Winterborn item set and what could be done

ESO_Nightingale

Hey everyone, i just wanted to talk about an underused item set in the game at the moment. One i find extremely fun to use despite it's performance.

as the title suggests, that set is Winterborn. a set that used to be used a ton in pvp a long time back but now has fallen into obscurity due to other sets outperforming it in it's unique areas.




Winterborn has my favourite sound effect in the entire game attached to it. a visceral spiking noise, followed by an ice shatter as it shoots up a sharp icicle pillar under it's target.

with a 50% snare on it, it seems to heavily eat up the power budget of this set, lowering it's damage output compared to other more powerful proc sets, while having nowhere near the level of impact that a strong CC set like dark convergence has on it's targets in addition to it's large burst. i think it's really unfortunate because i'd love to be able to use this item set in pve environments without comprimising a ginormous amount of damage.

Performance:

In PvE situations it underperforms pretty badly as you would expect compared to something considered meta such as pillar of nirn, even when using an item set such as frostbite which does amplify it's damage which technically should give it an edge over nirn. forgive my rusty parses, i did try to match everything i could between the 2 builds.

Winterborn:




Pillar of Nirn:

What can be done?:

I believe there are a couple of things that could be done to this set to make it perform better in at least some pve situations. Firstly, i think it should automatically proc the chilled status effect to the targets that it hits. this would raise it's power a little bit especially for frost wardens. Secondly like pillar of nirn i believe it should have a lingering damage over time effect on the 3 meter radius pillar that it summons. This would result in a set similar to pillar of nirn but more frontloaded into the initial burst with a faster proc and smaller damage over time component. i believe that the snare could in turn be reduced down to 30% or ideally removed if it is able to compete with pillar.

finally, I believe that the magicka recovery bonus on the 3 piece item set bonus harms it's potential. I think that it would be better replaced with a second line of weapon and spell damage, or critical chance in order to better enhance the wearer's damage. a critical chance bonus would nicely mirror pillar of nirn as well.

@ZOS_Kevin I've seen how active you have been lately which has been wonderful. i wonder if the developers have any sort of comment about this item set? i know it's not a priority right now compared to the newer sets, but I'm a firm believer that seperate class specs should be able to have different best in slot gear combinations, all the while understanding how hard that can be to achieve.

CP5

As someone who uses the set often I was going to say it isn't that bad, but seeing how it basically was "Pillar of Nirn" minus the 5p bonus, with frost damage skills almost matched between them... That's, impressively bad actually, but at least you're comparing it to one of the best sets out there, so it was bound to do worse. That much worse should be addressed, though.

ESO_Nightingale

CP5 wrote: »

As someone who uses the set often I was going to say it isn't that bad, but seeing how it basically was "Pillar of Nirn" minus the 5p bonus, with frost damage skills almost matched between them... That's, impressively bad actually, but at least you're comparing it to one of the best sets out there, so it was bound to do worse. That much worse should be addressed, though.

the funny thing is that frostbite actually buffs frost damage sets too contrary to it's wording so i was technically giving it an unfair advantage.

CP5

At least frostbite is the staple iceden set I use, I keep juggling the other one and forget what's currently there, but I didn't realize how low-roll this set is. That's why I always say it'd be nice for ZOS to just update a lot of older sets.

ESO_Nightingale

CP5 wrote: »

At least frostbite is the staple iceden set I use, I keep juggling the other one and forget what's currently there, but I didn't realize how low-roll this set is. That's why I always say it'd be nice for ZOS to just update a lot of older sets.

Even still, frostbite doesn't perform as well as meta sets despite being something you need to actively build around.

ESO_Nightingale

CP5 wrote: »

As someone who uses the set often I was going to say it isn't that bad, but seeing how it basically was "Pillar of Nirn" minus the 5p bonus, with frost damage skills almost matched between them... That's, impressively bad actually, but at least you're comparing it to one of the best sets out there, so it was bound to do worse. That much worse should be addressed, though.

I wanted to ask which situations you generally use it in?

Necrotech_Master

i actually see winterborn being used in pvp for ranged burst dmg, and it can hurt quite a lot

ESO_Nightingale

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

i actually see winterborn being used in pvp for ranged burst dmg, and it can hurt quite a lot

which other sets are being used in the same role?

CP5

While frostbite is my standard pve set, I did dabble with some odd ones when I pvp'ed on my warden, gave winterborn a shot but found the one that summons an ice wraith to be more enjoyable since you could place a blood alter and trigger it as an alarm system. And to be honest I did misread your post and, not having been in game a lot lately, mistook frostbite for winterborn.

ESO_Nightingale

CP5 wrote: »

While frostbite is my standard pve set, I did dabble with some odd ones when I pvp'ed on my warden, gave winterborn a shot but found the one that summons an ice wraith to be more enjoyable since you could place a blood alter and trigger it as an alarm system. And to be honest I did misread your post and, not having been in game a lot lately, mistook frostbite for winterborn.

even icy conjuror isn't that good. i can show you the difference.





while it does do better than winterborn, it's still a bit worse than nirn. the key point of difference is that pillar of nirn is aoe and conjuror is single target. nirn is just way better.

CP5

It is, I enjoyed using it in the past when it was more niche, but tend to avoid proc sets for damage just because I both enjoy buffing what I'm intentionally using and because when a proc set is off target it can be very, discouraging. But if it still works with blood alter, I'd give icy a try in cyrodiil just for the amusement factor, seeing the wraith wander into a random corner to snipe someone hiding. That was amusing, but as far as raw damage goes, definitely disappointing.

Finedaible

I mean like 90% of the sets in the game are comprised of cool effects/mechanics like that which we wish we could integrate effectively into our builds if they weren't so pitifully weak.

With how much set bloat there is in the game, I kinda wish ZoS would focus less on quantity and start focusing more on quality. Or just release less sets and start buffing some of the older ones like Winterborn that have cool ideas behind them.

katorga

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

i actually see winterborn being used in pvp for ranged burst dmg, and it can hurt quite a lot

which other sets are being used in the same role?

Defiler, Hrothgar's Chill come to mind. I've seen a winterborn/hrothgar warden using masters ice staff to proc the two sets at range. Sort of nasty damage.

ESO_Nightingale

Finedaible wrote: »

I mean like 90% of the sets in the game are comprised of cool effects/mechanics like that which we wish we could integrate effectively into our builds if they weren't so pitifully weak.

With how much set bloat there is in the game, I kinda wish ZoS would focus less on quantity and start focusing more on quality. Or just release less sets and start buffing some of the older ones like Winterborn that have cool ideas behind them.

I wish it was a lot closer for many more item sets. But the difference can be glaringly apparent.

ESO_Nightingale

katorga wrote: »

ESO_Nightingale wrote: »

Necrotech_Master wrote: »

i actually see winterborn being used in pvp for ranged burst dmg, and it can hurt quite a lot

which other sets are being used in the same role?

Defiler, Hrothgar's Chill come to mind. I've seen a winterborn/hrothgar warden using masters ice staff to proc the two sets at range. Sort of nasty damage.

as far as i know, hrothgar's isn't doing that great right now since the nerf.