Waffennacht wrote: »

Toc de Malsvi wrote: »

Waffennacht wrote: »

Toc de Malsvi wrote: »

Biro123 wrote: »

Toc de Malsvi wrote: »

Biro123 wrote: »

Toc de Malsvi wrote: »

leepalmer95 wrote: »

Toc de Malsvi wrote: »

@leepalmer95

Don't get me wrong it is a balance problem. Shields create a pinnacle, either they are too weak and virtually worthless, or they are too strong and virtually OP. The nature of Shield stacking allows for magSorc's to get the best of all worlds, great defense, great mobility, great damage. Which leads to complaints by those who are up against them.

But the nature of healing allows magplars to get great damage and then crit heal 12k breath of lifes. Its the same for all classes, damage = heals.

Shields have a big drop off effect in terms of efficiency depending of the amount of players. Streaks not a bad skill and allows them some mobility but its a lot cheaper for a medium build to sprint after a sorc and catch up (they will easily) and then finish a sorc because the sorc will be out of magicka.

Any stamina build has better mobility than mag sorc because of shuffle dodge, shuffle snare purge and roll dodge. Outside of death match bgs the sorc execute is one of the worst in the game. Lowest threshold, can be purged, rolled, both damage blocked, sometimes it doesn't even finish them off.

No it's not the same because of how shields are different than heals. Shields prevent damage, heals bring back health that is already lost. 30k burst will kill most targets, but its not going to kill a shield stacking Sorc, it will hurt it sure, but its not going to kill it. To add to that what was 30k burst against a non shielded target is only 20-25k against a shielded target because of the lack of critical hits.

Preventative mitigation is always better than healing.

It is simply not true that sprint is cheaper than streaking. Gap closing is cheaper than streaking but sprint is not. Only way that is possible is if you are wearing well fitted or some set to reduce sprint costs. Almost all of my builds are 6-7 medium and I routinely run out of stamina chasing streaking sorc's, who still have enough magicka to stop shield up and turn and curse me as I arrive completely out of resources. The only way it compares is if you are using a speed pot, which a mag Sorc can just as easily use and sprint between double casted streaks.

Claiming the Sorc execute is one of the worst in the game? You must be joking. When targets are more than 5m away how is any of the stam melee executes going to kill them? Gap closing means they get time to cast a heal.

Purge it? That is a losing battle every time. Base cost Mages Fury: 2430 Cleansing Ritual: 3780. You will run them out of magicka if they attempt to purge your execute every time you apply. Efficient Purge is 5400 base it's even worse.

Mages Fury acts as a passive execute after application, meaning you don't have to cast it at the time of the targets health getting low it will just go off. The only other skill that acts as a passive execute after application is Poison Injection. Poison Injection does not instantly tick and kill the target when their health drops below 20% or even 5%. It can tick, but its not guaranteed to tick before they can heal. Poison Injection ticks do not hit anywhere near as hard as Mages Fury, the whole dot damage is more but individual ticks are not.

And this example is just as bad... Heals are more effective when the healed target has higher mitigation.. Shields are not. That 30k burst against a light armour, no-impen shield-user is closer to 15k against a heavy armour, fill-impen wearer - which can be healed back. And that's assuming there was no other mitigation like block... (we are assuming that the shield user knows there is incoming hence he has a shield up....)

Preventative mitigation like this is VERY resource-intensive, unlike healing which is only used when its needed.

No heals are not more effective, shields are more mitigation and greatly increase the mitigation of that already high mitigation target. The only case to argue that healing is better than shields is if you view shields in isolation and pretend that no other forms of passive healing or health recovery exist. Otherwise shielding before damage is taken is ALWAYS better than healing after damage is taken.

Shielding not only provides direct mitigation, it also provides critical impunity for its duration or up to the value of its strength. Impen does not provide crit impunity even when maxed, impen provides a reduction to the strength of critical hits. Critical hits will still always hit for more than non crits, except against shields where they cease to exist.

Shielding is more resource intensive and with good measure. Shielding does not require damage to be taken because it is not healing it is direct mitigation. Healing requires damage to be taken. A shield at 100% health is still worth while, a heal at 100% health is useless. A shield at 5% health is just as valuable as a heal at 5% health for up to 6 seconds.

No.

You take a 10k hit with 0 mitigation, you need a 10k shield or a 10k heal to absorb it.
You take a 10k hit with 50% mitigation, you need a 10k shield or a 5k heal to absorb it.

Heals scale better with more mitigation.

A heal at 5% is much more effective than a shield at 5% - it takes you out of execute range.

Yes, it is better not to take the damage in the first place - as per shields, but heals+mitigation scales much better to give much more survivability vs multiple opponents than shields+mitigation.

Heals don't absorb, heals restore health from damage that is already DONE. Shields absorb damage before its done.

You take a 10k hit with 0 mitigation and a 10k shield and you are at 100% health, without a shield you need a 10k heal to RESTORE it.
You take a 10k hit with 50% mitigation and a 10k shield and you are at 100% health, without a shield you need a 5k heal to RESTORE it.

In either case a shield is better than healing.

But you had to pre cast the shield in this case meaning even though the heal comes later it's entire amount is used while a shield expires.

In your case I need a 10k shield to prevent 5k damage or a 5k heal to prevent 5k damage, making the heal more efficient.

Mitigation+heal is better than shield

But quite frankly, I like using both

That 5k damage could be what kills you and you never get the heal. With the shield you do not take the damage so you don't die. Despite your insistence that you know the difference you keep saying things as "5k heal to prevent 5k damage" when heals cannot prevent damage. You are still arguing against shields in isolation as if no other healing or recovery is happening outside of a damage shield.

Given a player with 20k health and 50% mitigation has the option to do damage, heal, and or shield for 10k before being attacked. Player takes 30k burst.

With a shield they take 5k damage after mitigation and are at 15k or 75% health, easily gained back with hots, recovery, or healing ward. If they are CC'd at this time it doesn't matter because they are no where near death, their opponent needs another 30k burst to kill them.

Without a shield they take 15k damage after mitigation and are at 5k or 25% health and are in execute range. If they are CC'd at this time their opponent only needs 10k burst which is easily accessible because they are in execute range so their opponent has an attack that will do 300% of normal damage 3-4k and kill them.

Heal's are absolutely more efficient provided you have the opportunity to heal, shields are more proficient because they act as active mitigation to prevent damage before it happens. If you can shield before damage is taken the likely hood of survival is much greater than if you wait to heal after damage is already taken.

Let's take your exact example of 20k health, 50% mitigation and a 10k ward vs a 10k heal
10k ward brings the remaining damage to 20k DMG 50% mitigation leaves 10k DMG leaving player with 10k health.

20k health with 50% mitigation means player takes 15k DMG leaving him at 5k and then heals for 10k leaving him at 15k health

Player without ward has 5k more health than player with ward.

Add as many variables as you want, as long as you apply them equally you still come to the same conclusion. Heal + Mitigation is better.


If more actions occur after your example (such as you pointing out a CC) well then you need to apply that to the shield user as he now cannot re cast and is equally dead.

Edit: Let's do any example of 20k health 50% mitigation and a 40k DMG burst. Our non shield user is dead... (Never got to heal) Our Ward user is at 5k health. This is the only instance where the shield is better - when the damage is higher than the health pool + mitigation (this is a VERY narrow area in which the preactive shield is superior - the range of which is 40k to 49k DMG any less and the heal is stronger, anymore and both are dead)

So out of 0-50k DMG only 40-49 or roughly 20% of the possible scenarios, a ward is better

Toc de Malsvi wrote: »

Furthermore, casting a ward before damage allows you to gauge an opponents respective output without putting your own health at significant risk. It allows you to gain an advantage against non warded targets by determining whether to press or not before risking your own life.

nekura wrote: »

I run a triple proc set stamblade. I think the real problem with Shield Breaker are addons like 'Dressing Room' that allow me to hotkey sets in PvP w/ no repercussions. It's highly ridiculous I can switch from Selene/Viper/Widow Maker to my Shield Breaker / Widow Maker sorc killer spec with one button.

I will continue to do it as long as it's available, b/c I don't like walking away from AP when I'm solo.

GreenSoup2HoT wrote: »

Magıc wrote: »

It's capped at what it says on the tooltip on the set. Only way to increase it is by golding outyour gear I assume.

Cancerous set anyway. I hope every sorc you fight destroys you for using that garbage set.

Cancerous because sorcs complete negate hots/health recovery due to op shield stacking over lapping healing ward.

Mag sorcs are the only class that can do it all. Insane sustain (lich), insane tankiness with shields and still deal crazy damage in 7 light.

Once proc sets are nerfed.. its gonna be mag sorc or nothing.

Sanctum74 wrote: »

Sorc threads are always so amusing

ak_pvp wrote: »

Irylia wrote: »

ak_pvp wrote: »

Irylia wrote: »

Sorc isn't all that like you all continue to say it's actually really straining on sustain.

For those of you who understand, thank you.

Also harness is trash. 4K for. 5-7k ward


You can't argue sorc with me.
-Irylia

"Waahhh... Sorcy is too hard to sustain... wahhh"

Even though you have a risk free dark conversion, some of the best regen passives and mag return from mages fury. Feewing too tuckered out? Have an inbuilt procute to do the work for you.

a risk free skill that can be bashed and uses Stam, the resource for breaking free and not dying. Pc na?

I urge you to play mag sorc outside of a zerg

PC/EU. Costs no resources if bashed, and the small (3kish) stam it uses is nothing compared to the health+mag gain, that also stops you from dying via shields, and healing you. Then on top of that there is everything else I mentioned. Sorc is EZ babby mode.

SirDopey wrote: »

Is the oblivion Damage from Shield breaker capped?

I've noticed it never hits for more than 2.1k regardless of how I tweak my max stam/WD.

For instance minor berserk doesn't affect it or either major sorcery/brutality.

It appears none of the champion point options affect its actual damage either

Any feedback on this?

Sarato wrote: »

@leepalmer95

"Shielbreaker is such a xv1 tool and shields arent amazing"

...1vXing isn't suppose to be in your favor

Biro123 wrote: »

ak_pvp wrote: »

Leave shieldbreaker as is. Sorcs are overpowered, and if they can't heal or outmove 2.1k damage, then l2p.

So, you tell me how to do that then. Let's assume you are a magsorc and being attacked by 2 players, one with shield breaker.
You are already spamming shields as quickly as possible just to stay alive from the normal hits, but in 5 seconds, you're in execute range just from shield breaker + oblivion enchants.

Where do the heals come from? Let's give the sorc a chance and assume he's running the twilight matriarch rather than healing ward.

Sorc has to heal now rather than shield, so he does, and loses a gcd of shields. He heals 9k of the 13k shieldbreaker +oblivion damage he has taken, but in that time, shields have dropped and he's lost another 4k health. If a cc or ulti hits then, while the sorc is down 8k health and shieldless, its gg.
If not, sorc has to shield fast, has only one shield up, is even more on the back foot and is still down 8k health. Assume he can keep the shields up for another 5 seconds without normal damage getting through, he's taken another 13k of oblivion damage so has now lost 21k health in total. GG.

With the more usual healing ward... It takes 6 seconds to kick in.. By the time the sorc realises its shield breaker damage, layers his shields to cast it, you're about 4/5 seconds into the fight already. Soi it won't go off until 10 seconds into the fight (assuming it does as opposed to its shield being taken down, removing the heal). But by then, you've lost 26k health to shield breaker + oblivion. GG.

Please tell me, in any situation other than a 1v1(which is very rare), how does a sorc with a standard build survive shieldbreaker (I'm not even asking you to tell me how he can be competitive against it, just how to survive without running away like a screaming girl).

SirDopey wrote: »

Actually, the more I think about it about, Shieldbreaker needs to be buffed.

Instead of doing 2k damage to a shielded player it should be 2k per active shield. This will really help address the issue of shield stacking and make the game so much more balanced