Crystal Blast is Gone?

Lord-Otto

Sarannah wrote: »

I always play one-bar builds, as I like to relax when playing a game. Crystal blast in combination with pets is(was) very important to me. The stun allowed my pets to engage, and kept the monster in my aoe.

After trying the other here suggested AOE's, I'm getting more and more frustrated by it, as the monsters keep running out of them towards my pets.

My clannfear now has no time to grab aggro. My flying pet(forgot the name) is usually the first to attack, since it is ranged, pulling the mob to it while it itself is far behind me. Making me lose LOS, while making the monster run out of my ground AOE, and while at the same time making the clannfear dps/aggro void, since it just runs after the mob(without catching up to it until it stops moving).
Not to mention, when up against multiple enemies, the crystal blast AOE worked like a charm, since all monsters are usually grouped up when you pull them.

I don't really care about DPS, it was just an extremely usefull and fun skill all-around. And with the cast time, I don't see why it got nerfed. Just add the AOE and stun back to the magicka morph.

Throw Volcanic Rune.
And the scamp is for magicka builds. Also stuns.

LordProteus

I actually used this ability so it sucks they just decided to replace it completely. Worse, they didn't even give us a respec to change it to something else. I had no use for the new stamina ability.

the1andonlyskwex

geschaftmaker wrote: »

the1andonlyskwex wrote: »

They don't see being AoE as an advantage, even though it makes a huge difference in tons of practical situations that people encounter all the time.

In their defense, these people don't really care about AoE because they get enough to satisfy their needs from the small number of AoE skills that actually result in higher single target DPS, or they can slot something like Elemental Ring to one-shot overland trash.

Woa woa stop, so do they care about aoe or not? First you say they don't care about aoe, but then you say they've got aoe skills with more dps and lesser cast time (i.e. better, right? ) and use ele ring and stuff to oneshot things? Looks like contradiction in your speech for me.

And Crystal Blast was not oneshotting anything anyway, it was just useless on the upper level of gameplay. And you say they don't like it for being aoe, it's kinda manipulation here. They don't use it because it is inefficient, since they do use other aoe skills being efficient for aoe purposes. You wrote that, right?

Looks like you mix up trial pve builds with solo builds, the latter definitely require lots of aoe.

And speaking of oneshotting, you won't definitely acquire equip required for that while spamming Crystal Blast. It was a niche skill for beer-sipping questing and no more than that. And I do understand and respect those protecting such playstyle until it fits their easy-chilling purposes. But you try to manipulate things here, talking about single dps and stuff. No one have ever recommended crystal blast for any serious solo build exactly due to its inefficiency and impossibility to efficiently use any other skills with it, while they did recommended other aoe skills. Any of them, but never this particular one.

Way to twist my words.

Crystal Blast was BY FAR the most powerful burst AoE skill in the game (doing literally double the damage of anything else). The so-called experts didn't value it though because their builds don't need strong AoE. Weaker alternatives are good enough for them because their builds are so optimized for maximum DPS that they can afford to sacrifice AoE to improve their single target damage. If you can one-shot trash with Elemental Ring you don't need Crystal Blast.

As for the experts on "solo" builds, they're still all optimizing for single-target DPS because their builds are all designed for soloing dungeon and world bosses. Again, where mediocre AoE damage is fine because they're running golded out DPS gear and 810 CP optimized for high DPS.

Where Crystal Blast shined was for people who needed good AoE and didn't have those optimized DPS builds, like people who are at lower CP or who primarily tank or heal but still like to do overland content.

geschaftmaker

@the1andonlyskwex

So you say it's cool aoe but they did not use it because they had worse aoe and golden stuff to make it sufficient? Why not use that "better" skill then, they still needed at least one button for that "mediocre" aoe when building for solo? Still looks like kinda logical manipulation for me. And I didn't see it in recommendations for newbs neither, because it is a dead end regarding further development of characters in the game.

And when you say about golden equip you should also keep in mind that trash mobs are obviously simplier than arena and stuff, no?

And what about world bosses? I could not kill them with CB and had to avoid them due to this. Dungeon ones were also difficult enough due to quick mana depletion and it was kinda excess expenditure regarding single target dps. And I definitely would not get any good clothes and stuff by spamming Crystal Blast due to limitation of its use by just overland trash.

I don't argue about CB being cool and easy skill for trash mobs, I used it myself and if consider being simple as part of less effort contributing to overal efficiency having in mind the simplicity as a goal it was obviously cool, that was my point here from the very start and I don't deny it. But 1. the skill is gone and those willing it back are minority 2. there are still options for easy play like Templar or other magsorc skills. Developers made their choice and it looks adequate, you can't make everyone happy but you can try minimize the number of unhappy ones and it was made by satisfying those who wanted stamsorc class spammable that they obviously lack, while disturbing minimally possible audience since the deleted skill was not popular, and the latter still have options to choose like picking another class or trying to retrain their playstyle, like I do. That's my point.

Couple "easy sorc" videos (may not all be doable depending on achieved progress in the game but people can get some useful ideas maybe):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ7B-lH4Yg8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRbAWFV5WNo

Lord-Otto

the1andonlyskwex wrote: »

geschaftmaker wrote: »

the1andonlyskwex wrote: »

They don't see being AoE as an advantage, even though it makes a huge difference in tons of practical situations that people encounter all the time.

In their defense, these people don't really care about AoE because they get enough to satisfy their needs from the small number of AoE skills that actually result in higher single target DPS, or they can slot something like Elemental Ring to one-shot overland trash.

Woa woa stop, so do they care about aoe or not? First you say they don't care about aoe, but then you say they've got aoe skills with more dps and lesser cast time (i.e. better, right? ) and use ele ring and stuff to oneshot things? Looks like contradiction in your speech for me.

And Crystal Blast was not oneshotting anything anyway, it was just useless on the upper level of gameplay. And you say they don't like it for being aoe, it's kinda manipulation here. They don't use it because it is inefficient, since they do use other aoe skills being efficient for aoe purposes. You wrote that, right?

Looks like you mix up trial pve builds with solo builds, the latter definitely require lots of aoe.

And speaking of oneshotting, you won't definitely acquire equip required for that while spamming Crystal Blast. It was a niche skill for beer-sipping questing and no more than that. And I do understand and respect those protecting such playstyle until it fits their easy-chilling purposes. But you try to manipulate things here, talking about single dps and stuff. No one have ever recommended crystal blast for any serious solo build exactly due to its inefficiency and impossibility to efficiently use any other skills with it, while they did recommended other aoe skills. Any of them, but never this particular one.

Way to twist my words.

Crystal Blast was BY FAR the most powerful burst AoE skill in the game (doing literally double the damage of anything else). The so-called experts didn't value it though because their builds don't need strong AoE. Weaker alternatives are good enough for them because their builds are so optimized for maximum DPS that they can afford to sacrifice AoE to improve their single target damage. If you can one-shot trash with Elemental Ring you don't need Crystal Blast.

As for the experts on "solo" builds, they're still all optimizing for single-target DPS because their builds are all designed for soloing dungeon and world bosses. Again, where mediocre AoE damage is fine because they're running golded out DPS gear and 810 CP optimized for high DPS.

Where Crystal Blast shined was for people who needed good AoE and didn't have those optimized DPS builds, like people who are at lower CP or who primarily tank or heal but still like to do overland content.

This is wrong.

Highend builds used to have some form of AoE damage in their kits. Something like a lightning staff on the backbar or the destro ult. But AoE got nerfed a couple of times and just isn't very useful anymore. So now you typically try to kill weaker adds with the AoE from skills you use on bosses as well. It's called "cleave damage". It's not that you're oneshotting mobs with an Elemental Wall tick, but rather that a lightning heavy doesn't do anything against a boss.

Typical highend builds aren't built to solo bosses. You would need heals and mitigation and sustain, alongside damage, to solo certain bosses properly. A typical DD sacrifices everything to gain maximum dps, and leaves taunting and debuffing to the tank, while the healer takes care of heals, sustain and buffs. Alcast has recently put up a video of him soloing Stonegarden, and that build is quite different from what he normally runs with his group.

You still have AoE options. You lost nothing. Stamsorcs never had a spammable. They gained everything. That's a good trade. Stop being selfish with your niche build, use the given alternatives and be glad that your stam brethren finally got a well-deserved something.

the1andonlyskwex

You guys are still totally twisting my words.

@geschaftmaker you can't have both Crystal Frags and Crystal Blast at the same time. If you're prioritizing single target DPS, you will always pick Crystal Frags. People aren't using things like Elemental Ring because they're better than Crystal Blast, they're using those things because they need/want Crystal Frags more. Also, I don't really know how to respond to your comment about not being able to solo world bosses with CB. I can do it just fine (unlike some people here, I wasn't only using Crystal Blast, but it was my spammable). That said, Crystal Frags would probably be faster because world boss fights require single-target damage a lot more than they require AoE. I still chose to use Crystal Blast though because I spend a lot more total time killing packs of trash than fighting world bosses.

@Lord-Otto you're mixing up all of my arguments.
1) I totally agree that high end DPS builds are using what you're calling cleave damage. That's what I meant when I said that they're getting enough AoE for their purposes from the few AoE skills they use that increase their single target DPS.
2) My reference to Elemental Ring is in regard to what those people use when soloing overland trash. If you can one-shot trash with Elemental Ring, you don't need Crystal Blast. On my healer, I've gone from killing trash packs in 2 CB casts (~2 seconds) to killing them in 3-4 Shock Clench casts (~3 seconds). I could try to put together some kind of rotation, but that would just add a bunch of setup casts and slow things down when I'm only killing a few mobs and then running to the next pack. Similarly, using single target damage is a waste because then I'd be casting something like Force Pulse at least once (and often twice) per enemy (meaning 4+ casts per pack).
3) A solo build still has a lot more gear and CP invested into damage than a lower-level player, a tank, or a healer.

Lord-Otto

No, we do NOT get enough AoE from cleave skills. We have to build for boss encounters and therefore try to cleave efficiently and use the single-target skills on slightly beefier adds.
We also don't oneshot mobs with Elemental Ring. It's two casts for overland mobs, as fast as old Crystal Blast (which had a long cast time).
No, it's not a gear or CP issue. Overland mobs scale to you. It's not using your skills properly.

the1andonlyskwex

Lord-Otto wrote: »

No, we do NOT get enough AoE from cleave skills. We have to build for boss encounters and therefore try to cleave efficiently and use the single-target skills on slightly beefier adds.
We also don't oneshot mobs with Elemental Ring. It's two casts for overland mobs, as fast as old Crystal Blast (which had a long cast time).
No, it's not a gear or CP issue. Overland mobs scale to you. It's not using your skills properly.

If you weren't getting enough AoE from you would be slotting more AoE. You may be getting less than you would prefer, but you're absolutely not getting so little that you're willing to sacrifice single-target DPS for more AoE. That's my whole point.

Also, overland mobs do not scale for anyone over CP160, and never scale with gear or specific CP allocation. There is also at least one person in one of the two Crystal Blast threads (I thought it was you) claiming to one-shot stuff with Elemental Ring. Regardless, Crystal Blast will always take roughly half as many casts as Elemental Ring to do the same amount of damage.

Factoring in the GCD, the net effect is that spamming Crystal Blast did significantly more AoE DPS than spamming Elemental Ring. The "problem" is that it does less single target DPS than spamming Force Pulse or mixing Force Pulse with Crystal Frags procs, and that's not a sacrifice people who prioritize single-target DPS are willing to make.

GoodFella146

Makes sense to me. The first thing I think of when I hear the word sorcery is some *** swinging a sword around. Yup, makes sense.

Corellon Thromorin

Lord-Otto wrote: »

You lost nothing. Stamsorcs never had a spammable. They gained everything. That's a good trade. Stop being selfish with your niche build, use the given alternatives and be glad that your stam brethren finally got a well-deserved something.

Stamina sorcerers are an abomination and shouldn't even be allowed to exist in the first place. Selfish? Removing even more magicka variety is the selfish thing here.

kringled_1

Vevvev wrote: »

CritsTheBed wrote: »

Has anyone told Hskbret?

I don't know. That being said I have not seen her in a while.

I saw the player (might not have been that character) somehow dead in the DC spawn area of either Arena or Memorial earlier this week.

juliandracos

Lord-Otto wrote: »

We also don't oneshot mobs with Elemental Ring. It's two casts for overland mobs, as fast as old Crystal Blast (which had a long cast time).
No, it's not a gear or CP issue. Overland mobs scale to you. It's not using your skills properly.

If this were true, then not only would mobs be dying as fast as with Crystal Blast, but I would also be able to take on as many mobs as before. This is not true. If it were, then those of us who want it back would not complain. We would load it up, kill things things like before and move on. Since that is not the case, then this cannot be the case. Public dungeons are much more dangerous now.

Lord-Otto

the1andonlyskwex wrote: »

Lord-Otto wrote: »

No, we do NOT get enough AoE from cleave skills. We have to build for boss encounters and therefore try to cleave efficiently and use the single-target skills on slightly beefier adds.
We also don't oneshot mobs with Elemental Ring. It's two casts for overland mobs, as fast as old Crystal Blast (which had a long cast time).
No, it's not a gear or CP issue. Overland mobs scale to you. It's not using your skills properly.

If you weren't getting enough AoE from you would be slotting more AoE. You may be getting less than you would prefer, but you're absolutely not getting so little that you're willing to sacrifice single-target DPS for more AoE. That's my whole point.

Also, overland mobs do not scale for anyone over CP160, and never scale with gear or specific CP allocation. There is also at least one person in one of the two Crystal Blast threads (I thought it was you) claiming to one-shot stuff with Elemental Ring. Regardless, Crystal Blast will always take roughly half as many casts as Elemental Ring to do the same amount of damage.

Factoring in the GCD, the net effect is that spamming Crystal Blast did significantly more AoE DPS than spamming Elemental Ring. The "problem" is that it does less single target DPS than spamming Force Pulse or mixing Force Pulse with Crystal Frags procs, and that's not a sacrifice people who prioritize single-target DPS are willing to make.

No. We SACRIFICE AoE to increase that which is more important, single-target. It does take longer to kill mobs, but bursting down bosses and important targets is what matters more. And therefore, a playstyle has evolved which centers on holding adds as much in the AoEs as possible, while focusing the boss or important targets.
It's the complete opposite of what you accuse us of. It's not that we're content with our AoE, but can't afford to lower single-target for it. Have you tried Valkyn Skoria hardmode yet? You can't take your time slowly killing each flame atro. You need to keep damaging Skoria or you won't kill him fast enough and die without platforms. Therefore, you try to let them cook in the AoEs as much as possible and keep focusing the boss.

If you're 160CP already, then what are you struggling with? Feel weak? Get better gear, more CP and a better rotation. This is how RPGs work. If you don't want that, make a new character and enjoy the scaling.
Yes, I am oneshotting overland mobs with Elemental Ring. But this requires a crit. Two casts are for non-crits. It's still just as fast as the old Blast. That one used to have such a long cast time that you could fire two Rings in the time it took for one Blast. So dps was more or less the same.

Lord-Otto

juliandracos wrote: »

Lord-Otto wrote: »

We also don't oneshot mobs with Elemental Ring. It's two casts for overland mobs, as fast as old Crystal Blast (which had a long cast time).
No, it's not a gear or CP issue. Overland mobs scale to you. It's not using your skills properly.

If this were true, then not only would mobs be dying as fast as with Crystal Blast, but I would also be able to take on as many mobs as before. This is not true. If it were, then those of us who want it back would not complain. We would load it up, kill things things like before and move on. Since that is not the case, then this cannot be the case. Public dungeons are much more dangerous now.

Then IMPROVE! Are you screaming at the stairs it should lower its steps? Climb it! This is an evolving MMO, you've been lucky to not have had to learn new stuff until now. I'm an ex-dual-wield sorc. An ex-nonpet sorc. An ex-vampire. And god knows how many times I had to change morphs, sets and rotations. You need to adapt. The faster you get that into your head and start listening to advice given to you, the faster those public dungeons start losing their danger.

Wyrd88

Corellon Thromorin wrote: »

Stamina sorcerers are an abomination and shouldn't even be allowed to exist in the first place.

Well, that's a big "oof" and lol at the same time.

Poor stamsorcs, years of waiting for a stamina spammable, getting a copy-paste of a clunkiest skill in the entire game and now that. Abominations.

Someone call an ambulance.

the1andonlyskwex

Lord-Otto wrote: »

the1andonlyskwex wrote: »

Lord-Otto wrote: »

No, we do NOT get enough AoE from cleave skills. We have to build for boss encounters and therefore try to cleave efficiently and use the single-target skills on slightly beefier adds.
We also don't oneshot mobs with Elemental Ring. It's two casts for overland mobs, as fast as old Crystal Blast (which had a long cast time).
No, it's not a gear or CP issue. Overland mobs scale to you. It's not using your skills properly.

If you weren't getting enough AoE from you would be slotting more AoE. You may be getting less than you would prefer, but you're absolutely not getting so little that you're willing to sacrifice single-target DPS for more AoE. That's my whole point.

Also, overland mobs do not scale for anyone over CP160, and never scale with gear or specific CP allocation. There is also at least one person in one of the two Crystal Blast threads (I thought it was you) claiming to one-shot stuff with Elemental Ring. Regardless, Crystal Blast will always take roughly half as many casts as Elemental Ring to do the same amount of damage.

Factoring in the GCD, the net effect is that spamming Crystal Blast did significantly more AoE DPS than spamming Elemental Ring. The "problem" is that it does less single target DPS than spamming Force Pulse or mixing Force Pulse with Crystal Frags procs, and that's not a sacrifice people who prioritize single-target DPS are willing to make.

No. We SACRIFICE AoE to increase that which is more important, single-target. It does take longer to kill mobs, but bursting down bosses and important targets is what matters more. And therefore, a playstyle has evolved which centers on holding adds as much in the AoEs as possible, while focusing the boss or important targets.

None of this disagrees with anything I said. I'm not sure why you're acting like it does.

Lord-Otto wrote: »

It's the complete opposite of what you accuse us of. It's not that we're content with our AoE, but can't afford to lower single-target for it. Have you tried Valkyn Skoria hardmode yet? You can't take your time slowly killing each flame atro. You need to keep damaging Skoria or you won't kill him fast enough and die without platforms. Therefore, you try to let them cook in the AoEs as much as possible and keep focusing the boss.

I have done Valkyn Skoria HM many times, as a healer. I'm not arguing that Crystal Blast is optimal (or even necessarily good) for DPSing in dungeons. Those are single-target DPS-focused activities. Overland questing, on the other hand, is not.

Lord-Otto wrote: »

If you're 160CP already, then what are you struggling with? Feel weak? Get better gear, more CP and a better rotation. This is how RPGs work. If you don't want that, make a new character and enjoy the scaling.

I'm not struggling with anything. I'm annoyed with people dumping on Crystal Blast because they can't seem to comprehend that not everybody plays the same way they do. The fact that Crystal Blast isn't useful for you because you're already 1-2 shotting stuff with Elemental Ring doesn't mean it isn't useful to someone whose baseline DPS is much lower because of lower CP or a non-DPS spec.

Lord-Otto wrote: »

Yes, I am oneshotting overland mobs with Elemental Ring. But this requires a crit. Two casts are for non-crits. It's still just as fast as the old Blast. That one used to have such a long cast time that you could fire two Rings in the time it took for one Blast. So dps was more or less the same.

Crystal Blast was a 1 second cast that dealt twice as much damage as Elemental Ring. Every time your Elemental Ring took two shots to kill something you could have killed that same thing in only one shot from Crystal Blast. The GCD is 1 second long, so it's impossible to cast Elemental Ring twice in the time it took to cast Crystal Blast once.

That said, as someone with the stats to regularly one-shot stuff with Elemental Ring, you probably are better off using it than Crystal Blast, because every one-shot kill is taking you significantly less than the cast time of Crystal Blast.

On the other hand, for someone where Elemental Ring takes 3-4 shots, Crystal Blast was a significant time savings. I've gone from killing stuff with 2 Crystal Blasts (~2 seconds) to killing the same stuff with 3-4 Shock Clenches (~2.5-3.5 seconds), which is a significant inconvenience.

Additionally, the fact that I am taking 3-4 shots to kill stuff isn't an indication that I'm terrible or stupid like a lot of people are suggesting. It's an indication that I've chosen to prioritize something else. I don't play DPS in dungeons, I heal, so I've prioritized different stats.

Furthermore, beyond just overland content, Crystal Blast was great for dungeon healing because it allowed me to contribute significant AoE DPS for trash fights while only slotting one skill that I could safely ignore when I needed to focus on healing in boss fights. Other skills don't really work the same way. Crystal Frags is useless in trash fights, and I don't cast it often enough in boss fights for it to matter. The other options, Shock Clench and Elemental Ring, not only do less damage (and DPS) than Crystal Blast but they also don't proc Exploitation, so if I equip one of them I also have to make room on my bar for some other Dark Magic skill (currently Dark Conversion).

To reiterate, just because Crystal Blast wasn't optimal for you and your elite DPS playstyle doesn't mean it was bad or inappropriate for how other people were using it.

Lord-Otto

You have alternatives. Use them. If you're unwilling to do so, you'll go under. You know, Streak used to be my go to AoE spammable when the game launched for me. It didn't have the stacking cost back then. But it got changed, it had to. So I adapted. This isn't about some elite mindset. This is about seeing the whole picture, looking for new ways and becoming a better player.

markulrich1966

ok, have observed all the valuable suggestions.

So the solutions are:

replace the old skill with new ones that have half the damage and cost more magicka.

If that is not sufficient, replace the sorcerers with templars. Meaning I have to destroy at minimum 12 full skilled crafters that help me to earn approx 300.000 gold each day.

wow, I'm impressed.

Lord-Otto

Ele Ring casts twice as fast as old Blast, Mark. Dps is nearly the same.

markulrich1966

Lord-Otto wrote: »

Ele Ring casts twice as fast as old Blast, Mark. Dps is nearly the same.

crystal blast: 1112 damage, costs 2920
elemental ring: 636 damage, costs 3510

So to get the same damage, you must cast it twice, paying 7000 magicka instead od 3000. Again, "wow".

the1andonlyskwex

markulrich1966 wrote: »

Lord-Otto wrote: »

Ele Ring casts twice as fast as old Blast, Mark. Dps is nearly the same.

crystal blast: 1112 damage, costs 2920
elemental ring: 636 damage, costs 3510

So to get the same damage, you must cast it twice, paying 7000 magicka instead od 3000. Again, "wow".

Don't forget that Crystal Blast's cast time was only 1 second long and the global cooldown prevents casting more than one spell per second anyway.

Runaerian

It feels like people are complaining because their one button marked "win" has been removed and now they have to think a bit harder. I understand that fun is subjective but this change was made for a good reason based on data the developers have that we don't.

Everyone has their preferences and in ten years playing MMORPGS I've lost count of the number of times I've had to respec, change class or learn a new rotation/playstyle. That's the nature of MMORPGS. I've switched specs or class before because I didn't like the new changes. Often I've been able to embrace the changes and find they are actually better, more fun, more challenging once I'm willing to move out of my comfort zone and learn. But I get that not everyone plays to be challenged, they want to zone out and press one button repeatedly.

Like Otto said though, the bottom line is the change has happened so adapt and find new ways to enjoy your toon. Or don't...

This is an MMORPG. Change is going to be the one constant and over time ALL playstyles have to evolve. Whether or not you can evolve too is going to dictate whether or not you continue to enjoy this or any other MMO.

Corellon Thromorin

Wyrd88 wrote: »

Corellon Thromorin wrote: »

Stamina sorcerers are an abomination and shouldn't even be allowed to exist in the first place.

Well, that's a big "oof" and lol at the same time.

Poor stamsorcs, years of waiting for a stamina spammable, getting a copy-paste of a clunkiest skill in the entire game and now that. Abominations.

Someone call an ambulance.

Well... They are. Sorcerers should use magic or something. At least it should be the class ZOS respects enough to keep it without stamina morphs. But not even the bare minimum, I see.

Lord-Otto

the1andonlyskwex wrote: »

markulrich1966 wrote: »

Lord-Otto wrote: »

Ele Ring casts twice as fast as old Blast, Mark. Dps is nearly the same.

crystal blast: 1112 damage, costs 2920
elemental ring: 636 damage, costs 3510

So to get the same damage, you must cast it twice, paying 7000 magicka instead od 3000. Again, "wow".

Don't forget that Crystal Blast's cast time was only 1 second long and the global cooldown prevents casting more than one spell per second anyway.

That's not how it worked. The cast time was the animation of waving your hand for roughly a second. Then you did the actual skill, the arced fragment throw for another second. It took two seconds in total until you could cast another skill again.

Sarannah

Personally I have already adapted(the char is level 50 now), but this does not mean I do not want the magicka form to stay the same. It should incorporate the old blast(AOE/stun), instead of it just being outright removed.

At the moment I am using elemental ring, around my character. As this is somewhat aimable by where I am. All the other AOE's were useless as mobs ran out of them constantly.

Change is a constant in mmo's yes, but if it is regression, it is useless. Change should make something better. ZOS should have made the stamina morph like they did now, but they should have adjusted the magicka form as well.

PS: Anyone else have a bug with elemental ring, where the first cast near mobs does not hit them at all? This seems to happen to me 100% of the time.

FlopsyPrince

geschaftmaker wrote: »

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

I am not sure why the skill was bad in groups though. Can anyone explain that?

When in group for trials you are expected to give good results. Spamming CB you weren't even satisfactory dps-wise. That's it. For fun walking around questing together may be ok, but no more than that.

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

I also fail to see how the replacement is spammable, since it only pairs with a normal attack, making for a very odd playstyle in my experience. (I briefly tried it, but I do not like pressing it between each attack.)

Replacement can be Elemental Ring or Destructive (Shock) Clench (it has lesser distance though) if Lightning Stuff equipped, in latter case you can also hard attack with it for aoe damage and no weaving light attacks needed.

See, the thing that you did not use your staff at all is also not normal in this game, you have a weapon and you don't use it. I also played the same way but honestly I agree with those claiming this is bad and ignorant way of playing, it's like you've got a laser rifle and you throw stones from your pocket to your enemies, not even bashing their heads with that rifle at least, it is just hanging on your back because you can't stop pulling these stones out of your pocket because in that case you stop even this mean fire and lose much time. You could not even use your staff with crystal blast because of start animation, the same reason why you couldn't honestly use ANY other skills with it because of that start animation. For that particular case it did the trick though, but globally speaking it was a way to nowhere actually.

Anyway, what do you mean by odd? It's not pressing it "between" each attack, it is also an attack with possibility to skip its animation so you do more damage in less time, that's it. If you have Critical Surge active, each crit heals you for 3300 health, so more attacks = more crits = more damage = more heal per unit of time in this case, huge win actually. If you use Force Pulse (instead of its another Crushing Shock morph) you have a chance to damage up to 2 enemies adjacent to that one you attack with Force Pulse with somewhat 5k damage "if they were already afflicted with burning, chilled or concussed", kinda aoe damage too. And when you throw procced Frag you make even more damage while still making crits and healing yourself if Critical Surge buff is active, this buff also increases your damage done by 30% by the way.

So you buff Critical Surge, cast one or two Elemental Rings for aoe damage and to apply burning effect on them, then pew pew them with your staff and Force Pulse and Crystal Frags when the latter procs.

If you don't want to weave it's also ok, when spamming Elemental Ring (better under Critical Surge buff anyway) you don't even need light attacks, you can just press it along. You can add the Lightning Storm buff and aoe dots like Unstable Wall of Elements (or Elemental Blockade) around you or Lightning Flood in set point and you are definitely fine. See, you can even use any other skills with Elemental Ring either before or after or in between, because there is no start animation like Crystal Blast had. And you can try different ways to make your damage, with weaving or without it.

Regarding pets. you can also have Twilight Matriarch for some damage, enemies distraction and healing on you panel also, in this respect it is more multifunctional than Familiar. I feel ok without pets but it is personal thing anyway. Maybe I'll add one for distraction when soloing the bosses by the way, because single-attacking them looks like bad idea. But for now I don't do it so no need in pet.

Ofcourse you can say whatever, cut your crap and just give me back my precious that's all I want, and it would be fair a bit, but I can't do it, I can just adapt myself and advise you the same. Or pick Templar, here people confirm it's very simple to play even after it has been slightly nerfed in regard of auto-healing, one guy even complains it is too simply and dull for him. Your choice anyway.

I thought you (and others) were saying the replacement is spammable, yet that is not what you note.

I do use my staff BTW, quite a bit. It is upgraded to gold on most characters as well. It is a lightning staff and not a fire staff since I can hit easier with it, but I use it. Why is using it holy and great though and an ability is bad? Lots of words to not explain that.

I run a pet sorc. Fine if you do not, doesn't bother me at all. But it does annoy me to lose a key ability that was fun. It also had utility you fail to note, such as the stun and AOE hit on a lot of stuff. Great for groups of mobs. Content has both single targets and groups, not just single targets. Though I am not worrying about Trials and such, so I fail to see the problem.

Sarannah wrote: »

I don't really care about DPS, it was just an extremely usefull and fun skill all-around. And with the cast time, I don't see why it got nerfed. Just add the AOE and stun back to the magicka morph.

Exactly! It was a fun skill to use and they had to remove it. Some of us want to have fun at the game, it is definitely much less fun because of this one change.

It is not a complete breaker for the game, but it did suck a lot of fun out of playing a sorc/pet sorc for me.

Lord-Otto

Sarannah wrote: »

Personally I have already adapted(the char is level 50 now), but this does not mean I do not want the magicka form to stay the same. It should incorporate the old blast(AOE/stun), instead of it just being outright removed.

At the moment I am using elemental ring, around my character. As this is somewhat aimable by where I am. All the other AOE's were useless as mobs ran out of them constantly.

Change is a constant in mmo's yes, but if it is regression, it is useless. Change should make something better. ZOS should have made the stamina morph like they did now, but they should have adjusted the magicka form as well.

PS: Anyone else have a bug with elemental ring, where the first cast near mobs does not hit them at all? This seems to happen to me 100% of the time.

Uh, I'm not sure what exactly you mean with the first cast. But I've noticed ground-targeted abilities often canceling for no reason this patch. Happens with my atro a lot.

Sarannah

Lord-Otto wrote: »

Sarannah wrote: »

Personally I have already adapted(the char is level 50 now), but this does not mean I do not want the magicka form to stay the same. It should incorporate the old blast(AOE/stun), instead of it just being outright removed.

At the moment I am using elemental ring, around my character. As this is somewhat aimable by where I am. All the other AOE's were useless as mobs ran out of them constantly.

Change is a constant in mmo's yes, but if it is regression, it is useless. Change should make something better. ZOS should have made the stamina morph like they did now, but they should have adjusted the magicka form as well.

PS: Anyone else have a bug with elemental ring, where the first cast near mobs does not hit them at all? This seems to happen to me 100% of the time.

Uh, I'm not sure what exactly you mean with the first cast. But I've noticed ground-targeted abilities often canceling for no reason this patch. Happens with my atro a lot.

When I run up to a group of mobs, and I cast elemental ring in range before they move, it for some reason does not register me attacking them.

Runaerian

@Sarannah

All the other AOE's were useless as mobs ran out of them constantly.

Sounds like positioning might be the issue here.

Change is a constant in mmo's yes, but if it is regression, it is useless. Change should make something better.

I think we all agree change should be better. But better is subjective. What's good for the game as a whole or for a class as a whole might not be good for certain niche playstyles.

I don't think it's even about the validity of your playstyle. Something was seen as imbalanced, a decision was made based on data we don't have and the change has already happened. At this point other than a small group of people preferring the old crystal blast there is no compelling reason for ZOS to revert the change.

Sarannah

Runaerian wrote: »

@Sarannah

All the other AOE's were useless as mobs ran out of them constantly.

Sounds like positioning might be the issue here.

Change is a constant in mmo's yes, but if it is regression, it is useless. Change should make something better.

I think we all agree change should be better. But better is subjective. What's good for the game as a whole or for a class as a whole might not be good for certain niche playstyles.

I don't think it's even about the validity of your playstyle. Something was seen as imbalanced, a decision was made based on data we don't have and the change has already happened. At this point other than a small group of people preferring the old crystal blast there is no compelling reason for ZOS to revert the change.

Pet aggro is the issue, as described in my other post.

And I doubt ZOS will revert the change. In fact, I am glad they made a stamina morph available for those who wanted it. But there was no need to keep the magicka morph so gutted.