Stam Sorcs, where are their improvements?

Cathexis · February 2016

Jeezye wrote: »

Its not that stamina sorcs do particulalry need a spammable stamina morph, but they just need over all stamina supported dmg. Boundless storm is only used for utilty and thers litterary no other stamina dmg skill we can use. bound armor kind of supports HA wielding, but I tried to build around that and an 11% increase is just nothing to rely on.

If we dont get a spammable ability, at least change the utility abilites so they can find a place in our builds, and buff those skills that support stamina gameplay.

I can hit 20k damage heay attacks with a bow. Problem is heavy attack is garbage - most of the time you can't just stand there and charge up a heavy attack.

Alucardo · February 2016

How about Major Fracture? Currently if you want it you have to look to the S+B skill line. Generally I prefer slash, but unable to use it because I'd have to run puncture as well. On my DK I can get away with it just fine thanks to fiery breath.
I say give them a class major fracture so they are truly free to use the skills and weapons they desire. With Surge and major fracture, that will pretty much be possible. What I mean is, if you're going to lock them into using weapon skill lines, at least give the utility to be able to do so properly.
Wasn't really sure where to put it, but all I could come up with was Thundering Presence. If an enemy gets zapped by it they get the debuff and it sticks around 4 seconds after they leave. Should make thundering a little more useful then as well, I suppose.

ub17_ESO · February 2016

Jeezye wrote: »

How comes that theres still no reply for this thread yet??

The kit that stam sorcs provide with the current setup is embarassing and ZOS promised to change that. If the TG goes live like that theres really now room for any decent stam build in PvP, given that all other classes are well looked after.

We still need

- any stamina dmg ability, e.g. the long discussed stamina frag (yes stamsorcs dont have a SINGE stam dmg ability, besides thundering presence that not even stam builds morph into)

- any defensive mechanic that stamina sorcs can choose, because shields are just not viable with stamina builds
- crit surge can't heal against shields which is a MASSIVE disadvantage and makes it less viable compared to momentum

In the current TG state, stamina sorceres will again vanish into thin air.. PLS include this in the update @ZOS_GinaBruno

I removed your line item about Bound Armaments bc I actually think that skill is worth double slotting in a lot of situations.

The rest of your post I think is spot on!!

ub17_ESO · February 2016

Personally I would like to have an option for an instant cast DPS from the sorc skill line. I'm not too picky how they make that work. Or even if the other morph of C-frag was stamina but had the same effect...casting stamina abilities could proc instant cast stamina based C-frag that hit as hard or harder than WB.

Alucardo · February 2016

ub17_ESO wrote: »

Personally I would like to have an option for an instant cast DPS from the sorc skill line. I'm not too picky how they make that work. Or even if the other morph of C-frag was stamina but had the same effect...casting stamina abilities could proc instant cast stamina based C-frag that hit as hard or harder than WB.

When stam sorcs read that the unused crystal blast was getting buffed instead of being converted to a stamina ability a lot of us were kinda like this

Jar_Ek · February 2016

Maybe what stamina sorcerers really need is for NB and Templars not to have direct stamina damage morphs and for all weapon skills to be made useful with a decent direct damage morph. That certainly seems to be the zos direction of travel. However ATM the situation is a complete mess.

Jeezye · February 2016

Cathexis wrote: »

I can hit 20k damage heay attacks with a bow. Problem is heavy attack is garbage - most of the time you can't just stand there and charge up a heavy attack.

Well you can hit 20k HAs against guards and stuff, but against players the maxium i got is like 12-14k, and I'm already trying to be as bursty as possible. (Talking of PvP ofc). The thing is that crit is less and ess worthy in PvP since ppl invest into impenetrable and CPs. And as you said, you'll generally just be weaving your HA's, but they can't compete with WBs and other stamina abilities DPS wise. Thats why I said they should buff it.

Autolycus · February 2016

Xeven wrote: »

Soneca798 wrote: »

I think a stamina morph of deadric curse, dealing poison damage and applying to self might be a good idea for a stam sorc damage ability.

No because you will *** off all 7 people using pets with this morph.

You are stuck being a Wrecking blow spamming werewolf with streak and lightning form for 6 more months. Likely forever.

It's amusing to see how cranky you get over people brainstorming ideas. Oh no, they made a suggestion! Butthurt alert! Do you actually believe that all stam sorcs do this? Lol

Cathexis · February 2016

With regard to crit surge they should just make it on par with rally putting a hot on it, reduce the mag cost and call it a day.

I'm suggesting they call it a day because that is literally probably the extent of the work they do on balancing this game in a single day.

FENGRUSH · February 2016

Cathexis wrote: »

With regard to crit surge they should just make it on par with rally putting a hot on it, reduce the mag cost and call it a day.

I'm suggesting they call it a day because that is literally probably the extent of the work they do on balancing this game in a single day.

Lol.

Id rather see the dot crit heals return and cooldown wiped away. No dots give burst healing - but they would provide in combat healing over time. It wont save you from burst, which is what kills you in this game - but it assists with sustain.

Some exception like bats - but that burst heals already anyway.

dodgehopper_ESO · February 2016

Jar_Ek wrote: »

Maybe what stamina sorcerers really need is for NB and Templars not to have direct stamina damage morphs and for all weapon skills to be made useful with a decent direct damage morph. That certainly seems to be the zos direction of travel. However ATM the situation is a complete mess.

I could live with that, but the problem ZoS would have is that they would then need to do a lot of work rebalancing those two classes (and how long would players have to wait for them to do that?). Much of what those classes stand on would topple over. Jabs is one of the favorite skills of the class, but also the whole Spear theme would go out the window without it (although I'd love to see them add Spear and Shield or Longspear as a weapon line). The same holds true for the 2 active and 1 ultimate daggers of NB.

Jar_Ek · February 2016

DoT crits healing shouldn't come back unless we get heals off both DoTs and direct damage simultaneously, otherwise the 10k wb heal could get stolen by a 0.5k DoT heal. And that is unlikely to happen as it is more complex.

Dyride · February 2016

I would love to be able to run a DoT build and am working on stam DK for just that.

Crit surge not healing off of Rapid Strikes or any other dot really limits Stam Sorcs.

I also really enjoy the utility from SnB and get decent DPS from bash-weaving puncture or slash but I don't find the crit surge heals worthwhile even if it is proccing on the higher damage attack.

This makes me keep having to go back into 2H/Bow or 2H/DW to feel effective.

FENGRUSH · February 2016

Jar_Ek wrote: »

DoT crits healing shouldn't come back unless we get heals off both DoTs and direct damage simultaneously, otherwise the 10k wb heal could get stolen by a 0.5k DoT heal. And that is unlikely to happen as it is more complex.

yea that is because there is a cooldown on it and Im saying to get rid of it altogether. It limits the use of skills and builds.

dodgehopper_ESO · February 2016

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Jar_Ek wrote: »

DoT crits healing shouldn't come back unless we get heals off both DoTs and direct damage simultaneously, otherwise the 10k wb heal could get stolen by a 0.5k DoT heal. And that is unlikely to happen as it is more complex.

yea that is because there is a cooldown on it and Im saying to get rid of it altogether. It limits the use of skills and builds.

Agreed.

Dyride · February 2016

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Jar_Ek wrote: »

DoT crits healing shouldn't come back unless we get heals off both DoTs and direct damage simultaneously, otherwise the 10k wb heal could get stolen by a 0.5k DoT heal. And that is unlikely to happen as it is more complex.

yea that is because there is a cooldown on it and Im saying to get rid of it altogether. It limits the use of skills and builds.

Yes, it doesn't matter how small the "cooldown" goes because it still kills your overall HPS as long as it is one heal at a time and there is the global cooldown for skills that capable of healing.

Something is telling them in their math that stam Sorc would be too powerful without the cooldown.

But that is what heal debuffs and CC is for.

Anhedonie · February 2016

Zenimax, buff wrecking blow!

Now on a serious note. They could take 1 morph of Mages Wrath and make it a stamina morph with scalable damage (lower health - bigger damage), but make it physical damage and increase base damage of this ability.
When? Well...it can take a while. Unless they come up with something during these 2 weeks, before TG patch goes live.

Jeezye · February 2016

Dyride wrote: »

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Jar_Ek wrote: »

DoT crits healing shouldn't come back unless we get heals off both DoTs and direct damage simultaneously, otherwise the 10k wb heal could get stolen by a 0.5k DoT heal. And that is unlikely to happen as it is more complex.

yea that is because there is a cooldown on it and Im saying to get rid of it altogether. It limits the use of skills and builds.

Yes, it doesn't matter how small the "cooldown" goes because it still kills your overall HPS as long as it is one heal at a time and there is the global cooldown for skills that capable of healing.

Something is telling them in their math that stam Sorc would be too powerful without the cooldown.

But that is what heal debuffs and CC is for.

What do you mean? They can just REMOVE, not reduce the cooldown. This way every crit, lets say poison injection + WB delayed by 5 ms, will heal you. Or am I missing out anything?

Despite of the cooldown removal and including dots, I guess that overall healing will still be less than momentum since you still can't crit shields... So I think that's the place where major fracture or major savagery would fit in. All "crits apply major fracture to the target", or "gain major savagery for 5(?) sec after landing a crit" would make a great addition to the skill.

Would still not increase the survivability but at least make the skill worth using, and those buffs/debuffs need to be implemented into stam sorcs anyways.

cschwingeb14_ESO · February 2016

Removing the cooldown entirely would allow surge to proc more than once on AE attacks. Which would result in a 100%heal on every steel tornado in a zerg (PvE or PvP). That is seriously unbalanced.

Allowing surge to proc on single target DoTs would be nice. With the .1 sec comedown I don't think a lot of big attack surge-heals would get blocked by DoT ticks. But between boundless storm, volley, caltrops, liquid lightning, wall of elements, etc, I think that getting surge-heals from AE DoTs will block more healing than it provides

Soneca798 · February 2016

Some people here that advocate for the planned weapon skill line buffs zos teased at as the fix for stam sorcs don't seem to realize that buffing weapon skill lines doesn't do much for the sorc class when compared to other classes. Sure, they could give us more options in regards to dps and utility via weapons, but all other classes get this too so it's not a sorc fix.

We need our own unique way of doing dps. Templars have channels, as seen with jabs and jesus beams. DKs have dots, as seen with searing strike and flame breath. NB has instant cast dps, as seen with concealed weapon, surprise attack and soul harvest. I've mentioned some magicka morphs as well to help illustrate the point that when stamina morphs were introduced, the classes that got them transitioned into familiar territory, except the sorc.

So drawing from that analysis, stamina sorcs should have something that, while still remaining with the feel of playing a sorcerer, transitions into the stamina playstyle and separates playing a stam sorc from all other stam classes. Right now streak and crit surge are the only real appealing points for a stam sorc, but even then streak seems less and less appealing when zos constantly nerfs mobility with the gap closer silences.

In my honest opinion, stam sorcs could be made unique with a skill that carried delayed dps, similar to prox det. In my view this would make stam sorc a desirable playstyle for stamina players for the following reasons:

1. It would give us a stamina based offensive attack that would be unique when compared to other classes (this should be obvious, but for the argument of class identify I'll point it out anyways)

2. It would give stam sorc the much needed class identity. Right now stam sorc remains one of those niche classes that are fun because of this and that, but objectively have always at least one class that does it better.

3. It would make it unique and valuable in group play as the only stamina spec with a prox det equivalent.

4. And finally, I'm going to hammer class identity some more, as this would synergize well with streak and crit surge, using gap closers to soften up enemies and then streaking away to create distance, all the while timing a poison explosion just right to burst down a target.

Soneca798 · February 2016

I think I could have phrased my last post a bit better, but if zos really want to create class identity it would be nice if they didn't identify the stam sorc class as a guy who uses weapon skill lines and streaks every once in a while.

Cathexis · February 2016

FENGRUSH wrote: »

Cathexis wrote: »

With regard to crit surge they should just make it on par with rally putting a hot on it, reduce the mag cost and call it a day.

I'm suggesting they call it a day because that is literally probably the extent of the work they do on balancing this game in a single day.

Lol.

Id rather see the dot crit heals return and cooldown wiped away. No dots give burst healing - but they would provide in combat healing over time. It wont save you from burst, which is what kills you in this game - but it assists with sustain.

Some exception like bats - but that burst heals already anyway.

@FENGRUSH I agree with you entirely, dot crit heals and no cooldown for sure. But if I am going to be forced into the current restrictions of surge, a hot would offload some of the pressure from being entirely crit dependent (and also augment healing vs shielded targets). Don't get me wrong, I am all for advocating for real and effective changes to the class, but I have never once seen Zen look at a change they made and say "yeah, that was a bad idea, it didn't work, lets undo it." Their mentality is more like:

RoyJade · February 2016

IMO, stamsorc should be about how using magic to reinforce weapon power. StamDK use dots with their weapon, stamplar use channeled lances, stamblade use direct self-attack, so stamsorc should focus on weapon reinforcement, like battlemage in the TES lore. Bound armament is a good idea, but not really strong at the moment.
With the new change to toogle (except bound armor), I'll love a change like that :
- bound armor : give +5% (8% max) max magicka while slotted, activate for a minor defense/resistance for 33 second.
- bound aegis : also give the 8% less damage taken (only if this buff don't reduce damage taken by shield) -> it will be a great non-shield tank morph, and also a good one for those magicka sorc who don't play a lot with shield.
- bound armament : give stamina instead of magicka, also give a 20% bonus damage on all weapon attack for 15 second -> it will be the stam morph, who maximise weapon power.

Surge should also be changed to proc on every attack, but only one heal by attack each second (so no full-life's steel tornado, but more rapid strike and dots). It also can give a little thunder damage or dot on weapon attack, like a second enchant.

Of course, clannfear's damage scaling on stamina, a better utility for dark magic's abilities, add a 2 second slow to all target hit by the stam thunder form, a stam morph of mage's wrath user centered like keep guard's ability and some other ideas are also good.

Cathexis · February 2016

RoyJade wrote: »

IMO, stamsorc should be about how using magic to reinforce weapon power. StamDK use dots with their weapon, stamplar use channeled lances, stamblade use direct self-attack, so stamsorc should focus on weapon reinforcement

Fundamentally, conceptually this could be a good detection to go if it is executed properly. I really think they totally missed the mark with stam sorcs and summoning as a whole.

Personally I think conjuration in previous TES games was extremely well executed and could have been an exellent conceptual starting point for stamina sorcerers and summoning, and it is a shame they didn't even come close to capturing it's essence.

Jeezye · February 2016

Cathexis wrote: »

Personally I think conjuration in previous TES games was extremely well executed and could have been an exellent conceptual starting point for stamina sorcerers and summoning, and it is a shame they didn't even come close to capturing it's essence.

I've been thinking about that too. In Skyrim you could conjure your weapons, which were really strong too.

With the new change to toogle (except bound armor), I'll love a change like that :
- bound armament : give stamina instead of magicka, also give a 20% bonus damage on all weapon attack for 15 second -> it will be the stam morph, who maximise weapon power.

That would fit in perfectly into the active component of bound armament. However, all active components of the daedric summoning abilites are designed to not be spammed. Due to the lack of defense, it would make more sense to me to give it a stam based shield + major mending or something like that. Would also fit into the sorc's playstyle and not be completly offtopic from magicka sorcs.

Dmg wise the best option still is a proggable stamfrag in meele range or something like that. Otherwise theres no spell in dark magic we use.

Xeven · February 2016

A strong Crit Surge with no cooldown that procs on shields/DOTs and a physical based dawnbreaker would go a long way towards lifting stam Sorcs up a notch.

The problem is that it used to proc on dots with no cooldown. It was OP AF.

The first step is to remove the slot requirements for our stam regen passive. That's kind of a big deal. If you want to force us to use the summoning skill branch, try, I dunno, making the skill branch useful.

SturgeHammer · February 2016

RoyJade wrote: »

IMO, stamsorc should be about how using magic to reinforce weapon power.

I completely agree with this. In fact, back in the day when momentum and surge damage buffs stacked Stam Sorc played exactly like that. During that time Stam Sorc felt like a warrior that used magic to enhance their combat skills and it was awesome. Unfortunately the major/minor buff system completely killed that interaction. Maybe if minor berserk were added to Crit Surge that feeling could be recaptured.

Jeezye · February 2016

I also agree to stam sorcs making use of their class utility such as streak and mobility, and I think they should mainly buff their physical dmg, like critsurge. The thing is that one loses 2 slots to bound armaments, 1 to critsurge and if you want to give them more assisting abilites even more. That doesn't leave much room for damage abilites that stamina sorcs will have to take from weapon skill lines. The nice thing however is that you have a optional 3rd skillbar that I'm making use of all the time and that is essential in all my stam sorc builds.

What I'm trying to say is, buffing is great, but if you have to keep 4 buffs with 15-20 sec uptime active your basically only buffing your whole combat. Other classes have their buffs integrated into their passives. So since all sorc passives are working okay, the needed buffs need to be applied to the skills that we use. Thats why I'm saying give critsurge also major fracture, and just twink the overall passives of bound armament and boundless storm.

D0ntevenL1ft · February 2016

I enjoy how this thread keeps growing without any reply from ZOS. Keep it up guys and maybe we can force change.

AfkNinja · February 2016

D0ntevenL1ft wrote: »

I enjoy how this thread keeps growing without any reply from ZOS. Keep it up guys and maybe we can force change.

Lol please. Templar's are at over 2000 posts. If ZOS doesn't wanna acknowledge you they won't.

I feel for you guys but it looks like Stam balancing patch isn't till Dark Brotherhood.