Yes, magsorc still needs a tankiness adjustment, but people also need to adapt.

StaticWave · January 10

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

I've been seeing nerf Sorc threads and I think they're over-reacting. Yes, magSorc is still too tanky for their archetype and still needs to be toned down at the highest level of PvP, but a lot of the complaints are simply a learn to play issue. For example, take a look at this recent 1v4 video I had in Cyrodiil. In this video, I fought a magSorc, a stamSorc, a bow NB ganker, and a Jesus Beam spammer :

https://youtu.be/Kux3g_VVuro

Breaking down the time stamps, we can see that:
- At 0:07, my armor buff was down and I took 4396 damage from a non crit Curse
- At 0:30, my armor buff was down and I took 5637 damage from a non crit Frag
- At 0:38, I took 4801 damage from a crit Frag
- At 0:47, I took 9916 damage from a crit Frag by the stamSorc and 5760 damage from a non crit Merciless Resolve by the NB
- At 0:48, I took a full Meteor + Streak combo by the stamSorc and only lost 2k HP

The most threatening moment in that video was at 0:47 when I took a 10k Frag and 5.7k Merciless Resolve, followed by a Meteor + Streak combo and I dropped to 58% HP for half a second, then instantly went back to full HP lol. Not once did I feel like I was going to die. You know why? Because I actually adapted and built tankier while still having high damage. At 0:13, I used Dawnbreaker and hit both those Sorcs for 9.1k and 9.8k NON CRIT damage. There is not a single chance any of them could have killed me in that fight, but I could kill them. That is why they ran away at the end. They knew they had no chance.

This is how most Cyrodiil fights are. Very rarely will you run into actual top tier magSorcs, and trust me, you will know it when you see one. The majority of Sorcs you face in Cyrodiil will be exactly like those 2 Sorcs in my video. Those Sorcs are most likely running meta builds too, but it's through sheer skill difference and theory crafting that I was able to shrug off their damage and force them to run away. If you die to these Sorcs, then the first thing you need to do is to update your build and relearn how to fight them. Magsorc is very powerful in the hands of a good player, but there are builds that will still farm them easily. You just need to discover that build via theory crafting and improve your mechanical skills to the point where the majority of your fights vs magsorcs won't feel extremely difficult.

So tell me how do I adapt my tanky Magicka Tentacular dread Arcanist to do as much damage as your sorc?

Use Essence Thief + Rallying Cry + Balorgh, build 30-33k resistances and 3.5k+ crit resistance, use at least 2 defensive CPs.

xylena_lazarow · January 10

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

So tell me how do I adapt my tanky Magicka Tentacular dread Arcanist to do as much damage as your sorc?

Static's build puts up the numbers on paper but you won't perform anywhere near a Sorc because you won't be landing nearly as many hits as a Sorc. Players can too easily just sidestep your beams and tentacles, while Sorc blindsides people from max range with instant burst, sticky delayed damage, and the threat of constant pressure.

In practice you need to perfectly time the ET rune grab and 500 Balorgh Thrive in Chaos + spam with someone else's stun, preferably a pull bomb. There's a player in BGs that's pretty good at this (but he bombs like crazy on every class). You'll probably get better solo results on a casual bow proc pressure build like Oakensoul + Sheer Venom + WoF.

MincMincMinc · January 10

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

I've been seeing nerf Sorc threads and I think they're over-reacting. Yes, magSorc is still too tanky for their archetype and still needs to be toned down at the highest level of PvP, but a lot of the complaints are simply a learn to play issue. For example, take a look at this recent 1v4 video I had in Cyrodiil. In this video, I fought a magSorc, a stamSorc, a bow NB ganker, and a Jesus Beam spammer :

https://youtu.be/Kux3g_VVuro

Breaking down the time stamps, we can see that:
- At 0:07, my armor buff was down and I took 4396 damage from a non crit Curse
- At 0:30, my armor buff was down and I took 5637 damage from a non crit Frag
- At 0:38, I took 4801 damage from a crit Frag
- At 0:47, I took 9916 damage from a crit Frag by the stamSorc and 5760 damage from a non crit Merciless Resolve by the NB
- At 0:48, I took a full Meteor + Streak combo by the stamSorc and only lost 2k HP

The most threatening moment in that video was at 0:47 when I took a 10k Frag and 5.7k Merciless Resolve, followed by a Meteor + Streak combo and I dropped to 58% HP for half a second, then instantly went back to full HP lol. Not once did I feel like I was going to die. You know why? Because I actually adapted and built tankier while still having high damage. At 0:13, I used Dawnbreaker and hit both those Sorcs for 9.1k and 9.8k NON CRIT damage. There is not a single chance any of them could have killed me in that fight, but I could kill them. That is why they ran away at the end. They knew they had no chance.

This is how most Cyrodiil fights are. Very rarely will you run into actual top tier magSorcs, and trust me, you will know it when you see one. The majority of Sorcs you face in Cyrodiil will be exactly like those 2 Sorcs in my video. Those Sorcs are most likely running meta builds too, but it's through sheer skill difference and theory crafting that I was able to shrug off their damage and force them to run away. If you die to these Sorcs, then the first thing you need to do is to update your build and relearn how to fight them. Magsorc is very powerful in the hands of a good player, but there are builds that will still farm them easily. You just need to discover that build via theory crafting and improve your mechanical skills to the point where the majority of your fights vs magsorcs won't feel extremely difficult.

So tell me how do I adapt my tanky Magicka Tentacular dread Arcanist to do as much damage as your sorc?

Post your build with a uesp link

mwo1480 · March 3

seen alot of complains in cyro about it yesyes, and indeed people need to adapt more,
still multiple times now where i tried to gank a sorc who is looking in bag or on map or riding a mount and as soon they get hit they have full shield, without leaving their bag/map or horse...thats a bit nono

Veinblood1965 · March 3

I've gotten pretty deadly on my NB but magsorc was my first PVP toon. Makes me want to roll him out of mothballs and learn the class better.

Theignson · March 5

Hmm I thought this video proves the point about magsorcs being OP.

You killed off a squishy NB with a 16k DB, but never touched the sorcs, due to their shields. The sorc streaked away when your ally came riding up.

So the sorc could never be touched due to shields and could streak away indefinitely when needed.

Still nice job on the 1v4

Theignson · March 5

StaticWave wrote: »

Navaac223 wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

Avran_Sylt wrote: »

xylena_lazarow wrote: »

Avran_Sylt wrote: »

Hmm, adapted and built tankier while still dealing high damage… Seems kinda like the whole Healing scales with DPS issue.

Very wrong. OP outplayed those players by leveraging Streak and leaning heavily into skills that do NOT scale with damage stats: Surge and Dark Deal, which are fixed heal values that only scale with % healing buffs and crit.

Fair, so he was just choosing a select video of a circumstance where not all factors are known (such as the skill and builds of the comparative players).

And tbh I didn't really see much outplay apart from the other players just being... well, bad.

He was at least using Vigor, and there is something to be said as well with Healing crits sourced via the same scaling stat as Damaging crits (just the crit stat in general).

But... Your sentiment with your comment, I guess Sorc is fine and doesn't need tweaks?

The average skill in Cyro is surprisingly pretty low. Most Cyrodiil players behave like that, even the ones with maxed out Alliance rank. Here’s another clip of me 1v7ing:

https://youtu.be/7sNQTDWaOM0?si=ahsYQCyU8MaW0XDw

Mainly using line of sight and building decently tanky is enough for Cyrodiil. Sorc’s true power is displayed better by top tier players. The average magsorc won’t be able to tank multiple people unfortunately.

Uhh hey, any chance I can know what build you're using ? I'm getting bored of playing stamcro and I'd like to play stamsorc a bit. Rn I'm using the classic proc build with maarselok but I feel way too squishy for not enough damage : https://youtu.be/Tfo4LDEDR7Q

Yea sure! I'll post the UESP Build Editor link here, and a written version of the build.

Link:
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildData?id=652229

Sets:
- Essence Thief front bar
- Rallying Cry back bar
- Balorgh monster set
- Death Dealer’s Fete/Markyn/Saints of the Seducer mythics

Armor Weight:
- 3 heavy, 3 medium, and 1 light for the armor pieces
- The belt must be light armor, and the chest must be heavy armor

Weapon Type:
- Dualwield maces front bar and ice staff back bar

Traits:
- Reinforced for heavy armor pieces, and impenetrable for the remaining armor pieces
- Nirnhoned mainhand and sharpened offhand for the maces, and defending for the ice staff
- All protective for the jewelries

Enchants:
- All tri-stat glyphs on the body pieces
- All weapon damage glyphs for the jewelries
- Diseased and absorbed stamina glyphs for the maces, and berserker glyph for the ice staff

Race:
- Imperial/Orc/Nord/Khajiit/Dark Elf all work
Attribute Points:
- For maximum damage, put 64 points into stamina
- For maximum tankiness, put 64 points into HP
- For a mix of both, do 50% into HP and the other 50% into stamina

Food:
- For best value, use Orzoga’s Smoke Bear Haunch
- For maximum damage, use Bewitched Sugar Skulls
- For a mix of both, use Artaeum Takeaway Broth

Potions:
- Must use Essence of Spell Critical for Major Prophecy

Champion Points:
- Blue CPsDuelist Rebuff, Iron Clad, Resillience, Fighting Finesse
- Red CPs: Survival Instincts, Pain’s Refuge, Sustained by Suffering, Fortified

Skills:
- Front bar: Blood for Blood, Bound Armaments, Quick Cloak, Crit Surge, Hurricane, Dawnbreaker of Smiting
- Back bar: Streak, Dark Deal, Vigor, Elemental Susceptibility, Vibrant Shroud, Temporal Guard

Note: You can swap Streak front bar if you are more offensive. You can also use Thrive in Chaos dualwield ult for outnumbered fights

Advantages of this build:
- High mitigation (33k+ resistances, 4k+ crit resist, Major Evasion, Major Maim, Minor Protection, and 3 defensive blue CPs)
- High mobility (Major + Minor Expedition and Streak)
- High single target burst damage (Bound Armaments and B4B can deal a total of 15-17k burst damage when crit)
- Rewards risky playstyle (B4B does more damage when your HP gets lower, which allows players with good mechanics to land 10k+ B4B hits)
- Decent DoT pressure (Burning, Hemorrhage, Quick Cloak, Hurricane)
- High recovery (B4B costing HP and Essence Thief)
- Decent group utility (Streak and Vibrant Shroud)

Disadvantages:
- Requires high APM (you need to perfect the light attack + spammable + bash weave, and use Bound Armaments every 4s to achieve maximum pressure)
- Does not offer good AoE damage (since your only AoE damage abilities are Quick Cloak, Hurricane, and Dawnbreaker)
- Requires getting used to picking up Essence Thief (Essence Thief can be unfamiliar for people)
- Can be inconsistent when kiting (can’t pick up Essence Thief consistently)
- No execute (this is an issue for most Sorcs)

In my opinion, this is currently the best stat build for stamsorc. It has everything you need, but isn’t easy to use and requires you to already be decent at the class, making it hard to be abused by everyone.

Thanks for very generously posting your build. It's amazing how tanky it is. But it is also a very high skill level as you note. I find essence thief annoying to find the pools. Do you have a recommendation for a replacement set for essence thief?

Aces-High-82 · March 6

Shieldbreaker should be decent at least.

StaticWave · March 6

Theignson wrote: »

Hmm I thought this video proves the point about magsorcs being OP.

You killed off a squishy NB with a 16k DB, but never touched the sorcs, due to their shields. The sorc streaked away when your ally came riding up.

So the sorc could never be touched due to shields and could streak away indefinitely when needed.

Still nice job on the 1v4

Magsorc's tankiness needs an adjustment and I'm pretty much in agreeance with that part. The video was meant to show that you can deal with magsorc's damage by building tankier, which is what a lot of people are complaining about.

StaticWave · March 6

Theignson wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

Navaac223 wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

Avran_Sylt wrote: »

xylena_lazarow wrote: »

Avran_Sylt wrote: »

Hmm, adapted and built tankier while still dealing high damage… Seems kinda like the whole Healing scales with DPS issue.

Very wrong. OP outplayed those players by leveraging Streak and leaning heavily into skills that do NOT scale with damage stats: Surge and Dark Deal, which are fixed heal values that only scale with % healing buffs and crit.

Fair, so he was just choosing a select video of a circumstance where not all factors are known (such as the skill and builds of the comparative players).

And tbh I didn't really see much outplay apart from the other players just being... well, bad.

He was at least using Vigor, and there is something to be said as well with Healing crits sourced via the same scaling stat as Damaging crits (just the crit stat in general).

But... Your sentiment with your comment, I guess Sorc is fine and doesn't need tweaks?

The average skill in Cyro is surprisingly pretty low. Most Cyrodiil players behave like that, even the ones with maxed out Alliance rank. Here’s another clip of me 1v7ing:

https://youtu.be/7sNQTDWaOM0?si=ahsYQCyU8MaW0XDw

Mainly using line of sight and building decently tanky is enough for Cyrodiil. Sorc’s true power is displayed better by top tier players. The average magsorc won’t be able to tank multiple people unfortunately.

Uhh hey, any chance I can know what build you're using ? I'm getting bored of playing stamcro and I'd like to play stamsorc a bit. Rn I'm using the classic proc build with maarselok but I feel way too squishy for not enough damage : https://youtu.be/Tfo4LDEDR7Q

Yea sure! I'll post the UESP Build Editor link here, and a written version of the build.

Link:
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildData?id=652229

Sets:
- Essence Thief front bar
- Rallying Cry back bar
- Balorgh monster set
- Death Dealer’s Fete/Markyn/Saints of the Seducer mythics

Armor Weight:
- 3 heavy, 3 medium, and 1 light for the armor pieces
- The belt must be light armor, and the chest must be heavy armor

Weapon Type:
- Dualwield maces front bar and ice staff back bar

Traits:
- Reinforced for heavy armor pieces, and impenetrable for the remaining armor pieces
- Nirnhoned mainhand and sharpened offhand for the maces, and defending for the ice staff
- All protective for the jewelries

Enchants:
- All tri-stat glyphs on the body pieces
- All weapon damage glyphs for the jewelries
- Diseased and absorbed stamina glyphs for the maces, and berserker glyph for the ice staff

Race:
- Imperial/Orc/Nord/Khajiit/Dark Elf all work
Attribute Points:
- For maximum damage, put 64 points into stamina
- For maximum tankiness, put 64 points into HP
- For a mix of both, do 50% into HP and the other 50% into stamina

Food:
- For best value, use Orzoga’s Smoke Bear Haunch
- For maximum damage, use Bewitched Sugar Skulls
- For a mix of both, use Artaeum Takeaway Broth

Potions:
- Must use Essence of Spell Critical for Major Prophecy

Champion Points:
- Blue CPsDuelist Rebuff, Iron Clad, Resillience, Fighting Finesse
- Red CPs: Survival Instincts, Pain’s Refuge, Sustained by Suffering, Fortified

Skills:
- Front bar: Blood for Blood, Bound Armaments, Quick Cloak, Crit Surge, Hurricane, Dawnbreaker of Smiting
- Back bar: Streak, Dark Deal, Vigor, Elemental Susceptibility, Vibrant Shroud, Temporal Guard

Note: You can swap Streak front bar if you are more offensive. You can also use Thrive in Chaos dualwield ult for outnumbered fights

Advantages of this build:
- High mitigation (33k+ resistances, 4k+ crit resist, Major Evasion, Major Maim, Minor Protection, and 3 defensive blue CPs)
- High mobility (Major + Minor Expedition and Streak)
- High single target burst damage (Bound Armaments and B4B can deal a total of 15-17k burst damage when crit)
- Rewards risky playstyle (B4B does more damage when your HP gets lower, which allows players with good mechanics to land 10k+ B4B hits)
- Decent DoT pressure (Burning, Hemorrhage, Quick Cloak, Hurricane)
- High recovery (B4B costing HP and Essence Thief)
- Decent group utility (Streak and Vibrant Shroud)

Disadvantages:
- Requires high APM (you need to perfect the light attack + spammable + bash weave, and use Bound Armaments every 4s to achieve maximum pressure)
- Does not offer good AoE damage (since your only AoE damage abilities are Quick Cloak, Hurricane, and Dawnbreaker)
- Requires getting used to picking up Essence Thief (Essence Thief can be unfamiliar for people)
- Can be inconsistent when kiting (can’t pick up Essence Thief consistently)
- No execute (this is an issue for most Sorcs)

In my opinion, this is currently the best stat build for stamsorc. It has everything you need, but isn’t easy to use and requires you to already be decent at the class, making it hard to be abused by everyone.

Thanks for very generously posting your build. It's amazing how tanky it is. But it is also a very high skill level as you note. I find essence thief annoying to find the pools. Do you have a recommendation for a replacement set for essence thief?

You can replace ET with these sets:

- Wretched Vitality (you want to use Sugar Skull food with this set)
- Order's Wrath
- Shattered Fete (Use axes instead of maces)
- Kynmarcher's Cruelty (brawler build)
- Serpent's Disdain

Of course, there are also proc versions you can replace ET with:

- Tarnish Nightmare
- Hrothgar's Chill

Miracle19 · March 6

This further proves why CP is very bad and anti-competitive for the game. Magsorc/Stamsorc are still strong, but not absurdly busted in those scenarios. You have to balance defense and offense much more so in noCP compared to CP

Tonturri · March 6

Miracle19 wrote: »

This further proves why CP is very bad and anti-competitive for the game. Magsorc/Stamsorc are still strong, but not absurdly busted in those scenarios. You have to balance defense and offense much more so in noCP compared to CP

I really wish a simplified version of CP was made for PvP areas. It's perfectly fine as a PvE number-gotta-go-up-otherwise-brain-sad system, but it doesn't really feel like it offers much of anything for PvP. The extent of my interaction with it in CP-enabled PvP is to just google the recommended loadout for however many points I have and that's it.

Tcholl · March 8

We adapt and we adapt. This is actually all we do, since each patch make players more tanky. The more we adapt, more boring the game tends to be.

With all due respect, Sorc, in its current state, is clearly not healthy to pvp. It is not even debatable anymore. The more we adapt to it, the worst for pvp in general.

Avran_Sylt · March 13

Eh, it fits with their design philosophy. They absolutely hate ganking.

Theignson · April 6

@StaticWave I finally got around to trying your build and it was a revelation.I switched essence for orders wrath but otherwise the same. Amazingly tanky but still could deal damage. I have otherwise been running infused to get higher weapon damage and 4 offensive blue stars.

Now I understand better how you can be super tanky but still get offense, although I still need to incorporate bound armaments better. Also my blood for blood really wasn’t hitting all that high. But not one death in many chaotic fights.

Thanks again for posting your build. It is a high apm so I agree not everyone will like it since you have to constantly reapply the buffs etc

xylena_lazarow · April 6

Spent the past few days of post-Vengeance sadness minmaxing my Sorc. Wanted to do a brawler Sorc, but my iterations inevitably led to either the meta MagSorc, or the meta MDW/Vatesh pressure spec. Playing Sorc is far from god mode, trying to fight outnumbered on Sorc is just as hard as on DK or whatever. Ward spam is a stupid easy way to recover, but you can also die very fast should you miss even a single shield cast, so I get why Sorc mains feel defensive.

The experience has reinforced what I see as the problem with Sorc's design: it massively rewards low skill cheese gameplay, much moreso than 1vX or whatever one considers skilled gameplay. Sit somewhere 100% safe, inside a zerg or atop the roof, and go nuts blasting away at unaware opponents. Teleport away if you somehow get attacked. Never at any point should you actually engage opponents for normal PvP. Once you do, the game becomes as hard as on any other class.

You don't need to be good at Sorc to do this, and you don't need an optimized build (beyond stacking one single stat) to deal threatening amounts of damage with busted speed and range. One mid Sorc blasting away isn't a problem but it's never just one. Go into an 8v8 solo BG and there's a good chance literally half the lobby is on Sorc, you're going to spend half the match having to stop brawling to deal with being shot by these huge off screen threats (who just teleport away).

Would nerfing Ward again change this? Absolutely not. The whole Sorc problem is the amount of zero risk damage they deal from safety, and their ability to spam teleports to stay in safety, where they never even need to press their shield button in the first place. I'm still not finding Sorcs "too tanky" when I end up in a real fight with one, but that's not happening outside staged duels unless the Sorc deliberately ignores overpowered cheese tactics to play their class worse.

The Vengeance teleports with a 3sec cooldown still felt good to use while being fair to fight against. Vengeance Sorc ranged attacks were appropriately slow and telegraphed, requiring you to line up combos to do any significant damage, but you could still use Overload ult to temporarily turn into the machine gun that Sorc always is on live. Ward doesn't heal, but a huge shield is still really powerful on its own. Seemed like it addressed all 3 Sorc pain points really effectively.

Xarc · April 6

It seems that the consequences of the adaptation are the desertion of Cyrodiil

Kaelthorn_Nightbloom · April 6

Theignson wrote: »

@StaticWave I finally got around to trying your build and it was a revelation.I switched essence for orders wrath but otherwise the same. Amazingly tanky but still could deal damage. I have otherwise been running infused to get higher weapon damage and 4 offensive blue stars.

Now I understand better how you can be super tanky but still get offense, although I still need to incorporate bound armaments better. Also my blood for blood really wasn’t hitting all that high. But not one death in many chaotic fights.

Thanks again for posting your build. It is a high apm so I agree not everyone will like it since you have to constantly reapply the buffs etc

I tried the max stamina Sorc and found the max magicka Breton Stam Sorc was better since you can slot both Hardened Ward and Vibrant Shroud. Otherwise mostly the same setup and defensive CP and you are insanely tanky. Swap Bound Armaments for Crystal Fragments. I played that for a week before I got bored and moved on.

AngryNecro · April 7

StaticWave wrote: »

I've been seeing nerf Sorc threads and I think they're over-reacting.

all this would have happened if you had played in a different class. And so another sorс 1xX. What's the point of your video and this post anyway?
You either do the same thing on a necromancer or play a necromancer against such a sorс.

You managed to put on heavy armor because you have a passivation on the spd.
you managed to put trait nirn on the weapon because you have a passive on crit chance.
because of the passivity on resource regeneration, you use mundus for protection and eat with out regen.

This is an absolutely standard sorc cowardly build. There are all the unjustified advantages that shouldn't be there. the topic would make sense if you were doing all this in any other class.

by the way similar sorc bild absolutley unless for team in 4x4 BG. It implies a very cowardly gameplay aimed at one's own survival and very rare and short periods of powerful attack. This build can only kill a normal player when catching at a weak moment and doing a full combo with an ultimate.

I really didn't understand what this video proved.

MincMincMinc · April 7

AngryNecro wrote: »

StaticWave wrote: »

I've been seeing nerf Sorc threads and I think they're over-reacting.

This build can only kill a normal player when catching at a weak moment and doing a full combo with an ultimate.

Congrats you figured out the essence of how to build for 1vX now adays.

xylena_lazarow · April 7

MincMincMinc wrote: »

Congrats you figured out the essence of how to build for 1vX now adays.

The players who never advance beyond that point are the first to cry when they can't crutch on their one broken gimmick anymore. You can 100% adapt a dueling build to open world for 1vX and cross heals/shields while still being able to beat other sweatlords on even ground. The best Sorc players were still dropping lethal Overload combos on Vengeance, while the guys crutching on overpowered zero-risk range spam faced a reckoning.

MincMincMinc · April 7

xylena_lazarow wrote: »

MincMincMinc wrote: »

Congrats you figured out the essence of how to build for 1vX now adays.

The players who never advance beyond that point are the first to cry when they can't crutch on their one broken gimmick anymore. You can 100% adapt a dueling build to open world for 1vX and cross heals/shields while still being able to beat other sweatlords on even ground. The best Sorc players were still dropping lethal Overload combos on Vengeance, while the guys crutching on overpowered zero-risk range spam faced a reckoning.

Yeah nobody really builds for turn and burn 1vX. Its just not as possible with high ttk healthbars and heals. Most are moving to these pseudo dueling builds that are modified for survival.

Tcholl · April 7

I will repeat my post: the more we adapt aiming to be tanky and match sorcs streaking around with ward, the worst for PvP.

Builds that are very ez to survive and cannot kill on their own justs adds to the boring tanky/healing/shield meta.

You cannot say you hate this meta, when you support everything that creates this PvP enviroment. From OP classes to semi tank builds.

xylena_lazarow · April 8

MincMincMinc wrote: »

Yeah nobody really builds for turn and burn 1vX. Its just not as possible with high ttk healthbars and heals. Most are moving to these pseudo dueling builds that are modified for survival.

Turn and burn is alive and well i.e. Thrive in Chaos. Turn and one-shot is gone, and that's a good thing.

CanAPanda · April 9

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

CameraBeardThePirate wrote: »

To be honest this is an issue across the board. 90% of people in Cyrodiil or BGs have no clue how to *actually* build for PvP, and just slap on the meta sets without taking the time to set up their resists and recoveries or learn their defensive rotation/good defensive movement.

This is more an issue of a lack of resources. The game doesn't have a good tutorial that actually teaches mechanics of the game, and PvP requires knowledge of mechanics.

PvP itself has been so neglected that there aren't many content creators left, so 90% of the resources to learn PvP online are either outdated or simply don't exist for newer skills/classes.

Exactly this. TBH. It's also becoming an issue in PvE too. So many players just copying the meta builds/strats without understanding the nuances/reasons behind using them and failing hard in content that should otherwise be relatively easy to clear with a more fitting build/strategy.

It's something the game really should teach the players much better than it ever has done. It doesn't have to be throwing players into hard mode trials the instant they start, but for example adding all the combat mechanics to the tutorials (like they used to have in wailing prison) where the player has to move out of the circle or behind a wall to avoid an attack/AoE, dodge roll an incoming attack, block an incoming attack, heal themselves to survive a hit, recast their buffs, etc. to teach the players these mechanics early when there's no pressure to get it right immediately.

Then have these things reinforced throughout all the story quests where bosses will each require using a couple of those different mechanics to successfully survive/beat them. The story itself is the perfect place to teach/train/reinforce these concepts because there's no penalty to failing outside of restarting the specific encounter and trying again.

This at least would prepare most players for things harder than overload and allow them to just casually develop those skills over time as they play/enjoy the game, allowing the players to learn the mechanics naturally, and then be able to easily apply them further if they choose to go on to do trials/vet/HM/PvP/etc. content.

It would help lessen the cliff-like learning curve that currently exists when moving up from overload/normal dungeons into vet/HM/DLC content and PvP.

Yeah I see this a lot in pve myself since most of my gameplay is in pve hm and regular vet trials. I see a couple different types of players. Some just copy meta builds but don't fully understand them so they don't know how to adjust their build to the situation. For example if we don't have a zenkosh they don't change their build so they have 1 piece of light or two if they can then don't slot the pen CP or do anything else. If we don't have EC or LE in group they don't slot fighting finesse etc.

Then there are the players who refuse to be on meta like it's their job. I had a player complain about how their magplar is so mag hungry. I looked at their build and they had only 1 Stam ability, power of the light. I suggested they run master's back bar with poison injection and endless hail plus either caltrops or trap. Their argument was "I'm a mag plar tho if I run Stam abilities then I'm not a magplar anymore". I was just like "okay well if you want to be a pure magplar that's fine but just know you will suffer sustain issues and do subpar DPS and won't be able to do any of the more difficult hm content because of it". This is just one of many similar examples of people like this. I just don't roster them.

You will also have players that refuse to play any role but theirs. This is not so much of an issue as some others but I do find it to be hindering to their own role. To some extent being a jack of all trades can make you incredibly proficient at your main role. If all you have ever done is tanked then I guarantee your DPS probably have some not so nice things to say about you. I've met some pure tanks who constantly move bosses around for literally no reason. They also don't ever make where they intend to stack stuff predictable or even restack trash somewhere else. Since they don't understand how DPS and heal ground dots and hots work they are detrimental to group success.

One of the biggest gripes I have about many players especially when I am tanking is when they catch a beach and die to it then complain about an untaunted enemy. Let's use Depths of Malataar as an example because I've seen it so many times here. First of you have never tanked before you need to understand that tanks don't have AOE taunts. There is one set in the game and no one runs it because it sucks. So if a trash pack has 6 enemies then it will be 5 seconds after combat starts AT BEST where everything will be taunted. I sometimes miss a taunt because targeting sucks in this game and an enemy will path in front of others. The trash pull right before Lokke in vSS is a great example of this. Anyways one of the bigger elite guys who's name eludes me right now will sometimes channel an heavy on a dps or heal. That person gets 1 shot. This is on PC so people have codes combat alerts addon. They see codes pop up with the heavy attack cast bar telling them to dodge they don't then die. How about just dodge the attack? If the bar is red you can dodge it if it's purple from codes that means it's undodgable for one reason or another and must be blocked.

Imo if you are new to pve and need some practice go do vateshran or maelstrom arena but don't look up how to do it. Just go inside, get *** up by enemies and learn how to adjust your build so you survive. Just remember that as you adjust your build you are becoming more solo orientated so as you go back to 4/12 man content you likely don't need to be providing major resolve and major breach as tanks and healers provide this for the group.

El_Borracho · April 9

xylena_lazarow wrote: »

The experience has reinforced what I see as the problem with Sorc's design: it massively rewards low skill cheese gameplay, much moreso than 1vX or whatever one considers skilled gameplay. Sit somewhere 100% safe, inside a zerg or atop the roof, and go nuts blasting away at unaware opponents. Teleport away if you somehow get attacked. Never at any point should you actually engage opponents for normal PvP. Once you do, the game becomes as hard as on any other class.
____

The whole Sorc problem is the amount of zero risk damage they deal from safety, and their ability to spam teleports to stay in safety, where they never even need to press their shield button in the first place. I'm still not finding Sorcs "too tanky" when I end up in a real fight with one, but that's not happening outside staged duels unless the Sorc deliberately ignores overpowered cheese tactics to play their class worse.

@xylena_lazarow I can not agree more with these two points. I usually run a DK in Cyro, but decided to give the Magsorc a go to see what all the hype/complaining is about. You are spot-on.

I feel absolutely lethal when picking off outer players in a group from range. Its not hard at all to burst down someone in 2-4 shots when they are out of position and have no real counter to the ranged attack. Most of the time, since they are zerglings or dependent on the group for offensive support, they run towards another player you can blow up with Force Pulse or a scribed skill. Even some of the more organized groups are susceptible to this.

You don't see much of a resource drain, either, thanks to Dark Deal. But once you have 4+ players close in on you, the only real counter is streak away, preferably towards some friendlies who can help. Its not a 1vX killing machine. And you can never go into a close-quarters battle against a group with one.

I completely understand why a lot of players have gone to the ranged Magsorc. The lag that is inherent in larger scale battles has made avoiding the more notorious proc sets difficult, so why risk it by getting in close. In a lot of ways, it IS the counter to the ball groups who rely on the same old proc sets to survive as it is effective in picking off those on the outside.

As for the perma-shield tanky Magsorcs, I don't even bother with them. Most of the time, they are there to lure players in for their group to ambush, or are just a nuisance. I don't understand why people play those builds at all. Ooh, you can't die but can't kill me. Neat.

With that said, I do not find the Magsorc meta particularly fun to play. I much prefer my DK or NB as that feels more like PVP. I'm definitely going to give OP's build a go.

supabicboi · April 15

now that pts sorc updates are here, sorc can say byebye to the meta discussion, once again seeing a sledgehammer nerf changes to this class, again. the sorc nerf buff nerf cycle is sickening lol, maybe sorc players will have to wait for another 5 years till it gets good again, HAHA

all whiners towards 'op immortal sorcs' have disappear now right

Oblivion_Protocol · April 15

supabicboi wrote: »

now that pts sorc updates are here, sorc can say byebye to the meta discussion, once again seeing a sledgehammer nerf changes to this class, again. the sorc nerf buff nerf cycle is sickening lol, maybe sorc players will have to wait for another 5 years till it gets good again, HAHA

all whiners towards 'op immortal sorcs' have disappear now right

…Except that those “sledgehammer” nerfs have done nothing to affect the Sorc play style that most of the people in this thread are complaining about. Sorcs still have Streak. Frags and Curse can still nuke people from afar. And Scribing means that, unlike before the heal was added to Hardened Ward, Sorc still has access to decent healing options without needed to go to cross-classing (which is an entirely different kettle of potentially OP fish).

Joy_Division · April 15

Oblivion_Protocol wrote: »

supabicboi wrote: »

now that pts sorc updates are here, sorc can say byebye to the meta discussion, once again seeing a sledgehammer nerf changes to this class, again. the sorc nerf buff nerf cycle is sickening lol, maybe sorc players will have to wait for another 5 years till it gets good again, HAHA

all whiners towards 'op immortal sorcs' have disappear now right

…Except that those “sledgehammer” nerfs have done nothing to affect the Sorc play style that most of the people in this thread are complaining about. Sorcs still have Streak. Frags and Curse can still nuke people from afar. And Scribing means that, unlike before the heal was added to Hardened Ward, Sorc still has access to decent healing options without needed to go to cross-classing (which is an entirely different kettle of potentially OP fish).

Because most people are never satisfied unless every class they don;t play is C tier trash while theirs is S tier.

Static was always 100% correct when he had the guts to come here on day 1 and claim that his class had one skill that made it overpowered. Nobody thought Sorcs was OP with its Streak, Curse, and Frags "nuking" 35K health builds with 30K resistances that never run out of resources after U35. When ZOS changed Ward to not just return to familiar mechanic of magicika stacking defense, but then added a heal too it, that was crazy. That was all that needed to adjust because that was all that put sorcerer into S tier.

Now ZOS comes around and not only takes away the heal, but keeps their previous nerf of reducing it's scaling, while also basically telling non pet sorcs just slot some other class line by reworking the passives so non pets sorcs get nothing from that line (such as the removal of 10% magicka/stamina). People who are still complaining about sorcerers are precisely those types who will never be satisfied and probably the type who whine incessantly when their class gets any sort of "adjustment" from ZOS and lack the self awareness while they wonder why people are totally cool when their class gets hit with heavy handed nerfs.

Turtle_Bot · April 15

Oblivion_Protocol wrote: »

supabicboi wrote: »

now that pts sorc updates are here, sorc can say byebye to the meta discussion, once again seeing a sledgehammer nerf changes to this class, again. the sorc nerf buff nerf cycle is sickening lol, maybe sorc players will have to wait for another 5 years till it gets good again, HAHA

all whiners towards 'op immortal sorcs' have disappear now right

…Except that those “sledgehammer” nerfs have done nothing to affect the Sorc play style that most of the people in this thread are complaining about. Sorcs still have Streak. Frags and Curse can still nuke people from afar. And Scribing means that, unlike before the heal was added to Hardened Ward, Sorc still has access to decent healing options without needed to go to cross-classing (which is an entirely different kettle of potentially OP fish).

FYI: PvP Sorc also lost the Expert Summoner passive (it now requires a permanent pet to be active (not even just slotted and not even just atro) to grant its reworked (see nerfed) bonuses), so that's removed the 10% max mag that sorc had, on top of the ward nerfs. That 10% max mag was also what made curse strong enough to nuke players and was also what made ZOS nerf it to allow it to be blocked.
Also, with subclassing, ALL classes can use storm calling for Streak so that's hardly a reason to use sorc anymore when the other classes have more coherent skill lines that better fit the defined roles than sorc has and can easily swap the least required line for storm calling and gain streak + overload + all the stormcalling passives. Outside of DK specifically, every other class has a ranged build that is still very strong (especially with scribing), so it's not like that was unique to sorc (sorc did it best, but other classes still had very strong ranged builds).

Other classes also have a much more role coherent skill line setup, so it's easier for the other classes to simply swap a line out for stormcalling (for streak + surge + lightning form + overload) than it is for sorc to swap something out for other class lines.

For example, it's easier to simply swap warden's green balance line for storm calling, losing trees and vines, but keeping access to polar wind + northern + shulks + wings, while gaining streak + surge + hurricane + overload.

Or NB swap out siphoning for storm calling, losing tether (heal soul easily replaces offering, so no loss there), but gaining streak + surge + overload while keeping access to cloak, shade, spec bow, incap.

For sorc to gain the most out of other class skills, is rough, because sorc requires abilities from across all of it's 3 lines to fill out the different roles, while the other classes can drop a line for storm calling much easier and fill the few remaining gaps with wield soul or a weapon ability.

I've spent a good few hours on the PTS already (although I can do better testing once EU gets ported to PTS since I'm on EU and my test characters cannot start with maxed skill lines), testing sorc and trying to make a build work that uses subclassing (since all classes can now easily slot streak).
The early results of this testing were that it was far too easy to simply slot storm calling into another classes kit and call it a day than it was to try and rehash the now (once more) overnerfed sorc into a functional build using subclassing like the other classes are able to. The closest I got to for a functional build was:
Animal Companions (warden) for shulks (delayed burst) + wings (speed + cleanse) + passives and
Siphoning (NB) for offering (needed wield soul for the spammable which ruled out using heal soul) + cripple (DoT for surge procs and immobilize), heal morph of tether (back bar defensive ult) and passives.
Stormcalling (sorcs remaining class line) for streak + overload + surge + hurricane + passives
This build loses out on ward, frags, curse, negate, aegis (or armaments), expert summoner, dark deal (or conversion) and the dark magic passives.
Sure I could keep all 3 sorc lines instead of subclassing or keep 2/3, but what's the point when doing so means I am just playing pre-U41 sorc, but with wield soul, where as all the other classes get to keep the strongest/most relevant 2 of their 3 lines and swap the least important line for stormcalling to gain streak + overload + surge + hurricane + passives AND get to also use wield soul.