Frost Staff Block Cost Inquiry.

A_G_G_R_O

I have a few questions about frost staff for a hybrid I have been building.

Primarily how much magicka does it take to block at base on an ice staff?

Will base block cost reductions being implemented on PTS affect this block cost?

Does green tree shadow ward affect the block cost?

Thanks in advance!

Lynx7386

It costs the same amount of magicka to block with a frost staff as it does stamina with a shield.

Yes the block cost reductions on pts will effect frost staff the same as shield.

Yes frost staff benefits from shadow ward.

Marginis

Anything that affects block cost also affects block cost for frost staves. The only difference is the frost staff passive that says you use magicka instead of stamina. Presumably the block cost changes will also affect frost staves after the update, although I have not tested this personally so I cannot confirm this.

A_G_G_R_O

Anyone at ZOS able to answer this?

A_G_G_R_O

Thank you! Do you know off the top of your head default block Cost for shield? I will google as well.

Marginis

A_G_G_R_O wrote: »

Thank you! Do you know off the top of your head default block Cost for shield? I will google as well.

The block costs are changing with the next update, so I'd wait until the update. The PTS is where you'd see the changes now, but those are subject to change, so the value of looking them up now isn't that high.

EDIT: It's more helpful than anything to look at frost staves compared to shields, specifically their passives, if the comparison is what you're going for. I'll tell you right away that shields block more damage and have more things that reduce block cost, but frost staves take off a big chunk of block cost just with their passive. The main trade-off is that frost staves are magicka based and shields are stamina based, and while shields are better for regular everyday tanking, frost staves give you some utility with destruction spells, that can help with things like procing (proccing?) weapon enchantments or weakening targets.