Snipe Vs Crystal Shards

Kronosphere · August 2014

now i know snipe has a slightly longer range but how come when i get a stealth attack off with snipe, so crit, i am hitting 4-550 damage (even with poison dmg morph) yet crystal shards (probs critting im not sure but either way) are hitting consistantly 800-900? rare cases 1.2k. is it just the whole magic pen calculation fail form light armor or what?

Edit and thats with me using igneous weapons for wep dmg and flawless dawnbreaker passive buff.

SFBryan18 · August 2014

Cost and cast time?

nikolaj.lemcheb16_ESO · August 2014

You picked the wrong snipe morph. The other one debuff the target so you can hit it at longer range with your other attacks and do more, damage.

That being said I regulary hit people for 1300+ with my sniper shot and 1600 damage happens every day. I am just shy of 2200 stamina and use hunding + night mother . These numbers are without scroll bonuses.

nikolaj.lemcheb16_ESO · August 2014

SFBryan18 wrote: »

Cost and cast time?

Slower and more costly than shards but with better range and single target damage if your gear and stats are set up correctly.

Reiterpallasch · August 2014

Because ZOS doesn't know how to stamina.

cuz_mike200 · August 2014

It depends if your are using a stamina, or magic build and the morphs and attributes you have

Morvul · August 2014

Kronosphere wrote: »

now i know snipe has a slightly longer range but how come when i get a stealth attack off with snipe, so crit, i am hitting 4-550 damage (even with poison dmg morph) yet crystal shards (probs critting im not sure but either way) are hitting consistantly 800-900? rare cases 1.2k. is it just the whole magic pen calculation fail form light armor or what?

Edit and thats with me using igneous weapons for wep dmg and flawless dawnbreaker passive buff.

because, given your numbers, you specced quite heavily into magicka/spelldamage and not quite so heavily into stamina/weapondamage.
If you were to build as much for stamina as you are currently build for magicka, snipe damage would be roughly on par with fragments damage
(considering snipe is more tricky to use, that still leaves snipe somwhat inferior, but not by the huuuuge margin your numbers suggest)

Kronosphere · August 2014

Morvul wrote: »

Kronosphere wrote: »

now i know snipe has a slightly longer range but how come when i get a stealth attack off with snipe, so crit, i am hitting 4-550 damage (even with poison dmg morph) yet crystal shards (probs critting im not sure but either way) are hitting consistantly 800-900? rare cases 1.2k. is it just the whole magic pen calculation fail form light armor or what?

Edit and thats with me using igneous weapons for wep dmg and flawless dawnbreaker passive buff.

because, given your numbers, you specced quite heavily into magicka/spelldamage and not quite so heavily into stamina/weapondamage.
If you were to build as much for stamina as you are currently build for magicka, snipe damage would be roughly on par with fragments damage
(considering snipe is more tricky to use, that still leaves snipe somwhat inferior, but not by the huuuuge margin your numbers suggest)

you ARE correct however my wep damage still far exceeds spell damage. but i see your point

zgrssd · August 2014

Kronosphere wrote: »

Morvul wrote: »

Kronosphere wrote: »

now i know snipe has a slightly longer range but how come when i get a stealth attack off with snipe, so crit, i am hitting 4-550 damage (even with poison dmg morph) yet crystal shards (probs critting im not sure but either way) are hitting consistantly 800-900? rare cases 1.2k. is it just the whole magic pen calculation fail form light armor or what?

Edit and thats with me using igneous weapons for wep dmg and flawless dawnbreaker passive buff.

because, given your numbers, you specced quite heavily into magicka/spelldamage and not quite so heavily into stamina/weapondamage.
If you were to build as much for stamina as you are currently build for magicka, snipe damage would be roughly on par with fragments damage
(considering snipe is more tricky to use, that still leaves snipe somwhat inferior, but not by the huuuuge margin your numbers suggest)

you ARE correct however my wep damage still far exceeds spell damage. but i see your point

Weapon damage is only one part of the deal. There are several things to consider:
Wich Damage (weapon or spell) does it use?
Is it affected by total Magicka/stamina?
Does it use Weapon or Spell Crit?
Does it go against Armor or Spell Resistance?
Can it do sneak attack bonus damage?
Wich resoruce does it use (and thus wich armor it receives bonus from).

Snipe and Shards are both good openers for a Stam/Man build respectively
Both also have the ability to boost your other stam/man skills accordingly (Passives for Shards, Snipe Morph).

There is also the issue that Stam skills are not 100% on par with Mana skills yet, but they finally seem to have time to fix them.
With 1.3 a whole host of boosts was put into Stams skill and I asume some more are th come.

p_tsakirisb16_ESO · August 2014

Kronosphere wrote: »

now i know snipe has a slightly longer range but how come when i get a stealth attack off with snipe, so crit, i am hitting 4-550 damage (even with poison dmg morph) yet crystal shards (probs critting im not sure but either way) are hitting consistantly 800-900? rare cases 1.2k. is it just the whole magic pen calculation fail form light armor or what?

Edit and thats with me using igneous weapons for wep dmg and flawless dawnbreaker passive buff.

Assuming you are like myself. Using the bow to open a battle, or shoot from afar/stealth on a Magicka focused build, with around 1188 base Stamina + green VR5 food. (blue HP/MA good when switching to spell casting).

To improve your damage with bow alone you need more stamina and to bring it to 2200, and have more weapon power to boot.
And again still it will be weaker than your Fragments, full stop.

So how do you improve with 1560 STA (1188+372 green STA food). You will ask.

Simple solution. When you "defend" a keep, have a 4 part Heavy armour with as much weapon power and max stamina bonuses as possible. Since your bow is your main attack will benefit. Switch when wall is down, to your magicka build gear. (4 part armour is easy to change than go down the jewellery etc, 5th item of set is your bow)

If you are one of those using the add-on to change the whole set, get the Eagle Eye Bow + Rings for when you rely on that type of attacks only and full set Heavy armour with as much Max Stamina and Weapon power as possible. (why Heavy? Because of the damage bonus even if small it adds up).

Second. Camouflage Hunter. So many Vampire players there, nice tool to kick them hard......

Third. Flawless Dawnbreaker is a MUST ultimate slotted with your bow qbar.

Jaxom · August 2014

My snipe regularly hits for 1500+ and that is with no PvP buffs. 220 Weapon Damage, Flawless Dawnbreaker and 2300 Stamina. I've hit upwards to 1800 on non-vr 12's. As others have said, the default weapon damage of 150- ish seems like a lot when you compare it to Spell Damage, but it really doesn't scale as well. Push Weapon Damage over 200 and watch the numbers increase significantly.