A Few Questions: Sneak Attack Bonus Only Applying to Stamina Abilities

rb2001 · September 2015

Hi all,

I've thoroughly tested this in the past and come to the conclusion that probably many others have: There are the following tiers of attack damage based on crit/sneak states:

1. Regular crit - either via using a cloak morph that guarantees crit, or just your % chance fired - 1.5x normal damage
2. HIDDEN status with Physical attack that uses STAMINA - regular crit + special bonus physical sneak damage - huge damage
3. Above with Magicka attack - always gets regular crit but does not get the huge damage bonus, acts like a regular criT

My questions:

1. What reasoning have we been given that only Physical attacks/morphs get the special sneak bonus from ZOS?
2. Is this officially addressed, or stated as working as intended?
3. Will this ever be changed? Has it ever been that both Magicka and Physical based attacks both get the special extra sneak bonus?

Thanks.

Nestor · September 2015

Here is why, the mobs always see the spell coming or hear it being cast. I don't' think it is possible to get a sneak crit on a spell. I never have with my NB and he always did his opener from stealth. I would do my opener, cloaked or not, then followed up with a Stamina attack, then followed with magic or stamina as the case may be.

Man, I miss my 1.5 Hybrid NB.....

ScruffyWhiskers · September 2015

Concealed weapon SHOULD give you the bonus damage from stealth. Alas it does not since 1.6. One of the great injustices of the design changes over the last year. If a magicka melee attack lands from stealth, it should be treated just like its stam counterpart.

Tadhg_Longhouse · September 2015

Working as intended. The Stygian set allows casters to do extra damage from stealth. Not that I believe it has ever been discussed officially.

http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Stygian+Set

DeanTheCat · September 2015

It's an Elder Scrolls tradition to have spells not being able to achieve sneak damage multipliers as the idea is that the light and sound produced by casting the spell would give away your position. In ESO, that translates to only abilities scaling off weapon critical can achieve sneak damage.

"Melee" type abilities used to scale off weapon critical in the past, but it was too confusing to some players who didn't understand why an ability that costs Magicka would use weapon critical. So ZOS normalised the abilities to mean that Magicka = Spell Damage + Spell Critical, thereby inadvertently removing the sneak bonus from "Melee" spells.

rb2001 · September 2015

Thanks, everyone.