Restore Bracing - Never Ask for Buffs

GoodOlPinkly · April 2016

Liofa wrote: »

I will lose 3 Infused and 4 Divines effect for %1 cost reduction increase . Thanks for the great buff to the heavy armor . Now I can do more DPS with Pierce Armor ! Isn't this just great for PvE tanks ? How I love getting nerfed in every patch for ''PvP purposes'' .

In the next DLC :

Heavy Armor passive added . ''Stupidly Brave'' : If using 5 or more Heavy , gain the ability ''Helmet Throw'' . Throw your helmet to the enemy , dealing no damage but 0.5 second stun and gain Minor Expedition until you get your helmet back . It takes 2 slots in your Ability Bar due to throwing and taking the helmet are different actions .

This is devastating for HA pvp builds -.- I only used HA for the block cost reduction.... Zos should keep damage from gear sets and utility from armor types

ninjaguyman · April 2016

In general it seems that:
pve tanks really hate that they lost bracing for more weapon and spell damage. Why should a pve tank need more damage? Even with the new constituion buff, its still a net loss since there seem to be things that u just can't "reactively block" in trials and such and have to block the whole time. Even if the new sturdy trait can make up for the loss, losing all other trait bonuses like infused or divines sucks.

Im not quite sure the sentiment of the heavy armor pvpers is quite as unified. There are some pvpers who welcome the extra damage, and others who would have preferred to keep bracing in pvp. This is mainly a difference between the "pure" tanks/permablockers who don't care about damage and tanks who can take hits, but still get kills.

The straight up tank, and the tank that can do decent damage. Theres a lot of "lets bring back bracing the way it was before" and also "Lets keep the new wrath the way it is now." I saw a lot less "lets keep both play styles viable."

As i saw like once earlier in the thread, just combine the bracing and wrath passive in one, or add bracing in as an extra effect of another hvy armor passive. It wouldn't be OP or anything i guess. pve and pure tanks in pvp wouldn't really be affected by wrath if they don't care about damage and would keep their all important bracing passive. Heavy armor users who desire more damage from wrath can still have that as well.

quadraxis666 · April 2016

I had posted this in the Non-Class changes thread but I'll repost it here as this thread is specific to my main DB Change concern:

Heavy Armor - Removal of Bracing

TL;DR Bracing removal very bad, take away Rapid Mending instead

Why on earth was this done? This is an absolutely awful change for tanks. I main a Stam DK Tank, Bracing was the only reason I stuck with it after the removal of block regen, hell, Bracing is the only reason to wear Heavy Armor period.

We've all seen the other posts in various threads detailing the resource losses caused by this even if we were to re-craft everything in the revamped sturdy trait, so I won't repeat them here.

When block regen was removed, I was forced to respec all attributes into stamina, this means I've gone with the stamina morphs of most abilities because if I'm switching clothes to pvp in medium armor I'm going to use abilities that scale off my highest resource pool. It also means most of my supporting abilities in the PVE Tank role are running off the same resource I need to block with. I throw out caltrops to snare as much trash as I can, use the melee taunt (pierce armor/ransack) as often as possible since it's cheaper resource-wise, only using the ranged taunt (I went with the magicka morph on this one since it's used less often and saves me some stamina) and using Unstable Flame (soon to be renamed Venomous Claw) as my occasional cast stacking DoT.

Stamina management is not a problem in this current setup because blocking is cheap and I only need to block the big hits. I should mention that I have 100 cp in Block Expert already to allow me to have elemental resistances on my jewellery.

On the PTS Myself and my 2 regular Sorc DPS guildies decided to do a dungeon to see how the new changes worked. We picked Wayrest since it's the easiest Vet dungeon and we didn't have a healer with us, and it was a different experience from live to say the least, bearing in mind this is a dungeon I have ran completely alone on live as a Tank (so it took a very long time with my non-existent DPS).
The First thing I noticed was how quickly my stamina was gone when I had a room full of zombie trash mobs wailing on me, I mean a bar of 30k stamina was just gone, and this is WITH 100 cp in Block Expert.
The second thing was where the hell are my DPS? Dead behind me because one or two hits from trash mobs ended them since their shields duration has been so severely nerfed.

We finished the dungeon, but it was not much fun. It was a frustrating exercise in having to further micro-manage my resources because now not only can I not regain stamina when I block, I'm lucky if I have enough stamina to re-apply taunts after 15 seconds of being beat on from a 30k pool! And the base block cost will be even higher on live!

What good is the new Wrath passive going to do if I have no resources left to do anything with it by the time it's built up enough to contribute in any meaningful way to the groups damage?

Me and my guildies are far from super elitist epeeners but we've all done every dungeon enough times to have every monster set several times over, VDSA and all that stuff. We know what we're doing.
The same can't be said for a huge number of Pug groups who struggle as things are NOW, so what will this do for random queues and pledges when it goes live?

If making dungeons challenging again was the goal of these changes you succeeded but the thing is I and everyone else knows these changes weren't made to restore the challenge to PVE, they were made to cater to PvP whiners who can't Wrecking Blow to death someone holding block or kill a sorc with a shield up.

I agree that Heavy Armor needed a buff to its damaging capabilities, but that should never have been at the expense of the one passive that made it worthwhile for the dying Tank role.

Bracing MUST remain in the Heavy Armor passives. Take away Rapid Mending and put Wrath there instead, Rapid mending is the truly useless passive Heavy Armor has that nobody will miss.

Sadly I believe this is yet another unwanted, hated change that Zos will push through regardless of the community's pleas, and one that further consigns Tanks to the scrapheap.

Personofsecrets · April 2016

Well said Quadraxis

Nebthet78 · April 2016

ninjaguyman wrote: »

In general it seems that:
pve tanks really hate that they lost bracing for more weapon and spell damage. Why should a pve tank need more damage?.

This Exactly!!

As a PVE Tank, it is NOT my job to try to DPS the bosses. It's my job to keep the Boss and adds aggro'd to me so the DPS' can do the damage they need and the Healer can concentrate on healing and if someone needs to be rez'd the other player doesn't get killed in the process.

As a TANK, I don't care about having extra spell or weapon damage, it's not my role to damage the boss. I am also not one of those tanks that just stand there in one place and permablock. I block when needed. I am otherwise driving the boss away from the other players when needed if they have to take care of adds, or rez another player and bring it back in when ready. If you are doing a proper tanking job, you shouldn't just be standing in one spot permablocking. You should be actively moving and aware of where your party members are at all times.

Now, that doesn't mean that I don't help out with some damage. As a hybrid build I switch freely between magicka and stamina use and have one of each taunt on my bar (Puncture and Inner Fire). I have swallow soul to help keep my health up in between taunts, and Vigor if I get hit hard. I also use debilitate from time to time as well as sap essence due to the bonus it gives my allies. I switch between bats if I need a health boost and the healer is too far away, or I have Veil of Blades to put down when needed to help take a boss down quicker at the end.

This change to bracing means I am not going to be able to block when I need to. Stamina resources are hard as hell to keep up as it is and I have balanced out my build a lot to be able to compensate for the High cost of stamina abilities, blocking, cc breaking etc (which are going to be even higher now). This means the healer will be needing to throw shards much more often to compensate for that, which means they will have a harder time keeping the two DPS' healed.

I loved the fact when this game first came out that I could play the way I wanted to. My hybrid build was actually useful. I didn't have to be a min/maxer. I didn't have to use a specific armor set to be able to do my job. I could choose one that would enhance what I wanted to do and over the last couple of years I have been able to adapt to keeping it that way. There was a defined role for my playstyle that I was able to become pretty darned good at. But now, with the changes to bracing and the added stamina costs making it harder to mitigate the damage received because some DPS wants to wear heavy armor, I find myself at a point where I don't bother doing daily pledges or the weekly trials any more because I am sick and tired of having to recraft my end game gear over and over again to attempt to make up for the changes being made, which will just get nerfed in the next update again.

The only way this is going to be fixed is by allowing players to choose with passive morph they want. Wrath or Bracing, otherwise, many more players are going to have an even harder time finding a Tank to do dailies with.

Personofsecrets · April 2016

Thank you for stopping by @Nebthet78 . I really really really hope that @wrobel @ZOS_RichLambert and @ZOS_Finn didn't create this change with Cyrodiil in mind after past nerfs were heavily, and I mean heavily, criticized for being PVP nerfs that caused collateral damage to PVE.

ThatNeonZebraAgain · April 2016

Cathexis wrote: »

I think the idea is that you only need to block now when bone armor isn't active.

But if you can't activate bone armor, then you don't have any stamina to block with...

Spec magicka and use Harness Magicka as your damage shield of choice, then you can save all your stamina for blocking! That's what I do already with my Argonian magicka NB tank, now it'll just be more effective... or perhaps less effective since I will have to burn more magicka to use it since physical damage attacks will eat it up without returning magicka, and it will experience in 6 seconds...

ThatNeonZebraAgain · April 2016

Ishammael wrote: »

DDuke wrote: »

code65536 wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

For as long as Tavas and other group buffs exist, selfish sets, like black rose might as well not exist.

Furthermore, Black Rose is a set for stamina tanks. To suggest that Black Rose is a suitable solution to this problem is very narrow-minded.

Not necessarily a stamina set only... I'll have to do some calculations, but it gives both spell & weapon damage on the 5-piece.

Now, if the sustain from 5-piece is also worth more than one magicka regen bonus, it could be a decent alternative to Kagrenac for magicka tanks. Sure, you'd get a little bit less spell dmg/healing & one magicka bonus less, but if the sustain is worth it...

Black Rose sustain can be quickly calculated:

Constitution w/ 5pc heavy: ~1000 per 4s

Black Rose: +50% = 500 per 4s
Which is equivalent to 250 stam AND mana regen

The total Black Rose set is: HP/Stam/Stam/157dmg/250 mana regen/250 stam regen

Compared to Kag: HP/Mana/129 Mana regen/224 dmg

So yeah, its good.

The real question is... do I go Sturdy or Impen?

Too bad Black Rose doesn't have jewelry.

Sugaroverdose · April 2016

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Thank you for stopping by @Nebthet78 . I really really really hope that @wrobel @ZOS_RichLambert and @ZOS_Finn didn't create this change with Cyrodiil in mind after past nerfs were heavily, and I mean heavily, criticized for being PVP nerfs that caused collateral damage to PVE.

zerosingularity · April 2016

I wonder if the devs will ever chime in on this thread. Maybe if we add another 30 pages...

ninjaguyman · April 2016

Nebthet78 wrote: »

ninjaguyman wrote: »

In general it seems that:
pve tanks really hate that they lost bracing for more weapon and spell damage. Why should a pve tank need more damage?.

This Exactly!!

As a PVE Tank, it is NOT my job to try to DPS the bosses. It's my job to keep the Boss and adds aggro'd to me so the DPS' can do the damage they need and the Healer can concentrate on healing and if someone needs to be rez'd the other player doesn't get killed in the process.

As a TANK, I don't care about having extra spell or weapon damage, it's not my role to damage the boss. I am also not one of those tanks that just stand there in one place and permablock. I block when needed. I am otherwise driving the boss away from the other players when needed if they have to take care of adds, or rez another player and bring it back in when ready. If you are doing a proper tanking job, you shouldn't just be standing in one spot permablocking. You should be actively moving and aware of where your party members are at all times.

Now, that doesn't mean that I don't help out with some damage. As a hybrid build I switch freely between magicka and stamina use and have one of each taunt on my bar (Puncture and Inner Fire). I have swallow soul to help keep my health up in between taunts, and Vigor if I get hit hard. I also use debilitate from time to time as well as sap essence due to the bonus it gives my allies. I switch between bats if I need a health boost and the healer is too far away, or I have Veil of Blades to put down when needed to help take a boss down quicker at the end.

This change to bracing means I am not going to be able to block when I need to. Stamina resources are hard as hell to keep up as it is and I have balanced out my build a lot to be able to compensate for the High cost of stamina abilities, blocking, cc breaking etc (which are going to be even higher now). This means the healer will be needing to throw shards much more often to compensate for that, which means they will have a harder time keeping the two DPS' healed.

I loved the fact when this game first came out that I could play the way I wanted to. My hybrid build was actually useful. I didn't have to be a min/maxer. I didn't have to use a specific armor set to be able to do my job. I could choose one that would enhance what I wanted to do and over the last couple of years I have been able to adapt to keeping it that way. There was a defined role for my playstyle that I was able to become pretty darned good at. But now, with the changes to bracing and the added stamina costs making it harder to mitigate the damage received because some DPS wants to wear heavy armor, I find myself at a point where I don't bother doing daily pledges or the weekly trials any more because I am sick and tired of having to recraft my end game gear over and over again to attempt to make up for the changes being made, which will just get nerfed in the next update again.

The only way this is going to be fixed is by allowing players to choose with passive morph they want. Wrath or Bracing, otherwise, many more players are going to have an even harder time finding a Tank to do dailies with.

Nice idea about choosing a morph for a passive, but if this were a thing, i would hope that it would be pretty easy to switch between morphs. Would kinda suck to have to respec between bracing and wrath for a bunch of gold every time i wanted to switch between pve and pvp. Would be easier to just have both at the same time. Then again maybe i could just roll a new toon with the removal of vet ranks.

But in defense of the "dps who wants to where heavy armor." I think this type of character applies mostly to pvp. Those who want maximum damage potential should just run with light or medium in pve. I doubt there will be some emergence of dedicated dd's in pve who run full heavy, theres no point in a pve dps to have high mitigation when a light armor user without a shield can get by with situational awareness and staying out of red. But those who wanted a little more damage in heavy armor(such as me) in pvp aren't trying to make pure dps burst builds or anything. I just want some actual killing potential while maintaining a good amount of upfront tankiness. And to be honest, i think that zos created the wrath passive with pvp in mind, not pve. Wrath does not benefit the pve tank in any way other than maybe giving them a little more heals from the spell/weapon damage. But 200 spell damage is definitely welcome in pvp, where u don't HAVE to be permablocking 24/7.

AhPook_Is_Here · April 2016

As a guy who does almost nothing but tank in PVE, on a DK, Sorc, NB and Templar, I really don't mind the change that much. I will say I haven't bought any of the DLCs but I have tanked everything inside the old content from hard-mode speed runs of SO to Wayrest sewers. The nerf makes sense to me because basically i don't need to block anymore on any of that content. Blocking is almost like RPing. SO and some of the trials being the few exceptions where blocking some attacks is required to live. Even then the only fight I think you really need to keep block up a majority of the fight is Manta upper, and you can still weave a few heavy attacks in on the AOE phase. With shards, random synergies, GDB and pot rotation keeping your STA bar near max isn't that hard even on that fight. I tanked it with a NB a few weeks back in junk, hand-me-downs vr14 stuff an it was still easy with CP allocations. If you are really built to tank and not to tank-dps like a build you might want to run on VDSA if you aren't just running 3 dps 1 heals, then you really don't need that much block cost reduction. I run 20 in the CP tree, and honestly, it's a waste.

Ajaxduo · April 2016

When I noticed the removal of Bracing and them adding Wrath I was like...wat. ZoS could you at least replace/or integrate the Rapid Mending passive with Bracing or a new passive which reduces the cost of block by 3% per piece of heavy armor equipped? Devs? Somebody?

Oompuh · April 2016

@Wrobel The Combat Specialist
@ZOS_RichLambert The dungeons lead who asked tanks what we want

We provided our feedback and would like some of yours, please.

Jakhajay · April 2016

zerosingularity wrote: »

I wonder if the devs will ever chime in on this thread. Maybe if we add another 30 pages...

Didn't work for Templars in the TG patch

On topic, ZOS should never have mucked about with Bracing except to buff it. What we got was a replacement which is totally useless in PVE and NONE of the other changes make up for the nerf after nerf.

And ZOS wonders why there are not enough tanks in the group finder when they pull sh*t like this

Razorback174 · April 2016

Oompuh wrote: »

@Wrobel The Combat Specialist
@ZOS_RichLambert The dungeons lead who asked tanks what we want

We provided our feedback and would like some of yours, please.

I think we all would like some feedback, but I highly doubt we'll get any. Just like the official feedback thread for templars in TG. 75 pages (yes, 75) before any official dev response, and even then they dismissed all feedback with the wave of a hand and told us to deal with it.

They did it there, they did it in IC with blocking, and they will most definitely do it again here.

I think I give up. I'm sick to death of this DPS meta.

STEVIL · April 2016

Nebthet78 wrote: »

ninjaguyman wrote: »

In general it seems that:
pve tanks really hate that they lost bracing for more weapon and spell damage. Why should a pve tank need more damage?.

This Exactly!!

As a PVE Tank, it is NOT my job to try to DPS the bosses. It's my job to keep the Boss and adds aggro'd to me so the DPS' can do the damage they need and the Healer can concentrate on healing and if someone needs to be rez'd the other player doesn't get killed in the process.
.

but heavy armor is not just for tanks. its supposed to support a variety of styles. Unlike the other armor types which had offensive, defensive and sustain components, heavy had no offensive element which pigeon-holed it into non-offensive roles more than the others. Adding the damage element pushes HA more in line with the game's core concept of varietyin builds.

this patch may be impacting the current meta a lot but thats not necessarily a bad thing in itself.

Day 5 of playtest and the sun came up in spite of the playtest. ZOS did not trigger armageddon... yet.

Clarity is a flower that smells bad.

Personofsecrets · April 2016

@wrobel @zos_richlambert @ZOS_Finn

You have us lose half of our CP value into block cost reduction to diminished returns. 25% cp reduction only really grants 12.5% of actual reduction. On top of that later champion points are worth less than earlier invested ones. Inherently embedded into the CP system is diminished by half returns. Wasnt one diminished return enough?

Tanks, they have us paying out of our noses just to do out job. Then we get @Wrobel tell us that there is an issue with tanks in group finder.

Well no kidding! We are getting clobbered to just do our job. Of course people arent going to tank when the role is getting clobbered again abd again.

You know what I say? Tanks first. No more of these bad trades. We are going to make tanking great and become steel walls again. Tanks first from here on out.

AhPook_Is_Here wrote: »

As a guy who does almost nothing but tank in PVE, on a DK, Sorc, NB and Templar, I really don't mind the change that much. I will say I haven't bought any of the DLCs but I have tanked everything inside the old content from hard-mode speed runs of SO to Wayrest sewers. The nerf makes sense to me because basically i don't need to block anymore on any of that content. Blocking is almost like RPing. SO and some of the trials being the few exceptions where blocking some attacks is required to live. Even then the only fight I think you really need to keep block up a majority of the fight is Manta upper, and you can still weave a few heavy attacks in on the AOE phase. With shards, random synergies, GDB and pot rotation keeping your STA bar near max isn't that hard even on that fight. I tanked it with a NB a few weeks back in junk, hand-me-downs vr14 stuff an it was still easy with CP allocations. If you are really built to tank and not to tank-dps like a build you might want to run on VDSA if you aren't just running 3 dps 1 heals, then you really don't need that much block cost reduction. I run 20 in the CP tree, and honestly, it's a waste.

Holy smokes, somebody is still using GDB???

Personofsecrets · April 2016

Razorback174 wrote: »

Oompuh wrote: »

@Wrobel The Combat Specialist
@ZOS_RichLambert The dungeons lead who asked tanks what we want

We provided our feedback and would like some of yours, please.

I think we all would like some feedback, but I highly doubt we'll get any. Just like the officical feedback thread for templars in TG. 75 pages (yes, 75) before any official dev response, and even then they dismissed all feedback with the wave of a hand and told us to deal with it.

They did it there, they did it in IC with blocking, and they will most definitely do it again here.

I think I give up. I'm sick to death of this DPS meta.

@ZOS_RichLambert , that is despicable acting of the game developers if what this person says about templar feedback is true.

Personofsecrets · April 2016

@ZOS_MattFiror , after reading a players comment about 70 some pages of templar feedback being shrugged off, I have to ask you a question.

Can this be the players game too?

Maybe since you know, we pay for the DLCs, can we have some say in what happens and some compromise instead of getting nerfed or totally changed from patch to patch. On a serious note, why do your developers feel like a good developing strategy is to pull the rug out from under players every major patch?

"It's always funny how you design things with certain play styles in your head and then player just do what they want, which is great, it's why we make games like this." - @ZOS_MattFiror 2014

I guess it is fun to see players playing how they want, despite design intentions, until tanks decide that they want to be able to do their job and use block in an efficient way? Can't it be great that us tanks are so passionate about our role that we don't want to be nerfed? It would just be nice if blocking, a core game mechanic, felt good to use rather than like utter ***. Blocking just keeps going down the drain further and further. Very sad.

Personofsecrets · April 2016

Jakhajay wrote: »

zerosingularity wrote: »

I wonder if the devs will ever chime in on this thread. Maybe if we add another 30 pages...

Didn't work for Templars in the TG patch

On topic, ZOS should never have mucked about with Bracing except to buff it. What we got was a replacement which is totally useless in PVE and NONE of the other changes make up for the nerf after nerf.

And ZOS wonders why there are not enough tanks in the group finder when they pull sh*t like this

Don't worry, @Wrobel seemed to, based on his ESO Live statements, have plans of fixing group finder by making tanks not necessary. (I'm not trying to imply that they are necessary for any other reason than group finder requiring them by default)

SublimeSparo · April 2016

Are there any other mmo's on ps4. Growing tired of this one

Weesacs · April 2016

Im not quite sure the sentiment of the heavy armor pvpers is quite as unified. There are some pvpers who welcome the extra damage, and others who would have preferred to keep bracing in pvp. This is mainly a difference between the "pure" tanks/permablockers who don't care about damage and tanks who can take hits, but still get kills.

The straight up tank, and the tank that can do decent damage. Theres a lot of "lets bring back bracing the way it was before" and also "Lets keep the new wrath the way it is now." I saw a lot less "lets keep both play styles viable."

As i saw like once earlier in the thread, just combine the bracing and wrath passive in one, or add bracing in as an extra effect of another hvy armor passive. It wouldn't be OP or anything i guess. pve and pure tanks in pvp wouldn't really be affected by wrath if they don't care about damage and would keep their all important bracing passive. Heavy armor users who desire more damage from wrath can still have that as well.

Well said @ninjaguyman, and I complete agree with this. Why not keep both wrath and bracing to appease both styles of play? Isn't the aim of ESO about playing how we want to?

From a PvP perspective, if there are loads of enemies attacking you and your perma-blocking then your eventually going to die anyway - which is how it should be. However, in a 1v1 situation, and against perma-wrecking-blowers as an example, my counter to this is to perma-block. Why should I just roll over and die to the DPS gravy train? If bracing is removed then the DPS guys are going to beat me in 1v1 situations all day long. So I've just to bend over and take it like a ***?

Why does it always seem about DPS with you ZOS?

Also ZOS, you could take the courteous approach, do the decent thing and provide your CUSTOMERS with some feedback as to why these changes where implemented in the first place instead of ignoring us?

A 10.4k hit thread with over 440 comments is a hot topic which I think ZOS should definitely be commenting on.

Jade1986 · April 2016

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Thank you for stopping by @Nebthet78 . I really really really hope that @wrobel @ZOS_RichLambert and @ZOS_Finn didn't create this change with Cyrodiil in mind after past nerfs were heavily, and I mean heavily, criticized for being PVP nerfs that caused collateral damage to PVE.

This nerf damages pvp just as bad as pve, dont make this a pve v pvp debate. Both sides - HATE - this change. Even as a tanky dps HA sword and shield player I HATE this change, I am going to die SO much faster because of having to give up my impen traits and having a MUCH higher blocking cost. This is ESPECIALLY awful for the non CP campaigns. This change was made with CPs in mind, and without them, you might as well just not even block after the DB patch.

boundsy88 · April 2016

so im suppose to use heavy armor over light armor now for exactly what reason now? same block cost with more magic recovery and skill cost reduction. bracing was the only reason ANYBODY ever used heavy armor before. now we have to give up our tankiness just to use it. because we cant use impen on the traits. impen will always be the best damage mitigation and its now been taken away as an option for heavy armor

Cinbri · April 2016

if Sturdy wil lstay as it is now, there will be no reason to switch for it from Impenetrable

Teridaxus · April 2016

Even if they buff sturdy, the whole situation would be still bad.
Their revamped the traits so all of them be viable but if tanks are forced to run the same trait only, they missed their goal.

Weesacs · April 2016

laced wrote: »

Personofsecrets wrote: »

Thank you for stopping by @Nebthet78 . I really really really hope that @wrobel @ZOS_RichLambert and @ZOS_Finn didn't create this change with Cyrodiil in mind after past nerfs were heavily, and I mean heavily, criticized for being PVP nerfs that caused collateral damage to PVE.

This nerf damages pvp just as bad as pve, dont make this a pve v pvp debate. Both sides - HATE - this change. Even as a tanky dps HA sword and shield player I HATE this change, I am going to die SO much faster because of having to give up my impen traits and having a MUCH higher blocking cost. This is ESPECIALLY awful for the non CP campaigns. This change was made with CPs in mind, and without them, you might as well just not even block after the DB patch.

.

Weesacs · April 2016

This nerf damages pvp just as bad as pve, dont make this a pve v pvp debate. Both sides - HATE - this change. Even as a tanky dps HA sword and shield player I HATE this change, I am going to die SO much faster because of having to give up my impen traits and having a MUCH higher blocking cost. This is ESPECIALLY awful for the non CP campaigns. This change was made with CPs in mind, and without them, you might as well just not even block after the DB patch.

Agreed. This x1000. (I gave u an awesome). Some people just don't realise how important impenetrable is especially in a very CC-entric place like Cyrodill.

You also make a great point in regards the non-vet campaigns where the reduced blocking from CP won't be available - I hadnt thought about that before - those guys will be particularly affected by this.

hrothbern · April 2016

Constitution needs in my opinion still a further buff:

Comparing Resource sustain between HA and LA,MA:

The Constitution passive gives a flat recovery, whereas LA give mainly a percentual cost reduction and a smaller flat recovery.
In order to make a comparison, this wall of Math is therefore aimed at calculating for what amount of ability costs there is a break even between HA and LA,MA.
For abilities higher than that break even, the percentual cost reduction of LA and MA will always favor LA and MA above HA.

Important note:
The HA Constitution passive gives both Magicka as Stamina restoration.
IF you use only Magicka or only Stamina abilities, the hybrid recovery purpose of Constitution will NEVER be really valuable for you !

The first assumption to be made is how to handle the hybrid resource regain of Constitution (Mag + Stam) so that we get a "like for like" with the mono Resource sustain of LA or MA.

The easiest way to do that is by conforming to the already by ZOS used method for hybrid features.
Those are Food (tri-stat, two-stat and one-stat), Drinks (same) and for example the bonus for Spell & Weapon Damage used in the Black Rose set.

If we normalise the values of Food and Drinks, and put the one-stat value at 100,
you get for Food:
one-stat: 100/---/---
two-stat: 80/80/---
tri-stat: 67/67/67
The same ratios are used for Drinks.
So the total stat increase effect for Food is for tri-stat 200, compared to 160 of the two-stat and 100 of the one-stat.
Hybrid and tanky-Tank builds use tri-stat. Focussed/stacking DPS/HPS builds use two-stat.
And apparently everybody of the playerbase is comfortable with this method of giving BOTH dimishing returns PER stat for the more Hybrid Food, but also giving a higher overall total.

The same happens more or less with the hybrid Black Rose set if we compare that for example with the Kagrenac's hope set.
Black Rose has a 5 piece bonus for a damage effect of 154 more Spell AND Weapon Power, besides a second effect of increasing Constitution.
Kagrenac's hope has a 5 piece bonus for a Damage effect of 224 more Spell Power, besides a second effect of the 25% rezz time and the Magicka regain when an ally is rezzed.
If you divide the 154 by the 224 you get 68%.
So if you normalise that, you either get the one-stat bonus of 100 or two times 68 for Mag and Stam. (there is no Health Power)

So....
Ignoring Health and Health recovery aspects of Food and Drinks, because Constitution is about Magicka and Stamina only, 2x67 should be converted in 1x100
ZOS has done the same with the Black Rose set. They applied 2x68 in Black Rose instead of 1x100 in Kagenac.

Applying this to convert the two-stat Constitution bonus to a one stat, I think it is justified to say that we must take 67-68 as base to convert Constitution to a one stat recovery.
So if Constitution gives 186 per piece per 4 seconds of Stamina AND Magicka.
Then the converted value is 279 Magicka OR Stamina per piece per 4 seconds.
That is: Converted to 1 stat Constitution gives during combat per piece of HA Armor 70 Magicka per second OR 70 Stamina per second.

If you take for example one piece of LA, you get 4% Magicka Recovery, during combat and out of combat and you get 3% Cost reduction.
When your base Magicka Recovery would be around 700, the 4% per piece deliver 28 Magicka Recovery. When you have 71 CP in Arcanist for 20% more recovery, you get 34 Magicka Recovery per piece of LA, which is 17 Magicka per second.

Assuming for the sake of simplicity that you cast 1 ability per second:
If the 3% Cost reduction from one piece of LA gives (70 -17) = 53 Magicka Cost reduction, you have a break even between Constitution and LA passives.
1 divided by 3% = 33.3. So we have a this break even when abilities used have an average cost of 1766.
Assuming that you have put 100 CP, the rest of your 171 CP, in Magician for 16% Cost reduction:
The break even takes place at (1766/84%) = 2102.

Concluding:
LA or MA are better in sustain than HA, if the average base value costs of your abilities per second casted are higher than 2102 !

In my opinion that break even point has to be shifted up from 2102 to 2700 minimal.
That means that the to one stat converted Constitution must deliver 86 Magicka or Stamina per second.
Or that the unconverted two-stat Constitution must deliver 57.6 Magicka AND Stamina per second.
This is 230 per piece instead of the PTS value of 186 per piece, or a 24% increase of the PTS value.

But my suggestion to increase the PTS Constitution value is ofc a personal opinion and open for debate, where the break even ability costs used in practice are pivotal.

Here below the PTS base costs of some abilities, which are BTW increased compared to live !

Puncturing Sweeps: 2952
Reflective Light: 2700
BOL: 4590
Grand Healing: 3510
Regeneration: 2160
Force Shock:2700
Uppercut: 3240
Strife: 1367
Veiled Strike morphs: 2700 Magicka or 2160 Stamina
Sap Essence: 3240
Burning Embers: 1350 Magicka
Lava Whip: 2700
Dragon Blood/Inhale/Earthen Heart: >4000
CrystalFragments: 4050 (2025)
Liquid Lightning: 3510
Conjured Ward: 3510