What is best dps weapon for stamina builds?

Gokmak · July 2014

What is the best dps weapon for stamina builds?

I'm curious... IF you are a stamina build, what dps weapon do you use?

I'm struggling to get my dps over 300. Ever since they nerfed the shield bash, I haven't found any stamina-based weapons that can sustain over 300 dps. I average ~250 dps typically. I have respec'd several times. I went from sword and board, to two-handed, and am currently leveling the bow (have bow up to rank 33).

Again, IF you are a stamina build, what dps weapon do you use?

Thanks

ps: I'd like to keep this positive, don't want to get into grief about stamina vs magicka, or anything else OFF TOPIC. Let's try to stay on topic please.

SirAndy · July 2014

A pretty dress and a wooden stick ...

UPrime · July 2014

I'm not 100% sure on the answer, stamina seems to be balances against itself. The problem is that class skills are all magicka, so you NEED to use those skills. You can't be pure stamina. I think until they make some class skills stamina based instead of magicka you'll always have this problem.

yelloweyedemon · July 2014

What's a stamina build? Hell, what's a magicka build? If you don't mix those two, you are doing it wrong, or you're a traditional mage.

NorthernFury · July 2014

Dual Wield has the best potential for DPS just using weapon/stamina skills, IMO. Daggers seem to work well for me.

Gilvoth · July 2014

NorthernFury wrote: »

Dual Wield has the best potential for DPS just using weapon/stamina skills, IMO. Daggers seem to work well for me.

yeah, very funny. im not laughing. i have a vet 12 nighblade duel wield daggers, and i can tell you for a fact that daggers are the weakest damage dealing in elder scrolls online. there are multiple threads and a massive amount of complaints on this forum about us duel wield dagger users not being able to be equal to the damage output of the dragonights and sorcerers.

Sihnfahl · July 2014

yelloweyedemon wrote: »

What's a stamina build? Hell, what's a magicka build? If you don't mix those two, you are doing it wrong, or you're a traditional mage.

Stamina builds use more stamina enchants than magicka, and you slot more melee weapon abilities than class skills.

Magicka builds use more magicka enchants than stamina, and you slot more class skills than melee weapon abilities.

2H is about the better middle-of-the-road for the melee builds. Sword and Board sinks too much stam into defense, and dual wield needs more oomph, imho.

dsalter · July 2014

Hlaren_shortsheath wrote: »

NorthernFury wrote: »

Dual Wield has the best potential for DPS just using weapon/stamina skills, IMO. Daggers seem to work well for me.

yeah, very funny. im not laughing. i have a vet 12 nighblade duel wield daggers, and i can tell you for a fact that daggers are the weakest damage dealing in elder scrolls online. there are multiple threads and a massive amount of complaints on this forum about us duel wield dagger users not being able to be equal to the damage output of the dragonights and sorcerers.

your doing it wrong then, as a Sorc DW with only 1 magicka ability active, i can tell you DW works best. i'v taken down several bosses solo as well so either i'm hacking or your not doing it right

leandro.800ub17_ESO · July 2014

I tested and for me bow did allot more dmg than dw. I mean snipe alone does more than 600 dmg when you have around 2100 stamina at VR 9 (tooltip info)

Gecko · July 2014

The problem is snipe has a cast time (animations are not sped up with attack speed, if they were, weapon DPS would probably be respectable, except for the crazy stamina drain then). So you are doing 600 damage in 2 seconds, so the skill is only doing 300 dps.

A lot of the dual wield skills (all, maybe) are instant or channelled so there is no 2 second break in output in order to cast. That makes the potential damage higher for dual wield.

Lord_Draevan · July 2014

I'm not sure which is best for my main, a two-handed DK DPS. Medium armor passives increases attack speed and stamina regenration, which is good, while heavy armor passives increases the power of melee attacks.
Currently I'm wearing heavy armor but I'm wondering if a DPS would do better with medium armor.

Sihnfahl · July 2014

Gecko wrote: »

A lot of the dual wield skills (all, maybe) are instant or channelled so there is no 2 second break in output in order to cast. That makes the potential damage higher for dual wield.

All dual wield skills are instants.

Two handed's main single-target damage dealer has a wind-up time. The other damage dealers are situational or not suited for single target; cleave does low damage on a single target, but good frontal AOE, and executioner requires you to have lowered the opponent's health significantly to be worth the stam expenditure.

Lord_Draevan wrote: »

Currently I'm wearing heavy armor but I'm wondering if a DPS would do better with medium armor.

If you're looking for better DPS, medium serves you better with the stamina regen, crit and weapon speed boost of Medium.

The flat damage boost of Heavy does not, in any way, equal to the crit boosts of Medium in terms of over time DPS ... if you're looking solely at physical melee dps.

Lord_Draevan · July 2014

Sihnfahl wrote: »

If you're looking for better DPS, medium serves you better with the stamina regen, crit and weapon speed boost of Medium.

The flat damage boost of Heavy does not, in any way, equal to the crit boosts of Medium in terms of over time DPS ... if you're looking solely at physical melee dps.

Yeah, I really don't like how much damage I'm doing, I'll switch to medium tonight. Luckily I was refunded 240k gold from ZOS when someone hacked my account a few weeks ago and sold all my stuff, I can hopefully afford a respec and some medium armor/clothing grind. Respeccing at max level is damn expensive.

Sihnfahl · July 2014

Lord_Draevan wrote: »

Respeccing at max level is damn expensive.

It's not the level, it's the number of skill points you slotted. And I feel that; I have over 300 now. And that is a pain.

What faction are you in and what level? I can probably help you out with a basic setup; I believe I have up to six trait across the board in medium.

Lord_Draevan · July 2014

Sihnfahl wrote: »

Lord_Draevan wrote: »

Respeccing at max level is damn expensive.

It's not the level, it's the number of skill points you slotted. And I feel that; I have over 300 now. And that is a pain.

What faction are you in and what level? I can probably help you out with a basic setup; I believe I have up to six trait across the board in medium.

My main is a V12 in the Ebonheart Pact, I have a full set of V12 Medium Pact's Armor I was going to use for my alt but I'll use for my main instead, once I upgrade it all to Epic.

Gokmak · July 2014

Thank you all for the discussion. I need to hear what other stamina builds are doing. I'm the only stamina build left in my guild lol.

Sihnfahl wrote: »

All dual wield skills are instants.

I haven't looked at dual wield yet, but it sounds interesting. I have to admit, I like the bow, but I was used to melee, block, dodge, etc. I think I might check out dual wield, have to respec again UGH.

Sihnfahl wrote: »

If you're looking for better DPS, medium serves you better with the stamina regen, crit and weapon speed boost of Medium.

I wear all 7 medium armor pieces, researched all to 6, 3 of them researching #8 right now. Also have dagger, 1h axe and shield already at 8 traits.

I think I'll make a pair of uber daggers, and start leveling DW.

What about jewelry? I'm also enchanter, made myself 3 glyphs of +damage. Testing shows damage only went up 30 points (3x10), which doesn't really help much. I gave up +armor, +fire resist and +regen to try these out. Not yet sure if they are worth it.

Thanks again for everyone's feedback, and thanks for keeping it positive

Sihnfahl · July 2014

Jewelry is hit or miss. Your best bet as a melee are stamina cost reduction items with stamina boosts on them, IMO, rather than weapon damage boosts (skills are modified as a % of weapon damage, so a +10 weapon damage boost may actually only get you +3 on a skill in the end).

Armor is so negligible that it's not worth it. Fire resist only is important for vamps; the rest of it can be dealt with fine. +regen is laughable, IMHO, due to soft capping being so easy to reach.

Soothy · July 2014

patrykstencel wrote: »

I'm not 100% sure on the answer, stamina seems to be balances against itself. The problem is that class skills are all magicka, so you NEED to use those skills. You can't be pure stamina. I think until they make some class skills stamina based instead of magicka you'll always have this problem.

I'd have to agree and I am a stamina based build (with a little Magicka).

Gokmak · July 2014

Soothy wrote: »

patrykstencel wrote: »

I'm not 100% sure on the answer, stamina seems to be balances against itself. The problem is that class skills are all magicka, so you NEED to use those skills. You can't be pure stamina. I think until they make some class skills stamina based instead of magicka you'll always have this problem.

I'd have to agree and I am a stamina based build (with a little Magicka).

I agree completely too, and I use almost as much magicka skills from my class, it's a no brainer. That wasn't my question though.

Tamanous · July 2014

I am ok with 2h being middle of the road damage as long as it's utility is maintained. I understand it may need tweaking for those using it as a primary source of dps but I use it along side many primary sorc powers in a more mage-like way. As primary dps I would suggest dual-wield.

I truly hope another weapon or 2 is added to this game very soon. I'd love to see pole arms added to 2h. New weapons with new abilities could include crossbow (designed more as a single target/anti-armor ranged specialist over bow) and quarter staff (love to see this as a melee-support option with powers tapping from BOTH stamina and magicka).

Soothy · July 2014

Gokmak wrote: »

Soothy wrote: »

patrykstencel wrote: »

I'm not 100% sure on the answer, stamina seems to be balances against itself. The problem is that class skills are all magicka, so you NEED to use those skills. You can't be pure stamina. I think until they make some class skills stamina based instead of magicka you'll always have this problem.

I'd have to agree and I am a stamina based build (with a little Magicka).

I agree completely too, and I use almost as much magicka skills from my class, it's a no brainer. That wasn't my question though.

Two-Hander would be your safe bet then.

Tobiz · July 2014

There are calculations that if youre high enough on crit then swords are better with the +damage from medium armour. If you still need crit, daggers are better. Ill try to find the exact data, but dont hold your breath.
Say for arguments sake the breakpoint is 50 ish crit chance. Below that you want daggers, above that you want swords.

Just for completion mace is crap with the 80 armour reduction and bleeds from axes dont stack with skill based bleeds.
These are not my own observations, just what I have read.

My own observation is that maces are cool and thats what I roll with.

Stannum · July 2014

duals for focus dps, 2h for AoE

Tobiz · July 2014

Ok found some links at Tamriel Foundry:

They are very old as there are no theorycrafting taking place about weapon builds any more, these days its all about squezing juice from sticks.

http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/dw-sword-vs-dw-daggers/

(edit this link has nothing to do with this post but i leave it here anyway http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/light-attacks-vs-heavy-and-igneous-weapons/)

kieso · July 2014

I'm leveling up DW on my NB now at VR1, I find it to be fun and so far decent enough maybe ill run into issues later but so far I like it more than bow which was my main 1-50 weapon.

purple-magicb16_ESO · July 2014

Lord_Draevan wrote: »

I'm not sure which is best for my main, a two-handed DK DPS. Medium armor passives increases attack speed and stamina regenration, which is good, while heavy armor passives increases the power of melee attacks.
Currently I'm wearing heavy armor but I'm wondering if a DPS would do better with medium armor.

I'm moving to med armor and it makes a world of difference stamina wise. I don't even notice the power loss bcoz I'm a good mix of the two.

Gokmak · July 2014

Tobiz wrote: »

Ok found some links at Tamriel Foundry:

They are very old as there are no theorycrafting taking place about weapon builds any more, these days its all about squezing juice from sticks.

http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/dw-sword-vs-dw-daggers/

(edit this link has nothing to do with this post but i leave it here anyway http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/light-attacks-vs-heavy-and-igneous-weapons/)

Great links, thanks!

I'm curious, what enchants do people put on their duel daggers?

What enchants on other dual 1-handed, i.e. 1h axe, mace, sword?

reften · July 2014

Best DPS for a weapon is like asking what is the strongest baby...really doesn't matter, they're all weak.

I prefer bow, because...it's cool, and I like ranged combat. Can morph #1 skill to impale and use it at range too.

RatsnevE · July 2014

NorthernFury wrote: »

Dual Wield has the best potential for DPS just using weapon/stamina skills, IMO. Daggers seem to work well for me.

Why daggers and not swords or maces that do even more DPS? Is DW limited to daggers only? I don't think so but it seems like I'm only doing a heavy attack for instance with just one weapon. Is it possible I've misunderstood yet more lack of intuitiveness in this game?

Tankqull · July 2014

NorthernFury wrote: »

Dual Wield has the best potential for DPS just using weapon/stamina skills, IMO. Daggers seem to work well for me.

not entirely its depending on your class - does it proviede a "finisher" than probably dual wield if it does not (templar/DK) then it is 2h.

sagitter · July 2014

Tobiz wrote: »

There are calculations that if youre high enough on crit then swords are better with the +damage from medium armour. If you still need crit, daggers are better. Ill try to find the exact data, but dont hold your breath.
Say for arguments sake the breakpoint is 50 ish crit chance. Below that you want daggers, above that you want swords.

Just for completion mace is crap with the 80 armour reduction and bleeds from axes dont stack with skill based bleeds.
These are not my own observations, just what I have read.

My own observation is that maces are cool and thats what I roll with.

In the tooltip of "twin blade and blunt" it says: deals up to 5% bonus damage to heavily armored enemies with mace equipped, and not reduce armor by 80.