Biro123 wrote: »

The only possible reasoning I can come up with is to kill DW sorc builds. If sorcs are forced into staff-only builds, it makes it a LOT easier for Zos to balance around the much more limited gear combinations available.

Basically, they don't want sorcs to be able to go 5/5/2 outside of the few specific 5-piece bonuses that let them (ie Lich/Spriggarns/BSW etc.)

Builds are gonna be VERY samey and VERY vanilla.. I liked my DW sorc build.. I thought it was unique, effective while not OP and suited my playstyle. Took quite a bit of thought to get right and still had a lot of room for improvement in terms of grind for it.. Now I guess I gotta run the same as everyone else. Like I say - makes it easy for ZoS to balance it.

But PLEASE ZoS. If I'm forced to use crushing shock - do something with the awful graphic and sounds effects of the skill. Especially sound...

I'm a destro sorc but I feel my playstyle is more similar to a DW sorc because I've never used force pulse in pvp, I just use the destro for light/heavy attacks between skills. I've always hated using force pulse on players, I prefer lining up burst with heavy attacks, curse, wrath, frags and streak. The timing of curse was just right for this. I'm not complaining about the force pulse buff, ranged magicka builds needed another tool against DKs, but this buff combined with the curse nerf feels like zos just took my skill bar off me and edited it themselves. If curse had remained unchanged I would still feel like I had a choice over whether to use force pulse, but not now; the choice has been made for me.

rustic_potato wrote: »

So magsorcs are out dpsing stam dks on single targets and people still complain on these forums that they got a nerf.. I wonder how many of these players actually tested on the PTS.

Try magsorc in pvp and then tell me this v. curse redesign is not the most idiotic thing they could have come up with.

I will say this about the Curse Change, i no longer have to choose between it and the pet Curse, which is nice *grin*

Biro123 wrote: »

The only possible reasoning I can come up with is to kill DW sorc builds. If sorcs are forced into staff-only builds, it makes it a LOT easier for Zos to balance around the much more limited gear combinations available.

Basically, they don't want sorcs to be able to go 5/5/2 outside of the few specific 5-piece bonuses that let them (ie Lich/Spriggarns/BSW etc.)

Builds are gonna be VERY samey and VERY vanilla.. I liked my DW sorc build.. I thought it was unique, effective while not OP and suited my playstyle. Took quite a bit of thought to get right and still had a lot of room for improvement in terms of grind for it.. Now I guess I gotta run the same as everyone else. Like I say - makes it easy for ZoS to balance it.

But PLEASE ZoS. If I'm forced to use crushing shock - do something with the awful graphic and sounds effects of the skill. Especially sound...

I do not get it, why do mmorpgs keep going down this road of giving less build variety, hardly anyone I ever met in an mmorpg wants less build options, and I mean no one, it literally drives people away.

I am very curious behind the reasoning behind this because to be honest to me it looks like "Oh crap, we have to do something with the sorcerer skills" too.

There is literally nothing that needed to be nerfed for sorcs, NOTHING!
I truelly love(d) sorc class and have two max levelled ones my main will always be my breton sorc because she's the one that did everything in the game.

[EDIT: Removed for bait] Beat ya to it

To end bit positive, thanks for the improvements
We can now stay home with our extra healthy pets!

I really feel like they should add the functionality of haunting curse to daedric prey and leave velocious curse untouched.

It has happened a couple of times now that ZOS changed the "popular" morph choice of a skill in the effort to make the unpopular choice more appealing (anyone remember stamina skill conversion suprise attack, unstable flame, crushing shock dmg nerf, etcpp). That´s a bad way to balance in my opinion.
Are you going to convert fragments to stamina next in the attempt to make people use crystal blast?

Edit: I don´t think haunting curse is necessarily a net nerf for sorcs - for most it´s most likely going to be a buff. But i will miss the timing windows old curse created.

Edit2: @Wrobel @ZOS_GinaBruno every dot retains some functionality against templars ability to cleanse negative effects. 6s curse duration guarantees a templar will never get dmged by curse - could you look into having some sort of dot protection for curse or a partial dmg on cleanse funcionality to put it on par with any other damage over time?

What if the tanky pet tanked really well and the dps pet did 20kdps..then ppl would like pet builds

I'm really disappointed dark deal didn't get toned down.. I say that as a proud owner of 2 sorcerers... either decrease movement speed, increase cast time or adjust the returns (and get rid of the resource return when you get interrupted).. or most preferably, a combination of these

I really hate manasorcs in PvP. But still, even I see there was no point to nerf Curse. No one even asked for this. Why would you do that?
1. Leave Curse as it is. Don't touch it. You're breaking them.
2. Nerf Overload with max ultimate number? Again, for what purpose? I don't see anything being wrong with it.
3. Hurricane. It was not the problem with stamina sorcs. No reason to nerf it. Again...
3. About pets. I know, you try to make pets useful. But just become more annoying.
4. Atronach. I personally think it was already pretty strong against melee players, and now it becomes more brutal? Uh... Who asked for this one? Put your hands up!
6. Dark Conversion. The only thing that needed to be rebalanced is not touched. This one needs changes. It should still consume magicka, if interrupted, or give less healing, oh, Gods, there were tons of suggestions already, why did you let this one stay?
To summ it up: you changed what was alright already and left the most argued and unbalanced thing to be, as it is. Good job, ZOS.

rustic_potato wrote: »

So magsorcs are out dpsing stam dks on single targets and people still complain on these forums that they got a nerf.. I wonder how many of these players actually tested on the PTS.

Lol what? Show me a parse where stam DK is inferior to mag Sorc in pure single target, self buffed situation. AKA Bloodspawn or the DPS dummy. Then I'll believe you. Haunting Curse does pull some respectable DPS. But a 42% nerf out of no where is still a nerf.

So I did some testing yesterday.
While everyone freaked out about Haunting Curse, I thought it would even benefit my build at first.
But some testing clearly showed me, it does not.

As I've read through the patch notes for the destro staff (unreflectable force pulse, passives increase dmg etc) I though it makes up for the lost damage from Velocious Curse. While overall the damage seems higher, the problem is the now missing burst potential that Velocious Curse offered, that is most important in PvP.

Example:
In a 1vs1 situation the reliable (unblockable/undodgeable) damage of curse simply doesnt come in frequent enough, 3.5s was almost perfect for that. You could combine that with so many things to build up some burst like Mages Wrath (4sec duration), chrystal frag, Meteor (little delay), soul assault (also lasts 4sec) and so on. Its an absolute PvP Issue, if you have no good burst, especially on the sorc class.
But a templar can easily outheal or simply purge haunting curse, where Velocious happens faster and more often and therefore can take them by suprise.
A Sorc cant spam shields fast enough at some point, if you keep curses on him that explode after 3.5sec, with the 6sec ones there is too much time between each explosion, too much time to react.
And a DK? Until now, a DK could reflect almost anything strong you had back at you, with the exception of curses exploding on him every 3.5sec, that was, what made a fight against DK's possible.

Ok enough about that. But what about 1vs X?
Well, what I loved about the short time for velocious curse was, I could switch my target in the middle of a fight very fast, when I noticed Player A was annyoing but Player B was the dangerous one, setting up a burst or something, I myself could start the burst on the right target in a quick manner, I could react way better to situations overall. This also doesnt work now, its super annoying the way it is now with 6 seconds. A second explosion 6 seconds after that simply doesnt make up for it, when im probably dead already.


Now, lets take a look at the changes that happened to the Sorcerer class in this patch only

- (New) Summons resistances have been doubled
- (New) The Atronach Summon does 25% more damage
- (New) Volatile Familiar's special ability lasts 4 seconds longer now. This means the ability ticks 2 more times and the stun is after 8 seconds, not 4 seconds.
- (New) Twillights Health has been doubled.
- (New) Haunting Curse is replacing Velocious Curse.



I am confident to say now, that ZOS wants to turn the sorcerer into a pet based class.
Its always been going into this direction, but this patch was very obvious.
The Haunting Curse change was, what made it so clear to me.

Nobody really asked for these changes, but the worst part is, they ruin builds that people loved to play and always played, just to force pets onto people.
Velocious Curse was a must have for dual-wield sorcerers because they couldnt weave with a staff(they dont have one) so they can put some pressure on the enemy - thats gone. Staff users loved that ability so they could stand a chance against BoL spamming templars or perma wing flapping DK's who effectively took away any option to attack (too much counted as projectiles, and which didnt, was too weak, take mages wrath for example).

I will give you an example of what ZOS wants people to run:

Gear and Weapons:
- Possible Monster Sets: Shadowrend, Infernal Guardian, Maw of the Infernal
- Necropotence, Desert Rose, Arch Mage, Seducer
- Any fitting 5pc heavy Armor, for example Black Rose (since u wont need much regen and cost reduction from Light Armor with this build + passive makes up anyway )
1x Shock Staff (for heavy attack spamming as main ability)
1x Resto Staff (same as above, maybe for healing ward, too)

Main Bar:
Bound Armaments
Twillight
Familiar
Ward
Power Surge/Mages Wrath/Encase
Ult: Atronach

Backbar:
Bound Armaments
Twillight
Familiar
Haunting Curse
Power Surge/ Daedric Mines
Ult: Overload


You can see, a "Togglemancer". It was always going that direction. And now by ruining velocious curse as one of the most important abilites for "non pet users" (the absolute majority of Mag Sorc), it perfectly fits as a backbar skill, since you dont have much space on your Skillbars anymore (because your pets + other toggles need space right?).

To sum it up:
A extremely dumbed down build, where pets and your heavy attack spam are the focus and the goal is to outsustain/outlast the enemy.
With the change to Velocious Curse, you now have the option to chose between 2 different Curses, depending on which works better for your pet build.
Daedric Prey for increased pet damage? Or save ressources and backbar the new Haunting Curse? Your "choice".

If we really want to go the Haunting Curse path, atleast make it 4sec explosion -> 6 sec explosion, so those who still want to activate it themselves every 4sec can do that, and others who want to backbar and forget it, also can do that.


What I wished would have happened:
- Light Armor gets some deserved buffs
- Destro Staves improve (they did, so its okay)
- Chrystal Blast becoming interesting
- Combining both Atronach Morphs into 1 and redo the 2nd morph to grant the caster Minor Berserk as long as the Atro is alive
- Slight Damage buff to Mages Fury
- Bound Armaments working like Inner Light, finally offering some active ability
- Hardened Ward duration to 8s
- Empowered Ward to have a meaningful buff (minor magickareg is not)
- Lightning Flood to be a real alternative to Liquid Lightning (very unused)
- Ball of Lightning to be a real Alternative to Streak, or atleast have a little longer duration (also very unused)
- Passives to work better with some active abilities, instead of just passively increasing dmg by X/recovery by Y or Pets by Z.
- Combining Haunting Curse and Daedric Prey into one Morph, while leaving Velocious Curse as it is. Keeps both playstyles alive and even improves one (in Daedric Preys situation).

@ZOS_GinaBruno

I wanted to ask, if the next pts update will include leveld guilds abilities (mages/fighters) aswell as a maxed vampire skill line and maxed vampire abilities? I'd love to test the new batswarm morph, but simply cant on the templates.

I think the destro staff changes could give us more dmg than the curse nerf take away. (PVE)

Frontbar: Inferno Staff for single target
Backbar: Lightning Staff for AoE

The question is, got Blockade and Liquid the 8% AoE Bonus from Lightning Staffs?