87% of Class Skills are Magicka (131) vs. Stamina (19) - Is this Balanced?

GrumpyDuckling

Magicka vs. Stamina Discrepancy by Class (Morphs Only)

Dragonknight
Magicka - 28 skills (+4 ultimates)
Stamina - 2 skills (+2 ultimates)

Nightblade
Magicka - 24 skills (+5 ultimates)
Stamina - 6 skills (+1 ultimate)

Sorcerer
Magicka - 26 skills (+6 ultimates)
Stamina - 4 skills (+0 ultimates)

Templar
Magicka - 26 skills (+5 ultimates)
Stamina - 4 skills (+1 ultimate)

Warden
Magicka - 27 skills (+5 ultimates)
Stamina - 3 skills (+1 ultimate)

Total Numbers

Total class skill morphs - Magicka (131) vs. Stamina (19)
Total class ultimate morphs - Magicka (25) vs. Stamina (5)

Variables to Consider

- There are more Stamina weapon skill lines (4) than Magicka weapon skill lines (2).
- There are a few oddball skills (ex: Flames of Oblivion costs magicka to use, but will scale with highest statistics).
- There are a few skills that scale off health, but cost magicka (ex: Blazing Shield).
- Some skills are buff skills, without damage components.
- Stamina is used exclusively in breaking CC, roll-dodging, and blocking (for every weapon equipped except ice staff).
- Magicka is used exclusively for shielding - excluding Bone Shield (guild ability), and blocking with ice staff.

Analysis

Most of the variables point to the need for more class-based Magicka skills than Stamina, however when 131 out of 150 skills are Magicka-based, Stamina builds are very limited when selecting from their pool of class skills. Perhaps a 60-40%, or even a 70-30% divide (in favor of Magicka) would give Stamina morphs more options. Also, there is no justification for why Magicka Ultimate morphs are more abundant (25 in total), than Stamina Ultimate morphs (5 in total).

@Wrobel
@ZOS_BrianWheeler
@ZOS_RichLambert
Please consider.

Lexxypwns

I'd love to see ZoS address this by revamping seldom used skills to add to overall build diversity for both magika and stamina.

As it stands now, I just don't enjoy stam builds nearly as much because of the lack of skill diversity. Its all the same skill lines in use.

D0ntevenL1ft

Didn't realize the numbers were this ridiculous, awesome post.

GrumpyDuckling

Lexxypwns wrote: »

I'd love to see ZoS address this by revamping seldom used skills to add to overall build diversity for both magika and stamina.

As it stands now, I just don't enjoy stam builds nearly as much because of the lack of skill diversity. Its all the same skill lines in use.

I know what you mean. Most of my stamina characters are similar builds with a different coat of paint - and I have to lean heavy on weapon skill lines. With magicka characters, I can much more easily create optimal builds that only require class skills.

Rohamad_Ali

Yes and some of those stamina abilities just came into the game a year ago . It's a huge imbalance in ability selection .

Lexxypwns

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Lexxypwns wrote: »

I'd love to see ZoS address this by revamping seldom used skills to add to overall build diversity for both magika and stamina.

As it stands now, I just don't enjoy stam builds nearly as much because of the lack of skill diversity. Its all the same skill lines in use.

I know what you mean. Most of my stamina characters are similar builds with a different coat of paint - and I have to lean heavy on weapon skill lines. With magicka characters, I can much more easily create optimal builds that only require class skills.

My only issue is I'm concerned that people always talk about "stamina talons" for example, and don't consider that both of those magika morphs are very crucial because of the mechanics of the aoe minor maim from choking talons. For this reason, I think it is crucial that we look at unused skills: Crystal Blast, Frag shield, that channeled templar heal, etc. From there we can add build diversity to stamina, give them more meaningful class choice options, remove useless skills from skill lines, and not reduce magika variety at the same time.

Edit: I want to point to the radiant aura change as an example of revamping an unused skill and making meaningful choice out of the morph.(RIP repentance now tho, idk why they add these choices then gimp one side of things)

D0ntevenL1ft

On the topic, id love to see some type of deep breathe changes for a stamina counterpart as its my favourite skill on the magdk (one can only dream).

olsborg

You could also flip it, that stamina builds have tons of magicka skills for utility, but magicka builds have very, very few stamina skills for utility.

D0ntevenL1ft

olsborg wrote: »

You could also flip it, that stamina builds have tons of magicka skills for utility, but magicka builds have very, very few stamina skills for utility.

Because you use it for dodge roll, block, and break free aka utility …. I don't think I've seen you post one comment EVER thats useful or positive.

Cheer up life aint so bad.

Stamden

I just wish they realized their mistake and made corrections when adding a new class, but it doesn't look like it. Swarm should obviously have a stamina morph. It is the key DPS ability for the entire class and not giving it a stamina morph is just so sad.

They really had a great opportunity to make a viable ranged Stamina setup. Like a ranger of some sort that could run Bow/Bow. But they blew it, unfortunately.

Lexxypwns

Neighbor wrote: »

I just wish they realized their mistake and made corrections when adding a new class, but it doesn't look like it. Swarm should obviously have a stamina morph. It is the key DPS ability for the entire class and not giving it a stamina morph is just so sad.

They really had a great opportunity to make a viable ranged Stamina setup. Like a ranger of some sort that could run Bow/Bow. But they blew it, unfortunately.

There's absolutely no excuse for stam warden not to have a class DoT. Mag warden already has so many choices to make

RavenSworn

Huh? Wasn't this addressed? Why the comparison for class skills when you have other options open to you? You have fighters guild skill line which is fully stamina, you have parts of undaunted skill line to be stamina based as well, and four out of the five weapon categories are stamina based.

STEVIL

Between guilds and weapons and class skills, i have never had a problem filling my two bar slots for my stamina chars. "More than you need" is more than sufficient in my book, especially given the increased usage of the three non-skill maneuvers block, dodge and break-free.

Darlgon

Frankly, you left out weapon skills.. unless its one of the staves.. they are.. what? Any Magicka morphs?

DragonBound

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Magicka vs. Stamina Discrepancy by Class (Morphs Only)

Dragonknight
Magicka - 28 skills (+4 ultimates)
Stamina - 2 skills (+2 ultimates)

Nightblade
Magicka - 24 skills (+5 ultimates)
Stamina - 6 skills (+1 ultimate)

Sorcerer
Magicka - 26 skills (+6 ultimates)
Stamina - 4 skills (+0 ultimates)

Templar
Magicka - 26 skills (+5 ultimates)
Stamina - 4 skills (+1 ultimate)

Warden
Magicka - 27 skills (+5 ultimates)
Stamina - 3 skills (+1 ultimate)

Total Numbers

Total class skill morphs - Magicka (131) vs. Stamina (19)
Total class ultimate morphs - Magicka (25) vs. Stamina (5)

Variables to Consider

- There are more Stamina weapon skill lines (4) than Magicka weapon skill lines (2).
- There are a few oddball skills (ex: Flames of Oblivion costs magicka to use, but will scale with highest statistics).
- There are a few skills that scale off health, but cost magicka (ex: Blazing Shield).
- Some skills are buff skills, without damage components.
- Stamina is used exclusively in breaking CC, roll-dodging, and blocking (for every weapon equipped except ice staff).
- Magicka is used exclusively for shielding - excluding Bone Shield (guild ability), and blocking with ice staff.

Analysis

Most of the variables point to the need for more class-based Magicka skills than Stamina, however when 131 out of 150 skills are Magicka-based, Stamina builds are very limited when selecting from their pool of class skills. Perhaps a 60-40%, or even a 70-30% divide (in favor of Magicka) would give Stamina morphs more options. Also, there is no justification for why Magicka Ultimate morphs are more abundant (25 in total), than Stamina Ultimate morphs (5 in total).

@Wrobel
@ZOS_BrianWheeler
@ZOS_RichLambert
Please consider.

I know what you mean, stamina classes are some of the most boring classes because they literally use the same weapons and abilities beyond the 2 or 3 class skills that give them any identity to begin with. I mean holy crap how does anyone think that is very fun at all?

All we need to do is give 2 magicka and 2 stamina morph options per ability or something.

DragonBound

STEVIL wrote: »

Between guilds and weapons and class skills, i have never had a problem filling my two bar slots for my stamina chars. "More than you need" is more than sufficient in my book, especially given the increased usage of the three non-skill maneuvers block, dodge and break-free.

Considering the fighters guild abilities are crap to medicore for stamina classes you really do not know what your talking about, the only two abilities people pick is rearmed trap and dawnbreaker and every stamina build uses exactly the same thing.

DragonBound

olsborg wrote: »

You could also flip it, that stamina builds have tons of magicka skills for utility, but magicka builds have very, very few stamina skills for utility.

Tons? That is pushing it a bit, some classes offer some utility that is it.

Omnipresent

Yes due to the fact zos clearly hates stam lol i thew pelinals on my stamblade and grabed a destro staff and i honestly am kinda pissed off at myself for not doing this sooner. the bow needs some love, stamblade needs like crazy love.

Kova

It needs to be said. After years of playing stamina, magicka, and hybrid I feel as though it must be; cannot help but be asked:

What is a stamina class? By this we must assume that outside of the realm of min/maxing stam and magicka "classes" do not exist. This isn't an argument of lexicon, this is an argument of pragmatism.

Did ZoS make the stamina class or did WE the players make the stamina class?

Do you see what I'm getting at? In order to profess that there is an imbalance between two things we must assert that they exist, as such we define a stamina class as a build that focuses on stamina based skills but we have no issue including with stamdks, stamplars, and of course StamSorcs that all use magicka skills as part of their regular arsenal.

Now, I understand the counterpoint. Even if the devs did not intend to push the community to create this chasm between the two non-existent "classes" that's what, unfortunately, it is now. So what do we do as a solution? We stop asking for one way buffs and nerfs.

The player who thinks they're mature and ahead of the curve for saying, "Just buffs please! Stop nerfs!" is still just as damaging as the salty player who is frothing at the mouth for nerfs, because they're still mindlessly supporting the war between green and blue. Instead we should support an equilibrium in choice, something that ZOS has been trying to do for months now.

There are four, soon to be five, classes. Whatever pre-fix sticks to them after that is the doing of a player trying to be competitive.

tl;dr:

ZoS didn't create class distinction, we the community did.
The game didn't start as stamina vs magicka, we made it into that.
One way buffs/nerfs will never solve the problem because we actively contribute to the problem of their only being two options.

This is the most damning but most important point:

If the devs were to make everything balanced I have no doubt that a large chunk of the playerbase, such as the people that argue in these threads, would leave the game.

GrumpyDuckling

Kova wrote: »

It needs to be said. After years of playing stamina, magicka, and hybrid I feel as though it must be; cannot help but be asked:

What is a stamina class? By this we must assume that outside of the realm of min/maxing stam and magicka "classes" do not exist. This isn't an argument of lexicon, this is an argument of pragmatism.

Did ZoS make the stamina class or did WE the players make the stamina class?

Do you see what I'm getting at? In order to profess that there is an imbalance between two things we must assert that they exist, as such we define a stamina class as a build that focuses on stamina based skills but we have no issue including with stamdks, stamplars, and of course StamSorcs that all use magicka skills as part of their regular arsenal.

Now, I understand the counterpoint. Even if the devs did not intend to push the community to create this chasm between the two non-existent "classes" that's what, unfortunately, it is now. So what do we do as a solution? We stop asking for one way buffs and nerfs.

The player who thinks they're mature and ahead of the curve for saying, "Just buffs please! Stop nerfs!" is still just as damaging as the salty player who is frothing at the mouth for nerfs, because they're still mindlessly supporting the war between green and blue. Instead we should support an equilibrium in choice, something that ZOS has been trying to do for months now.

There are four, soon to be five, classes. Whatever pre-fix sticks to them after that is the doing of a player trying to be competitive.

tl;dr:

ZoS didn't create class distinction, we the community did.
The game didn't start as stamina vs magicka, we made it into that.
One way buffs/nerfs will never solve the problem because we actively contribute to the problem of their only being two options.

This is the most damning but most important point:

If the devs were to make everything balanced I have no doubt that a large chunk of the playerbase, such as the people that argue in these threads, would leave the game.

Thanks for the post. I disagree with your statement that the community creates the stamina and magicka distinction/divide. Have you ever watched the developers speak about balance on ESO Live or read their comments in patch notes? They often speak in distinctions/divides themselves. For example, this is a direct quote and developer comment from PTS (about Caltrops change):

"The changes to Caltrops allow it to behave more like a standard ground-targeted damage over time ability, such as Lightning Splash or Volley. This will help improve Stamina builds’ sustained single target and area of effect damage in dungeons and Trials."

So yes, they do think in terms of a stamina/magicka divide.

And although I have never seen or heard a comment directly about this from a developer, my common sense tells me that when they decided to implement attribute scaling (ex: damage and healing increases the more a player dumps points into one attribute) and made the decision to remove soft caps, they knew that the strongest builds in the game would be the ones who had the largest divide.

DragonBound

Kova wrote: »

It needs to be said. After years of playing stamina, magicka, and hybrid I feel as though it must be; cannot help but be asked:

What is a stamina class? By this we must assume that outside of the realm of min/maxing stam and magicka "classes" do not exist. This isn't an argument of lexicon, this is an argument of pragmatism.

Did ZoS make the stamina class or did WE the players make the stamina class?

Do you see what I'm getting at? In order to profess that there is an imbalance between two things we must assert that they exist, as such we define a stamina class as a build that focuses on stamina based skills but we have no issue including with stamdks, stamplars, and of course StamSorcs that all use magicka skills as part of their regular arsenal.

Now, I understand the counterpoint. Even if the devs did not intend to push the community to create this chasm between the two non-existent "classes" that's what, unfortunately, it is now. So what do we do as a solution? We stop asking for one way buffs and nerfs.

The player who thinks they're mature and ahead of the curve for saying, "Just buffs please! Stop nerfs!" is still just as damaging as the salty player who is frothing at the mouth for nerfs, because they're still mindlessly supporting the war between green and blue. Instead we should support an equilibrium in choice, something that ZOS has been trying to do for months now.

There are four, soon to be five, classes. Whatever pre-fix sticks to them after that is the doing of a player trying to be competitive.

tl;dr:

ZoS didn't create class distinction, we the community did.
The game didn't start as stamina vs magicka, we made it into that.
One way buffs/nerfs will never solve the problem because we actively contribute to the problem of their only being two options.

This is the most damning but most important point:

If the devs were to make everything balanced I have no doubt that a large chunk of the playerbase, such as the people that argue in these threads, would leave the game.

Correct me if I am wrong here but wasnt hybrids a thing before stamina classes existed? I do recall people saying in beta everything was classless anyways. So in killing the viability in hybrids stamina was born?

Kova

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Kova wrote: »

It needs to be said. After years of playing stamina, magicka, and hybrid I feel as though it must be; cannot help but be asked:

What is a stamina class? By this we must assume that outside of the realm of min/maxing stam and magicka "classes" do not exist. This isn't an argument of lexicon, this is an argument of pragmatism.

Did ZoS make the stamina class or did WE the players make the stamina class?

Do you see what I'm getting at? In order to profess that there is an imbalance between two things we must assert that they exist, as such we define a stamina class as a build that focuses on stamina based skills but we have no issue including with stamdks, stamplars, and of course StamSorcs that all use magicka skills as part of their regular arsenal.

Now, I understand the counterpoint. Even if the devs did not intend to push the community to create this chasm between the two non-existent "classes" that's what, unfortunately, it is now. So what do we do as a solution? We stop asking for one way buffs and nerfs.

The player who thinks they're mature and ahead of the curve for saying, "Just buffs please! Stop nerfs!" is still just as damaging as the salty player who is frothing at the mouth for nerfs, because they're still mindlessly supporting the war between green and blue. Instead we should support an equilibrium in choice, something that ZOS has been trying to do for months now.

There are four, soon to be five, classes. Whatever pre-fix sticks to them after that is the doing of a player trying to be competitive.

tl;dr:

ZoS didn't create class distinction, we the community did.
The game didn't start as stamina vs magicka, we made it into that.
One way buffs/nerfs will never solve the problem because we actively contribute to the problem of their only being two options.

This is the most damning but most important point:

If the devs were to make everything balanced I have no doubt that a large chunk of the playerbase, such as the people that argue in these threads, would leave the game.

Thanks for the post. I disagree with your statement that the community creates the stamina and magicka distinction/divide. Have you ever watched the developers speak about balance on ESO Live or read their comments in patch notes? They often speak in distinctions/divides themselves. For example, this is a direct quote and developer comment from PTS (about Caltrops change):

"The changes to Caltrops allow it to behave more like a standard ground-targeted damage over time ability, such as Lightning Splash or Volley. This will help improve Stamina builds’ sustained single target and area of effect damage in dungeons and Trials."

So yes, they do think in terms of a stamina/magicka divide.

And although I have never seen or heard a comment directly about this from a developer, my common sense tells me that when they decided to implement attribute scaling (ex: damage and healing increases the more a player dumps points into one attribute) and made the decision to remove soft caps, they knew that the strongest builds in the game would be the ones who had the largest divide.

Hey, thanks for the pleasant response. I need to point out that I never said they don't speak on the divides, but that this discussion was created after the fact and not decided by the devs themselves.

That is to say, they now and have for some time spoke with duality because of the created distinction.

Vaoh

I see what you mean OP but the bias exists there for very good reason, though I still somewhat agree with you to a small extent. I mainly believe you are chasing the wrong solution to the problem. Many more important variables are there to be considered which you haven't taken into account.

You have already noted that Magicka needs more skills because there are plenty of skills that must cost Magicka. This is true for them to be more useful on all builds, including Stamina and Health builds. However, this adds up to a lot of skills.

- Magicka has to account for healing skills. These skills practically all cost Magicka, and would be a nightmare if they were weirdly/forcibly tailored to mostly cost Stamina.
- Magicka has to account for tanking skills. These skills almost all cost Magicka, and would be a mess in content if they didn't.
- Magicka has to account for buff skills. A large majority of these skills will cost Magicka, and it would be bad for everyone if they costed Stamina.

To restate, only Stamina builds need those Stamina skills. Everything else - Magicka builds, healers, tanks, supports, whatever, etc - these all rely on Magicka skills with only tanks and supports needing a tiny bit of Stamina cost skills. Stamina builds themselves require plenty of Magicka-based buffs for the sole reason they don't burn Stamina.

Weapon skill lines add up this way:
Stamina - 40 (+8 Ultimates)
Magicka - 20 (+4 Ultimates)

You also have to consider that Stamina has four viable weapon skill lines to use, packed with many good skills. Magicka has two weapons, with one tailored to healers in particular that leave Magicka with one main weapon to use. Stamina fills their bars very strongly with bunch of weapon skill line abilities in both PvE and PvP. After this, they fill empty spots with class Stamina skills that happen to all be strong. Magicka works the opposite way, in that they must fill their bars with class skills and then slot a couple mandatory staff skills.

If we created this 70%/30% balance in our class skills we would see normal Magicka builds suffer tremendously and become an utter mess, while Stamina would have a huge amount of viable skills. Heck, you'd manage to hurt tanks and healers as well.

**What you should ask for is:
1. To change the many garbage/unused Magicka Morphs.
Think of Stone Giant, Shattering Prison, Prolonged Suffering, Crystal Blast, Solar Barrage, Debilitate, Ritual of Rebirth, etc - these could all very easily become Stamina abilities with slightly different effects.
It would add a bunch a fantastic stamina options without hurting Magicka.
2. Ask for each skill to have THREE morphs, a suggestion brought up many times. It could be that Stamina was given a morph of nearly every skill, or maybe 3 morphs per skill line. Everyone would benefit a lot and a ton of build diversity would also result from it. I recall a few Devs saying they were open to the possibility of having three morphs in the future as well.

Class skills are this way for a very good reason. Ask for three morphs per skill, and/or the changing of current trash Magicka morphs to powerful Stamina morphs!

P.S. Warden has 25 magic skills, and 3 Stamina skills..... Netches don't cost anything!

geonsocal

killer thread...thanks @GrumpyDuckling ...

so many folks with"opinions" about stuff - super cool to see someone just lay it out and say this is what it is...

that'd be interesting to see it broken down into support, defense and attack - or some other subset distinction...

FearlessOne_2014

I'll be ok with ZOS taking away many magicka class based skills to give stamina players them. Only if ZOS gives a magicka version of break free, and active evasion skills that can be counted on like stamina's roll dodge. I think this would be a good start. If this is truly a cause for balance then why not right? Or are we pushing a personal imbalance drive in disguise of balance and fair play for stamina based players?

I wonder if magicka or stamina based play style will be dominate in the BGs?

FearlessOne_2014

Maybe drastically increase the cost to all of the insane snaring spamable gap closers? So they are not so spamable.

Vaoh

Lexxypwns wrote: »

Neighbor wrote: »

I just wish they realized their mistake and made corrections when adding a new class, but it doesn't look like it. Swarm should obviously have a stamina morph. It is the key DPS ability for the entire class and not giving it a stamina morph is just so sad.

They really had a great opportunity to make a viable ranged Stamina setup. Like a ranger of some sort that could run Bow/Bow. But they blew it, unfortunately.

There's absolutely no excuse for stam warden not to have a class DoT. Mag warden already has so many choices to make

Magicka Warden? They really don't though..... currently Magicka Warden is the worst class spec in the history of ESO.

I'll admit you could find this impressive, but not for arguing that they have too many options

Stam Warden could get a morph from Swarm, but then we are going to create threads about a much more serious problem - why have everyone use the same skills?

So many people argue that their specific class spec doesn't have every skill they can think of available to them when they're already doing well enough as it is. You can always role a new character and enjoy that different playstyle, but if we keep on giving everything to everyone, then each class will more or less play the same way. \\

Like I said in my post above, it would be best to give every skill three morphs (and unique morphs, not a DoT that simply scales different) rather than having every class play the same but with a different mained resource.

GrumpyDuckling

Vaoh wrote: »

I see what you mean OP but the bias exists there for very good reason, though I still somewhat agree with you to a small extent. I mainly believe you are chasing the wrong solution to the problem. Many more important variables are there to be considered which you haven't taken into account.

You have already noted that Magicka needs more skills because there are plenty of skills that must cost Magicka. This is true for them to be more useful on all builds, including Stamina and Health builds. However, this adds up to a lot of skills.

- Magicka has to account for healing skills. These skills practically all cost Magicka, and would be a nightmare if they were weirdly/forcibly tailored to mostly cost Stamina.
- Magicka has to account for tanking skills. These skills almost all cost Magicka, and would be a mess in content if they didn't.
- Magicka has to account for buff skills. A large majority of these skills will cost Magicka, and it would be bad for everyone if they costed Stamina.

To restate, only Stamina builds need those Stamina skills. Everything else - Magicka builds, healers, tanks, supports, whatever, etc - these all rely on Magicka skills with only tanks and supports needing a tiny bit of Stamina cost skills. Stamina builds themselves require plenty of Magicka-based buffs for the sole reason they don't burn Stamina.

Weapon skill lines add up this way:
Stamina - 40 (+8 Ultimates)
Magicka - 20 (+4 Ultimates)

You also have to consider that Stamina has four viable weapon skill lines to use, packed with many good skills. Magicka has two weapons, with one tailored to healers in particular that leave Magicka with one main weapon to use. Stamina fills their bars very strongly with bunch of weapon skill line abilities in both PvE and PvP. After this, they fill empty spots with class Stamina skills that happen to all be strong. Magicka works the opposite way, in that they must fill their bars with class skills and then slot a couple mandatory staff skills.

If we created this 70%/30% balance in our class skills we would see normal Magicka builds suffer tremendously and become an utter mess, while Stamina would have a huge amount of viable skills. Heck, you'd manage to hurt tanks and healers as well.

**What you should ask for is:
1. To change the many garbage/unused Magicka Morphs.
Think of Stone Giant, Shattering Prison, Prolonged Suffering, Crystal Blast, Solar Barrage, Debilitate, Ritual of Rebirth, etc - these could all very easily become Stamina abilities with slightly different effects.
It would add a bunch a fantastic stamina options without hurting Magicka.
2. Ask for each skill to have THREE morphs, a suggestion brought up many times. It could be that Stamina was given a morph of nearly every skill, or maybe 3 morphs per skill line. Everyone would benefit a lot and a ton of build diversity would also result from it. I recall a few Devs saying they were open to the possibility of having three morphs in the future as well.

Class skills are this way for a very good reason. Ask for three morphs per skill, and/or the changing of current trash Magicka morphs to powerful Stamina morphs!

P.S. Warden has 25 magic skills, and 3 Stamina skills..... Netches don't cost anything!

I'm a little concerned about hoping for a 3rd morph for skills, only because that would create a lot of extra work on ZOS' part, and based on comments they have made on ESO about their workload, I don't think they would actually want to do it.

I would prefer to avoid general, sweeping suggestions, but most of the damage-specific skills could/should be examined closely to determine if both a stamina and magicka option could be implemented - that way healers/tanks wouldn't be stepped on because I agree, those skills should for the most part, remain in their current state.

Edit: Haha gotta love those free skills. With the stamina morph for Netch and Repentance (skills that don't cost anything but provide clear stamina bonus) I listed them under stamina.

Vaoh

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

I see what you mean OP but the bias exists there for very good reason, though I still somewhat agree with you to a small extent. I mainly believe you are chasing the wrong solution to the problem. Many more important variables are there to be considered which you haven't taken into account.

You have already noted that Magicka needs more skills because there are plenty of skills that must cost Magicka. This is true for them to be more useful on all builds, including Stamina and Health builds. However, this adds up to a lot of skills.

- Magicka has to account for healing skills. These skills practically all cost Magicka, and would be a nightmare if they were weirdly/forcibly tailored to mostly cost Stamina.
- Magicka has to account for tanking skills. These skills almost all cost Magicka, and would be a mess in content if they didn't.
- Magicka has to account for buff skills. A large majority of these skills will cost Magicka, and it would be bad for everyone if they costed Stamina.

To restate, only Stamina builds need those Stamina skills. Everything else - Magicka builds, healers, tanks, supports, whatever, etc - these all rely on Magicka skills with only tanks and supports needing a tiny bit of Stamina cost skills. Stamina builds themselves require plenty of Magicka-based buffs for the sole reason they don't burn Stamina.

Weapon skill lines add up this way:
Stamina - 40 (+8 Ultimates)
Magicka - 20 (+4 Ultimates)

You also have to consider that Stamina has four viable weapon skill lines to use, packed with many good skills. Magicka has two weapons, with one tailored to healers in particular that leave Magicka with one main weapon to use. Stamina fills their bars very strongly with bunch of weapon skill line abilities in both PvE and PvP. After this, they fill empty spots with class Stamina skills that happen to all be strong. Magicka works the opposite way, in that they must fill their bars with class skills and then slot a couple mandatory staff skills.

If we created this 70%/30% balance in our class skills we would see normal Magicka builds suffer tremendously and become an utter mess, while Stamina would have a huge amount of viable skills. Heck, you'd manage to hurt tanks and healers as well.

**What you should ask for is:
1. To change the many garbage/unused Magicka Morphs.
Think of Stone Giant, Shattering Prison, Prolonged Suffering, Crystal Blast, Solar Barrage, Debilitate, Ritual of Rebirth, etc - these could all very easily become Stamina abilities with slightly different effects.
It would add a bunch a fantastic stamina options without hurting Magicka.
2. Ask for each skill to have THREE morphs, a suggestion brought up many times. It could be that Stamina was given a morph of nearly every skill, or maybe 3 morphs per skill line. Everyone would benefit a lot and a ton of build diversity would also result from it. I recall a few Devs saying they were open to the possibility of having three morphs in the future as well.

Class skills are this way for a very good reason. Ask for three morphs per skill, and/or the changing of current trash Magicka morphs to powerful Stamina morphs!

P.S. Warden has 25 magic skills, and 3 Stamina skills..... Netches don't cost anything!

I'm a little concerned about hoping for a 3rd morph for skills, only because that would create a lot of extra work on ZOS' part, and based on comments they have made on ESO about their workload, I don't think they would actually want to do it.

I would prefer to avoid general, sweeping suggestions, but most of the damage-specific skills could/should be examined closely to determine if both a stamina and magicka option could be implemented - that way healers/tanks wouldn't be stepped on because I agree, those skills should for the most part, remain in their current state.

Edit: Haha gotta love those free skills. With the stamina morph for Netch and Repentance (skills that don't cost anything but provide clear stamina bonus) I listed them under stamina.

Warden does have three Stam-costing morphs though:
- Cutting Dive (Dive)
- Subterranean Assault (Scorch)
- Soothing Spores (Fungral Growth)

I think it'd be fantastic if a 3rd set of morphs were added to create much more diversity in morphs as well as add more Stam options.

It would easily work very well assuming ZOS created interesting morphs.

This is my own opinion on the matter at least

ESO could learn A LOT about build diversity from interesting skills by analyzing Diablo 3 imo.

STEVIL

DragonBound wrote: »

STEVIL wrote: »

Between guilds and weapons and class skills, i have never had a problem filling my two bar slots for my stamina chars. "More than you need" is more than sufficient in my book, especially given the increased usage of the three non-skill maneuvers block, dodge and break-free.

Considering the fighters guild abilities are crap to medicore for stamina classes you really do not know what your talking about, the only two abilities people pick is rearmed trap and dawnbreaker and every stamina build uses exactly the same thing.

If I don't really know what I am talking about why would you be agreeing on the use of 1/3 of the guild skills? Also correct me if I am wrong, but don't more than no builds use camo hunter or the other morph? That raises it to half, right?

Are you sure you know which of us doesn't know what they are talking about?

Far be it from me to stick facts in the way of fury tho. Carry on with whichever sky is falling regurgitation you were on.

RavenSworn

The thing that should be raised is how we can improve the current stamina skills, rather than adding more to it. I don't agree with having 3 morphs but I won't argue the direction of the suggestion: better stamina options, not more options. Changing what would be the 'flavour' of the classes would just make homogenization of all the classes. It doesn't help. This is a class based, role centric theme park mmo, let's keep it that way.