Damage Shield stacking balancing idea

kazeweaver · May 2015

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

Yolokin_Swagonborn · May 2015

Gorthax · May 2015

Seems like you need to get better ( no offense) I do pretty damn good on my sorc but that's because I worked hard to get there. Been playing it since beta wave 1. Been perfecting it since then. I seen the best of times as a Sorc and I have seen the worst of times as sorcs. You know what? I have been stacking shields ever since my first time in pvp in beta. Did it before it was the meta in 1.6 you know why? Without that I would die.

Even with it I still die. It's kind of hard to be offensive with my build setup while having to refresh shields constantly. You know what else is just as bad? Templar's who out heal everythinf, dragonknights Who gdb Right before death. Or ANY class who grabs a sword and shield and block cast all day long. people seemed to stop complaining bout them because that's ok. Yet it isn't ok for a sorc to be defensive? I will never understand the forum warriors.

I am easy to kill. I accept that. My shields give me a little edge on staying alive. My mobility and positioning with bolt escape also helps me pick and choose my fights. Don't like bolt escape....stop chasing sorcs. They will come back and then you and some friends should be ready. don't like their shields? Put DoT on em, evaluate your gear to get more dps, evaluate your build. Shields are the least of this games issues. That's my two cents.

Gorthax · May 2015

Also, just so you know, anyone can stack shields. Especially if you get the support ultimate from alliance war skill tree. 30k shield that heals you mixed with harness magicka, healing ward, bone shield, white strakes Proc, etc etc. You get the picture

anyone can do it. Most just choose not to then complain that they died in pvp with the current HUGE burst meta they created. Shields are needed.

Lyzaaa · May 2015

Best part is, u dont crit vs dem shields.. try killing a sorc standing in his minefield like this^

olsborg · May 2015

Im a sorc, I use only hardward, have been since 1.3. I do fine. Nerf shieldstack

Attorneyatlawl · June 2015

Yolokin_Swagonborn wrote: »

CLIPPY! My hero.

Gorthax wrote: »

Also, just so you know, anyone can stack shields. Especially if you get the support ultimate from alliance war skill tree. 30k shield that heals you mixed with harness magicka, healing ward, bone shield, white strakes Proc, etc etc. You get the picture anyone can do it. Most just choose not to then complain that they died in pvp with the current HUGE burst meta they created. Shields are needed.

This. Every class and every build in the game can stack up shields. People in general are too razor-focused on the whole old-school MMO trope of "lasers, pew pew damage!" as happens in many games with open build system that don't forcibly guide people into viable vs. non-viable builds by not having the openness (instead giving you a set line or two and you are told you can pick 10 out of the 12, while 10 more are given automatically). Die in PVP? Die in PVE? Learn some better positioning, spend a little time finding out what your options are to help stop yourself from dying, and either act on them or if there is nothing you could have changed (which is virtually never the case), accept that you can't win every fight without fail and learn from it.

Lyzaaa wrote: »

Best part is, u dont crit vs dem shields.. try killing a sorc standing in his minefield like this^

A minefield? You can melee from further out than the mines cast from the sorc

. And that's assuming you aren't fielding any kind of ranged damage or other stuff you could be doing... glass cannons are great and have their uses, but if you are just building glass and don't have the damage to make it into a cannon against typical enemies you encounter, you need to think up a better version of your build

.

That's a little blunt, but it is the truth. I had a discussion with a guildmate claiming that harness magicka was overpowered because it supposedly couldn't be broken without 2-3+ abilities by him, tonight. I told him the same thing I will here which is that is outright wrong (to which he claimed I was literally fabricating it, but that's neither here nor there

).

If you're unable to break through a 10-11k shield with no damage mitigation reducing your raw damage output, you are not built for damage at all. Quite literally, that is one light attack with a single nuke from a good build (any class; for a nightblade that can include even something like funnel health in a PTS magicka build I made by leveraging character-copied gear), and light/medium attack). You need to be going back to the drawing board if you are putting out that little damage against an unmitigated shield and your choices are unable to compensate for the lack of damage. For reference, that PTS setup was done with only 300 champion points, as I have just shy of 260 on the live servers and will reach that number more than handily as I finish another character.

On live with the champion points I have, my magicka DK's flame lash (6.5k tooltip and that is amplified further by other modifiers in my build not reflected in that tooltip and results in around a 7.4k hit when no mitigation such as a shield reduces it as a non-critical attack unempowered) + a single light attack from a flame staff (~3.2k unmitigated non-critical/unempowered (not even a medium weaved!)) will actually do more damage against a shield than it can absorb) and that's in my PVP build with a fair amount of survivability baked into it so that while it's squishy, it's a "survivable DPS" and not a dandelion that falls over in a stray breeze like many I run into that are trying to damage but not really doing so too well .. Any class can use force pulse or crushing shock with a medium attack immediately and break that if they are built as a proper damage build (including obviously, a couple of survival abilities and extra health for Cyrodiil), or a large variety of physical attacks for the same effect.

The game is actually balanced as such that you can easily deal much more than the damage a shield can be cast to absorb in a single combat "round" against a single target. This design is for group play since Cyrodiil isn't an arena, and is actually very well balanced overall as if you are spending all of your effort to break a shield and deal a small amount of damage, an enemy casting a shield repeatedly isn't able to do much against you either and it's a stalemate until one of you forces a change in the encounter. If you as a player aren't even willing to explore and find the existing ways you could try to combat an enemy setup, it's fairly disrespectful to demand nerfs or buffs from that level

.

Baragorath · June 2015

Buff my DK hardened armor skill with my health bar shield not as it states now only 10%, remove spell resistant as would not care about it anymore, inscrease shield time to 10 sec and I dont care about Cyrodill lags, raids, zergs so I can gank anyone everwhere.

Would stack it with my Igneous Shield.

snackrat · June 2015

I hear ya, but I wouldn't want to have that Minor/Major. Many, if not most, shields will have varying strength depending on certain conditions (typically target health or number of hostiles hit). The Min/Maj system wouldn't allow for that.

One of my favourite shields is Healing Ward when healing for dungeons; its strength is significantly increased if a target's health is low so it is a very good panic button. The Brawler morph of Cleave is also good for sudden add swarms. I'd drop or swap out both if they had set effect, because they would cease to be adaptable.

Julianos · June 2015

i played with all classes in vet content only my NB is 40s. I cried about sorcs for nerf but noone listened and most sorcs doing down play. Or they really dont know how to play to unlock full potential of Sorcerer. I ended up with Sorcerer now im playing as a Sorc and its most adventigous class on everything by far except tanking but you can be a decent tank. For me sorc is even better on healing than templar and best dps and in PVP its tanky high burst damage and heals. So dont listen people down playing on forums just level a sorc and see for yourself.

Merlin13KAGL · June 2015

This is awesome, OP. The utter and complete cluelessness that continues to ensue never ceases to amaze me, and the numbers keep going up.

I figure in another 6 months, Sorc's will be hitting for 50k using provisioning skills while standing naked behind their 200k shields (alll without a weapon equipped, of course.)

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

Not sure why I'm going to bother, but here goes:

Sorcs have one shield. (Ward is the only class specific).
Sorcs have one shield (Other classes have class shields to, in some form) (Yes, even mirage with it's % mitigation - it's just not a pretty 'bubble.')
Sorcs have one shield. This means the remaining (still stackable) shields are available to any class.
Frags is counterable a half a dozen ways - covered in many other threads, use the search tool.
"Double health shield stack" doesn't matter if you're on your back from not doing the above. A 1 HP Sorc takes no damage from you while you're down anyway, so his resistances are moot.
Resistances on Sorcs are a joke as is if wearing LA, which most likely are. They buffed the hell out of your MA/HA to an extreme, so this is what there is.
You wanna change what amounts to a buff into a buff... to make "Sorcs work their armours to include more resistances" I can only assume you mean - don't let them wear LA, as the only 'armor resistance buffs' I am aware of are tied directly to AC, which translates to SR, and is tied directly to armor type.
You want Sorcs to use more variety of skills because you can't figure out how to counter the ones they use now??

I really hate to go this way, but the input and balance suggestion for this case has to be L2P.

Lyzaaa wrote: »

Best part is, u dont crit vs dem shields.. try killing a sorc standing in his minefield like this^

And you can't get Crit shield at 150% the value when cast. It evens out. Full damage, no redux, no block. Been covered as well 100+ other times.

BTW, Sorcs can't crit against shields you have available either.

Pro tip: Used ranged, get the Sorc to move, or wait for mines to dissipate...

BuggeX · June 2015

Merlin13KAGL wrote: »

This is awesome, OP. The utter and complete cluelessness that continues to ensue never ceases to amaze me, and the numbers keep going up.

I figure in another 6 months, Sorc's will be hitting for 50k using provisioning skills while standing naked behind their 200k shields (alll without a weapon equipped, of course.)

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

Not sure why I'm going to bother, but here goes:
Sorcs have one shield. (Ward is the only class specific).

Sorcs have one shield (Other classes have class shields to, in some form) (Yes, even mirage with it's % mitigation - it's just not a pretty 'bubble.')

Sorcs have one shield. This means the remaining (still stackable) shields are available to any class.

Frags is counterable a half a dozen ways - covered in many other threads, use the search tool.

"Double health shield stack" doesn't matter if you're on your back from not doing the above. A 1 HP Sorc takes no damage from you while you're down anyway, so his resistances are moot.

Resistances on Sorcs are a joke as is if wearing LA, which most likely are. They buffed the hell out of your MA/HA to an extreme, so this is what there is.

You wanna change what amounts to a buff into a buff... to make "Sorcs work their armours to include more resistances" I can only assume you mean - don't let them wear LA, as the only 'armor resistance buffs' I am aware of are tied directly to AC, which translates to SR, and is tied directly to armor type.

You want Sorcs to use more variety of skills because you can't figure out how to counter the ones they use now??

I really hate to go this way, but the input and balance suggestion for this case has to be L2P.

Lyzaaa wrote: »

Best part is, u dont crit vs dem shields.. try killing a sorc standing in his minefield like this^

And you can't get Crit shield at 150% the value when cast. It evens out. Full damage, no redux, no block. Been covered as well 100+ other times.

BTW, Sorcs can't crit against shields you have available either.

Pro tip: Used ranged, get the Sorc to move, or wait for mines to dissipate...

Just Mhee. so explain wy in all camps (on EU) in every fraction (ok i know 2 Templers also) the top 3 are just sorcs?

The shild stack is fine, but with Kombination with Boltescape ist just a unkillable broken mechanic.

Sorcs have also Access to the most powerfull combinations to skill witch are not avoidable. Like the Storm Atronarch and Deadric Curse (both hit with 6k on a Tank with 53k mres) this together with mana Detonation and lightning stuff (also not avoidable) is you dead for sure, no matter witch class you Play.

There are only 2 ways to kill a sorc, gank him with lethal arrow and hope i die on the second shoot.
Or gank him with wrecking blow and hope he die on the second hit.

Anything else will not deal enought dmg to burst a sorc down and to avoid that he is just boltescaping through whole cyro within 5secs.

All over this, a sorc has somthing about 20-22k hp, a well played sorc Keep his shild alltime up, so he has a effektiv health from 30k (all dmg) or 40k Magic Dmg

Merlin13KAGL · June 2015

BuggeX wrote: »

Just Mhee. so explain wy in all camps (on EU) in every fraction (ok i know 2 Templers also) the top 3 are just sorcs?

The shild stack is fine, but with Kombination with Boltescape ist just a unkillable broken mechanic.

Sorcs have also Access to the most powerfull combinations to skill witch are not avoidable. Like the Storm Atronarch and Deadric Curse (both hit with 6k on a Tank with 53k mres) this together with mana Detonation and lightning stuff (also not avoidable) is you dead for sure, no matter witch class you Play.

There are only 2 ways to kill a sorc, gank him with lethal arrow and hope i die on the second shoot.
Or gank him with wrecking blow and hope he die on the second hit.

Anything else will not deal enought dmg to burst a sorc down and to avoid that he is just boltescaping through whole cyro within 5secs.

All over this, a sorc has somthing about 20-22k hp, a well played sorc Keep his shild alltime up, so he has a effektiv health from 30k (all dmg) or 40k Magic Dmg

@BuggeX Which is why no one is ever able to complete the kill 20 Sorc's quest?

Come on...

Classes can spec into 35k health that only takes post-mitigated damage, vs a <35k health shielded equivalent that mitigates none of the incoming damage before absorbing it and it's somehow not equal?

Storm Atro has limited range and requires LoS - consider moving? Also, if you have 53k SR, you likely have massive armor as well, so you're mitigating a ridiculous amount of damage that the Sorc (with 1/5th to 1/10th of that) is not..

Curse? You mean the one that the Support line and the Templar class has a counter to? (Even if you let it finish, you can actually cut your damage in half from that one further... by performing one simple action, or entirely by using another non-class, non-Alliance-war skill.)

Magicka Detonation is not a Sorc skill - it can be used by any class with the attained Alliance Rank. It gives plenty of time, has a huge visual, and can be rendered completely null (with the exception of one morph) three different ways.

Lightning 'stuff' which is not avoidable? You mean both skills? Fury (useful only as a finisher) and the channeled attack from an elemental stave any class can use? (both of these require Line of Sight, btw...so they're broken by rocks and trees and stuff...)

Lighting armor: move.
Lightning Splash: move.
Streak: dodge or move.
Overload Single Target: move/dodge

(Hint: The key to ranged is range.)

Most other magic based skills (class specific) and weapon based magic skills (Destro) are projectile based and can be reflected. Restro is the only other channeled attack and exists because of the reflectability (translated as made virtually ineffective) of almost everything else.

The flippin' Ult from the Mages Guild line (granted, accessible to anyone) can be reflected back.

You also speak as if the other classes do not have set/mobility options available to catch a streaking Sorc. You equally have the option to not pursue. You also make it sound as if you never have options or opportunity to exit the fight? (Retreating maneuver, cloak, roll dodge, sprint, invis potion) or pursue (Shield charge, Invasion, Teleport Strike, Focused Charge, Retreating maneuver again)

Further, if the Sorc is escaping, you're not dying. You don't have to have killed the other guy to win the fight. You just have to not be dead.

Those top three leaderboard ranks, I suspect, are from people that know the skills, the gear, the classes (not just their own), and the counters.

Every class dies every day in Cyrodiil. If it was truly as OP as you say it is, it wouldn't just be the top three, would it?

You forget that with every point spent, with every skill slotted and used, there is a tradeoff. Sounds like you need to find the weaknesses that are there based on those trade offs and learn to counter the build.

Last thing, you simply have to break the shield. once you do that, any extra damage goes right on through, takes stamina to block/break free, and chips away. A 30k eats-unmitigated damage shield takes 3 seconds to drop at 10k DPS, more than attainable on most builds, and every ounce spent on protection/escape is not doing DPS to you.

Davadin · June 2015

ummmm not here to nerf sorc, but can i get my DK's hardened armor a bit of a buff?

i get the damage return stuff, but really, i'ts a lot of "meh".

and i wish it can stack with igneous shield too........

Araxleon · June 2015

shh everyone can stack shields.

If anything the only thing I hate about sorc is how much movement/damage/defense they can achieve and any pro sorc knows its off the charts.

though shield stacking isnt really an issue its the ammount of magicka recovery people can achieve, its the same with stamina builds and roll dodging or perma blocking

but thats not a sorc only issue.

Exstazik · June 2015

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

np.Let's introduce new CC mechanic for range-mage.CC control without immune.SO i will keep CC on you and you can't charge all the time to me?oki?

nastuug · June 2015

Exstazik wrote: »

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

np.Let's introduce new CC mechanic for range-mage.CC control without immune.SO i will keep CC on you and you can't charge all the time to me?oki?

Not many can keep up the CC in 1v1 due to having to scramble from incoming burst dps, or at least I've noticed.

BuggeX · June 2015

Merlin13KAGL wrote: »

BuggeX wrote: »

Just Mhee. so explain wy in all camps (on EU) in every fraction (ok i know 2 Templers also) the top 3 are just sorcs?

The shild stack is fine, but with Kombination with Boltescape ist just a unkillable broken mechanic.

Sorcs have also Access to the most powerfull combinations to skill witch are not avoidable. Like the Storm Atronarch and Deadric Curse (both hit with 6k on a Tank with 53k mres) this together with mana Detonation and lightning stuff (also not avoidable) is you dead for sure, no matter witch class you Play.

There are only 2 ways to kill a sorc, gank him with lethal arrow and hope i die on the second shoot.
Or gank him with wrecking blow and hope he die on the second hit.

Anything else will not deal enought dmg to burst a sorc down and to avoid that he is just boltescaping through whole cyro within 5secs.

All over this, a sorc has somthing about 20-22k hp, a well played sorc Keep his shild alltime up, so he has a effektiv health from 30k (all dmg) or 40k Magic Dmg

@BuggeX Which is why no one is ever able to complete the kill 20 Sorc's quest?

Come on...

Classes can spec into 35k health that only takes post-mitigated damage, vs a <35k health shielded equivalent that mitigates none of the incoming damage before absorbing it and it's somehow not equal?

Storm Atro has limited range and requires LoS - consider moving? Also, if you have 53k SR, you likely have massive armor as well, so you're mitigating a ridiculous amount of damage that the Sorc (with 1/5th to 1/10th of that) is not..

Curse? You mean the one that the Support line and the Templar class has a counter to? (Even if you let it finish, you can actually cut your damage in half from that one further... by performing one simple action, or entirely by using another non-class, non-Alliance-war skill.)

Magicka Detonation is not a Sorc skill - it can be used by any class with the attained Alliance Rank. It gives plenty of time, has a huge visual, and can be rendered completely null (with the exception of one morph) three different ways.

Lightning 'stuff' which is not avoidable? You mean both skills? Fury (useful only as a finisher) and the channeled attack from an elemental stave any class can use? (both of these require Line of Sight, btw...so they're broken by rocks and trees and stuff...)

Lighting armor: move.
Lightning Splash: move.
Streak: dodge or move.
Overload Single Target: move/dodge

(Hint: The key to ranged is range.)

Most other magic based skills (class specific) and weapon based magic skills (Destro) are projectile based and can be reflected. Restro is the only other channeled attack and exists because of the reflectability (translated as made virtually ineffective) of almost everything else.

The flippin' Ult from the Mages Guild line (granted, accessible to anyone) can be reflected back.

You also speak as if the other classes do not have set/mobility options available to catch a streaking Sorc. You equally have the option to not pursue. You also make it sound as if you never have options or opportunity to exit the fight? (Retreating maneuver, cloak, roll dodge, sprint, invis potion) or pursue (Shield charge, Invasion, Teleport Strike, Focused Charge, Retreating maneuver again)

Further, if the Sorc is escaping, you're not dying. You don't have to have killed the other guy to win the fight. You just have to not be dead.

Those top three leaderboard ranks, I suspect, are from people that know the skills, the gear, the classes (not just their own), and the counters.

Every class dies every day in Cyrodiil. If it was truly as OP as you say it is, it wouldn't just be the top three, would it?

You forget that with every point spent, with every skill slotted and used, there is a tradeoff. Sounds like you need to find the weaknesses that are there based on those trade offs and learn to counter the build.

Last thing, you simply have to break the shield. once you do that, any extra damage goes right on through, takes stamina to block/break free, and chips away. A 30k eats-unmitigated damage shield takes 3 seconds to drop at 10k DPS, more than attainable on most builds, and every ounce spent on protection/escape is not doing DPS to you.

yes i have a lot of armor to, but wath does it matter? i decied to be tanky but lack the dmg.
sorce has both dmg and tankyness.

all class die yes, but sorcs dont die that often like others

Exstazik · June 2015

nastuug wrote: »

Exstazik wrote: »

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

np.Let's introduce new CC mechanic for range-mage.CC control without immune.SO i will keep CC on you and you can't charge all the time to me?oki?

Not many can keep up the CC in 1v1 due to having to scramble from incoming burst dps, or at least I've noticed.

Well i can run without shields at all on my sorc.But if ZOS make Rune prison instant cast,it will not have any CC immune.So i will be glass cannon,but if i CC you-you are dead by CC-dmg skill-CC-dmg skill.

nastuug · June 2015

Exstazik wrote: »

nastuug wrote: »

Exstazik wrote: »

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

np.Let's introduce new CC mechanic for range-mage.CC control without immune.SO i will keep CC on you and you can't charge all the time to me?oki?

Not many can keep up the CC in 1v1 due to having to scramble from incoming burst dps, or at least I've noticed.

Well i can run without shields at all on my sorc.But if ZOS make Rune prison instant cast,it will not have any CC immune.So i will be glass cannon,but if i CC you-you are dead by CC-dmg skill-CC-dmg skill.

I'm not saying that your method isn't effective. I'm only remarking upon the rarity of its usage by the masses.

Samadhi · June 2015

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

In PvE Sorcs cause all these issues?

Minor and Major buffs for shields has been suggested before, and it is a pretty reasonable and solid idea. ZOS would have to decide between 10% and 30% of maximum Health or maximum Magicka as the base stat though.

The only reason Sorcerer seems to have such powerful shields is because they are the only class whose class shield scales up in effect based on a DPS stat.
Hardened Ward becomes more effective the higher the Sorcerer's Magicka stat is. Increasing Magicka stat also increases all Magicka-based damage output.
Building for a more effective shield still means sacrificing Spell Damage stat for Magicka though, and Spell Damage provides more meaningful increase to damage output.

Blazing Shield, Igneous Shield, Hardened Armour, Ferocious Leap all scale based off of Health instead, meaning that such shields only provide meaningful benefit to characters that are built for tankyness rather than DPS.

Changing Hardened Ward to scale off of Health rather than Magicka would make the Sorcerer class shield skill designed for tank builds similar to the Templar and Dragonknight Class shields, but is that the right choice?

Merlin13KAGL · June 2015

Samadhi wrote: »

kazeweaver wrote: »

It seems that in PvE, sorcs stacking damage shields has gotten out of control. They can put you on your ass with a 12k crystal fragments and as soon as you break the cc to retaliate, they stare at you with damage shields stacked to double their health, pretty much making resistances on sorcs useless. I think that to help remedy this situation and balance out the insane stacking of shields that we make shields the same as buffs, minors and majors. I think this will make sorcs think about working their armours to include more resistances, use a more variety of skills and generally help stop the unstoppable force of the 30k damage shield. All input and suggestions to help balance damage shields another way is welcome.

In PvE Sorcs cause all these issues?

@Samadhi , to be fair, I agree completely with this statement, for I, too, am unable to kill a player Sorc in PvE

dRudE · June 2015

I'm just going to let the OP think i run around using only 2 skills like he said. Because if he died to someone using only shields and frags then he deserves to feel silly

Tors · June 2015

People who compain are generally 100% dps, they have never tried any other build type.

A DK can seem invincible, a KB can dodge roll all day and a Sorc cant be kiled by less than 50 people chasing them like lemmings..

What these people dont realise is that these builds they are complaining about cant actually kill them unless they allow them to by being stupid.

Merlin13KAGL · June 2015

@Tors, no they don't realize, and until they do, there is nothing we can do.

Incidentally, lemming fights are the best. They should be obligated to have FNG tattooed on their forhead if this takes place after 10 Cyrodiil visits or Alliance Rank 3.

Also, it's not limited to Sorcs. I've lost count of the number of times I've watched half a dozen, or more, people chase one other individual around a stack of logs, all going the same direction...

Tors · June 2015

@Merlin13KAGL , dont get me wrong, im not slating these people.

I was EXACTLY the same, untill i rolled a KB that could dodgeroll across Cryo on one stam bar, but tried to kill a sleeping Smurf solo one day.

His total lack of damage (together with my fat fingers and old man reactions) was an eyeopener

kazeweaver · June 2015

ok What I think is needed then is,s ince we have a lot of shields that scale off magic, we need one that scales off stamina since there isn't one

Johngo0036 · June 2015

Hi,

Good Sorcs are tough to kill, a good sorc NEVER lets their shields down,

However a less than good sorc(not to offend any) will at some time let their shield down,
At this time they are sooooooo easy to kill,

Shield stacking for a sorc in light armour, coz light armour is the best, is a neccessity.

It is frustrating trying to get through that shield, i will be honest.