Thrassian Stranglers Review

Vaoh

In my own gameplay here’s what I’ve noticed with the Thrassian Stranglers....

The Good
• They’re fun to use. Content (particularly solo content) is faster and easier than ever. So much damage is being gained that it makes farming stuff in a public dungeon, solo group dungeon/arena, or whatever it is much quicker.
• Any build is now viable in Vet dungeons. I even played an “Ice Mage” with 1x Iceheart, 5x False God (frontbar), 5x Winter’s Respite, Thrassian Stranglers, and a vMA staff (backbar) for some Vet Wayrest Sewers 2 runs farming Malubeth helm style pages and the damage was still very high. It doesn’t matter what else you put on when you’ve got a free 3K Spell Damage.
• The 40% Shield/Healing Reduction feels like it’s less than that. I don’t feel like I’m struggling more to survive in any content except some trials. In a lot of content I even feel *more safe* with Thrassian Stranglers since the targets die so quickly they can barely put out damage.

The Bad
• Overtime our characters have become far more powerful both in terms of damage and defense. With Thrassian Stranglers, we are basically trading that power creep-based excess defense in order to disproportionately skyrocket our damage. Vet Dungeons feel like they’re on Normal now... not an exaggeration.
• Much more tailored to the very best groups in endgame PvE trials, while being mostly useless to everyone else in trials. This is all already summed up well by WrathofInnos.
• Very clearly overpowered in PvE. Even if they cut the Spell Damage down from 3000 to 1500 I’d still use it.

Overall
It’s the most blatantly OP item to ever exist in ESO. As fun as it is to faceroll content at an unprecedented pace, ESO is becoming too much about facerolling content before mechanics even happen.

I want there to be a lot more Mythic items so that all roles and builds have a Mythic which can alter the original playstyle. Giving out an astronomical 3K Spell Damage just makes Thrassian Stranglers a “if you don’t buy Greymoor you won’t even compare to someone who did” kind of set imo.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Vaoh wrote: »

In my own gameplay here’s what I’ve noticed with the Thrassian Stranglers....

The Good
• They’re fun to use. Content (particularly solo content) is faster and easier than ever. So much damage is being gained that it makes farming stuff in a public dungeon, solo group dungeon/arena, or whatever it is much quicker.
• Any build is now viable in Vet dungeons. I even played an “Ice Mage” with 1x Iceheart, 5x False God (frontbar), 5x Winter’s Respite, Thrassian Stranglers, and a vMA staff (backbar) for some Vet Wayrest Sewers 2 runs farming Malubeth helm style pages and the damage was still very high. It doesn’t matter what else you put on when you’ve got a free 3K Spell Damage.
• The 40% Shield/Healing Reduction feels like it’s less than that. I don’t feel like I’m struggling more to survive in any content except some trials. In a lot of content I even feel *more safe* with Thrassian Stranglers since the targets die so quickly they can barely put out damage.

The Bad
• Overtime our characters have become far more powerful both in terms of damage and defense. With Thrassian Stranglers, we are basically trading that power creep-based excess defense in order to disproportionately skyrocket our damage. Vet Dungeons feel like they’re on Normal now... not an exaggeration.
• Much more tailored to the very best groups in endgame PvE trials, while being mostly useless to everyone else in trials. This is all already summed up well by WrathofInnos.
• Very clearly overpowered in PvE. Even if they cut the Spell Damage down from 3000 to 1500 I’d still use it.

Overall
It’s the most blatantly OP item to ever exist in ESO. As fun as it is to faceroll content at an unprecedented pace, ESO is becoming too much about facerolling content before mechanics even happen.

I want there to be a lot more Mythic items so that all roles and builds have a Mythic which can alter the original playstyle. Giving out an astronomical 3K Spell Damage just makes Thrassian Stranglers a “if you don’t buy Greymoor you won’t even compare to someone who did” kind of set imo.

I think its one of those 40%'s that doesnt end up being 40% at the end of the math equation (ESO math is not my specialty). Part of me thinks the best way to balance these is actually increase the damage taken by a fair amount (yes I am all over the place on these).

I farmed my second ring of the hunt recently. I queued in group finder as a Tank on my NB for the Elden Hollow lead. I did slot a taunt, and I assure you I had all the appropriate aggro, so no one came shame me for being a fake tank. haha.

Didnt really feel any of the big hits (I didnt stand in stupid), and legitimately pulled 90% of group damage. It was a glass cannon MageBlade build, I just replaced one DOT with a taunt. I had pugs complimenting the other DPS as having AMAZING damage. I just quietly LOL'ed.

FrancisCrawford

Zer0_CooL wrote: »

I just wonder if it would work on a bomb blade in pvp

Not one that stealths.

karekiz

As soon as expansion launched 4 man team was running it.

Its silly
Its broken levels OP
It will probably get nerfed

Honestly the worst thing I heard was from a stamina player who said. Yup at the start of the dungeon I do fine. By the end of it I might as well reroll.

The fact that literally 4 kills is worth 20 stacks of siroria that has a movement penalty is proof alone that its a tad bit much. If you were to tell people 1 year ago that you would be running around with the spell damage this gives, people would have thought you were insane.

Also silly Stam DPS have no PvE equal for it. 0_o

Vaoh

karekiz wrote: »

As soon as expansion launched 4 man team was running it.

Its silly
Its broken levels OP
It will probably get nerfed

Honestly the worst thing I heard was from a stamina player who said. Yup at the start of the dungeon I do fine. By the end of it I might as well reroll.

The fact that literally 4 kills is worth 20 stacks of siroria that has a movement penalty is proof alone that its a tad bit much. If you were to tell people 1 year ago that you would be running around with the spell damage this gives, people would have thought you were insane.

Also silly Stam DPS have no PvE equal for it. 0_o

Yes they do......

Stam DPS can go Thrassian Stranglers with 5x Pelinal’s Aptitude on body, and stack everything into Spell Damage

thorwyn

Side question:
I know that the Thrassian stacks are removed after porting into a new zone. How does it work in trials like Cloudrest when you are entering a portal or the time rifts in Sunspire? Do these portals reset the Thrassian stacks too?

MudcrabAttack

Vaoh wrote: »

karekiz wrote: »

As soon as expansion launched 4 man team was running it.

Its silly
Its broken levels OP
It will probably get nerfed

Honestly the worst thing I heard was from a stamina player who said. Yup at the start of the dungeon I do fine. By the end of it I might as well reroll.

The fact that literally 4 kills is worth 20 stacks of siroria that has a movement penalty is proof alone that its a tad bit much. If you were to tell people 1 year ago that you would be running around with the spell damage this gives, people would have thought you were insane.

Also silly Stam DPS have no PvE equal for it. 0_o

Yes they do......

Stam DPS can go Thrassian Stranglers with 5x Pelinal’s Aptitude on body, and stack everything into Spell Damage

Yeah I see around a 10-15% bump in damage on the stamblade in Thrassian/pelinal. It pretty much demolishes pledges.

I swap between Tzogvin for AOE trash mob damage and relequen for boss fighting. Power extraction works to provide the major sorcery. Imagine hitting 10% more single target damage in spite of adding power extraction to a rotation.

fred4

For me these have been great. I have not made a serious attempt of using them in PvP, because my first impression was that my magplar became way too squishy with them. If the additional damage taken was reduced then, like Oreyn_Bearclaw, I would be afraid of them becoming truly useful, there, not less so.

I don't do trials. As a PvPer, what it has done for me is make vDSA accessible. Not only had this been quite inaccessible for my circle of friends (PvPers), but not having good DPS had made it plain tedious. I've always enjoyed vMA. vDSA and BRP not so much until this item came along. As a PvPer I don't play optimised PvE DPS builds, but builds that bear a resemblence to my PvP ones with some self-healing and defense. These suit this item down to the ground. Those two arenas arguably yield PvP weapons. I am grateful that I can now farm them with something resembling my PvP build. While nDSA now also drops weapons, vDSA is finally becoming fun.

Funnily enough it has also made overland more fun. I was OP before, but mobs still snare you and CC you. I used to prefer my cloaking magblade when you needed to get something done, such as farming leads. Now templar is basically just as fast. Overland has turned from super annoying to kind of fun as you insta-kill everything.

Grianasteri

I've been running in groups using this set for dlc vet dungeons, including hard modes.

Its OP. Simple as that. Its too powerful. With a decent healer and a decent tank, you can now face role vet dlc dungeons, skipping mechanics as if it were on normal. I do not think that is positive for the over all game.

Is it fun? Hell yeah. High risk, high reward.

We did encounter some dungeons where the damage was just too much to use the stranglers, Depths of Malatar springs to mind and there are plenty of others, we had to drop them and revert to normal group compositions. Although with that said, the flip side is that we also tried dropping a healer altogether and going with three dps, and apart from the hardest content I elude to above, I mean stuff just disappeared, boss fights that are usually intensely difficult, they just got deleted in seconds.

Perhaps worth noting that at points we were hitting 9 or 10k overall spell damage each I think. Oh and yeah, you have to manage the stacks, you have to take it in turns during add pulls to build your stacks. I think perhaps this is an intended function, perhaps to make it more difficult to run multiple strangler groups, in which case fair enough.

I could say more but the last thing to point out, is no one should think chucking this set on will magically make them a god, you still have to know how to play, and you certainly have to know how to avoid damage altogether, or you die, fast.

JTD

Grianasteri wrote: »

I could say more but the last thing to point out, is no one should think chucking this set on will magically make them a god, you still have to know how to play, and you certainly have to know how to avoid damage altogether, or you die, fast.

And here in lies the difficulty. It raises the skill ceiling by a hell of a lot. Which in itself I do not mind at all. Good players being rewarded for their excellence is a good thing.

The question is will newer content be designed around this item (and accompanying DPS)?

As an example in four man content we let the 2dds wearing this set alternate the last hits on mobs. It builds their stacks very easy and both em as tank and the healer have no problems in keeping them alive or keeping the mobs off them. Something that will oneshot you without will oneshot you with this item..

Oreyn_Bearclaw

thorwyn wrote: »

Side question:
I know that the Thrassian stacks are removed after porting into a new zone. How does it work in trials like Cloudrest when you are entering a portal or the time rifts in Sunspire? Do these portals reset the Thrassian stacks too?

Dont know about Cloudrest. I would guess the stacks stay. In Cyro for what its worth, you can use wayshrines and keep recall stones and keep your stacks. You cannot go into a delve to grab the AP buff. You lose stacks on the way in and the way out. You also seem to lose porting into your house. I might need to build a 20 stack of 3 million health dummies just for fun.

Stahlor

Grianasteri wrote: »

I've been running in groups using this set for dlc vet dungeons, including hard modes.

Its OP. Simple as that. Its too powerful. With a decent healer and a decent tank, you can now face role vet dlc dungeons, skipping mechanics as if it were on normal. I do not think that is positive for the over all game.

Is it fun? Hell yeah. High risk, high reward.

We did encounter some dungeons where the damage was just too much to use the stranglers, Depths of Malatar springs to mind and there are plenty of others, we had to drop them and revert to normal group compositions. Although with that said, the flip side is that we also tried dropping a healer altogether and going with three dps, and apart from the hardest content I elude to above, I mean stuff just disappeared, boss fights that are usually intensely difficult, they just got deleted in seconds.

Perhaps worth noting that at points we were hitting 9 or 10k overall spell damage each I think. Oh and yeah, you have to manage the stacks, you have to take it in turns during add pulls to build your stacks. I think perhaps this is an intended function, perhaps to make it more difficult to run multiple strangler groups, in which case fair enough.

I could say more but the last thing to point out, is no one should think chucking this set on will magically make them a god, you still have to know how to play, and you certainly have to know how to avoid damage altogether, or you die, fast.

That's nothing new and already was like that before without Thrassian Strangler. 3 proper DD's, a Tank and everything melts. Same issue here with the DLC dungeons, where you have very high damage income. So I cannot see why Thrassian is op...

Tanis-Stormbinder

Stahlor wrote: »

Grianasteri wrote: »

I've been running in groups using this set for dlc vet dungeons, including hard modes.

Its OP. Simple as that. Its too powerful. With a decent healer and a decent tank, you can now face role vet dlc dungeons, skipping mechanics as if it were on normal. I do not think that is positive for the over all game.

Is it fun? Hell yeah. High risk, high reward.

We did encounter some dungeons where the damage was just too much to use the stranglers, Depths of Malatar springs to mind and there are plenty of others, we had to drop them and revert to normal group compositions. Although with that said, the flip side is that we also tried dropping a healer altogether and going with three dps, and apart from the hardest content I elude to above, I mean stuff just disappeared, boss fights that are usually intensely difficult, they just got deleted in seconds.

Perhaps worth noting that at points we were hitting 9 or 10k overall spell damage each I think. Oh and yeah, you have to manage the stacks, you have to take it in turns during add pulls to build your stacks. I think perhaps this is an intended function, perhaps to make it more difficult to run multiple strangler groups, in which case fair enough.

I could say more but the last thing to point out, is no one should think chucking this set on will magically make them a god, you still have to know how to play, and you certainly have to know how to avoid damage altogether, or you die, fast.

That's nothing new and already was like that before without Thrassian Strangler. 3 proper DD's, a Tank and everything melts. Same issue here with the DLC dungeons, where you have very high damage income. So I cannot see why Thrassian is op...

I totally agree, this item set just puts magic dps on par with stamina dps

Ragnaroek93

Much fun to fish for hours just to get no leads at all. Let's gate this item behind the most awful content in the entire game.

karekiz

Stahlor wrote: »

Grianasteri wrote: »

I've been running in groups using this set for dlc vet dungeons, including hard modes.

Its OP. Simple as that. Its too powerful. With a decent healer and a decent tank, you can now face role vet dlc dungeons, skipping mechanics as if it were on normal. I do not think that is positive for the over all game.

Is it fun? Hell yeah. High risk, high reward.

We did encounter some dungeons where the damage was just too much to use the stranglers, Depths of Malatar springs to mind and there are plenty of others, we had to drop them and revert to normal group compositions. Although with that said, the flip side is that we also tried dropping a healer altogether and going with three dps, and apart from the hardest content I elude to above, I mean stuff just disappeared, boss fights that are usually intensely difficult, they just got deleted in seconds.

Perhaps worth noting that at points we were hitting 9 or 10k overall spell damage each I think. Oh and yeah, you have to manage the stacks, you have to take it in turns during add pulls to build your stacks. I think perhaps this is an intended function, perhaps to make it more difficult to run multiple strangler groups, in which case fair enough.

I could say more but the last thing to point out, is no one should think chucking this set on will magically make them a god, you still have to know how to play, and you certainly have to know how to avoid damage altogether, or you die, fast.

That's nothing new and already was like that before without Thrassian Strangler. 3 proper DD's, a Tank and everything melts. Same issue here with the DLC dungeons, where you have very high damage income. So I cannot see why Thrassian is op...

If three DPS is stong with tank.

Slap some heals on tank and go three DPS with stranglers.