Sword/Shield vs Ice Staff

mb10

Sword/Shield vs Ice Staff

2 pieces towards item sets, so you could usee 5-5-2 monster set vs 1 piece so no extra set for you
Sword and shield is 2 different traits vs ice staff has only 1
1 offensive and 1 defensive enchantment vs 1 offensive enchantment
Spell/weapon damage from weapon and resistance buff from shield vs increased spell/weapon damage from staff
Instant cast cheap cost taunt vs 4-5 second Heavy attack taunt with a HUGE 699 damage shield. Yes 699 damage shield
15% bonus to blocking ranged attacks vs no bonus at all
60% movement speed when blocking vs no movement speed bonus
bashing costs 40% less stamina vs bashing costs maximum stamina


I understand the two forms of playing defensively are not meant to be identical but can you at least close the gap between the two. I know you wanted to push the whole Warden and Morrowind thing but this Ice staff isnt just a Warden weapon. Its available to any class and for every other class to be put at this much of a disadvantage is just unfair especially when the frost tanking idea really really isnt being welcomed by the majority of the community atm. So we need to keep pushing ZOS to understand that we arent fond of the current state of frost magic.

You could:
Allow minor maim to be applied to multiple targets from the chilled effect as oppose to just one.
Give frost blocking its own animation. The holding the staff side ways just isnt right for 2018 eso. A frost shield appearing in front of the character would be nice.
Change one or two of the destruction staff abilities to cater for the Ice staff's defensive approach (when ice staff is equipped)
Potentially, potentially make frost tanks a bit more resistant to magic abilities (could be overkill so Im not sure)
Buff sets that target frost magic because I think they're all just not good enough atm


My overall point is Im hoping we see some changes in the upcoming patch notes because the potential is there for tanking but if its going to be abandoned then just revert it to a dps option and make the passive an increase in penetration.

Lynx7386

It won't be abandoned, zos doesn't go back on their changes.

Frost tanking definitely needs some improvements, but the way I see it they're not designed to stand up as a sole/primary tanking weapon against 1h/shield, they're complimentary. Use a shield front bar and ice staff back bar and you get the benefits of both and disadvantages of neither.

Btw I'm tired of people exaggerating the issues regarding frost staff. It is NOT a "4-5 second heavy attack". Frost heavy lies between 2 and 3 seconds, closer to the 2 second side- if you cast shalks, which has a 3 second delay before firing off, you can get a full frost heavy in before the shalks detonate. Against most bosses I've encountered, with low latency and good timing you can get frost heavies between the boss' attacks and still have time to block Each one.

That's not to say it doesn't still feel like 4-5 seconds in a bad spot, I wouldn't mind it being made quicker, but right now it actually lines up really well with shalks for burst (primarily PvP oriented there- you can cast shalks then do a frost heavy and an instant cast like force shock and they'll all hit at the same time)

Lynx7386

Btw, giving frost staff a penetration stat for dps would still have it as the least used destro option for endgame. Any magicka user is already going to be at 5-7k penetration just from passives, and raid debuffs handle the rest. A fire or lightning staff will still be better by a long shot when you're so easily able to hit the penetration cap.

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

the damage shield from the ice staff taunt is 8% of your health, so no, "Yes 699 damage shield", is wrong, you must have had only 8738 health when you got the shield, somehow.

Lynx7386

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

the damage shield from the ice staff taunt is 8% of your health, so no, "Yes 699 damage shield", is wrong, you must have had only 8738 health when you got the shield, somehow.

Yea forgot to touch on that point, i get around a 3k shield with it. Not great but definitely no 699

mb10

Lynx7386 wrote: »

Btw, giving frost staff a penetration stat for dps would still have it as the least used destro option for endgame. Any magicka user is already going to be at 5-7k penetration just from passives, and raid debuffs handle the rest. A fire or lightning staff will still be better by a long shot when you're so easily able to hit the penetration cap.

Those penetration passives come from 5 light armour though. Giving ice staff penetration means that those users can use heavy armour so that defensive element will still be there

Lynx7386

mb10 wrote: »

Lynx7386 wrote: »

Btw, giving frost staff a penetration stat for dps would still have it as the least used destro option for endgame. Any magicka user is already going to be at 5-7k penetration just from passives, and raid debuffs handle the rest. A fire or lightning staff will still be better by a long shot when you're so easily able to hit the penetration cap.

Those penetration passives come from 5 light armour though. Giving ice staff penetration means that those users can use heavy armour so that defensive element will still be there

I don't know any dps build that runs heavy armor in trials. Ice staff is already in a good spot for PvP as it provides defense and control that fire/lightning do not. PvP is the one place where the 8% extra damage from fire or lightning staves doesn't make that big of a difference compared to the utility an ice staff offers, and the taunt from tri focus doesn't have any effect there.

xaraan

Couple things are off - the shield you get isn't that low, it's not shabby. And yes, you only get one trait from the weapon, but let's say you chose defensive - it's twice as strong as if it was on a one handed weapon.

I do realize it's not balanced, but personally don't think it should be. It's silly that holding up a stick might be equal to having a giant shield in front of you, but ZoS seems determined to make it work. Not sure whose silly idea frost staff tanking was, but they thought it was the way to go.

I'd rather see some other benefits added instead of seeing them constantly buff the frost staff to be equal to sword and shield blocking. Kind of like you can make a heavy attack with ice staff and get a shield and that isn't something you can do with sword/board.

Like maybe they should make each ability from destro staves more varied - put down "wall of elements" with Ice Staff and it makes one of those little defensive walls we see with NPCs.

Personally I really wish the ice staff was an offensive weapon and they did something else in the undaunted tree to create a staff blocking line. I wouldn't mind the increase in pen mentioned earlier as an option or something similar.

Jim_Pipp

Lots of things need to be done to make it possible for all classes to tank without sword and board.

My 1st suggestion would be to add major fracture and major breach to the undaunted ranged taunt inner fire. Few classes have access to these essential tanking debuffs, forcing the use of S&B.

Samadhi

Lynx7386 wrote: »

...
Btw I'm tired of people exaggerating the issues regarding frost staff. It is NOT a "4-5 second heavy attack". Frost heavy lies between 2 and 3 seconds, closer to the 2 second side- if you cast shalks, which has a 3 second delay before firing off, you can get a full frost heavy in before the shalks detonate. Against most bosses I've encountered, with low latency and good timing you can get frost heavies between the boss' attacks and still have time to block Each one.

That's not to say it doesn't still feel like 4-5 seconds in a bad spot, I wouldn't mind it being made quicker, but right now it actually lines up really well with shalks for burst (primarily PvP oriented there- you can cast shalks then do a frost heavy and an instant cast like force shock and they'll all hit at the same time)

Been poking around with a Nightblade Frost Staff/Resto Staff tank
taunting boss is generally fine
the painful part about the heavy attack taunt
is trying to taunt a group of mobs one by one
and having them CC or interrupt the cast

Sword and Board lets me just spin in a circle hammering 2 to gather up a group

Maybe turn Elemental Blockade into an AoE Taunt with Frost Staff equipped

ANGEL_BtVS

Ice staff tanking is going to go away when they introduce a new support staff line, whether it's an illusion staff or an alteration staff or maybe even 1H+spell. But it would still be nice to see some improvements until then.

Minno

This is what frost needs:
-The minor defile should be easier to proc to match SnB's spamable deep slash.
- faster mobility through block mode
- major fracture with major breach.

Otherwise Id say it will never replace SNB.

Flipside, frost staff offers something completely different in PVP:
- ranged immobile for classes that lack this or have too many cc imunity spells that don't actually stun (templars). Pairs very well with actual CC or skills like eclipse where after they spend stamina breaking free you can actually force them to spend more stamina dodge rolling out of the immobilze.
- ele drain. 300 mag per second plus 5280 armor debuff is such a good skill to run for classes that don't have the DMG boost passives to compete.
- blocking passives actually replace SnB blocking for templars/wardens/DKs who want to slot dual weld for extra dmg and to fit 5/5/2 set combos. Really strong on the backbar because you don't need ele drain on your front bar or the frost reach since it has a dot component.
- frost heavy attack regen, while not as high as resto staff, still helps. Lets you slot 2h/dual weld front bar and you can heavy attack in melee range to return stamina.
- extra armor on the staff replaces the armor from the shield for SnB. Not OP but nice little icing.

Also, classes like templar, who have a way to return mag through block, can theoretically have lesser block costs than using stamina via SnB. ele drain + channeled focus is about 540 mag per second (about 1080 per 2 seconds). But up for actual math to prove if that's a way to go.

mb10

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

the damage shield from the ice staff taunt is 8% of your health, so no, "Yes 699 damage shield", is wrong, you must have had only 8738 health when you got the shield, somehow.

I got the figure from UESP

mb10

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

the damage shield from the ice staff taunt is 8% of your health, so no, "Yes 699 damage shield", is wrong, you must have had only 8738 health when you got the shield, somehow.

@Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

8% of 25000 is 2000 so in PVP that becomes 1000 lol

Even though the figure I got is from UESP the figure is still quite pathetic

Dapper Dinosaur

From what I can tell, the intent of ice staff tanking is to allow you to use it on your backbar for the sole purpose of restoring your magicka with heavy attacks that also happen to re-taunt for you. I don't think anyone, even the people who made the changes at Zenimax, truly believe ice-tanking will ever be an actual thing.

mb10

Dapper Dinosaur wrote: »

From what I can tell, the intent of ice staff tanking is to allow you to use it on your backbar for the sole purpose of restoring your magicka with heavy attacks that also happen to re-taunt for you. I don't think anyone, even the people who made the changes at Zenimax, truly believe ice-tanking will ever be an actual thing.

What's hilarious about your comment is I actually think they did intend it to be a tanking option but have just failed miserably at deploying it

Lynx7386

ANGEL_BtVS wrote: »

Ice staff tanking is going to go away when they introduce a new support staff line, whether it's an illusion staff or an alteration staff or maybe even 1H+spell. But it would still be nice to see some improvements until then.

That's a lot of wishful thinking. Too bad for you its wrong - zos doesn't go back on their changes, Frost tanking is here to stay