your whole Sorc is bad theory) is that Gil.Galad broke down every deficiency of the class and parses do not show these deficiencies.

I can sum up Gil.Galad's contributions to the Sorc discussion for you even....

Sorc has poor group utility and flexibility
-True to an extent. We are poor healers and possibly the worst tank in 1.6 as well. The one thing good ol Gil forgets to mention is that we do our DPS from range which is a big boost in a lot of fights. I fully admit that we bring less in terms of buffs to a raid, but I will say that Negate is still useful although far from mandatory.

He presents a terrible sorc vs temp survivability comparison in spellscar
- This is a ridiculous comparison and means nothing. He is comparing heals per second with surge and fails to realize how powerful and survivable he could be using dmg shields instead. This is just a player failing to realize what the new tool we must use to survive is.

Skill balancing

- He then goes on to make some skill balancing suggestions, all of which are fairly minor and are pretty acceptable IMO. Negate getting the major dmg reduction buff just like VoB and Nova makes sense. His other changes don't really affect much besides his change to Surge healing. The problem with surge healing is dots and small attacks taking up the cooldown, and it should be addressed somehow. His suggestion of 6 target max is acceptable as long as it is within ZOS power to implement this.


And basically that is it. Please enlighten me to what I am missing about either the above information that I paraphrased or some other of Gil.Galad's posts that have this groundbreaking and definitive information that supersedes all real world parses from other players. Also please note that I do not intend to denigrate Gil.Galad's work. He provided good feedback on PTS and his post was thorough. I just don't see why you are building him up to be the voice of reason against actual in game proof.

What you, PPontus, and the other "sorc DPS is awesome so the class is fine" advocates are missing is that Gil, myself, and many others have been pointing out the sorcerer has many poorly designed and inefficient skills that make them awkward to play and rob the class of the sort of flexibility that others offer.

I don't care what screenshots PPontus posts, the surge skill is probably the most terribly designed skill in the game. If we play like PPontus we have at least 3 minor dots up at all times all but guaranteeing making the heal component of this skill worthless. It is more than 3 times as expensive as entropy, the latter, incidentally, by merely slotting it will increase my health by 8%!!! as well as grant me access to Mage's guild passives, as well as another DoT for Valkyn, etc., etc. Surge is just badly designed because the heal function of the spell is totally unreliable and no screen shot from PPontus will change that.

When I see responses saying just use conjured ward, these completely miss the point. How is it acceptable to have a terribly designed skill just because there is a different skill that performs *part* of the function of said terrible skill. Go ahead and cast conjured ward...but it doesn't give the damage boost of surge It also fails to replace the survivability sustain that heal morph of surge skill is designed to do and did before 1.6.

When I play on my Templar or DK, I have a hard time choosing which skills to put on my bar because those classes have so many good ones. With my sorc, I have not even bothered unlocking like half of them since the update.

• I have never been in a raid or dungeon group where someone said, "I think it would be helpful if I used encase." However useful you might think that skill is, just go ahead and take a glance at Talons from the DK skill line.
• In Cyrodiil, I noticed some people are trying to be cute with the Rune prison morph that paralyzes the attacking. Yes it is cute. So I simply break free and then chase down your bolt escaping build until you are half way across the map or dead. At least DKs who slot petrify - an instant cast that attains the same desired effect - will threaten an opponent more than once with a long duration stun.
• I know some theory-crafters are excited about the possibilities with bound armor because it adds 8% to the sorc's mana pool. First of all, this ignores the whole problem that the ostensible function of this spell, to provide damage mitigation, utterly fails because the amount it offers is a pittance (not to mention that I can slot Thunderous Presence instead that only take up 1 slot and provides a useful DoT as well). Secondly, it is a toggle, which means a sorcerer has to devote two valuable skill slots to maintain it. Thirdly, what exactly are most Sorcerers getting with that? A sorcerer who has 28K magicka, a reasonable amount atm, is getting 2240 bonus magicka - enough to cast, what, one and half spells. Now (assuming 2500 spell damage) your velocious curse does 7279 damage instead of 6990. Whoop-de-do. How about just replacing the skill with something actually useful that is not a toggle?
• The sorcs in my Sanctum raid group are still using spell symmetry instead of Dark Exchange. Why does this skill even exist? You know what sorcerers are in ESO? Mage's Guild dropouts because their versions of Mage's guild spells are strictly worse.
• Players in Cyordiil still run through my mines instead of avoiding them. As I still ignore the enemy mines in DSA, I don't blame them. So another high cost spell, that is cumbersome to use, that fails at it's intended effect, area denial. Unfortunately a common theme with the sorc class line.

And this does not even consider that someone who does not want to play a pet build will have even less slots to consider.

What this means is that many sorcerers in Cyrodiil run the same build! And the only PvE distinction is pet or non-pet. I don't care what DPS screenshots are out there, these numbers do not change the reality that this class has so many poorly designed and inefficient spells. When I play my templar, out of the 15 class skills, I actually want to use 14 of them (healing ritual is really the only loser). My templar build is going to be different than the other templars I run across and fight. But when I run my sorcerer and fight other magicka- sorcs, it is very much a mirror image: we all have a restoration staff and use Conjured Ward, Mage's Fury, Crystal Frags, Crushing Shock, Velocious Curse, Bolt Escape, Healing Ward, Harness Magicka. We all use these skills because they are so much better, efficient, and versatile than the many plague our skills lines.

And no DPS screenshot will diversify out builds. In fact, quite the opposite as those sorcs struggling trying to use it's bad skill lines will mirror those builds that pull competitive DPS.

Thanks for saving me the effort of picking apart the many loose threads in Erocks response...

It should be blindingly obvious to anyone with the slightest interest in being unbias in their analysis, but a few limited specification dps pareses don't mean a thing.

As you rightly point out, and as has been pointed out before by Gil, regardless of Erocks attempt to state otherwise, is that the problems with magicka Sorcs, and to a similar extent in different ways with the stamina build possibilities of Sorcs is that they are a mess. Little synergy, a high percentage of useless skills, forced into bars filled with skills from other skill lines to actually work properly, forced into using massively nerfed armour, saddled with extremely resource-expensive skills with effects that are demonstrably weaker in effect than other class equivalents. Low survivability, low variability of build and a woefully nerfed class ultimate which makes them even less irrelevant in top end PvE content than their 15% presence in trials in 1.5 already clearly demonstrated.

I am getting weary with the dogmatic rubbish being touted as 'the only relevant fact' from people who are metaphorically sticking their fingers in their ears and shouting 'la la la not listening' when these valid points are raised.

"Sorcs are fine, look at my parse against this target dummy!" is a laughably simplistic argument which has been made endlessly on this and all threads where the class is discussed. It adds nothing to the debate, solves nothing and proves nothing except that in corner case circumstances, with the same rotation of the same skills, with the same gear, and the same high level of skill, one can, with the Sorcerer, just about have low-end competitive damage.

Big deal!

That we should be expected by anyone, to be fobbed off with a single second rate band-aid capability like this to far more complex and comprehensive issues of this poorly designed and implemented class is, frankly, a bad joke.

Any more sub-90 second parses of static target ideal conditions dps are utterly useless at this point. Useless and irrelevant.

But bet your bottom dollar we'll see more of them, and featuring on EVERY SINGLE OCCASSION, the use of Force Shock to do the most damage... and Entropy to boost that damage, the first skill which was nerfed to lose it's utility, the second an abiliity that makes the nerfed Sorcerer equivalent skill into a trap choice...

... it would seem the irony of this is utterly lost on those who think the class is 'fine'...

As is any sense of 'what the hell' as Zenimax 'fix' dps on the magicka Sorc by adding piddling spell power bonuses for slotting Sorc abilities whilst simultaneously making other skill lines replacements innevitable due to them being flat-out better!

And don't get me started on the avalanche of toggle skills we are uniquely saddled with... or the uniquely castrating way in which our self heals are made borderline useless by idiotic implementation... again, of all the classes uniquely so!

The class is a hash of poorly designed and implemented abilities that require replacing with a high proportion of other skills lines, not as a choice, but as a necessity.

Zenimax have had plenty of good suggestion on how these could be changed to make them better, and nothing asked for is OP or unreasonable.

The only unreasonable things here are Zenimax's denial and silence, and the 'dps parsers' selective blindness to the vast majority of the relevant issues and both of them deliberately ignoring the problems listed above whilst trotting out the same tired, and suspiciously similar mantra;

Zenimax - 'You can get good damage spikes in short PvP fights - the class is fine, and you're all complainers...'

Parsers - ' You can get half-decent dps in short static PvE fights - the class is fine, and you're all whiners...'

Enough said...

byrom101b16_ESO

MADshadowman wrote: »

Patch 2.0.1 is out!

No sorc changes.

Thanks for that.

Yeah...

Jar_Ek

@byrom101b16_ESO Has hit the nail on the head, despite his natural flair for the over dramatic.
Sorcerers may be capable of decent burst and passable dps in certain circumstances or with specific builds, but a fair number of our class skills are at best lack lustre and at worst plain bad. What we as a community need to do is to agree on which skills are poor and what the fixes could be... and take on board valid comments about how a specific change might not work in order to offer a reasoned and agreed sorcerer community position.

byrom101b16_ESO

Jar_Ek wrote: »

@byrom101b16_ESO Has hit the nail on the head, despite his natural flair for the over dramatic.
Sorcerers may be capable of decent burst and passable dps in certain circumstances or with specific builds, but a fair number of our class skills are at best lack lustre and at worst plain bad. What we as a community need to do is to agree on which skills are poor and what the fixes could be... and take on board valid comments about how a specific change might not work in order to offer a reasoned and agreed sorcerer community position.

Sounds like a plan.

If you need it dramatised - I'm always available!

Fayaburn

Jar_Ek wrote: »

@byrom101b16_ESO Has hit the nail on the head, despite his natural flair for the over dramatic.
Sorcerers may be capable of decent burst and passable dps in certain circumstances or with specific builds, but a fair number of our class skills are at best lack lustre and at worst plain bad. What we as a community need to do is to agree on which skills are poor and what the fixes could be... and take on board valid comments about how a specific change might not work in order to offer a reasoned and agreed sorcerer community position.

That was specifically my aim when I created the thread linked below :
Sorcerer PvE - Toolkit and analysis

However, the thread got burried in less than an hour while dialogues of the deaf about DPS are 10 pages long and stay at the top for days.
It seems that the community is eager to argue but not very keen to discuss the true issues in detail. I am not sure if I will ever take a long time to redact something on that board again as it clearly seems like a waste of time.

anitajoneb17_ESO

Fayaburn wrote: »

I am not sure if I will ever take a long time to redact something on that board again as it clearly seems like a waste of time.

Please don't think so. I for one am very grateful to you and people like you who take the time of testing, analyzing and writing clearly like you did. It is of great help at understanding my "new sorc". Thank you. :-)

byrom101b16_ESO

anitajoneb17_ESO wrote: »

Fayaburn wrote: »

I am not sure if I will ever take a long time to redact something on that board again as it clearly seems like a waste of time.

Please don't think so. I for one am very grateful to you and people like you who take the time of testing, analyzing and writing clearly like you did. It is of great help at understanding my "new sorc". Thank you. :-)

Agreed.

Erock25

byrom101b16_ESO wrote: »

Joy_Division wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

byrom101b16_ESO wrote: »

Jar_Ek wrote: »

Whether sorcerers have been needed or are about the same misses the point somewhat. The people posting on this, and other threads, are essentially advocates for sorcerers. The goal of all should be to point out the weak points in the sorcerer class design and to offer suggestions on possible fixes. This means pointing out stamina, tank and healer shortfalls, weak points with regards to a number of abilities and highlighting the issues with, for example, pets.

I would equally expect NB, DK, and Templar advocates to do the same...
And if we had class forums and nominated player class advocates, then these threads could become productive rather than poisonous.

This is what Gil.Galad did - then the thread was hijacked by the 'Sorcs are fine and here's a few seconds of me on my Sorc dpsing a target dummy to prove it' routine by a very small handful of people.

They have successfully and repeatedly steered the conversation away from the holistic whole as you and the OP have laid out and refuse even when asked directly to answer on these issues.

Apparently, saying 'Sorc is fine because I'm a top player in a top guild so you're opinion is irrelevant' is enough proof to make your case for these individuals.

A well rounded evidence based argument eludes them for some reason...

Me... I prefer facts and intelligent analysis, so the OP has my vote, and my personal observations playing my Sorcerer agree with his take on the problems pretty closely.

@byrom101b16_ESO You've gone on and on about Gil.Galad's contributions and I'm sorry, but I've looked at his whole post history, and there is nothing scientific or groundbreaking about any of his posts or topics. Your whole arguments against anyone providing real life parse information (that shoots down your whole Sorc is bad theory) is that Gil.Galad broke down every deficiency of the class and parses do not show these deficiencies.

I can sum up Gil.Galad's contributions to the Sorc discussion for you even....

Sorc has poor group utility and flexibility
-True to an extent. We are poor healers and possibly the worst tank in 1.6 as well. The one thing good ol Gil forgets to mention is that we do our DPS from range which is a big boost in a lot of fights. I fully admit that we bring less in terms of buffs to a raid, but I will say that Negate is still useful although far from mandatory.

He presents a terrible sorc vs temp survivability comparison in spellscar
- This is a ridiculous comparison and means nothing. He is comparing heals per second with surge and fails to realize how powerful and survivable he could be using dmg shields instead. This is just a player failing to realize what the new tool we must use to survive is.

Skill balancing

- He then goes on to make some skill balancing suggestions, all of which are fairly minor and are pretty acceptable IMO. Negate getting the major dmg reduction buff just like VoB and Nova makes sense. His other changes don't really affect much besides his change to Surge healing. The problem with surge healing is dots and small attacks taking up the cooldown, and it should be addressed somehow. His suggestion of 6 target max is acceptable as long as it is within ZOS power to implement this.


And basically that is it. Please enlighten me to what I am missing about either the above information that I paraphrased or some other of Gil.Galad's posts that have this groundbreaking and definitive information that supersedes all real world parses from other players. Also please note that I do not intend to denigrate Gil.Galad's work. He provided good feedback on PTS and his post was thorough. I just don't see why you are building him up to be the voice of reason against actual in game proof.

What you, PPontus, and the other "sorc DPS is awesome so the class is fine" advocates are missing is that Gil, myself, and many others have been pointing out the sorcerer has many poorly designed and inefficient skills that make them awkward to play and rob the class of the sort of flexibility that others offer.

I don't care what screenshots PPontus posts, the surge skill is probably the most terribly designed skill in the game. If we play like PPontus we have at least 3 minor dots up at all times all but guaranteeing making the heal component of this skill worthless. It is more than 3 times as expensive as entropy, the latter, incidentally, by merely slotting it will increase my health by 8%!!! as well as grant me access to Mage's guild passives, as well as another DoT for Valkyn, etc., etc. Surge is just badly designed because the heal function of the spell is totally unreliable and no screen shot from PPontus will change that.

When I see responses saying just use conjured ward, these completely miss the point. How is it acceptable to have a terribly designed skill just because there is a different skill that performs *part* of the function of said terrible skill. Go ahead and cast conjured ward...but it doesn't give the damage boost of surge It also fails to replace the survivability sustain that heal morph of surge skill is designed to do and did before 1.6.

When I play on my Templar or DK, I have a hard time choosing which skills to put on my bar because those classes have so many good ones. With my sorc, I have not even bothered unlocking like half of them since the update.

• I have never been in a raid or dungeon group where someone said, "I think it would be helpful if I used encase." However useful you might think that skill is, just go ahead and take a glance at Talons from the DK skill line.
• In Cyrodiil, I noticed some people are trying to be cute with the Rune prison morph that paralyzes the attacking. Yes it is cute. So I simply break free and then chase down your bolt escaping build until you are half way across the map or dead. At least DKs who slot petrify - an instant cast that attains the same desired effect - will threaten an opponent more than once with a long duration stun.
• I know some theory-crafters are excited about the possibilities with bound armor because it adds 8% to the sorc's mana pool. First of all, this ignores the whole problem that the ostensible function of this spell, to provide damage mitigation, utterly fails because the amount it offers is a pittance (not to mention that I can slot Thunderous Presence instead that only take up 1 slot and provides a useful DoT as well). Secondly, it is a toggle, which means a sorcerer has to devote two valuable skill slots to maintain it. Thirdly, what exactly are most Sorcerers getting with that? A sorcerer who has 28K magicka, a reasonable amount atm, is getting 2240 bonus magicka - enough to cast, what, one and half spells. Now (assuming 2500 spell damage) your velocious curse does 7279 damage instead of 6990. Whoop-de-do. How about just replacing the skill with something actually useful that is not a toggle?
• The sorcs in my Sanctum raid group are still using spell symmetry instead of Dark Exchange. Why does this skill even exist? You know what sorcerers are in ESO? Mage's Guild dropouts because their versions of Mage's guild spells are strictly worse.
• Players in Cyordiil still run through my mines instead of avoiding them. As I still ignore the enemy mines in DSA, I don't blame them. So another high cost spell, that is cumbersome to use, that fails at it's intended effect, area denial. Unfortunately a common theme with the sorc class line.

And this does not even consider that someone who does not want to play a pet build will have even less slots to consider.

What this means is that many sorcerers in Cyrodiil run the same build! And the only PvE distinction is pet or non-pet. I don't care what DPS screenshots are out there, these numbers do not change the reality that this class has so many poorly designed and inefficient spells. When I play my templar, out of the 15 class skills, I actually want to use 14 of them (healing ritual is really the only loser). My templar build is going to be different than the other templars I run across and fight. But when I run my sorcerer and fight other magicka- sorcs, it is very much a mirror image: we all have a restoration staff and use Conjured Ward, Mage's Fury, Crystal Frags, Crushing Shock, Velocious Curse, Bolt Escape, Healing Ward, Harness Magicka. We all use these skills because they are so much better, efficient, and versatile than the many plague our skills lines.

And no DPS screenshot will diversify out builds. In fact, quite the opposite as those sorcs struggling trying to use it's bad skill lines will mirror those builds that pull competitive DPS.

Thanks for saving me the effort of picking apart the many loose threads in Erocks response...

It should be blindingly obvious to anyone with the slightest interest in being unbias in their analysis, but a few limited specification dps pareses don't mean a thing.

As you rightly point out, and as has been pointed out before by Gil, regardless of Erocks attempt to state otherwise, is that the problems with magicka Sorcs, and to a similar extent in different ways with the stamina build possibilities of Sorcs is that they are a mess. Little synergy, a high percentage of useless skills, forced into bars filled with skills from other skill lines to actually work properly, forced into using massively nerfed armour, saddled with extremely resource-expensive skills with effects that are demonstrably weaker in effect than other class equivalents. Low survivability, low variability of build and a woefully nerfed class ultimate which makes them even less irrelevant in top end PvE content than their 15% presence in trials in 1.5 already clearly demonstrated.

I am getting weary with the dogmatic rubbish being touted as 'the only relevant fact' from people who are metaphorically sticking their fingers in their ears and shouting 'la la la not listening' when these valid points are raised.

"Sorcs are fine, look at my parse against this target dummy!" is a laughably simplistic argument which has been made endlessly on this and all threads where the class is discussed. It adds nothing to the debate, solves nothing and proves nothing except that in corner case circumstances, with the same rotation of the same skills, with the same gear, and the same high level of skill, one can, with the Sorcerer, just about have low-end competitive damage.

Big deal!

That we should be expected by anyone, to be fobbed off with a single second rate band-aid capability like this to far more complex and comprehensive issues of this poorly designed and implemented class is, frankly, a bad joke.

Any more sub-90 second parses of static target ideal conditions dps are utterly useless at this point. Useless and irrelevant.

But bet your bottom dollar we'll see more of them, and featuring on EVERY SINGLE OCCASSION, the use of Force Shock to do the most damage... and Entropy to boost that damage, the first skill which was nerfed to lose it's utility, the second an abiliity that makes the nerfed Sorcerer equivalent skill into a trap choice...

... it would seem the irony of this is utterly lost on those who think the class is 'fine'...

As is any sense of 'what the hell' as Zenimax 'fix' dps on the magicka Sorc by adding piddling spell power bonuses for slotting Sorc abilities whilst simultaneously making other skill lines replacements innevitable due to them being flat-out better!

And don't get me started on the avalanche of toggle skills we are uniquely saddled with... or the uniquely castrating way in which our self heals are made borderline useless by idiotic implementation... again, of all the classes uniquely so!

The class is a hash of poorly designed and implemented abilities that require replacing with a high proportion of other skills lines, not as a choice, but as a necessity.

Zenimax have had plenty of good suggestion on how these could be changed to make them better, and nothing asked for is OP or unreasonable.

The only unreasonable things here are Zenimax's denial and silence, and the 'dps parsers' selective blindness to the vast majority of the relevant issues and both of them deliberately ignoring the problems listed above whilst trotting out the same tired, and suspiciously similar mantra;

Zenimax - 'You can get good damage spikes in short PvP fights - the class is fine, and you're all complainers...'

Parsers - ' You can get half-decent dps in short static PvE fights - the class is fine, and you're all whiners...'

Enough said...

You are a real piece of work, man. It is tough to respond to your posts without anger but I will do my best. I'd appreciate it if you toned it down a bit. You seem to think I have some agenda to ruin the Sorc class, which is preposterous. I main a Sorc and have 20x the amount of hours in my Sorc as my 2nd and only other alt in the VR which is a DK. I'm going to address @Joy_Division response here as well since you took the easy way out and instead of responding to my last post, you just thanked him/her for clearing up the many loose threads in my prior post.

Joy_division's response to my post is basically saying a lot of Sorc skills are bad and he/she specifically calls out Surge, Encase, Rune Prison, Dark Exchange, Bound Armor, and Mines. I agree with the issues on Surge and I have always said this. DoTs reducing the healing potential is an issue and needs to be fixed UNLESS other utility is added to the spell that makes it a must use for a Sorc over Entropy/Rally. I do not agree that Encase is a poor spell now that the cost was reduced in 1.6. We have a ranged root that is very useful in many situations, especially in PVE and especially with our ability to drop ranged AOE damage. Rune Prison is a niche spell and I understand frustration with it, although I have been enjoying using the self buff version of it in PVP on my overload bar. Works wonders I find. Dark Exchange is another spell that I love in PVP and find it useless in group PVE. Is that a problem? To me, no it isn't. It is fine to have spells that have their specific uses. Bound Armor is a so-so spell. 8% magicka boost can increase your DPS by around 5% depending on how you are set up, which can be useful in some builds. Mines is something that again, I love in PVP, but they really should change it to have a better use in group PVE. So you will see that even though I am in the camp that says "Magicka Sorcs are Fine," for the most part, I agree with what all of you "Sorcs were nerfed" people are saying when we break it down to specific skills.

Where our thinking is completely different however, is that I do not think this is a Sorc specific problem, nor is it even a problem. Every single class has skills that you can look at and say this ability has no use for me in group PVE and therefore it sucks. Every single class has abilities that are only smart to use in PVP. Every single class has abilities that 95% of players aren't using and every class has or will have builds that a vast majority of players will be using. I find it ridiculous to complain about Sorc skills at this time, or even to suggest we were nerfed in 1.6, when there are so many useful skills now compared to in 1.5. Our group PVE DPS situation was terrible in 1.5, and I'm not talking about the actual DPS we could do. I'm talking about the god-awful rotation of Power Surge and Crushing Shock spam. I'm shocked anyone could even suggest Sorcs are worse off now than they were before.

Joy_division states that so many skills are useless for Sorc, while he has trouble finding enough slots for all the Templar abilities he wants. I disagree here completely. I'd love to have Restoring Twilight, Empowered Ward (and Hardened Ward), Daedric Prey (and Vel Curse), Crystal Frag, Liquid Lightning, Bound Aegis, Shattering Prison, Thundering Presence, Streak, Mage's Wrath, and even Dark Exchange on my bar to go with Force Pulse, Degeneration, and Inner Light. Every single one of those Sorc abilities would make a build better. I think that is the definition of having useful skills, especially in light of how terrible it was in 1.5. So what skills did I leave out .... Rune Prison, Mines, Surge, and Familiar. As I said earlier, Rune Prison has its niche uses but could be improved, Mines needs to have better use in PVE (giving Sorc a DPS boost in range like all other classes have), Surge needs some ancillary buffs to make it worth using over Entropy/Rally, and Familiar needs its cast time removed (especially with the change to Rebate).

It is funny to me to re-read your post and the amount of hyperbole and over reactions you make. You attack me for liking my class and the skills we have (especially comapred to where we are coming from in 1.5). You attack me for liking where Sorcs are currently parsing. I honestly believe it is time for you to move on from the Sorcerer class if you are so infuriated by every aspect of it. It is clear to me that you've made up your mind that you have every skill we have and you shoot down every parse ( FYI a lot of trial fights only last 90 seconds so not sure how they aren't relevant) that people provide and even make up some conspiracy theory that people providing these parses are out to get Sorcerers for some unimaginable reason.

Do I think magicka Sorcs are in a 100% perfect place right now? Of course not! Is anyone out there thinking that every single skill their class has is perfect... probably not. I do think that suggesting that we are worse off than we were in 1.5 is comical, however. Make Surge worth using by adding self and group buffs to it, make negate give major buff of damage reduction, and change either Thundering Presence or a morph of Mines to give Sorc a real way to increase their DPS if they can get into melee range comfortably and I am as happy as can be about magicka Sorc. Stamina/Heal Sorc on the other hand could use some serious work IMO (and just FYI by serious work, I mean a few morphs here and there that we can use to actually contribute to either build).

Fayaburn

Erock25 wrote: »

I do not agree that Encase is a poor spell now that the cost was reduced in 1.6. We have a ranged root that is very useful in many situations, especially in PVE and especially with our ability to drop ranged AOE damage.

The main problem here is that it is not truely a ranged root. It is currently a lesser version of Talons. Make it a ground targeted spell ala DK's Ash Cloud and then it would start to be used or at least have its own identity.

Erock25 wrote: »

Rune Prison is a niche spell and I understand frustration with it, although I have been enjoying using the self buff version of it in PVP on my overload bar. Works wonders I find.

A spell which is only useful once at the beginning of a fight. And by saying useful, I feel being generous. Yes, the spell is cute, but you said it yourself, you slot it on the 3rd bar. Let's say Sorcs did not benefit of that aberration that is the 3rd bar. Would the skill be worth 1/10 of you skill slots?

Erock25 wrote: »

Dark Exchange is another spell that I love in PVP and find it useless in group PVE. Is that a problem? To me, no it isn't. It is fine to have spells that have their specific uses.

Imho, the issue here is that Dark Exchange is an out of combat skill. You love it in PvP but have to get out of LoS from your enemy to chanel it. The only use it has when an enemy is close is to try to juke him into a bash. And as you said, there is no use of it in PvE.
Why not rework the skill and make it a true asset for in-combat resource management? (intended use when it was designed I guess).

Erock25 wrote: »

Bound Armor is a so-so spell. 8% magicka boost can increase your DPS by around 5% depending on how you are set up, which can be useful in some builds.

2 slots taken (aka 20% of your skills) just to gain 5% DPS? That's a bit harsh.

Erock25 wrote: »

Mines is something that again, I love in PVP, but they really should change it to have a better use in group PVE.

Agree on that. In PvE, it should be part of a Melee sorcerer build. Also, it should detonate on charging enemies.

Erock25 wrote: »

Where our thinking is completely different however, is that I do not think this is a Sorc specific problem, nor is it even a problem. Every single class has skills that you can look at and say this ability has no use for me in group PVE and therefore it sucks. Every single class has abilities that are only smart to use in PVP. Every single class has abilities that 95% of players aren't using and every class has or will have builds that a vast majority of players will be using.

I agree. However, not only our skills were lamely designed. Our passives aren't great either, and this is an even more important problem to my eyes.

Joy_Division

Erock25 wrote: »

Joy_division's response to my post is basically saying a lot of Sorc skills are bad and he/she specifically calls out Surge, Encase, Rune Prison, Dark Exchange, Bound Armor, and Mines. I agree with the issues on Surge and I have always said this. DoTs reducing the healing potential is an issue and needs to be fixed UNLESS other utility is added to the spell that makes it a must use for a Sorc over Entropy/Rally. I do not agree that Encase is a poor spell now that the cost was reduced in 1.6. We have a ranged root that is very useful in many situations, especially in PVE and especially with our ability to drop ranged AOE damage. Rune Prison is a niche spell and I understand frustration with it, although I have been enjoying using the self buff version of it in PVP on my overload bar. Works wonders I find. Dark Exchange is another spell that I love in PVP and find it useless in group PVE. Is that a problem? To me, no it isn't. It is fine to have spells that have their specific uses. Bound Armor is a so-so spell. 8% magicka boost can increase your DPS by around 5% depending on how you are set up, which can be useful in some builds. Mines is something that again, I love in PVP, but they really should change it to have a better use in group PVE. So you will see that even though I am in the camp that says "Magicka Sorcs are Fine," for the most part, I agree with what all of you "Sorcs were nerfed" people are saying when we break it down to specific skills.

Where our thinking is completely different however, is that I do not think this is a Sorc specific problem, nor is it even a problem. Every single class has skills that you can look at and say this ability has no use for me in group PVE and therefore it sucks. Every single class has abilities that are only smart to use in PVP. Every single class has abilities that 95% of players aren't using and every class has or will have builds that a vast majority of players will be using. I find it ridiculous to complain about Sorc skills at this time, or even to suggest we were nerfed in 1.6, when there are so many useful skills now compared to in 1.5. Our group PVE DPS situation was terrible in 1.5, and I'm not talking about the actual DPS we could do. I'm talking about the god-awful rotation of Power Surge and Crushing Shock spam. I'm shocked anyone could even suggest Sorcs are worse off now than they were before.

Joy_division states that so many skills are useless for Sorc, while he has trouble finding enough slots for all the Templar abilities he wants. I disagree here completely. I'd love to have Restoring Twilight, Empowered Ward (and Hardened Ward), Daedric Prey (and Vel Curse), Crystal Frag, Liquid Lightning, Bound Aegis, Shattering Prison, Thundering Presence, Streak, Mage's Wrath, and even Dark Exchange on my bar to go with Force Pulse, Degeneration, and Inner Light. Every single one of those Sorc abilities would make a build better. I think that is the definition of having useful skills, especially in light of how terrible it was in 1.5. So what skills did I leave out .... Rune Prison, Mines, Surge, and Familiar. As I said earlier, Rune Prison has its niche uses but could be improved, Mines needs to have better use in PVE (giving Sorc a DPS boost in range like all other classes have), Surge needs some ancillary buffs to make it worth using over Entropy/Rally, and Familiar needs its cast time removed (especially with the change to Rebate).

@ Erock -

What you are missing, I believe, is the distinction between a "cute" spell that has some effect and an effective and efficient spell that is comparable to alternatives

You "love" dark exchange in PvP. Love! You have to disengage from the enemy (and thus stop threatening the enemy while directing enemy fire onto your teammates who I am sure are appreciate), so you can drain your stamina and pray you don't get CCed. And what if you got CCed and had to break it? No Dark Exchange for you. How about not abandoning your teammates and just heavy attack?

Encase - "very" useful in "many" situations? Maybe the Praxin fight in Spindleclutch vs the spiders if you dont have a DK tank who can use a proper root spell. I have run every trial many many times and have never once seen a sorcerer use this spell or the raid leader ask for it. In fact, because most raid leaders prefer the enemies to be next to the stack, this spell is actually counterproductive as opposed to being useful. Want to give sorcs unique utility? Instead of this spell rooting enemies, it creates a vortex that sucks the enemies to a desired location. Bam! Now every raid leader will actually want a sorcerer.

You "enjoy" using Rune Prison. That's nice, but just because you enjoy it does not make it effective. The DK version of this spell is an instant cast.

It is disingenuous to say that the definition of a "useful" skill is one that makes your build better. By your criteria EVERYTHING is a useful spell and there is never any need to examine skills because they ALL make your build "better." Think of the worse skill in the game - soul trap, maybe? - I'll put in on my bar. There my build is better. I can put a dot on an enemy (actually two of them), raises my DPS, procs the Valkyn set, and gives me a return on resources when the enemy dies. There, my build is better!

So, tell me why nobody uses soul trap? Because it is relatively ineffective and inefficient when compared to the alternatives. That is the line of distinction that separates useful skills from trap choices that have traditionally plagued RPG balance every since Gary Gygaxx designed Dungeon and Dragons some 40 years ago.

If you put poor, niche, inefficient, cute, or trap skills like soul trap, dark exchange, and rune prison on your bar, there is a real opportunity cost because you are devoting resources that could be used to do something that has a greater effect on the battle or raid. 13 templar skills all fit the criteria I laid out above:

• Biting Jabs: Crazy DPS and heals me.
• Aurora Javelin: Marginal, but an instant ranged stun is always useful.
• Toppling Charge: Mobility, stun, damage...if ZoS would ever fix the cooldown issue this might be the best PvP skill the Templar has.
• Blazing Spear: Ranged AoE that stuns and DoTs? Sorcerers wish they had this.
• Blazing Shield: So good people think it is OP.
• Sun Fire: Marginal (for a templar). But think about this. When a ranged DoT that grants you major prophecy and gives ultiamte is considered "marginal" for you class, that means you class has very good skills.
• Dark Flare / Solar Barrage: Both are good: healing debuffs are strong, this AoE is better than elemental ring.
• Backlash: now that I think about this, it probably is too niche for PvP. It is, however, quite good in PvE. So 13 spells out of 15.
• Eclipse: very strong in a 1v1 situation and against enemies who target you in general.
• Radiant Destruction: No comment necessary.
• Breathe of Life: No comment necessary.
• Healing Ritual: Fails my criteria. Cast time + short range means you are better off slotting/casting something else most of the time.
• Repentance: Free resources are very good.
• Purifying rituals: Strong and versatile spell that cleanses, HoTs, and augments heals.
• Rune focus: Before the patch this was weaksauce. The very definition of a trap spell that literally trapped its user to a particular spot on the ground. Now much more flexible. Very strong skill for PvE templar tanks.

The only spell there I can see an argument being made against my criteria is Rune Focus because I think Thundering Presence is strictly better (also such a PvP argument does not change the fact this skill is very strong for PvE...something that cant be said for Dark Exchange, Encase, and the like).

Because templars have so many good skills, templars are kind of like ESO snowflakes, every one is a bit different (the other class that fits this description is the nightblade - it is also a very versatile PVP class. It's magicka DPS is kind of meh atm however).

What is a twilight doing for you in Cyrodiil that makes it competitive with any of my templar skills? Using two slots to give you mana regen? I will buy the argument that in a 1v1 situation it might sufficiently distract an inexperienced player that might grant a crucial advantage (and to that I'd argue the clannfear/volatile familiar is better because the heal or stun). But in an AvA environment, siege warfare, and the large open field fights, what exactly is that twilight doing that is worth the opportunity cost of 2 slots? Is a sorcerer who has twilight more valuable to her alliance than my templar with breathe of life, blazing spear, radiant destruction, purifying ritual, biting jabs, etc? Is that twilight more versatile or valuable than the liquid lightning and thundering presence you can have instead? Clearly not.

And that is the problem with sorcerers. If I slot a "cute," spell that fits your definition of useful, I am objectively detracting from the contributions I could otherwise make in a raid or AvA setting. If I am a templar, and I have many more spells that are versatile and effective enough that if I slot one over another, my effectiveness is nearly the same.

Erock25

@Joy_Division I had a long response typed out but screw it. Yes you are right and all templar skills are amazing while sorc might as well not have any skills at all. I'm sure in a few weeks time, Sorc will be non-existent in PVP because we have such terrible skills. I mean, how can I compete with templars who have ranged stuns and dots that grant major prophecy and OH MY GOD they have ECLIPSE Not only do templars have skills with more utility, they also do more ranged magicka DPS than Sorc too and apparently the best aoe magicka DPS as well. I will not just go along quietly using my 'cute' spells while you continue your templar path of destruction through all game content because all of your spells are so useful.

eventide03b14a_ESO

Fayaburn wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

I do not agree that Encase is a poor spell now that the cost was reduced in 1.6. We have a ranged root that is very useful in many situations, especially in PVE and especially with our ability to drop ranged AOE damage.

The main problem here is that it is not truely a ranged root. It is currently a lesser version of Talons. Make it a ground targeted spell ala DK's Ash Cloud and then it would start to be used or at least have its own identity.

It's far better than it used to be now that it no longer has max targets. I have always used this spell Solo and I will continue to do so. It's a low cost spell and highly effective for CC I am perfectly happy with the way it functions.

Erock25 wrote: »

Rune Prison is a niche spell and I understand frustration with it, although I have been enjoying using the self buff version of it in PVP on my overload bar. Works wonders I find.

A spell which is only useful once at the beginning of a fight. And by saying useful, I feel being generous. Yes, the spell is cute, but you said it yourself, you slot it on the 3rd bar. Let's say Sorcs did not benefit of that aberration that is the 3rd bar. Would the skill be worth 1/10 of you skill slots?

The main benefit to the morph is that it lasts 60 seconds; that's practically an eternity in PvP. It's a nice safeguard against surprise attacks.

Erock25 wrote: »

Dark Exchange is another spell that I love in PVP and find it useless in group PVE. Is that a problem? To me, no it isn't. It is fine to have spells that have their specific uses.

Imho, the issue here is that Dark Exchange is an out of combat skill. You love it in PvP but have to get out of LoS from your enemy to chanel it. The only use it has when an enemy is close is to try to juke him into a bash. And as you said, there is no use of it in PvE.
Why not rework the skill and make it a true asset for in-combat resource management? (intended use when it was designed I guess).

I use it Solo all the time. I also use a pet a build Solo so the channeling isn't a problem as my pets can easily handle most situations while I use it. I use it for both the heal and the magicka regen.

Erock25 wrote: »

Bound Armor is a so-so spell. 8% magicka boost can increase your DPS by around 5% depending on how you are set up, which can be useful in some builds.

2 slots taken (aka 20% of your skills) just to gain 5% DPS? That's a bit harsh.

The magicka increase is a nice change, but I think I would have preferred a higher armor and spell resistance for taking up two slots.

Erock25 wrote: »

Mines is something that again, I love in PVP, but they really should change it to have a better use in group PVE.

Agree on that. In PvE, it should be part of a Melee sorcerer build. Also, it should detonate on charging enemies.

Erock25 wrote: »

Where our thinking is completely different however, is that I do not think this is a Sorc specific problem, nor is it even a problem. Every single class has skills that you can look at and say this ability has no use for me in group PVE and therefore it sucks. Every single class has abilities that are only smart to use in PVP. Every single class has abilities that 95% of players aren't using and every class has or will have builds that a vast majority of players will be using.

I agree. However, not only our skills were lamely designed. Our passives aren't great either, and this is an even more important problem to my eyes.

I would love our passives increased, but they are lame compared to what exactly?

byrom101b16_ESO

Alright Erock25 - I'll accept you're not as bias as some of your posts have seemed to indicate - especially those on other threads where you have a good go at my position and support the two players we both know the names of...

My position on your position has therefore changed.

My position on the Sorcerer however, hasn't.

I think you're missing one thing. I don't do badly with the Sorcerer at the moment. But I cannot do truly well. One can on one's other characters, quite easily by comparison. So combined with the evidence, the troubles a significant number of Sorc. players I know in-game and the dismissive hubris of Zenimax's response to paying customers... (maybe not paying now...) I am irritated by their lack of attention, response and acknowledgement.

I am also amazed at the simplicity of the counter posts by a couple of people in particular which only talk about one thing repeatedly, and in a manner that seems designed to spam the threads involved and effectively paralyse them in walls of text... dismissive, fanboi'istic and 'leet' text at that.

However, as you are talking about issues, despite the fact we disagree, we can at least stop the irritable counterpoint.

Snit

rileynotzb14_ESO wrote: »

We don't care about about stamina builds. We picked sorcerers to use MAGIC! Make us viable. Make us relevant.

You got a mouse in your pocket? Who's "we?"

The class is viable and relevant now. Our DPS appears to be fine with magicka. The only areas where sorcs are unarguably laggards are healing and group utility. As for stamina sorcs, they could use a closer look if only to make sure they have reasonable resource management and build flexibility.

eventide03b14a_ESO

byrom101b16_ESO wrote: »

Alright Erock25 - I'll accept you're not as bias as some of your posts have seemed to indicate - especially those on other threads where you have a good go at my position and support the two players we both know the names of...

My position on your position has therefore changed.

My position on the Sorcerer however, hasn't.

I think you're missing one thing. I don't do badly with the Sorcerer at the moment. But I cannot do truly well. One can on one's other characters, quite easily by comparison. So combined with the evidence, the troubles a significant number of Sorc. players I know in-game and the dismissive hubris of Zenimax's response to paying customers... (maybe not paying now...) I am irritated by their lack of attention, response and acknowledgement.

I am also amazed at the simplicity of the counter posts by a couple of people in particular which only talk about one thing repeatedly, and in a manner that seems designed to spam the threads involved and effectively paralyse them in walls of text... dismissive, fanboi'istic and 'leet' text at that.

However, as you are talking about issues, despite the fact we disagree, we can at least stop the irritable counterpoint.

I didn't see any postings that indicated anyone attempting to spam. I have only seen alternative viewpoints to your own assessment of the class. Not everyone plays the same as you or envisions the class the same way you do. That's doesn't make them wrong or "fanboi'istic".

Septimus_Magna

Erock25 wrote: »

Bound Armor is a so-so spell. 8% magicka boost can increase your DPS by around 5% depending on how you are set up, which can be useful in some builds.

You just gave me an good idea to increase my dps and improve my defense. I use spell power/spell crit/magicka potions which make the spell crit buff from Inner Light useless, I only use it for the 7% magicka bonus. But if I would use Bound Armor I would get major spell crit bonus from the potions, have 8% more magicka, minor armor and spell resist buffs and 2% increased spell damage from the sorc passive.

The only disadvantage, I have to use a potion every 45 seconds to get the buffs. So probably not realistic for trash pulls but manageable during boss fights. And it might be necessary to use a increase potion effectiveness enchantment for jewelry. Im gonna try this out the next time I run AA or Hel Ra.

pppontus

Septimus_Magna wrote: »

Erock25 wrote: »

Bound Armor is a so-so spell. 8% magicka boost can increase your DPS by around 5% depending on how you are set up, which can be useful in some builds.

You just gave me an good idea to increase my dps and improve my defense. I use spell power/spell crit/magicka potions which make the spell crit buff from Inner Light useless, I only use it for the 7% magicka bonus. But if I would use Bound Armor I would get major spell crit bonus from the potions, have 8% more magicka, minor armor and spell resist buffs and 2% increased spell damage from the sorc passive.

The only disadvantage, I have to use a potion every 45 seconds to get the buffs. So probably not realistic for trash pulls but manageable during boss fights. And it might be necessary to use a increase potion effectiveness enchantment for jewelry. Im gonna try this out the next time I run AA or Hel Ra.

You need 50 in alchemy and 3 points in Medicinal Use together with one glyph of Potion Cooldown Reduction and you can have constant pots. Pro tip: make the glyph with a Ta because the duration is the same no matter the quality. I may own a few Kutas less because of not knowing that..

Earelith

Emma_Eunjung wrote: »

7) Hold down block and use Lightning Splash, whichever morph you prefer, to wear your enemy down over a long period of time. Do a heavy attack whenever you can.

I am curious...wouldn't this just deplete your stamina in a very short time while you slowly trying to kill mobs/boss?

AfkNinja

Earelith wrote: »

Emma_Eunjung wrote: »

7) Hold down block and use Lightning Splash, whichever morph you prefer, to wear your enemy down over a long period of time. Do a heavy attack whenever you can.

I am curious...wouldn't this just deplete your stamina in a very short time while you slowly trying to kill mobs/boss?

Nnnnnnneeeeeeccccrrrroooooo bump. Look at the dates....March 2015.

Xendyn

Earelith wrote: »

Emma_Eunjung wrote: »

7) Hold down block and use Lightning Splash, whichever morph you prefer, to wear your enemy down over a long period of time. Do a heavy attack whenever you can.

I am curious...wouldn't this just deplete your stamina in a very short time while you slowly trying to kill mobs/boss?

Lol, yes it would Now. this thread is from before the nerf to stam regen while blocking

ThatNeonZebraAgain

but hey, at least @Earelith used the search function!

dodgehopper_ESO

Normally I'm not one to cry Necro thread, because I believe a conversation should be allowed to go on for a long while, but in this case I have to say this is a dead thread. Feel free to make a new topic on the issue, by all means, but the things said in the initial post really have no bearing on current events. Its almost a year old - and ties into patches from early 2015.

flawless4812

I feel other classes should be buffed and sorcs should be left alone.... rediculous how a sorcs can take on 4 guys in pvp straight up...... the moment we stun snare etc he's dead but those shields r rediculous........ buff the other classes and make a separate scaling system for pvp and pve it will make the game 100% better in ever aspect

Bfish22090

TehMagnus wrote: »

Sorcs weren't overnerfed. They are still very strong in PVP when played by SKILLED players and they still suck in PVE, nothing new here .

Edit: That being said, leaderboards are not just about time and DPS anymore and sorcs can complete any content the game has to offer and are actually more useful in PVE in 1.6 than they where in 1.5.

As long as you can complete everything and that leaderboards aren't majorly influenced by the time it takes you to kill stuff but more by the # of deaths and some other stuff, I don't really see why care if the DPS of the sorc is 2-3k below others

because of threads like these, sorcerers were over nefed, they are now a niche class that was a shadow of its former self.

david.haypreub18_ESO

Dyride wrote: »

Soris_ESO wrote: »

Did you guys even pvp'ed in last 2 days? You are such an op shiet with all those burst and shields when you stack magicka. Overload lights alone hit around 12k, Frags 9k lol. What are you taking about?
L2P, git gut and stop crying.

The only place I feel any level of power is PVP.

Yes my Sorc is great to kite, I've got my ranged interrupt with Crushing Shock and Streak/Boundless Storm makes me a lightning god.

However, once you get into PVE and mobs are immune to half of your abilities, being "carried" thru content is the least fun feeling in the world.

As a Templar, I would gladly trade any and all advantages I have in PvE to be viable in PvP.

remilafo

Holy necro thread... let it die... check the dates people, this discussion isn't relevant anymore.