A Ridiculously Long Feedback Post About New Item Sets (Orsinium Patch)

Glory · October 2015

My last review of the item sets that were added with the Imperial City patch seemed to be appreciated, so I wanted to do a feedback post about my initial impressions of the new Orsinium sets after I have looked at them. Please note that I am not going super in-depth to theorycraft the ultimate potential of these sets, but am instead looking at the general expected effectiveness of these sets. I am willing to test each set in more depth if people express explicit interest in me testing them. These sets come with a specific armor type as well as jewelry (if they are drops, not crafted). I have not evaluated the Maelstrom Weapons in this post, although I could do a follow up if that is desired.

Really quickly, I wanted to point out my major thoughts about what I do and do not like:

These sets are each unique in their own way. Most try to fill niche playstyles and could be very effective in the right hands. I personally would buff the proc's damage/healing, increase the proc chance, or reduce the cooldown for many of these sets.
The Hunt Leader set is a joke. Please change it.
The strongest sets of this patch (in my opinion) will be Briarheart, Elemental Succession, Julianos, and possibly Trial by Fire for tanking.

Okay! The sets are ordered by Crafted, Light, Medium, and Heavy. I also included pretty (although poorly cropped and small) pictures at the top of each category so you can set the bonuses information. Without further ado...

Crafted

Law of Julianos: The magicka user's equivalent of Hunding's Rage. It is a solid set, the 5 piece bonus makes up for the mediocre 2 and 4 piece spell critical bonuses. Probably more for PvE than PvP in my personal opinion. Asayre has a great post here about how Twice-Born Star is potentially better than Julianos with the correct setup.

Morkuldin: Another extremely unique set. Solid 2, 3, 4 bonuses. I am liking how ZOS has decided to stray away from the simple 5 piece bonuses in favor of interesting effects. The animated weapon does move slow though!

Trial by Fire: A tanky set. Mediocre 2, 3, 4 bonuses. Reducing one type of elemental damage is a bit weak, especially compared to a set like the Pariah which reduces overall Spell Resistance by potentially more. This set could be extremely useful against fights like City of Ash's bosses who love their fire.

Light

Elemental Succession: Very good 2, 3, 4 bonuses. I have a strong feeling that players whose primary DPS is crushing shock weave will have great success with this set. Although this set doesn't play to certain one-element builds as well (read fire DK), if a build finds a way to implement multiple magicka elements (Sorcerer with lightning and crushing shock or fire DK?), this set could be very good.

Trinimac's Valor: Good 2, 3, 4 bonuses. I am conflicted about this set, much like I was conflicted with Spell Power Cure and Combat Physician. A 10% chance to proc when giving players a damage shield resulting in healing/damage is obviously very strong in this meta (barrier anyone?) Still, the damage and healing procced are extremely low, and this set suffers from cooldown-itis (3 second cooldown to proc a 1 in 10 chance to do 4000 healing/damage?).

@IxSTALKERxI has mentioned that the radius of this proc is very small (around 4m). @CP5 has also noted that there seems to be a delay in the healing/damage (similar to Nerienth's perhaps?).

Winterborn: Very good 2, 3, 4 bonuses. This set looks extremely cool, a 5% proc chance (fairly low) for a 2 second pillar that damages enemies and more importantly snares them 60%. I like that this is a cold damage set bonus, but want to point out that if you're using cold you probably already have access to several snares. Also, ZOS needs to put in more cold damage skills for this to be viable (imagine a DK using this set if it procc'ed off fire damage!). I will say that Elemental Blockade procs this set a LOT on AoE, although the ice pillar seems to have a small radius.

@ToRelax and @andypappb16_ESO generously contributed the facts that this set seems to have a hidden cool down as well as is only one damage burst (not over the 2 seconds).

Medium

Briarheart: Mediocre 2, 3, 4 bonuses. This set in its current state is insane. This set has a 10% chance on critical damage (easy for a stamina build) to give 450 weapon damage and have your critical damage heal you for 600 health. It is possible to have a 66% uptime on this set. The reason I'm finding this set insane is that this proc chance is currently working off of vigor/rally/healing criticals, which I think makes proccing this set way too easy.

Hunt Leader: Good 2, 3, 4 bonuses. The 5 piece bonus is easily the most useless set bonus of this item list. This set is not only another pet set (Necropotence being the other major one), it is a STAMINA pet set. Many magicka sorcs detest the toggle-pet-mancer build as it is. Adding a set that gives a hilariously low amount of stamina and health back (1216 in PvE...) when you attack the same enemy as a pet did, with a 5 second cooldown. I highly recommend this set be revamped (increase the heal/damage, make it magicka based, change the way pets work to allow stamina pets, or just scrap the idea), or I highly recommend that players trash this item the second they get it.

Para Bellum: Decent 2, 3, 4 bonuses. The 5 piece is very unique, and could be good in boss fights, or when charging into a fight. I think this is a niche set that could prove very effective for certain playstyles and be neglected otherwise.

Heavy

Glorious Defender: Decent 2, 3, 4 bonuses. I personally would like to see a higher chance for this set to proc, as 8% is pretty low for something that only dodge's one attack. This 5 piece is neat and could be extremely cool in a build that weaves light attacks if you had a better chance to proc the dodge.

Mark of the Pariah: Mediocre 2, 3, 4 bonuses. I tested this set a bit, and got some numbers to show how the scaling plays out. These numbers are all rough estimates as it's hard to get exact percentage health missing. 25% missing health = 1892 resistance. 50% missing = 4128 resistance. 75% missing health = 7740 resistance. 100% missing health = 8300 resistance. So, sets like the Armor Master are probably a better bet to get extra resistance unless you like running around with 25% health!

Permafrost: Good 2, 3, 4 bonuses. This set is a magicka tank's friend. Heavy armor aiming to give magicka bonuses, followed by health recovery when you have a damage shield up. I would love to see something like Patrick Scott's Regenerator build with this. Just a note: I briefly put together a build that used Major Fortitude, a damage shield, health recovery Champion Points, drink, regen enchants, and this heavy armor set, and had 3932 health recovery!

@Xsorus has mentioned comboing this set alongside the Orsinium set could result in insane health recovery!

Birdovic · October 2015

A little addition:

Ive been playing around with Winterborn and we noticed a tooltip error.
Its not 4.8k each second over 2 seconds. Its 4.8k at proc and thats it.
So you basically get hit by 4.8k dmg and the slow but no additional 4.8k in the next second.

Ishammael · October 2015

Good list.

Briarheart is absolutely, positively insane right now. The new meta will be:
Briarheart, hundings, and daggers. Spin to win, while healing yourself and doing outrageous damage.

CP5 · October 2015

Again a nice write-up. Trinimac's Valor could use some looking into, given how small the proc is, how infrequent it is and that it has a cooldown. I tried the winterborn set out and found it shines in aoe situations, which is generally what the frost staff is good for but I really wish there were other sources of frost damage in game.

I didn't notice the briar thorns procing on heals, but that would explain how I was able to easily keep the set active and by gar that healing on a high crit build is nice (was testing this and volley at the same time, the results were interesting). I do feel bad about the hunt leader set, the proc helps, kinda, but is low with that cooldown and dealing with the pet to get it is another barrier. But trashing it on pick-up, that is a direct insult to me and my love for my clannfear.

Joy_Division · October 2015

Very insightful.

I think the Elemental Succession set is going to be too cumbersome to try and derive it's benefits. And you have to try in order to trump Julianos. It would be one thing if class skills had access to elemental damage of each type. I could try and use two destruction staffs (a bad weapon, impractical for PvP), but even then are you going to put something like elemental wall, a weak skill, on both bars? A crushing shock spammer will always derive at least one-third of that spell damage, but that comes out to only 150. Maybe I'm not thinking of something.

If what you say about Morkuldin is true about the weapon moving too slow, that's a shame because I also like that ZoS is trying for interesting sets rather than just damage bonuses.

In general, and this goes for all of ESO armor sets, I do agree that for the most part conditional procs have too small of a chance or are underwhelming. The conditional benefit has to be either very good or reliable if I am going to give up on something we all know is solid such as extra weapon / spell power that I am always benefiting from. This is especially true with "tanky" sets because those are stuck with the mediocre set-bonuses that ZoS thinks tanks want (e.g. +4% healing taken, + small spell resist, etc).

I would legit want to try Morkuldin (but is has the same exact mechanics of the daedroth monster set..ugh!), the Winterborn set for my Nord! (but what cold spells in the game? Elemental wall is terrible), the Glory [ehem...just for the name, you should be using this!], because I like the concept of an agile tank, (but doesn't histbark do this better and more reliably?). I do like what ZoS is trying to do, I just think they need to tweak some numbers around.

ToRelax · October 2015

I tried a bit around iwth Winterborn today - it has a 3 second cooldown I think (wich should be in the tooltip, but no surprise anyway). The radius is too small though, when I pull ~20 mobs it adds 2-3k dps, wich is insignificant when I already do several 10k and I alreay commit to using frost spells, wich I'd never do otherwise.
If the radius was bigger though, I could see it being more useful when fighting many enemies.

Glory · October 2015

Writing from an iPad so I apologize for the inability to quote as I can only responde via @ (unless I'm missing something...).

@andypappb16_ESO I also saw this but wasn't confident enough to report it. The duration was so short I could only evaluate damage based on addons.

@ishmmael Yeah, I believe something like that will be the must have new meta setup... Sad.

@CP5 I agree with all your statements. I have longed for more non-fire damage in ESO. Briar heart does indeed procs from healing at the moment, it's crazy. I also was mostly joking about the Hunt Leader set when I said to trash it (I still have rare sets from V12...). I mostly just wanted to iterate that the set's five piece bonus is extremely lackluster.

@Joy_Division thanks for the response. I agree wholeheartedly with your statements, although I still hold hope that someone crazy will come up with a multi-element build! It's exciting to see ZOS putting a diverse bunch of sets out there, now all we need are the skills to back them up! The Morkuldin set (from what I've seen) can keep up with a regular speed player/NPC, but would get left in the dust by speed movement and/or bolt (much like the Daedroth as you've said). (Also, the Glory set is one of my favorite sets added, if they upped the percentage to something like 20% I would love to use it!

)

@ToRelax I was curious about unspoken cool downs (uncool man!). Thank you for this info. I think that set would be very cool in niche cold damage builds if damage was increased as well as the radius.

CP5 · October 2015

I'm thinking the Glory set will work well with DW since the heavy attacks are done as two hits, giving two chances to proc. I haven't tested to see if the aoe damage of 2h or shock staves can up the proc chance yet, given how things are labeled in the game.

Sotha_Sil · October 2015

@ebethke_ESO When you refer to barrier, you are forgetting that in Cyrodiil we get a 50% shield/damage reduction making Trinimac's set completely useless as it is now. This is strictly a PVE set. But is it useful in PVE ? Not really.

Glory · October 2015

@CP5 I did not think of these possibilities. I would love to hear what happens during your tests (I will probably do some of my own!).

@Sotha_Sil Barrier is probably one of the strongest (and most hated when used by large groups) skills in the PvP meta right now. I would more say that it is the 3500 heal (halved in PvP) and three second cool down that makes Trinimacs not useful.

CP5 · October 2015

Once I get around to testing this evening i'll post here of the Glory set has any interesting traits.

Yonkit · October 2015

@ebethke_ESO actually, the Hunt Leader set procs on NB shades, so uh... It's actually a very good PvP set for Stamblades, as it'd allow them to stack even more weapon damage, forgo sustain, and let the Shades do the sustain for them... Cooldown, should be removed, and it should be changed so that whenever your pets attack a target, not just a target you've recently attacked.

Atronach also works for stam sorcs so you don't actually have to use pets, um, Daedroth from the maw of the infernal would work.. Engine guardian WOULD work if it attacked, it's not a bad set rlly.

CP5 · October 2015

Did some more testing with the Glory set. It seems the shock staff was procing on its channel and dual wield was procing the set very frequently on heavy attacks. I didn't have much luck with 2h in groups of enemies, was hard to tell which enemy missed in those situations, same with the shock staff. Overall I can say shock channels worked well on single targets, no idea if the aoe works with it, and dual wield worked very effectively with the set. As for 2h I can't say.

As a side note I came up with a use for thundering presence. It uses weapon crit, and is an aoe. It worked rather well with the briar thorns set on a high crit rate character, and does indeed proc and heal when you critically heal. Set could even be useful for a healer who uses a lot of aoe's and hots.

acw37162 · October 2015

How many traits researched for morkuldin?

dpencil · October 2015

One thing to note about Elemental Succession is that DOTS are effected by it, so if you cast something like Lightning splash during the fire or ice phase, the damage of each tic during the lightning phase will be higher, assuming the spell lasts until then. One way you could potentially play it as a Sorc would be to have fire or ice destroy staff and use staff skills during the appropriate phase, then lighting skills during that phase, then magic skills like c frags and curse during the phase you don't have anything for. I suppose with practice, one could develop somewhat of a timed rotation...whether that would be worth it dps-wise, I dunno. When I played with it I didn't pay any attention to what phase I was in, too many other things to be aware of for me.

dpencil · October 2015

Also, one really nice thing about the new dropped sets having jewelry is that it's possible to get 2 5pc sets going and still have room for a maelstrom wep.

byrom101b16_ESO · October 2015

Nice to see the Briarheart set is the hands down winner of the OP Awards.

Nothing to do with Eric Wrobles' Nightblade main of course...

As you say, spammed steel tornado will be the ezemode FOTM even more now.

A 12m radius high damage aoe execute with fast regeneration and twinned Maelstrom Daggers with the twin weapon bonus that 2H weapons can only dream of.

COULD THIS BE ANY MORE BIAS!!??

I swear if I hear another NB complain about anything...

Xsorus · October 2015

I'm going to probably do 5 Piece Ogrims/5 Piece Perma Frost/2 Piece Engine guardian on my DK.

I was getting some pretty insane Health Regen on PTS with very little effort (I would be able to hit 7k on live with that setup below 60% health)

ToRelax · October 2015

Xsorus wrote: »

I'm going to probably do 5 Piece Ogrims/5 Piece Perma Frost/2 Piece Engine guardian on my DK.

I was getting some pretty insane Health Regen on PTS with very little effort (I would be able to hit 7k on live with that setup below 60% health)

You'd have to keep up a damage shield for that though. I don't see how it's worth it with small DK shields.

CP5 · October 2015

ToRelax wrote: »

Xsorus wrote: »

I'm going to probably do 5 Piece Ogrims/5 Piece Perma Frost/2 Piece Engine guardian on my DK.

I was getting some pretty insane Health Regen on PTS with very little effort (I would be able to hit 7k on live with that setup below 60% health)

You'd have to keep up a damage shield for that though. I don't see how it's worth it with small DK shields.

I've been thinking, if you are fighting melee damage opponents you could use annulment. They can't break it so the shield becomes a long duration health regen buff, at the cost of lining yourself up for random shield breakers which would be unlikely for a dk to face.

ToRelax · October 2015

CP5 wrote: »

ToRelax wrote: »

Xsorus wrote: »

I'm going to probably do 5 Piece Ogrims/5 Piece Perma Frost/2 Piece Engine guardian on my DK.

I was getting some pretty insane Health Regen on PTS with very little effort (I would be able to hit 7k on live with that setup below 60% health)

You'd have to keep up a damage shield for that though. I don't see how it's worth it with small DK shields.

I've been thinking, if you are fighting melee damage opponents you could use annulment. They can't break it so the shield becomes a long duration health regen buff, at the cost of lining yourself up for random shield breakers which would be unlikely for a dk to face.

I thought of that, but the shield is too small if he runs a stamina build. It will be gone in no time if there's any magic damage and not return it's cost, making it very expensive.

CP5 · October 2015

ToRelax wrote: »

CP5 wrote: »

ToRelax wrote: »

Xsorus wrote: »

I'm going to probably do 5 Piece Ogrims/5 Piece Perma Frost/2 Piece Engine guardian on my DK.

I was getting some pretty insane Health Regen on PTS with very little effort (I would be able to hit 7k on live with that setup below 60% health)

You'd have to keep up a damage shield for that though. I don't see how it's worth it with small DK shields.

I've been thinking, if you are fighting melee damage opponents you could use annulment. They can't break it so the shield becomes a long duration health regen buff, at the cost of lining yourself up for random shield breakers which would be unlikely for a dk to face.

I thought of that, but the shield is too small if he runs a stamina build. It will be gone in no time if there's any magic damage and not return it's cost, making it very expensive.

True, I was honestly thinking of using Shield Assault, shield weapon enchants, igneous shield, hardened armor and ferocious leap to try to keep the bonus going.

Ffastyl · October 2015

Despite any negativity about the Morkuldin set, I am excited to use it as a Dragonknight. I have set up a heavy attack build, focusing on Igneous Weapons and a Greatsword for very powerful normal attacks. This should proc Morkuldin more often than other builds and compliments mine very well. If the axe has a 2 second delay like other NPCs I will be disappointed but not terribly so, the damage per hit still seems solid.

I am excited to try this out with my build and even more excited to reach VR16 and unleash my build's full potential (no more half upgraded gear).

Sharkano · October 2015

Re the comment on hp regen with Org. set, the problem I had with that set when I tried it a long time ago is that it triggers when you drop below the cut-off point, but then the boost vanishes when you get above it -- and then cooldown hoses you. I.e., drop just below trigger, proc/or heal then boosts you back up a bit, then it's gone. I found bastion at the time far better, as the shield it gave you at 30% hp did not insta-disappear when your hp went to 31%+. Not sure if it's changed now.

Also, re the Morkuldin set, the sword that appears is really cool, hits pretty hard, and when one mob is dead it auto transfers to another. Definitely one worth thinking about.

ToRelax · October 2015

Sharkano wrote: »

Re the comment on hp regen with Org. set, the problem I had with that set when I tried it a long time ago is that it triggers when you drop below the cut-off point, but then the boost vanishes when you get above it -- and then cooldown hoses you. I.e., drop just below trigger, proc/or heal then boosts you back up a bit, then it's gone. I found bastion at the time far better, as the shield it gave you at 30% hp did not insta-disappear when your hp went to 31%+. Not sure if it's changed now.

Also, re the Morkuldin set, the sword that appears is really cool, hits pretty hard, and when one mob is dead it auto transfers to another. Definitely one worth thinking about.

That's Whitestrake's Retribution you're talking about. Undaunted Bastion gives you a large damage shield when you use a taunt at under 60% HP. But that is another idea... I remember @Xsorus used the set in 1.5. Maybe it would work well with Permafrost and Puncture. Would be a smaller shield though, and comes only in V14 I think.

Xsorus · October 2015

Sharkano wrote: »

Re the comment on hp regen with Org. set, the problem I had with that set when I tried it a long time ago is that it triggers when you drop below the cut-off point, but then the boost vanishes when you get above it -- and then cooldown hoses you. I.e., drop just below trigger, proc/or heal then boosts you back up a bit, then it's gone. I found bastion at the time far better, as the shield it gave you at 30% hp did not insta-disappear when your hp went to 31%+. Not sure if it's changed now.

Also, re the Morkuldin set, the sword that appears is really cool, hits pretty hard, and when one mob is dead it auto transfers to another. Definitely one worth thinking about.

Have to use a crafted set with the setup.

You don't need ogrims technically, like i said i could hit 5k Health Regen with a shield up with ease.

You could run White Strakes for example....

Or hell.. you could do Twice Born and run health regen mundus/warrior mundus or Run Hundring Rage set instead.

Cinbri · October 2015

Seems again, just like with leeching set, people underestimate usefullness of pariah set.

Ishammael · October 2015

Cinbri wrote: »

Seems again, just like with leeching set, people underestimate usefullness of pariah set.

Pariah is bad. ~4k at 50% hp.

RoamingRiverElk · October 2015

There is too much grinding in the game already, why make the new sets Bind on Pickup? Those who want to do the Arena over and over again would still get the benefit from it by earning gold by selling the items they don't want to use.

PvPers need to do way too much grinding in PvE to get the new sets, materials and the gold for upgrade materials (especially for weapons). It takes the joy out of the game and is going to result in players leaving the game. Every PvPer I know has already had to grind way, WAY more than they wanted to. This gear grind is also not going to entice any of the players who already left the game to come back, since all they would do for the first X weeks is grind to make their builds competitive again.

IxSTALKERxI · October 2015

ebethke_ESO wrote: »

Trinimac's Valor: Good 2, 3, 4 bonuses. I am conflicted about this set, much like I was conflicted with Spell Power Cure and Combat Physician. A 10% chance to proc when giving players a damage shield resulting in healing/damage is obviously very strong in this meta (barrier anyone?) Still, the damage and healing procced are extremely low, and this set suffers from cooldown-itis (3 second cooldown to proc a 1 in 10 chance to do 4000 healing/damage?).

@ebethke_ESO

Trinimac's Valor could be a decent set but there is one major flaw with it. The aoe healing/damage has a very very small radius. From what I can see it almost appears to be a radius of like 4m. This set is therefore useless unless you multi-box lmao. It's like zos want us to stack in the tightest ball as possible.

Sharkano · October 2015

Yes, that's right whitestrakes. It's not that it was awesome, but just that org.'s proc vanished in the blink of an eye if you exceeded the trigger hp.