Why are Stamina setups bad for Trials? (PvE)

Alcast · January 2017

Hello, now in this thread I want to explain why Magicka is superior to Stamina Builds in Trial environments. I want to show you why it is basically pointless to bring Stamina setups into a Trial.

Now there is changes that affect all builds, like the aggressive warhorn or nerf. However, we all know stamina setups are built upon crit chance and increased critical damage taken.

Stamina Builds used to have a higher single target dps and that is mostly WHY we brought them into trials. However, nowadays Magicka basically gets the same Single Target dps as Stamina setups, also magicka has like 2x the AoE damage output. So why bother bringing stamina setups? There is even magicka builds that basically get the same single target dps from RANGED whereas a Stamina build has to stay melee to actually to any decent dmg at all.

Now ZOS keeps nerfing Stamina setups:
-MSA Nerf last patch (which I agree with, because Stam Setups are relying too much on those, but its only way to stay competitive)
-Aggressive Warhorn nerf
-Rearming Trap nerf (Dmg and inc crit dmg)
-Less Gearchoices viable due to inc crit modifier change
-Bow damage got slightly buffed

So why again does stamina underperform in trials?
No fake health (Harness Magicka, it is so much easier to stay alive on a magicka setup)
Much lower AoE dps compared to magicka setups (Destro Ulti for Magicka setups op) 70-80% in Trials we are fighting Trash
Approx. same Single Target DPS as Magicka setups.

Maelstrom Weapons
The only reason Stamina builds come even close to good Single target DPS is due to Malestrom Weapons, which I also think is not good. Basically you need those weapons to achieve good dps on most setups. Without MSA Weapons Stamina Builds prolly could not even f... Roleplay mkay.

Take Away MSA weapons and Proc sets and stamina would both suck in PvE and PvP. So stamina builds dmg is artifically increased through MSA waeps(PvE) or Proc sets (PvP). Take away those two things and you will most likely end up with garbage.

Magicka is in any way superior and its just pointless to bring stamina setups into competitive Trial groups.

How to fix this? A lot of suggestions have been made over the past few months. I am not gonna list up any again bc it does not matter anyway, hence why am I even writing this lol?

DPShiro · January 2017

I agree with the above.
They should be viable in some way, make them king of ST fights again, then maybe this will change idk.

They also need more support than magicka DDs (sets, debuffs etc) and that won't be worth it either if we only take 1 stam into Trials.

FeaR Turbo · January 2017

Alcast wrote: »

I am not gonna list up any again bc it does not matter anyway, hence why am I even writing this lol?

YOU WROTE THIS FOR ME AND ALL THE STAMINA BOYZ OUT THERE.

Every point 100% True. Like How can i invest so much time and money and gear grinding. To only be neglected and removed from all trial groups. NOT TALKING ABOUT CLASSES, talking about a whole fkin spec LOL

austinwalter87ub17_ESO · January 2017

Alcast wrote: »

Hello, now in this thread I want to explain why Magicka is superior to Stamina Builds in Trial environments. I want to show you why it is basically pointless to bring Stamina setups into a Trial.

Now there is changes that affect all builds, like the aggressive warhorn or nerf. However, we all know stamina setups are built upon crit chance and increased critical damage taken.

Stamina Builds used to have a higher single target dps and that is mostly WHY we brought them into trials. However, nowadays Magicka basically gets the same Single Target dps as Stamina setups, also magicka has like 2x the AoE damage output. So why bother bringing stamina setups? There is even magicka builds that basically get the same single target dps from RANGED whereas a Stamina build has to stay melee to actually to any decent dmg at all.

Now ZOS keeps nerfing Stamina setups:
-MSA Nerf last patch (which I agree with, because Stam Setups are relying too much on those, but its only way to stay competitive)
-Aggressive Warhorn nerf
-Rearming Trap nerf (Dmg and inc crit dmg)
-Less Gearchoices viable due to inc crit modifier change
-Bow damage got slightly buffed

So why again does stamina underperform in trials?
No fake health (Harness Magicka, it is so much easier to stay alive on a magicka setup)
Much lower AoE dps compared to magicka setups (Destro Ulti for Magicka setups op) 70-80% in Trials we are fighting Trash
Approx. same Single Target DPS as Magicka setups.

Maelstrom Weapons
The only reason Stamina builds come even close to good Single target DPS is due to Malestrom Weapons, which I also think is not good. Basically you need those weapons to achieve good dps on most setups. Without MSA Weapons Stamina Builds prolly could not even f... Roleplay mkay.

Take Away MSA weapons and Proc sets and stamina would both suck in PvE and PvP. So stamina builds dmg is artifically increased through MSA waeps(PvE) or Proc sets (PvP). Take away those two things and you will most likely end up with garbage.

Magicka is in any way superior and its just pointless to bring stamina setups into Trial groups.

How to fix this? A lot of suggestions have been made over the past few months. I am not gonna list up any again bc it does not matter anyway, hence why am I even writing this lol?

Perhaps Stamina needs to bring an element of utility to trials which is impossible to be without and impossible to get elsewhere? That way stamina is not sought solely for its damage.

Zagnut123Zagnut123 · January 2017

Thank you for articulating this in the way you did. This next patch will hit someone like me hard I only have stam toons and work 12 hr days so I can't exactly make a new toon at the drop of the hat. I could always race change to be more viable but in this case id rather not spend money on it. Gone are the days of my 50k parses... Until stam rises again

Anhedonie · January 2017

You already know this is pointless, so why create this thread in the first place?
Or are you halfway in denial phase? Zenimax already proved that they should have been named Zenidoesntgiveanyfux Online.

On a more serious and less offtopic note: stamina and magicka both are in a desperate need of balancing. Builds need to be optional, but useful. It should be a matter of choice and taste, not effectiveness. And while I prefer magicka builds, I don't like when balance shifts in favour one over another. Lack of build diversity, playstyles and choices kinda sucks.

I remember when everybody was running around in Aether, was vampire mDK, put all points into health stat, used crit to abuse ult generation and there was no build diversity at all. It was awful. And the worst part is PTS patch looks really similar.

mr_wazzabi · January 2017

Maybe if they didnt revert the planned bone shield change to scale off stamina, stam builds would be in a much better place.

No shield, only major evasion and vigor, which is a good heal, but won't protect you against high damage attacks like a crematorial guard's fire breath.

Strider_Roshin · January 2017

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Strider_Roshin · January 2017

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Maybe if they didnt revert the planned bone shield change to scale off stamina, stam builds would be in a much better place.

No shield, only major evasion and vigor, which is a good heal, but won't protect you against high damage attacks like a crematorial guard's fire breath.

I doubt that would do anything since they'll still dish out subpar AoE damage.

Stamina should have the superior DPS if magicka is going to have the superior survivability.

mr_wazzabi · January 2017

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

FeaR Turbo · January 2017

RIP ALL STAMINA CLASSES

RIP BLACK GOKU THE STAMINA SORC.
RIP THE 64K PARSE DREAM

http://imgur.com/a/E7ikj

FeaR Turbo · January 2017

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Maybe if they didnt revert the planned bone shield change to scale off stamina, stam builds would be in a much better place.

No shield, only major evasion and vigor, which is a good heal, but won't protect you against high damage attacks like a crematorial guard's fire breath.

I doubt that would do anything since they'll still dish out subpar AoE damage.

Stamina should have the superior DPS if magicka is going to have the superior survivability.

AT LEAST GIVE US SINGLE TARGET OR SOMETHING. WE ARE FORCED MELEE? SO WHY NOT HAVE MORE SINGLE TARGET BOSS DAMAGE? O.o

Asmael · January 2017

FeaR Turbo wrote: »

RIP ALL STAMINA CLASSES

RIP BLACK GOKU THE STAMINA SORC.
RIP THE 64K PARSE DREAM

http://imgur.com/a/E7ikj

Not even 40k STDPS?

Ah, L2Stamina issue.

Also, because it's relevant to the topic at hand, here iz diz one's analysiz of stamina VS magicka in 12-men trialz:

I can absolutely understand the reasoning behind the changes, but I don't agree with the changes themselves, as there are quite a few collateral victims.

I'll be blunt: there isn't a single reason to bring a stamina damage dealer (DD) in a trial next patch. Not. A. Single. One. We have 0 buffs to look forward to, only nerfs, while magicka gets the extra 8% STDPS (single target DPS) or AoE DPS based on staff used, so they have some nice theorycrafting going on for next patch. For stamina, the change to bow simply won't work. The current best stamina setup will not change, and it doesn't benefit from this change at all.

That being said: I want to go over the current PvE balance of stamina / magicka in the current patch, and how things will change with the PTS, and most importantly: why.

DDs can be evaluted thru multiple angles: survivability, AoE potency, single target potency, cleave damage, melee / ranged, sustain, utility and survivability. I'll go through each of these points for both stamina and magicka.

AoE potency

In the current patch, we have 2 main stamina DDs seeing competitive use: DKs and sorcerers, who happen to the stamina DDs with the highest AoE potency of all stamina classes. This is a first point, because it defines your capability of destroying packs of mobs, which is critical to a group, since it represents approximately 50%~ of a trial's opposition.

Stamina DKs rely on Standard to buff up their AoE capabilities. It is getting nerfed with next patch.
Stamina sorcs rely on Hurricane as well as strong damage dealing passives. Hurricane is getting nerfed patch.
Stamina nightblades have only passives, as Power Extraction is a weaker version of Steel Tornado.
Stamina templars have only passives, as Biting jabs has a very small AoE.

Clearing tactics for trash packs rely on the careful use of ultimates and positioning to minimize the time required. The introduction of the Destro ult has increased magicka's potential in this regard, as you'll not always get the opportunity to stack up mobs in an efficient enough manner to make Meteor worthwhile (at least not as much as the destro ultimate).

As it currently stands, for a pack burn, magicka DPS is overall higher than stamina. The strongest stamina option is stam DK with Standard and caltrops, which can actually compete with magicka options as it currently. Seeing a 25% nerf to Standard's damage buff (15% = 20% * ( 1 - 0.25 )) is going to increase the gap in terms of maximum AoE potential between the specs.

Other point: caltrops see its use limited due the stacking made impossible. I'm absolutely aware of how messed up things would be in PvP if this were to be stackable again, so I'm not going to suggest that.

For short: the next patch is a rather small nerf to stamina potency, magicka will remain on a rather similar ground. This is not what I'd consider the most critical, since stamina builds are not currently used for their AoE potency anyway.

Single Target potency

THIS, is why stamina is no more competitive next patch. Preliminar tests of magicka single target DPS has shown either similar results or an increase. Stamina is taking a pretty huge hit in this regard, as there is no extra 8% single target option coming for them. One Tamriel already reduced the gap quite a bit, next patch will remove it completely.

To go over the current stamina options:

Stamina DKs currently have the highest single target DPS ingame. This is going to be reduced both the overall stamina nerf, but also the Standard nerf.
Stamina sorcerers and stamina nightblades are on a rather even ground. Excluding the overall nerfs, sorcerers will do very slighty less with the Hurricane change (nothing significant otherwise for NBs)
Stamina templars... with no significant class ultimate, passives outclassed by sorcerers, jabs being an "overall good, master of none" ability, they are lacking if they solely use Biting Jabs. Drastically lacking.

This is the most critical part, as Single Target DPS is currently stamina DDs' niche. If you remove it, you remove the last reason to have stamina DDs in competitive groups.

Single target DPS is required, as it allows groups to help skipping mechanics. Their (stamina DDs) sole purpose in raid is to shorten boss fights.

If you want to remove the gap between magicka and stamina, you'll need to change something else. If you don't, I hope you invested a few skill points in role playing for your stamina sorc.

Cleave damage

Cleave damage can be defined as "damage dealt around a target while specifically focusing this target". To make this clear: If a magicka sorcerer focuses a boss, he's going to use Liquid Lightning, Elemental Blockade, Velocious Curse (

), Force Pulse and Crystal Fragments.

The "Cleave" damage part is the damage dealt to adds by using Liquid Lightning, Elemental Blockade and Velocious curse.

The interesting part is that, when comparing magicka vs stamina parses, stamina has highly "focused" damage. Their cleave damage is extremely low (for a 56k parse as a stam DK, my cleave damage was 4k, which means 52k DPS was done on the boss).

When looking at current stamina builds:

DKs have extremely low cleave damage. They can help it a bit with Caltrops and Noxious Breath, altho due to their role in a trial, it is recommended to favor Rending Slashes of Noxious Breath.
NBs have the lowest cleave damage possible. Endless Hail. Caltrops if they slot it, Rend / Dawnbreaker as ultimates, and that's it.
Sorcerers have the highest cleave damage of all stamina builds due in big part to Hurricane.
Templars have either extremely bad cleave damage (maelstrom daggers setup) or good cleave damage (jabs setup)

Current trial tactics favor focusing the boss as much as possible to shorten the fight (and push higher scores), which is why having the necessary cleave damage to kill the adds without having to focus them at any point has become a strong point of magicka.

That being said, I don't think this is the most critical point.

Melee / Ranged

This is going to vary a lot depending on content, but in literally all cases, you won't be able to have 8 melees without taking unecessary risks:

At least 1 ranged DD is required on Mantikora
Zhaj, the first boss of vMoL, is notorious for severely punishing groups with a majority of melees. It is possible to have up to 6 melees with extremely good positioning (tank included), but you're shooting yourself in the feet by not picking as many ranged DDs as possible, as they also get the least DPS downtime from curses
The Mage in AA will grow harder the more melees you have due to chain lightnings, as you need to clear the minimages (reflections).
The Warrior have a few "Cleave" moves which represent a risk of one shot for melees.

There are other cases, just wanted to give a few.

Why is it related to stamina / magicka? Stamina has currently no good pure ranged options. Their lack of efficient class ranged options means they need to rely on a bow / bow build which currently doesn't compete with the more classic DW / Bow setup.

Because a bow / bow setup is not effective enough, stamina is either forced to be either underperforming or melee. Those trial conditions make competitive full stamina DDs raid inexistent.

The change to the bow passive is a good first step in this regard, so well done, but it's not going to be enough. I'd honestly don't want to see trials change to make it possible to have only 8 melees at all time, since the DDs also have to adapt to a given situation. Changing trials accordingly could also limit the mechanics in play, "a trial must be doable by 8 melees or bust it" isn't exactly great.

This is not a critical point, but an extremely nice addition.

Sustain

This is actually a strong point of stamina for all content. A stamina DD is almost self sustainable, as in they might only need a shard once in a while if a healer is using a Master restoration staff. There are no changes to stamina sustain in the next patch as it currently, only magicka with the introduction of Minor magickasteal. To go over the classes:

Stamina DKs have the Earthen Heart passives, between Battle Roar and Helping hands (used either thru Igneous shield or Molten Armaments), they are in a very good spot.
Stamina sorcerers have Dark Deal, a reduction to stamina cost with Unholy Knowledge and an extra 20% stam recovery.
Stamina NBs have Siphoning Strikes.
Stamina templars, you are the exception in a bad way. They do get 4% cost reduction, but Biting Jabs is an extremely expensive ability to spam (2903 stamina), and they don't have a good active way to recover stamina.

For magicka, their sustain comes from their healers in the current patch: Siphon Spirit, Worm's Cult set, Elemental Drain and Orbs. Next patch, Worm's Cult is probably going to be mandatory on a healer, and Orbs will need to pop all the time.

Stamina's strong point, heavy reliance on healers for magicka. Only change I would ask for is to slighty reduce the cost of Biting Jabs for templar (from 2903 to 2700 for instance). For magicka, the reliance on the healers make random groups an absolute PITA for magicka DDs, as you're not guranteed to get enough group support, and will likely spend a pretty large amount of time heavy attacking if you're a templar, DK or sorc, especially next patch.

Utility

Stamina provides completely different utility from magicka, and it's going to vary a lot depending on the class:

Magicka templars provide the Spear synergy and Purify, they also have Nova if required for the mitigation.
Magicka NBs can provide extra offhealing with Funnel Health (sees little use as Force Pulse is favored) and Veil of Blades for the mitigation if there's no Nova Available.
Magicka DKs provide a damage boost thru Engulfing Flames and control with Chains, Deep Breath (interrupt) and snares / roots (Eruption / Burning Talons if used, altho Talons tend to see less play due to the cost and "meh" range)
Magicka sorcerers provide the Conduit Synergy, Negates, and general OPness at doing MoL backyard (nurf! :O)

Stamina utility comes from constant snares from caltrops, access to some of the utility of magicka (chains for DKs, tho to a less extent due to the limited magicka pool) and backup group healing with Echoing Vigor which helps for dangerous trash pulls (Overcharge / Poison / constant damage)

Not a critical point, they both provide different utility. Bringing the extra group healing might be underrated, but that does make a difference in some situations.

Survivability

This is why stamina sees very little competitive play. In an environment where every single death costs a lot of time and points, staying alive has never been so critical, for the absolute best scores, if even a single person dies, the raid has to restart from the beginning.

Deadly Cloak has become pretty much mandatory due to the amount of AoEs in trials, Vigor is mostly for those situations where you take constant damage and have no guarantee to be saved by your healer. Damage shields are also important, as they allow you to limit repeated health damage and potential one shots.

The main point about staying alive in trials is that you'll almost always die because of burst damage due to a combination of mechanics, which means that the most important is to survive burst damage. Vigor helps little in this regard.

I'll go over stamina survivability:

Stamina DKs have the best survivability of all classes: between Deadly Cloak, Standard's mitigation, many defensive passives, Igneous Shield and thus stronger Vigor healing, they can stay alive about as well as magicka in pretty much all circumstances.
Stamina sorcerers have good mitigation thanks to Hurricane and Bound Armaments, they can also use Surge and have a full bar of survivability-oriented abilities with Overload. They do miss a few slots without Overload to slot as much as they need, between Bone Shield, Surge and Dark Deal.
Stamina templars do have Radiant Ward if they want a shield that doesn't use their stamina pool, which is a nice plus, and a few decent mitigation-oriented passives.
Stamina nightblades have it hard. No easy way to keep Shadow Barrier up, you can get minor Ward & Resolve with Mirage, as well as the extra dodge chance, and... that's it. You do have Deadly Cloak and the (meh) Bone Shield to prevent burst damage, but be prepared to bring in your A+-game if you want to stay alive.

Magicka can be summed up in two words: Annulment morphs. Harness Magicka and Dampen Magic provide shields at the very least twice as big as stamina ones, allowing them to limit the risks by a very large margin.

If someone asks in the forum whether he should bring a stamina or magicka DD for vMoL (especially HM), the answer is going to be universally magicka. Especially on the Rakkhat fight, your health as a stamina DD will drop extremely low multiple times (platform change, Unstable Void Projectile, execute phase, Lunar Phase...).

So yes, this is a critical point, since it is the number #1 reason stamina isn't used.

TL;DR:

Survivability issues make magicka a better pick for difficult / risky content
The trials mechanics and stamina being pretty much forced into being melee is an artifical limit to the maximum number of stamina DDs
Stamina DDs' niche - single target DPS - is getting nerfed. This is the only real reason to bring stamina DDs in a trial right now. There's no such niche in the current PTS, and means stamina DDs total extinction in competitive 12-men trials.
Currently: the part of stamina DDs in a trial group (8 DDs) is less than 25% overall. You'll have either 0, 1 or 2 stamina DDs.
This post took 1h 12mn 07s to write, so I'm going to make some coffee right now if you don't mind.

RazorCaltrops · January 2017

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

Faster you clear the trash, better scores you get as boss fights take more or less the same time. Destro ult is the bread and butter for trash fights. Vma staff buffs your light weaving in single target + heavy attack aoe dmg in trash if you're using a lightning staff.

Grothdar/ilambris sets make the difference in both single target/aoe scenarios + destro ult as mentioned above.

On top of that;

Blockade of fire for all mag classes (melee/range)

Magplars have blazing spear + reflective light + ritual of retribution

Mag DKs have engulfing flames (also a group buff) + eruption

Mag Sorcs have liquid lightning + heavy attack(which costs zero magicka) as they use lightning staff

For AOE damage. And can focus on boss while these skills melt the adds in the background. hope that helps.

Dracane · January 2017

Magicka needs to stay in melee range as well for maximum damage, range is no excuse.
Templars and Dks need to stay close for sweeps and lash and Sorcerer for lightning form. Only exception could be magicka nightblade, but only because surprise attack is too expensive to spam it as much.

Melee is always superior when it comes to damage.

Strider_Roshin · January 2017

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

Grothdar, BSW, Destro staff passives (in U13) and OP Destro Ult are IMO the main factors that make Magicka overall superior in terms of damage.

ZOS needs to buff stamina by the means of buffing class passives/abilities, and stamina weapons (specifically the 2H).

The worst way ZOS could buff/balance stamina is by throwing item sets at the issue.

Dracane · January 2017

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

Grothdar, BSW, Destro staff passives (in U13) and OP Destro Ult are IMO the main factors that make Magicka overall superior in terms of damage.

ZOS needs to buff stamina by the means of buffing class passives/abilities, and stamina weapons (specifically the 2H).

The worst way ZOS could buff/balance stamina is by throwing item sets at the issue.

They can't just throw blank buffs at stamina. They need to be very careful here.
The best way, in my opinion, is to give them an ability that is great vs mobs, but not easily useable vs players.

mr_wazzabi · January 2017

RazorCaltrops wrote: »

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

Faster you clear the trash, better scores you get as boss fights take more or less the same time. Destro ult is the bread and butter for trash fights. Vma staff buffs your light weaving in single target + heavy attack aoe dmg in trash if you're using a lightning staff.

Grothdar/ilambris sets make the difference in both single target/aoe scenarios + destro ult as mentioned above.

On top of that;

Blockade of fire for all mag classes (melee/range)

Magplars have blazing spear + reflective light + ritual of retribution

Mag DKs have engulfing flames (also a group buff) + eruption

Mag Sorcs have liquid lightning + heavy attack(which costs zero magicka) as they use lightning staff

For AOE damage. And can focus on boss while these skills melt the adds in the background. hope that helps.

Lol i love how you didn't mention mageblade path cause it SUCKS!

So is blockade with vma staff more damaging than hail with vma bow?

Is grothdar better than kragh and veli for melee dps?

I would have loved to see a side by side comparison of stam abilities vs their magicka counterparts.

Maybe what zos needs to do is buff rend to at least be on par with destro ult for its duration.

Maybe tweak caltrops to have a morph that does more damage for a shorter duration. More importantly, they need to change the code so that multiple caltrops can stack as the 1 caltrops coding is broken.

Strider_Roshin · January 2017

Dracane wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

Grothdar, BSW, Destro staff passives (in U13) and OP Destro Ult are IMO the main factors that make Magicka overall superior in terms of damage.

ZOS needs to buff stamina by the means of buffing class passives/abilities, and stamina weapons (specifically the 2H).

The worst way ZOS could buff/balance stamina is by throwing item sets at the issue.

They can't just throw blank buffs at stamina. They need to be very careful here.
The best way, in my opinion, is to give them an ability that is great vs mobs, but not easily useable vs players.

If that's the case we need to double the duration of the destro ult, while maintaining the same overall damage it produces.

Afterall, we need to make sure powerful abilities such as that are great vs mobs, but not easily used against players

Dracane · January 2017

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Dracane wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

Grothdar, BSW, Destro staff passives (in U13) and OP Destro Ult are IMO the main factors that make Magicka overall superior in terms of damage.

ZOS needs to buff stamina by the means of buffing class passives/abilities, and stamina weapons (specifically the 2H).

The worst way ZOS could buff/balance stamina is by throwing item sets at the issue.

They can't just throw blank buffs at stamina. They need to be very careful here.
The best way, in my opinion, is to give them an ability that is great vs mobs, but not easily useable vs players.

If that's the case we need to double the duration of the destro ult, while maintaining the same overall damage it produces.

Afterall, we need to make sure powerful abilities such as that are great vs mobs, but not easily used against players

It's good for aoe, but not single target. It's good, but the best single target ult is in fact soul assault.

Alcast · January 2017

Asmael wrote: »

I can absolutely understand the reasoning behind the changes, but I don't agree with the changes themselves, as there are quite a few collateral victims.

I'll be blunt: there isn't a single reason to bring a stamina damage dealer (DD) in a trial next patch. Not. A. Single. One. We have 0 buffs to look forward to, only nerfs, while magicka gets the extra 8% STDPS (single target DPS) or AoE DPS based on staff used, so they have some nice theorycrafting going on for next patch. For stamina, the change to bow simply won't work. The current best stamina setup will not change, and it doesn't benefit from this change at all.

That being said: I want to go over the current PvE balance of stamina / magicka in the current patch, and how things will change with the PTS, and most importantly: why.

DDs can be evaluted thru multiple angles: survivability, AoE potency, single target potency, cleave damage, melee / ranged, sustain, utility and survivability. I'll go through each of these points for both stamina and magicka.

AoE potency

In the current patch, we have 2 main stamina DDs seeing competitive use: DKs and sorcerers, who happen to the stamina DDs with the highest AoE potency of all stamina classes. This is a first point, because it defines your capability of destroying packs of mobs, which is critical to a group, since it represents approximately 50%~ of a trial's opposition.
Stamina DKs rely on Standard to buff up their AoE capabilities. It is getting nerfed with next patch.

Stamina sorcs rely on Hurricane as well as strong damage dealing passives. Hurricane is getting nerfed patch.

Stamina nightblades have only passives, as Power Extraction is a weaker version of Steel Tornado.

Stamina templars have only passives, as Biting jabs has a very small AoE.

Clearing tactics for trash packs rely on the careful use of ultimates and positioning to minimize the time required. The introduction of the Destro ult has increased magicka's potential in this regard, as you'll not always get the opportunity to stack up mobs in an efficient enough manner to make Meteor worthwhile (at least not as much as the destro ultimate).

As it currently stands, for a pack burn, magicka DPS is overall higher than stamina. The strongest stamina option is stam DK with Standard and caltrops, which can actually compete with magicka options as it currently. Seeing a 25% nerf to Standard's damage buff (15% = 20% * ( 1 - 0.25 )) is going to increase the gap in terms of maximum AoE potential between the specs.

Other point: caltrops see its use limited due the stacking made impossible. I'm absolutely aware of how messed up things would be in PvP if this were to be stackable again, so I'm not going to suggest that.

For short: the next patch is a rather small nerf to stamina potency, magicka will remain on a rather similar ground. This is not what I'd consider the most critical, since stamina builds are not currently used for their AoE potency anyway.

Single Target potency

THIS, is why stamina is no more competitive next patch. Preliminar tests of magicka single target DPS has shown either similar results or an increase. Stamina is taking a pretty huge hit in this regard, as there is no extra 8% single target option coming for them. One Tamriel already reduced the gap quite a bit, next patch will remove it completely.

To go over the current stamina options:
Stamina DKs currently have the highest single target DPS ingame. This is going to be reduced both the overall stamina nerf, but also the Standard nerf.

Stamina sorcerers and stamina nightblades are on a rather even ground. Excluding the overall nerfs, sorcerers will do very slighty less with the Hurricane change (nothing significant otherwise for NBs)

Stamina templars... with no significant class ultimate, passives outclassed by sorcerers, jabs being an "overall good, master of none" ability, they are lacking if they solely use Biting Jabs. Drastically lacking.

This is the most critical part, as Single Target DPS is currently stamina DDs' niche. If you remove it, you remove the last reason to have stamina DDs in competitive groups.

Single target DPS is required, as it allows groups to help skipping mechanics. Their (stamina DDs) sole purpose in raid is to shorten boss fights.

If you want to remove the gap between magicka and stamina, you'll need to change something else. If you don't, I hope you invested a few skill points in role playing for your stamina sorc.

Cleave damage

Cleave damage can be defined as "damage dealt around a target while specifically focusing this target". To make this clear: If a magicka sorcerer focuses a boss, he's going to use Liquid Lightning, Elemental Blockade, Velocious Curse ( ), Force Pulse and Crystal Fragments.

The "Cleave" damage part is the damage dealt to adds by using Liquid Lightning, Elemental Blockade and Velocious curse.

The interesting part is that, when comparing magicka vs stamina parses, stamina has highly "focused" damage. Their cleave damage is extremely low (for a 56k parse as a stam DK, my cleave damage was 4k, which means 52k DPS was done on the boss).

When looking at current stamina builds:
DKs have extremely low cleave damage. They can help it a bit with Caltrops and Noxious Breath, altho due to their role in a trial, it is recommended to favor Rending Slashes of Noxious Breath.

NBs have the lowest cleave damage possible. Endless Hail. Caltrops if they slot it, Rend / Dawnbreaker as ultimates, and that's it.

Sorcerers have the highest cleave damage of all stamina builds due in big part to Hurricane.

Templars have either extremely bad cleave damage (maelstrom daggers setup) or good cleave damage (jabs setup)

Current trial tactics favor focusing the boss as much as possible to shorten the fight (and push higher scores), which is why having the necessary cleave damage to kill the adds without having to focus them at any point has become a strong point of magicka.

That being said, I don't think this is the most critical point.

Melee / Ranged

This is going to vary a lot depending on content, but in literally all cases, you won't be able to have 8 melees without taking unecessary risks:
At least 1 ranged DD is required on Mantikora

Zhaj, the first boss of vMoL, is notorious for severely punishing groups with a majority of melees. It is possible to have up to 6 melees with extremely good positioning (tank included), but you're shooting yourself in the feet by not picking as many ranged DDs as possible, as they also get the least DPS downtime from curses

The Mage in AA will grow harder the more melees you have due to chain lightnings, as you need to clear the minimages (reflections).

The Warrior have a few "Cleave" moves which represent a risk of one shot for melees.

There are other cases, just wanted to give a few.

Why is it related to stamina / magicka? Stamina has currently no good pure ranged options. Their lack of efficient class ranged options means they need to rely on a bow / bow build which currently doesn't compete with the more classic DW / Bow setup.

Because a bow / bow setup is not effective enough, stamina is either forced to be either underperforming or melee. Those trial conditions make competitive full stamina DDs raid inexistent.

The change to the bow passive is a good first step in this regard, so well done, but it's not going to be enough. I'd honestly don't want to see trials change to make it possible to have only 8 melees at all time, since the DDs also have to adapt to a given situation. Changing trials accordingly could also limit the mechanics in play, "a trial must be doable by 8 melees or bust it" isn't exactly great.

This is not a critical point, but an extremely nice addition.

Sustain

This is actually a strong point of stamina for all content. A stamina DD is almost self sustainable, as in they might only need a shard once in a while if a healer is using a Master restoration staff. There are no changes to stamina sustain in the next patch as it currently, only magicka with the introduction of Minor magickasteal. To go over the classes:
Stamina DKs have the Earthen Heart passives, between Battle Roar and Helping hands (used either thru Igneous shield or Molten Armaments), they are in a very good spot.

Stamina sorcerers have Dark Deal, a reduction to stamina cost with Unholy Knowledge and an extra 20% stam recovery.

Stamina NBs have Siphoning Strikes.

Stamina templars, you are the exception in a bad way. They do get 4% cost reduction, but Biting Jabs is an extremely expensive ability to spam (2903 stamina), and they don't have a good active way to recover stamina.

For magicka, their sustain comes from their healers in the current patch: Siphon Spirit, Worm's Cult set, Elemental Drain and Orbs. Next patch, Worm's Cult is probably going to be mandatory on a healer, and Orbs will need to pop all the time.

Stamina's strong point, heavy reliance on healers for magicka. Only change I would ask for is to slighty reduce the cost of Biting Jabs for templar (from 2903 to 2700 for instance). For magicka, the reliance on the healers make random groups an absolute PITA for magicka DDs, as you're not guranteed to get enough group support, and will likely spend a pretty large amount of time heavy attacking if you're a templar, DK or sorc, especially next patch.

Utility

Stamina provides completely different utility from magicka, and it's going to vary a lot depending on the class:
Magicka templars provide the Spear synergy and Purify, they also have Nova if required for the mitigation.

Magicka NBs can provide extra offhealing with Funnel Health (sees little use as Force Pulse is favored) and Veil of Blades for the mitigation if there's no Nova Available.

Magicka DKs provide a damage boost thru Engulfing Flames and control with Chains, Deep Breath (interrupt) and snares / roots (Eruption / Burning Talons if used, altho Talons tend to see less play due to the cost and "meh" range)

Magicka sorcerers provide the Conduit Synergy, Negates, and general OPness at doing MoL backyard (nurf! :O)

Stamina utility comes from constant snares from caltrops, access to some of the utility of magicka (chains for DKs, tho to a less extent due to the limited magicka pool) and backup group healing with Echoing Vigor which helps for dangerous trash pulls (Overcharge / Poison / constant damage)

Not a critical point, they both provide different utility. Bringing the extra group healing might be underrated, but that does make a difference in some situations.

Survivability

This is why stamina sees very little competitive play. In an environment where every single death costs a lot of time and points, staying alive has never been so critical, for the absolute best scores, if even a single person dies, the raid has to restart from the beginning.

Deadly Cloak has become pretty much mandatory due to the amount of AoEs in trials, Vigor is mostly for those situations where you take constant damage and have no guarantee to be saved by your healer. Damage shields are also important, as they allow you to limit repeated health damage and potential one shots.

The main point about staying alive in trials is that you'll almost always die because of burst damage due to a combination of mechanics, which means that the most important is to survive burst damage. Vigor helps little in this regard.

I'll go over stamina survivability:
Stamina DKs have the best survivability of all classes: between Deadly Cloak, Standard's mitigation, many defensive passives, Igneous Shield and thus stronger Vigor healing, they can stay alive about as well as magicka in pretty much all circumstances.

Stamina sorcerers have good mitigation thanks to Hurricane and Bound Armaments, they can also use Surge and have a full bar of survivability-oriented abilities with Overload. They do miss a few slots without Overload to slot as much as they need, between Bone Shield, Surge and Dark Deal.

Stamina templars do have Radiant Ward if they want a shield that doesn't use their stamina pool, which is a nice plus, and a few decent mitigation-oriented passives.

Stamina nightblades have it hard. No easy way to keep Shadow Barrier up, you can get minor Ward & Resolve with Mirage, as well as the extra dodge chance, and... that's it. You do have Deadly Cloak and the (meh) Bone Shield to prevent burst damage, but be prepared to bring in your A+-game if you want to stay alive.

Magicka can be summed up in two words: Annulment morphs. Harness Magicka and Dampen Magic provide shields at the very least twice as big as stamina ones, allowing them to limit the risks by a very large margin.

If someone asks in the forum whether he should bring a stamina or magicka DD for vMoL (especially HM), the answer is going to be universally magicka. Especially on the Rakkhat fight, your health as a stamina DD will drop extremely low multiple times (platform change, Unstable Void Projectile, execute phase, Lunar Phase...).

So yes, this is a critical point, since it is the number #1 reason stamina isn't used.

TL;DR:
Survivability issues make magicka a better pick for difficult / risky content

The trials mechanics and stamina being pretty much forced into being melee is an artifical limit to the maximum number of stamina DDs

Stamina DDs' niche - single target DPS - is getting nerfed. This is the only real reason to bring stamina DDs in a trial right now. There's no such niche in the current PTS, and means stamina DDs total extinction in competitive 12-men trials.

Currently: the part of stamina DDs in a trial group (8 DDs) is less than 25% overall. You'll have either 0, 1 or 2 stamina DDs.

This post took 1h 12mn 07s to write, so I'm going to make some coffee right now if you don't mind.

@Asmael thanks for showing your opinion with that carefully written explanation. I hope ZOS will read that @ZOS_GinaBruno

Stamden · January 2017

As a Stam DK, I just want some damn AoE. Having to rely on an ult just to get any AoE is ridiculous, and now even that is getting nerfed. Please make inferno the AoE that it should be, and give it a stam morph.

Also, take some of the useless stam weapon skills (ie: Cleave) and make them viable AoE options.

Edziu · January 2017

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

So is blockade with vma staff more damaging than hail with vma bow?

here Im not sure becuase I dont have this bow, but at all just buff into hail is a bit better into buff to light/heavy attacks from blockade but its just buff from enchant while blockade is much much better on this aoe, as I know one of the best aoe in the game

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Is grothdar better than kragh and veli for melee dps?

yes, very, kragh have only good 1st bonus, 2nd is meh, just additional pathetic 2k dps before crit remove

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Maybe what zos needs to do is buff rend to at least be on par with destro ult for its duration.

at all it now is the only ult which is catchin gap between stam dk standar and rest classes ulti while using MSA duals

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Maybe tweak caltrops to have a morph that does more damage for a shorter duration. More importantly, they need to change the code so that multiple caltrops can stack as the 1 caltrops coding is broken.

maybe, but at all it will be some exploiting, imagine stacked 5+ caltrops also on pvp, 500-1k damage per second in big long aoe, on pve also will be some funny this skill then

but as you say, maybe other morph which is shorted duration with increased damage to be comparable with dps into blocka od fire, sorc liquid lighting etc

OrphanHelgen · January 2017

They also nerfed sunderflame, the fire dmg doesnt proc twice when doing a heavy attack on dual wield anymore. On live with engulfing flames in trial, it does around 900 dps with 4-5 heavy attacks every 12 seconds. Its not a lot already, but will be even worse next patch, also considering its flame dmg and not poison or physical. But I guess sunderpoison would be a stupid name and sunderFLAME with poison dmg wouldn't fit the role playing direction this game is heading, .. ok I shut up now ..

Izaki · January 2017

FeaR Turbo wrote: »

Alcast wrote: »

I am not gonna list up any again bc it does not matter anyway, hence why am I even writing this lol?

YOU WROTE THIS FOR ME AND ALL THE STAMINA BOYZ OUT THERE.

Every point 100% True. Like How can i invest so much time and money and gear grinding. To only be neglected and removed from all trial groups. NOT TALKING ABOUT CLASSES, talking about a whole fkin spec LOL

So much this. When you work so hard to perfect every rotation, to grind out all vMA weapons, spend gold on golding stuff out.
And now we are informed that all that was a waste of time.

Dracane · January 2017

It's not a waste, you'll still have great damage.

Izaki · January 2017

Dracane wrote: »

It's not a waste, you'll still have great damage.

LOL. Great damage, sure, but magicka does more, so it is a waste of time

Dracane · January 2017

IzakiBrotherSs wrote: »

Dracane wrote: »

It's not a waste, you'll still have great damage.

LOL. Great damage, sure, but magicka does more, so it is a waste of time

So far, stamina usually did more single target dps and it still was not a waste of time for magicka.
You're overreacting and also, pts is not done yet.

Edziu · January 2017

Dracane wrote: »

IzakiBrotherSs wrote: »

Dracane wrote: »

It's not a waste, you'll still have great damage.

LOL. Great damage, sure, but magicka does more, so it is a waste of time

So far, stamina usually did more single target dps and it still was not a waste of time for magicka.
You're overreacting and also, pts is not done yet.

but magica builds have usually more surviv because of atleast damage shields they can survive more higher damage than stamina especially on something like vAA HM. this mag build can survive more without healer because he is focused on someone else at this moment when this stamina dps will fast die then and then need a 2nd person to revive him and then you have 2 dps slacking because 1 stamina died while magic build was able to survive this moment without healer and dps again

Izaki · January 2017

Dracane wrote: »

IzakiBrotherSs wrote: »

Dracane wrote: »

It's not a waste, you'll still have great damage.

LOL. Great damage, sure, but magicka does more, so it is a waste of time

So far, stamina usually did more single target dps and it still was not a waste of time for magicka.
You're overreacting and also, pts is not done yet.

I know I'm over reacting, but hey magicka was never a waste of time because: range, cleave damage, insane AoE damage and survivability. Now magicka does as much as stam in single target. All of this has already been explain a by a few posta on this thread.
I think I have the right to over react this one because I've spent days worth of time to make my rotations flawless, to get my vMA weapons for each of my 3 stam chars that I play in trials only (never PvP), to grind out the money/mats for all my gear, to get dropped gear in perfect traits, etc. Literally days maybe weeks worth of time... Every char has each set that I might need at any certain point, all golded out. Its just disheartening to know that the only time I'll get to play these chars is for the trials weekly where everyone is on alts, or for the weekly leaderboard vMA run. So yeah. It sucks.

Strider_Roshin · January 2017

Dracane wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Dracane wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

mr_wazzabi wrote: »

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Stamina needs to cause more damage in order to justify their low survivability. The fact that magicka now has the same single target damage output, superior AoE, and superior survivability is not balanced at all. The issue is that the magicka community QQs whenever there's an aspect of the game they're not the best at, and ZOS listens to them.

Was the difference maker vma staff and destro ult?

I haven't played trials since before 1T came out, so what abilities/sets make magicka better in aoe and what makes it better in single target?

Just curious, not trying to challenge anybody as I don't know

Grothdar, BSW, Destro staff passives (in U13) and OP Destro Ult are IMO the main factors that make Magicka overall superior in terms of damage.

ZOS needs to buff stamina by the means of buffing class passives/abilities, and stamina weapons (specifically the 2H).

The worst way ZOS could buff/balance stamina is by throwing item sets at the issue.

They can't just throw blank buffs at stamina. They need to be very careful here.
The best way, in my opinion, is to give them an ability that is great vs mobs, but not easily useable vs players.

If that's the case we need to double the duration of the destro ult, while maintaining the same overall damage it produces.

Afterall, we need to make sure powerful abilities such as that are great vs mobs, but not easily used against players

It's good for aoe, but not single target. It's good, but the best single target ult is in fact soul assault.

It's incredibly powerful against a single target; that's why it needs to be nerfed. If it was such a terrible single target ultimate it wouldn't be banned in dueling tournaments. Also soul assault is incredibly overpowered against medium armor wearers, but underwhelming against everyone else. It's like ZOS is trying to make playing magicka idiot friendly. Right now all you need to be a killing machine is just a destro ult. No brain cells or talent need; we'll reserve that for non-proc stamina players.