Hi all, the recent change to Conjured Ward mechanics caused me to take a deeper look into the skills it effects, something I hadn't done yet this PTS cycle. This is Sorcerer feedback, but I feel it'd derail or get buried in the Official thread.
The DPS comparisons in this thread were done with provided Julianos, Willpower, Maelstrom staves, and Monster set items, with provided crown food and Magelight. CP are 100 Bastion, 100 Magician, and 100 Staff Expert to not interfere in damage type comparisons. This is not an ideal summoner setup at all, so don't take the numbers I've provided too seriously. If any EU players could provide Magicka stacked numbers, I'd appreciate it
Volatile Familiar
Health at VR16: 22,022
Attacks: Familiar Melee: Deal Shock damage to target, every 3 seconds. Negligible damage, can proc Concussion.
Active Effect: Familiar Damage Pulse, deal 8% total Magicka as AoE damage every 2 seconds for 4 seconds (3 pulses). 6 Meter radius
Observed DPS: 2,370 with active ability used on cooldown.
The active effect on this skill is more useful than I initially imagined it could be. Unlike basic summon attacks, the Familiar Damage Pulse scales with Champion Points. Elemental Expert, Elfborn, and Thaumaturge all increase its strength. As such, it should comfortably make its way onto AoE rotations. The damage output is higher than Liquid Lightning, with added stun chance. It's possible to spam the active Pulse, but I wouldn't recommend it, unless the caster is out of range of the target. Crystal Blast and Impulse out-damage it, as direct-damage instant abilities should. Imo this is a better iteration of the skill than the Live version, which was useful in Cyrodiil for surprise attacks, but had few use cases in PvE. It should see play in both sectors coming up in March.
Unstable Clannfear
Health at VR16: 27,266
Attacks: Claw: Deal Physical damage to target and Tail Swipe: Deal Physical damage, frontal AoE, every 2-3 seconds.
Active Effect: Spend 200% Summoning cost to restore 35% of your health, base, to yourself and the Clannfear, if within range.
Observed DPS: 400
The self-heal change, coupled with the Conjured Ward fix make the Clannfear nigh-immortal in the hands of any player who pays attention. Drawing aggression with the familiar before wading in is very effective for reducing threat. The only thing I can even think to suggest is perhaps to allow Taunted enemies to focus on the summon, rather than the caster. It'd put all this fortitude to use
Twilight Tormentor
Health at VR16: 10487
Attacks: Zap: Deal Shock damage to target and Kick: Deal Physical damage to target, every 2 seconds.
Active Effect: Empower, causing your Tormentor to deal 50% more damage to enemies above 50% Health for 15 seconds.
Observed DPS: 1.2k passive, 1.8k active above 50%.
This skill morph needs improvement. Unlike the Volatile Familiar, the active ability does not scale with CP. Considering it as a single-target DoT, it is mediocre. It outdoes Structured Entropy(.6k), Soul Splitting Trap(.5), and Boundless Storm(.75). It comes in about equal with Proxy Det (1k), Destructive Clench (1.1), fails to beat Wall of Elements(2.2k), Liquid Lightning (2.3k), and most critically, Volatile Familiar (2.37). Activating Boundless, Clench, Det, LL, WoE, or VF all give more damage for your button press than activating Empower, and many of them do so AoE for the entire fight rather than single-target for half. Nearly any combination of 2 dot abilities would be a higher damage choice than slotting this thing on front and back bars.
Because this morph is juxtaposed with a strong healing option, the damage that it produces needs to be very tempting if anyone is going to consider slotting it. One way to do that which would synergize with a Summoner build excellently would be to make the active skill cast Minor Berserk with a small radius. This would allow a Sorcerer to use one familiar to buff others, especially the Storm Atronach. The radius could be centered on the Twilight rather than the Sorc, if possible, so as not to compete so directly with Combat Prayer. Another possible adjustment could be to give the Active ability an additional DoT, such as VF has been given, but still single-target. If the strength were similar to WoE, in addition to the base Zaps and Kicks, the Tormentor could become a good damage choice.
Summary: Less health, less damage, no AoE, no stun vs Scamp. Needs help.
Twilight Matriarch
Health at VR16: 10,487
Attacks: Zap: Deal Shock damage to target and Kick: Deal Physical damage to target, every 2 seconds.
Active Effect: Smart Heal two friendly targets (including caster) within 28m of Sorcerer for 22.4% total Magicka, and Twilight if in range.
This active ability as well as the Clannfear's is technically cast by the Sorcerer, and therefore scales correctly with everything available to healers. I'm almost afraid to give numbers on how high this heal can be pushed. A true Magicka stacker could crit heal players outside Cyrodiil with % healing taken for excess of 30k. Average cast strength can approach 20k on a neutral target. It's a good thing I own Spell Power Cure, because that gives me the excuse not to wear Necropotence in 2016, just for this skill. I know there are calls to improve that set, but honestly, if Zeni gave it VR16 status and useful traits it would be downright scary. The heal is almost worthy of a reduction, except for the Matriarch's Health: 10.5k doesn't stick around through anything. Warding is required, and in Cyrodiil it'd be quite obvious to take out the flyers first. The fact that Sorcerers can be deprived of this skill is balance enough.
Charged Atronach
Health at VR16: 34,082
Attacks: Lightning Strike: AoE Shock Damage, Atronach Zap, Single-Target Shock Damage
Synergy: Major Berserk (25% increased damage to Atronach and Synergizer for 8 seconds)
This is another summon which could benefit from attention. The Charged Atro sells itself as an AoE morph, but it does very little actual AoE damage. An average cast plays out with the summon landing on targets, casting 3 Lightning Strike waves with two single-target Zaps between, and expiring. It seems to have no AoE cap, but as it does about 5k damage average in pts gear, that doesn't help much. It is incapable of killing a Spellfiend pack in Craglorn. They tend to remain with 40% health afterwards, though the 2 singled out targets could die. Overload Heavy attack would kill them with less ultimate, in less time. So could Flawless Dawnbreaker, and either morph of Meteor would also clean them up nicely. Perhaps if it were changed to be pure AoE rather than mixed, or the Lightning Strikes provided damage over time during its channel phases, this Ultimate might be worth its cost. Currently, it's a better idea to simply cast Negate to down or silence the group, and AoE them with skills.
This would be a good place to put a Physical based Ultimate for Stamina Sorcerer, if a complete rework is in order. Air Atronach, perhaps, with whirling blades and synergies for other classes to empower it elementally? Flesh Atronach, with poison or disease damage? I'm sure something could be worked out.
Greater Atronach
Health at VR16: 34,082
Attacks: Atronach Zap, Single-Target Shock Damage
Synergy: Major Berserk (25% increased damage to Atronach and Synergizer for 8 seconds)
I've given some analysis about this skill
over here. Summary: It can do more total single-target damage than Meteor, and the Berserk synergy is great, but it takes a good deal of buffing to get it there. Daedric Curse is required for decent damage. It's not for everything, and it would be great if the Zap damage could scale with CP. It doesn't.
The change to allow Storm Atronachs to be Commandable is appreciated, though it does introduce a l2p issue: Dropping one with your pets Commanded to stand down will preclude it from attacking until you designate a target. Also, what is the reasoning behind these Ultimates having less health than Monster Set summons? Dwemer Spheres have 34,606 and MotI Daedra have 42k. I don't think it'd be excessive for these guys to have 40 or 45k, considering they can be disabled entirely in PvP, are situational casts in PvE, and have expiration times for both.
Shadow Silk Spiders
Health at VR16: 6,921
Attacks: Initial synergy strike, Black Widow Poison, Bite
Synergy: Friendly player can activate spiders with poison or fear effects.
This summon is unusual, as the synergizer is the one who the spiders belong to, not the caster. Spiders can be Warded and benefit from Daedric Prey. By default the initial activation does about two thirds of the total damage (12k-ish total with pts gear), a Sorcerer could increase the synergy's total damage by about 20% with Prey. This would bring the cast up to about 18-20k total damage with PTS gear for an instant, counting both participants. It's worth casting if your party can cooperate well, but not intensely so. Teaming up to cast Fear in PvP is cool. Hopefully this can get a look in DB with the rest of the Undaunted tree.
Maw of the Infernal Daedroth
Health at VR16: 41,947
Attacks: Fiery Breath: Deal AoE cone Fire damage, Jagged Claw: Deal Physical damage to Target, Fiery Jaws: Deal Fire damage to Target
Unlike the other summons here, the Maw of the Infernal familiar does not scale with the player's stats at all. Rather, its strength scales with the level and quality of the monster set equips. VR16 Legendary values state "basic attack deals 5321 damage", which can be used to estimate 45k total single-target damage per summon, with this thread's gear setup. This assumes it does not miss, travel, become stunned, or die. The familiar would be nice, if it came up more often or lasted longer. 5% on light/heavy is very infrequent in practice, uptime is generally low. Lightning or Restoration channels have the best summon rate, with chance to proc from each tick. I personally would like the duration to be increased by 5 seconds or so. It would allow enough time for a second full Fiery Breath cycle. Also, he needs a new desummon animation, having him fall flat mid-attack just feels lame.
Daedric Prey
Finally, the summon buff skill itself. It's worth casting this as a dot if you're wearing the Volatile Familiar, using the Greater Atro, or both. Otherwise, its contributions to damage are too small to justify in PvE. I can't imagine it being used in PvP currently, the halved cast time of Velocious is too nice for burst setups. A great way to improve this skill would be for the AoE portion of the explosion to tag the targets hit with the Prey damage increase. This would synergize really well with the Volatile Familiar and excellently with the Charged Atro.
Generally, Summoner is in a better place than it has been for the last year, PvE wise at any rate. Allowing CP Scaling for the basic attacks would help address several of the points raised. What are your thoughts, everyone? Did I miss any interactions, or could someone speak to the PvP side of these skills? Hopefully the entire Daedric Summoning tree can become seen as a useful portion of the class, for one role or another.