Spell Penetration

malistorr

Hi all. Trying to get the best dps of course as a mag. sorc (don't use pets). I found this:

Light Armor Concentration = 4884
Tank/Torug’s Pact Infused Crusher = 2741
Tank/Major Breach = 5280
Templar PoTL = 1320
Alkosh = 3010
Spell Erosion 10 pts = 1003
Total debuff = 18238

Questions:

1. I see that the only thing I can control from the above is the 10 CPs into Spell Erosion. If I do that, and have the light armor bonus for mag sorc wearing light armor, can I reliably assume that all the rest will be provided in the average PUG for dungeons and trials?

I'm trying to figure out how to maximize my dps for all group content. If I can assume that I'll get all of the above help from outside sources then obviously I don't need to bother using mundus, gear (including weapon trait), or additional points in Spell Erosion to get more spell penetration. I should instead focus on more max. magic, spell damage, and crit. chance/damage to get the most DPS possible.

2. For single player content in general including soloing group delves and vMA, I was wondering if the enemy still has 18k+ resist (I know in overland content it's closer to 9K) and if so, and I'm not getting all the other spell penetration from other players obviously, should I go more for a build where I'm taking away things like spell damage and max magic so I can get as close to the 18k+ penetration number that people seem to say is needed so that enemies in PVE can't mitigate some of my damage?

Essentially, 1 build/setup or at least gear set for PVE group where buffs (more pen) is provided, and another for single player like soloing group delves, or vMA where I have to provide a lot more of my own pen to maximize my damage. What do you think? It seems like if I'm always using a build with a lot of my own built in spell pen, then in trials etc. I'll be having too much pen where I could increase my spell damage or something else instead.

WrathOfInnos

In pug groups you can only rely on the 4884 from Light Armor and whatever you have in Spell Erosion CP. You’ll usually get Major Breach from either the tank or healer (but not always, so be prepared to slot Ele Drain yourself). Crusher is relatively common, but you can’t count on it being Infused Torugs Crusher for the 2740 value, it could be one of those 2 buffs for 2108 or just regular Crusher for 1622 (with 50% uptime). Alkosh and Minor Breach (from PotL) are rare outside of coordinated trial groups.

In my opinion, you’re doing the right thing by optimizing yourself around an optimized group setup. If you end up in a pug where no buffs are provided, nobody is going to care if you are set up perfectly for the group composition, and you’re not going to be breaking any DPS records with that group.

malistorr

So then I should account for needing another 5,000 roughly of extra spell pen (self-provided) in the average PUG if I want to do the most damage possible, even at the risk of less spell damage let's say and even if I'll have too much pen in some groups I guess.

What about the idea of 2 different setups (at least gear)? Are many people doing this or do you think most just find a middle ground and have too much pen for veteran trials and maybe not enough if they're playing with noobs?

WrathOfInnos

I don’t really think it’s necessary to change gear or stats for pug groups, the most I would do is have a duplicate of my front bar weapon with the Sharpened Trait (I always keep back bar infused Berserk for the Spell Damage). The Spinner’s set and Lover Mundus Stone are also options, but giving up a 5pc set or the Shadow Mundus makes these hardly worth doing. The gain would be very slight.

malistorr

I guess I'll just stick to what I'm doing now then. But I have way too many points in Spell Erosion so I'll reallocate my CP. My staff is Sharpened right now so I'll change it to charged to get max uptime with concussion and off-balance to get the 170% bonus damage from my heavy attack. Except for a few AOE skills, all I do is heavy attack. And my gear is for max heavy attack.

I single-bar now so I just have the gold Undaunted Infiltrator lightning staff with shock and sharpened.

If I go 2-bar then back-bar maelstrom lightning staff with probably shock and charged. (to proc. concussion and then off-balance with wall of elements)
Front-bar Undaunted Infiltrator shock and infused (I'm guessing would be best) since I'm mag sorc. with lots of CP to buff electric damage.

malistorr

Weird thing is I have an add-on that's supposed to tell you, based on a specific fight for example, how to allocate your blue CP to get max dps. I think the fights I've used are overland stuff so it should have been guiding me to needing only 9k+ spell pen. I think it told me I should have something like 50 points into spell erosion to maximize my damage. I do have 5-pieces of light armor. I'll have to go look at this in more detail when I get home. The add-on should be telling me that I need barely anything in spell pen for overland things.

WrathOfInnos

I’m not aware of any addons that check an enemy’s spell resistance. It might just be hard coded to add up debuffs applied try to get to 18.2k.

malistorr

Yeah that's what I was thinking too so I'll check that. I think you're right. Based on the numbers in my OP I should only need 10 spell erosion and no sharpened staff if I'm assuming I'll get all buffs from a group, or if I'm facing overland stuff.

Iskiab

You should expect elemental drain from the healer too. I’d spend points into pen with these two things in mind for maelstrom. I can’t remember what mitigation they have, but it’s less then 18k.

malistorr

Sorry Iskiab I didn't understand your comment.
What 2 things?
And do you have specifics for how you recommend I spend the points?
What is the "they" you're referring to that has less than 18k?

Dagoth_Rac

Iskiab wrote: »

You should expect elemental drain from the healer too. I’d spend points into pen with these two things in mind for maelstrom. I can’t remember what mitigation they have, but it’s less then 18k.

Everything varies in VMA. Some enemies have 9.1k resist, some 12.1k, some 18.2k. And physical and spell resist is often different. For example, final boss of VMA has 18.2k spell resist and 9.1k physical resist.

Average is 12.2k physical resist and 13.4k spell resist.

Complete breakdown is here:
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/373925/veteran-maelstrom-arena-mob-resistances

Emma_Overload

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

In pug groups you can only rely on the 4884 from Light Armor and whatever you have in Spell Erosion CP. You’ll usually get Major Breach from either the tank or healer (but not always, so be prepared to slot Ele Drain yourself). Crusher is relatively common, but you can’t count on it being Infused Torugs Crusher for the 2740 value, it could be one of those 2 buffs for 2108 or just regular Crusher for 1622 (with 50% uptime). Alkosh and Minor Breach (from PotL) are rare outside of coordinated trial groups.

In my opinion, you’re doing the right thing by optimizing yourself around an optimized group setup. If you end up in a pug where no buffs are provided, nobody is going to care if you are set up perfectly for the group composition, and you’re not going to be breaking any DPS records with that group.

My experience with pug tanks is that they keep around 50% uptime on Major Breach. I usually slot Elemental Drain just to cover my ass!

Isojukka

malistorr wrote: »

Weird thing is I have an add-on that's supposed to tell you, based on a specific fight for example, how to allocate your blue CP to get max dps. I think the fights I've used are overland stuff so it should have been guiding me to needing only 9k+ spell pen. I think it told me I should have something like 50 points into spell erosion to maximize my damage. I do have 5-pieces of light armor. I'll have to go look at this in more detail when I get home. The add-on should be telling me that I need barely anything in spell pen for overland things.

I think you meant constellations add on, its not accurate at all. It said to me that I should put zero points into thaumaturge and zero to spell erosion, fight data was from Iron atro dummy. So don't trust that.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

You are not going to come close to that from an average pug group. Those values you outlined pretty much only exists in very good raids with very good support players, and not every group is going to necessarily have both torugs AND alkosh.

It's also often a good idea to think of these buffs as percentages regarding uptimes. So for example, if you can expect alkosh to be up about 75% of the time, it is giving you 3010*.75= 2257.5 penetration. My quick take on the following:

Light Armor Concentration = 4884 - Will always be there, no issues unless you wear the wrong gear.

Tank/Torug’s Pact Infused Crusher = 2741 - Torug's pact is a set you may or may not see. Certainly wouldnt count on it in a pug group. To be candid, you might not even have a basic crusher glyph on a tank in a pug group, but must trial groups, and most tanks will keep up an infused crusher (withuot torugs pact), at a pretty high percent. If your tank is back baring a destro staff, you can typiclaly assume your crusher uptime will be high.

Tank/Major Breach = 5280 - Reasonable to expect this to be up close to 100% of the time on anything that needs taunting. It certainly wont be there on all the adds you might encounter.

Templar PoTL = 1320 - Totally depends on your group. Lots of templar healers in pug groups arent going to bother with this, so unless you have a stamplar DPS, good chance it wont be there in a lot of groups. Most trial groups will have a healer or stamplar run it on boss fights, bet again, not going to be there on all the mobs in a trash pull.

Alkosh = 3010 - The best groups keep this up close to 100% of the time. Your average pug tank doesnt even have the gear, or if they do, likely run something a little more selfish in 4 man content with pug groups. This is one of those things you need to check with in your group. It is becoming more common to put a DPS in Alkosh these days.

Spell Erosion 10 pts = 1003 - You will always have it, so uptime is not an issue, but the reality is, unless you are running with a very well oiled trial group, 10 pts is likely pretty low.

malistorr

Thanks for all the replies. I guess the vote is that you should probably not count on having nearly all of the pen listed in my OP. So to be safe, if I want to maximize my damage in largely PUGs, I should probably aim for somewhere in the middle of the 9k and 18k pen. If I get PUGs with good, high-level players, who have the gear and skills they're supposed to to clear end-game stuff, I'll have too much pen. (oh well)

For most PUGs, my damage should be better because I'll be closer to eliminating all enemy spell resistance and then what magic and spell damage I do have will hit close to as hard as possible.

WrathOfInnos

malistorr wrote: »

Thanks for all the replies. I guess the vote is that you should probably not count on having nearly all of the pen listed in my OP. So to be safe, if I want to maximize my damage in largely PUGs, I should probably aim for somewhere in the middle of the 9k and 18k pen. If I get PUGs with good, high-level players, who have the gear and skills they're supposed to to clear end-game stuff, I'll have too much pen. (oh well)

For most PUGs, my damage should be better because I'll be closer to eliminating all enemy spell resistance and then what magic and spell damage I do have will hit close to as hard as possible.

If you want to take that approach, then the key is going to be weighing points in Spell Erosion against things like Elemental Expert and Master at Arms. Don’t assume that Spell Erosion is superior and put 100 points into it. If you’re going for balanced across the board blue CP’s (assuming 810) you can start with something like:
- 56 Elemental Expert
- 56 Elfborn
- 56 Master at Arms
- 56 Thaumaturge
- 9 Staff Expert
- 37 Spell Erosion

Then fine-tune as needed to fit your build. If you don’t use many Light Attacks you can move those 9 points from Staff over to Erosion, or if you are great at weaving go up to 19 Staff. For high crit you can go up to 72 Elfborn, Low Crit down to 40. Shift points between Thaum and Master depending on your damage from DoTs or Direct attacks. Never go above 72 Master or 81 Thaum (the next jump point over 75 for exploiter), and never below 28 on either. Most of the time 40 or 56 will be best. Elemental Expert is almost always going to be 56 or 64, since it takes a lot of points to get to the next 1% at 75.

malistorr

The bad thing for me (in terms of CP allocation) is that I mostly heavy attack. So I have nothing in master since that affects only the last tick. I just use a few AOE DOTs and heavy attack. So I will have a lot in Elemental, Thaum, and Staff Expert for sure and then have to divvy up what's left between Spell Erosion and Elfborn. If I want to account for a weak PUG group and use another 15-30 points in Spell Erosion, it has to come from somewhere, even without anything in Master. I'll probably have to go for no more than 20-25 Erosion because I don't want to lower the other 4 too much since they'll affect damage 100% of the time.

MartiniDaniels

Tbh, all those bosses in trials where support can reliably provide all those debuffs with high uptime are relatively easy, in serious encounters practice average penetration will be at least 1-2k lower even in well-organized group and in dungeons chance to have simultaneously alkosh, infused crusher, potl etc is abysmally low.
And obviously there are elite adds who won't have any debuffs at all or will have major breach at best.

So you may safely spent more points into spell erosion, maybe to 2500 of total pen from CP. Also be ready to have your own ele drain in dungeons, next patch a lot of tanks will switch to another morph of puncture which lacks major breach and good pug healers are quite rare. It is usually semi-dps who just slotted resto for fast queue and uses something like mutagen+BoL.

malistorr

Yeah, I'll have to give myself enough pen, without using a Sharpened staff or the pen mundus stone. So since I won't get any from gear, I'll have to use CP to get my (self-provided) pen.