Sorcerer: The difference between Empowered and Hardened Ward

Kammakazi

Magicka pool used for testing: 40207.
Conjured Ward and both of its morphs scale only with your maximum Magicka pool.

17733 damage shield. Empowered Ward.

23584 damage shield. Hardened Ward.


and in Cyrodiil. Empowered vs. Hardened.

Now the ultimate question is... which is better in each scenario? PvE & PvP. A large shield for 6 seconds, or a shield that has reduced cost, Minor Intellect and lasts for 10 seconds?

Izaki

I personally don't play with shields in PvE (4-man or trials) apart from Maelstrom where I use Hardened Ward.
In PvP, I used to want to shield stack again so I thought that going with Empowered Ward and Dampen Magicka would be the better option, but in my experience you don't need to shield stack at all. Its better to slot Boundless Storm to get some extra armor and speed. So when you play with only 1 shield, it depends on your build. If you're runing a high recovery build and can afford to spam shields forever in tough situations (any 1vX) then Hardened Ward is better. If you running a more damage focuses build, then Empowered Ward because of the reduced cost and the little bonus to regen that adds up nicely with the potion buff. So its entirely up to you, both are very good.

jakeedmundson

I use empowered for the reason above.... extra regen and longer uptime.
Not sure how your got your shield to 18k... i swear mine said it was at maybe...13k? and i have 42k magicka. maybe i read it wrong last night.

Beardimus

^ agreed I've never seen the stat that high. Unless Bastion applies to tool tip on PC?? My never does on XBOX

Minalan

From my experience:

Solo PVE: Use empowered ward, it's enough for most content.
Group PVE: No shield at all. Stay out of the red circles, block, and let your tank and healer do their jobs. If your job is DPS focus on doing that right.
PVP: Hardened ward at least, with other skills like lightning form, etc.

Vaoh

Long time Magicka Sorc.... This is how I look at it.

Magicka Sorcerers tend to almost always stack Annulment with Conjured Ward for PvP.

Nowadays it is about which pair of shields benefits your playstyle more. The rule is you have to run one big shield (Hardened/Dampen) and one smaller shield (Empowered/Harness).

In PvE, you can definitely get away with running one shield. I'd pick Empowered Ward because:
1) Main perk: Better duration, Reduced Cost
2) Other perks: 10% magicka regeneration while active
3) Enough shield to keep you alive in PvE

For vMA, Hardened Ward could be a better choice if running one shield, but I would stick to Empowered Ward for the duration/cost reduction.

Personally, I almost always run content with two shields on my Magicka Sorc except for pure DPS content like trials and sometimes vMA.

Pairs of Shields: Which is better?

Empowered Ward and Dampen Magic:
• Increases your Magicka Regeneration by 10% while Empowered is active
• Empowered has a 10 second duration
• Empowered has a low Magicka Cost
• Dampen provides the big defense

Hardened Ward and Harness Magicka:
• Hardened is cheaper to spam than Dampen
• Harness gives flat Magicka Return when absorbing spells, great for Reduced Magicka Cost builds. Likewise, the benefits are greatly diminished for builds with high Magicka Regeneration.

Empowered is usually a better skill now. If an attack cuts through your shield and hits your health, it still has to get you down to 0% to kill you. If it doesn't, you can cast it again and heal up to full asap/cast healing ward. The extra ~5K shield is great but not really worth what you give up imo.

You won't go wrong either way. For now, I'm sticking to Empowered Ward. I like how it looks too!

greylox

I've always used empowered and I've got it above 20k now so I'm happy with it (in pve).