Should Bound Armaments be moved to Dark Magic?

MurkyWetWolf198

Should the Bound Armaments skill be swapped with another from Dark Magic to make the Dark Magic skill line more appealing?

MurkyWetWolf198

Yes

Any other ideas to improve the skill line?

ZhuJiuyin

Yes

suggestion about sorc:
1. Swap Bound Armaments with Daedric Mines, and change the passive ability of Bound Armaments to While slotted, your Max Stamina&Magic is increased by 5%.
2. Change Lightning Splash to the same level as Spear Shards, increase damage, and allow own synergy.
3. Exchange Power Stone with Persistence to turn all Daedric Summoning abilities except pets into tank abilities.
4.Expert Summoner changed back to U45 effect.
5. Suppression Field has been reworked, leaving the silencing effect to Absorption Field, and greatly increasing the damage of Suppression Field, and giving Major Brittle to the damaged target, making it competitive with Atronach.
6. Reworked Endless Fury, removed the execution effect, and provided more damage, making it a spam skill for sorc.
7. Reworked Power Surge and changed it to a sticky dot similar to Degeneration.
8. Buff Shattering Spines, so that it gives a 10-second sticky dot and a 4-second delayed burst of direct damage, making it a qualified damage skill.
9. Defensive Rune has been reworked to have an effect similar to Solar Barrage, dealing direct damage every 5 seconds centered on itself, and increasing the damage the target receives from the black magic skill line.

ForumBully

Whatever it takes to get Curse and Ward out of Daedric Summoning because I'm a non pet sorc and I don't belong.

MurkyWetWolf198

Yes

Does the rest of the skill line have enough if we give it Bound armaments?

Artim_X

No

I'm summoning armor or daggers with the skill so no...

ZhuJiuyin

Yes

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

Does the rest of the skill line have enough if we give it Bound armaments?

It is far from enough.
Dark Magic's passive is very bad, except for Exploitation, the others do not affect dps. Especially Persistence, it's just terrible.
Unholy Knowledge should be moved to Persistence and merged with it, and a new passive ability should be added to Unholy Knowledge: When you deal damage with a Sorc class skill, increase the damage your target takes by 3/6% for 10 seconds. This effect will be triggered every 10 seconds.
And need buff Shattering Spines, so that it gives a 10-second sticky dot and a 4-second delayed burst of direct damage, making it a qualified damage skill.

CaptainRele

Yes

Having bound armaments be under dark magic would give sorc dps an option to provide minor prophecy without needing to run frags or dark deal. The fact it doesn't and the standard sorc dps skill allotment is too tight to include armaments and frags is rough.
It would need a flavor rework so Summoned daggers doesn't count as a Summon anymore though. Dark daggers maybe, lol

Stx

No

I would say no. Bound daggers are clearly a conjuration ability which fits right with the other summons.

The problem with sorcerers is that they still don’t have a clear cut tank/healing skill line. Tank and healing stuff is scattered throughout all three skill trees. This is going to make it very hard to balance this class for subclassing.

ESO_Nightingale

Yes

Absolutely since they gutted the passives for non pet sorc. It would also open up dark magic to be more inticing as a pick for subclassing.

StarOfElyon

Yes

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

Should the Bound Armaments skill be swapped with another from Dark Magic to make the Dark Magic skill line more appealing?

Sure, bound armaments can swap places with Encase.

Jierdanit

Yes

StarOfElyon wrote: »

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

Should the Bound Armaments skill be swapped with another from Dark Magic to make the Dark Magic skill line more appealing?

Sure, bound armaments can swap places with Encase.

Swap Armaments for Mines rather than Encase please.

Vibrant Shroud is the only real sorc alternative for Hardened Ward atm and it would be pretty bad if they were both in the same tree.

MashmalloMan

Yes

It makes the most logistical sense at this point.

• Curse can't be moved because it's attached to Daedric Prey, no matter how much I love Haunting Curse, it belongs there so it can't be moved.
• Ward can't be moved because it's attached to Regenerative Ward, it's been an underused skill for a long time, I quite like the idea they've been pushing where it's more utility/pet based. It works and has spruced it up a bit. Additionally, they went to the effort of removing the heal from Hardened Ward, putting it in Dark Magic would add Blood Magic which esentially did the same thing to a much lesser degree (at least from mag stacking perspective, not sure what the exact % was for health stackers). They could always add a condition that somehow excludes Ward, but I go back to the original point of 1 morph actually having a pet effect. Maybe adding a new Dark Magic skill here could do a similar thing, but we're getting into fantasy land at this point.
• Bound Aegis is a tank skill that doesn't really get anything out of the Daedric Summoning line.. except for this new 5% mitigation bonus, but I mean it's 3 days old, I'm not married to that idea. I'd argue if you did have the line, it would still be covered via Hardened Ward or Clanfear. Suppression Field is also more utilty based than Storm Atro for a tank to provide, and Blood Magic would proc any time you cast Bound Aegis which makes WAY more sense seeing as it is a max hp % heal tanks barely take advantage from in the line. We also need to consider that Persistance is in the Dark Magic line which reduces the cost of abilities after blocking by -18%. The bonus plus Blood Magic tells me this line is way closer to tanking line than Daedric Summoning ever could be.
• Bound Armaments, again all of the points raised in this thread. Dark Magic is just not appealing enough right now for damage dealers seeing as it only has Crystal Frag/Crystal Weapon. If the skill moved here, then it could proc Blood Magic and Exploitation which make much more sense for the skill as a semi spammable. It also allows us more ways to keep up minor prophecy and justify's the lack of power this ability has in comparison to Grim Focus... which for some reason... provides up to 450 Weapon Damage now, a huge burst heal, and +37% more damage... +52% more damage on PTS just on the tooltip, before you consider you also have more damage and crit for using it... I'm not saying BA having a heal would fix it's weak AF damage, but it would certainly highlight it as a more utility based pressure tool, rather than an outright burst damage tool that holds no candle to Grim Focus on.

We're told by ZOS that if we're not into pets, we should subclass Daedric Summoning out, but there is 3 abilities in there that are staples of the no pet sorc playstyle we've been acustomed to for 10+ years (Ward/Armor/Curse). While moving only 1 skill wouldn't entirely solve the problem, it would certainly help their argument about Daedric Summoning being meant for pet builds. I'd prefer the line have its own non pet bonus like before, but due to the way the lines are designed, I really only take 1-2 skills from both Dark Magic and Daedric Summoning at a time, which now have comparitively weaker passives when I start to consider subclassing for similar skills.

For example, if I really wanted Bound Armaments and Dark Deal, why would I take Daedric Summoning and Dark Magic when it would be better to take Assassination (Grim Focus) and Siphoning (Siphoning Attacks). Obviously as a Sorc main I can't do this, so the reality is, I now have to reroll into Nightblade, then swap out Shadow to pick up Storm Calling to play as a better version of the Sorc playstyle I was already doing before. The funniest part about this is despite not having the negligible bonus of +8% stamina from Bound Armaments I was used to, I now get Magicka Flood from Siphoning for +6% Stam/Mag lol.

I mean something about that last point just sounds like a deliberate joke to me. Like they intentionally changed MAGICKA Flood into a speudo version of the bonus Sorc mains got from Bound Armor and/or Expert Summoner as if to say "Remake your character, you don't belong over there".

To be clear, I've been advocating to hybridize Magicka Flood for years, I'm just pointing out the weird situation this is. Also rename that..?

MashmalloMan

Yes

Jierdanit wrote: »

StarOfElyon wrote: »

MurkyWetWolf198 wrote: »

Should the Bound Armaments skill be swapped with another from Dark Magic to make the Dark Magic skill line more appealing?

Sure, bound armaments can swap places with Encase.

Swap Armaments for Mines rather than Encase please.

Vibrant Shroud is the only real sorc alternative for Hardened Ward atm and it would be pretty bad if they were both in the same tree.

Actually of the candiates I can think of (Encase/Mines/Rune Prison), Rune Prison seems to make the most sense without hurting either lines dynamic.

• Encase is used for healing (Vibrant Shroud) and utility/damage (Shattering Prison). Blood Magic and Exploitation work well here for healers, tanks, and damage dealers.
• Mines is used for healing (Daedric Refuge) and utility/damage (Daedric Tomb). Again, previous passives work well here.
• Rune Prison morphs are barely ever used to begin with, but if they were, it doesn't make sense to have either morph proc Blood Magic and Exploitation. Why would you need a heal the moment you cast a 60s self buff via Defensive Rune, it doesn't heal when it stuns so it's useless when you pre-buff ahead of time. Rune Cage holds no candle to Streak, but some people like it, if you're on the offensive trying to stun someone for the delayed burst sorc is typically known for, then you're not usually in a position where you'd need healing in the 1st place, 1.5k (based on 30k hp) every 7-10s is not really advantagous to begin with.

Moving Rune Prison wouldn't really change anything. If anything Defensive Rune could make better use of the new Daedric Protection passive 5% mitigation because it lasts 60s. Rune Cage wouldn't get much use out of it in that short 1-2s window of going on the offensive, but both abilities would benefit from Rebate's +371 magicka return, especially considering this ability often goes wasted when your opponent dodges the delayed stun. Rebate actually fits the theme of the tempermental skills that they are.

Justification aside, I've wanted Rune Prison morphs to change for a long time, maybe this is an excellent opportunity to introduce some pet related abilities that have nothing to do with stunning. Defensive Rune is super niche, I can honestly say I've seen maybe 1 or 2 people use it in 5+ years of BGs. Rune Cage is completely outclassed by Streak, it's just too frustrating to use, if you wanted a ranged CC, there is much better options out there.

Like imagine Defensive Rune applied to you AND your pets, so if someone attacks a pet, you can now defend them before they get nuked. Rune Cage could buff pet damage dealt by a small amount to the CC'ed target. It could be an interesting way to offer an all pet damage option since they didn't want to put that on Daedric Prey. Eg. something like 10-20% that works on sets and other class pets. I'm just spitballing here, I just think it would have a lot more potential for pet synergies and swapping than Encase or Mines can provide.

MashmalloMan

Yes

Stx wrote: »

I would say no. Bound daggers are clearly a conjuration ability which fits right with the other summons.

The problem with sorcerers is that they still don’t have a clear cut tank/healing skill line. Tank and healing stuff is scattered throughout all three skill trees. This is going to make it very hard to balance this class for subclassing.

Change it from Daggers to Purple Crystals, problem solved? Also Daggers are not "pets" which is where a "summon" actually matters here, they were never buffed by Daedric Prey so it doesn't really have a place in this line. I get what you mean from a VFX standpoint that they're conjured daggers, but at some point you need to weigh what is more important between visuals and game design. We can both agree Sorc's lines are a mess when considering subclassing, the lines don't stand very well on their own because they cross polinate too much. Shouldn't we seek to resolve that instead of getting hung up on the way a skill looks or sounds?

Plus, if we start nitpicking things like that, we can find numerous examples where abilities don't follow the theme of the line they're in. Most classes share themes from 1 line into the others to make the entire thing feel like a complete package. That's why the pets deal shock damage despite not being from Storm Calling, although that has always bother me that Dark Magic doesn't deal physical/shock, but it's not something I'm going to die fighting about because clearly ZOS doesn't care.

Let's look at Ward and Curse for example, how does that have anything to do with "Daedric Summoning" any more than "Dark Magic"? Seems more Dark Magic to me, but someone 18 years ago decided to put them in Daedric Summoning so here we are. Bound Armaments was only created in like 2018 so it's not like it can't change again. The original Bound Armor used to replace your outfit for a Daedric one, but players hated that, so they just made it a purple glow which funny enough fits Dark Magic way more than Daedric Summoning does, but the name "Bound Armor" despite not giving you Daedric Armor remains. Even in this sense they chose game design over VFX.

Look at all the skills for DK that were changed from magic to flame damage 3-4 years ago without any alteration to their VFX whatsoever. Spikes and dragon wings dealt magic damage, now they deal fire, no 1 batted an eye because fire damage made way more sense on a class that is suppose to be proficient with fire.

Nightblade just recently swapped Veiled Strike to Assassination and Blur to Shadow, neither ability had their VFX changed, it just made more sense to move them. I saw requests to do this dating back to like 2015 which is crazy to think that it took them 10 years to finally cave in.

Templar's Backlash is a yellow glowing spear that comes from the sky, seems more like an Aedric Spear skill to me, yet we have Sun Shield in there that has nothing to do with spears. From a pure gameplay standpoint, I'd move Sun Shield, Focused Charge, and Piercing Javelin into Dawn's Wrath, then move Dark Flare (spammable), Backlash (semi-spammable), and Radiant Destuction (execute) into Aedric Spear, making it a clear DPS line, where as Dawn's Wrath becomes the clear utility/tanking line. As it stands, Templar has a similar Sorc problem, the lines are mixed, but their issue is 2 lines instead of 3. Aedric Spear has 2/5 damage skills, and Dawn's Wrath 4/5, ults aside, yet Aedric Spear has the classes majority of damage related passives. Dawn's Wrath is basically only useful for Minor Sorcery, but that is a 20s buff. Enduring Rays +2 duration applies to skills where you don't need it in the 1st place making timers awkard at 22s instead of 20s..... Anyway, off topic, it's just bad design, I wouldn't want them to be held back by VFX either. I don't main templar though, I have no idea if they noticed this issue or if it's just me.

Zyaneth_Bal

It's not just bound armour. The problem is sorcerer being unable to benefit from subclassing to the extent the other classes can. Not so in pve as in pvp where the best option is likely to not subclass at all. This is due to the fact that sorcerer's skill trees aren't dedicated to any particular function, so healing/damage/survivability skills are all spread and mixed. Even other base game classes have some sort of differentiation. That is why sorcerer can't replace a skill tree without not only sacrificing some essential class skill but also ruining the very core of the build. For instance if one would want to slot a healing skill tree they would inevitably sacrifice a core damage skill and vice versa. Once again, because sorcerer's trees aren't dedicated to any role while those of other classes are. Thus by attempting to change any of build's aspects (say healing/survivability/damage) sorcerer inevitably takes a hit too big to be worth the trouble. And considering all this the class will likely fall behind due to the fact that other classes have received heavy buffs (which is subclassing) while sorc not only is excluded but has received big nerfs as well.

Some changes and moving would be welcome, something similar has been made only recently for nightblade's shadow and assassination skill trees