Can someone go into detail on how Hybridization killed diversity?

Redguards_Revenge

I play stamplar.

I will admit, I did switch all of my weapon damage glyphs to spell damage.

I did add more magica to my pool to use the magica class abilities.

However, I am using 2h and dual wield.

Although I will admit I am not upgraded to the newest chapter of the game.


So how has diversity of builds died? I keep hearing streamers throw it around without any explanation. What caused it? What I use in BGs is far from what you all use. So I can't even fully grasp it. Yes, my build is probably inferior, but I do get 1 or 3 kills here and there. So long as my kills even my deaths, I that means I am doing something right.

Hybridization was the best thing to happen since 1 Tamriel.

I still need to keep winning BGs to see what the top people are doing there....but so far yes some people can wipe me clean. However, I can still get some people down. It may be because my BG rank is too low.

I mean for me Toothrow is BIS.

Paralyse

PvP and PvE players are two very different groups in most cases.

Hybridization has been a bad thing for us PvE types.

I don't PvP enough in ESO to have an opinion about whether it helped or hurt PvP.

OBJnoob

Well for pvp and PvE, at the highest levels, there's really "the best" setup and then there's everything else. And with the forums, test server, and streamers it doesn't take long for people to know what the best setup is and adopt it.

So people have complained about lack of build variety for a while. Meaning every stamsorc was the same and every magsorc was the same, as well as the other classes.

What hybridization changes is that now magsorcs are the same as stamsorcs... They're both just hybrid sorcs now, using the same gear and the same skills. So there were two builds per class now there's only one. Hybridization essentially cut build diversity in half.

At least that's what they say. I think the whole thing is a slight exaggeration told by people who really only where meta gear... But it's certainly true to a large extent.

The_Titan_Tim

Hybridization is amazing for the game, if there’s a clear-cut winner on a better ability, it sheds a light on something over-performing and should allow the balance team to smooth them out or provide sets that make abilities more or less useful.

Abilities have never been so clearly imbalanced.

Snamyap

For me personally, as someone who plays mostly solo and used a stamina NB build for years, it's been great. Because I can finally use more of all those magicka skills I've collected over the years and thus it gave me more diversity/choices. But for people who do high end group content the Meta has become a lot more narrow. No more magicka and stamina builds, everyone is a hybrid and uses mostly the same sets and even skills.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

I think the simplest explanation is something like this.

The intent was certainly that when you make everything scale off the highest stat, you in theory give players more options. The result however was that it become much easier for skilled players to look at two skills and say skill A is objectively better than skill B, so Skill B never gets used. The flipside is for players that have less knowledge, its just more confusing than ever.

Same logic can be applied to entire weapon lines. Now its basically DW/2H for DPS or GTFO. It used to be that magic users typically favored staffs, maybe DW front bar when possible to parse, and stamina really had several options, combinations of DW/2H/Bow. But now since everything scales, people figured out fairly quickly that you get the best stats using DW front bar, and Stampede is the strongest ST skill to proc your back bar enchant, so everyone runs DW/2H regardless of what stat they stack into.

IMO they should either revert the hybridization changes, or go all in. By all in I mean, remove the distinction completely between weapon and spell damage, and weapon and spell crit. Just call them damage and crit chance. Make skills all cost magic, make sprint, block, and dodge cost stamina. That would make everything much simpler. If you want to go all in on damage, you stack into magic. If you want more defense, you can spend more points into stamina. Very straight forward, go as glass cannon as you want (its what people do anyway at the extremes).

React

From the PVP perspective, here is how hybridization killed build diversity/combat "replayability" for me.

It effectively halved the number of classes in the game. In the past, there was 12 classes in ESO post-summerset; a magicka and stamina version of every spec. The stamina versions often utilized weapon abilities mixed with stamina cost class abilities, while only using magicka cost abilities for utility or buffs (things like armor buffs, templar purge, necro mender, etc). The magicka versions almost always used entirely magicka cost abilities for everything, utilizing their stamina pools only for core combat functionalities (sprint, dodge, block, break free, bash).

The stamina and magicka specs of every class played distinctly differently to one another. The used different weapon combos, different heals and spammables, sets, etc. This added a ton of replayability for those of us that play multiple classes, as we could try our hand at 12 uniquely different specs. We could further theorycraft builds that used a wider variety of sets, as there was more applicable options when there was a clear magicka/stamina split in the game.

Hybridization made it so that almost every class performs much better as a full hybrid than it does as a stamina or magicka spec, because now you are simply going to use the best morph of every ability as well as whatever the strongest heals & spammables are. You can choose not to do this, but you are massively reducing your effectiveness by not using the best morphs.

The result of this forced decision making is that classes are using the same heals, the same weapon choices (the current meta is very frequently ice/dw on most classes), the same gear, etc.

Now you can make the argument that "oh, you're just choosing to do that, I can play just fine with my full stamina sorcerer or my full magicka templar!". I agree, when it comes to PVE (outside of vet trials and DLC dungeon trifectas)/questing/overland, you can get by just fine without building a hybrid. Even if you're going into cyrodiil to casually PVP in a large group or siege keeps, you can choose not to be a hybrid and be okay.

But if you seriously want to perform well in PVP, or learn how to do things like solo/group PVP or coordinated battlegrounds, the first step is to make sure you are using an optimized hybrid build. You simply sacrifice too much effectiveness by not being a hybrid, to seriously compete in any high level PVP environment. This kills the diversity for me personally, because now I effectively have half the classes to enjoy.

From my limited endgame PVE experience, the same exact concept applies there now.

gariondavey

@MashmalloMan

MudcrabAttack

Before update 33, every stamina build had stamina-based skills that were very obvious to choose since they were so strong, and the exact same thing could be said for magic builds and their corresponding skills.

After 33 hit, the old single-source builds were underperforming by around 20% compared to the hybrid builds that picked only the best of both worlds. It was still easy to argue that everything could still be accomplished with the old builds, but 20% more damage was really hard to pass up in the hardest content. It’s low hanging fruit that has a huge trade off that would allow new record breaking for every pve thing in the game.

I think the later nerf updates were an attempt to bridge gaps. To be honest I can’t even tell anyone what the difference is between single source and hybrid anymore since all the benefits of dipping into both stamina and magic skills are what I’ve always wanted anyway, so I have no single source parsing to compare anymore

Amottica

It does not take much detail to explain. The best skills available to a build are what will be used by the best builds. With more of the same skills being available and viable to more builds, we now have more of the same skills used by the best builds across all classes because they are mathematically superior.

Zenimax would have known that this would be the outcome due to the effect shared skill lines have always had on build diversity. So I find it odd that they made such changes when they addressed players' concerns about class flavor just a couple of years ago. I am starting to question the existence of a long-term vision for combat in ESO since it seems to be a new vision each year.

I do hope they figure this out.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Redguards_Revenge wrote: »

I play stamplar.

I will admit, I did switch all of my weapon damage glyphs to spell damage.

.

Here is the funny thing. At end game (especially in 4 man), thanks to hybridization, you now actually have to swap your jewelry enchants to min/max depending on your group composition, which is about the dumbest thing ever. Gear is now hybridized in the damage department, in other words, everything that gives a line of weapon damage also gives spell damage. So the distinction is mostly meaningless outside of potion choice and jewelry enchant.

Have a Templar in your group that can give minor sorcery, well you should be running spell damage glyphs, even on a "Hybrid" build that otherwise screams stamina and weapon damage.

Have a DK in the group giving you minor brutality, you should probably be running weapon damage glyphs, even on a full magic spec.

Have both? Doesn't matter what you run, so now your "choice" is meaningless.

Biggest problem with hybridization is frankly that it was incomplete.

DMuehlhausen

Every class, uses essentially the exact same build and gear. It needs to change. Armor sets should give buffs to different class skills so not everyone is just the exact same character running around.

Necrotech_Master

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I think the simplest explanation is something like this.

The intent was certainly that when you make everything scale off the highest stat, you in theory give players more options. The result however was that it become much easier for skilled players to look at two skills and say skill A is objectively better than skill B, so Skill B never gets used. The flipside is for players that have less knowledge, its just more confusing than ever.

Same logic can be applied to entire weapon lines. Now its basically DW/2H for DPS or GTFO. It used to be that magic users typically favored staffs, maybe DW front bar when possible to parse, and stamina really had several options, combinations of DW/2H/Bow. But now since everything scales, people figured out fairly quickly that you get the best stats using DW front bar, and Stampede is the strongest ST skill to proc your back bar enchant, so everyone runs DW/2H regardless of what stat they stack into.

IMO they should either revert the hybridization changes, or go all in. By all in I mean, remove the distinction completely between weapon and spell damage, and weapon and spell crit. Just call them damage and crit chance. Make skills all cost magic, make sprint, block, and dodge cost stamina. That would make everything much simpler. If you want to go all in on damage, you stack into magic. If you want more defense, you can spend more points into stamina. Very straight forward, go as glass cannon as you want (its what people do anyway at the extremes).

it makes absolutely no sense though from the perspective of spending magic to say slash someone with a physical weapon

i would hate doing that, if say cleave from 2h cost magicka, or flurry from DW cost magicka, that would make absolutely no sense from an RP/general elder scrolls perspective

I_killed_Vivec

One would hope that in time ZoS will understand what the "best" skills are that all the end-game players use.

Once they have done this then they should be able to balance the other skills so that they all provide something of use.

And then there's the simple (!) task of making all those skills give something a little different, including in the way they combine.

With damage scaling off the max stat there will always be a desire to max magica or stamina, and so there will be the associated resource management issues, limiting the capacity to have all the "best" skills.

I imagine that this is their aim for increasing diversity... the fact that some people aren't happy just shows that they haven't got there yet.

ForzaRammer

I am sure 5 dk 2 necro for dd is what diversity looks like. No more take a sorc and a nightblade just for minor buffs

propertyOfUndefined

I'm somebody who's all about build diversity and variety. I think hybridization is awesome and is without question my favorite thing introduced in the past couple of patches.

Shihp00

It didn't

DMuehlhausen

propertyOfUndefined wrote: »

I'm somebody who's all about build diversity and variety. I think hybridization is awesome and is without question my favorite thing introduced in the past couple of patches.

This is massive sarcasm right...it has to be..please tell me this is sarcasm

Wing

the type of hybridization ZOS is attempting boils down to

"you cannot fail"

for the most part, everything boosts everything, nothing specific really matters.

the problem, in any system like this, where you have 1,000,000 ! choices ! but all of them are pretty much the same, is that nobody cares.

all dots do pretty much the same dps within .5 of ZOS's dps calculations
all spamables are the same (again SOZ target dummy calcs)
all heals are the same (see above)
all heavy attacks are becoming more and more the same
everyone has the same 6 buffs and debuffs and none of it stacks
all gear is the same, nothing is allowed to be cool or special

nothing matters

so it all boils down to slotting whatever color of dots / heals / spamable / execute / whatever you have access to, because none of it matters, they all do the same-ish.


why does this kill diversity?

if everything is the same ease of use and action economy win out in player choice.
-uppercut is easy to spam
-breath of life is easy to spam
-etc.

so if everything is the same, everyone will gravitate to whatever is then easy to use / play.



example

lets say all classes are perfectly balanced!

but sorcerer is just easy to play for some reason, the players just gravitate to the on demand heals and damage, the comfortable gameplay, the LOOK of the class and the visual effects of its abilities.

sorcerer becomes 70% of the player base.

other classes drop to a combined 30% playrate.


everything is PERFECTLY balanced

and yet, we find somehow, we ended up with far less diversity than ever before.

FrankonPC

Redguards_Revenge wrote: »

I play stamplar.

I will admit, I did switch all of my weapon damage glyphs to spell damage.

I did add more magica to my pool to use the magica class abilities.

However, I am using 2h and dual wield.

Although I will admit I am not upgraded to the newest chapter of the game.


So how has diversity of builds died? I keep hearing streamers throw it around without any explanation. What caused it? What I use in BGs is far from what you all use. So I can't even fully grasp it. Yes, my build is probably inferior, but I do get 1 or 3 kills here and there. So long as my kills even my deaths, I that means I am doing something right.

Hybridization was the best thing to happen since 1 Tamriel.

I still need to keep winning BGs to see what the top people are doing there....but so far yes some people can wipe me clean. However, I can still get some people down. It may be because my BG rank is too low.

I mean for me Toothrow is BIS.

From a pvp perspective it halved builds. Before hybridization stamina based builds would run rally/vigor for heals with stamina based spammables and dots. Magicka builds would run their burst heals with magicka based spammables and dots. Playing a magicka sorcerer for instance was a night and day difference from playing a stam sorc pre-hybridization.

After hybridization, you don't choose the best magicka or stamina skills, you just choose the best skills, and they're universal. So the 12 classes were eliminated to 6 because if vigor is the best, you run vigor. If you don't, you're being held back as a mag sorc. The uniqueness of classes like mag dk, mag sorc, etc... have been replaced with fighting optimization.

A year or two ago ZOS wrote an entire article about how each character and class should have its own player fantasy, or stylistic playstyle. "When you see a player using class abilities, you should have little doubt which class they are playing, and it should look awesome!" https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-gb/news/post/57025

That quote is from their developer deep dive, and you can argue that hybridization did not help this goal at all.

Hybridization itself isn't a bad thing. Im still pro hybrid as an option, just not the only option. If things were more balanced, people could run how they want and remain similarly competitive. That's just not the case and hasn't been so for most of the year.

aaisoaho

Disclaimer: I'm writing this from the perspective of group PVE.

OBJnoob wrote: »

Well for pvp and PvE, at the highest levels, there's really "the best" setup and then there's everything else. And with the forums, test server, and streamers it doesn't take long for people to know what the best setup is and adopt it.

So people have complained about lack of build variety for a while. Meaning every stamsorc was the same and every magsorc was the same, as well as the other classes.

What hybridization changes is that now magsorcs are the same as stamsorcs... They're both just hybrid sorcs now, using the same gear and the same skills. So there were two builds per class now there's only one. Hybridization essentially cut build diversity in half.

At least that's what they say. I think the whole thing is a slight exaggeration told by people who really only where meta gear... But it's certainly true to a large extent.

A bit nitpicky, but the difference between top-parsing magsorcs and stamsorcs are:
- magsorc stacks 64 points to mag
- stamsorc stacks 64 points to stam
- magsorc uses class execute ability and spams frags
- stamsorc spams weapon skill/fighter's guild skill and casts frags when they proc

The principles of damage dealing has changed a lot with hybridisation. Now there are clear winners in regards to dps when it comes to gear and skills.

You want to use just enough light armor to reach the penetration cap in your group. Rest of the gear you want to be in medium armor. Heavy armor has no use for damage dealers, and thanks to hybridised abilities, your sustain depends more on having off-resource abilities instead of using armor weight to balance sustain.

Weapons are determined by your range now. If you can be at melee range, you want to be at melee range and use dw and twohanded. One exception is the 522221 stam sorcs that use BRP dw as their backbar. On ranged, you probably want staves still, something like Nahvintaas portals comes to mind, because there the melee is a lot harder and ranged is easier and safer.

Most of the dots are just the strongest dots you can have, no matter the cost. The spammable is determined by your maximum resource pool, since you can't spam spin to win as magicka dd. As necromancers with dot rotations, the skills stays about the same between both specs. Exception is the specialised roles like EC setup where you want to remorph the detonsting siphon to deal shock damage and to have a fire damage skill.

Potions and jewelry enchants now depends on your groups. If you have NB and DK in your group, you get minor buffs to weapon damage and weapon critical leading to you wanting to use weapon damage enchants and weapon damage potions to maximise those resources. The spell damage counterpart is to have sorcerers and templars in your group.

This does lead to quite homogenised builds. The gear stays the same between the specs since that depends on your group now. Skills have a little variance that depends on your sustain. Potions and jewelry enchants now depend on your group rather than your spec. The weapons now depend on your assigned positions and mechanics.

ErMurazor

React wrote: »

From the PVP perspective, here is how hybridization killed build diversity/combat "replayability" for me.

It effectively halved the number of classes in the game. In the past, there was 12 classes in ESO post-summerset; a magicka and stamina version of every spec. The stamina versions often utilized weapon abilities mixed with stamina cost class abilities, while only using magicka cost abilities for utility or buffs (things like armor buffs, templar purge, necro mender, etc). The magicka versions almost always used entirely magicka cost abilities for everything, utilizing their stamina pools only for core combat functionalities (sprint, dodge, block, break free, bash).

The stamina and magicka specs of every class played distinctly differently to one another. The used different weapon combos, different heals and spammables, sets, etc. This added a ton of replayability for those of us that play multiple classes, as we could try our hand at 12 uniquely different specs. We could further theorycraft builds that used a wider variety of sets, as there was more applicable options when there was a clear magicka/stamina split in the game.

Hybridization made it so that almost every class performs much better as a full hybrid than it does as a stamina or magicka spec, because now you are simply going to use the best morph of every ability as well as whatever the strongest heals & spammables are. You can choose not to do this, but you are massively reducing your effectiveness by not using the best morphs.

The result of this forced decision making is that classes are using the same heals, the same weapon choices (the current meta is very frequently ice/dw on most classes), the same gear, etc.

Now you can make the argument that "oh, you're just choosing to do that, I can play just fine with my full stamina sorcerer or my full magicka templar!". I agree, when it comes to PVE (outside of vet trials and DLC dungeon trifectas)/questing/overland, you can get by just fine without building a hybrid. Even if you're going into cyrodiil to casually PVP in a large group or siege keeps, you can choose not to be a hybrid and be okay.

But if you seriously want to perform well in PVP, or learn how to do things like solo/group PVP or coordinated battlegrounds, the first step is to make sure you are using an optimized hybrid build. You simply sacrifice too much effectiveness by not being a hybrid, to seriously compete in any high level PVP environment. This kills the diversity for me personally, because now I effectively have half the classes to enjoy.

From my limited endgame PVE experience, the same exact concept applies there now.

I'll summarize it for you. The game got boring with hybridisation.

Before when I got bored with playing a certain class i switched to another class or went from mag to stam or the other way around. Now it's just the same all over, same skills, same sets basically. Hybridisation made me stop playing this summer after playing and enjoying the game since 2015.

Jaimeh

Talking about PvE dps, one example of decreased diversity is that in trial groups all DDs are wearing medium armour, the exact same sets, use the same back-bar weapon, and the only thing that separates stam-mag is mostly the choice of spammable. (Also, less to do with hybrid more to do with classes, but if you check logs, you'll see an overwhelmng majority of DKs/necros in top groups, so there's not much diversity in classes either).

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I think the simplest explanation is something like this.

The intent was certainly that when you make everything scale off the highest stat, you in theory give players more options. The result however was that it become much easier for skilled players to look at two skills and say skill A is objectively better than skill B, so Skill B never gets used. The flipside is for players that have less knowledge, its just more confusing than ever.

Same logic can be applied to entire weapon lines. Now its basically DW/2H for DPS or GTFO. It used to be that magic users typically favored staffs, maybe DW front bar when possible to parse, and stamina really had several options, combinations of DW/2H/Bow. But now since everything scales, people figured out fairly quickly that you get the best stats using DW front bar, and Stampede is the strongest ST skill to proc your back bar enchant, so everyone runs DW/2H regardless of what stat they stack into.

IMO they should either revert the hybridization changes, or go all in. By all in I mean, remove the distinction completely between weapon and spell damage, and weapon and spell crit. Just call them damage and crit chance. Make skills all cost magic, make sprint, block, and dodge cost stamina. That would make everything much simpler. If you want to go all in on damage, you stack into magic. If you want more defense, you can spend more points into stamina. Very straight forward, go as glass cannon as you want (its what people do anyway at the extremes).

it makes absolutely no sense though from the perspective of spending magic to say slash someone with a physical weapon

i would hate doing that, if say cleave from 2h cost magicka, or flurry from DW cost magicka, that would make absolutely no sense from an RP/general elder scrolls perspective

@Necrotech_Master

You mean like my stampede that leaves behind a ground aoe? My Brawler that somehow gives me a huge shield? or maybe my daggers that I can somehow throw infinite amount of times and watch them bounce to other targets? Or heck, even my flurry that somehow damages an enemy but also heals me? All of it screams some sort of mystic power. Call it magic, call it mana, call it whatever you want. It sure would be a lot more straight forward if skills cost one resource pool and defense mechancis cost another. What we have now is a mess. I think Hybridzation was ultimately not good for the game, but if they are going to do it, they should finish the job.

If weapon LA/HA cost resources, I could certainly see the physical weapons requiring stamina, but its a moot point because they dont. Once you go beyond simply swinging your weapon (LA/HA) it doesnt take much of a leap to realize you are using some sort of mystical power to make your weapon do something else. I dont think magic is necessarily the wrong term for that.

I get the argument in theory and I do agree that lore should always be considered when implementing changes, but when you actually see what we have in game right now, I am not sure it holds up.

francesinhalover

i was fully against weapon skills being hybrid and in favor of the rest.

that's the issue, you have mags with daggers and two handed, stams with staffs.

To the point where you just swap btw magicka and stamina on your main to fit what spammable you want to use. that's it.

Everest_Lionheart

It basically created one meta to rule them all, but it’s also effectively made other sets and skills slightly more viable for harder content.

The trick maximizing damage in this environment is playing in organized groups where more of the buffs are available for high amount of uptime. This generally means at least 2 DPS losing significant damage so that the other 6 in group can put out significantly more.

For groups missing buffs you can still make up a portion of what is missing by building towards individual damage and slotting stam or mag focused skills, they might still have a hard time, just not as hard of a time.

The hard part now is you need to do math before entering into content where pen and crit cap come into play. If everyone is in medium but you don’t have the group pen numbers then the group is taking a loss by following the meta. Especially if you also happen to be over crit cap wearing all that medium armor. But chances are if you are missing pen you are probably also missing crit.

Under pen and under crit are not two things you want in your group. Hybridization makes it easy to achieve both the pen and crit numbers but can also greatly expose poorly made group comps in a hurry.

Food for thought…

Ratzkifal

Hybridization opened up build creation by tearing down barriers that previously kept some sets or weapons exclusive to one or two specs. So on first glance the notion that it could kill diversity sounds quite silly. However as a result it causes build options that never had to compete with one another into competition. One option comes out ahead, leaving the other one behind and sometimes making it straight up not viable.
Take Deadly Strikes for example. The set used to be stamina exclusive and increase dot damage by 20% - less than Blooddrinker's bleed exclusive 30%. The set was balanced because it was impossible for magicka builds to take advantage of the medium armor and weapon damage boni. By hybridizing the armor boni and allowing it to apply to all dots, not just martial dots and channels, the set needed to be nerfed so that destruction staff ultimates and "jesus beam" would not become crazy strong. This meant that all stamina builds using this set suffered a nerf in direct consequence of a hybridization change, ultimately resulting in the set not being viable anymore compared to the usual sets everyone else is wearing.
And so, as a result of opening up one set to all, the set lost its niche use case and stopped being viable, resulting in less build diversity rather than more of it.

Necrotech_Master

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

I think the simplest explanation is something like this.

The intent was certainly that when you make everything scale off the highest stat, you in theory give players more options. The result however was that it become much easier for skilled players to look at two skills and say skill A is objectively better than skill B, so Skill B never gets used. The flipside is for players that have less knowledge, its just more confusing than ever.

Same logic can be applied to entire weapon lines. Now its basically DW/2H for DPS or GTFO. It used to be that magic users typically favored staffs, maybe DW front bar when possible to parse, and stamina really had several options, combinations of DW/2H/Bow. But now since everything scales, people figured out fairly quickly that you get the best stats using DW front bar, and Stampede is the strongest ST skill to proc your back bar enchant, so everyone runs DW/2H regardless of what stat they stack into.

IMO they should either revert the hybridization changes, or go all in. By all in I mean, remove the distinction completely between weapon and spell damage, and weapon and spell crit. Just call them damage and crit chance. Make skills all cost magic, make sprint, block, and dodge cost stamina. That would make everything much simpler. If you want to go all in on damage, you stack into magic. If you want more defense, you can spend more points into stamina. Very straight forward, go as glass cannon as you want (its what people do anyway at the extremes).

it makes absolutely no sense though from the perspective of spending magic to say slash someone with a physical weapon

i would hate doing that, if say cleave from 2h cost magicka, or flurry from DW cost magicka, that would make absolutely no sense from an RP/general elder scrolls perspective

@Necrotech_Master

You mean like my stampede that leaves behind a ground aoe? My Brawler that somehow gives me a huge shield? or maybe my daggers that I can somehow throw infinite amount of times and watch them bounce to other targets? Or heck, even my flurry that somehow damages an enemy but also heals me? All of it screams some sort of mystic power. Call it magic, call it mana, call it whatever you want. It sure would be a lot more straight forward if skills cost one resource pool and defense mechancis cost another. What we have now is a mess. I think Hybridzation was ultimately not good for the game, but if they are going to do it, they should finish the job.

If weapon LA/HA cost resources, I could certainly see the physical weapons requiring stamina, but its a moot point because they dont. Once you go beyond simply swinging your weapon (LA/HA) it doesnt take much of a leap to realize you are using some sort of mystical power to make your weapon do something else. I dont think magic is necessarily the wrong term for that.

I get the argument in theory and I do agree that lore should always be considered when implementing changes, but when you actually see what we have in game right now, I am not sure it holds up.

i think those secondary effects are just ways to add variety to the game, and you can still have an enchanted weapon, but it still takes stamina to wield a weapon regardless if its enchanted

if im using a physical weapon it should take stamina to do stuff, if im using a magical weapon (staff, or maybe some 1 handed magic weapon we still dont yet) then it should take magicka

i dont think hybridization has anything to do with what items cost, at least now you still have to make build choices for sustain instead of just 100% stacking magicka for every build and actually making the game have absolutely no variety whatsoever, having everything scaled feels like you can have more variety because as a stam toon you can have a mag ability for dmg instead of only buffs

my stamplar for example can actually use jesus beam effectively, when that was almost useless before hybridization because of the scaling difference

Kisakee

If hybridization has killed anyhing then it's the ability of people to think for themself and try own things while being nothing but copy cats.

So many possibilities have opened up and almost no one even tries new builds. Go out, think on your own, create something new and maybe you'll find something even better than the so called "meta".

Quackery

Me personally, I've stopped caring. I use the exact same gear and have for years, I just can't be bothered any longer. ZOS has already nerfed every magsorc skill that I use. I'm not even focusing on the game when playing, I do many things at the same time. It's not the same and it's not fun.

Everest_Lionheart

Kisakee wrote: »

If hybridization has killed anyhing then it's the ability of people to think for themself and try own things while being nothing but copy cats.

So many possibilities have opened up and almost no one even tries new builds. Go out, think on your own, create something new and maybe you'll find something even better than the so called "meta".

This is true. What I see in a several discord channels that I am in though is people giving bad advice and pushing player to the meta builds anyway. Yes those meta sets work for sweaty players but they don’t necessarily work for average players. The meta has a higher ceiling yes but can also have wild swings in DPS if you can’t properly control your stacks or procs. It too much for players to manage.

Sets can be simplified, and some classes don’t even need a mythic to hit hard. For instance I put Siroria and pillar on a Khajiit sorc with maw and a maelstrom backbar and hit between 112 and 114 of the dummy 6x in a row. A guild mate of mine has Rele and pillar on a dark elf with maw, kilt and split dagger front with 2H on back and topped out at 119K but also put up a few under 110K.

What’s more interesting is that same person said Khajiit was trash and maelstrom backbar was trash and light armor was trash. 4-5% off top end number for consistency is a trade you take 99% of the time in my book. Only when you are score pushing is there a need to take the risk. I wish more people realized that before they copy paste the meta.