MagSorc - Anyone NOT running triple shields?

Datolite

With today's bleed meta, I just use matriarch and healing ward. Sloads and bleeds will go right through shields.

MalagenR

I was starting to think that Mutagen was better, is Dark Deal just to slow? Seems like it's the *** and you could pop one off right after a dodge roll.

jaws343

MalagenR wrote: »

I was starting to think that Mutagen was better, is Dark Deal just to slow? Seems like it's the *** and you could pop one off right after a dodge roll.

I run dark deal, but I barely use it. It's too slow and you get caught in the animation and have to cancel it if something pressures you. Mostly I use it after combat, but I am probably going switch over to the Psijic skill as soon as I run through the questline on that toon.

MalagenR

jaws343 wrote: »

MalagenR wrote: »

I was starting to think that Mutagen was better, is Dark Deal just to slow? Seems like it's the *** and you could pop one off right after a dodge roll.

I run dark deal, but I barely use it. It's too slow and you get caught in the animation and have to cancel it if something pressures you. Mostly I use it after combat, but I am probably going switch over to the Psijic skill as soon as I run through the questline on that toon.

Careful on that, I get tons of cast interruptions and kills from interrupting that skill.

jaws343

MalagenR wrote: »

jaws343 wrote: »

MalagenR wrote: »

I was starting to think that Mutagen was better, is Dark Deal just to slow? Seems like it's the *** and you could pop one off right after a dodge roll.

I run dark deal, but I barely use it. It's too slow and you get caught in the animation and have to cancel it if something pressures you. Mostly I use it after combat, but I am probably going switch over to the Psijic skill as soon as I run through the questline on that toon.

Careful on that, I get tons of cast interruptions and kills from interrupting that skill.

Yeah, I will most likely use it after or between combat to restore resources quicker, much like I am using dark deal now.

Ankael07

Instead of Streak use Ball of Lightning. Its a spell projectile defense that scales with the number of enemies and protects your allies as well

Mureel

MalagenR wrote: »

I've tried running double shields but it's really not enough to survive an ultimate combo by any competent player. Why are all of these people crying about magSorc on forums when we are pigeon holed into running triple shield to survive long enough to kill anyone competent in a 1vx or 1v1 fight?

Anyone have a double shield build they rock and have success with?

I run only empowered ward.

MalagenR

Ankael07 wrote: »

Instead of Streak use Ball of Lightning. Its a spell projectile defense that scales with the number of enemies and protects your allies as well

Yeah I run Ball of Lightning for that reason exactly. It seems like Sorc is pigeon holed into running very specific things for PVP and that those things are things that the rest of the community whines ridiculously about.

There is no such thing as build diversity in ESO besides picking your favorite monster mask.

ZarkingFrued

MalagenR wrote: »

I've tried running double shields but it's really not enough to survive an ultimate combo by any competent player. Why are all of these people crying about magSorc on forums when we are pigeon holed into running triple shield to survive long enough to kill anyone competent in a 1vx or 1v1 fight?

Anyone have a double shield build they rock and have success with?

People get mad just because they dont see your health bar move. Its infuriating. But in reality the moment that bar moves it's either shield up or die instantly. If people get the nerfs they are crying out for then sorc gets entirely destroyed. I wanna make the point that if you get rid of or entirely ruin only one skill it's no longer even viable to play mag sorc. It takes a pretty standard skill setup to make sense of running mag sorc in pvp

geonsocal

jaws343 wrote: »

MalagenR wrote: »

I was starting to think that Mutagen was better, is Dark Deal just to slow? Seems like it's the *** and you could pop one off right after a dodge roll.

I run dark deal, but I barely use it. It's too slow and you get caught in the animation and have to cancel it if something pressures you. Mostly I use it after combat, but I am probably going switch over to the Psijic skill as soon as I run through the questline on that toon.

I have dark deal slotted on one of my bars also, mostly though I'm dependant on potions for healing...

my magblade just started using meditate...as long as you can find a quiet spot for a few moments it works well...

MalagenR

ZarkingFrued wrote: »

MalagenR wrote: »

I've tried running double shields but it's really not enough to survive an ultimate combo by any competent player. Why are all of these people crying about magSorc on forums when we are pigeon holed into running triple shield to survive long enough to kill anyone competent in a 1vx or 1v1 fight?

Anyone have a double shield build they rock and have success with?

People get mad just because they dont see your health bar move. Its infuriating. But in reality the moment that bar moves it's either shield up or die instantly. If people get the nerfs they are crying out for then sorc gets entirely destroyed. I wanna make the point that if you get rid of or entirely ruin only one skill it's no longer even viable to play mag sorc. It takes a pretty standard skill setup to make sense of running mag sorc in pvp

That's exactly what I mean! If I'm shield spamming I can't DPS, meanwhile they are burning maximum ultimates and pressuring unbelievably strong. And all of our animations are so slow it's obvious what we have coming so it gets dodged / blocked. It's unbelievable how all these stealth COD players running NB's are whining about Sorc, it's unreal, NB has the advantage hands down in a 1v1 and in a group setting with support heals on them.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

datoliteb16_ESO wrote: »

With today's bleed meta, I just use matriarch and healing ward. Sloads and bleeds will go right through shields.

I am not much of a fan of pets, but I actually think the blood/sloads meta is one more reason to consider a spot for mutagen. HOTs are the best way to deal with both, and sorcs lack HOTs.

As to those talking dark deal, in open world, I think you need to make a spot for it. It can be used midfight, but you just need to be careful. It is certainly better if you can break LOS for a second to cast it. I would not rely on this as your main source of healing, but it can give you a burst if you get caught, just make sure you get your shields up first. I also like that this can be used while running after you have streaked a few times. And by streak, I mean Ball of lighting. No good reason to run Streak in the current RC meta, as you really shouldnt be using it for the stun, so you likely arent making use of the extra damage. BOL is a much better escape tool.

I have been messing with meditate in BGs. Its not bad to quickly dip behind a corner and cast for a second or two, but honestly I think you should build enough sustain into your BG build that you dont need it. I dont like it in open world because you have to stop to cast.

MalagenR wrote: »

Ankael07 wrote: »

Instead of Streak use Ball of Lightning. Its a spell projectile defense that scales with the number of enemies and protects your allies as well

Yeah I run Ball of Lightning for that reason exactly. It seems like Sorc is pigeon holed into running very specific things for PVP and that those things are things that the rest of the community whines ridiculously about.

There is no such thing as build diversity in ESO besides picking your favorite monster mask.

Sorcs get a lot of bad press. They have 1-2 skills that need looked at, but they are certainly not the strongest overall class. I often describe them as a well built house of cards. They look great and work well when you have all the pieces, but remove any one of them and they quickly crumble. They have the least build flexibility of any class in the game. I am not for one second saying they arent strong, they just arent the OP craziness that the average forum goer would have you believe.

End of the day, bad players hate sorcs. They only see health bars, lack the DPS to pressure shields, and fail to understand that to kill good players (especially good sorcs) you need to pressure their stamina. On the flip side, they have bad battle field awareness and miss the obvious tells that a sorc combo is coming, fail to react accordingly, simply fall over dead to a well timed burst, and respawn on the forums.

Gprime31

SilverWF wrote: »

Why do you need 3 shields? when you would cast 3rd, the 1st one would be nearly disappeared

It's really enough only 1 (class shield) but shield from Resto provides healing, so this one too

For the healing

Emma_Overload

No.

Healing Ward sucks, basically just a placebo so ZOS and forum Sorc-haters can pretend we have a heal.

I can count on one hand the number of times I've gotten the full heal from Healing Ward!

Gprime31

Biro123 wrote: »

Just watch Malcolm's vids.. He uses 3 shields - but goes into a lot of detail about the stam side, traits and approaches to defence.

He also has great ping- better ping wins 100% of the time, (unless you are really bad)

MalagenR

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

datoliteb16_ESO wrote: »

With today's bleed meta, I just use matriarch and healing ward. Sloads and bleeds will go right through shields.

End of the day, bad players hate sorcs. They only see health bars, lack the DPS to pressure shields, and fail to understand that to kill good players (especially good sorcs) you need to pressure their stamina. On the flip side, they have bad battle field awareness and miss the obvious tells that a sorc combo is coming, fail to react accordingly, simply fall over dead to a well timed burst, and respawn on the forums.

^best way to describe it, I hate that oh *** feeling when I see the Meteor cue and I'm out of stamina.....it was my fault for not looking at the curse counter though. I see a lot of complaining in these forums from people who probably should be muzzled.

brandonv516

Once a month I pull my MagSorc off the shelf.

I run front bar Force Pulse, Hard Ward, RC, Curse, Fury, Ult and on back bar I run Lightning, Harness, Deal, Ball, Surge, Healing Ult.

Those two shields are enough to get the job done.

Kadoin

I only use 1-2 on my sorc. Mutagen is much better than another shield IMO and with sloads, knightslayer, shield breaker, etc. I don't want to be the idiot without an HoT that dies simply because all I can do is shield or eat the damage. I don't remember any times an extra shield actually saved me...unless I was standing and showing someone that can't do damage they won't kill me.

wozborne

Against A Compentant opponent or when fighting outnumbered 3 shields are absolutely necessary. 2 sheilds, especially, if it’s just Hardened and Healing Ward, will not cut it. With the overall increase in damage output of Summerset 2 Shields will not be able to hold back the pressure of high DoT pressure, and you will get stuck casting Hardened over and over again till you die. Against potatoes (which is most of the player base) yes 2 shields can work. But so can gimmicky meme builds, but nobody would bring them into a real fight.

Waffennacht

I've never ran 3.

One front, one back

Aedaryl

I beat you all !

I only run hardened ward and 99% of people run away from me when they 2v1 me.

They usually wait to be 3 with 3 ultimates ups and some coordination to finally not running like noobs.

There is other way to mitigate damage than just sacking shield.

I personally use hardened, a burst heal, more stam regen than most of stam builds and LoS.

Urvoth

I run Hardened Ward and Healing Ward along with Boundless Storm. The extra speed boost from Storm is really useful in BGs and the extra resistance is useful if my shields get dropped. I've never felt the need to use 3 shields tbh.

Ragnaroek93

@Derra is the only sorc who I know who used to play without 3 shields while playing a "normal" sorc build and not some kind of max magicka stack while still having good success on it.

Imo it's not worth to drop Harness or Healing Ward (unless you play a niche build like petsorc, but even then that's arguable).

Derra

It´s not worth it unless you like to intentionally weaken your build to prove a point or be a special snowflake - on traditional sorc builds.
For pets + high magica it´s vaible.

gepe87

3 shields on cp, 2 shield and bound.storm in no cp

MalagenR

As an aside for everyone commenting. Last night I started running Dark Deal, Mutagen, Hardened, and Harness on my Overload build.

Essentially I run a stacked spell damage build, no impen, no stam recovery, but I do have around 18k stam, 40k max mag, and 26k health.

I had some really strong 1v1 outings with it last night. Essentially it's a turtle build, I resto heavy attack, mutagen, hardened, harness - force pulse / frags for pressure until Acuity procs.

When Acuity proc's I immediately go to OL bar - Wrath, Cage, Frag, OL LA. I think if I had max CP and a different set (I want to switch to either Transmutation or Alteration Mastery with Stam Recovery on my jewels and Bloodspawn - (so I can throw up Resto ultimate while I'm turtled if I have to). I think the ability to dodge more would make it better since you can exit and enter OL bar while rolling on a Resto Staff bar and it's pretty strong, that coupled with the fact that Wrath - Cage - Frag - OL LA basically will kill anyone who isn't max shielded I think I'll be okay.

I also want to try - Elegance - Maelstrom Lighting Front Bar - Maelstrom Resto Back Bar - Willpower - Skoria for a heavy attack build.

p00tx

I run Harness/Hardened. you have to stack one inside the other to gain the full benefit. Those two alone should give you a full bar shield. Healing should only be an "oh s*$#" stack.

Micah_Bayer

Feanor wrote: »

I run Hardened Ward and Healing Ward, no Harness, in noCP. It’s tougher. But also more fun.

How is you dying more, more fun lol

raasdal

I run 0 shields on my magsorc.

Mirrrr

I run 1 or 2 shields. Tripple cost me to many skillslots