Single target Sorc melee stamina build help

Kattemynte · March 2016

So I made a dual-wield medium armor sorc stamina build that has awesome aoe damage and survivability. However, when doing dungeons I tend to get a drop in dps when fighting a single target boss. I am currently using a 2-handed weapon as my second weapon and the only real good skill to use against the boss in rapid succession in wrecking blow.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Chadwikid · March 2016

You should have caltrops down at all times. Assuming someone else in the party isn't running them as they don't stack. Put rending slashes on your dual wield bar for the DoT and mKe sure you refresh it. You should be light attack weaving with your wrecking blow. Weaving properly increases dps by a huge amount. You can look for Alcast's video on the subject to see exactly how much.

dday3six · March 2016

I personally don't think Stam Sorc is very good for PVE at the moment, but if I were going to use it I'd use DW/Bow and use Rapid Strikes as my main single target skill.

Chadwikid · March 2016

Stan sorc is not very good for anything at the moment lol

OrphanHelgen · March 2016

Bow on offbar. Put dots and buff yourself.
Swap to either dual wield or 2H..
Spam dmg.
Be sure to have flawless dawnbreaker ult on dmg bar.
GG

Gear:
Make sure your weapon are vr16 and legendary.
Weapon dmg kuta enchant in all 3 jewlery.
GG

dday3six · March 2016

Chadwikid wrote: »

Stan sorc is not very good for anything at the moment lol

They could use work to be more synergized with their passives and skills. Though they're viable in PVP thanks to the utility of Magicka skills like Boundless Storm and Streak. As well as being able to use Sword and Board for dps without having to worry about pulling aggro.

Chadwikid · March 2016

I run one. They are viable however severely gimped compared to every other stamina class especially now after TG. They can be played very effectively (see fengrush) however the skill requirement to do so at any noticeable degree is way higher than I think just about any other class in the game at this time.

The mobility is awesome and gives a unique advantage. The broken game mechanics (gap closer stun/snare anyone) that make it useless are not awesome and very frustrating to the point of controller throwing. When it's good it's good when it's bad it's very bad.

Kattemynte · March 2016

Hmm.. thanks for the insight.

Autolycus · March 2016

A fair amount of what's being said here is false. I run a Breton stam sorc (so not even a stam race) with 2H + bow and I consistently pull 20-25k. Here's what I run:

5 Set Hunding's Rage
- Chest (divine)
- Pants (divine)
- Belt (divine)
- Boots (divine)
- Gloves (divine)

2 Molag Kena
- Shoulder (divine)
- Head (infused)

Maelstrom 2H Mace w/ Sharpened
Gold vr16 bow w/ Sharpened

I don't have my vMA bow yet, so I'll swap for that when I get it.

Have caltrops, arrow barrage, and poison injection active 100% of the time. Usually I'll drop the AOEs and poison inj. and then crit rush in (applying another dot with the vma hammer) and then WB/Heavy Attack weave until kena wears off. I keep Kena proc'd for 100% of the fight if possible, utilizing heavy attack weaving to sustain stamina. With a stam sorc this isn't a drop in DPS because Bound Armaments increases heavy attack damage, plus the 2h passives for heavy attack buffs WB, which in turn empowers the heavy attacks.

As long as you be sure to bar-swap and reapply arrow barrage, poison inj, and caltrops (when necessary) you can weave your WBs all day long. Even without a vMA hammer or bow you should be able to reach 20k in minute-long fights.

Edit: Assume everything is legendary. I think one or two pieces is not yet, but I know for sure all the Hundings and both weapons are gold. I don't remember if both Kena pieces are or not, typing this up from memory.

Reykice · March 2016

Autolycus wrote: »

A fair amount of what's being said here is false. I run a Breton stam sorc (so not even a stam race) with 2H + bow and I consistently pull 20-25k. Here's what I run:

5 Set Hunding's Rage
- Chest (divine)
- Pants (divine)
- Belt (divine)
- Boots (divine)
- Gloves (divine)

2 Molag Kena
- Shoulder (divine)
- Head (infused)

Maelstrom 2H Mace w/ Sharpened
Gold vr16 bow w/ Sharpened

I don't have my vMA bow yet, so I'll swap for that when I get it.

Have caltrops, arrow barrage, and poison injection active 100% of the time. Usually I'll drop the AOEs and poison inj. and then crit rush in (applying another dot with the vma hammer) and then WB/Heavy Attack weave until kena wears off. I keep Kena proc'd for 100% of the fight if possible, utilizing heavy attack weaving to sustain stamina. With a stam sorc this isn't a drop in DPS because Bound Armaments increases heavy attack damage, plus the 2h passives for heavy attack buffs WB, which in turn empowers the heavy attacks.

As long as you be sure to bar-swap and reapply arrow barrage, poison inj, and caltrops (when necessary) you can weave your WBs all day long. Even without a vMA hammer or bow you should be able to reach 20k in minute-long fights.

Edit: Assume everything is legendary. I think one or two pieces is not yet, but I know for sure all the Hundings and both weapons are gold. I don't remember if both Kena pieces are or not, typing this up from memory.

Can you post a screenshot of that 25k dps? (To better see skill breakdown)

dday3six · March 2016

Autolycus wrote: »

A fair amount of what's being said here is false. I run a Breton stam sorc (so not even a stam race) with 2H + bow and I consistently pull 20-25k. Here's what I run:

5 Set Hunding's Rage
- Chest (divine)
- Pants (divine)
- Belt (divine)
- Boots (divine)
- Gloves (divine)

2 Molag Kena
- Shoulder (divine)
- Head (infused)

Maelstrom 2H Mace w/ Sharpened
Gold vr16 bow w/ Sharpened

I don't have my vMA bow yet, so I'll swap for that when I get it.

Have caltrops, arrow barrage, and poison injection active 100% of the time. Usually I'll drop the AOEs and poison inj. and then crit rush in (applying another dot with the vma hammer) and then WB/Heavy Attack weave until kena wears off. I keep Kena proc'd for 100% of the fight if possible, utilizing heavy attack weaving to sustain stamina. With a stam sorc this isn't a drop in DPS because Bound Armaments increases heavy attack damage, plus the 2h passives for heavy attack buffs WB, which in turn empowers the heavy attacks.

As long as you be sure to bar-swap and reapply arrow barrage, poison inj, and caltrops (when necessary) you can weave your WBs all day long. Even without a vMA hammer or bow you should be able to reach 20k in minute-long fights.

Edit: Assume everything is legendary. I think one or two pieces is not yet, but I know for sure all the Hundings and both weapons are gold. I don't remember if both Kena pieces are or not, typing this up from memory.

You're talking minute long fights which if the group is putting out solid DPS shouldn't happen often outside of trials. You're wasting a slot on Crit Rush for a dot when Rending Slashes would net more damage, another set piece, more crit from daggers, and weapon enchants. Without some evidence to back this up, I find it hard to believe.

Autolycus · March 2016

dday3six wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

A fair amount of what's being said here is false. I run a Breton stam sorc (so not even a stam race) with 2H + bow and I consistently pull 20-25k. Here's what I run:

5 Set Hunding's Rage
- Chest (divine)
- Pants (divine)
- Belt (divine)
- Boots (divine)
- Gloves (divine)

2 Molag Kena
- Shoulder (divine)
- Head (infused)

Maelstrom 2H Mace w/ Sharpened
Gold vr16 bow w/ Sharpened

I don't have my vMA bow yet, so I'll swap for that when I get it.

Have caltrops, arrow barrage, and poison injection active 100% of the time. Usually I'll drop the AOEs and poison inj. and then crit rush in (applying another dot with the vma hammer) and then WB/Heavy Attack weave until kena wears off. I keep Kena proc'd for 100% of the fight if possible, utilizing heavy attack weaving to sustain stamina. With a stam sorc this isn't a drop in DPS because Bound Armaments increases heavy attack damage, plus the 2h passives for heavy attack buffs WB, which in turn empowers the heavy attacks.

As long as you be sure to bar-swap and reapply arrow barrage, poison inj, and caltrops (when necessary) you can weave your WBs all day long. Even without a vMA hammer or bow you should be able to reach 20k in minute-long fights.

Edit: Assume everything is legendary. I think one or two pieces is not yet, but I know for sure all the Hundings and both weapons are gold. I don't remember if both Kena pieces are or not, typing this up from memory.

You're talking minute long fights which if the group is putting out solid DPS shouldn't happen often outside of trials. You're wasting a slot on Crit Rush for a dot when Rending Slashes would net more damage, another set piece, more crit from daggers, and weapon enchants. Without some evidence to back this up, I find it hard to believe.

I've considered and tested dual wield as an alternative instead, and considered rending slashes as well. I've found that Crit Rush is superior to Rending Slashes with the vMA 2h Maul for the extra DoT component. If I had vMA daggers it might be a different setup. As of now, my typical rotation on bosses, and generally most trash pulls, is as follows:

Caltrops > Arrow Barrage > Poison Inj (proc kena; LA, then Poison Inj, then LA) > bar swap > crit rush > WB + HA weaves

I continue to WB + HA weave until kena wears off, then I re-proc it. As long as Arrow Barrage and Poison Injection are active, I stay in melee. Once these wear off, I start back peddling, bar swap, and restart the rotation.

With a little practice, this rotation allows maximum up-time on all of my DoTs and kena, including crit rush DoT. I only have about 880 stam recovery, but between Major Endurance from potions and heavy attack weaving (which is viable as a stam sorc, considering Bound Armaments + the Follow Up passive in 2H) I rarely have stam issues. Every once in awhile I call for a shards, but usually I manage on my own.

For certain fights I pull less damage, such as Molag Kena and the Planar Inhibitor, which both require a great deal of moving around and is punishing for melee. On these fights I typically average 17-18k. I've bursted as high as 30k on things like Crematorial Guards, I've done varying numbers on blood spawn but at the lowest test it was 20k. Back when I was dual wielding, I pulled 18k on Blood Spawn.

I'd be willing to share some screen shots later if i can find the time. I'm not opposed to sharing my setups if it helps others. It's also entirely possible that I may refine this build yet, but I've been testing and theorycrafting on this toon for weeks, and this is by far my highest damage setup I've had for him. My stam sorc is also not a stam race, he's a Breton, so with another race the damage potential is higher, like with Khajiit or Orc. I previously tried dual-wielding on my off-bar and using Rending Slashes, Rearming Trap, Caltrops, and crit rush with my DoT rotation, but that was inferior in total damage output to what I'm doing now.

Legendary gear helps a great deal, even if it's not a set item (as is the case with my bow, until I replace it with a vMA bow). It's something like 200 extra weapon damage between a purple and a gold v16 weapon.

Edit: Forgot to mention I'm also at the CP cap. It might not be relevant to everyone, but to some it will matter. The difference between 500 and 400 CP isn't all that substantial, but anyone below 300 CP shouldn't expect to consistently pull these numbers. Sustain is much easier with higher CP, and a fair amount of damage comes from the CP allocations beyond 300.

Autolycus · March 2016

I ran a few numbers to get an idea of how arrow barrage and rending slashes compare without accounting for maelstrom weapons. These are only tooltip values and not on a stam/WD - oriented character. The actual values themselves will be higher or lower depending on your gear, rank, etc. The values themselves are irrelevent; what we want to know is how the two compare to each other with all else constant.

Rending Slashes has a duration of 9s before it needs to be reapplied. Arrow Barrage has a duration of 8s before it needs to be reapplied. I use the lowest common multiple of 72 seconds (1min 12s) as a time frame for this comparison.

Rending Slashes

Deal 974 (x2) damage initially and then an additional 4,870 damage over 9 seconds
The '974 (x2)' damage occurs every time the DoT wears off. This occurs 8 times over a 72s timeframe. Therefore: (974*2)*8 = 15,584 total damage from only the initial hits.
Factoring in the DoT component, which occurs over 9s and thus occurs 8 total times = (4,870*8) = 38,960.
So the total damage for Rending Slashes over 72s, assuming all else is constant and the DoTs are reapplied exact when necessary, is:

54,544 damage or (54,544 / 72) = 757.56 DPS

Arrow Barrage

Deals 604 damage every 0.5 seconds to enemies in the area.
First, we need to get this in terms of seconds and not half-seconds. So, (604*2) = 1,208 damage per second to targets in the area.
There is no initial hit damage to calculate here, so it's simply the total damage of the AoE, multiplied by the number of times the AoE is used:
(1,208 per sec) * 8 sec = 9,664
(9,664 * 9) = 86,976 total damage, or

(86,975 / 72) = 1,208 DPS

Given these tooltip values and assuming I've done my math correctly, Arrow Barrage is:(1,208 / 757.56) = 1.59459 or approximately 60% more damage than Rending Slashes.

Edit: Crit Rush (with the vMA 2H Maul)
This compares only the DoT component of Crit Rush, not the damage of the skill itself.

Your Critical Charge deals an additional 4300 physical damage over 5 seconds.
(4,300 / 5) = 860 damage per second. To get this into the same time frame as our example above:
860 * 72 seconds = 61,920 total damage

Rending Slashes could still be a better option than Crit Rush, once we account for the base damage of both skills and determine the total damage output of each one. Typically a dual wield build will likely have enough weapon damage and stamina so that the DoT from RS would be a strong contender against the crit rush DoT. However, in order to make this work, bow must be forgone, and arrow barrage is far too powerful to forego imho.

In this particular example, we show a DoT from RS that has only slight higher damage, but over almost twice as long, effectively making it only about half the damage of the crit rush DoT. However, these tooltip values were not taken from a stam build with high stam and WD, so we can't draw this conclusion without additional info. We need tooltip values from a stam build for both RS and Crit Rush while everything else is constant, i.e. no buffs, same gear, etc.

vontariel · March 2016

Autolycus wrote: »

I ran a few numbers to get an idea of how arrow barrage and rending slashes compare without accounting for maelstrom weapons. These are only tooltip values and not on a stam/WD - oriented character. The actual values themselves will be higher or lower depending on your gear, rank, etc. The values themselves are irrelevent; what we want to know is how the two compare to each other with all else constant.

Rending Slashes has a duration of 9s before it needs to be reapplied. Arrow Barrage has a duration of 8s before it needs to be reapplied. I use the lowest common multiple of 72 seconds (1min 12s) as a time frame for this comparison.

Rending Slashes
Deal 974 (x2) damage initially and then an additional 4,870 damage over 9 seconds
The '974 (x2)' damage occurs every time the DoT wears off. This occurs 8 times over a 72s timeframe. Therefore: (974*2)*8 = 15,584 total damage from only the initial hits.
Factoring in the DoT component, which occurs over 9s and thus occurs 8 total times = (4,870*8) = 38,960.
So the total damage for Rending Slashes over 72s, assuming all else is constant and the DoTs are reapplied exact when necessary, is:

54,544 damage or (54,544 / 72) = 757.56 DPS

Arrow Barrage
Deals 604 damage every 0.5 seconds to enemies in the area.
First, we need to get this in terms of seconds and not half-seconds. So, (604*2) = 1,208 damage per second to targets in the area.
There is no initial hit damage to calculate here, so it's simply the total damage of the AoE, multiplied by the number of times the AoE is used:
(1,208 per sec) * 8 sec = 9,664
(9,664 * 9) = 86,976 total damage, or

(86,975 / 72) = 1,208 DPS

Given these tooltip values and assuming I've done my math correctly, Arrow Barrage is:(1,208 / 757.56) = 1.59459 or approximately 60% more damage than Rending Slashes.

Edit: Crit Rush (with the vMA 2H Maul)
This compares only the DoT component of Crit Rush, not the damage of the skill itself.
Your Critical Charge deals an additional 4300 physical damage over 5 seconds.
(4,300 / 5) = 860 damage per second. To get this into the same time frame as our example above:
860 * 72 seconds = 61,920 total damage

Rending Slashes could still be a better option than Crit Rush, once we account for the base damage of both skills and determine the total damage output of each one. Typically a dual wield build will likely have enough weapon damage and stamina so that the DoT from RS would be a strong contender against the crit rush DoT. However, in order to make this work, bow must be forgone, and arrow barrage is far too powerful to forego imho.

In this particular example, we show a DoT from RS that has only slight higher damage, but over almost twice as long, effectively making it only about half the damage of the crit rush DoT. However, these tooltip values were not taken from a stam build with high stam and WD, so we can't draw this conclusion without additional info. We need tooltip values from a stam build for both RS and Crit Rush while everything else is constant, i.e. no buffs, same gear, etc.

I find your comparing method flawed: You didn't count cast (& travel time in case of volley) which add additional time, and lowers overall dps. Because this vary for big degree from skill to skill excluding this for practical reason makes estimations of that sort at least questionable, if not totally useless.

RS is MUCH faster and even can be weaved to cancel some portion of animation, can't say same about volley. So there is (big) probability that in the end RS could be better.

Autolycus · March 2016

vontariel wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

I ran a few numbers to get an idea of how arrow barrage and rending slashes compare without accounting for maelstrom weapons. These are only tooltip values and not on a stam/WD - oriented character. The actual values themselves will be higher or lower depending on your gear, rank, etc. The values themselves are irrelevent; what we want to know is how the two compare to each other with all else constant.

Rending Slashes has a duration of 9s before it needs to be reapplied. Arrow Barrage has a duration of 8s before it needs to be reapplied. I use the lowest common multiple of 72 seconds (1min 12s) as a time frame for this comparison.

Rending Slashes
Deal 974 (x2) damage initially and then an additional 4,870 damage over 9 seconds
The '974 (x2)' damage occurs every time the DoT wears off. This occurs 8 times over a 72s timeframe. Therefore: (974*2)*8 = 15,584 total damage from only the initial hits.
Factoring in the DoT component, which occurs over 9s and thus occurs 8 total times = (4,870*8) = 38,960.
So the total damage for Rending Slashes over 72s, assuming all else is constant and the DoTs are reapplied exact when necessary, is:

54,544 damage or (54,544 / 72) = 757.56 DPS

Arrow Barrage
Deals 604 damage every 0.5 seconds to enemies in the area.
First, we need to get this in terms of seconds and not half-seconds. So, (604*2) = 1,208 damage per second to targets in the area.
There is no initial hit damage to calculate here, so it's simply the total damage of the AoE, multiplied by the number of times the AoE is used:
(1,208 per sec) * 8 sec = 9,664
(9,664 * 9) = 86,976 total damage, or

(86,975 / 72) = 1,208 DPS

Given these tooltip values and assuming I've done my math correctly, Arrow Barrage is:(1,208 / 757.56) = 1.59459 or approximately 60% more damage than Rending Slashes.

Edit: Crit Rush (with the vMA 2H Maul)
This compares only the DoT component of Crit Rush, not the damage of the skill itself.
Your Critical Charge deals an additional 4300 physical damage over 5 seconds.
(4,300 / 5) = 860 damage per second. To get this into the same time frame as our example above:
860 * 72 seconds = 61,920 total damage

Rending Slashes could still be a better option than Crit Rush, once we account for the base damage of both skills and determine the total damage output of each one. Typically a dual wield build will likely have enough weapon damage and stamina so that the DoT from RS would be a strong contender against the crit rush DoT. However, in order to make this work, bow must be forgone, and arrow barrage is far too powerful to forego imho.

In this particular example, we show a DoT from RS that has only slight higher damage, but over almost twice as long, effectively making it only about half the damage of the crit rush DoT. However, these tooltip values were not taken from a stam build with high stam and WD, so we can't draw this conclusion without additional info. We need tooltip values from a stam build for both RS and Crit Rush while everything else is constant, i.e. no buffs, same gear, etc.

I find your comparing method flawed: You didn't count cast (& travel time in case of volley) which add additional time, and lowers overall dps. Because this vary for big degree from skill to skill excluding this for practical reason makes estimations of that sort at least questionable, if not totally useless.

RS is MUCH faster and even can be weaved to cancel some portion of animation, can't say same about volley. So there is (big) probability that in the end RS could be better.

You can ani cancel volley. I do it all the time. The "cast time" on volley is instant. Your travel time on the arrows is all but negligible; if you look at your floating damage text you can see it ticking away before the arrows start falling.

acw37162 · March 2016

Stamina Sorcs are the bright shinning light on the dispairty between stamina based.

Disparity meaning 2H is heand and shoulders better then DW/Bow (I did not say either couldn't work just 2H is better)

You should technically be able to run a DW/Bow setup in a stam sorc since a stam sorc has crit surge for major brutality and some active healing but it pales to 2H/Bow because 2H direct damage single target skill is better then DW throwing dagger. The passive healing from momentum to rally is one of the best skills in the game and the extra stam regen from the last passive in he 2H tree is so good.

We are four months away from Dark Brotherhood and Theives Guild has not even made it to my PS4 and all I'm hi king about is how they are going to ruin 2H and call DW and Bow better in Dark Brotherhood just like they did with needing major expidition buffing sprint speed and calling well fitted better.

Stam Sorcs well stam anything is fairly pedestrian right now the genius who thought four months of this is a great idea should have his/her MENSA membership pulled.

dday3six · March 2016

.

acw37162 wrote: »

Stamina Sorcs are the bright shinning light on the dispairty between stamina based.

Disparity meaning 2H is heand and shoulders better then DW/Bow (I did not say either couldn't work just 2H is better)

You should technically be able to run a DW/Bow setup in a stam sorc since a stam sorc has crit surge for major brutality and some active healing but it pales to 2H/Bow because 2H direct damage single target skill is better then DW throwing dagger. The passive healing from momentum to rally is one of the best skills in the game and the extra stam regen from the last passive in he 2H tree is so good.

We are four months away from Dark Brotherhood and Theives Guild has not even made it to my PS4 and all I'm hi king about is how they are going to ruin 2H and call DW and Bow better in Dark Brotherhood just like they did with needing major expidition buffing sprint speed and calling well fitted better.

Stam Sorcs well stam anything is fairly pedestrian right now the genius who thought four months of this is a great idea should have his/her MENSA membership pulled.

What?

In PVE the best source of Major Brutality is pots. They last longer, don't take up a skill slot, and help with resource management. Pre-IC Flying Blade was used, but now Rapid Strikes is the much better single target skill to use for Stamina DK and Sorc in PVE. It was buffed awhile back, and in TG it's a DOT so it benefits from CP in Thaumaturge.

DW simply offers more benefits than 2H. Major Brutality is covered by pots. More weapon damage, another set piece, more crit via daggers all amount to more damage across all skills. A DPS rotation is about the sum of the whole. Then once you throw Steel Tornado in the mix, still the best AOE even post nerf. 2H just falls short. Sure in PVP and VMSA 2H has more to offer because it a different scenario, and different skills are required. But for a dps role in a group setting like dungeons or trials. DW is just provides more DPS, and that's not saying 2H isn't viable. Just that DW is better.

Autolycus · March 2016

Here's a BS test I ran last night. It's not as high as I quoted previously, but still decent. In this I'm using the same setup I described in earlier posts. Messed up the rotation a bit, didn't have full up-time on caltrops and arrow barrage like I should have. Had I done it properly, this may have been a bit better. Keep in mind also that this isn't even a stam race. There's a lot more potential I haven't reached yet, as I'm still looking for a couple things to finish off my build.

Duiwel · March 2016

Autolycus wrote: »

Here's a BS test I ran last night. It's not as high as I quoted previously, but still decent. In this I'm using the same setup I described in earlier posts. Messed up the rotation a bit, didn't have full up-time on caltrops and arrow barrage like I should have. Had I done it properly, this may have been a bit better. Keep in mind also that this isn't even a stam race. There's a lot more potential I haven't reached yet, as I'm still looking for a couple things to finish off my build.

Nice kind of reminds me of King Richard's Stamsorc build...

Steel_Brightblade · March 2016

On console my stam sorc got 30K from rapid strikes, rare though, all hits critted. Wouldn't rely on it though as it counts as a dot so no healing.

Destruent · March 2016

I usually play my Stamsorc with DW/Bow bc it does more DPS than the wrecking-blow-build (atleast for me and with maelstromeweapons).
I keep up the following DoTs while light attack weaving rapid strikes: poison injection, arrow barrage (should be scorched earth), caltrops, rearming trap, rending slashes. Sadly i only have some old screenshots form pre-TG. Haven't done that much tests on Stamsorc so far.

Adjucator (First boss vWGT)

tunepunk · March 2016

I'm playing stamina 2H sorc and most of my skills are not chosen for high damage. More for utility/survivability, and my main damage is from light/heavy attacks. Critting around 12-14K on regular heavy attacks. around 6.2k on light attack crits. 42-48K with heavy attack from sneak, doing around 18K splash damage to closeby enemies on first hit. I'm a very lazy gamer so I don't wanna dance around, block, roll dodge. I just go in. Hammer, hammer, hammer, and reapplying the buffs and dmg shield when needed.

I'm not using HP/STA food, as my main damage is from light heavy attacks those stats doesn't matter much. Using regen drink instead for health/stamina regen for resource management.

18K HP
23K Stamina.
60% weapon crit
Around 4.300 weapon damage buffed.

My main skill bar.
Thundering Presence - For the resistances and a bit of area damage.
Streak, for stuns - getting to dangerous hard hitting ranged enemies quickly & escape.
Brawler, for instant sustained Damage shield and some area damage.
Critical Surge. for some increased damage and heals.
Bound Armor, a bit more resistance, health regen and heavy attack dmg.
Flawless dawnbreaker, for passive damage and occasional AOE.

Brawler is the key for this build, reapplying a 5000-15000 damage shield (depending on how many enemies) whenever it breaks, so i don't need to bother with healing much. I very rarely block or roll dodge either, since it costs more stamina than just reapplying the Brawler Damage Shield.

I went all in for maximizing my light/heavy attack damage instead and using most of my resources for survival/utility investing in weapon damage and regen instead. I even went so far to use the weapon damage glyph with infused trait, so getting nearly 300 extra weapon damage when it procs (with all other passives and multipliers). 300 weapon damage also increases the effectiveness of the stamina based skills

Stamina doesn't improve your light/heavy attacks, so not really that important.

I wouldn't say my DPS is very Uber, but i survive quite well. Last night i wanted to test out how well, so did Dolmen group boss solo in Wrothgar, and halfway through banished cells. v16 solo, then it was time for bed.

Still working on improving the build, maybe exchange the the hundings rage set for a whitestrake's set for a bit less dmg, but even better survivability, for when things go sour.

Autolycus · March 2016

Destruent wrote: »

I usually play my Stamsorc with DW/Bow bc it does more DPS than the wrecking-blow-build (atleast for me and with maelstromeweapons).
I keep up the following DoTs while light attack weaving rapid strikes: poison injection, arrow barrage (should be scorched earth), caltrops, rearming trap, rending slashes. Sadly i only have some old screenshots form pre-TG. Haven't done that much tests on Stamsorc so far.
Adjucator (First boss vWGT)

I can definitely believe that if you're running maelstrom daggers and maelstrom bow, which appears to be the case, given the damage statistics on both rending slashes and arrow barrage (scorched earth?). You have both vma weapons? Right now all I have is the vma 2H. Once I get ahold of the others I switch things up a bit and see if I can't crank out higher numbers with DW/bow too.

Destruent · March 2016

Autolycus wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

I usually play my Stamsorc with DW/Bow bc it does more DPS than the wrecking-blow-build (atleast for me and with maelstromeweapons).
I keep up the following DoTs while light attack weaving rapid strikes: poison injection, arrow barrage (should be scorched earth), caltrops, rearming trap, rending slashes. Sadly i only have some old screenshots form pre-TG. Haven't done that much tests on Stamsorc so far.
Adjucator (First boss vWGT)

I can definitely believe that if you're running maelstrom daggers and maelstrom bow, which appears to be the case, given the damage statistics on both rending slashes and arrow barrage (scorched earth?). You have both vma weapons? Right now all I have is the vma 2H. Once I get ahold of the others I switch things up a bit and see if I can't crank out higher numbers with DW/bow too.

Yes, i'm using maelstromebow and one maelstrome-axe. I'm also using arrow barrage atm, but scorched earth would be stronger.

Autolycus · March 2016

Destruent wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

I usually play my Stamsorc with DW/Bow bc it does more DPS than the wrecking-blow-build (atleast for me and with maelstromeweapons).
I keep up the following DoTs while light attack weaving rapid strikes: poison injection, arrow barrage (should be scorched earth), caltrops, rearming trap, rending slashes. Sadly i only have some old screenshots form pre-TG. Haven't done that much tests on Stamsorc so far.
Adjucator (First boss vWGT)

I can definitely believe that if you're running maelstrom daggers and maelstrom bow, which appears to be the case, given the damage statistics on both rending slashes and arrow barrage (scorched earth?). You have both vma weapons? Right now all I have is the vma 2H. Once I get ahold of the others I switch things up a bit and see if I can't crank out higher numbers with DW/bow too.

Yes, i'm using maelstromebow and one maelstrome-axe. I'm also using arrow barrage atm, but scorched earth would be stronger.

Ah okay, thanks for clarifying. I'm curious about Arrow Barrage though, I think I missed something. Both morphs scale from WD and max stam, however one deals fire damage (scorched earth) and one deals additional physical (arrow barrage). Why is SE higher, when stam builds (typically) don't put points into elemental expert? I could see that from a stam DK perspective, but I don't follow for a sorc.

Destruent · March 2016

Autolycus wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

I usually play my Stamsorc with DW/Bow bc it does more DPS than the wrecking-blow-build (atleast for me and with maelstromeweapons).
I keep up the following DoTs while light attack weaving rapid strikes: poison injection, arrow barrage (should be scorched earth), caltrops, rearming trap, rending slashes. Sadly i only have some old screenshots form pre-TG. Haven't done that much tests on Stamsorc so far.
Adjucator (First boss vWGT)

I can definitely believe that if you're running maelstrom daggers and maelstrom bow, which appears to be the case, given the damage statistics on both rending slashes and arrow barrage (scorched earth?). You have both vma weapons? Right now all I have is the vma 2H. Once I get ahold of the others I switch things up a bit and see if I can't crank out higher numbers with DW/bow too.

Yes, i'm using maelstromebow and one maelstrome-axe. I'm also using arrow barrage atm, but scorched earth would be stronger.

Ah okay, thanks for clarifying. I'm curious about Arrow Barrage though, I think I missed something. Both morphs scale from WD and max stam, however one deals fire damage (scorched earth) and one deals additional physical (arrow barrage). Why is SE higher, when stam builds (typically) don't put points into elemental expert? I could see that from a stam DK perspective, but I don't follow for a sorc.

It's stronger, bc the maelstrome enchant can tick 6 (?) seconds longer which increases the last dmg-ticks by a lot. you will also usually have at least one DK with engulfing flames (the tank can do this, too) in your group. This will increase the fire damage by another 10%.

Autolycus · March 2016

Destruent wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

I usually play my Stamsorc with DW/Bow bc it does more DPS than the wrecking-blow-build (atleast for me and with maelstromeweapons).
I keep up the following DoTs while light attack weaving rapid strikes: poison injection, arrow barrage (should be scorched earth), caltrops, rearming trap, rending slashes. Sadly i only have some old screenshots form pre-TG. Haven't done that much tests on Stamsorc so far.
Adjucator (First boss vWGT)

I can definitely believe that if you're running maelstrom daggers and maelstrom bow, which appears to be the case, given the damage statistics on both rending slashes and arrow barrage (scorched earth?). You have both vma weapons? Right now all I have is the vma 2H. Once I get ahold of the others I switch things up a bit and see if I can't crank out higher numbers with DW/bow too.

Yes, i'm using maelstromebow and one maelstrome-axe. I'm also using arrow barrage atm, but scorched earth would be stronger.

Ah okay, thanks for clarifying. I'm curious about Arrow Barrage though, I think I missed something. Both morphs scale from WD and max stam, however one deals fire damage (scorched earth) and one deals additional physical (arrow barrage). Why is SE higher, when stam builds (typically) don't put points into elemental expert? I could see that from a stam DK perspective, but I don't follow for a sorc.

It's stronger, bc the maelstrome enchant can tick 6 (?) seconds longer which increases the last dmg-ticks by a lot. you will also usually have at least one DK with engulfing flames (the tank can do this, too) in your group. This will increase the fire damage by another 10%.

Ah okay, very insightful and makes perfect sense. Thanks!

CreepyPahuska · March 2016

Destruent wrote: »

you will also usually have at least one DK with engulfing flames (the tank can do this, too) in your group.

I know it's totally out of the topic, but it always hurts my Sorc tank feelings to see tanks always automatically associated to DKs...

Now, about the topic itself, I have a stamina sorcerer (redguard) that is currently v8, so I'm still kinda trying to figure out the best way to play it. Right now I'm mostly focused on PvE. Here's a few questions for you :
1. Since you guys seems to rely quite a lot on DoTs in your builds, what's your thoughts on Thundering Presence ? Do you use it ?
2. Also, what's the good balance between Critical Chances and Penetration ?
3. Has anyone been able to try sets like Sheer Venom, Shock Master and Briar Heart on a stamina sorcerer ? Is it worth it over hunding ?

Autolycus · March 2016

CreepyPahuska wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

you will also usually have at least one DK with engulfing flames (the tank can do this, too) in your group.

I know it's totally out of the topic, but it always hurts my Sorc tank feelings to see tanks always automatically associated to DKs...

Now, about the topic itself, I have a stamina sorcerer (redguard) that is currently v8, so I'm still kinda trying to figure out the best way to play it. Right now I'm mostly focused on PvE. Here's a few questions for you :
1. Since you guys seems to rely quite a lot on DoTs in your builds, what's your thoughts on Thundering Presence ? Do you use it ?
2. Also, what's the good balance between Critical Chances and Penetration ?
3. Has anyone been able to try sets like Sheer Venom, Shock Master and Briar Heart on a stamina sorcerer ? Is it worth it over hunding ?

I can give some insight into a couple of your questions. I'm going to use a lot of "usually" and "typically" because I'm an advocate for build diversity, and the meta is not the only way to play. We often associated meta with the requirement, and this is not the case in ESO. In practice there is a very large gap between what is optimal and what is necessary to complete content. That being said, here we go:

1. Thundering Presence is not buffed via CP in a "typical" stam sorc build. Usually a stamina build will sink all (or the vast majority) of mage points into Mighty, Precise Strikes, and Piercing. In most cases, virtually everything goes into these three stars and not into Elemental Expert, which is what would buff TP. However, TP still does scale from max stamina and weapon damage, so it's not a completely useless skill. The general opinion is that you can do better than TP. I gave up TP in my build for Bound Armaments, and I would personally suggest this instead, provided you have plans to run one or the other. The max stamina and heavy attack damage is more valuable in every analysis I've seen (so far) than the damage from TP.

2. It kind of varies. Normally I would say to lean more into penetration once you hit that 50% crit chance, but honestly high crit chance is incredibly valuable too. There is room for both, but I haven't run an analysis on these yet, so if I were you, I'd take my suggestion on this with a grain of salt and do your own experimenting. I suggest that a good place to start is somewhere between 60-70% crit. But again, you'll want to test it and not rely on my word for this.

3. Sheer Venom is an awesome set. Unfortunately the grind vs. reward tradeoff isn't all that high. Depending on how you build, you can produce higher numbers with Sheer Venom than with Hundings. In most builds, however, Hundings is optimal. Shock Master is ... not worth it (trying to be nice; cool concept, poor implementation), for the same reasons as Thundering Presence, more or less. Briar Heart is an incredibly useful set when paired with Hundings or Essence Thief. You can do a lot of work with either of these sets, but again you're at the whim of RNG for these. Finding the traits and level of all those pieces is very difficult and time-consuming, and again here we see a very high grind vs. low reward trade-off. It has great potential, but it's not so much better than Hundings that it's BiS. These are really a matter of preference: how badly do you want to use them? They are cool sets, produce good numbers, and they're fun to play with. Hundings is easy.

Destruent · March 2016

CreepyPahuska wrote: »

Destruent wrote: »

you will also usually have at least one DK with engulfing flames (the tank can do this, too) in your group.

I know it's totally out of the topic, but it always hurts my Sorc tank feelings to see tanks always automatically associated to DKs...

Now, about the topic itself, I have a stamina sorcerer (redguard) that is currently v8, so I'm still kinda trying to figure out the best way to play it. Right now I'm mostly focused on PvE. Here's a few questions for you :
1. Since you guys seems to rely quite a lot on DoTs in your builds, what's your thoughts on Thundering Presence ? Do you use it ?
2. Also, what's the good balance between Critical Chances and Penetration ?
3. Has anyone been able to try sets like Sheer Venom, Shock Master and Briar Heart on a stamina sorcerer ? Is it worth it over hunding ?

Sry to hurt your tank, but one out of 4 (or even 12) in a group is usually a DK, and it doesn't matter if it's a DD or tank or heal...the DK can apply the debuff and also should apply it ;-)

1. I use thundering presence only in vDSA bc it's damage i can activate before portals spawn, anywhere else it's useless, bc it does too low dps
2. Depends on your build and group setup. if your targets gets completely debuffed you don't need to specc into penetration. Warhorn/Beastrap also increase the effectiveness of a high critchance. I run atm 85% crit and mobs are debuffed with night mothers gaze and major fracture all the time, i also have aggressive warhorn and beasttrap (minor and major force) up as much as possible.
3. no, haven't had the possibility to check it. But hundings >briar heart bc of maths. and if noone else uses it even night mothers gaze is better than hundings rage in a full crit setup

CreepyPahuska · March 2016

Thanks for the answers.
I already play with Bound Armaments. It's a great skill and removing it was never an option. Same goes for crit surge.
About the sets, IMO, if the sets are worth using, they're worth farming. The Briarheart set isn't that hard to get, since you can do (1 daily delve + 6 world bosses) * the number of v16 character you own. As for the Sheer Venom... well vICP isn't the easiest dungeon, but with some practice and experience it can be done under 45 minutes. Now the loot rates sucks for sure, but it's part of the fun

. I already own 2 Briar Hearts with good traits & 4 Sheer Venom with acceptable traits, so I guess I'll keep farming on my main while I level my Stam Sorc. I really want to try something else than the usual hunding set when he'll be v16