Non-Sharpened Maelstrom Staves

Ch4mpTW

Are they truly not worth using over crafted sharpened Staves? I'm aware that sharpened outclasses the other traits by a long shot, and how either precise or powered is a solid choice for the restoration staff. However, is it worth using: Defending, infused, and or Nirnhoned on your Maelstrom: Ice, Inferno, or Lightning staves?

Xerton

In a 100% optimized raid environment sharpened is no longer necessary and you could use precise and maybe even nirnhorned.

In every other case you will loose dmg using a non sharpened maelstrom staff over any other sharpened staff

Xerton

Yes that is correct. BUT reaching those 100% is not that realistic and due to some changes with the next patch will be even harder.
It is save to say, that even most of the high and raiding groups don't reach that point and sometimes might not even really try to, as you can't really ensure that all the debuffs necessary have a high enough uptime.
The moment you fail to keep up all those debuffs the whole group using precise weapons will loose dps.

So maybe to be more accurate than my previous answer: In 99.9999% of the cases sharpened will be the trait you should run with

Asardes

You have 4.9K spell penetration from Evocation LA passive. Major Breach gives 5.3K penetration, you get that from tank using Pierce Armor or healer using Elemental Drain.Those together give 10.2K penetration. Mobs and bosses in group content have 18.2K spell resistance. Penetrating Magic from destro staff line ignores 10% of resistance so you have another 1.8K penetration from that one when using a staff. So with basic buffs and passives, without sharpened, you already have about 13K penetration on 18.2K resistance enemies. Their remaining 5.2K resistance gives them (5.2K/33.5K)*50%=7.7% mitigation. Gold sharpened will almost remove that, leaving them basically 0 mitigation so your attacks will do full damage.

If the tank or a melee DD in a trial group uses Roar of Alkosh that removes 3K from the target physical and spell resistance though I'm not sure about the up time. Other sets like NMG and Sunderflame do debuff, but only for physical resistance. So if not using sharpened, that still leaves around 2.2K resistance to be overcome. The remaining 2.2K resistance gives them 2.2K/33.5K)*50%=3.3% mitigation against destruction staves with other traits. However this is purely theoretical, because 100% Alkosh uptime is unlikely to achieve due to the cooldowns on activating the same synergy. For example even if the tank gets shards and orbs every 10s, he will only be able to activate each one every 30s, giving a total uptime of 20s, even if they are perfectly timed. So considering at <66% Alkosh uptime the real remaining resistance is probably closer to 3.2K on average, which puts non-sharpened weapons at an even steeper disadvantage. Thus the remaining mitigation is (3.2K/33.5K)*50%=4.8%.

So even with fully optimized trial group, proccing Alkosh perfectly, sharpened will still do at least 4.8% more damage than non-sharpened. On the other hand If the group is using only sharpened destro staves, and only contains magicka DDs, Alkosh is almost redundant.

lolo_01b16_ESO

Ch4mpTW wrote: »

Xerton wrote: »

Yes that is correct. BUT reaching those 100% is not that realistic and due to some changes with the next patch will be even harder.
It is save to say, that even most of the high and raiding groups don't reach that point and sometimes might not even really try to, as you can't really ensure that all the debuffs necessary have a high enough uptime.
The moment you fail to keep up all those debuffs the whole group using precise weapons will loose dps.

So maybe to be more accurate than my previous answer: In 99.9999% of the cases sharpened will be the trait you should run with

Okay. I ask this question, because of the increased spell damage that they tend to supply just for having them slotted. However, you're saying that the 210ish spell damage or so isn't worth taking over the increased penetration that sharpened supplies with an enchantment that adds spell damage instead.

Keep in mind that you just can put a spell damage glyph on your crafted staff which on average will provide a similar amount.

lolo_01b16_ESO

Asardes wrote: »

You have 4.9K spell penetration from Evocation LA passive. Major Breach gives 5.3K penetration, you get that from tank using Pierce Armor or healer using Elemental Drain.Those together give 10.2K penetration. Mobs and bosses in group content have 18.2K spell resistance. Penetrating Magic from destro staff line ignores 10% of resistance so you have another 1.8K penetration from that one when using a staff. So with basic buffs and passives, without sharpened, you already have about 13K penetration on 18.2K resistance enemies. Their remaining 5.2K resistance gives them (5.2K/33.5K)*50%=7.7% mitigation. Gold sharpened will almost remove that, leaving them basically 0 mitigation so your attacks will do full damage.

If the tank or a melee DD in a trial group uses Roar of Alkosh that removes 3K from the target physical and spell resistance though I'm not sure about the up time. Other sets like NMG and Sunderflame do debuff, but only for physical resistance. So if not using sharpened, that still leaves around 2.2K resistance to be overcome. The remaining 2.2K resistance gives them 2.2K/33.5K)*50%=3.3% mitigation against destruction staves with other traits.

So even with fully optimized trial group, sharpened will still do 3.3% more damage. On the other hand If the group is using only sharpened destro staves, and only contains magicka DDs, Alkosh is almost redundant.

Destro staff passive is calculated after armour debuffs. So with Alkosh and Major breach that passive only adds ~1k penetration.

Asardes

lolo_01b16_ESO wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

You have 4.9K spell penetration from Evocation LA passive. Major Breach gives 5.3K penetration, you get that from tank using Pierce Armor or healer using Elemental Drain.Those together give 10.2K penetration. Mobs and bosses in group content have 18.2K spell resistance. Penetrating Magic from destro staff line ignores 10% of resistance so you have another 1.8K penetration from that one when using a staff. So with basic buffs and passives, without sharpened, you already have about 13K penetration on 18.2K resistance enemies. Their remaining 5.2K resistance gives them (5.2K/33.5K)*50%=7.7% mitigation. Gold sharpened will almost remove that, leaving them basically 0 mitigation so your attacks will do full damage.

If the tank or a melee DD in a trial group uses Roar of Alkosh that removes 3K from the target physical and spell resistance though I'm not sure about the up time. Other sets like NMG and Sunderflame do debuff, but only for physical resistance. So if not using sharpened, that still leaves around 2.2K resistance to be overcome. The remaining 2.2K resistance gives them 2.2K/33.5K)*50%=3.3% mitigation against destruction staves with other traits.

So even with fully optimized trial group, sharpened will still do 3.3% more damage. On the other hand If the group is using only sharpened destro staves, and only contains magicka DDs, Alkosh is almost redundant.

Destro staff passive is calculated after armour debuffs. So with Alkosh and Major breach that passive only adds ~1k penetration.

Then my initial calculations are only off by 0.8-1K, which translates to 1.2-1.5% mitigation. If that's the case, then things are even more skewed in favor of sharpened.

DPShiro

No, sharpened is always better.
Theoretically precise can be better, but that includes an extremely high uptime on all buffs, and when even one of those buffs fall off for a second, sharpened is better.

Also in trash pulls sharpened is always better since you can't debuff every single add.


Sharpened or bust, at least until they balance the traits, if ever.

DPShiro

Also for people thinking it's not important for your back back, you are wrong. You usually spend more time on it than you think, reapplying DoTs, weaving etc.

Tyrion87

Bigevilpeter wrote: »

Isn't the malestrom staff only used on the back bar? meaning it will only be used to set up and not contribute to the damage in the main hand? Sharpened will only work for like one second before you switch to your main hand.

correct me if I'm wrong

This is correct. This is exactly what I wrote above. It affects maybe one tick of DoTs until you swap to sharpened staff on front bar so this is not a huge deal. If someone uses non-sharpened weapon on front bar - that's the different story then...

Xerton

Bigevilpeter wrote: »

Isn't the malestrom staff only used on the back bar? meaning it will only be used to set up and not contribute to the damage in the main hand? Sharpened will only work for like one second before you switch to your main hand.

correct me if I'm wrong

You are wrong
A skill is affected by the weapon trait on the weapon bar it was activated on.

So if you use a defending maelstrom staff on your back bar and a sharpened random on your mainbar, the elementar wall you cast with your maelstrom staff will not profit from the sharpened trait of your mainbar and thus deal less dmg.

Believe me, i had to learn this the hard way, as my precise bow cost me so much dmg compared to others using a sharpened one under the same conditions.

@Asardes you are wrong with your statement, but i am to tired to lay out the math for you.
You can either believe me or not, but long story short is: With all debuffs and without sharpened you end up below penetration cap, but the extra 7% crit chance compensate for it.

This is only true for this patch, i have not done the math for next patch yet, but my gut tells me, that sharpened is going to be mandatory in all cases.
And btw: Alkosh is NEVER redundant

Asardes

Xerton wrote: »

@Asardes you are wrong with your statement, but i am to tired to lay out the math for you.
You can either believe me or not, but long story short is: With all debuffs and without sharpened you end up below penetration cap, but the extra 7% crit chance compensate for it.

This is only true for this patch, i have not done the math for next patch yet, but my gut tells me, that sharpened is going to be mandatory in all cases.
And btw: Alkosh is NEVER redundant

Assuming a magicka DD wearing full divines TBS set with Thief and Shadow mundus, the latter gives an 18.3% bonus to critical damage. Major force now gives another 15% on the first 9.5s of Aggressive Warhorn. Putting 100 CP in Elfborn also gives a 25% bonus. All those added together amount to 58.3% bonus to the base critical damage, which is by default 50% of the normal damage. As a result you will be doing 29.2% more damage on each critical attack with those bonuses. If you add 7% from precise staff you would be doing ~2% more damage on average from the increased chance of having a critical attack. Even whith 100% warhorn major force bonus, shadow and points in Elfborn you would be still doing slightly less damage with precise than sharpened since resistance can't be fully debuffed/ignored to the point it gives less than 2% mitigation without the use of a sharp weapon.

Ch4mpTW

Xerton wrote: »

In a 100% optimized raid environment sharpened is no longer necessary and you could use precise and maybe even nirnhorned.

In every other case you will loose dmg using a non sharpened maelstrom staff over any other sharpened staff

@Xerton Hm... I see... So if I were strictly aiming for clearing dungeons and WB solo, and things if that nature — I'd be better off with sharpened crafted weapons... Correct? But, if I should join an optimized raid group — then it'd be okay using 1 of the other traits I listed. Is that right?

Ch4mpTW

Xerton wrote: »

Yes that is correct. BUT reaching those 100% is not that realistic and due to some changes with the next patch will be even harder.
It is save to say, that even most of the high and raiding groups don't reach that point and sometimes might not even really try to, as you can't really ensure that all the debuffs necessary have a high enough uptime.
The moment you fail to keep up all those debuffs the whole group using precise weapons will loose dps.

So maybe to be more accurate than my previous answer: In 99.9999% of the cases sharpened will be the trait you should run with

Okay. I ask this question, because of the increased spell damage that they tend to supply just for having them slotted. However, you're saying that the 210ish spell damage or so isn't worth taking over the increased penetration that sharpened supplies with an enchantment that adds spell damage instead.

Tyrion87

For me it always depends on for what purpose you want to use your maelstrom staff. In most builds maelstrom inferno staves are used on the back bar on which you place only your buffs or DoTs while spending most of the time on the front bar. That's why I think that the trait on your back bar (maelstrom bar) is not that important.

So far I've got only maelstrom sharpened lighting staff and precise/nirnhoned inferno staves (still no sharpened inferno). I use the lighting one on my front bar where all my single target dps skills are (crystal frags, force pulse, curse), and the inferno one on my back bar where I have DoTs/buffs (elemental blockade, liquid lighting, surge). On back bar I also have fiery rage slotted but after casting it I immediately swap to front bar. Your dps is actually affected by the weapon (and its trait) you are currently using, not a weapon you casted a skill from.

As for the pure dmg comparison though, I tested it and any non-set crafted sharpened staff is better than non-sharpened maelstrom staff...

Browiseth

what would sharpening a staff do anyway, not like you're stabbing them with it

Bigevilpeter

Isn't the malestrom staff only used on the back bar? meaning it will only be used to set up and not contribute to the damage in the main hand? Sharpened will only work for like one second before you switch to your main hand.

correct me if I'm wrong

waterfairy

I'm weird, i like to use defending on my vamp sorc...it gives 2 cp perks worth of traits so it costs less cp to make up for sharpened.

VizigothAlaric

Speaking of sharpened inferno vma , i finally got my own after TONS of runs. And recently i switched to magicka sorcerer and droped my stam sorcerer.

My question is : I don't still have (RNG) aether or moondancer sharpened staffs for front bar ( current meta ) and i am using non-set sharpened inferno stave for my front bar. However i do have moondancer precise and inferno vma precise staves for example.

Is it really better to use what i have currently which is front bar non-set inferno sharpened back bar inferno vma sharpened, or should i use moondancer, vma inferno precise staves for front bar ? I am really new to magicka classes so i wanted to ask , thanks.

Sheva I 7 I

Once we get to higher cp cap, sharpened will become obsolete muahahaha!

Xerton

Asardes wrote: »

Xerton wrote: »

@Asardes you are wrong with your statement, but i am to tired to lay out the math for you.
You can either believe me or not, but long story short is: With all debuffs and without sharpened you end up below penetration cap, but the extra 7% crit chance compensate for it.

This is only true for this patch, i have not done the math for next patch yet, but my gut tells me, that sharpened is going to be mandatory in all cases.
And btw: Alkosh is NEVER redundant

Assuming a magicka DD wearing full divines TBS set with Thief and Shadow mundus, the latter gives an 18.3% bonus to critical damage. Major force now gives another 15% on the first 9.5s of Aggressive Warhorn. Putting 30 CP in Elfborn also gives a 10.8% bonus. All those added together amount to 44.1% bonus to the base critical damage, which is by default 50% of the normal damage. As a result you will be doing 22% more damage on each critical attack with those bonuses. If you add 7% from precise staff you would be doing ~1.5% more damage on average from the increased chance of having a critical attack. Even whith 100% warhorn major force bonus, shadow and points in Elfborn you would be still doing slightly less damage with precise than sharpened since resistance can't be fully debuffed/ignored to the point it gives less than 1.5% mitigation without the use of a sharp weapon.

And again you are wrong...
Warhorn does NOT give 15% (at least not until Homestead hits live), but instead increases your critical DMG modifier by 30% AFTER all other modifiers are added.

With TBS you should have around 70% crit (not 100% sure of the exact value as i am currently only playing stam in PvE) and your crit DMG is the following:
(50% base + 18.3% thief + 12% minor force + 15% from CP) * 1.3 major force = 124%

This makes an average dmg boost of 86.7%
If you ad 7% crit change you have a dmg boost of 95.4%

Now let's look at our penetration with a precise weapon:
100 base + 3010 Alkosh + 5280 Major Breach + 1320 minor breach (poison) + 4884 LA Passive + 1940 crushing (infused)
That is a total of 16534 so we are 1666 below cap which results into a dmg mitigation of 2.5%

Now let us assume a base dmg of 1000 using a sharpened weapon.
Dropping sharpened for precise gives us a base dmg of 975.

DMG with crit dmg boost:
Sharpened: 1867
Precise: 1905

So Precise does 2% more dmg.

But as i said in a previous post it is almost impossible to get these perfect conditions, so sharpened is still better than precise

Asardes

Well, I excluded minor force because it doesn't apply in all cases. For example a boss that has no adds, or has adds that are immune to some effects will not trigger the trap. Thus the only reliable source would be stalwart ward. But even that is hard to maintain, because sooner or later the tank will swap bars to refresh his buffs. And that's for only one DD.

Xerton

Asardes wrote: »

Well, I excluded minor force because it doesn't apply in all cases. For example a boss that has no adds, or has adds that are immune to some effects will not trigger the trap. Thus the only reliable source would be stalwart ward. But even that is hard to maintain, because sooner or later the tank will swap bars to refresh his buffs. And that's for only one DD.

So you are trying to tell me, that a boss does not trigger the trap?

Yes you cannot CC the boss, but the trap triggers!
If you look at my buff uptimes you will see at the very bottom, that minor force had an uptime of 92.6%
And there were no adds only a boss in this fight