Magicka Warden PvE DPS: How's it looking for you, and can we make it work in its current state?

Vaoh · June 2017

@stileanima Besides my owm suggestions listed above (which are mostly opinionated

), the most I can see a Magicka Warden currently bringing to a raid is Northern Storm and Expanive Ice Cloak.

Northern Storm is similar to Nova or Consuming Darkness - 30% group damage mitigtion for difficult scenarios such as The Mage execute or (even tougher) Assembly General execute.

Expansive Ice Cloak could be used every other rotation for the same scenarios as above.

Damage-wise, they cannot really put out more DPS than you are. All I can add atm is that there is another rotation that can pull slightly more DPS but is likely unrealistic in trial scenarios. Also it may not be worth casting a few of the Warden skills over a simple Cliff Racer if built for Direct Damage

I have a tonnnn of testing to do still.

Also in a trial you won't be using the bear

Northern Storm+Ele Rage is the go-to setup.
Lastly it is worth noting that Valkyn Skoria+Witchmother's Brew is another powerful setup that's worth a shot, and that DW/Destro might be stronger on Mag Warden than Destro/Destro.

Idk yet...

subtlezeroub17_ESO · June 2017

Screaming cliff racer should have done ice damage instead of magical. Right now, we have access to one frost damage ability when we have a whole 6% boost to it. It just doesn't make sense...

Draqone · June 2017

My speculation is that Winters revenge is not affected by Major Prophecy.

I did a few parses with my very new lvl 50 magWarden, a few things for you guys to try and consider:

Clench instead of Cliff Racer
Unstable wall instead of blockade.

Unstable's proc scales with MAA and the timing fits in well with 2x Deep Fissure.

stileanima · June 2017

@Draqone I tried out Unstable Wall instead of Blockade, and for me, it wasn't any better. The Unstable Wall definitely did more DPS than Blockade because of your point about the end explosion being boosted by Master at Arms, but overall it hurt my rotation just because I had to cast it more frequently and therefore needed to heavy attack a bit more. My overall DPS wasn't "bad" with it by any means- I got 35k with it. But IDK if in the end it will be better or worse in trials, needing to heavy attack more.

@Vaoh You make some interesting points and suggestions.

I got a comfortable 37k today, but yeah, using the bear of course. Definitely can't be done without it. I also thought about using dual wield on the back bar, but, WTB Moondancer swords.

And I hadn't thought about replacing other Warden skills with more Cliff Racers, but I'll give it a shot. Thanks!

s7732425ub17_ESO · June 2017

The Warden ice ultimate is equivalent to a Templar nova or NB veil. Of course it doesn't do as much damage as the destro staff ultimate, but it gives massive damage reduction.

Warden has a chain ability. So it can replace DKs in places where chains are needed. About time they gave another class this ability.

Warden can provide constant uptime of 10% damage reduction on the group through frost shield (even if it only hits 6 people, it's still decent). Remember, the CP damage reduction stars were nerfed, dropping from 25% reduction to 15% at max level. Guess where you can make up this extra 10%? Granted other classes can get this from other sources, but many aren't using those sources.

Wardens also provide resource sustain buffs to the group that you don't really get anywhere else right now. Granted they are minor, but just having an extra 10% regen can really reduce the amount of heavy attacks required.

Bug? Fletcher Infection is not a DOT. It is considered a direct damage attack with regards to CP.
Bug. The 12 second ice based ground DOT does not get benefit from a certain CP star. I think it's the crit damage one, but I'll have to double-check my notes.

Gaden.Phoenix · June 2017

s7732425ub17_ESO wrote: »

Bug? Fletcher Infection is not a DOT. It is considered a direct damage attack with regards to CP.
Bug. The 12 second ice based ground DOT does not get benefit from a certain CP star. I think it's the crit damage one, but I'll have to double-check my notes.

Fletcher not a DOT? Seriously that it is the highest damage skill on my rotation, which I get about 15k~20k, about 10k ~ 20k on vet dungeons (I not those epic people that can get 35k). Because of Fletcher, I pumped tons of my 320 CP into DOT and Magika dmg increase...

Maybe I should respec my CP, but that would mean respecing again (if they fix it).

Vaoh · June 2017

Did some more testing. So the Magicka Warden is in a strange situation atm......

Swarm is not a DoT. It is counting as a Direct Damage ability, getting boosted by Master At Arms (not Thaumaturge) and proccing sets like Scathing Mage. However, the uptime on Scathing Mage can only be high if Force Pulse is used, which is not worth the sacrifice.

In essence, it is actually serving to hurt Wardens quite a bit. Thaumaturge must be stacked to 75 in order to unlock the Exploiter passive in PvE. This leaves a large damage loss on Swarm since Master At Arms won't be stacked as high. On top of this, we now have 1 less DoT to proc Valkyn Skoria, which is basically the go-to set for Mag Warden DPS rn since it provide good single target damage.

Plz buff and bug fix Warden ZOS

Alcast · June 2017

Vaoh wrote: »

Did some more testing. So the Magicka Warden is in a strange situation atm......

Swarm is not a DoT. It is counting as a Direct Damage ability, getting boosted by Master At Arms (not Thaumaturge) and proccing sets like Scathing Mage. However, the uptime on Scathing Mage can only be high if Force Pulse is used, which is not worth the sacrifice.

In essence, it is actually serving to hurt Wardens quite a bit. Thaumaturge must be stacked to 75 in order to unlock the Exploiter passive in PvE. This leaves a large damage loss on Swarm since Master At Arms won't be stacked as high. On top of this, we now have 1 less DoT to proc Valkyn Skoria, which is basically the go-to set for Mag Warden DPS rn since it provide good single target damage.

Plz buff and bug fix Warden ZOS

It was reported multiple times that Fetchet Flies is counting as Direct Damage for some reason on PTS.

There was a huge discussion during PTS on why Magwardens are in a bad postion. They SLIGHTLY buffed it, but obviously was not enough.

Waffennacht · June 2017

Why no one like bear? I had mine hitting for 45k+ at the low cost of 75 ult?

But I play solo, is it a group thing?

Plus 2.5k dps without having to do anything is alright,

stileanima · June 2017

Waffennacht wrote: »

Why no one like bear? I had mine hitting for 45k+ at the low cost of 75 ult?

But I play solo, is it a group thing?

Plus 2.5k dps without having to do anything is alright,

Ultimately, yeah, it is largely a "group thing", not to mention a substantial "self" thing as well. Currently, Magicka Wardens achieve their highest possible damage output only when using the Eternal Guardian ultimate, as it pumps out (in my case) 5-6k+ DPS, which is approximately 18% of my total damage (a pretty substantial amount); however, in trials, the Eternal Guardian is truly useful only in single-target scenarios, and not all of them at that.

In a good amount of situations, you would want to be running an AOE ultimate; i.e., the Destro Ult, as it is the most optimal way to burn down large amounts of mobs quickly. When you do this as a Magicka Warden, you will then be losing that 5-6k+ DPS that the Eternal Guardian provides out of necessity, with no way to gain it back (while it does contribute somewhat, casting the Destro Ult does not make up for this loss).

Deep Fissure is pretty nice AOE, but it and and the rest of the Warden's toolkit unfortunately do not make up for the loss of the Eternal Guardian.

PS- Just a somewhat related/funny/L2P side story that I want to share:

I've had the chance to play a casual vMoL on my Warden recently. For the final boss, I volunteered to run the backyard as I wanted to experiment with using the Eternal Guardian, keeping him on the boss while I was outside. For the first round of running, everything went swimmingly- my Bear stood his ground against Rakkhat, and was still fighting valiantly when I returned. For the second round, however, the Bear somehow died just as I was about to sidestep a blue orb. I then became stuck in the re-summoning animation, casually slow-walked into an orb as I was unable to move any faster away from it, took all the damage from the orb as I couldn't cast any skills while the re-summoning occurred, and died, causing my group to wipe.

Waffennacht · June 2017

stileanima wrote: »

Waffennacht wrote: »

Why no one like bear? I had mine hitting for 45k+ at the low cost of 75 ult?

But I play solo, is it a group thing?

Plus 2.5k dps without having to do anything is alright,

Ultimately, yeah, it is largely a "group thing", not to mention a substantial "self" thing as well. Currently, Magicka Wardens achieve their highest possible damage output only when using the Eternal Guardian ultimate, as it pumps out approximately (in my case) 5-6k+ DPS; however, in trials, the Eternal Guardian is truly useful only in single-target scenarios, and not all of them at that.

In a good amount of situations, you would want to be running an AOE ultimate; i.e., the Destro Ult, as it is the most optimal way to burn down large amounts of mobs quickly. When you do this as a Magicka Warden, you will then be losing that 5-6k+ DPS that the Eternal Guardian provides out of necessity, with no way to gain it back (while it does contribute somewhat, casting the Destro Ult does not make up for this loss).

Deep Fissure is pretty nice AOE, but it and and the rest of the Warden's toolkit unfortunately do not make up for the loss of the Eternal Guardian when it comes to damage.

PS- Just a somewhat related/funny/L2P side story that I want to share:

I've had the chance to play a casual vMoL on my Warden recently. For the final boss, I volunteered to run the backyard as I wanted to experiment with using the Eternal Guardian, keeping him on the boss while I was outside. For the first round of running, everything went swimmingly- my Bear stood his ground against Rakkhat, and was still fighting valiantly when I returned. For the second round, however, the Bear somehow died just as I was about to sidestep a blue orb. I then became stuck in the re-summoning animation, casually slow-walked into an orb as I was unable to move any faster away from it, took all the damage from the orb as I couldn't cast any skills while the re-summoning occurred, and died, causing my group to wipe.

I kinda got sold on the bear last night, he actually aggroed one of the ilambris twins making my job a Lot easier.

I also have a soft spot for pets...

Thus far my bear and I have soloed veteran Fungal Grotto, Banished Cells, Crypt of Hearts, and Dark Shade Caverns.

I know it can solo, vCoA, Elden Root, Madness, Crucible, Whisperer, Arx

I'm running on him, Necro x5 willpower x3, infernal guardian x2, gold staff

The main thing is when you do Northern Storm and Destro ult, you're minimum costing ult is 200 vs the 75 of the bear.

I, for the longest time, thought the bear was immortal lol until the Dark Shade boss used that auto kill ability on it.

P.S. the chanting voices when the bear comes auto back is pretty cool sounding!

Draqone · June 2017

I just ran my MagWarden through vAA ( 90k score) and vDSA (35k score).

I don't have a vMA staff and I run 2x Lightning, with Julianos frontbar and Master Architect backbar. I use the bear ult to proc Master Architect getting some 40-odd percent uptime.

My skillbars are as follows:

Trial:
FRONT: Force Pulse - Fetcher - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - (flex: Frost Cloak/Enchanted Growth/Vines)
BACKBAR: Clench - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

The clench is mainly for the Destro passive and some single target DoTs.

vDSA:
FRONT: Orbs - Fetcher Infection - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - Living Trellis
BACKBAR: Ele Drain - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

I switch the bear out for the Dwemer round (Ice ulti/Destro Ulti) and for the final round I additionally switch the Orbs to a taunt.

Oooh and! I run a suboptimal Illambris set (I have a Fire enchant on the frontbar staff to proc it). The reasons are purely aesthetical, I could never run something as ugly as Skoria.

Waffennacht · June 2017

Draqone wrote: »

I just ran my MagWarden through vAA ( 90k score) and vDSA (35k score).

I don't have a vMA staff and I run 2x Lightning, with Julianos frontbar and Master Architect backbar. I use the bear ult to proc Master Architect getting some 40-odd percent uptime.

My skillbars are as follows:

Trial:
FRONT: Force Pulse - Fetcher - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - (flex: Frost Cloak/Enchanted Growth/Vines)
BACKBAR: Clench - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

The clench is mainly for the Destro passive and some single target DoTs.

vDSA:
FRONT: Orbs - Fetcher Infection - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - Living Trellis
BACKBAR: Ele Drain - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

I switch the bear out for the Dwemer round (Ice ulti/Destro Ulti) and for the final round I additionally switch the Orbs to a taunt.

Oooh and! I run a suboptimal Illambris set (I have a Fire enchant on the frontbar staff to proc it). The reasons are purely aesthetical, I could never run something as ugly as Skoria.

You think ilambris is better looking than skoria?! That's crazy talk!

subtlezeroub17_ESO · July 2017

Waffennacht wrote: »

Draqone wrote: »

I just ran my MagWarden through vAA ( 90k score) and vDSA (35k score).

I don't have a vMA staff and I run 2x Lightning, with Julianos frontbar and Master Architect backbar. I use the bear ult to proc Master Architect getting some 40-odd percent uptime.

My skillbars are as follows:

Trial:
FRONT: Force Pulse - Fetcher - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - (flex: Frost Cloak/Enchanted Growth/Vines)
BACKBAR: Clench - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

The clench is mainly for the Destro passive and some single target DoTs.

vDSA:
FRONT: Orbs - Fetcher Infection - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - Living Trellis
BACKBAR: Ele Drain - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

I switch the bear out for the Dwemer round (Ice ulti/Destro Ulti) and for the final round I additionally switch the Orbs to a taunt.

Oooh and! I run a suboptimal Illambris set (I have a Fire enchant on the frontbar staff to proc it). The reasons are purely aesthetical, I could never run something as ugly as Skoria.

You think ilambris is better looking than skoria?! That's crazy talk!

Same boat here. Ilambris plays with my "storm caller" theme perfectly while Storia doesn't. Matter fact, that's half the reason I won't use the bear. My storm caller build demands ice and thunder storms.

Waffennacht · July 2017

subtlezeroub17_ESO wrote: »

Waffennacht wrote: »

Draqone wrote: »

I just ran my MagWarden through vAA ( 90k score) and vDSA (35k score).

I don't have a vMA staff and I run 2x Lightning, with Julianos frontbar and Master Architect backbar. I use the bear ult to proc Master Architect getting some 40-odd percent uptime.

My skillbars are as follows:

Trial:
FRONT: Force Pulse - Fetcher - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - (flex: Frost Cloak/Enchanted Growth/Vines)
BACKBAR: Clench - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

The clench is mainly for the Destro passive and some single target DoTs.

vDSA:
FRONT: Orbs - Fetcher Infection - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - Living Trellis
BACKBAR: Ele Drain - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

I switch the bear out for the Dwemer round (Ice ulti/Destro Ulti) and for the final round I additionally switch the Orbs to a taunt.

Oooh and! I run a suboptimal Illambris set (I have a Fire enchant on the frontbar staff to proc it). The reasons are purely aesthetical, I could never run something as ugly as Skoria.

You think ilambris is better looking than skoria?! That's crazy talk!

Same boat here. Ilambris plays with my "storm caller" theme perfectly while Storia doesn't. Matter fact, that's half the reason I won't use the bear. My storm caller build demands ice and thunder storms.

I get theme, but visually skoria is much better looking than the kinda zombie bear thing illambris has going on

subtlezeroub17_ESO · July 2017

Waffennacht wrote: »

subtlezeroub17_ESO wrote: »

Waffennacht wrote: »

Draqone wrote: »

I just ran my MagWarden through vAA ( 90k score) and vDSA (35k score).

I don't have a vMA staff and I run 2x Lightning, with Julianos frontbar and Master Architect backbar. I use the bear ult to proc Master Architect getting some 40-odd percent uptime.

My skillbars are as follows:

Trial:
FRONT: Force Pulse - Fetcher - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - (flex: Frost Cloak/Enchanted Growth/Vines)
BACKBAR: Clench - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

The clench is mainly for the Destro passive and some single target DoTs.

vDSA:
FRONT: Orbs - Fetcher Infection - Deep Fissure - Unstable Wall of Elements - Living Trellis
BACKBAR: Ele Drain - Winter's Revenge - Harness - Netch - Lotus

I switch the bear out for the Dwemer round (Ice ulti/Destro Ulti) and for the final round I additionally switch the Orbs to a taunt.

Oooh and! I run a suboptimal Illambris set (I have a Fire enchant on the frontbar staff to proc it). The reasons are purely aesthetical, I could never run something as ugly as Skoria.

You think ilambris is better looking than skoria?! That's crazy talk!

Same boat here. Ilambris plays with my "storm caller" theme perfectly while Storia doesn't. Matter fact, that's half the reason I won't use the bear. My storm caller build demands ice and thunder storms.

I get theme, but visually skoria is much better looking than the kinda zombie bear thing illambris has going on

Oh, I almost always wear costumes lol. Rarely is there ever any good looking non crafted pieces.

Draqone · July 2017

Waffennacht wrote: »

I get theme, but visually skoria is much better looking than the kinda zombie bear thing illambris has going on

This is my warden. As you can imagine, the skoria shoulder does not fit at all.

akl77 · July 2017

So is 5 necro better or 5 julianos?

Samwell Slayer · August 2017

A couple of quick points.

1) Necro is underperforming with wardens, not for any deep mathematical reason but mostly because, for some reason, the bear does not got affected by the 5 piece. You can even see this with the parses posted above. You test this yourselves by replacing the 5th piece of necro by an equal quality piece not in the set and noting the damage does mot change.

2) Taking the weighted average of the metics is not valid since each piece only defined up to a constant. Essentially the different pieces have different units. You can however add together a weighted average of changes in the metric.

stileanima · August 2017

Final build video (will update original post too):

https://youtu.be/0pAxCn7UPw8

Thanks, all, for your input.

Shushu_H · August 2017

I'm inexperienced in pve but could you tell me why your not using falcon for the minor berserk instead of slotting magelight for more max mag. I looked at it and tested that the falcon outdoes magelight in terms of getting damage.

Also I don't know what your CP is when it comes to how much direct damage vs thaumaturge and this is a downhill battle it seems but have you tried two spammables. Like force pulse with Cliff racer. If you use Cliff racer first force pulse hits it at the same time Cliff racer hits idk if that helps at all.

Waffennacht · August 2017

Shushu_H wrote: »

I'm inexperienced in pve but could you tell me why your not using falcon for the minor berserk instead of slotting magelight for more max mag. I looked at it and tested that the falcon outdoes magelight in terms of getting damage.

Also I don't know what your CP is when it comes to how much direct damage vs thaumaturge and this is a downhill battle it seems but have you tried two spammables. Like force pulse with Cliff racer. If you use Cliff racer first force pulse hits it at the same time Cliff racer hits idk if that helps at all.

I can answer the falcon question. The GCD required to have falcon up sacrifices a GCD for an attack, because of falcons duration, it costs dps. This I have read but not tested.

stileanima · August 2017

Shushu_H wrote: »

I'm inexperienced in pve but could you tell me why your not using falcon for the minor berserk instead of slotting magelight for more max mag. I looked at it and tested that the falcon outdoes magelight in terms of getting damage.

Also I don't know what your CP is when it comes to how much direct damage vs thaumaturge and this is a downhill battle it seems but have you tried two spammables. Like force pulse with Cliff racer. If you use Cliff racer first force pulse hits it at the same time Cliff racer hits idk if that helps at all.

On Bird of Prey: In a raid setting, I would already be getting Minor Berserk from my healers, who both would be running Combat Prayer, which provides the same buff. Even if they weren't, the cost of the skill is too high for the short duration. At the moment, this skill is more of a PvP thing rather than PvE.

On Force Pulse plus Cliff Racer: This again is a PvP thing that you are suggesting. Ultimately Cliff Racer costs less and deals more damage than Force Pulse. Using them at the same time to take advantage of Cliff Racer's delay to land both hits at once isn't going to mean anything in a fight where enemies have millions of health, not to mention it'd be harder on resources.

Edit: Deep Fissure is basically already my second spammable anyway.

NyassaV · August 2017

So you are managing better with Julianos rather than Necro... Interesting

Gan Xing · August 2017

On a side note, I've noticed that it is much harder to animation cancel with the warden than with any other class, severely hurting dps.

Vaoh · August 2017

Hollery wrote: »

So you are managing better with Julianos rather than Necro... Interesting

Necropotence doesn't provide nearly enough stats to be worth it over other sets. The reason Magicka Sorcs went to Necropotence pre-HotR is because Sorc Familiar and Twilight both scale *only* off of Maximum Magicka.

So a set like this wouldn't boost typical skill damage as much as others, but it'd cause your pet to dish out huge damage to more than make up for it. A Warden doesn't use true pets to DPS so Necropotence can't be good for PvE DPS. I've tested Warden a looooot so far and came to the same conclusion pretty early - Julianos > Necropotence

Gan Xing · August 2017

OK then question... What would you pair Julianos with? (assume I don't have any trial gear)

Noodles · August 2017

Gan Xing wrote: »

On a side note, I've noticed that it is much harder to animation cancel with the warden than with any other class, severely hurting dps.

Thats the main reason i stopped trying to get better numbers on my Mag Warden, that LA weaving doesnt happen half the time and it hurts