Which glyph is better for stamina sustain?

LittlePinkDot

I'm trying to determine which would be better for my stam wardens sustain.

SeaGtGruff

Honestly, I think it will depend on your whole build-- max stats, gear set bonuses, gear item traits and enchantments, food and drink buffs, etc. If you're already getting good stamina regeneration from other sources, then you might go with the feat cost reduction glyph. But if you're already getting good feat cost reduction and max stamina from other sources, then you might go with the stamina regeneration glyph. Ideally, you really want some of both, so you want to balance between them as you're choosing your gear sets, item enchantments, and provisions.

But if everything else were equal and I had to choose between one or the other, I'd probably go with regeneration, since I don't normally use any potions. But if you do use potions, then you might prefer to go with feat cost reduction, since you can just pop a potion if you need to quickly restore stamina and other resources.

divnyi

Stamina Regen glyph

Regens, all the time.
Stam is used not only on skills, but on blocks, rolls, breaks, sprint.
Regen can be buffed and the numbers can go as far as x1.65-x1.9 (depending on class).
Regen works even when you are not using skill, cost reduce only works if you are using skill.

Urzigurumash

Skill Cost reduction glyph

divnyi wrote: »

Regens, all the time.
Stam is used not only on skills, but on blocks, rolls, breaks, sprint.
Regen can be buffed and the numbers can go as far as x1.65-x1.9 (depending on class).
Regen works even when you are not using skill, cost reduce only works if you are using skill.

Not all the time, in combat while activating skills every GCD the Cost Reduction Glyphs are stronger.

So while it's true the Regen Glyph would give you much more over 20 minutes of play, within the 20 seconds you and your opponent are trying to finish each other, the Cost Reduction Glyph wins.

The logic I follow, assuming starting with all invested into Damage/Stam, first ditch the Max Stat food for Regen food. Then if you still need more, ditch the Warrior/Lover Mundus for Serpent. Then, ditch one Damage Glyph for one Cost Reduction Glyph.

After that, replace the 2 remaining Damage Glyphs with Regen Glyphs.

taugrim

If you run regen food (Orzorga's Smoked Bear Haunch, or the more economical Jewels of Misrule), you can get triple weapon (or spell) damage.

divnyi

Stamina Regen glyph

Urzigurumash wrote: »

divnyi wrote: »

Regens, all the time.
Stam is used not only on skills, but on blocks, rolls, breaks, sprint.
Regen can be buffed and the numbers can go as far as x1.65-x1.9 (depending on class).
Regen works even when you are not using skill, cost reduce only works if you are using skill.

Not all the time, in combat while activating skills every GCD the Cost Reduction Glyphs are stronger.

That if you are activating STAM skills every GCD, with hybridisation there is no reason not to use mag skills also.

And that's if you are actually activating a skill every GCD, which might not be true even for heated battles, as LoS would prevent you from doing that. Unless you are clicking defensive skills, but most of them aren't stam anyway.

And also the less the skill costs, the more cost reduction makes sense.
Speaking of which, if you have % cost reductions (like from armor type), they apply after flat reductions, effectively making flat reductions worse.

The only case where I would recommend flat reduction is magica cost on MagDK, to make Cinder Storm 0-cost or close to that.

Urzigurumash

Skill Cost reduction glyph

divnyi wrote: »

Urzigurumash wrote: »

divnyi wrote: »

Regens, all the time.
Stam is used not only on skills, but on blocks, rolls, breaks, sprint.
Regen can be buffed and the numbers can go as far as x1.65-x1.9 (depending on class).
Regen works even when you are not using skill, cost reduce only works if you are using skill.

Not all the time, in combat while activating skills every GCD the Cost Reduction Glyphs are stronger.

That if you are activating STAM skills every GCD, with hybridisation there is no reason not to use mag skills also.

And that's if you are actually activating a skill every GCD, which might not be true even for heated battles, as LoS would prevent you from doing that. Unless you are clicking defensive skills, but most of them aren't stam anyway.

And also the less the skill costs, the more cost reduction makes sense.
Speaking of which, if you have % cost reductions (like from armor type), they apply after flat reductions, effectively making flat reductions worse.

The only case where I would recommend flat reduction is magica cost on MagDK, to make Cinder Storm 0-cost or close to that.

Hmm yes those are all good points and I think your recommendation about Ash Cloud is a sound one.

But it's a lot of Ifs, so I would agree with SeaGtGruff - it really depends on your build.

For StamDen, how many Heavy vs Medium? Bothbarring Animal Companions (regen bonus)? Mushrooms as your burst heal by chance, if so which one (stam heal or regen bonus)? Spin 2 Win or Reverse Slash (expensive vs cheap)? Blue or Green Netty? Etc.

I did overlook the fact that Cost Reductions weaken Percentile Reductions. But don't overlook that Maneuvers (block bash breakfree rolldodge sprint) each disable one tick of Regen, right? So if you're bash canceling, blockcasting, etc, a point for Cost Reduction.

divnyi

Stamina Regen glyph

Urzigurumash wrote: »

Maneuvers (block bash breakfree rolldodge sprint) each disable one tick of Regen, right? So if you're bash canceling, blockcasting, etc, a point for Cost Reduction.

Incorrect. Block and sprint in their toggled on state block the tick. If you can sprint inbetween the ticks, it still doesn't disable the tick (unless I have outdated information). Bash & Breakfree doesn't block any ticks. And chances to block the regen tick with proper block-canceling for animation is very tiny.

Urzigurumash

Skill Cost reduction glyph

divnyi wrote: »

Urzigurumash wrote: »

Maneuvers (block bash breakfree rolldodge sprint) each disable one tick of Regen, right? So if you're bash canceling, blockcasting, etc, a point for Cost Reduction.

Incorrect. Block and sprint in their toggled on state block the tick. If you can sprint inbetween the ticks, it still doesn't disable the tick (unless I have outdated information). Bash & Breakfree doesn't block any ticks. And chances to block the regen tick with proper block-canceling for animation is very tiny.

Interesting, can you tell whether it makes a difference whether you keybind Bash or use the Block button to Bash? (as we must do on console afaik)

If anything my ideas may be out of date, there was an old maxim of investing into non-regen sources of sustain specifically because of maneuvering, and that was even back with racial regen modifiers.

I used to use this an argument that sDK sustain was actually the best in the game (Battle Roar + Helping Hands) - if and only if you "taped down the block button", another old maxim specific to sDK.

Obviously these two Glyphs are supposed to be balanced depending on build and playstyle. If that's no longer true then these Glyphs need a tune up? I've always had good results with a single infused Cost Reduction glyph on Warden, but on console we can only test by experience, no CMX for us.

fred4

I once met a person vigorously arguing for cost reduction, because ~200 cost reduction per second, e.g. when you are spamming (stamina) skills, beats 169 (stamina) regen every 2 seconds by a mile. However, we soon agreed that you need at least a moderate amount of regen, namely ~1.5K, before you think about that. After all you also have idle time between fights, as well as times where you use the other resource. You want your resources to come back at those times. Cost reduction does nothing for that.

As a PvE DD or solo player you may best judge your sustain on a target dummy, bearing in mind the normal and trial one will feel very differently. Generally speaking you will need only damage glyphs for parsing on the trial dummy (and in a trial), because it throws you synergies.

You may indeed tune your sustain perfectly on the dummy, something you should do especially if wearing Coral Riptide. You may consider cost reduction for that purpose. However, there are times where that is not appropriate for actual content. Look no further than being a bridge DD in the (v)DSR Talaria fight, for example. Between sprinting and breaking free, your sustain can suddenly be under great pressure. Same with dodge rolling in vAS+2. For example an Arcanist can almost oversustain with 1.5K stamina regen (at least my Imperial), but suddenly be in trouble in that content.

My personal preferences are also coloured by game engine idiosyncracies that, I believe, are still present to this day. What you see on the stat sheet are your in combat recoveries only. Your out-of-combat recoveries are typically higher, but are also calculated differently. They are higher, because there would appear to be some multiplication factor in play, something like 2x higher than in combat (but I don't know exactly). On the other hand, the game engine does not consider all sources of recovery when calculating the total reovery while out of combat. It mainly considers your mundus and your food only, and not recovery lines on gear or from jewelry enchants.

To make this clear: If your recovery comes from your mundus and your food, then you will find your resources come back more quickly out of combat than if you got the same on paper recovery from armor sets or jewelry enchants. I find this especially relevant and noticeable when I'm standing on a flag in PvP, waiting for it to turn while anticipating a gank. In PvP I prefer a recovery mundus for that reason (they are also good value stat-wise). As a PvE tank or healer, it's generally also a recovery mundus, e.g. the Atronach. It's only as a PvE DD I use the obligatory Thief mundus. Regardless of role, I prefer foods that have a regen component.

As an aside: Special mention goes to Cloak sustain as a (PvP) magblade in this context. Due to the above idiosyncracies - gear recovery lines don't work outside of combat - Cloak spamming is best sustained by mundus, food and cost reduction. This could be a magicka cost reduction enchant, but also the Breton race, the Seducer set, or slotting Barrier to boost magicka regen from that skill line's passive.

The latter brings up an important point. There are various passives, mostly class passives, that may boost your regen by a percentage. Nightblades have them. You can slot the werewolf ulti for +15%. I'm not sure about warden, but on any class potions will boost your regen, you may also gain Minor Endurance, and there are the medium armor passives boosting recoveries. This makes regen more effective than the paper value of a recovery enchant.

On the other hand you need to pay attention to how much cost reduction you actually get from those enchants. As far as I know, if you also have percentage-based cost reductions, such as from medium armor, this reduces the value of flat (jewelry enchant) cost reductions - by that percentage, I think. In other words, recovery enchants benefit from (medium armor) percentage buffs, whereas cost reduction enchants are penalized by (medium armor) percentage buffs.

Mainly, though, you never just continuously use one resource. You may use magicka at times, and you have idle times. The former will be especially pronounced, if you are a hybrid. In that case, all bets are off as far as cost reduction winning out. You should be better off with regen. You could even lean into that more, by wearing the Torc of Tonal Contancy. Not a bad mythic for PvP, but I also like it for PvE tanking.

Finally there's the Indeko enchants. Perhaps due to the above drawbacks of cost reduction in a hybrid scenario, those enchants have a larger value when used for cost reduction, namely 133 each. I like using one on a tank, because it brings down the cost of Pierce Armor, which I like to use as a heal with Master's 1H+Shield. Tanks, of course, block a lot, thus stam regen isn't much use to them, and they cast a lot of magicka skills only. This makes cost reduction interesting. Those enchants also bring health costs of skills like Siphoning Attacks down.

divnyi

Stamina Regen glyph

Urzigurumash wrote: »

If that's no longer true then these Glyphs need a tune up?

They need a tune up. And I wouldn't mind hybridization to hit this specific case, uniting stam/mag/hybrid enchants into one and designing 2 other enchants with unique effects instead.

fred4

Just to add: I overlooked this is a PvP thread, but I'll let my original post stand, as it covers a bit of everything. As per that post, I think there are specific reasons why you might use a (magicka) cost reduction enchant on some builds, such as on a magblade for cloak sustain, though I can't think of any for a stamden. I think there is also something to be said for using a skill cost reduction (Indeko) enchant instead of a magicka or stamina one, simply because of the high overall value of that enchant. This might shift your decision from recovery to that enchant in some cases, but only if it happens to make sense for your build.

In general, for PvP, I think it has to be regen, simply because dodge rolling, sprinting, breaking free, and just repositioning are much more of a thing than in PvE. If you are just running, you simply need / want your stamina to come back as quickly as possible while doing that. The exception might be as a (troll) tank, if you want to make an already cheap skill ultra cheap. Skills in that category include Pierce Armor, used as a heal while blocking with Master's 1H+S, or stuff like DK Cinder Storm, when that was a thing in previous patches (not anymore).

The other thing is that sustaining from heavy attacks is more viable in PvP than in competitive PvE (outside of an actual heavy attack build). Especially in heavy armor, combined with a blocking playstyle, stamina regen won't do you that much good. You may aim to sustain from heavy armor passives, your netch, and heavy attacks, the latter possibly as part of your burst combo. This would be especially true if you built for that, such as with a Vateshran 2H or the Anthelmir monster set. In that case, however, you would likely use neither cost reduction nor recovery enchants, but you'd go all in on weapon damage.