Weapon or Spell damage?

Morgha_Kul

So, I'm tinkering with my Sorceror, Telvanni Morgha Kul. I'm looking at getting him a new destruction staff... but I'm uncertain what to get. There are several considerations.

First, what damage does the staff DO? For example, I was looking at a staff of the Venomous set. It adds Weapon Critical... but I don't know if that would affect the staff's rating, which might use Spell Critical.

Second, I'm uncertain what attribute will be of greatest value to him. I usually tend to build for Critical Chance, but I'm unsure whether he'd be better off going for more Max Magicka or more Spell/Weapon Damage (depending on what type the staff actually does).

Any thoughts?

Ceejengine

Any ability that uses Magicka will go off of spell damage / crit.

Spell damage increases staff light / heavy attack damage.

Abilities that use Stamina will scale off of weapon damage/ crit.

Some specific abilities will scale from health. This will be denoted in the ability description.

Generally, whatever type of damage you're doing is the attribute you want to boost. So if you're going for Inferno Staff mage, prioritize magicka.

Health is good for surviving mechanics you screw up and giving you a cushion in PvP.

Adding a bit of stamina lets you roll dodge / sprint more.

Like 30 Magicka, 14 Health, 10 stamina is a decently balanced build. If you want more damage, put more into magicka.

oddbasket

Yeah, you wouldn't bother with weapon crit ona a magicka dps. Also, if you mean venomous smite set, that's a useless set now after being nerfed in U29. The proc used to last the full duration, but now only lasts until the target it proc on dies, which is all of 1 second in pve..

Morgha_Kul

Ya, I thought the staff attacks (ie, the light and heavy attacks, not the skills) were Spell Damage attacks.

That means I have to decide which of three attributes to prioritize:
Spell Damage (eg. Spell Strategist)
Spell Critical (eg. War Maiden)
Maximum Magicka (eg. Necropotence)

I know most of the sets have several attributes, I'm just wondering which is the best to focus on.

waterfairy

spell damage adds to your base magic damage from staffs and magic skills

crit chance and crit damage adds to how often you do crit attacks and how much extra damage they do

Morgha_Kul

Vigarr wrote: »

spell damage adds to your base magic damage from staffs and magic skills

crit chance and crit damage adds to how often you do crit attacks and how much extra damage they do

Ya, I know kind of what they do, just not the degree.

Spell damage will add damage, but how much?
Spell Critical will cause more criticals, but how much damage is gained from that, on average?
Maximum Magicka gives more magicka, but also increases damage, though by how much?

If Spell Critical actually yields more damage in the long run, I'd build for that. If they all have about the same damage benefit, I'd build for Max Magicka, because it also adds the resource. As I say, I'm just trying to figure out which one generates the greatest benefit... though I suppose the differences are likely kind of small.

Bradyfjord

Physical damage is:

• Physical weapons (melee/bows)
• Poison & Disease

Magic Damage is:

• Magicka weapons (staffs)
• Fire, Frost, Shock, & 'Magic' (the last is non-elemental magic damage)

The above isn't every type of damage in the game, but enough to give you a sense of what type of damage your going to need for your build.

Djennku

There are 500+ sets in the game, so if you want a specific setup for your character, there's endless possibilities to choose from.

For the staff element, you have to consider if you have more single target-focused skills, or aoe skills, or if you want to play more defensive. This will tell you whether you want a fire (single), lightning (aoe), or ice (tanking and defense)

orion_1981usub17_ESO

Don't split your attributes too much, use glyphs and jewelry to fill in any survival short falls. You lose dps for each point not spent into your dps attribute.

Crit chance took a nerf but a set that has one crit chance slot at 657 is 3%. Crit is still king if your not using malacath. If you go full crit don't forget to increase crit damage multiplier by being khajit, cp, axes, Medusa ect.

Spell penetration is the most important. It comes from many sources and you want to ensure your capable of being at cap and not a point over cap for what ever content your running.

Straight spell damage is next, it simply stacks faster than magicka. Of course it doesn't add anything else either. It's best to increase in 1to 1 relation with other stats.

Magicka regen is the thing that fools forget about, don't be a fool. Regen is easier today but if you your running out of magicka then dps suffers. Lesser used is cost reductions, nice perks but pure regen is usually better.

Finally base magicka helps with regen and damage. Of course having a deep pool to drain from feels safer than having a shallow pool you need to keep refilling quickly. (Back when shields stacked off magicka, big pools were king in pvp)

All these principles apply for stamina. Do not mix up stamina and magicka sets, unless your going pure pelinal aptitude hybrid build. Hybrids are mostly frowned upon in the hardest content due to lack of specialization.

waterfairy

Morgha_Kul wrote: »

Vigarr wrote: »

spell damage adds to your base magic damage from staffs and magic skills

crit chance and crit damage adds to how often you do crit attacks and how much extra damage they do

Ya, I know kind of what they do, just not the degree.

Spell damage will add damage, but how much?
Spell Critical will cause more criticals, but how much damage is gained from that, on average?
Maximum Magicka gives more magicka, but also increases damage, though by how much?

If Spell Critical actually yields more damage in the long run, I'd build for that. If they all have about the same damage benefit, I'd build for Max Magicka, because it also adds the resource. As I say, I'm just trying to figure out which one generates the greatest benefit... though I suppose the differences are likely kind of small.

your character sheet should tell you most of these numbers and you can see the damage of each skill in their tooltip as you adjust spell damage or your magic pool. As for the actual crit numbers in combat, you can see these if you turn them on in settings and practice on a dummy.
I can't give advice on what to focus on because I build my characters differently then most as I prefer a blend of every attack having decent damage as opposed to full crit and don't make glass cannons because I play most content solo.
Crit is still the primary focus to most dps builds but crit has taken a hit since the patch along with the spell damage that a large magic pool used to provide.

Brrrofski

How you buy ls depend entirely on the content you're playing.

For dealing most damage possible in difficult content, crit.

For levelling and questing, it doesn't matter too much. Max magica is nice as it gives damage but also means you'll run out of juice slower. Which if you're lower cp or less accustomed to the game and how to sustain, might help.

Some sets mix all those stats. A lot of magica based sets will, with maybe more focus on one aspect.

For pvp, there's a lot lot more that goes into making a build.