Stamdk help

Alfie2072

what do you guys think for stamina DK, running 5 medium 2 heavy
im tossed between using fragmented shield for the major mending or wings for the snare removal and the reflect, i do not want to run both simply because it uses too much mag and i end up putting myself in bad situations
give me advice on what you think would be better to use (advice going on the upcoming patch is welcome)

BohnT

There is no clear winner here because both skills provide good utility.
Wings give you 2 sec snare removal + give you a good chance to survive rune cage rotas from sorcs as they'll eat their light attacks and frags. This is very valueable as with medium armor you're very vulnerable to the oneshot combo of sorcs and with stamdk being in such a bad spot wings can help you to force draws in fights you would have otherwise lost.

On the other hand fragmented shield gives you ultimate, stamina, minor brutality and major mending all these things are great and make many fights and situations easier.

In the end you have to find out for yourself what you value more.

The best advice i can give you however is don't play stamdk at this point.

The_Brosteen

As mentioned above, the shield has alot of added bonuses because of passives. I personally use it over wings, but it may not fit your playstyle.

Grimlok_S

Shield.. Whether fragmented, or igneous is tied pretty tightly to stamdk builds. Especially in medium, you're going to need the Mending.

Think of wings as more of a flex skill, if you can sustain the magicka. Sets like shackle can help your mag sustain for clutch wings. More likely you'll run shuffle in medium for the snare cleanse.

del9

Best advice for stamdk is dont play stamdk open world.
Next best advice is to go heavy. It just synergizes better with DK skills and passives.

But if it comes down to it, I cant live on DK without the mending from shield. Wings is a flex but if you can afford the magicka slot it. Losing shuffle from medium will help you with bar space.

IQ 200 option for WWHunter: Go heavy, keep rally, run wings. It will take some high level skill to manage this, but those heals could be crazy.

Adenoma

I think between wings, volatile, and igneous it’s too much of a magicka drain to sustain in medium armor. In a sload’s meta that won’t be changing much I would also favor the higher health pool of heavy.

If snares are your problem look at ranger’s gait - it could also be quite strong in the next patch and let’s you use rally in heavy armor. Barkskin is another strong mobility set for stamDK and will still proc even with immunity from shuffle or forward momentum if a snare is applied - kind of like crits still being reduced to zero on shields, but it still procs wizards riposte.

I’ve been testing master’s S&B with durok’s back bar and blood spawn. Puts you slightly over physical resist cap when spawn procs (which is practically always up) and gives an effective 1k or so HOT which takes a bit of the burden off of vigor and igneous shield. You do definitely feel the loss of deep or heroic slash - if you don’t go this way I favor deep slash over heroic for 1vX because you poop out snares on everyone and minor maim is everywhere while you DPS.

Next patch reverb is getting nerfed hard so durok’s provides a reliable defile uptime and frees you up to use fossilize to drop block and control fights with roots. It’s harder on magicka sustain, but necessitates heavy armor.

Until shuffle snare/root immunity is buffed I wouldn’t run medium unless you intend on transmuting jewelry to protective. If you do that I would do something like bone pirate and veiled heritance or bone pirate and truth if CP. I’m not a fan of fortified brass because resistance stacking isn’t the most efficient form of mitigation.

Sleep724

Using shackle breaker as your sustain set gives enough mag for fragmented shield and wings use.

Mister_DMC

You can use both but you have to able to to decide when to use each, don't reapply volatile until it's just about to run out and wings as necessary. Or like others suggested run shackle and/or a couple of trips stat enchants

Ampnode

I run full medium and have 28k resistances, and I reach the cap when Bloodspawns procs.

2pc Bloodspawn
5pc Fortified Brass(body)
5pc Spriggan's(jewelry & 2h front bar)
2pc Agility(bow back bar)

I find this to work perfectly for me. The damage and sustain of medium armor while having the mitigation of fully buffed heavy armor.

As for the choice in ability, having fragmented shield is a must. You can make do without wings most of the time.

IZZEFlameLash

Reroll Stamden for better StamDK and your sanity health.

mursie

I love wings. I guess i just don't understand the power of fragmented shield.

My take: I already use volatile armor so the passives from skill line are acquired via that buff being up for 20+ seconds.

FS gives 25% increased healing for 5 seconds. Your primary heal is vigor. Let's say you have a tooltip of 15K healing. Effectively that 15K heal is now 18.75K. You picked up 4K more healing by poppping shield. You also got a small shield. cool.

Now wings reflects 4 attacks from doing any damage. It also removes snares. Do I think the four attacks that are reflected equate to more than 4K worth of damage? imo the answer is yes. And as such, wings is much more of a priority for me than fragmented shield.

maybe someone can educate me on why i'm so stupid regarding this. but that's the way I see it.


PS: my bars right now for BG play:

2H: noxious (for the armor debuff) / reverse slice / forward momentum / empowering chains / volatile / Leap
DW: Wings / venomous claw / fossilize / blood craze / vigor / corrosive

HankTwo

mursie wrote: »

I love wings. I guess i just don't understand the power of fragmented shield.

My take: I already use volatile armor so the passives from skill line are acquired via that buff being up for 20+ seconds.

FS gives 25% increased healing for 5 seconds. Your primary heal is vigor. Let's say you have a tooltip of 15K healing. Effectively that 15K heal is now 18.75K. You picked up 4K more healing by poppping shield. You also got a small shield. cool.

Now wings reflects 4 attacks from doing any damage. It also removes snares. Do I think the four attacks that are reflected equate to more than 4K worth of damage? imo the answer is yes. And as such, wings is much more of a priority for me than fragmented shield.

maybe someone can educate me on why i'm so stupid regarding this. but that's the way I see it.


PS: my bars right now for BG play:

2H: noxious (for the armor debuff) / reverse slice / forward momentum / empowering chains / volatile / Leap
DW: Wings / venomous claw / fossilize / blood craze / vigor / corrosive

I'd say fragmented shield is overrated. It's not a bad skill by any means but it's also not a must have either. As you said, wings are situational better when fighting snipe spammers, magblades or magsorcs (and there are plenty of magsorcs around atm).

Green dragon blood or cinder storm can also be worth checking out as a secondary heal/defensive skill. GDB is good when you don't use pots that give you major endurance or when there is a friendly healer around because of the vitality buff. Cinder storm on the other hand is the strongest AOE snare in the game with small HOT (for stam) on top of that. It can be really good against melee enemies that don't run forward momentum.

Tesfa

Alfie2072 wrote: »

what do you guys think for stamina DK, running 5 medium 2 heavy
im tossed between using fragmented shield for the major mending or wings for the snare removal and the reflect, i do not want to run both simply because it uses too much mag and i end up putting myself in bad situations
give me advice on what you think would be better to use (advice going on the upcoming patch is welcome)

sDK main 3 Years. You have to use both. Wing will give snare immunity next patch and removes snares while reflecting projectiles, completely busted on paper ( Leap a Sorc while the crystal frag you reflected is mid air watch him die with shields up or the flame reach from a mNB-he will get cc’d too. Even the scrub snipers send that lethal arrow back and just leap) Fragmented shields give major mending it is must have it also gives minor brutality from mountains blessing passive. sDK best resource bar is magicka, magicka gives you sustain,stamina,damage,and utility. Magicka is how we reveal nightblades and buff or defenses

5 medium is viable but if you’re new learn to play on heavy until you realize you want more damage to kill people. Sustain was the hardest thing for me to learn on sDK and I still suck at it it is not easy and in medium it gets harder.

With all that being said I think Shacklebreaker is one of the best sets on Stam DK if not the best especially after next patch . The max stats are a DK best friend

Eventually you will realize stamDK sucks and just re roll to another stamina class who can actually aid their team.

I run shackle + werewolfhide/fortifies/hundings
And Blood Spawn
- werewolf hide is amazing in group play just leap nonstop or the unexpected corrosive
- Fortified best option as the defenses make it seem like you are in heavy armor ,I can still reach 4.2k weapon damage with this set
- Hundings when you are against noobs just kill them very fast.


PS - any stam DK who plays without fragmented/igneous sheilds I think has no idea what they’re talking about.

mursie

Tesfa wrote: »

Alfie2072 wrote: »

what do you guys think for stamina DK, running 5 medium 2 heavy
im tossed between using fragmented shield for the major mending or wings for the snare removal and the reflect, i do not want to run both simply because it uses too much mag and i end up putting myself in bad situations
give me advice on what you think would be better to use (advice going on the upcoming patch is welcome)

sDK main 3 Years. You have to use both. Wing will give snare immunity next patch and removes snares while reflecting projectiles, completely busted on paper ( Leap a Sorc while the crystal frag you reflected is mid air watch him die with shields up or the flame reach from a mNB-he will get cc’d too. Even the scrub snipers send that lethal arrow back and just leap) Fragmented shields give major mending it is must have it also gives minor brutality from mountains blessing passive. sDK best resource bar is magicka, magicka gives you sustain,stamina,damage,and utility. Magicka is how we reveal nightblades and buff or defenses

5 medium is viable but if you’re new learn to play on heavy until you realize you want more damage to kill people. Sustain was the hardest thing for me to learn on sDK and I still suck at it it is not easy and in medium it gets harder.

With all that being said I think Shacklebreaker is one of the best sets on Stam DK if not the best especially after next patch . The max stats are a DK best friend

Eventually you will realize stamDK sucks and just re roll to another stamina class who can actually aid their team.

I run shackle + werewolfhide/fortifies/hundings
And Blood Spawn
- werewolf hide is amazing in group play just leap nonstop or the unexpected corrosive
- Fortified best option as the defenses make it seem like you are in heavy armor ,I can still reach 4.2k weapon damage with this set
- Hundings when you are against noobs just kill them very fast.


PS - any stam DK who plays without fragmented/igneous sheilds I think has no idea what they’re talking about.

fair enough - i'm not a stamdk main and i may have no idea what im talking about. but most of your points, from my experience, i completely agree with. especially the magicka part. it is why i'm running shackle as well and pair it with prisoner's. unbelievable sustain and magicka abilities make up alot of my bar.

and regarding FS - at no point am i saying this ability is bad. I understand how awesome major mending is. the problem is, I dont have a slot for it. I posted my bars, I would ask you to please let me know what you would sacrifice to put it on your bars. I'll explain my rationale too:

1. noxious - armor debuff is very critical to doing great damage. if there was an ability to drop - this would probably be the 1st pick but I hate getting rid of my armor debuff, especially when i run sustain sets in bg's where my damage is already low.
2. reverse slice - your execute and honestly main spammable. i wouldn't go without this
3. forward momentum - major brutality and 8sec immoveable - a must
4. empowering chains - gap closer and uses magicka, gives empower on next 2 LA's, snares due to passives, and provides 6 secs of major expedition. love this ability
5. volatile - your nb stealth detect plus access to the earthen passives and major ward
6. wings - snare removal, reflect - love it
7. venomous claw - loaded damage combined with my master dual wield blood craze. i love this ability
8. fossilize - one of the most overpowered stuns in the game
9. blood craze - dual wield amp from master's weapons. huge damage
10. vigor - your main heal


From those 10, the only one I could see maybe dropping is noxious. maybe i'll test it out more. if i go that route i may have to change empowering chains to stampede as my magicka already gets hit hard on a stam class with 12k pool from the following: wings / volatile / fossilize / empowering chains

Tesfa

I would drop noxious. Although it does not miss it is just a weird skill to use I find myself looking at my enemies debuffs to see if they got hit. Although the ability is great wrecking blow venomous claw rending and poisons & leap is all you need in BGs.

I don’t use chains I’ve learned to pay without gapclosers and I think my overall dps got better. Also fossilize is cool but a flex spot wrecking blow is cc.

sDK Sustain = Volatike armor ( while buffed all healing is buffed from one of your Passives) > FS major mending > Rally.

If you have a combat log look at your heals from vigor with and without FS you’re missing at times 1k-2K per tick of heals and when that crits you miss like 2-3k( these numbers may be off but I tested awhile ago and it’s in the area of those numbers)

HankTwo

@Tesfa

I did a large amount of PvP testing for fragmented/igneous shield vs wings, GDB, cinder storm and efficient purge. I run wings atm and for me its stronger in the current meta. I can assure you that for my build playing in no CP without fragmented shield can be very viable. I can imagine you running both is pretty strong defensive wise, but I don't wanna drop my gap closer.

Additionally, I dropped spiked armor for hardened armor this patch and now use noxious as my main cloak counter and for major fracture. I never looked back - even though it sometimes doesn't connect for weird reasons. When a magblade starts to spam cloak you will always run out of resources first with volatile armor as your counter.

PS: so you run medium atm, do you always use fortified when solo?

Xvorg

Best build for StamDK

1- Go to Mournhold with, say, 20 k gold. Pray at Stuhn, pray at Kyne. Go Magicka
2- In the caracter pages, pick your stamDK, click on delete, then write DELETE.

Seriously, as much as I love stamDK, it has no place in this game... and even worst, ZoS believes it's OK...

So OK, that now we have one passive in the DD skill line that only favors ONE skill

HankTwo

Xvorg wrote: »

Best build for StamDK

1- Go to Mournhold with, say, 20 k gold. Pray at Stuhn, pray at Kyne. Go Magicka
2- In the caracter pages, pick your stamDK, click on delete, then write DELETE.

Seriously, as much as I love stamDK, it has no place in this game... and even worst, ZoS believes it's OK...

So OK, that now we have one passive in the DD skill line that only favors ONE skill

Stam DK surely needs some love but it can still be viable. If they continue to slightly buff the class each patch we'll be meta by the end of 2019 xD

Tesfa

HankTwo wrote: »

@Tesfa

I did a large amount of PvP testing for fragmented/igneous shield vs wings, GDB, cinder storm and efficient purge. I run wings atm and for me its stronger in the current meta. I can assure you that for my build playing in no CP without fragmented shield can be very viable. I can imagine you running both is pretty strong defensive wise, but I don't wanna drop my gap closer.

Additionally, I dropped spiked armor for hardened armor this patch and now use noxious as my main cloak counter and for major fracture. I never looked back - even though it sometimes doesn't connect for weird reasons. When a magblade starts to spam cloak you will always run out of resources first with volatile armor as your counter.

PS: so you run medium atm, do you always use fortified when solo?

You're 100% right you can play with or without any skill on sDK. I just think you miss out on a lot with the mending, also noxious is usable I throw it on in BGs when I come across super tanky people, but I just don't like it personally.
Dropping gap closers was something I did after summerset patch so I know how you feel about not dropping it. However, with swift jewelry, I seem to be not caring about not having gap closer.

Fortified is not the only set usable for Solo but I had the best results with it.I run medium 5 Medium 2 Heavy


Also @Xvorg is not wrong mDK > sDK.

BohnT

Tesfa wrote: »

HankTwo wrote: »

@Tesfa

I did a large amount of PvP testing for fragmented/igneous shield vs wings, GDB, cinder storm and efficient purge. I run wings atm and for me its stronger in the current meta. I can assure you that for my build playing in no CP without fragmented shield can be very viable. I can imagine you running both is pretty strong defensive wise, but I don't wanna drop my gap closer.

Additionally, I dropped spiked armor for hardened armor this patch and now use noxious as my main cloak counter and for major fracture. I never looked back - even though it sometimes doesn't connect for weird reasons. When a magblade starts to spam cloak you will always run out of resources first with volatile armor as your counter.

PS: so you run medium atm, do you always use fortified when solo?

You're 100% right you can play with or without any skill on sDK. I just think you miss out on a lot with the mending, also noxious is usable I throw it on in BGs when I come across super tanky people, but I just don't like it personally.
Dropping gap closers was something I did after summerset patch so I know how you feel about not dropping it. However, with swift jewelry, I seem to be not caring about not having gap closer.

Fortified is not the only set usable for Solo but I had the best results with it.I run medium 5 Medium 2 Heavy


Also @Xvorg is not wrong mDK > sDK.

Anything > sDK at this point
There is no situation where bringing a stamdk is the best option you have, not a single one.
Often it isn't even one of the top 6 specs to choose from.

For solo: anything is better except for maybe magwarden.
For smallscale: stamplar, stamsorc, stamwarden always win, depending on the group setup stamnb is also better, all magclasses provide much more utility so no discussion here
For organized groups: The only stamspec that can make it in here is stamwarden
For brainless zerging: any other spec is so much better because they either provide more utility, their defence works much better when facing multiple opponents, they can dish out damage without having to jump right into the enemy zerg.


And for pve, let's face it stamnbs deal more damage meaning they get the meele Spots in all trials in which running stamspecs is a good idea.

Valabrog

BohnT wrote: »

Tesfa wrote: »

HankTwo wrote: »

@Tesfa

I did a large amount of PvP testing for fragmented/igneous shield vs wings, GDB, cinder storm and efficient purge. I run wings atm and for me its stronger in the current meta. I can assure you that for my build playing in no CP without fragmented shield can be very viable. I can imagine you running both is pretty strong defensive wise, but I don't wanna drop my gap closer.

Additionally, I dropped spiked armor for hardened armor this patch and now use noxious as my main cloak counter and for major fracture. I never looked back - even though it sometimes doesn't connect for weird reasons. When a magblade starts to spam cloak you will always run out of resources first with volatile armor as your counter.

PS: so you run medium atm, do you always use fortified when solo?

You're 100% right you can play with or without any skill on sDK. I just think you miss out on a lot with the mending, also noxious is usable I throw it on in BGs when I come across super tanky people, but I just don't like it personally.
Dropping gap closers was something I did after summerset patch so I know how you feel about not dropping it. However, with swift jewelry, I seem to be not caring about not having gap closer.

Fortified is not the only set usable for Solo but I had the best results with it.I run medium 5 Medium 2 Heavy


Also @Xvorg is not wrong mDK > sDK.

Anything > sDK at this point
There is no situation where bringing a stamdk is the best option you have, not a single one.
Often it isn't even one of the top 6 specs to choose from.

For solo: anything is better except for maybe magwarden.
For smallscale: stamplar, stamsorc, stamwarden always win, depending on the group setup stamnb is also better, all magclasses provide much more utility so no discussion here
For organized groups: The only stamspec that can make it in here is stamwarden
For brainless zerging: any other spec is so much better because they either provide more utility, their defence works much better when facing multiple opponents, they can dish out damage without having to jump right into the enemy zerg.


And for pve, let's face it stamnbs deal more damage meaning they get the meele Spots in all trials in which running stamspecs is a good idea.

Every other topic about stamplars (last month i was going hard on learning/playing stamplar) I saw the same - if you go solo - delete, dont play, switch to stamden. So basically both knightly classes are trash in pvp. If you want be competitive - play mage class, rogue class or druid class. On the other hand bgs are full of stamplars, stamdks. The later works a lot better for me personally because of resource management and wings - as we face so many caster all around..I cant count how many times I won against 2 enemies fighting near the flag due to wings and ultima resource restore, while stamplar takes 1 at best and goes down gloriously without taking a flag...

Thogard

I think DK is a good class for 1vX in cyro.. better than warden for that. Strong for dot dmg and dueling. But I think it really needs CP to shine.

Warden is better for small scale if you have a group because it adds more utility to the group and has more AOE burst.