Personally for PvP, I don't see a shift from Master's destro front-bar meta.

While Rune Cage getting damage and stun duration buffs is big, like Petrify, it's a skill you can't cast on a CC immune target. Which means you still need a spammable. And the increased damage and reduced cost of Reach make it superior to force Shock, even if it costs two item slots. I'm not sure how much use this improved Rune Cage will see outside of duels with all the skills we have to slot for PvP.

Light Attack buffs is pretty big for those Max Mag Necropotence builds though. We might start seeing Shackle+Necro+Shadowrend builds with big survivability and a fair bit of offence.

The main point to take away is that stam sorcs got ignored/a small nerf. Hoping to see some love to stam sorcs in the full patch notes.

Feanor wrote: »

@Maulkin

A4 and C2 are the biggies in my opinion. It adds another source of unavoidable damage to the delayed burst, and a second 5pc might make that burst more deadly again. If the change on the cost reduction passive was a misunderstanding then this is better than my initial thoughts, though I wouldn't call that "huge" buffs within the class. The biggest thing is the generic change of allowing 5/5/2.

I'm still disappointed the FP-Frags playstyle is still the only one apart from being a clench/reach spammer though.

A4 is pretty big, but to use it you gotta make a real sacrifice though. You've got to drop either mines or power surge from your bar. Or Rapid Regen in my case (was backbarring Maelstrom Resto). You want guaranteed burst, then it comes at the expense of spell damage/heals or area denial.

@Maulkin

I have been playing with Rune Cage ever since it was changed to being an unblockeable and undodgeable hard CC. Mainly because I never really felt Reach/Clench to be very effective, and Rune Cage does provide a good damage window. You're correct about the sacrifices though. RC isn't cheap, and it costs a bar slot you really would need other things for. For my current way of playing the change would be a nice buff. It's more about choices now than ever though.

@Biro123

Shackle/Necro/Shadowrend, or do you want Shadowrend just for the minor maim? I never tried Shadowrend, although I have it. Is the uptime good enough to steadily trigger Necro?

Biro123 wrote: »

An obvious early build to try would be shackle/lich/shadowrend - with no pet, and bound aegis on front bar only.

Why Lich over Necro?

You can tweak your jewellery for mag/stam regen, and when your Shadowrend procs the damage and shield size will go through the roof.

How come people always make generalized sorc threads even though they only want to discuss mag sorcs?

Vapirko wrote: »

How come people always make generalized sorc threads even though they only want to discuss mag sorcs?

Who wants to discuss only magsorcs? Not my fault not many stamsorcs are commenting but you.

From my side, I'm seeing the bound armaments changes as a buff, for all forms of content. In PvE whatever dmg loss you incur from buffing light instead of heavy, you more than gain by getting a free slot. For PvP, you can now get the buff by only one barring it. Good stuff.

Also I run S&B on my Stam Sorc so Persistence passive is good change. Good times.

Why do you see these changes as nerf to Stam Sorc?

It's not enough. All I see here is a front bar only bound armor and a nerf to my master destro, relatively speaking. We need better sets and a few more real buffs. Necro and Mastery are our best magicka sets. Both have been nerfed and both have been in the game basically since launch.

I'm not hopeful at the moment. Really disappointed.

@Merlin13KAGL

I think it’s to force a choice between damage and sustain. You probably won’t be able to sustain on LA alone, so in the overall picture it will be a damage reduction.

With the changes to the stat impacts on light/heavy attack damage, could max stam stamsorcs become viable?

Hulking Draugr/Bone Pirate/2x max stam Monster Sets, Bound Armaments for %boost ? Probably not - but a thought...

Only the unmorphed pets have gained an effect, to not make them useless for starters. The morphed ones remain as boring as they are. No changes for the twilight tormentor either.

Lightning flood is still hard to sustain and keep up, will still be a dps loss.
Summoned Atronach, well. Doesn't change a thing.
The conjured ward change makes the empowered ward morph worth considering for me. We will see.
The rune cage damage is very low and even though the duration was buffed, remember you loose 20% duration from the nerfed persistance passive. So this is at best a compensation.
I won't have a slot anymore for daedric mines next update. But it's a needed cost reduction.
And bound armor is the biggest let down for me. I was expecting a duration buff, that we can put on our overload bar. But instead, we get a worse version of mage light. It frees a slot for my tank, but that's all.

Overall, Sorcerer remains as it is for me. Boring in pvp, execute KS bots and pve remains as it is. No meaningfull buffs, useless morphs and skills remain useless. The light attack adjustments are good. I'm not getting hyped, because we don't even know to what extend they will scale with Magicka now. But more overall damage in pvp (for everyone) is great and not exclusive for Sorcs.

@Septimus_Magna Definitely agree on the jewelry trait.

The question is, in regards to set bonuses, will it become worse, better, or same to go for more Damage vs more Stat. Until we know how much the (stat) contribution to LA/HA has changed, it's a tough one to answer. Obviously the percentage damage contribution your LA/HA make will factor in there as well.

The SD/WD (converted) to max stat usually sits somewhere between 1:1 and 1:2 on typical builds. If they made LA/HA contribution truly about even, then stacking damage will still be the way to go.

Speaking from a strictly MagSorc PvP perspective (as that's all I do anymore)

Rune cage will earn a slot on my bar with it's new changes, a CC duration comparable to fear is something we've never really had, and the guaranteed damage is HUGE because it's now another timed burst in our arsenal. I'm hoping it goes off when the ability ends (aka if they break free it goes off then versus if they break free it still goes off 5 seconds after cast). This will allow a medium weave (now scaling with my 52k magicka thank Meridia), frag, curse, and rune prison to all hit within the same GCD (maybe even a streak as an immediate follow up), might even allow me to drop force pulse off my bar again since I've never liked the ability anyways(really wish you recieved the 8% single target just from using the staff...) On that note having to slot abilities for passives aggregates me in general but I'm rambling.

Bound armor change is whatever, doesn't hurt, doesn't help. Activating that toggle counteracts the use of damage shields and MagSorcs don't really have the stamina to hold block for 3 seconds. I guess I can back bar bound armor for the 1% more magicka for my damage shields but that's negligible. If they want to make this skill usefull for anyone they'd need to bump up that 3 second duration...

The new passive will be interesting, I have my back bar S&B so I can train myself to block before casting occasionally to help with sustain.

Empowered Ward may be usable, I mean that's roughly 1.6k less shield strength which does hurt but the minor bonus might be really nice, time will tell.

For any of those old school MagSorcs the new meditate ability reminds me of the old dark conversion where you'd float in air as a channel. This may gain a spot on my bar because I loved the way the ability used to work (back when the resources returned scaled with your max magicka