Maelstrom inferno staff: precise or nirnhoned worth it?

Stoopid_Nwah

I have been lucky enough to get the inferno staff in precise and nirnhoned, but with all the talk of how sharpened is best, I was wondering if I'm actually better off using a sharpened set piece staff with the spell damage enchantment. If not, would you recommend using the precise or nirnhoned staff?

Additional info: I play a dunmer magicka nb, well over the cp cap. I currently use the precise maelstrom with julianos, skoria/nerieneth, and willpower, but I am able to craft or buy new gear if it would improve my dps signicantly. I am also asking this from a strictly pve standpoint (I hope I put this in the right category).

I would test this myself, but I'm on console so... .

Father_X_Zombie

The only staff I got so far is a lightning presice, id kill for any trait on an inferno staff

But to answer your question if you have at least 50% spell crit on a mag nb, it's better to go nirnhoned. If your under 40% I'd do precise

Izaki

Well thing is... If you want max dps in PvE, you should back bar your Maelstrom staff so the trait doesn't really matter.

So on your front bar you should have an extra set piece/off-set staff with the spell damage enchantment and on your back bar you should have your Maelstrom staff (Elemental Blockade on the back bar too obviously).

Check out Mashinate's stuff for good builds

Silver_Strider

Maelstrom Inferno > ANYTHING
Unless the trait is outright terrible (IE Training, Prosperous, etc) any Maelstrom Inferno staff is a vast improvement overall.

Minute_Waltz

I would use it on back bar with elemental blockade, then switch to front bar for your funnel/force pulse with spell enchant sharpen staff. You will still benefit from vma enchant bonus.

Gear wise scathing is best with >70% uptime, otherwise TBS is preferred. Juli is perfectly fine though for a mag nb since you will have passives that help to boost your hp.

Autolycus

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

Sharpened, unless your group is running all of the buff sets (i.e. alkosh, sunderflame, SPC, IA, etc.). With all buff sets run precise.

Sorry just wanted to get a bit of clarification-you're saying go with main dps bar as a sharpened staff and run the maelstrom with woe on backbar to get the bonus as Izaki said above?
Also thanks for the info with picking precise when the group is running buff sets. Would this even be the case if I had a sharpened maelstrom staff?

It's going to vary to some degree depending on how many of the buff sets your group is running, and on the uptime of each of them in an actual fight. Some of my guild's testing suggests that sharpened weapons are more useful for those whose group doesn't have access to all of the buffs, whereas precise really starts to take the cake when those buffs are running (also uptime on war horn).

For what it's worth, my experience with Nirnhoned specifically is a bit lacking, but my inclination is that it's best used for pvp rather than a trial setting.

At one point, running WoE on the back-bar didn't afford the extra light attack damage on the primary. This is no longer the case (almost 100% sure, we tested this to some degree too), so I don't think it matters. However I didn't test it on all classes. Again, it will vary with how much time you spend on your off-bar, but in most cases the trait on the off-bar is of very small impact. Of course, true min/maxing would afford for a BiS trait on back bar too, and I still think it would ultimately depend on buffs/uptime.

Stoopid_Nwah

IzakiBrotheSs wrote: »

Check out Mashinate's stuff for good builds

I'll be sure to check these out thank you!

Father_X_Zombie wrote: »

The only staff I got so far is a lightning presice, id kill for any trait on an inferno staff

But to answer your question if you have at least 50% spell crit on a mag nb, it's better to go nirnhoned. If your under 40% I'd do precise

Best of luck in getting the inferno! They really do seem to be the most elusive of the Maelstrom weapons...

AGrz5585

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Maelstrom Inferno > ANYTHING
Unless the trait is outright terrible (IE Training, Prosperous, etc) any Maelstrom Inferno staff is a vast improvement overall.

This quote makes me want to use my charged maelstrom inferno

Stoopid_Nwah

AGrz5585 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Maelstrom Inferno > ANYTHING
Unless the trait is outright terrible (IE Training, Prosperous, etc) any Maelstrom Inferno staff is a vast improvement overall.

This quote makes me want to use my charged maelstrom inferno

This quote made me feel so sad that charged ever made its way into the loot table lol. But on a serious note, I think I read somewhere on here that as a dunmer, charged on maelstrom inferno staves adds a decent dot from keeping up woe.

AGrz5585

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

AGrz5585 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Maelstrom Inferno > ANYTHING
Unless the trait is outright terrible (IE Training, Prosperous, etc) any Maelstrom Inferno staff is a vast improvement overall.

This quote makes me want to use my charged maelstrom inferno

This quote made me feel so sad that charged ever made its way into the loot table lol. But on a serious note, I think I read somewhere on here that as a dunmer, charged on maelstrom inferno staves adds a decent dot from keeping up woe.

Yeah, charged in vma make me stop doing it... got bout 40 weapons 1 sharpened, 1 precise, 2 infused and the other 36 are charged... makes me sad cuz I got a few staves from there but all bad traits

NBrookus

I wish I had ANY maelstrom inferno. I would gladly trade you a charged greatsword.

Stoopid_Nwah

AGrz5585 wrote: »

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

AGrz5585 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Maelstrom Inferno > ANYTHING
Unless the trait is outright terrible (IE Training, Prosperous, etc) any Maelstrom Inferno staff is a vast improvement overall.

This quote makes me want to use my charged maelstrom inferno

This quote made me feel so sad that charged ever made its way into the loot table lol. But on a serious note, I think I read somewhere on here that as a dunmer, charged on maelstrom inferno staves adds a decent dot from keeping up woe.

Yeah, charged in vma make me stop doing it... got bout 40 weapons 1 sharpened, 1 precise, 2 infused and the other 36 are charged... makes me sad cuz I got a few staves from there but all bad traits

Ouch...I'm sorry to hear that. I lucked out after I took a couple weeks to just use the time I had to play to farm Maelstrom. A few sharpened, nirnhoned and precise items and the resto staff in precise and powered for my healer. Though I'm not sure I want to use that or the masters staff. The part people hate hearing is that I was mostly just after arcane winterborn rings.

Have you considered running it again now that it's a 100% drop rate?

NBrookus wrote: »

I wish I had ANY maelstrom inferno. I would gladly trade you a charged greatsword.

Haha I would gladly give one of them for some arcane winterborn rings or sharpened daggers/axes !

AGrz5585

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

AGrz5585 wrote: »

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

AGrz5585 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Maelstrom Inferno > ANYTHING
Unless the trait is outright terrible (IE Training, Prosperous, etc) any Maelstrom Inferno staff is a vast improvement overall.

This quote makes me want to use my charged maelstrom inferno

This quote made me feel so sad that charged ever made its way into the loot table lol. But on a serious note, I think I read somewhere on here that as a dunmer, charged on maelstrom inferno staves adds a decent dot from keeping up woe.

Yeah, charged in vma make me stop doing it... got bout 40 weapons 1 sharpened, 1 precise, 2 infused and the other 36 are charged... makes me sad cuz I got a few staves from there but all bad traits

Ouch...I'm sorry to hear that. I lucked out after I took a couple weeks to just use the time I had to play to farm Maelstrom. A few sharpened, nirnhoned and precise items and the resto staff in precise and powered for my healer. Though I'm not sure I want to use that or the masters staff. The part people hate hearing is that I was mostly just after arcane winterborn rings.

Have you considered running it again now that it's a 100% drop rate?

I've gotten all that this week. Only time I've ever run it

NBrookus

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

I wish I had ANY maelstrom inferno. I would gladly trade you a charged greatsword.

Haha I would gladly give one of them for some arcane winterborn rings or sharpened daggers/axes !

I have so much winterborn stuff I've considered making an ice mage.

Too bad we can't trade VMA items. It would be a way to ensure they are rewards for difficult content while alleviating the awful RNG.

Stoopid_Nwah

NBrookus wrote: »

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

I wish I had ANY maelstrom inferno. I would gladly trade you a charged greatsword.

Haha I would gladly give one of them for some arcane winterborn rings or sharpened daggers/axes !

I have so much winterborn stuff I've considered making an ice mage.

Too bad we can't trade VMA items. It would be a way to ensure they are rewards for difficult content while alleviating the awful RNG.

Agreed, I would be cool with it if VMA weapons were tradeable among players who have already completed VMA. Or of course, a token system.

I feel like I have seen VMA gear in the Cyrodiil vendor though? Perhaps I was just going crazy that day xD.

Jaronking

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

I wish I had ANY maelstrom inferno. I would gladly trade you a charged greatsword.

Haha I would gladly give one of them for some arcane winterborn rings or sharpened daggers/axes !

I have so much winterborn stuff I've considered making an ice mage.

Too bad we can't trade VMA items. It would be a way to ensure they are rewards for difficult content while alleviating the awful RNG.

Agreed, I would be cool with it if VMA weapons were tradeable among players who have already completed VMA. Or of course, a token system.

I feel like I have seen VMA gear in the Cyrodiil vendor though? Perhaps I was just going crazy that day xD.

This @ZOS_Finn @Wrobel I been saying this for months now.

NBrookus

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

I wish I had ANY maelstrom inferno. I would gladly trade you a charged greatsword.

Haha I would gladly give one of them for some arcane winterborn rings or sharpened daggers/axes !

I have so much winterborn stuff I've considered making an ice mage.

Too bad we can't trade VMA items. It would be a way to ensure they are rewards for difficult content while alleviating the awful RNG.

Agreed, I would be cool with it if VMA weapons were tradeable among players who have already completed VMA. Or of course, a token system.

I feel like I have seen VMA gear in the Cyrodiil vendor though? Perhaps I was just going crazy that day xD.

Not crazy. They had VMA armor drops at the golden vendor. No weapons, tho.

Autolycus

Sharpened, unless your group is running all of the buff sets (i.e. alkosh, sunderflame, SPC, IA, etc.). With all buff sets run precise.

nordsavage

They won't hurt that's for sure especially if others in the group are putting breach debuffs on the mobs and bosses. I was using a decisive Maelstrom inferno on my NB for a while and the ult return from the staff and class passives made it pretty worth while. Shooting stars and veils all day.

Trashkan

I'm a magical dk and will never get that staff I have 3 ice staffs 5 lightning staffs and 2 of ever melee weapon in precise nirn and sharpened I hate rng!!!!!!! Oh ya and 2 bows wtf!!!!!!!!

Stoopid_Nwah

Autolycus wrote: »

Sharpened, unless your group is running all of the buff sets (i.e. alkosh, sunderflame, SPC, IA, etc.). With all buff sets run precise.

Sorry just wanted to get a bit of clarification-you're saying go with main dps bar as a sharpened staff and run the maelstrom with woe on backbar to get the bonus as Izaki said above?
Also thanks for the info with picking precise when the group is running buff sets. Would this even be the case if I had a sharpened maelstrom staff?

Stoopid_Nwah

Autolycus wrote: »

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

Sharpened, unless your group is running all of the buff sets (i.e. alkosh, sunderflame, SPC, IA, etc.). With all buff sets run precise.

Sorry just wanted to get a bit of clarification-you're saying go with main dps bar as a sharpened staff and run the maelstrom with woe on backbar to get the bonus as Izaki said above?
Also thanks for the info with picking precise when the group is running buff sets. Would this even be the case if I had a sharpened maelstrom staff?

It's going to vary to some degree depending on how many of the buff sets your group is running, and on the uptime of each of them in an actual fight. Some of my guild's testing suggests that sharpened weapons are more useful for those whose group doesn't have access to all of the buffs, whereas precise really starts to take the cake when those buffs are running (also uptime on war horn).

For what it's worth, my experience with Nirnhoned specifically is a bit lacking, but my inclination is that it's best used for pvp rather than a trial setting.

At one point, running WoE on the back-bar didn't afford the extra light attack damage on the primary. This is no longer the case (almost 100% sure, we tested this to some degree too), so I don't think it matters. However I didn't test it on all classes. Again, it will vary with how much time you spend on your off-bar, but in most cases the trait on the off-bar is of very small impact. Of course, true min/maxing would afford for a BiS trait on back bar too, and I still think it would ultimately depend on buffs/uptime.

Thank you so much. Amazing info worth a thousand insightfuls !

Oreyn_Bearclaw

I am going to go against the grain here. I believe that unless you have a sharpened VMA staff, it is not worth running in a trial setting. I have a precise VMA inferno and have recently gone away from it.

I think the meta is shifting. I am now running 5 TBS/4Infal/2skoria on my DK and the same but Nerienth on my Sorc. If I had a sharpened infallible inferno staff, I would run a VMA staff on the back bar. I don't, so I just use TBS staffs with a spell power enchant. Sharpened is too powerful to pass up, and the crafted glyph is a wash with the VMA staff in terms of spell damage. You lose the light attack buff to blockade, but you gain the choice of trait and spell damage from the 4th piece of infallible.

Magic cannot debuff bosses like Stamina can. You always want the sharpened debuff these days on a staff. I have seen a noticeable increase in VMOL since dropping my precise VMA staff, and our raid is pretty close to optimal.

Stoopid_Nwah

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am going to go against the grain here. I believe that unless you have a sharpened VMA staff, it is not worth running in a trial setting. I have a precise VMA inferno and have recently gone away from it.

I think the meta is shifting. I am now running 5 TBS/4Infal/2skoria on my DK and the same but Nerienth on my Sorc. If I had a sharpened infallible inferno staff, I would run a VMA staff on the back bar. I don't, so I just use TBS staffs with a spell power enchant. Sharpened is too powerful to pass up, and the crafted glyph is a wash with the VMA staff in terms of spell damage. You lose the light attack buff to blockade, but you gain the choice of trait and spell damage from the 4th piece of infallible.

Magic cannot debuff bosses like Stamina can. You always want the sharpened debuff these days on a staff. I have seen a noticeable increase in VMOL since dropping my precise VMA staff, and our raid is pretty close to optimal.

Hmm this changes things then. I'll have to complete my infallible set and try this out as well...thanks for the info, much appreciated!

s7732425ub17_ESO

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am going to go against the grain here. I believe that unless you have a sharpened VMA staff, it is not worth running in a trial setting. I have a precise VMA inferno and have recently gone away from it.

I think the meta is shifting. I am now running 5 TBS/4Infal/2skoria on my DK and the same but Nerienth on my Sorc. If I had a sharpened infallible inferno staff, I would run a VMA staff on the back bar. I don't, so I just use TBS staffs with a spell power enchant. Sharpened is too powerful to pass up, and the crafted glyph is a wash with the VMA staff in terms of spell damage. You lose the light attack buff to blockade, but you gain the choice of trait and spell damage from the 4th piece of infallible.

Magic cannot debuff bosses like Stamina can. You always want the sharpened debuff these days on a staff. I have seen a noticeable increase in VMOL since dropping my precise VMA staff, and our raid is pretty close to optimal.

Hmm this changes things then. I'll have to complete my infallible set and try this out as well...thanks for the info, much appreciated!

If we do some simple calculations, we can see sharpened gives roughly 7.5% damage increase. Precise gives 4.5% without warhorn and around 6.3% with warhorn. So sharpened does win all around.

So the question becomes, does the 189 spell damage and buff to light/heavy attacks make up for the 3% damage loss?

Stoopid_Nwah

s7732425ub17_ESO wrote: »

Stoopid_Nwah wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I am going to go against the grain here. I believe that unless you have a sharpened VMA staff, it is not worth running in a trial setting. I have a precise VMA inferno and have recently gone away from it.

I think the meta is shifting. I am now running 5 TBS/4Infal/2skoria on my DK and the same but Nerienth on my Sorc. If I had a sharpened infallible inferno staff, I would run a VMA staff on the back bar. I don't, so I just use TBS staffs with a spell power enchant. Sharpened is too powerful to pass up, and the crafted glyph is a wash with the VMA staff in terms of spell damage. You lose the light attack buff to blockade, but you gain the choice of trait and spell damage from the 4th piece of infallible.

Magic cannot debuff bosses like Stamina can. You always want the sharpened debuff these days on a staff. I have seen a noticeable increase in VMOL since dropping my precise VMA staff, and our raid is pretty close to optimal.

Hmm this changes things then. I'll have to complete my infallible set and try this out as well...thanks for the info, much appreciated!

If we do some simple calculations, we can see sharpened gives roughly 7.5% damage increase. Precise gives 4.5% without warhorn and around 6.3% with warhorn. So sharpened does win all around.

So the question becomes, does the 189 spell damage and buff to light/heavy attacks make up for the 3% damage loss?

Exactly, and that's why I'm dying for console damage reports, would make life so much easier ha.