How to improve the DPS and sustain on target skeleton.

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO · May 2017

Hello,

I am doing 30k DPS on a target skeleton, but I have seen people doing well over 40k on youtube videos. Can someone please provide any suggestions what I can do to improve my DPS. In addition I seem to run out of magicka at aroung 50% of the target dummy's health.

My setup is as follows

CP:

Elfborn: 25
Elemental Expert: 100
Thaumaturge: 75 (for the 10% bonus damage from off balance enemies)

Gear:

5. Necropotance gold gear with divines
2. Valkyn Skoria set pieces in heavy and medium (I am still trying to find Illambris medium shoulders in devines)
1. vMSA gold Inferno staff with sharpened trait on the back bar
1. Random gold inferno staff with sharpened trait on the front bar for the spell damage proc enchantment. (dont have a second vMSA staff or Moondancer staff yet)
3. Three Moondancer gold pieces on with devines traits

(Rings and amulet are enchanted with Spell damage enchants)

Back bar abilities:
Liquid Lightning
Elemental Blockade
Volatile Familiar
Daedric Prey
Bound Aegis

Front Bar:
Elemental Drain (can be replaced with Mage's Wrath If I get him to 20% hp before running out of resources)
Crystal Fragments
Force Pulse
Volatile Familiar
Bound Aegis

With Buffs on my resources are:

17800 HP
48 000 Magicka
Magicka recovery when buffed with Intellect: ~1600-1650
Food: The one that gives health magicka and magicka recovery.

My rotation is to execute all abilities on the back bar, switch to front bar and spam Force Pulse 5 times (or Crystal Fragments when it is with no cast time), and then do the rotation all over again. I make sure that I spam Meteor as soon as it becomes available and make sure that the Spell Damage Potion is always on cooldown for a 100% uptime on the buffs. I also make sure to light attack weave before every spell so that I cancel the light attack animations for that extra 9% overall damage.

My problem is that I run out of magicka half way through at 1.5 million HP and my DPS is only 30k.

Can someone please explain what I am doing wrong. I am playing on the EU server so any healp will be greatly appreciated as I am preparing myself for vet MOL and want to do my best (as vet dungeons are too easy)

Danksta · May 2017

1 piece of divines adds less than 1% crit, so using an inferior set because you don't have perfect traits for Ilambris is a bad reason. I'm guessing most players that hit 40k are not only very good but they also have a healer with worm and applying ele drain on the dummy.

Violynne · May 2017

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO wrote: »

My problem is that I run out of magicka half way through at 1.5 million HP and my DPS is only 30k.

Before I begin, a note: I am by no means an expert in this game, but the statement above is something I can address.

Max DPS means sacrificing sustain. I've never seen a build where one can use the other without making sacrifices.

Your 17k HP is a dead giveaway, which means you're buffing at least 2k into HP which should be going to DPS. The only food I know which can grant 5k health are blue recipes. The purples, with their "3 sustains" sacrifices over 1.2k on health. So maybe think about boiling up some rabbits ("rabbit" is in the recipe name I use, but there are others which have identical effects) for the health+magicka buffs as you tweak things a bit.

I understand the need for a 17k HP bar, as bosses can easily one-shot kill at 16-17k hits.

But the key is your CP.

Change the 100 in Elemental Expert to 100 in Spell Erosion (The Apprentice) which increases Spell Penetration by "X" (and maxed will be about 5.1k.)
You want max spell penetration as this allows more damage to hit the target after mitigation. That's why you're using the Sharpened weapons, after all. Currently, you have about 5k. This will give you 10k+.

If you're running out of mana, you may want to sacrifice a few points of DPS for pool sustain, which mean 3x Enchantments to replace your current jewelry enchants with Reduced Magicka Cost. Just in case you didn't know, you can replace the top enchant on jewelry sets while keeping the piece requirement attribute. For example, you can change "Increase Magicka Regen by 157" with "Reduce Spell Cost by 602" while keeping the "Adds 890 Magicka" attribute.

This, at max and x3, will save 600+ off your spell costs, which is tremendous when applied with a 2.4k+ mag regen rate. I rarely see my mana pool drop below 50%.

Again, with a slight reduction in DPS, you could use the Thief stone, which increases crit chance. I'm using it with my current test build and practically every other hit is a crit, which I find is exceptional for those light attack weaves. Always nice to see a screen filled with yellow numbers.

It's unfortunate "DPS" seems to be the measurement for success, when it's clearly not. There's a considerable number of variables to consider when trying to maximize for 40k+, as well as sacrifices.

30k is plenty acceptable, if you ask me, but with a few changes, you can get to about 32-36k and keep your sustain.

No one likes being one-shot killed in a fight, so you have a decision to make.

Danksta · May 2017

Violynne wrote: »

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO wrote: »

My problem is that I run out of magicka half way through at 1.5 million HP and my DPS is only 30k.

Before I begin, a note: I am by no means an expert in this game, but the statement above is something I can address.

Max DPS means sacrificing sustain. I've never seen a build where one can use the other without making sacrifices.

Your 17k HP is a dead giveaway, which means you're buffing at least 2k into HP which should be going to DPS. The only food I know which can grant 5k health are blue recipes. The purples, with their "3 sustains" sacrifices over 1.2k on health. So maybe think about boiling up some rabbits ("rabbit" is in the recipe name I use, but there are others which have identical effects) for the health+magicka buffs as you tweak things a bit.

I understand the need for a 17k HP bar, as bosses can easily one-shot kill at 16-17k hits.

But the key is your CP.

Change the 100 in Elemental Expert to 100 in Spell Erosion (The Apprentice) which increases Spell Penetration by "X" (and maxed will be about 5.1k.)
You want max spell penetration as this allows more damage to hit the target after mitigation. That's why you're using the Sharpened weapons, after all. Currently, you have about 5k. This will give you 10k+.

If you're running out of mana, you may want to sacrifice a few points of DPS for pool sustain, which mean 3x Enchantments to replace your current jewelry enchants with Reduced Magicka Cost. Just in case you didn't know, you can replace the top enchant on jewelry sets while keeping the piece requirement attribute. For example, you can change "Increase Magicka Regen by 157" with "Reduce Spell Cost by 602" while keeping the "Adds 890 Magicka" attribute.

This, at max and x3, will save 600+ off your spell costs, which is tremendous when applied with a 2.4k+ mag regen rate. I rarely see my mana pool drop below 50%.

Again, with a slight reduction in DPS, you could use the Thief stone, which increases crit chance. I'm using it with my current test build and practically every other hit is a crit, which I find is exceptional for those light attack weaves. Always nice to see a screen filled with yellow numbers.

It's unfortunate "DPS" seems to be the measurement for success, when it's clearly not. There's a considerable number of variables to consider when trying to maximize for 40k+, as well as sacrifices.

30k is plenty acceptable, if you ask me, but with a few changes, you can get to about 32-36k and keep your sustain.

No one likes being one-shot killed in a fight, so you have a decision to make.

You get a health bonus for having a pet active that would put you at about where the OP's health pool sits, and that's without the undaunted and heavy armor health bonuses.

Violynne · May 2017

Danksta wrote: »

You get a health bonus for having a pet active that would put you at about where the OP's health pool sits, and that's without the undaunted and heavy armor health bonuses.

Aren't pets useless in vet runs? I got the impression no one brings their pets to a meat grinder.

Danksta · May 2017

Violynne wrote: »

Danksta wrote: »

You get a health bonus for having a pet active that would put you at about where the OP's health pool sits, and that's without the undaunted and heavy armor health bonuses.

Aren't pets useless in vet runs? I got the impression no one brings their pets to a meat grinder.

The raid leader I run with doesn't like them but he's slowly softening his stance on them. The reason he doesn't like them has more to do with them interfering with tactics/mechanics though. They seem to be survivable in most situations. I'm not sure how the top guilds fell about running with them, but I'd imagine they'd be fine with it, they help to add to the crazy AoE damage that sorcs already have.

Juhasow · May 2017

@rosendoichinoveb17_ESO You can hit me on live server maybe I'll be able to help You.

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO · May 2017

Thank you all for the feedback.

As an update, my health will go down by 1k when I switch to Illambris once I a shoulder piece drops.

Also my spell penetration is ~10k (15k when debuffed with Elemental Drain). Running Spell Erosion instead of Elemental Expert I believe might lower the DPS numbers as 5k penetration equals something around 8% damage increase compared to the 25% that you get from Elemental Expert (after armor reduction this number is 15%-20%). Running Spell Erosion on Trials might also be an overkill as the tanks are also rebuffing the bosses.

Currently farming vMSA for a second sharpened staff as I think it will take me more time to form groups to farm for sharpened Moondancer staff.

Juhasow wrote: »

@rosendoichinoveb17_ESO You can hit me on live server maybe I'll be able to help You.

@Juhasow is "Juhasow" your ingame name?

On a sidenote, I just managed to get The Flawless Conqueror achievement

Ingame ID: @POCKATA
675CP Magica Sorcs: Archmage Vanus Galerion

Magdalina · May 2017

Violynne wrote: »

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO wrote: »

My problem is that I run out of magicka half way through at 1.5 million HP and my DPS is only 30k.

Before I begin, a note: I am by no means an expert in this game, but the statement above is something I can address.

Max DPS means sacrificing sustain. I've never seen a build where one can use the other without making sacrifices.

Your 17k HP is a dead giveaway, which means you're buffing at least 2k into HP which should be going to DPS. The only food I know which can grant 5k health are blue recipes. The purples, with their "3 sustains" sacrifices over 1.2k on health. So maybe think about boiling up some rabbits ("rabbit" is in the recipe name I use, but there are others which have identical effects) for the health+magicka buffs as you tweak things a bit.

I understand the need for a 17k HP bar, as bosses can easily one-shot kill at 16-17k hits.

But the key is your CP.

Change the 100 in Elemental Expert to 100 in Spell Erosion (The Apprentice) which increases Spell Penetration by "X" (and maxed will be about 5.1k.)
You want max spell penetration as this allows more damage to hit the target after mitigation. That's why you're using the Sharpened weapons, after all. Currently, you have about 5k. This will give you 10k+.

If you're running out of mana, you may want to sacrifice a few points of DPS for pool sustain, which mean 3x Enchantments to replace your current jewelry enchants with Reduced Magicka Cost. Just in case you didn't know, you can replace the top enchant on jewelry sets while keeping the piece requirement attribute. For example, you can change "Increase Magicka Regen by 157" with "Reduce Spell Cost by 602" while keeping the "Adds 890 Magicka" attribute.

This, at max and x3, will save 600+ off your spell costs, which is tremendous when applied with a 2.4k+ mag regen rate. I rarely see my mana pool drop below 50%.

Again, with a slight reduction in DPS, you could use the Thief stone, which increases crit chance. I'm using it with my current test build and practically every other hit is a crit, which I find is exceptional for those light attack weaves. Always nice to see a screen filled with yellow numbers.

It's unfortunate "DPS" seems to be the measurement for success, when it's clearly not. There's a considerable number of variables to consider when trying to maximize for 40k+, as well as sacrifices.

30k is plenty acceptable, if you ask me, but with a few changes, you can get to about 32-36k and keep your sustain.

No one likes being one-shot killed in a fight, so you have a decision to make.

I'm not the best dps up there ever either but that's just a lot of bad advices there.

A sorc's health sits at ~17k with ZERO points, enchants or set bonuses in health if you have 600 cp, UD passive and pet out - that's with blue food. With the Brew, I get 16.2k with pet. And yes, pets are great for dungeons at least and afaik also viable for most of vet trials with some exceptions. So OP's health seems about right.

You definitely do NOT want points in spell erosion unless you're strictly running solo. Between tank's Puncture, possibly Alkosh, your own sharpened weapon etc you'd simply over penetrate.

And no, as endgame dps aiming for vet trials he/she obviously doesn't want to enchant jewelry with mag recovery/cost reduction. Why give advices about part of the game you're obviously not familiar with?

To OP, tbh I'm not really good enough to advise you. Some things to keep in mind though - a lot of the 40k+ parses are done with Lightning staff on offbar which procs the off balance passive for you in single target environment, but in a trial it's something your healer will likely be providing. Having someone else provide Ele Drain for you will likely up your dps by another several thousand.

Far as magicka sustain, tbh it's hard to say without seeing. I always OOM if I run blue food, I can sustain with Brew(the food you seem to be using) generally(I run bsw not Necro though). It could be rotation issue perhaps? If you slip up your dots, refreshing them just a bit too early, that magicka cost adds up really fast. It sounds like you're doing everything else right to me. Do get Illambris though, even if it's in bad traits.
I'm also not sure on whether or not lightning front bar would be better for a pet sorc? Most of your dps is coming from aoe skills. Imo lightning is kinda harder to weave though.

Also I assume your green cp are in mag recovery/spellcost reduction at least partially, right?

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO · May 2017

Magdalina wrote: »

Also I assume your green cp are in mag recovery/spellcost reduction at least partially, right?

I will definitely get Illambris. My CP in green give me 13.2 spell cost reduction and 25% magicka regen explaining my ~1600 regeneration rates.

It might be best to record my DPS and post it here as a youtube video so that you can better analyze my rotation. Will probably do that on Saturday as I am swapped with work right now.