Overload (Ultimate) Questions

Darkstorne · May 2015

I've been trying out a Sorceror character for the first time, and using a two-handed melee crit build based on this awesome Battlemaster's Corner build: http://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/2015/02/02/battlemasters-corner--thunderous-destroyer

I'm curious about the Overload ultimate though, and wondered if it went through many changes after 1.6? I can only find info from a year ago, where it seems to be considered a very weak ultimate, and useless for melee builds.

Can the attacks crit? Do they use melee crit? (My crits heal me, so it's important for the build)
Does it benefit from the Surge buff (same skill tree, raises weapon damage by 20%)
Does it benefit from the Power Stone buff (reduces ultimate cost) for both activation and each attack?
Does it benefit from passives that increase weapon damage (such as Agility from the Medium Armour tree)?

Thanks for reading

Jitterbug · May 2015

While I can't answer your questions, I am very much interested in the answers, and can tell you this much.
When I use Overload on my vr14 melee sorc with around 3500 weapon damage it hits for like 3-4k and crits for like 5-6k so nowhere near the numbers magicka sorcs get. Sadly, I don't have any theorycrafting to back this up.
It's still fun though, and the extra bar is very useful.

lolo_01b16_ESO · May 2015

Darkstorne wrote: »

Can the attacks crit? Do they use melee crit? (My crits heal me, so it's important for the build)

They can crit.

Does it benefit from the Surge buff (same skill tree, raises weapon damage by 20%)

Overload and all other ultimates scale with spell power or weapon power, depending on which is higher. So Surge will buff your damage.

Does it benefit from the Power Stone buff (reduces ultimate cost) for both activation and each attack?

Yes, they do.

Does it benefit from passives that increase weapon damage (such as Agility from the Medium Armour tree)?

If you focus on weapon damage, yes it does.

Btw. on my v1 sorc with about 1k weapon damage overload hits for 6k so there might be something wrong with you @Jitterbug

Darkstorne · May 2015

lolo_01b16_ESO wrote: »

Does it benefit from the Surge buff (same skill tree, raises weapon damage by 20%)

Overload and all other ultimates scale with spell power or weapon power, depending on which is higher. So Surge will buff your damage.

Does it benefit from passives that increase weapon damage (such as Agility from the Medium Armour tree)?

If you focus on weapon damage, yes it does.

Btw. on my v1 sorc with about 1k weapon damage overload hits for 6k so there might be something wrong with you @Jitterbug

Any source for it scaling with weapon damage or spell damage, depending on which is higher? Because if @Jitterbug is a melee class dealing 3k with Overload (same as his melee), and you're a spellcaster dealing 6k (with 1k melee damage), that indicates it's still reliant on spell power and ignores weapon power.

Ranique · May 2015

Darkstorne wrote: »

lolo_01b16_ESO wrote: »

Does it benefit from the Surge buff (same skill tree, raises weapon damage by 20%)

Overload and all other ultimates scale with spell power or weapon power, depending on which is higher. So Surge will buff your damage.

Does it benefit from passives that increase weapon damage (such as Agility from the Medium Armour tree)?

If you focus on weapon damage, yes it does.

Btw. on my v1 sorc with about 1k weapon damage overload hits for 6k so there might be something wrong with you @Jitterbug

Any source for it scaling with weapon damage or spell damage, depending on which is higher? Because if @Jitterbug is a melee class dealing 3k with Overload (same as his melee), and you're a spellcaster dealing 6k (with 1k melee damage), that indicates it's still reliant on spell power and ignores weapon power.

Overload changes your skills with empowered versions of those skills that drain ultimate. The scaling however still depends on the actual source skill. So if you use a skill being scaled by spellpower, when using overload, it will still scale from spellpower. If you use a skill based on weapon power, then it will scale from that

Jitterbug · May 2015

I'm using it on my bow bar which (I can't check right now) has a weapon power of about 2k and I only use (or have only tested) light attacks.

Darkstorne · May 2015

Ranique wrote: »

Overload changes your skills with empowered versions of those skills that drain ultimate. The scaling however still depends on the actual source skill. So if you use a skill being scaled by spellpower, when using overload, it will still scale from spellpower. If you use a skill based on weapon power, then it will scale from that

I thought it only changes light and heavy attacks, not weapon skills / spells? Left click becomes a single ranged attack, and holding left click becomes a channelled AOE attack. I'm hoping those attacks scale off weapon damage if you normally use a melee weapon, and spell damage if you normally use a staff.

All the info I've found so far suggests the damage only scales from spell damage and from your maximum mana pool, not from your weapon damage and maximum stamina. Making it useless for melee build sorcerors. I'm just curious if it was altered to be useful for melee characters after 1.6 altered so many skills.

Jitterbug · May 2015

Darkstorne wrote: »

I'm just curious if it was altered to be useful for melee characters after 1.6 altered so many skills.

It's not.
I un-slotted it again.

Darkstorne · May 2015

Jitterbug wrote: »

Darkstorne wrote: »

I'm just curious if it was altered to be useful for melee characters after 1.6 altered so many skills.

It's not.
I un-slotted it again.

Dreams = crushed

Thanks for the info though! Saved me wasting a skillpoint

Merlin13KAGL · May 2015

Darkstorne wrote: »

lolo_01b16_ESO wrote: »

Does it benefit from the Surge buff (same skill tree, raises weapon damage by 20%)

Overload and all other ultimates scale with spell power or weapon power, depending on which is higher. So Surge will buff your damage.

Does it benefit from passives that increase weapon damage (such as Agility from the Medium Armour tree)?

If you focus on weapon damage, yes it does.

Btw. on my v1 sorc with about 1k weapon damage overload hits for 6k so there might be something wrong with you @Jitterbug

Any source for it scaling with weapon damage or spell damage, depending on which is higher? Because if @Jitterbug is a melee class dealing 3k with Overload (same as his melee), and you're a spellcaster dealing 6k (with 1k melee damage), that indicates it's still reliant on spell power and ignores weapon power.

@Darkstorne , somewhere in the 1.6ish Patch Notes, it's indicated that Ult's and Synergies will always scale off your highest Stat. (In the case of synergies, it uses their stats, not yours, I believe)

So, while it's not entirely accurate that they scale off Spell Power/Weapon Power, each of those scale primarily off their respective stat.

So, the weapon in your hand at the time of activation is irrelevant - it is replaced with Overload. But since Overload is an Ult, whichever stat is greater (Stamina or Magicka) will be the stat of choice.

This makes it seem as if it would scale of Weapon Damage/Spell Damage, but only inasmuch as WD/SD (whichever your concentration is based) also scale of the stat which you likely have set the highest.

You should see the same overload damage carrying a Level 1 weapon as you would a VR14 weapon, unless there is an enchant/set bonus that increases the respective pool.

Merlin13KAGL · May 2015

From 1.6.5:

Synergy abilities now scale off your highest stats that are either stamina or magicka based.
Ultimates and Synergy abilities now always scale of your highest Critical Strike stat instead of just your Spell Critical Strike.
Abilities that cost magicka will now always scale off your magicka, spell damage, and spell critical strike stats.
Abilities that cost stamina will now always scale off your stamina, weapon damage, and weapon critical strike stats.

Jitterbug · May 2015

Merlin13KAGL wrote: »

Darkstorne wrote: »

lolo_01b16_ESO wrote: »

Does it benefit from the Surge buff (same skill tree, raises weapon damage by 20%)

Overload and all other ultimates scale with spell power or weapon power, depending on which is higher. So Surge will buff your damage.

Does it benefit from passives that increase weapon damage (such as Agility from the Medium Armour tree)?

If you focus on weapon damage, yes it does.

Btw. on my v1 sorc with about 1k weapon damage overload hits for 6k so there might be something wrong with you @Jitterbug

Any source for it scaling with weapon damage or spell damage, depending on which is higher? Because if @Jitterbug is a melee class dealing 3k with Overload (same as his melee), and you're a spellcaster dealing 6k (with 1k melee damage), that indicates it's still reliant on spell power and ignores weapon power.

@Darkstorne , somewhere in the 1.6ish Patch Notes, it's indicated that Ult's and Synergies will always scale off your highest Stat. (In the case of synergies, it uses their stats, not yours, I believe)

So, while it's not entirely accurate that they scale off Spell Power/Weapon Power, each of those scale primarily off their respective stat.

So, the weapon in your hand at the time of activation is irrelevant - it is replaced with Overload. But since Overload is an Ult, whichever stat is greater (Stamina or Magicka) will be the stat of choice.

This makes it seem as if it would scale of Weapon Damage/Spell Damage, but only inasmuch as WD/SD (whichever your concentration is based) also scale of the stat which you likely have set the highest.

You should see the same overload damage carrying a Level 1 weapon as you would a VR14 weapon, unless there is an enchant/set bonus that increases the respective pool.

So... how does that make a magicka sorcs overload hit for 15k and mine hit for 5?
Don't mean to be rude but history tells us that linked patch notes rarely has a connection to whatever's going on on live.

Darkstorne · May 2015

Merlin13KAGL wrote: »

From 1.6.5:
Synergy abilities now scale off your highest stats that are either stamina or magicka based.

Ultimates and Synergy abilities now always scale of your highest Critical Strike stat instead of just your Spell Critical Strike.

Abilities that cost magicka will now always scale off your magicka, spell damage, and spell critical strike stats.

Abilities that cost stamina will now always scale off your stamina, weapon damage, and weapon critical strike stats.

Thanks for this info!

I took a look in-game. Visited the stat point rededication shrine and reset my abilities, and checked to see how that affected the damage. Before resetting my points I had 20 Stamina points, and the Overload tooltip read 2.5k damage per attack. After resetting to 0 Stamina points the tooltip read just under 2k damage per attack.

So yay! It definitely scales with Stamina now! And that's great news to hear that it also uses whichever crit rating is higher

I'm still not sure if it uses spell power or weapon power, but it makes me happy to know that I can focus on a Stamina build and reap reward from that