PvE Spell Damage versus Spell Penetration

Travy_2Hype

Since Update 12 I have been tweaking with my Magplar build.
As of recent someone told me that I should be aiming for Spell Penetration over Spell Damage, so I've been farming the Spinner set.
I've already spent two days farming this set and I am still missing a few key pieces so before I continue farming I just want the general publics opinion.

So here is the dilemma:

I already know Spell Penetration reduce an opponents Spell Mitigation/Spell Resistance. But I do not know how much Spell Resistance PvE enemies actually have. I already know that Spell Penetration would be useful in PvP situation but I'm not worried about PvP. So as far as PvE would it be best to focus on Spell Damage and Spell Critical or would it be better to use the Spinner Set which provides Spell Penetration?

Updated:

So I finally grinded more of my Spinner set (still missing a Sharped Sword) but subbing out an armour piece instead of using a full Monster set. This is how my stats differed:

After swapping to Spinner Set (currently using Spinner Armour/Weps and Rattlecage Armour/Jewelry)
Max Magicka increased by 1508
Magicka recovery increased by 168
Spell Damage decreased by 263
Spell Critical increased by 9.9%
Spell Penetration increased by approximately 9000
Reduce Magicka cost increased by ~12%

I mean, from the looks of it in my eyes it seems like a good trade off? But I'm not completely sure, so just looking for feedback - keep noted it's for PvE situations.

danno8

Overland enemies all have around 9k resistances.

Dungeons mostly have around 18k.

You should get 9k penetration just from light armor passive and sharpened weapons, at which point you may or may not want to focus on other stats depending on what you are fighting.

@Asayre is the resident genius over here for these sort of things.

Liofa

The thing you wanna do is ignoring enemy armor completely for maximum damage output . Light Armor gives 4884 . Sharpened gives 5280 . Major Breach gives 5280 . You also have 100 base penetration . So , 4884 + 5280 + 5280 + 100 = 15540 . If you do this -> 18200(armor of enemies) - 15540 = 2660 . So , in a good group , single Alkosh proc will make you completely ignore all the armor of the enemy . Crusher enchant on the tank's weapon also helps . You don't need any set or and CP to ignore enemy armor completely .

Baconlad

penetration is a different way to get damage. no i do not know the exact numbers or maths behind my statements. but i do know that spinners set will give you MORE damage than most sets (includin julianos ((debatable due to crit it provides))). now this extra damage is ONLY given for certain enemies. so i think a proper question would be, are you PVP? PVE? if PVP i think spinner is amazing in tandem with heavy armor and against heavy armor. when fighting a sorc you will accually do less damage since crap shields...against medium users kinda crap extra damage since low armor anyway, but in this heavy armor sword and shield META we have now, you are doing an awesome amount of damage to them. specifically nasty as a magplar with soulshine/skoria.

AzuraKin

light armor: sharpened + gear passive + breech = 15k penetration.

PS4_ZeColmeia

Think of damage done this way:

ß(weapon/spell damage*10.5+ resource)*(Amor mitigation-spell penetration)*(crit chance*(crit damage-crit resistance))

If you think of it that way, penetration is the cheapest dps increase, but if you over penetrate you have 0 dps increase for doing so. This is why trying to stay around 18k penetration is smart.

After that, it's your bonuses that start to matter. Just increase spell damage, you can effectively divide it in half as you have to grow your resources as well to get a great dps return (passive also play a great deal). Crit is great depending on class and percentage, but can be mitigated. You either have to buff that crit damage significantly or then look at spell damage and resources.

The balancing game is really understanding where you are excelling. On my nb, I run merciless resolve and shadowy disguise. I have a 100% chance to crit with shadowy but I'm under the 60% threshold for being a crit build. I opted to focus on base damage instead.

My crit don't hit as hard, but it would be a dps loss if I focused on them because of my crit chance. This makes my 20k staff weaves important since on a impen opponent I'll be modifying damage to likely 1.06 which doesn't do much.

Travy_2Hype

So I finally grinded more of my Spinner set (still missing a Sharped Sword) but subbing out an armour piece instead of using a full Monster set. This is how my stats differed:

After swapping to Spinner Set (currently using Spinner Armour/Weps and Rattlecage Armour/Jewelry)
Max Magicka increased by 1508
Magicka recovery increased by 168
Spell Damage decreased by 263
Spell Critical increased by 9.9%
Spell Penetration increased by approximately 9000
Reduce Magicka cost increased by ~12%

I mean, from the looks of it in my eyes it seems like a good trade off? But I'm not completely sure, so just looking for feedback - keep noted it's for PvE situations.

Syrani

I think what the others are saying is that it depends on what you are running, and who you are running with. If you are running with an optimal group doing vet trials, chances are you will have enough penetration with light armor passives, sharpened weapons, and group buffs/debuffs, making Spinners a less than optimal set (for penetration purposes). If you are running dungeons, then it is likely you will not hit the max pen, so Spinner's might be good there. It could also be good for soloing.

It might be good to have 2 sets that you can swap out: Spinner's for soloing and for dungeons, and something else for trials, like Aether/TBS.