Twice-Fanged Serpent vs. Sunderflame

Asardes · August 2017

I was curious how much of a difference makes using one set compared the other on a single target
http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Twice-Fanged+Serpent+Set
http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Sunderflame+Set
The 2-3-4 piece bonuses are identical: 1096 maximum stamina, 129 weapon damage and 1066 weapon critical (~4.9%)
Only the 5 piece bonus is different:
Twice-Fanged Serpent: When you deal damage, your Physical Penetration is increased by 1000 for 3 seconds, stacking up to 5 times.
Sunderflame: When you hit an enemy with a fully charged Heavy Attack, deal 774 Flame Damage and reduce target’s Physical Resistance by 3440 for 8 seconds.

The resistance cap is reached at 33,100, providing a mitigation of 50%. All enemies in instanced group content have 18,200 resistance, providing 27.5% damage mitigation. Thus, increased penetration against a target can be considered as a % increase to damage:
Twice-Fanged Serpent, with full damage stacking provides 5,000/33,100*50% = 7.5% damage increase against all targets for the user
Sunderflame, 8s after each heavy attack against the target - gets refreshed, so 100% uptime on the penetration bonus is very easy to achieve - provides 3,440/33,100*50% = 5.2% damage increase against the attacked target for every stamina DD in the group.

The difference between sets for the user, considering only penetration is 2.3% DPS loss, or s 920 DPS out of a theoretical 40,000 DPS parse for the Sunderflame user.

Additionally, Sunderflame provides 774 Flame Damage against the target for every heavy attack - the tool tip doesn't list any cool-down so I assume it doesn't have one, providing the damage for every heavy attack. In practice that gets boosted by CP (not sure if also by class or race passives) as I've seen a tool tip of about 1K when equipped on my DK. Assuming there are 4 fully charged heavy attacks on average every 10s - a DK will do those with every skill from front bar. Flame damage it does not benefit on the increased penetration of the set itself, but it will benefit from any major/minor breach debuff applied to target, as well as Alkosh and crusher. In practice major breach from Elemental Drain will always be applied, usually by the healer. Major breach is 5280 penetration and minor is 1320. With the former applied, the target mitigation is lowered to 19.5%. The latter is harder to keep up so I will not consider it. So damage done by Sunderflame becomes 4*1000*(1-19.5%)/10=320 DPS. Another potential benefit is the magicka return from Magicka Steal, which makes Flames of Oblivion and Molten Armaments easier to keep up.

So the final difference between the sets is only 600 DPS in favor of TFS, or 1.5% out of the 40,000 DPS parse for the user, but a 5.2% increase for every other stamina DD in the group. The sharpened trait has been halved from 2580 to 1290 per weapon equipped, and other debuffs, such as Alkosh, minor fracture and crusher enchantment do not achieve 100% uptime by design. Additionally other traits like precise and infused have increased in effectiveness so it's likely that players will use those instead of sharpened in group content. So overpenetration is less likely. That means the 5.2% DPS increase from Sunderflame debuff will fully benefit the other DDs in the group. Assuming 2 other stamina DDs that parse 40,000, the DPS increase will be 2*40,000*5.2%=4160 DPS, or a gain of 3560 compared to the situation where all 3 use Twice-Fanged Serpent. In a group with 8 DDs parsing around 40,000 DPS each, this is an 1.1% increase.

In single target fights the sets are very close to each other, and Sunderflame provides an useful bonus for the group. Additionally, being a dungeon set it's much easier to farm than Twice-Fanged Serpent, which is a trial set and does not fully stack penetration until several seconds in the rotation. Even compared to the other commonly used trial set, Vicious Serpent, the difference is not that big as the 5.2% damage increase from additional penetration on is almost identical to the 5% Minor Slayer one. When compared to Spriggan's Thorns, which also provides increased penetration one advantage is that the extra penetration is not lost when swapping bar when that set is equipped only on front bar.

In conclusion, the stamina DK player may not have to go to such great lengths to get a good, if not "BiS" set.

casparian · August 2017

Another nice thing about Sunderflame, especially for those who haven't farmed maximally optimized gear: it places a debuff, meaning it penetration bonus persists when you bar swap and lose the 5-piece bonus (unlike TFS). This means the player can be more flexible in their gear choices. This is also more forgiving for those who are still practicing their rotation.

Asardes · August 2017

casparian wrote: »

Another nice thing about Sunderflame, especially for those who haven't farmed maximally optimized gear: it places a debuff, meaning it penetration bonus persists when you bar swap and lose the 5-piece bonus (unlike TFS). This means the player can be more flexible in their gear choices. This is also more forgiving for those who are still practicing their rotation.

Yes, I've mentioned this regarding Spriggan's Thorns, but it's a nice addition. Equipping TFS weapon will indeed be weird, since they are far harder to obtain than armor or jewelry pieces - only from end boss and chests in SO - and will entail using them on both bars, which is not a good option due to the fact Maelstrom bow still remains BiS. So TFS further constrains the player to only use it only as body pieces or jewelry in order to be reliable, while Sunderflame doesn't have such a constraint. Using Spriggan weapons is at first more appealing due to the fact there is a named precise dagger that is obtained via a quest.

Qbiken · August 2017

Hmm, might have some Sunderflame weapons laying around I think

casparian · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

casparian wrote: »

Another nice thing about Sunderflame, especially for those who haven't farmed maximally optimized gear: it places a debuff, meaning it penetration bonus persists when you bar swap and lose the 5-piece bonus (unlike TFS). This means the player can be more flexible in their gear choices. This is also more forgiving for those who are still practicing their rotation.

Yes, I've mentioned this regarding Spriggan's Thorns, but it's a nice addition. Equipping TFS weapon will indeed be weird, since they are far harder to obtain than armor or jewelry pieces - only from end boss and chests in SO - and will entail using them on both bars, which is not a good option due to the fact Maelstrom bow still remains BiS. So TFS further constrains the player to only use it only as body pieces or jewelry in order to be reliable, while Sunderflame doesn't have such a constraint. Using Spriggan weapons is at first more appealing due to the fact there is a named precise dagger that is obtained via a quest.

I got an infused TFS dagger from a chest last night, and I cursed my excellent luck. I also have a sharpened TFS 1H axe from a run a few months ago. Both of which are so close to being BIS, but still so far... TFS just has to be on the body/jewelry, sadly.

Asardes · August 2017

Qbiken wrote: »

Hmm, might have some Sunderflame weapons laying around I think

Sure, many people probably have them as "by-catch" from farming the other set in the City of Ash 1/2 dungeons back in the day when it was considered "BiS". Also City of Ash 1 is one of the easiest dungeons, taking 10-12 minutes or less to fully farm. On normal an average player can do it alone in less than 15 minutes for sure. For SO you always need 12 people and the trial is long by design, taking 20 minutes or more even on normal with randoms.

SoLooney · August 2017

Lol, yea, i am not fortunate enough to have 2 vo weapons, just one vo dagger infused and 1 two fanged sword sharp, i hate losing two fanged snake on the backbar so i have to use hundings till i can get another vo weapon

pizzaow · August 2017

Another advantage of sunderflame is that it should [indirectly] grant better damage on the back bar...

A popular combination is TFS +hundings (with a maelstrom bow); where the dual wield weapons are both hundings.
So, on the back bar you lose out on the 4 and 5 piece hundings bonus.

Since you'd never want the 5-piece sunderflame bonus while on your bow bar, it would make sense to use dual wield sunderflame weapons. This would allow you to run 5-piece hundings on both bars, and still enjoy the resistance debuff while on your bow bar. i.e. an extra 299 weapon damage on bow bar.

Asardes · August 2017

Yes, if wearing Hunding's Rage (body) + Sunderflame (front bar weapons + jewels) having that 300 extra weapon damage on the back bar should boost the first ticks of your endless hail, caltrops and poison injection. So in practice the difference may actually be smaller than the 1.5% I estimated in my calculations. I also don't know to what degree does TFS actually stacks 5x during combat.

My actual build is like this:
5 Hunding's Rage: medium legs, feet, hands, heavy chest, light waist, all divines)
5 Sunderflame: jewels with , sharpened dagger poison damage, sharpened or precise axe disease damage (sharpened is not BiS anymore but it's within 0.5% of precise or infused when considering one weapon)
2 Kra'gh medium divines but I also have 2 Velidreth and 2 Spawn of Mephala - this one is actually worth considering this patch since the damage always applies on heavy attack, just as Sunderflame and it's AoE; also 1p bonus gets changed from health to stamina which makes it viable as DPS set.

hedna123b14_ESO · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

I was curious how much of a difference makes using one set compared the other on a single target
http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Twice-Fanged+Serpent+Set
http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Sunderflame+Set
The 2-3-4 piece bonuses are identical: 1096 maximum stamina, 129 weapon damage and 1066 weapon critical (~4.9%)
Only the 5 piece bonus is different:
Twice-Fanged Serpent: When you deal damage, your Physical Penetration is increased by 1000 for 3 seconds, stacking up to 5 times.
Sunderflame: When you hit an enemy with a fully charged Heavy Attack, deal 774 Flame Damage and reduce target’s Physical Resistance by 3440 for 8 seconds.

The resistance cap is reached at 33,100, providing a mitigation of 50%. All enemies in instanced group content have 18,200 resistance, providing 27.5% damage mitigation. Thus, increased penetration against a target can be considered as a % increase to damage:
Twice-Fanged Serpent, with full damage stacking provides 5,000/33,100*50% = 7.5% damage increase against all targets for the user
Sunderflame, 8s after each heavy attack against the target - gets refreshed, so 100% uptime on the penetration bonus is very easy to achieve - provides 3,440/33,100*50% = 5.2% damage increase against the attacked target for every stamina DD in the group.

The difference between sets for the user, considering only penetration is 2.3% DPS loss, or s 920 DPS out of a theoretical 40,000 DPS parse for the Sunderflame user.

Additionally, Sunderflame provides 774 Flame Damage against the target for every heavy attack - the tool tip doesn't list any cool-down so I assume it doesn't have one, providing the damage for every heavy attack. In practice that gets boosted by CP (not sure if also by class or race passives) as I've seen a tool tip of about 1K when equipped on my DK. Assuming there are 4 fully charged heavy attacks on average every 10s - a DK will do those with every skill from front bar. Flame damage it does not benefit on the increased penetration of the set itself, but it will benefit from any major/minor breach debuff applied to target, as well as Alkosh and crusher. In practice major breach from Elemental Drain will always be applied, usually by the healer. Major breach is 5280 penetration and minor is 1320. With the former applied, the target mitigation is lowered to 19.5%. The latter is harder to keep up so I will not consider it. So damage done by Sunderflame becomes 4*1000*(1-19.5%)/10=320 DPS. Another potential benefit is the magicka return from Magicka Steal, which makes Flames of Oblivion and Molten Armaments easier to keep up.

So the final difference between the sets is only 600 DPS in favor of TFS, or 1.5% out of the 40,000 DPS parse for the user, but a 5.2% increase for every other stamina DD in the group. The sharpened trait has been halved from 2580 to 1290 per weapon equipped, and other debuffs, such as Alkosh, minor fracture and crusher enchantment do not achieve 100% uptime by design. Additionally other traits like precise and infused have increased in effectiveness so it's likely that players will use those instead of sharpened in group content. So overpenetration is less likely. That means the 5.2% DPS increase from Sunderflame debuff will fully benefit the other DDs in the group. Assuming 2 other stamina DDs that parse 40,000, the DPS increase will be 2*40,000*5.2%=4160 DPS, or a gain of 3560 compared to the situation where all 3 use Twice-Fanged Serpent. In a group with 8 DDs parsing around 40,000 DPS each, this is an 1.1% increase.

In single target fights the sets are very close to each other, and Sunderflame provides an useful bonus for the group. Additionally, being a dungeon set it's much easier to farm than Twice-Fanged Serpent, which is a trial set and does not fully stack penetration until several seconds in the rotation. Even compared to the other commonly used trial set, Vicious Serpent, the difference is not that big as the 5.2% damage increase from additional penetration on is almost identical to the 5% Minor Slayer one. When compared to Spriggan's Thorns, which also provides increased penetration one advantage is that the extra penetration is not lost when swapping bar when that set is equipped only on front bar.

In conclusion, the stamina DK player may not have to go to such great lengths to get a good, if not "BiS" set.

Just fyi yout math is off...penetration to damage increase is calculated out of 50,000 for a PvE mob not out of 33,100. So TFS is a flat 10% dps buff on a 5 piece. Sunderflame 5 piece at 100% uptime is around 6.68%, but you wont have 100% uptime on it, probably closwr to around 80% in a trial vwrsus 99% on TFS, which is around 5.3%.

Asardes · August 2017

Well, that seems a bit strange, I always thought that mobs and players had identical mitigation, but with all inconsistencies in the game it is not unexpected. As for the uptime on Sunderflame, it probably means it has an implicit cooldown, which is also not mentioned anywhere in the tool tip, and it doesn't get refreshed on each hit. Good to know then. I won't be farming TFS any time soon, since I've taken a break from group content, but when I do I'll do a test of them to see what is really the case. That will probably be around march-may next year since I plan on a moderate break

hedna123b14_ESO · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

Well, that seems a bit strange, I always thought that mobs and players had identical mitigation, but with all inconsistencies in the game it is not unexpected. As for the uptime on Sunderflame, it probably means it has an implicit cooldown, which is also not mentioned anywhere in the tool tip, and it doesn't get refreshed on each hit. Good to know then. I won't be farming TFS any time soon, since I've taken a break from group content, but when I do I'll do a test of them to see what is really the case. That will probably be around march-may next year since I plan on a moderate break

Yeah this game is pretty convoluted. Asayre has a great page with damage dealt formulas. Its 50k for mobs and 66k for players weird huh?

Qbiken · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

Qbiken wrote: »

Hmm, might have some Sunderflame weapons laying around I think

Sure, many people probably have them as "by-catch" from farming the other set in the City of Ash 1/2 dungeons back in the day when it was considered "BiS". Also City of Ash 1 is one of the easiest dungeons, taking 10-12 minutes or less to fully farm. On normal an average player can do it alone in less than 15 minutes for sure. For SO you always need 12 people and the trial is long by design, taking 20 minutes or more even on normal with randoms.

And since the dps difference isn´t huge (as shown from your post) it´s a very nice setup to run

Asardes · August 2017

I'm actually thinking of dropping all penetration from my builds, gear wise, and simply focusing on higher crit rate and enchant procs. That means running something like Hunding + Leviathan with precise/infused weapons and ~30 CP in penetration and lover for solo, shadow for group content.

hedna123b14_ESO · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

I'm actually thinking of dropping all penetration from my builds, gear wise, and simply focusing on higher crit rate and enchant procs. That means running something like Hunding + Leviathan with precise/infused weapons and ~30 CP in penetration and lover for solo, shadow for group content.

I can tell you that in PvE penetration will give you significantly bettet reaults, so I wouldnt do that approach. Penetration gives the most damage.

Asardes · August 2017

hedna123b14_ESO wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

I'm actually thinking of dropping all penetration from my builds, gear wise, and simply focusing on higher crit rate and enchant procs. That means running something like Hunding + Leviathan with precise/infused weapons and ~30 CP in penetration and lover for solo, shadow for group content.

I can tell you that in PvE penetration will give you significantly bettet reaults, so I wouldnt do that approach. Penetration gives the most damage.

Well, with the buff to Lover, it's around 4K on divines if I'm not mistaken. If the gear covers for the lost crit from Thief, it will still work well.

hedna123b14_ESO · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

hedna123b14_ESO wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

I'm actually thinking of dropping all penetration from my builds, gear wise, and simply focusing on higher crit rate and enchant procs. That means running something like Hunding + Leviathan with precise/infused weapons and ~30 CP in penetration and lover for solo, shadow for group content.

I can tell you that in PvE penetration will give you significantly bettet reaults, so I wouldnt do that approach. Penetration gives the most damage.

Well, with the buff to Lover, it's around 4K on divines if I'm not mistaken. If the gear covers for the lost crit from Thief, it will still work well.

For stam shadow is BiS for Mundus and maxing Pen...ideally TFS/NMG

Asardes · August 2017

Well NMG looks worse than Sunderflame, since it's only 2.6K penetration. And on a DK you do plenty of HA to re-proc that. There isn't simply enough time for it to run out, with the whole rotation being like 8-10s.

getemshauna · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

Well NMG looks worse than Sunderflame, since it's only 2.6K penetration. And on a DK you do plenty of HA to re-proc that. There isn't simply enough time for it to run out, with the whole rotation being like 8-10s.

NMG works in AoE situations, and it is insanely strong when connected with caltrops, also it has double critical chance bonus, what is most buffed stat in a next patch.

Asardes · August 2017

I'm actually using 5 NMG 5 VO 2 Velidreth on my stam NB and the DPS is pretty good right now. I'm close to 30K ST self buffed on skeleton and 40K in trials. Should I use the same setup on DK? I'm not very experienced and I could probably go higher with the current setup, as I wasted plenty of time playing as tank instead of DD.

Raghul · August 2017

This is my setup on live:

setup i will be running next patch:
5 VO ( with infused and precise dagger) Thank you RNGesus !
5 TFS
1 Kragh
1 Slimecraw (5% extra crit)
1 VMA bow (Precise or nirn, not sure yet)
Shadow Mundus

here is a parse from live server (could have been higher as we didn't have sunderflame etc, we just grouped up for the lolz and killed the centurion.

hedna123b14_ESO · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

Well NMG looks worse than Sunderflame, since it's only 2.6K penetration. And on a DK you do plenty of HA to re-proc that. There isn't simply enough time for it to run out, with the whole rotation being like 8-10s.

You will realistically only get around 80% on sunderflame and 95+ on NMG. 80% of sunder is 2672 and 95% of NMG is 2451. As the person above mentioned its AoE so much more beneficial. Also the double crit bonus is worth more than crit/stam on sunder. To give you an example a setup like this woukd easily be 44k+ on the skele self buffed.

Asardes · August 2017

Then I'll stick with NMG+VO and swap it between chars. I was able to pull around 28K on my NB but I'm not that experienced. I could probably go at 32-35K with more practice but 44K seems way too much. I will probably need to invest more in recovery and weave LA instead of HA with the skills.

hedna123b14_ESO · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

Then I'll stick with NMG+VO and swap it between chars. I was able to pull around 28K on my NB but I'm not that experienced. I could probably go at 32-35K with more practice but 44K seems way too much. I will probably need to invest more in recovery and weave LA instead of HA with the skills.

I use 2 heavy attacks every 10 seconds and that seems like enough without leeching, but I am a redguard wearing VO..Its the penetration man. Grind out TFS and you will be good to go

Tasear · August 2017

Twin fang was nerfed today so maybe we will see sunderflame and night mother in trials?

Asardes · August 2017

I will redo the calculations tomorrow. I still don't know how high is Sunderflame uptime. But on a DK it should be quite high since you do heavy attacks all the time you are on the front bar and only switch to backbar to reapply DoTs and buffs, which doesn't take more than 4-5s, not enough time to run out.

Asardes · August 2017

Taking into account the changes in the current patch and the fact that mobs have a different resistance cap than players:
Twice Fanged Serpent provides 4300 penetration when fully stacked, which is a 4300/50000 = 8.6% damage increase
Sunderflame provides 3440 penetration for 8s after a heavy attack which is 3440/5000 = 6.9% damage increase
Additionally Sunderflame provides 774 (raised to about 1K by CP) flame damage for each heavy attack, which will benefit from major breach bonus, for 1000*(1-(18,200-5280)/50,000) = 740 damage. For 4 attacks every 10s that means ~300 DPS.
The difference on a 40K parse will be (8.6%-6.9%)*40,000 - 300 = 680 - 300 = 380, or less than 1% on that parse. So the sets are even closer this patch.

Tasear · August 2017

Asardes wrote: »

Taking into account the changes in the current patch and the fact that mobs have a different resistance cap than players:
Twice Fanged Serpent provides 4300 penetration when fully stacked, which is a 4300/50000 = 8.6% damage increase
Sunderflame provides 3440 penetration for 8s after a heavy attack which is 3440/5000 = 6.9% damage increase
Additionally Sunderflame provides 774 (raised to about 1K by CP) flame damage for each heavy attack, which will benefit from major breach bonus, for 1000*(1-(18,200-5280)/50,000) = 740 damage. For 4 attacks every 10s that means ~300 DPS.
The difference on a 40K parse will be (8.6%-6.9%)*40,000 - 300 = 680 - 300 = 380, or less than 1% on that parse. So the sets are even closer this patch.

But in group play wouldn't sunderflame be useful?

Asardes · August 2017

Yes, it's primarily a group play set. My point is that for the DD running it the DPS loss will be insignificant if running this instead of TFS. Another advantage I discussed is that you only need it on your front bar and on a DK the uptime will probably close to 100% since your front bar rotation is just DoTs and heavy attacks.

Izaki · August 2017

hedna123b14_ESO wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

Then I'll stick with NMG+VO and swap it between chars. I was able to pull around 28K on my NB but I'm not that experienced. I could probably go at 32-35K with more practice but 44K seems way too much. I will probably need to invest more in recovery and weave LA instead of HA with the skills.

I use 2 heavy attacks every 10 seconds and that seems like enough without leeching, but I am a redguard wearing VO..Its the penetration man. Grind out TFS and you will be good to go

Just to bring a souvenir from the "golden age of DPS" (first weeks of PTS)
http://imgur.com/JOkgTBv

Too bad the Shadow sucks now and the only usable mundus is the Warrior and the Apprentice in group content.

hedna123b14_ESO · August 2017

IzakiBrotherSs wrote: »

hedna123b14_ESO wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

Then I'll stick with NMG+VO and swap it between chars. I was able to pull around 28K on my NB but I'm not that experienced. I could probably go at 32-35K with more practice but 44K seems way too much. I will probably need to invest more in recovery and weave LA instead of HA with the skills.

I use 2 heavy attacks every 10 seconds and that seems like enough without leeching, but I am a redguard wearing VO..Its the penetration man. Grind out TFS and you will be good to go

Just to bring a souvenir from the "golden age of DPS" (first weeks of PTS)
http://imgur.com/JOkgTBv

Too bad the Shadow sucks now and the only usable mundus is the Warrior and the Apprentice in group content.

3 mil is too bursty I swapped to only testing on 6 mil, but nice parse anyhow:)