PTS Feedback Thread for Frost Staff Tanking

johu31

It's here to stay..

Liofa

I know we have more PTS patches to come . Just reminding , a lot of end-game PvE tanks have shared their opinions on why Frost Staff Tanking won't be a thing and why it is inferior to 1h/s in many ways . Even using it on back bar is not that appealing right now . Since you gave some little natch potes to class discussion threads , I would like the same to be done for Frost Staff tanking thread as well .

From what I see , I understand that this change was made for PvP purposes mainly but that Heavy Attack Taunt mechanic shows that you want to see it in PvE as well . Hope you listened to our opinions and suggestions and have some ideas for Frost Staff to make it more viable for end-game tanking . Saying again , Frost Staff tanking makes us lose more than we gain , even when used on off-bar . I am waiting for great changes to Frost Staff , hope you can make it work .

Hearts_Wake

I use frost staff on my mag nb. This would totes harsh my mellow with how/why I use a frost staff.

BigES

Please remove this. Get the existing game balanced first before introducing new and potentially game shattering changes.

kojou

And here I was hoping for something silly and unreasonable like Sword an Board abilities with Magicka Morphs.

On the bright side the Ice Staff of Alkosh I have now has a use...

I am going to give this a shot in PTS. It might actually be interesting, but the fact that I can't run a 5.5.2 does kind of ruin it.

Saint_Bud

Will there any coast chanches to magicka skills while blocking with a froststaff? Stamskills coast 20% less because stam is needed for block doge and breakfree. Why i should tank with a froststaff when i lose 1 setbosnus, have absolut no resurcce problems with stam, taking a defend staff for resist over a infused sword for a better armourpenetration enchant and have to use expensive magicka skills? Please tell me the reason why any should do this?

Sandman929

I think the majority of the feedback so far on frost staff tanking can be summed up in one word, and maybe we could all get on board if we got a clear, detailed description to answer the following feedback:

Why?

Stania

I might consider using a frost staff for tanking if:
1.- Doesn't need to be fully charged to taunt.
2.- The taunt is AoE. So we don't have to spend a lot of magicka (undaunted taunt) or stamina (puncture) to taunt each enemy and keep track on each one of them.

As it is now, it doesn't have anything useful to offer (for me) while I can still use my inner rage quickly and then cover my butt.

Strider_Roshin

This ice staff change has carcinogenic written all over it.

Woeler

Stania wrote: »

2.- The taunt is AoE. So we don't have to spend a lot of magicka (undaunted taunt) or stamina (puncture) to taunt each enemy and keep track on each one of them.

No.

CubanRay

I'm really trying to understand the mentality being this atrocity,I did make a tank hoping to have fun and 1 day later I deleted it for good,the sword and shield skill line is very underwhelming imo,no spammable attack hurts even more,only a couple of useful skills .
And now instead of fixing it you decided to come with this? Fascinating.

CubanRay

My newbie observation of SNS skill line here,if I'm wrong please let me know,I'm relatively new.
The first 3 skills seems about right,you got the taunts,the slash and absorb magic(is it good? Don't know for sure but it looks ok)
Then you got the charge and p-bash ,I think this 2 should be your power house of damage tbh,but they don't deal much damage.
What do you think pro tank?

Stania

Woeler wrote: »

No.

Care to explain why it's a bad idea?

CubanRay

@stania The way I see this patch is that they are boosting magic DK and giving the staff a taunt right?
Well obviously they give a f****k about stamina and now they want to make magic tanks.
This will "fix" the lack of tank ,yea right!!!!
This will do nothing more than devalue tanks even more.The idea in general doesn't seems bad but they have fix SnS skill line first and theeeeen come with this.

Stania

CubanRay wrote: »

@stania The way I see this patch is that they are boosting magic DK and giving the staff a taunt right?
Well obviously they give a f****k about stamina and now they want to make magic tanks.
This will "fix" the lack of tank ,yea right!!!!
This will do nothing more than devalue tanks even more.The idea in general doesn't seems bad but they have fix SnS skill line first and theeeeen come with this.

Sounds reasonable, I didn't really considered heavy stamina-based tanks. Of course I prefer to have better sword and shield abilities, but since ZOS are too determined to "solve" this problem by updating a weapon that most of us never use, I thought that at least they could add something different than what we already have.

CubanRay

@stania I don't think new stuff is even necessary,if they fix and balance the majority of skill (not happening) we will have plenty of options to choose from and come out with different builds .Problems is that the skills are broken and the rest unbalanced leaving us with only a few viable options and this is reducing the amount of builds.

Cellentel

I spent a few hours playing around with a frost staff sorc for a few hours tonight. Overall I like the range of possible builds this opens up, but agree that it seems less useful the harder content gets. Still, if something is viable in everything except vet trials, that's good for 99% of players so...sure.

I focused on builds with a staff on each bar. I think one S&S and one frost staff is a more likely combo, but I wanted to test the extreme. Since I didn't have anyone to test with, I didn't have a chance to try this in any actual dungeons.

• Without the shield, resistances are much lower (especially since the shield is the biggest piece because of the perk). Maybe they're still high enough in practice, but traditional heavy armor builds didn't seem to make any sense.
• Therefore I tried a light armor shield-focused build (in the sense of Hardened Ward/Harness Magicka). I like the idea of this a lot. With a frost staff on both bars you can go 100% in magicka for everything. Stamina is there for movement, break free and the occasional Dark Conversion.
• If we use magicka for all of our abilities as well as blocking, we need a lot of regen to keep up. Regen, of course, is useless when blocking. Therefore, we can't block very often in this build. That again complements shields very well, since we can shield through most attacks and block only the heavies (works in dungeons, probably not so much in trials).
• A few other ideas for regening magicka: since we're using a destruction staff, we can cast elemental drain ourselves. Hopefully the healer would be applying it, but if they aren't weren't not out of luck. A healer with orbs would help a lot as well, and that is improved by having a large magicka pool. It's analogous to tanks relying on healers to throw shards, except orbs are available to all healer classes. Finally, Equilibrium might be (finally) useful here, since it restores a good chunk of magicka and the health/healing penalty is not as big a deal when we have shields up.
• To regain magicka, I found myself wanting to heavy attack a lot. Now the "taunt on heavy attack" thing makes sense. This doesn't work when blocking, but we already established that we weren't gonig to be blocking very often. That said, I remain nervous about innocent DPS wanting to build a frost mate and causing a wipe because they hold the mouse button down too long.
• Gear-wise, Seducer seems like a good fit because we need to reduce magicka costs as much as possible. The lack of a second 5-piece is annoying, but we can at least do a 4-piece with some combination of max magicka, max health and magicka regen.
• There's not a lot of room for support in this build, beyond the fact that maybe I'm doing a bit more damage than most tanks because I have higher magicka and can spam some damage skills (maybe?). I can apply Major Breach with Elemental Drain if the healer isn't, but there's no source of Major Fracture. This won't matter if there aren't any stam characters in the group, so it's a good thing we seems to be killing stam builds.
• Given how little this build uses stamina, it may be possible to fit Major Evasion on one of the bars. Thus, the Tava ult regen build could still work if we can do without the sustain from Seducer. That said, with the nerf to Major Evasion that might not make sense any more.
• I'm most concerned about the lack of reliable access to Minor Maim. I find that indispensable in vet dungeons because it gives the DPS a bigger margin of error for surviving the "attack random target with big damage" attacks the new vet bosses like to do (hi Rillis). We can Minor Maim through Chilled, but that isn't as reliable as an ability that applies it directly. Perhaps a Charged (I think that's the + status effect one) staff will help, but I don't know the math behind how those traits work so I'm not sure.

Overall, my conclusion is that this is going to be a lot of fun to play around with, but pure frost staff tanking won't be very useful for genuinely hard content or groups looking for something vaguely close to "optimal". On the bright side, my Sorc will be able to do dungeons now because I won't have to queue as a DPS.

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

Great write-up @dws90 though I have to point out you can still have 2 five piece by having a different ice staff on each bar, I was thinking something along the lines of Magicka furnace on the main bar with a dragonguard back bar, this way you can still use blood spawn. Pretty much the only thing that sucks about using a staff is that you can't fit Ebony with another set and a monster set.

Cellentel

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

Great write-up @dws90 though I have to point out you can still have 2 five piece by having a different ice staff on each bar, I was thinking something along the lines of Magicka furnace on the main bar with a dragonguard back bar, this way you can still use blood spawn. Pretty much the only thing that sucks about using a staff is that you can't fit Ebony with another set and a monster set.

That's true, though that depends on how essential Seducer is for sustaining. I suppose losing the 8% cost reduction on your back bar isn't a big deal. Dragonguard on the back bar is a great idea, since the 5 piece is worthless except for the moment you activate your ult.

Dragonguard was one of the two I was considering for the 4 piece. You've sold me.

(Just picked up a charged Dragon ice staff from a vendor on live)

Cinbri

What does tanks thinking about making frost staff to be counted as 2pc instead of 1pc?

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

dws90 wrote: »

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

Great write-up @dws90 though I have to point out you can still have 2 five piece by having a different ice staff on each bar, I was thinking something along the lines of Magicka furnace on the main bar with a dragonguard back bar, this way you can still use blood spawn. Pretty much the only thing that sucks about using a staff is that you can't fit Ebony with another set and a monster set.

That's true, though that depends on how essential Seducer is for sustaining. I suppose losing the 8% cost reduction on your back bar isn't a big deal. Dragonguard on the back bar is a great idea, since the 5 piece is worthless except for the moment you activate your ult.

Dragonguard was one of the two I was considering for the 4 piece. You've sold me.

(Just picked up a charged Dragon ice staff from a vendor on live)

Lol I have been grinding for a defending dragon ice staff since they announced this change, in hall of the dead, figured it would be the best place and after literally thousands of boss kills and dozens of hours in that dungeon, the best I have to show for it is an infused and a decisive staff. Had a couple of sharpened ones drop and a like three defending dragon one hander, made some good gold witht those.

I say Magicka furnace cause that would be like a free 500 extra regen on hit and has physical resist on the first bonus, something a Magicka tank would need. Though you went full on light tanking with wards, so maybe not so good for that. Warlock might be a good back bar for that style then. But the utility from dragonguard is better in my opinion.

CubanRay

Please don't,stop feeding this idea .Im not even a tank and I feel bad already,I don't think tanks would like this,we barely have stamina builds.No more magic we already have 90% of builds been magicka.

Cellentel

I did some testing of Chilled on live (where I have S'rendarr to tell me when it is applied) and it didn't proc very often at all, even with a purple charged staff. Thus, I fear the Minor Maim from charged is not very reliable. I hope they change something under the hood to make it proc more often or available through another effect.

That said, I'll freely admit my testing methodology was not very rigourous so it's possible I was missing something that made Chilled awesome.

Waffennacht

@dws90 for effects like chilled you can reach 85% up time (reference vulnerability vs infallible thread) torug etc

But why do the whole la shield thing? I mean you can do that right now as is, no need for updates or blocking.


Might as well use lightning or fire staff if going la and wards right?

Woeler

Waffennacht wrote: »

@dws90 for effects like chilled you can reach 85% up time (reference vulnerability vs infallible thread) torug etc

Or you know, just use a sword and shield and use heroic slash which:
A. Has a 100% uptime
B. Does not need you to wear an entire set just to be effective
C. Does not rely on proc

It's inefficient and unreliable, in other words: terrible. It needs to be reworked, the current implementation is terrible.

Bislobo

I just hope this doesn't affect PvP in a really bad way, magicka builds already have crazy amounts of survivability/sustain.

Mettaricana

So far i tanked a a few vet dungeons on my ice staff nb frost tank with scroll read was pretty smooth and fun on top of popping element rage. Used inner fire as my taunted incase heavy wasn't working was soaking up dmg and doling out some dmg as well. Couple times party wiped in am aoe and I finished the bosses solo. May not be trial viable but seems works fine for the rest

Ajaxduo

Changes I'd like to see:

- Ice shield animation added to blocking.
- Remove the taunt from heavy attack and add it to destructive touch.
- Wall of Elements AoE root/snare.
- Force Pulse minor heroism/maim?
- Improved passives specific to Ice Staff tanking.

Although you have a conflicted community atm, you have those who enjoy the utility and ice dps variants for both PvE and PvP who are against these changes and those who are wanting to embrace a new tanking method. It needs...more though, it is basically a weaker sword and board currently.

Zarrakon

Woeler wrote: »

Alright, so, a change on my playing field. Or you would think? Right? Well after having tested almost every possible scenario I can say that this is not the case. The entire make-over frost staff has gotten on the PTS will not change anything at all when it comes to tanking meta in pve. It just makes an already pretty useless weapon useless in a different way. Let me elaborate on this:

The taunt issue

First of all, a taunt was implemented into the frost staff. Sounds good, right? You will taunt an enemy when you hit them with a fully charged heavy attack. A tank, whose main job is to absorb damage has to drop block for two and half seconds in order to use a heavy attack to taunt? Two and a half seconds of vulnerability in order to taunt. This makes absolutely no sense.
But I already gear you say “Then just use inner fire!”. And I will explain why this is bad. The job of a tank is not to just stand there, taunt and block. Anyone who believes this is the only thing a tank does (or should do) has no idea what he or she is talking about. A tank is besides a damage absorber and a combat organizer, a group-buff and boss-debuff machine. Reducing the resistances and increasing the vulnerability of the boss is a crucial aspect of tanking. The same goes for group buffing. A good tank plays 80% support and around 20% pure tank.

The taunt from sword and board applies both major fracture and major breach onto the enemy. These are the biggest armor debuffs in the game and are crucial in combat optimization. Without those DPS in the group is significantly reduced. Inner fire has no such debuff. The fact that a boss should always be taunted indirectly makes sure that a boss is (almost) always debuffed. With inner fire there is no debuffing at all. The same goes for the heavy attack. The tank has been stripped of one of his most crucial utilities, and that does not make sense at all.

Minor Maim

Minor maim is a debuff on an enemy that makes sure the enemy does 15% less damage on your allies. This debuff can be applied by the Heroic Slash skill in the sword and board tree. This is another debuff that is lacking with the frost staff. Yes, the chilled status effect that a frost staff can proc does apply minor maim, but the chance is 1% on dots and 5% on AOE abilities. Crucial debuffs like this should NEVER rely on a proc. When you encounter a pack of mobs in Veteran Maw, say like 5 mobs. They will be dead before you even get to proc minor main on all of them with a frost staff. With heroic slash I would have them all debuffed in under 10 seconds.

Battlefield Mobility

Sword and board has a passive that increases your movement speed while blocking by 60%. This is a crucial passive that allows for better mobility on the battlefield allthewhile staying behind the protection of your block. Frost staff has no such thing. A frost staff severely cripples the movement of a tank in combat. Don’t believe me? Try it out yourself. Equip a staff, block and walk and then do the same with a sword and shield. You will see the difference is massive.

Block cost reduction and mitigation

So, overall these passives are ok. There is one downside to them that makes them pretty much useless. In order to actually get the mitigation and cost reduction you need to slot a destruction staff ability. This would be no problem if not ALL destruction staff skills would be COMPLETELY useless for a tank. They bring zero advantage. Why are you making players slot useless abilities in order to get a passive they actually invested skillpoints in?

Secondly, there are passives for sword and board that reduce the incoming damage from projectiles even more. Staves have no such thing.

So here is it all in bullet points. While wearing a frost staff you have:

Negatives:
- No major fracture
- No major breach
- No reliable minor maim
- No minor heroism
- Less block cost reduction
- Crippled battlefield mobility
- No useful damage absorber
- A set-piece you will lose
- Less damage mitigation from projectiles

Positives:
- Blocking that costs magicka
Nobody in his right mind will give up all these utility aspects in order to use a frost staff. This entire change is pointless if you do not acknowledge “blocking and taunting” IS NOT tanking in this game.

Here is what I propose to at least make it a little more viable:

1. Make one of the destructive touch morphs apply minor maim.
2. Make Elemental susceptibility (other morph of elemental drain) apply taunt for 15 seconds while still keeping the spell resistance debuff on there. It’s not optimal, but at least it is something.
3. This whole “You need to slot a skill to get cost reduction and mitigation” needs to go, asap.
4. Some form of mobility increase needs to be added. Lacking the battlefield mobility passives is too much of a crippling effect. It just doesn’t make sense to be the one that needs to position everything on the field while being slower than a “stamplar buff” getting onto the live server.

You’re making people choose between a perfectly optimized set of skills or shooting yourself in the foot. What do you think people are going to choose?

As for now, this change means nothing and will change nothing. If this was truly meant for tanking it only proves one thing: The person that came up with it has no clue about tanking... at all... zero.

And that brings me to another point. Why no reaching out to the community? Now we are in the PTS phase again, and with or without feedback and changes, this is going live in February. Instead of first coming to community members you know have knowledge about these topics and asking them for opinions you just put this out on the PTS again. There it will be in the "six-weeks-test" phase and go live. Done, set. No more changes. Bad or good, whatever.

Instead of simply asking a few questions to dedicated community members (and this goes for more changes, ergo Stamplar and for instance @Alcast ) you simply put them out there on the PTS, which triggers this inevitable "go-live" deadline. so in these six weeks you have to get all the feedback, evaluate, redo stuff, ask for feedback again, re-evaluate and hope that now everything is good. And then... oh, launch day, well too bad, it's going in like this. Halfway done, and further improvements will end up in some old cardboard box in the basement, because now we need to work on new stuff. If only there was some way to get feedback before we throw ourselves into the deadline ultimatum...

And no, these feedback threads are not a good form of feedbacking. Do you see discussion here between developers and players? Well I sure don't. It's just like the "idea-box" every boss hangs in the office, but pretty much never opens. If you want feedback, talk, discuss, present your case, make us understand, because this is not working.

Who knows, maybe I get proven wrong this time.

I agree with everything you say, except suggestion 2. I think it's a terrible idea to turn a destruction staff skill into a taunt if it isn't affected by the staff you're using it with. No destruction staff abilities or their morphs should apply a taunt if I'm using a flame or lightning staff.

Throw minor maim into the base version of ice destructive touch, and add taunt to the destructive clench morph. Fully charged heavy attacks generate a ward scaling off max magicka, and maybe make it so that you automatically block attacks (or immune to stun/knockback) while charging a heavy attack with an ice staff as long as elemental blockade is up and hitting something.

Baconlad

The staffs need to be not only slightly different effects. They need completely separate lines that play VERY differently than the other. Close range frost staff giving more defense, close and long range lightning staff for best AOE and still great single target, and ing range fire staff with great Aoe and best single target...then for the love of the divines give me two sets bonuses for one two handed weapon. They already have lower damage than dual swords...

This would make it so that if you really liked your melee class abilities you could go dual swords, and for melee staff abilities go with staff...you guys are *** for allowing such a thing to pass the discussion table.