Frost Staff

MindOfTheSwarm

kringled_1 wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

kringled_1 wrote: »

As it is on live, if you run a frost staff on back bar, you can block big hits about as effectively as on a S+B bar. You still have some self snare, and I think S+B has additional projectile mitigation, but it's close to as good. Running another staff means those hits will do much more damage. In practice, if you're tanking easier content, you can run the other staves. If you know the content super well and can guarantee that you will be on the S+B bar at all important times, you can run the other staves. But if the big hits aren't as well telegraphed, or you have something like the Relequen bar swap mechanic going on, you may need to take a big hit on the other bar, and if you don't have that extra mitigation, then a nocturnals favor may well kill you.

I think you missed my point. I asked ‘how so?’ Because I had shifted those passives into Elemental Susceptibility. Making it so that any staff can tank effectively by slitting b that skill which would also serve as a taunt.

I did miss that in part, but since your version of the passives change block cost to magicka, it doesn't really serve as a complete substitute. I don't take tri-focus on my tank because I want block cost to stay stamina. Currently people have the flexibility by taking the passives separately.

It is interesting you do not take the tri-focus passive, perhaps it could be changed to blocking costs your highest resource. Although, from a certain angle it does suit a staff costing Magicka to block. Perhaps, it could work similar to CP Steed. When you block you gain a damage shield that refreshes every 2 seconds while you block. This would make more sense over a fully charged heavy giving a shield and make more sense from a 'Ice Shield' used for defence. Having this shield then scale from your highest resource would enable the staff to benefit both Stam and Magicka toons.

idk

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Does Frost Staff really need to be the dedicated tanking staff?

In the current design of the game, yes, Some players wanted a magicka tanking weapon. Zos seemed to choose the frost staff for this as it was already in the game (they did not want to design anything new), the least used of the three dStaves, and it lines up with the tanking skill line of the Warden that was added about a year after the retrofit.

Is it ideal? Of course not. Designing a dedicated Magicka tanking skill line would have been ideal and lead to less confusion with new players. However, that takes much more work and actually thinking through an entire 5 skills from the ground up, not to forget thinking through all the passives from the ground up. Laziness won the day.

MashmalloMan

idk wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Does Frost Staff really need to be the dedicated tanking staff?

... it lines up with the tanking skill line of the Warden that was added about a year after the retrofit.

ZOS updated frost staves 1 major update before Morrowind(May 2017) with the Homestead(Jan 2017) patch, which lead most people to believe they did the change (along with nerfing Templar healers) with Warden's in mind. This makes perfect sense given how their game developement cycles work and of course, like you stated, Warden's tanking skill line is related to Frost.

Below is a quote from Rich and the transcribed interview from May 27 2020 showing ZOS's decisions in a patch "today" could be directly influenced by whatever they have planned to release 3-9 months into the future. Just look at the new trial sets from Greymoor and then look at the proposed changes to light/heavy attacks. There is an obvious theme related between them.

Laziness will always win.. If we want a new tanking weapon, it's going to be sold as part of a chapter. Do we really think ZOS would make a new weapon for the least played role in the game? I don't think so. @ESO_Nightingale is on track with most of their ideas, the only logical fix is to redesign frost staves to be more inclusive of dps and tanking. Making a new passive for only taunt and/or updating a skill for taunting is the best fix.

theDTV wrote: »

19.
Q: Are we still on the same release cycle. (With everything going on in the world right now)
A: We are still commited to the quarterly updates. We are working on Update 27. Next internal date for it is tomorrow. (28.05). We are already working on Update 28, 29 and even Update 30 (The next Chapter)

Links:

Interview: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/6789337#Comment_6789337
Homestead Patch: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/311708/pts-patch-notes-v2-7-0-homestead/p1
Morrowind Patch: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/345258/pc-mac-patch-notes-v3-0-5-morrowind-amp-update-14#latest

Algorax

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Does Frost Staff really need to be the dedicated tanking staff? I mean it is called a 'Destruction' Staff after all. Also, the heavy attack is very similar to the fire staff, whereas the Lightning Staff has a unique channel. I have an idea for the staff while still retaining function for tanking as an option but on all staves.

Frost Heavy Attack:

No longer lobs a massive snowball, instead it channels a cone of icy wind before releasing a frost nova in the same cone area. This is similar to Lightning staff but has limited range as a tradeoff for being a small AOE. About the same area as say Mesmerize in Vampire Skill line (7m).

General Destruction Staff changes:

Elemental Susceptibility changed to Elemental Mockery:

Send the elements to sap an enemy's defenses, afflicting them with Major Breach for 20 seconds, reducing their Spell Resistance by 5280.
Taunt the enemy for 20 seconds forcing them to attack you. While slotted, blocking costs Magicka instead of Stamina and the cost of blocking is reduced by 30% and increases the amount of damage you block by 20%.

*Basically removed tanking from passives and put into an ability which would allow any staff be a tanking option.

Tri-Focus:

Fully-charged Frost Heavy Attack freezes all enemies hit, stunning them for 3 seconds.

*Replaces tanking passives to make it feel more like how a Frost Staff would work.

Ancient Knowledge:

Frost Staff increases your Spell Critical by 8%.

*Staff version of how Dagger's work.


With these changes, Frost Staff viability as a damage option increases, while at the same time you open up the possibility that any staff can now tank as it is tied to a morph of one skill.


@ESO_Nightingale

I can understand that the frost staff is... problematic to many players. And in fact it is truly unusable on PvE contenti if you are not a magika tank.
But where it truly shines in on PvP, where it becomes even preferable to the other 2 kinds of staves, and even to an healing staff if you roll an healer.
It depends mostly on the build but in pvp you would get a cheap shield and the capability to parry much more and much more efficiently, which is a game changer in pvp, while alsoretaining the damaging and healing capabilities of your original build.
It IS an exellent tradeoff, if done carefully.

But your ideas are intriguing nontheless. I roll a pvp frostcaster and it would be nice to see what i could acheive with a different approach to frost staves!

MindOfTheSwarm

Algorax wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Does Frost Staff really need to be the dedicated tanking staff? I mean it is called a 'Destruction' Staff after all. Also, the heavy attack is very similar to the fire staff, whereas the Lightning Staff has a unique channel. I have an idea for the staff while still retaining function for tanking as an option but on all staves.

Frost Heavy Attack:

No longer lobs a massive snowball, instead it channels a cone of icy wind before releasing a frost nova in the same cone area. This is similar to Lightning staff but has limited range as a tradeoff for being a small AOE. About the same area as say Mesmerize in Vampire Skill line (7m).

General Destruction Staff changes:

Elemental Susceptibility changed to Elemental Mockery:

Send the elements to sap an enemy's defenses, afflicting them with Major Breach for 20 seconds, reducing their Spell Resistance by 5280.
Taunt the enemy for 20 seconds forcing them to attack you. While slotted, blocking costs Magicka instead of Stamina and the cost of blocking is reduced by 30% and increases the amount of damage you block by 20%.

*Basically removed tanking from passives and put into an ability which would allow any staff be a tanking option.

Tri-Focus:

Fully-charged Frost Heavy Attack freezes all enemies hit, stunning them for 3 seconds.

*Replaces tanking passives to make it feel more like how a Frost Staff would work.

Ancient Knowledge:

Frost Staff increases your Spell Critical by 8%.

*Staff version of how Dagger's work.


With these changes, Frost Staff viability as a damage option increases, while at the same time you open up the possibility that any staff can now tank as it is tied to a morph of one skill.


@ESO_Nightingale

I can understand that the frost staff is... problematic to many players. And in fact it is truly unusable on PvE contenti if you are not a magika tank.
But where it truly shines in on PvP, where it becomes even preferable to the other 2 kinds of staves, and even to an healing staff if you roll an healer.
It depends mostly on the build but in pvp you would get a cheap shield and the capability to parry much more and much more efficiently, which is a game changer in pvp, while alsoretaining the damaging and healing capabilities of your original build.
It IS an exellent tradeoff, if done carefully.

But your ideas are intriguing nontheless. I roll a pvp frostcaster and it would be nice to see what i could acheive with a different approach to frost staves!

To be honest it is not completely useless in PVE. Wall of Elements, Destructive Touch, Impulse and Light and Heavy attacks all deal more damage than the other staves when playing on a Magicka Warden. This is due to the passive a Warden has that increases their Frost Damage by 10%. Whereas Fire and Lightning staves only give an 8% buff to Direct and AoE skills respectively. That only leaves Force Shock and Elemental Rage that deal more damage on the other staves. So then the question is “How many non-Destro skills am I running that deal damage?” Presumably you will have shalks and Winter’s Revenge for AoE and these do benefit more from Lightning staff as does Northern Storm. Bear and flies on the other hand benefit from Fire staff. Currently on my Frost Mage I am literally only running 1 skill that does not deal Frost Damage and so Frost Staff actually does end up giving me the most DPS on my setup. The issue then is just my skills that are not Destro skills, this is why I suggested changing Frost staff to benefit Crit Chance instead of taunting as Frost mages need both high Max Magicka and decent Crit to perform well.

Ps. Northern Storm is not a bad option for PvE DPS builds due to the 15% extra Max Magicka for 30 seconds, which depending on your Max Magicka stat can be the equivalent of anywhere between 400 and 900 extra spell damage.

JTD

The problem for destruction staves (frost especially)

Tri focus
Fully-charged Flame Staff Heavy Attacks deal 12% additional damage. Shock Staff Heavy Attacks damage nearby enemies for 100% of the damage done. Fully-charged Frost Staff Heavy Attacks taunt the enemy to attack you for 15 seconds and grant a damage shield that absorbs 699 damage. While a Frost Staff is equipped, blocking costs Magicka instead of Stamina.

and,

Ancient knowledge
Equipping a Flame Staff increases your damage done with single target abilities by 8%. Equipping a Lightning Staff increases your damage done with area of effect abilities by 8%. Equipping a Frost Staff reduces the cost of blocking by 36% and increases the amount of damage you block by 20%.

This makes it so that in MOST cases the frost staff is under performing in group content. Not taking a passive skill in a weapon skill is per definition a loss compared to the other staves.

BUT, even equipping a lightning staff is often not desired cause the single target damage boosts of the flame staff outweigh the AOE increase. Not to speak of the difference in 'burning', 'off balance' and 'Chilled' mechanics.

Combine that again with almost every boss-fight being a single target fight you have your answer in preferred magicka staff.

MorganaBlue

When I started playing a little over two years ago, Frost staves were destro staves and the tri-focus passive did NOT give a taunt.

I've been waiting two years for them to revert the changes ffs. Frost staves were not designed as utility staves but as destro staves. Give them back to DPS, please.

Algorax

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Algorax wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Does Frost Staff really need to be the dedicated tanking staff? I mean it is called a 'Destruction' Staff after all. Also, the heavy attack is very similar to the fire staff, whereas the Lightning Staff has a unique channel. I have an idea for the staff while still retaining function for tanking as an option but on all staves.

Frost Heavy Attack:

No longer lobs a massive snowball, instead it channels a cone of icy wind before releasing a frost nova in the same cone area. This is similar to Lightning staff but has limited range as a tradeoff for being a small AOE. About the same area as say Mesmerize in Vampire Skill line (7m).

General Destruction Staff changes:

Elemental Susceptibility changed to Elemental Mockery:

Send the elements to sap an enemy's defenses, afflicting them with Major Breach for 20 seconds, reducing their Spell Resistance by 5280.
Taunt the enemy for 20 seconds forcing them to attack you. While slotted, blocking costs Magicka instead of Stamina and the cost of blocking is reduced by 30% and increases the amount of damage you block by 20%.

*Basically removed tanking from passives and put into an ability which would allow any staff be a tanking option.

Tri-Focus:

Fully-charged Frost Heavy Attack freezes all enemies hit, stunning them for 3 seconds.

*Replaces tanking passives to make it feel more like how a Frost Staff would work.

Ancient Knowledge:

Frost Staff increases your Spell Critical by 8%.

*Staff version of how Dagger's work.


With these changes, Frost Staff viability as a damage option increases, while at the same time you open up the possibility that any staff can now tank as it is tied to a morph of one skill.


@ESO_Nightingale

I can understand that the frost staff is... problematic to many players. And in fact it is truly unusable on PvE contenti if you are not a magika tank.
But where it truly shines in on PvP, where it becomes even preferable to the other 2 kinds of staves, and even to an healing staff if you roll an healer.
It depends mostly on the build but in pvp you would get a cheap shield and the capability to parry much more and much more efficiently, which is a game changer in pvp, while alsoretaining the damaging and healing capabilities of your original build.
It IS an exellent tradeoff, if done carefully.

But your ideas are intriguing nontheless. I roll a pvp frostcaster and it would be nice to see what i could acheive with a different approach to frost staves!

To be honest it is not completely useless in PVE. Wall of Elements, Destructive Touch, Impulse and Light and Heavy attacks all deal more damage than the other staves when playing on a Magicka Warden. This is due to the passive a Warden has that increases their Frost Damage by 10%. Whereas Fire and Lightning staves only give an 8% buff to Direct and AoE skills respectively. That only leaves Force Shock and Elemental Rage that deal more damage on the other staves. So then the question is “How many non-Destro skills am I running that deal damage?” Presumably you will have shalks and Winter’s Revenge for AoE and these do benefit more from Lightning staff as does Northern Storm. Bear and flies on the other hand benefit from Fire staff. Currently on my Frost Mage I am literally only running 1 skill that does not deal Frost Damage and so Frost Staff actually does end up giving me the most DPS on my setup. The issue then is just my skills that are not Destro skills, this is why I suggested changing Frost staff to benefit Crit Chance instead of taunting as Frost mages need both high Max Magicka and decent Crit to perform well.

Ps. Northern Storm is not a bad option for PvE DPS builds due to the 15% extra Max Magicka for 30 seconds, which depending on your Max Magicka stat can be the equivalent of anywhere between 400 and 900 extra spell damage.

Well, first of all is uncorrect that your frost staves heavy attacks would strike harder thanks to warden passives: the benefit you get from them will never surpass the "Tri Focus" perk for flame staves, which is a straight 12% damage boost to heavy attacks.
That said you don't want to pull an enemy on PvE endgame content every time you perform an heavy attack.
Force shock, destructive touch and impulse do not have any morph changing the amount of damage and so they may rely on other passives to become more effective.
Instead wall of elements has a morph, elemental blockade, which gives a significant boost to your damage if you play with a flame staf, increasing the overall damage to burning enemies, and if you are wielding a lightning staff, which will cause concussed enemies to become off balanced.

So, to summerize, you will never reach the same damage efficiency of other staves and you cannot base the judjement of the frost staves on the use of the sole warden class

elfman236b14_ESO

I've been thinking about the frost staves, would it be better just to let staves convert SnB skills to magicka skills when used with a staff equipped with the tri-focus on?

Kind of like how the Destro kills change to whichever staff is equipped, so would the SnB skills. Sounds doable

MindOfTheSwarm

Algorax wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Algorax wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Does Frost Staff really need to be the dedicated tanking staff? I mean it is called a 'Destruction' Staff after all. Also, the heavy attack is very similar to the fire staff, whereas the Lightning Staff has a unique channel. I have an idea for the staff while still retaining function for tanking as an option but on all staves.

Frost Heavy Attack:

No longer lobs a massive snowball, instead it channels a cone of icy wind before releasing a frost nova in the same cone area. This is similar to Lightning staff but has limited range as a tradeoff for being a small AOE. About the same area as say Mesmerize in Vampire Skill line (7m).

General Destruction Staff changes:

Elemental Susceptibility changed to Elemental Mockery:

Send the elements to sap an enemy's defenses, afflicting them with Major Breach for 20 seconds, reducing their Spell Resistance by 5280.
Taunt the enemy for 20 seconds forcing them to attack you. While slotted, blocking costs Magicka instead of Stamina and the cost of blocking is reduced by 30% and increases the amount of damage you block by 20%.

*Basically removed tanking from passives and put into an ability which would allow any staff be a tanking option.

Tri-Focus:

Fully-charged Frost Heavy Attack freezes all enemies hit, stunning them for 3 seconds.

*Replaces tanking passives to make it feel more like how a Frost Staff would work.

Ancient Knowledge:

Frost Staff increases your Spell Critical by 8%.

*Staff version of how Dagger's work.


With these changes, Frost Staff viability as a damage option increases, while at the same time you open up the possibility that any staff can now tank as it is tied to a morph of one skill.


@ESO_Nightingale

I can understand that the frost staff is... problematic to many players. And in fact it is truly unusable on PvE contenti if you are not a magika tank.
But where it truly shines in on PvP, where it becomes even preferable to the other 2 kinds of staves, and even to an healing staff if you roll an healer.
It depends mostly on the build but in pvp you would get a cheap shield and the capability to parry much more and much more efficiently, which is a game changer in pvp, while alsoretaining the damaging and healing capabilities of your original build.
It IS an exellent tradeoff, if done carefully.

But your ideas are intriguing nontheless. I roll a pvp frostcaster and it would be nice to see what i could acheive with a different approach to frost staves!

To be honest it is not completely useless in PVE. Wall of Elements, Destructive Touch, Impulse and Light and Heavy attacks all deal more damage than the other staves when playing on a Magicka Warden. This is due to the passive a Warden has that increases their Frost Damage by 10%. Whereas Fire and Lightning staves only give an 8% buff to Direct and AoE skills respectively. That only leaves Force Shock and Elemental Rage that deal more damage on the other staves. So then the question is “How many non-Destro skills am I running that deal damage?” Presumably you will have shalks and Winter’s Revenge for AoE and these do benefit more from Lightning staff as does Northern Storm. Bear and flies on the other hand benefit from Fire staff. Currently on my Frost Mage I am literally only running 1 skill that does not deal Frost Damage and so Frost Staff actually does end up giving me the most DPS on my setup. The issue then is just my skills that are not Destro skills, this is why I suggested changing Frost staff to benefit Crit Chance instead of taunting as Frost mages need both high Max Magicka and decent Crit to perform well.

Ps. Northern Storm is not a bad option for PvE DPS builds due to the 15% extra Max Magicka for 30 seconds, which depending on your Max Magicka stat can be the equivalent of anywhere between 400 and 900 extra spell damage.

Well, first of all is uncorrect that your frost staves heavy attacks would strike harder thanks to warden passives: the benefit you get from them will never surpass the "Tri Focus" perk for flame staves, which is a straight 12% damage boost to heavy attacks.
That said you don't want to pull an enemy on PvE endgame content every time you perform an heavy attack.
Force shock, destructive touch and impulse do not have any morph changing the amount of damage and so they may rely on other passives to become more effective.
Instead wall of elements has a morph, elemental blockade, which gives a significant boost to your damage if you play with a flame staf, increasing the overall damage to burning enemies, and if you are wielding a lightning staff, which will cause concussed enemies to become off balanced.

So, to summerize, you will never reach the same damage efficiency of other staves and you cannot base the judjement of the frost staves on the use of the sole warden class

Yeah I messed up on the heavy attacks. but everything else counts. Don't forget Warden's have access to Off Balance in their kit.

ESO_Nightingale

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Algorax wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Algorax wrote: »

MindOfTheSwarm wrote: »

Does Frost Staff really need to be the dedicated tanking staff? I mean it is called a 'Destruction' Staff after all. Also, the heavy attack is very similar to the fire staff, whereas the Lightning Staff has a unique channel. I have an idea for the staff while still retaining function for tanking as an option but on all staves.

Frost Heavy Attack:

No longer lobs a massive snowball, instead it channels a cone of icy wind before releasing a frost nova in the same cone area. This is similar to Lightning staff but has limited range as a tradeoff for being a small AOE. About the same area as say Mesmerize in Vampire Skill line (7m).

General Destruction Staff changes:

Elemental Susceptibility changed to Elemental Mockery:

Send the elements to sap an enemy's defenses, afflicting them with Major Breach for 20 seconds, reducing their Spell Resistance by 5280.
Taunt the enemy for 20 seconds forcing them to attack you. While slotted, blocking costs Magicka instead of Stamina and the cost of blocking is reduced by 30% and increases the amount of damage you block by 20%.

*Basically removed tanking from passives and put into an ability which would allow any staff be a tanking option.

Tri-Focus:

Fully-charged Frost Heavy Attack freezes all enemies hit, stunning them for 3 seconds.

*Replaces tanking passives to make it feel more like how a Frost Staff would work.

Ancient Knowledge:

Frost Staff increases your Spell Critical by 8%.

*Staff version of how Dagger's work.


With these changes, Frost Staff viability as a damage option increases, while at the same time you open up the possibility that any staff can now tank as it is tied to a morph of one skill.


@ESO_Nightingale

I can understand that the frost staff is... problematic to many players. And in fact it is truly unusable on PvE contenti if you are not a magika tank.
But where it truly shines in on PvP, where it becomes even preferable to the other 2 kinds of staves, and even to an healing staff if you roll an healer.
It depends mostly on the build but in pvp you would get a cheap shield and the capability to parry much more and much more efficiently, which is a game changer in pvp, while alsoretaining the damaging and healing capabilities of your original build.
It IS an exellent tradeoff, if done carefully.

But your ideas are intriguing nontheless. I roll a pvp frostcaster and it would be nice to see what i could acheive with a different approach to frost staves!

To be honest it is not completely useless in PVE. Wall of Elements, Destructive Touch, Impulse and Light and Heavy attacks all deal more damage than the other staves when playing on a Magicka Warden. This is due to the passive a Warden has that increases their Frost Damage by 10%. Whereas Fire and Lightning staves only give an 8% buff to Direct and AoE skills respectively. That only leaves Force Shock and Elemental Rage that deal more damage on the other staves. So then the question is “How many non-Destro skills am I running that deal damage?” Presumably you will have shalks and Winter’s Revenge for AoE and these do benefit more from Lightning staff as does Northern Storm. Bear and flies on the other hand benefit from Fire staff. Currently on my Frost Mage I am literally only running 1 skill that does not deal Frost Damage and so Frost Staff actually does end up giving me the most DPS on my setup. The issue then is just my skills that are not Destro skills, this is why I suggested changing Frost staff to benefit Crit Chance instead of taunting as Frost mages need both high Max Magicka and decent Crit to perform well.

Ps. Northern Storm is not a bad option for PvE DPS builds due to the 15% extra Max Magicka for 30 seconds, which depending on your Max Magicka stat can be the equivalent of anywhere between 400 and 900 extra spell damage.

Well, first of all is uncorrect that your frost staves heavy attacks would strike harder thanks to warden passives: the benefit you get from them will never surpass the "Tri Focus" perk for flame staves, which is a straight 12% damage boost to heavy attacks.
That said you don't want to pull an enemy on PvE endgame content every time you perform an heavy attack.
Force shock, destructive touch and impulse do not have any morph changing the amount of damage and so they may rely on other passives to become more effective.
Instead wall of elements has a morph, elemental blockade, which gives a significant boost to your damage if you play with a flame staf, increasing the overall damage to burning enemies, and if you are wielding a lightning staff, which will cause concussed enemies to become off balanced.

So, to summerize, you will never reach the same damage efficiency of other staves and you cannot base the judjement of the frost staves on the use of the sole warden class

Yeah I messed up on the heavy attacks. but everything else counts. Don't forget Warden's have access to Off Balance in their kit.

it's pretty bad access though ngl.