Champion Point allocation for Magicka DK PvE DPS

Duragon_Darko · November 2017

As the title states, I just want to see what's out there, as well as bars, skills and rotations.
My rotation almost follows the way the bar is set up. I've got Julianos and BSW 5pc sets all divines, Lightning and Flame staves both sharpened and weapon damage enchantment, Iceheart helm, all gold except the jewelry. The apprentice stone btw.
Lightning Bar
1) Igneous Weapons
2) Elemental Drain
3) Rearming Trap
4) Blockade of Storms
5) Inner Light
Flame bar
1) Engulfing Flames
2) Eruption
3) Burning Embers
4) Flame Lash
5) Inner Light

Elfborn 56
Elememtal Expert 43
Spell Erosion 46

Thaumaturge 75

I can only muster 20k on a dummy. Is it the way the dummy calculates damage per second? Cause there's like 5 to 8 seconds where you have to wait for the DoT's to wear off and that takes precious time. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Narvuntien · November 2017

I can only get 22K DPS on a dummy, same gear set up, but with two flame staves. Same skills in a different order.

My issue is I run completely dry on magicka, extremely quickly. Even with witchmothers brew, It isn't long before I am really struggling to keep up my DoTs. Although I am using Whip not Lash. I am thinking about dropping a SD jewrelly enchant for a cost reduction one.

What are your ultimates? Remember that you need to have a destruction staff ability on your bar to get the destruction staff damage passives.

People get there stupidly high dps with animation cancelling, which with my 300 ping is insanely difficult to do.

Duragon_Darko · November 2017

I have the destro ultimate on the flame bar, and the standard on the lightning bar (Elememtal Blockade is on that bar for the passive). I use the lightning staff since it's OP for trash and adds in a group. That extra damage is crazy.

Anyone else?

WrathOfInnos · November 2017

You should try to finish off the 3 mil dummy. It tests sustain more accurately, and you won't have to worry about DPS lost to lingering DoTs.

As for CP's, your spell erosion seems higher than what I typically run. If you have a tank with Torug's infused crusher (2741) or Alkosh (3010) and a healer or Stamplar with power of the light (1320), then you only need 34 points in spell erosion. When solo or practicing on a dummy (no group support), this ~4K pen can be gotten from the Lover mundus. Just remember to switch back to Apprentice for group content.

Don't worry too much about the "Animation Cancelling" everyone always talks about. 35-40k is achievable on MagDK with nothing more complex than doing a light attack right before each skill.

Everything else seems good with CPs. I wouldn't put any more in elf born, given your relatively low crit chance (guessing around 53%?). If you move some out of spell erosion, put them into elemental expert and master at arms, also maybe bring thaum up to the 81 jump point.

One more thing I notice you are missing is Flames of Onlivion. If you can work it into your rotation it does great DPS, and can replace inner light on your back bar if you don't want to drop a different skill for it.

Edit: Just saw you said Iceheart 1 piece, so that puts your crit closer to 57%, which explains the high elf born. Your CPs seem pretty optimal with the exception of pen I mentioned above.

Edit Again: Corrected the ideal number of points in spell erosion to 34 if you have Torug's Crusher and Maj/Min Breach (technically this goes up to 35 points if using Lover stone for solo and wearing 4 pieces divines, but 34 is close enough and I like to optimize for trials).

Qbiken · November 2017

Magicka DK is in a bad spot at the moment. Mostly because of the sustain changes in Morrowind, which hit magicka DK (PvE) really hard. Unless you want to play a heavy-attack build, you´re forced to use Flame-lash. And in order for Flame-lash t be reliable (which it isn´t anyway) you need a group that can offer you off-balance support. If you don´t have off-balance support, you can´t sustain as a magicka DK. If anyone want to prove me wrong, feel free to do so, me if anyone would be more than happy.

If you want higher DPS on a target dummy, make sure to stack as much penetration as possible. Most of those buildvideos/write-ups you read about where people do 35-40k selfbuffed, are often done by stacking as much penetration as possible. On a target dummy the numbers looks nice and all, but in a dungeon or a trial, a "target-dummy build" isn´t very useful.

Your CP looks fine if you ask me.
This build is quite good if you want to have some inspiration.
http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/masels-elemental-fury-pve-dps-dk-build-1t-ready/

Gyra_Lothbrok · November 2017

Gear: 5pc BSW, 4pc Moon/IA, vMA lightning Nirn(or moon/ia), 2pc Groth
Charged on the inferno with a Shock enchant
Nirn on the lightning with Weapon Damage enchant

Skills: Front bar Lash, Engulf Flame, Burn Embers, Ele Drain, Inner Light Ulti Meteor
Back bar: Ele Blockade, FoO, Erupt, Trap, Flex Spot Ulti Standard

Note: I have Ele on FB for the Destro Passive, and the ability to run Meteor is a huge bonus.
For my BB Flex I normally keep my Harness Magicka there.

Rotation: Ele-> FoO -> Spell Pot -> Blockade -> Erupt -> Trap->Standard->BS -> Engulf -> Embers -> BS/Blockade/BS-> Lashx5->Engulf-> Embers-> Ele->BS->Blockade->BS->Lashx2->BS->FoO->Erupt->Trap->Blockade->BS->Engulf->Embers->BS->Blockade->BS->Lashx5->just keep swimming

Light Attacking between every skill no excuses!
Depending how fast you are, you can fit a few more Whips in before you BS to restart your BB rotation.
Pop Meteor when it is up, it'll help alleviate your mana pool.

I easily hit 35k with this, except I have vMA Flame, still on that grind for a lightning.
When parsing on a dummy use Apprentice, and mana/regen food. In a raid you want to use Witchmother's, but while learning/practicing it's best to use regen so you aren't struggling.
With lightning on backbar you will be able to proc Lash more often, free whips are lovely whips.
Also having the shock enchant on front bar will give you minor vuln which increases your damage by 8%, add the procced whips to that.. oh baby. With a vMA lightning BB 38-40k would be easily achievable.
Also I never heavy attack, especially in raids (when I take her rip magdk) you should never suffer sustain issues if you have good support and rotation.

Qbiken · November 2017

Gyra_Lothbrok wrote: »

Gear: 5pc BSW, 4pc Moon/IA, vMA lightning Nirn(or moon/ia), 2pc Groth
Charged on the inferno with a Shock enchant
Nirn on the lightning with Weapon Damage enchant

Skills: Front bar Lash, Engulf Flame, Burn Embers, Ele Drain, Inner Light Ulti Meteor
Back bar: Ele Blockade, FoO, Erupt, Trap, Flex Spot Ulti Standard

Note: I have Ele on FB for the Destro Passive, and the ability to run Meteor is a huge bonus.
For my BB Flex I normally keep my Harness Magicka there.

Rotation: Ele-> FoO -> Spell Pot -> Blockade -> Erupt -> Trap->Standard->BS -> Engulf -> Embers -> BS/Blockade/BS-> Lashx5->Engulf-> Embers-> Ele->BS->Blockade->BS->Lashx2->BS->FoO->Erupt->Trap->Blockade->BS->Engulf->Embers->BS->Blockade->BS->Lashx5->just keep swimming

Light Attacking between every skill no excuses!
Depending how fast you are, you can fit a few more Whips in before you BS to restart your BB rotation.
Pop Meteor when it is up, it'll help alleviate your mana pool.

I easily hit 35k with this, except I have vMA Flame, still on that grind for a lightning.
When parsing on a dummy use Apprentice, and mana/regen food. In a raid you want to use Witchmother's, but while learning/practicing it's best to use regen so you aren't struggling.
With lightning on backbar you will be able to proc Lash more often, free whips are lovely whips.
Also having the shock enchant on front bar will give you minor vuln which increases your damage by 8%, add the procced whips to that.. oh baby. With a vMA lightning BB 38-40k would be easily achievable.
Also I never heavy attack, especially in raids (when I take her rip magdk) you should never suffer sustain issues if you have good support and rotation.

Some thoughts: Most people I talk to regarding DPS-tests on target dummies prefer to do them on the 6 million ones, since that will give you a hint of the builds ability to sustain. A 3 million dummy is more or less a "burst-test" for a build. With the numbers I can get from your picture this build would not be able to sustain a 6 million dummy without heavy attacks and/or an outside source of off-balance support (and perhaps also some orbs and Wormcult set). Otherwise the DPS will be lower. I´m not criticising your build, I use the same one myself (except I´ve MD instead of IA). 35k is ok on a target dummy, but take any melee stamina class in the game and they´ll outperform magDK by a lot, without any outside help with off-balance support.

One thing that needs to be into consideration is that magDK takes up a melee spot in a raid. Every melee stamina build(except for maybe stamina warden) will outperform magDK in a raid. MagDK doesn´t even offer anything special to a raid anymore. They aren´t even needed in vMoL for chaining if there´re experienced tanks there. The old argument that magDK steals off-balance with Powerlash is more or less valid, all stamina DD that does a heavy attack in their rotation steals off-balance as well, so same thing could be said to them. MagDK isn´t viable just because they take up a melee spot that could´ve been used by a stamDD that does more DPS.

The sustain-nerfs with Morrowind is what "killed" magDK in PvE. Revert the changes to battle roar and helping hands + reduce the cost of Ardent Flame abilities so that magDK can have some fluent combat.

Gyra_Lothbrok · November 2017

I do agree I may not be able to sustain this on a 6mil, it wouldn’t matter since in a raid I’d be sucking the balls down every time they are sent my way. Most fights don’t last long enough anymore to warrant sustain issues tho. The ones that do, you just need to pop ultimate.
I run stamdk now since they are so much better, I wish magdk was more viable for endgame it’s just people don’t want them in a serious raid. But for vet dungeons they are still fun.

Duragon_Darko · November 2017

@WrathOfInnos
Very informative post, and I appreciate the time you spent on it. Thank you very much.

@Gyra_Lothbrok
Appreciate the time you took in not only giving us your build but your rotation as well. Thank you.

@Qbiken
Thank you for your response, very insightful.

WrathOfInnos · November 2017

@Duragon_Darko

Glad my post helped you. Just want to correct one piece of misinformation before it spreads. I had previously said too low a number for Spell Erosion CP's, after double checking the correct number is 34 (still slightly lower than what you had, but slightly higher that what I had said previously).