So how am I supposed to do vCR portals in U35?

Rimskjegg

So I'm a dumb, slow-learning StamSorc DD who's trying to prog regular vet Cloudrest+0 doing portals on Z'Maja. Our tanks and healers know what they're doing but none of the DDs have cleared the trial before. I saw the post about how a team of Cloudrest veterans struggled when Vigour was no longer enough to stay alive in the portals. They "adapted" but I don't know how?

I'm already struggling so bad on those portals now in U34. I feel like we have maybe a 50% chance of clearing the portal, which means, there is a drastically lower chance of clearing enough portals in a row to clear the trial. If shards land too far from orbs, we have to run too far, we take too much damage and we die en route. If we break all crystals so we know the shortest route is, we take too much damage from all the orbs being uncovered and we die. If we break only one crystal at a time we take too long and wipe the group, or the explosion happens when we are en route to a shard and we have sacrifice ourselves to deliver the orb because at least it's better to die to the explosion afterwards than just dying on the balcony to orb damage. To try to improve my survivability I now have the Twilight Matriarch as well as Vigour but we still die if we make the slightest mistake, like two of us going for the same shard for a sec and then having to turn toward another one.

And in U35 Vigour isn't enough even for the pros. What am I supposed to do in August in order not to let the team down every single time?

I'm scratching my head trying to find an alternative to Vigour as a DD heal over time. Most classes have a burst heal but I can't use those while sprinting. Most DD HoTs rely on doing damage (like Crit Surge or DK Embers) which won't work. What do I slot now? Will I maybe have to choose Resolving Vigour instead? I can but that will of course reduce my' ability to support the other portal runners while they carry orbs. And I already have Major Resolve from Hurricane so the new Major Resolve on Resolving Vigour feels wasted.

Also, DPS is a factor because the longer we take, we get more and more tired and we make more mistakes. Now, from PTS testing I'm gonna lose about 20% of my damage on the dummy, and that's with a non-moving target where I can use all DoT time to use spammables. To get some DPS back I have to learn a new rotation, which in my case is a really slow process. And less DPS probably means we get even more portals? Our chances of ever clearing will fall drastically. If the devs have simply decreed that slow learners like myself just shall not pass vet DLC content, what's the point anymore? It sucks to let my team down but I guess they'll just have to replace me, come August?

I already canceled ESO+ but I've bought most of the content from the Crown Store, and I invested so much time and money in this game from before, I'd really like to get as much out of it as I can. But normal mode content just isn't cutting it anymore. I realize the devs think vet content is just supposed to be too hard for a dimwit like me but perhaps there are some experienced portal DDs who'd be willing to offer ideas, especially if you've tried vCR on the PTS.

UntilValhalla13

Myself, I would ask why they're sending stamina dps in the portals, if everyone is relatively new; especially a sorc to begin with. You're losing a lot of penetration and sorcs don't have a lot of dots. Also communication is helpful to running cores. Call out which one you're running to before picking it up.

For heals, you could always run dark deal, if you're having issues with the bird. Maybe even switch the bird to the clannfear to be more selfish.

Dagoth_Rac

pklemming

+0 is a lot more tolerant than +3 , but pretty much what was said before, we don't usually send stam in to portals with a few exceptions.

If you are doing it now, you will have a few weeks before something may hit and you should have hopefully had a few clears. Having that experience will help a lot.

We mostly tend to have magnbs in portal, though I am a portal magden and we also had a stamden tonight, but that is rare.

Portals are a concern for me, but for different reasons due to 'sticky' dots, but I have no choice but to wait.

After the people we lost, this is only a minor concern now.

Hotdog_23

You could try using Bone Surge for the undaunted skill line along with vigor. Bone Surge also has a synergy attached to it for your team members.

Bone Surge
Target: Self
Cost: 3672
Skill description
Surround yourself with a whirlwind of bones, gaining a damage shield that absorbs up to 5121 damage for 6 seconds. This ability scales off your Max Health. An ally near you can activate the Spinal Surge synergy, granting the ally and up to 5 other allies a damage shield that absorbs up to 30% of their Max Health for 6 seconds and Major Vitality, increasing their healing received by 16%.
New effect
Upgrades the synergy to grant Major Vitality.
https://eso-skillbook.com/skill/bone-surge

Stay safe

pklemming

Shields, sadly, don't work in portals. Needs to be a heal due to damage-type.
.

Rimskjegg

I think the point was the Major Vitality. Lots of work just for a synergy though. Already enough issues with synergies just not going off until I've spammed X like 10 times.

ApoAlaia

pklemming wrote: »

Shields, sadly, don't work in portals. Needs to be a heal due to damage-type.
.

Yeah, is oblivion damage, ignores spell/physical resistance, blocking, shields...

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Oblivion_Damage

robpr

I'd use Clanfear or Matriarch still. It's all about the timing, do not pick orbs if there will be explosion soon and if you picked it and explosion is charging up, do not jump to balcony. DK spamming Coag should survive it, on a stamsorc it will be tough due to limited magicka. Do not pickup orbs at all untill all 3 spears are down unless it is right next to your current position.

Coordinate with other dd which way you will go, if you enter the portal facing the north (or the arena entrance) you will always see a Shadow Zmaja infront of you and one crystal there. One dd go clockwise, other dd go counter clockwise. Drop Storm Atro of first crystal. Place your bow dots on second crystal, place your frontbar "sticky" dots on third, attack with spammable when moving between crystals. Go to balcony. Jump down and execute remaining health if they are alive. Stop attacking if you hear 3rd spear coming down or you revealed 3rd orb.

If you want to practice crystal killing, Precursor and Vampire Thrall dummies have just a bit more health than crystal.

Rimskjegg

Thank you @robpr that sounds like really good advice! Never occurred to me to practice on the Precursor, but I'll deffo do that😁 I'll have to switch my setup for U35 anyway so if Bow and frontbar DoTs is the thing for vCR I'll try that.

Dagoth_Rac

Don't forget to apply Major Breach to the crystals you are attacking. They have just as much armor as any boss or add but are not being actively tanked or debuffed. Getting that armor down from 18k is probably your best damage bang for the buck. It won't do damage itself but will make everything else you do hit harder. Caltrops? Crushing Weapon? If you are running VMA staff on back bar by any chance, Elemental Susceptibility would work, too.

You could also try setting up multiple Precursors spread around your house, for practice at trying to kill them efficiently. Or maybe not killing them. You generally want a bunch of low health crystals, ready to be quickly finished off, not a bunch of dead crystals and waiting for shards.

p00tx

Rimskjegg wrote: »

So I'm a dumb, slow-learning StamSorc DD who's trying to prog regular vet Cloudrest+0 doing portals on Z'Maja. Our tanks and healers know what they're doing but none of the DDs have cleared the trial before. I saw the post about how a team of Cloudrest veterans struggled when Vigour was no longer enough to stay alive in the portals. They "adapted" but I don't know how?

I'm already struggling so bad on those portals now in U34. I feel like we have maybe a 50% chance of clearing the portal, which means, there is a drastically lower chance of clearing enough portals in a row to clear the trial. If shards land too far from orbs, we have to run too far, we take too much damage and we die en route. If we break all crystals so we know the shortest route is, we take too much damage from all the orbs being uncovered and we die. If we break only one crystal at a time we take too long and wipe the group, or the explosion happens when we are en route to a shard and we have sacrifice ourselves to deliver the orb because at least it's better to die to the explosion afterwards than just dying on the balcony to orb damage. To try to improve my survivability I now have the Twilight Matriarch as well as Vigour but we still die if we make the slightest mistake, like two of us going for the same shard for a sec and then having to turn toward another one.

And in U35 Vigour isn't enough even for the pros. What am I supposed to do in August in order not to let the team down every single time?

I'm scratching my head trying to find an alternative to Vigour as a DD heal over time. Most classes have a burst heal but I can't use those while sprinting. Most DD HoTs rely on doing damage (like Crit Surge or DK Embers) which won't work. What do I slot now? Will I maybe have to choose Resolving Vigour instead? I can but that will of course reduce my' ability to support the other portal runners while they carry orbs. And I already have Major Resolve from Hurricane so the new Major Resolve on Resolving Vigour feels wasted.

Also, DPS is a factor because the longer we take, we get more and more tired and we make more mistakes. Now, from PTS testing I'm gonna lose about 20% of my damage on the dummy, and that's with a non-moving target where I can use all DoT time to use spammables. To get some DPS back I have to learn a new rotation, which in my case is a really slow process. And less DPS probably means we get even more portals? Our chances of ever clearing will fall drastically. If the devs have simply decreed that slow learners like myself just shall not pass vet DLC content, what's the point anymore? It sucks to let my team down but I guess they'll just have to replace me, come August?

I already canceled ESO+ but I've bought most of the content from the Crown Store, and I invested so much time and money in this game from before, I'd really like to get as much out of it as I can. But normal mode content just isn't cutting it anymore. I realize the devs think vet content is just supposed to be too hard for a dimwit like me but perhaps there are some experienced portal DDs who'd be willing to offer ideas, especially if you've tried vCR on the PTS.

I was the kite healer for that team, and we adjusted by putting two dps in portals where we'd normally have someone soloing them. It makes portal phases faster, which means you'll have less incoming dmg to counter. Vigor will still be pretty strong, but you might want to use Crit Surge too while you're progressing. The selfish Vigor morph is definitely the play here, as the other DDs should have their own self heals on. I'm really sorry you're going to get shafted like this though. It sucks.

pklemming

Rimskjegg wrote: »

I think the point was the Major Vitality. Lots of work just for a synergy though. Already enough issues with synergies just not going off until I've spammed X like 10 times.

Aye, seems a waste of a spell slot, when you could add in something like resolving in addition to dark deal if you were having heal issues.

I use vines(trellis) in portal, and that is fine for me and also for healing the other portal dd if needs.

pklemming

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Don't forget to apply Major Breach to the crystals you are attacking. They have just as much armor as any boss or add but are not being actively tanked or debuffed. Getting that armor down from 18k is probably your best damage bang for the buck. It won't do damage itself but will make everything else you do hit harder. Caltrops? Crushing Weapon? If you are running VMA staff on back bar by any chance, Elemental Susceptibility would work, too.

You could also try setting up multiple Precursors spread around your house, for practice at trying to kill them efficiently. Or maybe not killing them. You generally want a bunch of low health crystals, ready to be quickly finished off, not a bunch of dead crystals and waiting for shards.

You just described my coldharbor house !

Galiferno

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Don't forget to apply Major Breach to the crystals you are attacking. They have just as much armor as any boss or add but are not being actively tanked or debuffed. Getting that armor down from 18k is probably your best damage bang for the buck. It won't do damage itself but will make everything else you do hit harder. Caltrops? Crushing Weapon? If you are running VMA staff on back bar by any chance, Elemental Susceptibility would work, too.

You could also try setting up multiple Precursors spread around your house, for practice at trying to kill them efficiently. Or maybe not killing them. You generally want a bunch of low health crystals, ready to be quickly finished off, not a bunch of dead crystals and waiting for shards.

Hey plenty of us tanks run Ele Drain and put it on every crystal while getting blasted by Z'maja

virtus753

Precursors have only 9.1k resists.

How much do crystals have? It feels like the usual 18.2k.

pklemming

virtus753 wrote: »

Precursors have only 9.1k resists.

How much do crystals have? It feels like the usual 18.2k.

I guessed around 12k. I don't have an issue clearing them, with, or without ele. I use base skels, which have way too many HPs, but allow me to practice my rotations on them.

I did consider precursors, but after doing it once.....

pklemming

Probably could be done better, but works for me.

As you can see, my housing skills are at elite level....

Rimskjegg

Big thanks to everyone who had suggestions in this thread! Between those and the update from Gina I feel much better about the future!

Pevey

Stam with vigor slotted does just fine in portals on live. With vigor gutted as on pts, that will not be the case. But then again, who will be doing vcr when pts goes live? Probably neither stam nor mag at any meaningful level.

ps. It's almost like they forget what balance adjustments were made and why in past patches. Like stam not having a decent self-heal until they could unlock vigor.

virtus753

pklemming wrote: »

virtus753 wrote: »

Precursors have only 9.1k resists.

How much do crystals have? It feels like the usual 18.2k.

I guessed around 12k. I don't have an issue clearing them, with, or without ele. I use base skels, which have way too many HPs, but allow me to practice my rotations on them.

I did consider precursors, but after doing it once.....

I didn’t think mobs had anything other than 9.1k or 18.2k resists in this game. But it would take a patient group to let someone test that in vCR.