Give Sorc an in-class source of Off Balance

MashmalloMan

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

Hm why are you jumping at me like meat gobblers, if I say that offbalance and breach are probably not the best buffs to ask for? As said, I think the class could use other tweaks, though. Adding major breach to any sorc skill used on live, will probably make the skill overloaded. Putting it on a non-used skill will make it compete with ele sus. And I guess we all know how good ele sus is by its own already.

I honestly do not care about offbalance though, since I do not see it benefitting sorc much as described in the previous post.

But it is fun to see people going crazy, when somebody says „be careful buffing/nerfing stuff“, when we all agree on the chisel being the better tool than the hammer for balance changes.

No one's jumping at you or going crazy just because they disagree with you. It's okay to disagree. Adding it to a lesser used skill doesn't aleivate Sorc's biggest problem in my opinion which is bar space and named buff/debuff access. To your point, how exactly would a debuff being added to Haunting Curse for example be OP in the context of todays combat?

Imagine it only debuffed the target it was on, which is 1 target at a time. Then think about how highly telegraphed Mag Sorc's burst kit is and how prevelant Breach and Savagery are across the other classes. DKs Breath and Warden's Scorch as examples apply Breach in AOE and are staples of their kits.

In support of your argument, I could easily see them buffing Rune Prison or Encase. When was the last time you saw any Sorc use those? They certainly aren't or have not been meta for very long at any point in the past 9 years of ESO. Either way, lets say they added breach to Encase, I still wouldn't slot it imo because I need 4-5 other damage skills to actually kill anything.

StaticWave

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

Perhaps ZoS is adjusting each class 1 at a time throughout different updates.
Starting with NB obviously.

Nah I think ZOS just legit doesn’t care about Sorc. For the past 5 years I have seen several classes receive 3-4 balance changes per update cycle, but Sorc barely gets 1-2, and sometimes none.

I remember asking for Bound Armaments to build 2 stacks with heavy attacks like Merciless Resolve 3 years ago. 3 years. They just implemented that this PTS cycle. I mean what lol? One simple QoL change took them 3 years to implement, and people call that a Sorc buff lol?

Same buddy, probably the same threads honestly. Die hard Stam Sorc mains lol.

Also asked them to remove the cast condition for 1-3 daggers because there is legitamitely no reason to cast them that early and just wastes the proc if it's accidently pressed. This is less of a problem with no buff timer because I was hoping it would just rebuff the timer instead, but still. Something to consider.

Mabye in another 3 years they will remove the 0.3s delay between each dagger and send them all at the same time. So silly that a skill that hits much less than NB Bow proc with the same telegraph counter condition, has an additional 1.2s window added to the already long projectile minimum travel time to make it even easier to dodge.

Lastly, it should give something universal like NBs Bow proc so Mag Sorc can be thrown a bone. I feel terrible for them, they have fallen so far from grace. We already lost the light/heavy attack damage of it, please change the stam for crit dmg-healing or crit chance.

All that being said, I'm pretty pumped for U39 changes and I'll happily take what I can get without poking the bear. Thanks ZOS you're the best lol..

Yea comparing BA and Merciless and we just see night and day difference.

BA has 1 less stack( less maximum burst), deals damage with 4 projectiles instead of 1 (less maximum burst since 4 of them need to crit), provides less useful bonus (8% stam on the bar slotted instead of Merciless’a 300 wd that applies to both bars), doesn’t have a secondary effect (Merciless also heals for 50% of dmg done in melee range), has less duration, and requires you to use it within 10 seconds lol.

Merciless Resolve is just flat out better in every way. I think ZOS threw a bone at us and half-a*s it when they created Bound Arms lol.

MashmalloMan

JerBearESO wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

Perhaps ZoS is adjusting each class 1 at a time throughout different updates.
Starting with NB obviously.

Nah I think ZOS just legit doesn’t care about Sorc. For the past 5 years I have seen several classes receive 3-4 balance changes per update cycle, but Sorc barely gets 1-2, and sometimes none.

I remember asking for Bound Armaments to build 2 stacks with heavy attacks like Merciless Resolve 3 years ago. 3 years. They just implemented that this PTS cycle. I mean what lol? One simple QoL change took them 3 years to implement, and people call that a Sorc buff lol?

Same buddy, probably the same threads honestly. Die hard Stam Sorc mains lol.

Also asked them to remove the cast condition for 1-3 daggers because there is legitamitely no reason to cast them that early and just wastes the proc if it's accidently pressed. This is less of a problem with no buff timer because I was hoping it would just rebuff the timer instead, but still. Something to consider.

Mabye in another 3 years they will remove the 0.3s delay between each dagger and send them all at the same time. So silly that a skill that hits much less than NB Bow proc with the same telegraph counter condition, has an additional 1.2s window added to the already long projectile minimum travel time to make it even easier to dodge.

Lastly, it should give something universal like NBs Bow proc so Mag Sorc can be thrown a bone. I feel terrible for them, they have fallen so far from grace. We already lost the light/heavy attack damage of it, please change the stam for crit dmg-healing or crit chance.

All that being said, I'm pretty pumped for U39 changes and I'll happily take what I can get without poking the bear. Thanks ZOS you're the best lol..

I'm actually thinking of using those bound daggers as a spamable on a HA build, and using it often with the 2 daggers from the heavy, so I like that it can be used before full stacks

Fair enough, I suppose in niche scenario's it could be useful like yours, but why not just use an actual spammable? At 2 stacks it's worth less than any other spammable. At 3 it's slightly stronger.

Oakensoul build?

MashmalloMan

StaticWave wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

Perhaps ZoS is adjusting each class 1 at a time throughout different updates.
Starting with NB obviously.

Nah I think ZOS just legit doesn’t care about Sorc. For the past 5 years I have seen several classes receive 3-4 balance changes per update cycle, but Sorc barely gets 1-2, and sometimes none.

I remember asking for Bound Armaments to build 2 stacks with heavy attacks like Merciless Resolve 3 years ago. 3 years. They just implemented that this PTS cycle. I mean what lol? One simple QoL change took them 3 years to implement, and people call that a Sorc buff lol?

Same buddy, probably the same threads honestly. Die hard Stam Sorc mains lol.

Also asked them to remove the cast condition for 1-3 daggers because there is legitamitely no reason to cast them that early and just wastes the proc if it's accidently pressed. This is less of a problem with no buff timer because I was hoping it would just rebuff the timer instead, but still. Something to consider.

Mabye in another 3 years they will remove the 0.3s delay between each dagger and send them all at the same time. So silly that a skill that hits much less than NB Bow proc with the same telegraph counter condition, has an additional 1.2s window added to the already long projectile minimum travel time to make it even easier to dodge.

Lastly, it should give something universal like NBs Bow proc so Mag Sorc can be thrown a bone. I feel terrible for them, they have fallen so far from grace. We already lost the light/heavy attack damage of it, please change the stam for crit dmg-healing or crit chance.

All that being said, I'm pretty pumped for U39 changes and I'll happily take what I can get without poking the bear. Thanks ZOS you're the best lol..

Yea comparing BA and Merciless and we just see night and day difference.

BA has 1 less stack( less maximum burst), deals damage with 4 projectiles instead of 1 (less maximum burst since 4 of them need to crit), provides less useful bonus (8% stam on the bar slotted instead of Merciless’a 300 wd that applies to both bars), doesn’t have a secondary effect (Merciless also heals for 50% of dmg done in melee range), has less duration, and requires you to use it within 10 seconds lol.

Merciless Resolve is just flat out better in every way. I think ZOS threw a bone at us and half-a*s it when they created Bound Arms lol.

I ask myself that all the time, the only argument I can see is because ZOS considers Sorc to having more damage tools at their disposal:

Bound Armaments == Grim Focus
Crystal Shard == Veiled Strike
Fury == Assassin's Blade
Dawnbreaker/Meteor == Incap
Curse == n/a
Streak == n/a

Sorc may have more, but compare the skills that are similar and in every scenario the NB's skill hits harder, while requiring less telegraph and skills to setup, their burst is simpler and easier to pull off.

Also even though ZOS is adamannt Shard morphs are spammables and Fury is an execute, they're both best used as delayed burst skills. So it's more like:

Crystal + BA + Curse + Fury == Grim Focus
n/a == Veiled Strike
n/a == Assassin's Blade
Dawnbreaker/Meteor == Incap

Incap is Cheap enough that it can be used as the classes dedicated stun, but if not, their spammable covers that for them via off-balance.

Point I'm making is Sorc feels like it required 4-5 skills and lots of prep to setup a kill, while our closest cousin NB can do the same thing in 3 skills while not needing a double slotted pet that can be killed for their burst heal. Thats the only logic I can see from ZOS's perspective, but I don't see it as a good thing, less is more.

FirmamentOfStars

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

Hm why are you jumping at me like meat gobblers, if I say that offbalance and breach are probably not the best buffs to ask for? As said, I think the class could use other tweaks, though. Adding major breach to any sorc skill used on live, will probably make the skill overloaded. Putting it on a non-used skill will make it compete with ele sus. And I guess we all know how good ele sus is by its own already.

I honestly do not care about offbalance though, since I do not see it benefitting sorc much as described in the previous post.

But it is fun to see people going crazy, when somebody says „be careful buffing/nerfing stuff“, when we all agree on the chisel being the better tool than the hammer for balance changes.

It wasn't so much jumping at you, but pointing out just how overloaded so many skills and classes are already such that it is ridiculous to even suggest "requiring care" when discussing giving sorcs easy access to the basic buff/debuff options of prophecy/savagery/breach.

Now if we were to talk about giving sorc easy access to some rare/unique buffs such as the now being change from unnamed 10% damage buff to major berserk that concealed currently has, or major brittle, major vulnerability, major courage, major force, etc, then for sure, we would need to be careful with things like that, but not for what are supposed to be standard buff/debuffs that all classes should have easy access to.

I agree, savagery/prophecy and breach are staples of lots of PvP builds, but both of these buffs are not easely available on the other classes either. When looking at the skills currently providing these buffs/debuffs, we have breach on noxious breath on dk and shalks on warden, while prophecy/savagery is found on inferno (cauterize/FoO) and lotus blossom from wardens (excluding sun fire from templars, because like nobody is using that). So both buffs/debuffs are really only found on both dk and warden (hmmm what were the meta classes again?), while the other 5 classes have to use elemental susceptibility and camouflaged hunter. And that is why I ask for "care" with such stuff.

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

Hm why are you jumping at me like meat gobblers, if I say that offbalance and breach are probably not the best buffs to ask for? As said, I think the class could use other tweaks, though. Adding major breach to any sorc skill used on live, will probably make the skill overloaded. Putting it on a non-used skill will make it compete with ele sus. And I guess we all know how good ele sus is by its own already.

I honestly do not care about offbalance though, since I do not see it benefitting sorc much as described in the previous post.

But it is fun to see people going crazy, when somebody says „be careful buffing/nerfing stuff“, when we all agree on the chisel being the better tool than the hammer for balance changes.

No one's jumping at you or going crazy just because they disagree with you. It's okay to disagree. Adding it to a lesser used skill doesn't aleivate Sorc's biggest problem in my opinion which is bar space and named buff/debuff access. To your point, how exactly would a debuff being added to Haunting Curse for example be OP in the context of todays combat?

Imagine it only debuffed the target it was on, which is 1 target at a time. Then think about how highly telegraphed Mag Sorc's burst kit is and how prevelant Breach and Savagery are across the other classes. DKs Breath and Warden's Scorch as examples apply Breach in AOE and are staples of their kits.

In support of your argument, I could easily see them buffing Rune Prison or Encase. When was the last time you saw any Sorc use those? They certainly aren't or have not been meta for very long at any point in the past 9 years of ESO. Either way, lets say they added breach to Encase, I still wouldn't slot it imo because I need 4-5 other damage skills to actually kill anything.

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably). In my opinion, curse would be overloaded with major breach on a high damage class like sorc is. Also as mentioned before, major breach isnt really prevalent at all on class skills (2/7 classes do have it on useful skills, while everyone else has to use another gcd for casting ele sus). Additionally, even though sorcs burst is telegraphed, its not avoidable easely thanks to streak being an unavoidable cc.

MashmalloMan

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

FirmamentOfStars

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

As much as I know only magsorcs and arcanists use a shield being able to „counter“ curse. The comparison with shalks comes from being able to negate every other bith of burst the warden has by simply blocking, meanwhile this does not worl against a sorc with streak slotted. The burst is telegraphed, sure, but its not really avoidable.

Also I did not mean that having in class breach and savagery makes dk and warden meta, but as you said it plays into it.

Again, major breach is very prevalent in PvP, but comes only within the class toolkit on two out of 7 classes, while everybody else needs to make space for ele sus (if that skill would not be overperforming, we might see breach far less prevalent in PvP).

If the goal is to bring every class up to dk, warden and nb level, sure go ahead with your sorc buffs. Just do not forget that 4 other classes do not have breach or savagery readely available either and 3 of them need some buffs as well. If you think, the top classes need some slight nerf and classes should be balanced around like templar or sorc level, then stop right there and think about changes „carefully“.

Weckless

StaticWave wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

No thanks. It's one of the easiest things for a sorc to proc because we're the most likely to use Dizzy Swing or Shock Blockade. I'd rather not lose room in our power budget for more useful debuffs or buffs like major savagery or breach..

No good sorc is using Dizzying Swing or Shock Blockade lol…

What context are you looking at exactly because you're putting toppling charge in your list which is only useful for PVP, yet everyone know's "no good" Warden would use Dive in pvp.

Either option is suitable if your chasing off balance, they just so happen to also be a little stronger for Sorc's due to their Shock/Physical affinity is what I'm getting at.

For your list. 1/7 is only useful for PVP. 4/7 are "spammables", but 1 no one likes due to the proc condition and travel time and the other is an AOE skill so it does considerably less DPS.

You didn't really make an argument for why off balance is necessary for Sorc besides it being a standard, although I disagree. I'm curious why you think it's important?

Sorc's have one of the best stuns in the game, one of the reasons off balance is important for some of the classes you listed is because it helps give them a decent on demand stun they can proc from a medium weave that they can't proc otherwise.

Everything comes at a cost. What Sorc really needs is efforts made to alleviate bar space issues that have plagued the class since they removed Overload 3rd bar without redesigning the class from the ground up.

1. Pets take 2 spaces and contribute to our theoretical DPS ceiling, which means Sorc appears to be a decent damage dealer... Until you move them to PVP where that damage falls off. Pets are borderline useless outside of group PVE.

2. Most of our damage skills have no overlap for named debuffs/buffs requiring us to slot extra generic abilities or none at all because you guessed it... Pets are taking up too much space.

3. Updated outdated passives that are redundant or undervalued in comparison to other classes.

Minor force and/or berserk being added to Dark Exchange morphs was a great step in the right direction. Higher concussed chance on Volatile Familiar and guaranteed via Charged Atro (minor vuln) are simply to unreliable to be considered, although appreciated. Again, pets though. Buff non pet Sorc.

Quick fix imo. Adding Breach or Savagery to Haunting Curse and Empower to Daedric Prey would be another huge step in adding build diversity, flexibility, a bit of power, but capped power for Sorc's where they need it most. 1 flex spot would do wonders.

Take a look at a Templar for example:

- Sustain tool is also their armor buff, and now a small passive hot.
- Their gap closer also procs major protection and enables stun via off balance.
- Their main damage skill procs minor protection, snares and heals/major brutality.
- DoT with Major Savagery
- Self DoT with Empower (and 5% class DMG buff)
- Multiple damage/buff skills layered with HoTs

Sorc's have Hurricane and Crit Surge. Curse, BA, Crystal, Wrath, Lightning Splash, Tormentor.. nothing named.

I’m strictly talking about PvP. Sorc does have a very good stun, but I if I want to use Ball of Lightning I will lose that stun. Other classes, particularly melee ones, get access to a stun via Off Balance.

Yes, I will have to slot Dizzy Swing, but Dizzy is honestly not a good spammable on stamsorc and makes the class squishier because you have to give up 2 slots for Dizzy and an execute. You’re also relying on out-of-class abilities, which won’t give you the bonuses of class passives.

I would prefer Off Balance on a Dark Magic ability. Most classes already have it and also have their own unique unblockable/undodgable stun (except for Necro), so I don’t really see that as an argument against giving Sorc Off Balance.

You just want to off balance someone into Crystal Weapon infused Overload heavy attacks don't you. Because that's what id do. Lightning staff go brr

JerBearESO

MashmalloMan wrote: »

JerBearESO wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

Perhaps ZoS is adjusting each class 1 at a time throughout different updates.
Starting with NB obviously.

Nah I think ZOS just legit doesn’t care about Sorc. For the past 5 years I have seen several classes receive 3-4 balance changes per update cycle, but Sorc barely gets 1-2, and sometimes none.

I remember asking for Bound Armaments to build 2 stacks with heavy attacks like Merciless Resolve 3 years ago. 3 years. They just implemented that this PTS cycle. I mean what lol? One simple QoL change took them 3 years to implement, and people call that a Sorc buff lol?

Same buddy, probably the same threads honestly. Die hard Stam Sorc mains lol.

Also asked them to remove the cast condition for 1-3 daggers because there is legitamitely no reason to cast them that early and just wastes the proc if it's accidently pressed. This is less of a problem with no buff timer because I was hoping it would just rebuff the timer instead, but still. Something to consider.

Mabye in another 3 years they will remove the 0.3s delay between each dagger and send them all at the same time. So silly that a skill that hits much less than NB Bow proc with the same telegraph counter condition, has an additional 1.2s window added to the already long projectile minimum travel time to make it even easier to dodge.

Lastly, it should give something universal like NBs Bow proc so Mag Sorc can be thrown a bone. I feel terrible for them, they have fallen so far from grace. We already lost the light/heavy attack damage of it, please change the stam for crit dmg-healing or crit chance.

All that being said, I'm pretty pumped for U39 changes and I'll happily take what I can get without poking the bear. Thanks ZOS you're the best lol..

I'm actually thinking of using those bound daggers as a spamable on a HA build, and using it often with the 2 daggers from the heavy, so I like that it can be used before full stacks

Fair enough, I suppose in niche scenario's it could be useful like yours, but why not just use an actual spammable? At 2 stacks it's worth less than any other spammable. At 3 it's slightly stronger.

Oakensoul build?

Gotta slot skills sparingly and the 8% stam is nifty, so will rather have it than a spamable. Can act as semi burst by holding out for full stacks which is fine on a HA build where that essentially means when I use curse I have full stacks after next heavy. Should be nice for taking out pugs xD I don't expect much more than that but anyway

Edit: yes oaken

StaticWave

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

As much as I know only magsorcs and arcanists use a shield being able to „counter“ curse. The comparison with shalks comes from being able to negate every other bith of burst the warden has by simply blocking, meanwhile this does not worl against a sorc with streak slotted. The burst is telegraphed, sure, but its not really avoidable.

Also I did not mean that having in class breach and savagery makes dk and warden meta, but as you said it plays into it.

Again, major breach is very prevalent in PvP, but comes only within the class toolkit on two out of 7 classes, while everybody else needs to make space for ele sus (if that skill would not be overperforming, we might see breach far less prevalent in PvP).

If the goal is to bring every class up to dk, warden and nb level, sure go ahead with your sorc buffs. Just do not forget that 4 other classes do not have breach or savagery readely available either and 3 of them need some buffs as well. If you think, the top classes need some slight nerf and classes should be balanced around like templar or sorc level, then stop right there and think about changes „carefully“.

Well Sorc needs something because at the end of the day it has one of, if not the least amount of in-class Major/Minor buffs/debuffs. This is the biggest cause for tight bar space on this class. Yes, it has 3 offensive skills to choose from, but there are 2 issues with this:

1) Not every spec of Sorc can slot all 3

The only spec of Sorc right now that can slot all 3 of their offensive class skills is ranged Sorc:



This is possible because Crystal Weapon is best weaved with a ranged weapon, allowing it to be used as a spammable. If you play a melee Sorc, you cannot use Crystal Weapon as a spammable because it's just clunky and can't be block casted. As a result, you have to rely on out-of-class spammables such as Rending Slashes or Dizzying Swing. This is what a standard melee skill layout looks like for DW and 2H builds:




As you can see, the DW build has to choose between Curse or Bound Armaments because it cannot drop Major Evasion (which is needed for melee builds). Similarly, the 2H build has to choose between either Curse or Bound Armaments because Executioner is needed on a Dizzy build.

Both of these builds have their own weaknesses too. The DW build has no burst heal, so it must rely on a set for that (Dragon's Appetite). Meanwhile, the 2H build has no Major Evasion or Crit Surge, so it's healing is bad and its tankiness is also bad. This is why DW is being used by the vast majority of melee Sorcs because you're better off getting a burst heal from a set than 2H, not to mention DW gives better stats.

2) There's too much setting up

There's just too much setting up on this class for it to be effective at killing players. For example, if I want to 1 shot someone on my melee Sorc, I have to build 4 stacks of Bound Armaments or place a Curse, precast Crystal Weapon, then time both of them with a Dawnbreaker. Curse + Crystal Weapon when crit deal just slightly less damage than a crit Spectral Bow. I have to do twice the work, spend twice/thrice the resources, waste 2 bar slots, and still have to rely on BOTH of them to crit when a NB can just use Spectral Bow every 5 LA weaves and deal a similar amount of damage.

You're essentially relying on your opponents to be a potato because you're not going to land all of your combo in 1 GCD. Some of them will be blocked or roll dodged. More moving parts in the combo also means more telegraphed fights. That's why I often have to hide my combo by bar swap canceling Crystal Weapon so my opponents don't see the cast, then hit them when they don't expect it.

I know you might think these 2 issues have nothing to do with Sorc getting more Major buffs, but they do. The point is this class already has a lot of moving parts in its offensive combo, so having to spend an extra GCD to apply Ele sus really restricts the class's ability to output as much damage as possible. For a class whose healing comes from being offensive (Surge and Blood Magic), this extra GCD is not an advantage at all. Furthermore, most delayed bursts in the game have a secondary effect. Curse is the only delayed burst in the game that still doesn't have a secondary effect. I think it's time it gets one.

Lalothen

I think Lightning Flood, instead of doing more damage over time, should get an AoE DD component that sets enemies off-balance. I also think the Daedric Tomb morph should just fire one large rune that does the same amount of AoE direct damage (shock damage, not magic) as Volcanic (or maybe a little more), still immobilizes and has an increased chance to proc concussion. Sorcs could also get a passive that increases the front-loaded damage of concussion, like Wardens get for chilled.

I dunno what I'd do specifically for stam sorcs... improve Bound Armaments, revert Crystal Weapon to 2x full damage procs, make Clannfear an actual stam dps pet morph instead of the wtf ever it is now?

MashmalloMan

StaticWave wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

As much as I know only magsorcs and arcanists use a shield being able to „counter“ curse. The comparison with shalks comes from being able to negate every other bith of burst the warden has by simply blocking, meanwhile this does not worl against a sorc with streak slotted. The burst is telegraphed, sure, but its not really avoidable.

Also I did not mean that having in class breach and savagery makes dk and warden meta, but as you said it plays into it.

Again, major breach is very prevalent in PvP, but comes only within the class toolkit on two out of 7 classes, while everybody else needs to make space for ele sus (if that skill would not be overperforming, we might see breach far less prevalent in PvP).

If the goal is to bring every class up to dk, warden and nb level, sure go ahead with your sorc buffs. Just do not forget that 4 other classes do not have breach or savagery readely available either and 3 of them need some buffs as well. If you think, the top classes need some slight nerf and classes should be balanced around like templar or sorc level, then stop right there and think about changes „carefully“.

Well Sorc needs something because at the end of the day it has one of, if not the least amount of in-class Major/Minor buffs/debuffs. This is the biggest cause for tight bar space on this class. Yes, it has 3 offensive skills to choose from, but there are 2 issues with this:

1) Not every spec of Sorc can slot all 3

The only spec of Sorc right now that can slot all 3 of their offensive class skills is ranged Sorc:



This is possible because Crystal Weapon is best weaved with a ranged weapon, allowing it to be used as a spammable. If you play a melee Sorc, you cannot use Crystal Weapon as a spammable because it's just clunky and can't be block casted. As a result, you have to rely on out-of-class spammables such as Rending Slashes or Dizzying Swing. This is what a standard melee skill layout looks like for DW and 2H builds:




As you can see, the DW build has to choose between Curse or Bound Armaments because it cannot drop Major Evasion (which is needed for melee builds). Similarly, the 2H build has to choose between either Curse or Bound Armaments because Executioner is needed on a Dizzy build.

Both of these builds have their own weaknesses too. The DW build has no burst heal, so it must rely on a set for that (Dragon's Appetite). Meanwhile, the 2H build has no Major Evasion or Crit Surge, so it's healing is bad and its tankiness is also bad. This is why DW is being used by the vast majority of melee Sorcs because you're better off getting a burst heal from a set than 2H, not to mention DW gives better stats.

2) There's too much setting up

There's just too much setting up on this class for it to be effective at killing players. For example, if I want to 1 shot someone on my melee Sorc, I have to build 4 stacks of Bound Armaments or place a Curse, precast Crystal Weapon, then time both of them with a Dawnbreaker. Curse + Crystal Weapon when crit deal just slightly less damage than a crit Spectral Bow. I have to do twice the work, spend twice/thrice the resources, waste 2 bar slots, and still have to rely on BOTH of them to crit when a NB can just use Spectral Bow every 5 LA weaves and deal a similar amount of damage.

You're essentially relying on your opponents to be a potato because you're not going to land all of your combo in 1 GCD. Some of them will be blocked or roll dodged. More moving parts in the combo also means more telegraphed fights. That's why I often have to hide my combo by bar swap canceling Crystal Weapon so my opponents don't see the cast, then hit them when they don't expect it.

I know you might think these 2 issues have nothing to do with Sorc getting more Major buffs, but they do. The point is this class already has a lot of moving parts in its offensive combo, so having to spend an extra GCD to apply Ele sus really restricts the class's ability to output as much damage as possible. For a class whose healing comes from being offensive (Surge and Blood Magic), this extra GCD is not an advantage at all. Furthermore, most delayed bursts in the game have a secondary effect. Curse is the only delayed burst in the game that still doesn't have a secondary effect. I think it's time it gets one.

Thank you, excellently put, this is how you can tell you're a Sorc main that gets it. I don't think ZOS even understands this. BA is a worse Grim Focus, Curse is a worse POTL which is already considered bad right now, Fury is a worse Jesus Beam, Crystal Weapon is a worse Surprise Attack.

In theory Sorc has a ton of damage skills, but basically no one can utilize all of them at the same time. They're either too clunky to line up, unreliable, overly complicated or no space to fit. Easier named Buff/Debuff access on some of the already used damage skills like Curse and/or BA would go a long way.

Buffing under used skills like Encase/Rune Cage would literally do nothing. Encase already gives Major Vitality for a decent uptime and I've never once considered making space for it because I need 5-6 damage skills to actually kill anyone.

Jierdanit

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

As much as I know only magsorcs and arcanists use a shield being able to „counter“ curse. The comparison with shalks comes from being able to negate every other bith of burst the warden has by simply blocking, meanwhile this does not worl against a sorc with streak slotted. The burst is telegraphed, sure, but its not really avoidable.

Also I did not mean that having in class breach and savagery makes dk and warden meta, but as you said it plays into it.

Again, major breach is very prevalent in PvP, but comes only within the class toolkit on two out of 7 classes, while everybody else needs to make space for ele sus (if that skill would not be overperforming, we might see breach far less prevalent in PvP).

If the goal is to bring every class up to dk, warden and nb level, sure go ahead with your sorc buffs. Just do not forget that 4 other classes do not have breach or savagery readely available either and 3 of them need some buffs as well. If you think, the top classes need some slight nerf and classes should be balanced around like templar or sorc level, then stop right there and think about changes „carefully“.

Well Sorc needs something because at the end of the day it has one of, if not the least amount of in-class Major/Minor buffs/debuffs. This is the biggest cause for tight bar space on this class. Yes, it has 3 offensive skills to choose from, but there are 2 issues with this:

1) Not every spec of Sorc can slot all 3

The only spec of Sorc right now that can slot all 3 of their offensive class skills is ranged Sorc:



This is possible because Crystal Weapon is best weaved with a ranged weapon, allowing it to be used as a spammable. If you play a melee Sorc, you cannot use Crystal Weapon as a spammable because it's just clunky and can't be block casted. As a result, you have to rely on out-of-class spammables such as Rending Slashes or Dizzying Swing. This is what a standard melee skill layout looks like for DW and 2H builds:




As you can see, the DW build has to choose between Curse or Bound Armaments because it cannot drop Major Evasion (which is needed for melee builds). Similarly, the 2H build has to choose between either Curse or Bound Armaments because Executioner is needed on a Dizzy build.

Both of these builds have their own weaknesses too. The DW build has no burst heal, so it must rely on a set for that (Dragon's Appetite). Meanwhile, the 2H build has no Major Evasion or Crit Surge, so it's healing is bad and its tankiness is also bad. This is why DW is being used by the vast majority of melee Sorcs because you're better off getting a burst heal from a set than 2H, not to mention DW gives better stats.

2) There's too much setting up

There's just too much setting up on this class for it to be effective at killing players. For example, if I want to 1 shot someone on my melee Sorc, I have to build 4 stacks of Bound Armaments or place a Curse, precast Crystal Weapon, then time both of them with a Dawnbreaker. Curse + Crystal Weapon when crit deal just slightly less damage than a crit Spectral Bow. I have to do twice the work, spend twice/thrice the resources, waste 2 bar slots, and still have to rely on BOTH of them to crit when a NB can just use Spectral Bow every 5 LA weaves and deal a similar amount of damage.

You're essentially relying on your opponents to be a potato because you're not going to land all of your combo in 1 GCD. Some of them will be blocked or roll dodged. More moving parts in the combo also means more telegraphed fights. That's why I often have to hide my combo by bar swap canceling Crystal Weapon so my opponents don't see the cast, then hit them when they don't expect it.

I know you might think these 2 issues have nothing to do with Sorc getting more Major buffs, but they do. The point is this class already has a lot of moving parts in its offensive combo, so having to spend an extra GCD to apply Ele sus really restricts the class's ability to output as much damage as possible. For a class whose healing comes from being offensive (Surge and Blood Magic), this extra GCD is not an advantage at all. Furthermore, most delayed bursts in the game have a secondary effect. Curse is the only delayed burst in the game that still doesn't have a secondary effect. I think it's time it gets one.

Thank you, excellently put, this is how you can tell you're a Sorc main that gets it. I don't think ZOS even understands this. BA is a worse Grim Focus, Curse is a worse POTL which is already considered bad right now, Fury is a worse Jesus Beam, Crystal Weapon is a worse Surprise Attack.

In theory Sorc has a ton of damage skills, but basically no one can utilize all of them at the same time. They're either too clunky to line up, unreliable, overly complicated or no space to fit. Easier named Buff/Debuff access on some of the already used damage skills like Curse and/or BA would go a long way.

Buffing under used skills like Encase/Rune Cage would literally do nothing. Encase already gives Major Vitality for a decent uptime and I've never once considered making space for it because I need 5-6 damage skills to actually kill anyone.

Curse is miles better than PoTL, it basically always does more damage, does that damage twice and without you needing to go full offense after casting it to get that dmg.

It's generally probably not a good idea to just straight up buff damage abilities that sorcs are already using atm, because proc stamsorc is already pretty strong, especially because of it's huge damage potential.
So buffing a skill like curse or frags, which is already going to be used in most of those builds is not a good choice imo.

Something like Bound Armaments might be okay to buff, since atm it's often mostly used for the passive buffs and doesn't really do a lot of dmg.

MashmalloMan

Jierdanit wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

As much as I know only magsorcs and arcanists use a shield being able to „counter“ curse. The comparison with shalks comes from being able to negate every other bith of burst the warden has by simply blocking, meanwhile this does not worl against a sorc with streak slotted. The burst is telegraphed, sure, but its not really avoidable.

Also I did not mean that having in class breach and savagery makes dk and warden meta, but as you said it plays into it.

Again, major breach is very prevalent in PvP, but comes only within the class toolkit on two out of 7 classes, while everybody else needs to make space for ele sus (if that skill would not be overperforming, we might see breach far less prevalent in PvP).

If the goal is to bring every class up to dk, warden and nb level, sure go ahead with your sorc buffs. Just do not forget that 4 other classes do not have breach or savagery readely available either and 3 of them need some buffs as well. If you think, the top classes need some slight nerf and classes should be balanced around like templar or sorc level, then stop right there and think about changes „carefully“.

Well Sorc needs something because at the end of the day it has one of, if not the least amount of in-class Major/Minor buffs/debuffs. This is the biggest cause for tight bar space on this class. Yes, it has 3 offensive skills to choose from, but there are 2 issues with this:

1) Not every spec of Sorc can slot all 3

The only spec of Sorc right now that can slot all 3 of their offensive class skills is ranged Sorc:



This is possible because Crystal Weapon is best weaved with a ranged weapon, allowing it to be used as a spammable. If you play a melee Sorc, you cannot use Crystal Weapon as a spammable because it's just clunky and can't be block casted. As a result, you have to rely on out-of-class spammables such as Rending Slashes or Dizzying Swing. This is what a standard melee skill layout looks like for DW and 2H builds:




As you can see, the DW build has to choose between Curse or Bound Armaments because it cannot drop Major Evasion (which is needed for melee builds). Similarly, the 2H build has to choose between either Curse or Bound Armaments because Executioner is needed on a Dizzy build.

Both of these builds have their own weaknesses too. The DW build has no burst heal, so it must rely on a set for that (Dragon's Appetite). Meanwhile, the 2H build has no Major Evasion or Crit Surge, so it's healing is bad and its tankiness is also bad. This is why DW is being used by the vast majority of melee Sorcs because you're better off getting a burst heal from a set than 2H, not to mention DW gives better stats.

2) There's too much setting up

There's just too much setting up on this class for it to be effective at killing players. For example, if I want to 1 shot someone on my melee Sorc, I have to build 4 stacks of Bound Armaments or place a Curse, precast Crystal Weapon, then time both of them with a Dawnbreaker. Curse + Crystal Weapon when crit deal just slightly less damage than a crit Spectral Bow. I have to do twice the work, spend twice/thrice the resources, waste 2 bar slots, and still have to rely on BOTH of them to crit when a NB can just use Spectral Bow every 5 LA weaves and deal a similar amount of damage.

You're essentially relying on your opponents to be a potato because you're not going to land all of your combo in 1 GCD. Some of them will be blocked or roll dodged. More moving parts in the combo also means more telegraphed fights. That's why I often have to hide my combo by bar swap canceling Crystal Weapon so my opponents don't see the cast, then hit them when they don't expect it.

I know you might think these 2 issues have nothing to do with Sorc getting more Major buffs, but they do. The point is this class already has a lot of moving parts in its offensive combo, so having to spend an extra GCD to apply Ele sus really restricts the class's ability to output as much damage as possible. For a class whose healing comes from being offensive (Surge and Blood Magic), this extra GCD is not an advantage at all. Furthermore, most delayed bursts in the game have a secondary effect. Curse is the only delayed burst in the game that still doesn't have a secondary effect. I think it's time it gets one.

Thank you, excellently put, this is how you can tell you're a Sorc main that gets it. I don't think ZOS even understands this. BA is a worse Grim Focus, Curse is a worse POTL which is already considered bad right now, Fury is a worse Jesus Beam, Crystal Weapon is a worse Surprise Attack.

In theory Sorc has a ton of damage skills, but basically no one can utilize all of them at the same time. They're either too clunky to line up, unreliable, overly complicated or no space to fit. Easier named Buff/Debuff access on some of the already used damage skills like Curse and/or BA would go a long way.

Buffing under used skills like Encase/Rune Cage would literally do nothing. Encase already gives Major Vitality for a decent uptime and I've never once considered making space for it because I need 5-6 damage skills to actually kill anyone.

Curse is miles better than PoTL, it basically always does more damage, does that damage twice and without you needing to go full offense after casting it to get that dmg.

It's generally probably not a good idea to just straight up buff damage abilities that sorcs are already using atm, because proc stamsorc is already pretty strong, especially because of it's huge damage potential.
So buffing a skill like curse or frags, which is already going to be used in most of those builds is not a good choice imo.

Something like Bound Armaments might be okay to buff, since atm it's often mostly used for the passive buffs and doesn't really do a lot of dmg.

Didn't they recently change it so it's much easier to hit that max damage? POTL has about 28% higher scaling than Haunting Curse despite the nerfs (which I personally feel were unjustified), yeah it takes longer to setup, but they also have Jabs + Burning Light. Less is more. The second tick is definitely nice, not really asking for much to change in the way of Curse really if you see my previous comments. Just some type of named debuff/buff.

It's just odd when you compare a lot of the skills in the Sorc kit they're noticably less potent or utility focussed than other classes similar skill structures and I think it fully comes from this place that we can stack so many skills together, but more often than not we don't or can't.

Jierdanit

MashmalloMan wrote: »

Jierdanit wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

As much as I know only magsorcs and arcanists use a shield being able to „counter“ curse. The comparison with shalks comes from being able to negate every other bith of burst the warden has by simply blocking, meanwhile this does not worl against a sorc with streak slotted. The burst is telegraphed, sure, but its not really avoidable.

Also I did not mean that having in class breach and savagery makes dk and warden meta, but as you said it plays into it.

Again, major breach is very prevalent in PvP, but comes only within the class toolkit on two out of 7 classes, while everybody else needs to make space for ele sus (if that skill would not be overperforming, we might see breach far less prevalent in PvP).

If the goal is to bring every class up to dk, warden and nb level, sure go ahead with your sorc buffs. Just do not forget that 4 other classes do not have breach or savagery readely available either and 3 of them need some buffs as well. If you think, the top classes need some slight nerf and classes should be balanced around like templar or sorc level, then stop right there and think about changes „carefully“.

Well Sorc needs something because at the end of the day it has one of, if not the least amount of in-class Major/Minor buffs/debuffs. This is the biggest cause for tight bar space on this class. Yes, it has 3 offensive skills to choose from, but there are 2 issues with this:

1) Not every spec of Sorc can slot all 3

The only spec of Sorc right now that can slot all 3 of their offensive class skills is ranged Sorc:



This is possible because Crystal Weapon is best weaved with a ranged weapon, allowing it to be used as a spammable. If you play a melee Sorc, you cannot use Crystal Weapon as a spammable because it's just clunky and can't be block casted. As a result, you have to rely on out-of-class spammables such as Rending Slashes or Dizzying Swing. This is what a standard melee skill layout looks like for DW and 2H builds:




As you can see, the DW build has to choose between Curse or Bound Armaments because it cannot drop Major Evasion (which is needed for melee builds). Similarly, the 2H build has to choose between either Curse or Bound Armaments because Executioner is needed on a Dizzy build.

Both of these builds have their own weaknesses too. The DW build has no burst heal, so it must rely on a set for that (Dragon's Appetite). Meanwhile, the 2H build has no Major Evasion or Crit Surge, so it's healing is bad and its tankiness is also bad. This is why DW is being used by the vast majority of melee Sorcs because you're better off getting a burst heal from a set than 2H, not to mention DW gives better stats.

2) There's too much setting up

There's just too much setting up on this class for it to be effective at killing players. For example, if I want to 1 shot someone on my melee Sorc, I have to build 4 stacks of Bound Armaments or place a Curse, precast Crystal Weapon, then time both of them with a Dawnbreaker. Curse + Crystal Weapon when crit deal just slightly less damage than a crit Spectral Bow. I have to do twice the work, spend twice/thrice the resources, waste 2 bar slots, and still have to rely on BOTH of them to crit when a NB can just use Spectral Bow every 5 LA weaves and deal a similar amount of damage.

You're essentially relying on your opponents to be a potato because you're not going to land all of your combo in 1 GCD. Some of them will be blocked or roll dodged. More moving parts in the combo also means more telegraphed fights. That's why I often have to hide my combo by bar swap canceling Crystal Weapon so my opponents don't see the cast, then hit them when they don't expect it.

I know you might think these 2 issues have nothing to do with Sorc getting more Major buffs, but they do. The point is this class already has a lot of moving parts in its offensive combo, so having to spend an extra GCD to apply Ele sus really restricts the class's ability to output as much damage as possible. For a class whose healing comes from being offensive (Surge and Blood Magic), this extra GCD is not an advantage at all. Furthermore, most delayed bursts in the game have a secondary effect. Curse is the only delayed burst in the game that still doesn't have a secondary effect. I think it's time it gets one.

Thank you, excellently put, this is how you can tell you're a Sorc main that gets it. I don't think ZOS even understands this. BA is a worse Grim Focus, Curse is a worse POTL which is already considered bad right now, Fury is a worse Jesus Beam, Crystal Weapon is a worse Surprise Attack.

In theory Sorc has a ton of damage skills, but basically no one can utilize all of them at the same time. They're either too clunky to line up, unreliable, overly complicated or no space to fit. Easier named Buff/Debuff access on some of the already used damage skills like Curse and/or BA would go a long way.

Buffing under used skills like Encase/Rune Cage would literally do nothing. Encase already gives Major Vitality for a decent uptime and I've never once considered making space for it because I need 5-6 damage skills to actually kill anyone.

Curse is miles better than PoTL, it basically always does more damage, does that damage twice and without you needing to go full offense after casting it to get that dmg.

It's generally probably not a good idea to just straight up buff damage abilities that sorcs are already using atm, because proc stamsorc is already pretty strong, especially because of it's huge damage potential.
So buffing a skill like curse or frags, which is already going to be used in most of those builds is not a good choice imo.

Something like Bound Armaments might be okay to buff, since atm it's often mostly used for the passive buffs and doesn't really do a lot of dmg.

Didn't they recently change it so it's much easier to hit that max damage? POTL has about 28% higher scaling than Haunting Curse despite the nerfs (which I personally feel were unjustified), yeah it takes longer to setup, but they also have Jabs + Burning Light. Less is more. The second tick is definitely nice, not really asking for much to change in the way of Curse really if you see my previous comments. Just some type of named debuff/buff.

It's just odd when you compare a lot of the skills in the Sorc kit they're noticably less potent or utility focussed than other classes similar skill structures and I think it fully comes from this place that we can stack so many skills together, but more often than not we don't or can't.

I honestly don't know a lot about plar, but when I tried the new POTL the damage still seemed very underwhelming and while almost every sorc I fight atm (and me) is using curse I barely see POTL on me ever and the damage is never really that noticeable.

Yeah I know what you mean, a lot of sorc skills have very limited uses with only 1 or 2 effects, while classes like NB, Warden or DK have a lot of uses in 1 skill.
That is especially the case for offensive sorc abilities.

However I still do not think that any sort of serious offensive buff for sorcs would be a good idea atm or the damage might be too strong.

The main struggle for sorc is imo that the defense is very dependent on speed with streak and you basically have no other option since sorc heal is probably the worst of any class.

OBJnoob

Random suggestion: Add off balance to Crystal Fragments. NOT when it procs, but only when you hard-cast it.

Jierdanit

OBJnoob wrote: »

Random suggestion: Add off balance to Crystal Fragments. NOT when it procs, but only when you hard-cast it.

Pretty sure no one would even notice that if they would leave it out of the patch notes

OBJnoob

Jierdanit wrote: »

OBJnoob wrote: »

Random suggestion: Add off balance to Crystal Fragments. NOT when it procs, but only when you hard-cast it.

Pretty sure no one would even notice that if they would leave it out of the patch notes

Yup. And that's how you give people what they want without pissing off everyone else.

The only other way, probably the better thing to do (but more complicated,) would be to take all the magic damage sorc skills and make them shock.

Which, I might need some clarity on this point. If you concuss somebody while holding a lightning staff them they are automatically off-balance, yes? Like chilled/brittle from ice staff?

But in the case of concussed if you heavy attack a concussed target don't they become off-balance?

FirmamentOfStars

OBJnoob wrote: »

Jierdanit wrote: »

OBJnoob wrote: »

Random suggestion: Add off balance to Crystal Fragments. NOT when it procs, but only when you hard-cast it.

Pretty sure no one would even notice that if they would leave it out of the patch notes

Yup. And that's how you give people what they want without pissing off everyone else.

The only other way, probably the better thing to do (but more complicated,) would be to take all the magic damage sorc skills and make them shock.

Which, I might need some clarity on this point. If you concuss somebody while holding a lightning staff them they are automatically off-balance, yes? Like chilled/brittle from ice staff?

But in the case of concussed if you heavy attack a concussed target don't they become off-balance?

No, you achieve off-balance only by hitting concussed enemies with blockade of storms.

OBJnoob

Oh okay thanks. NVM that then

PhoenixGrey

Right now a typical sorc uses a bunch of dots from busted arena weapons and proc sets

Sorc will honestly need an entire year of buffs to make its class skills actually useful

However any buffs are a small step

PhoenixGrey

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

Perhaps ZoS is adjusting each class 1 at a time throughout different updates.
Starting with NB obviously.

One thing certain in every update is a NB buff

PhoenixGrey

birdik wrote: »

Do sorcs ever need?

I need NB tears atm

PhoenixGrey

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

And I thought making classes unique and provide different classes with different buffs was a good idea...

So is buffing classes?

I would be careful with that. Sorc receives some goodies next patch and I suggest evaluating the class first before asking for more.

Also adding buffs like offbalance or breach to skills a sorc is already using, would probably make those skills maybe a bit too strong. Putting these buffs on non-used skills though would result on widening the issues with bar space.

Honestly I do not see a real reasom for sorcs to receive offbalance in their toolkit. Sorcs have a far easier sustaining tool with dark deal and using it for the stun to change to ball of lightning seems a loss in survivability and killing potential in my opinion.

Similar argument goes for breach I guess. As long as vateshran ice staff and elemental susceptibility are a thing, I doubt major breach on class skills will help much. But I very much hope that we see those nerfed at some point. Sadly major breach is almost a mandatory debuff in PvP, so I hope when sorc gets its own source of it, we see it on templar and necro too.

The only goodie sorc is getting, NB is getting that same thing and more despite being in a better spot than sorc (for PvP). I wouldn't be too concerned with being careful giving buffs to sorc unless the devs continue with their attitude that anything sorc gets, NB should also get that and more as well.

What's more important really for sorc, is fixing issues with healing and ensuring that the class kit is functional, synergistic and up to date.

Well, relatively sorc is still as bad so I wouldn’t count any sorc buffs yet

PhoenixGrey

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

Hm why are you jumping at me like meat gobblers, if I say that offbalance and breach are probably not the best buffs to ask for? As said, I think the class could use other tweaks, though. Adding major breach to any sorc skill used on live, will probably make the skill overloaded. Putting it on a non-used skill will make it compete with ele sus. And I guess we all know how good ele sus is by its own already.

I honestly do not care about offbalance though, since I do not see it benefitting sorc much as described in the previous post.

But it is fun to see people going crazy, when somebody says „be careful buffing/nerfing stuff“, when we all agree on the chisel being the better tool than the hammer for balance changes.

Sorc needs parabolic buffs to actually make it compete in pvp and not tweaks lol…

I see the idea of balance popping up only in sorc buff threads.

PhoenixGrey

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

And I thought making classes unique and provide different classes with different buffs was a good idea...

So is buffing classes?

I would be careful with that. Sorc receives some goodies next patch and I suggest evaluating the class first before asking for more.

Also adding buffs like offbalance or breach to skills a sorc is already using, would probably make those skills maybe a bit too strong. Putting these buffs on non-used skills though would result on widening the issues with bar space.

Honestly I do not see a real reasom for sorcs to receive offbalance in their toolkit. Sorcs have a far easier sustaining tool with dark deal and using it for the stun to change to ball of lightning seems a loss in survivability and killing potential in my opinion.

Similar argument goes for breach I guess. As long as vateshran ice staff and elemental susceptibility are a thing, I doubt major breach on class skills will help much. But I very much hope that we see those nerfed at some point. Sadly major breach is almost a mandatory debuff in PvP, so I hope when sorc gets its own source of it, we see it on templar and necro too.

What goodies are you talking about ?

Other classes have more goodies right now

PhoenixGrey

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

And I thought making classes unique and provide different classes with different buffs was a good idea...

Yes it was !

Except there are some classes which can literally access all buffs.

Jierdanit

PhoenixGrey wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

Hm why are you jumping at me like meat gobblers, if I say that offbalance and breach are probably not the best buffs to ask for? As said, I think the class could use other tweaks, though. Adding major breach to any sorc skill used on live, will probably make the skill overloaded. Putting it on a non-used skill will make it compete with ele sus. And I guess we all know how good ele sus is by its own already.

I honestly do not care about offbalance though, since I do not see it benefitting sorc much as described in the previous post.

But it is fun to see people going crazy, when somebody says „be careful buffing/nerfing stuff“, when we all agree on the chisel being the better tool than the hammer for balance changes.

Sorc needs parabolic buffs to actually make it compete in pvp and not tweaks lol…

I see the idea of balance popping up only in sorc buff threads.

Magsorcs definitely do need some buffs, stamsorc is in a pretty decent place atm imo.
At least damage wise Stamsorc is among the best specs atm. You just can't really stay in fights long and have to go for a quick kill and get out again cause the defense is ***.

PhoenixGrey

Jierdanit wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

Jierdanit wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

MashmalloMan wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

I am not a fan of major breach on curse, because its a very strong skill by itself with almost no counter as a delayed burst ability. Yes, shalks has breach too, but actually can be countered in contrast to curse (I know, there is purge, but only templars can use it as counter reliably).

You lost me here, almost no counter?

It places a giant purple glow on your character, precast a hot/shield and/or block for half a second if you don't have a purge. I thought it was pretty common knowlege that Curse/POTL are some of the most telegrapghed skills in the game to counter.

For the Scorch comparison. Scorch has a similar teleghraph, but the glow is on your enemy instead of you, making it a tad harder to follow. For whatever reason, they never programmed the glow telegraph on the second tick of either morph. Both skills can't be dodged, but only Curse can be purged. Scorch deals a little less damage on the first tick, more on the second tick, both take about 3s, but Scorch is aoe and applies 9k penetration for 10s.

So again I don't see why Breach to 1 target that is cursed would be too powerful when comparing 2 skills that function very similarly, from my perspective, Haunting Curse is behind.

Implying Breach on DK/Warden is the reason they were busted is misleading, there is so much more at play. Frankly Breach is so common in pvp that even if a Sorc doesn't have it, they can rely on someone else to proc it on their enemies in some way or another. My personal suggestion was to help Mag Sorc's in solo environments where so many other classes just do it better.

As much as I know only magsorcs and arcanists use a shield being able to „counter“ curse. The comparison with shalks comes from being able to negate every other bith of burst the warden has by simply blocking, meanwhile this does not worl against a sorc with streak slotted. The burst is telegraphed, sure, but its not really avoidable.

Also I did not mean that having in class breach and savagery makes dk and warden meta, but as you said it plays into it.

Again, major breach is very prevalent in PvP, but comes only within the class toolkit on two out of 7 classes, while everybody else needs to make space for ele sus (if that skill would not be overperforming, we might see breach far less prevalent in PvP).

If the goal is to bring every class up to dk, warden and nb level, sure go ahead with your sorc buffs. Just do not forget that 4 other classes do not have breach or savagery readely available either and 3 of them need some buffs as well. If you think, the top classes need some slight nerf and classes should be balanced around like templar or sorc level, then stop right there and think about changes „carefully“.

Well Sorc needs something because at the end of the day it has one of, if not the least amount of in-class Major/Minor buffs/debuffs. This is the biggest cause for tight bar space on this class. Yes, it has 3 offensive skills to choose from, but there are 2 issues with this:

1) Not every spec of Sorc can slot all 3

The only spec of Sorc right now that can slot all 3 of their offensive class skills is ranged Sorc:



This is possible because Crystal Weapon is best weaved with a ranged weapon, allowing it to be used as a spammable. If you play a melee Sorc, you cannot use Crystal Weapon as a spammable because it's just clunky and can't be block casted. As a result, you have to rely on out-of-class spammables such as Rending Slashes or Dizzying Swing. This is what a standard melee skill layout looks like for DW and 2H builds:




As you can see, the DW build has to choose between Curse or Bound Armaments because it cannot drop Major Evasion (which is needed for melee builds). Similarly, the 2H build has to choose between either Curse or Bound Armaments because Executioner is needed on a Dizzy build.

Both of these builds have their own weaknesses too. The DW build has no burst heal, so it must rely on a set for that (Dragon's Appetite). Meanwhile, the 2H build has no Major Evasion or Crit Surge, so it's healing is bad and its tankiness is also bad. This is why DW is being used by the vast majority of melee Sorcs because you're better off getting a burst heal from a set than 2H, not to mention DW gives better stats.

2) There's too much setting up

There's just too much setting up on this class for it to be effective at killing players. For example, if I want to 1 shot someone on my melee Sorc, I have to build 4 stacks of Bound Armaments or place a Curse, precast Crystal Weapon, then time both of them with a Dawnbreaker. Curse + Crystal Weapon when crit deal just slightly less damage than a crit Spectral Bow. I have to do twice the work, spend twice/thrice the resources, waste 2 bar slots, and still have to rely on BOTH of them to crit when a NB can just use Spectral Bow every 5 LA weaves and deal a similar amount of damage.

You're essentially relying on your opponents to be a potato because you're not going to land all of your combo in 1 GCD. Some of them will be blocked or roll dodged. More moving parts in the combo also means more telegraphed fights. That's why I often have to hide my combo by bar swap canceling Crystal Weapon so my opponents don't see the cast, then hit them when they don't expect it.

I know you might think these 2 issues have nothing to do with Sorc getting more Major buffs, but they do. The point is this class already has a lot of moving parts in its offensive combo, so having to spend an extra GCD to apply Ele sus really restricts the class's ability to output as much damage as possible. For a class whose healing comes from being offensive (Surge and Blood Magic), this extra GCD is not an advantage at all. Furthermore, most delayed bursts in the game have a secondary effect. Curse is the only delayed burst in the game that still doesn't have a secondary effect. I think it's time it gets one.

Thank you, excellently put, this is how you can tell you're a Sorc main that gets it. I don't think ZOS even understands this. BA is a worse Grim Focus, Curse is a worse POTL which is already considered bad right now, Fury is a worse Jesus Beam, Crystal Weapon is a worse Surprise Attack.

In theory Sorc has a ton of damage skills, but basically no one can utilize all of them at the same time. They're either too clunky to line up, unreliable, overly complicated or no space to fit. Easier named Buff/Debuff access on some of the already used damage skills like Curse and/or BA would go a long way.

Buffing under used skills like Encase/Rune Cage would literally do nothing. Encase already gives Major Vitality for a decent uptime and I've never once considered making space for it because I need 5-6 damage skills to actually kill anyone.

Curse is miles better than PoTL, it basically always does more damage, does that damage twice and without you needing to go full offense after casting it to get that dmg.

It's generally probably not a good idea to just straight up buff damage abilities that sorcs are already using atm, because proc stamsorc is already pretty strong, especially because of it's huge damage potential.
So buffing a skill like curse or frags, which is already going to be used in most of those builds is not a good choice imo.

Something like Bound Armaments might be okay to buff, since atm it's often mostly used for the passive buffs and doesn't really do a lot of dmg.

Didn't they recently change it so it's much easier to hit that max damage? POTL has about 28% higher scaling than Haunting Curse despite the nerfs (which I personally feel were unjustified), yeah it takes longer to setup, but they also have Jabs + Burning Light. Less is more. The second tick is definitely nice, not really asking for much to change in the way of Curse really if you see my previous comments. Just some type of named debuff/buff.

It's just odd when you compare a lot of the skills in the Sorc kit they're noticably less potent or utility focussed than other classes similar skill structures and I think it fully comes from this place that we can stack so many skills together, but more often than not we don't or can't.

I honestly don't know a lot about plar, but when I tried the new POTL the damage still seemed very underwhelming and while almost every sorc I fight atm (and me) is using curse I barely see POTL on me ever and the damage is never really that noticeable.

Yeah I know what you mean, a lot of sorc skills have very limited uses with only 1 or 2 effects, while classes like NB, Warden or DK have a lot of uses in 1 skill.
That is especially the case for offensive sorc abilities.

However I still do not think that any sort of serious offensive buff for sorcs would be a good idea atm or the damage might be too strong.

The main struggle for sorc is imo that the defense is very dependent on speed with streak and you basically have no other option since sorc heal is probably the worst of any class.

Yup defense is extremely underwelming atm

Buff to wards /HoTS/ adding burst heal will benefit sorc more than offensive buffs

Chilly-McFreeze

Jierdanit wrote: »

PhoenixGrey wrote: »

FirmamentOfStars wrote: »

Hm why are you jumping at me like meat gobblers, if I say that offbalance and breach are probably not the best buffs to ask for? As said, I think the class could use other tweaks, though. Adding major breach to any sorc skill used on live, will probably make the skill overloaded. Putting it on a non-used skill will make it compete with ele sus. And I guess we all know how good ele sus is by its own already.

I honestly do not care about offbalance though, since I do not see it benefitting sorc much as described in the previous post.

But it is fun to see people going crazy, when somebody says „be careful buffing/nerfing stuff“, when we all agree on the chisel being the better tool than the hammer for balance changes.

Sorc needs parabolic buffs to actually make it compete in pvp and not tweaks lol…

I see the idea of balance popping up only in sorc buff threads.

Magsorcs definitely do need some buffs, stamsorc is in a pretty decent place atm imo.
At least damage wise Stamsorc is among the best specs atm. You just can't really stay in fights long and have to go for a quick kill and get out again cause the defense is ***.

Can it be that stamsorc is "pretty decent" because of a combination of overperforming arena weapons & sets?