PTS Update 20 - Feedback Thread for Sorcerer

Sanctum74 · September 2018

It wouldn't be so bad if it was actually a 1 second cast time, but all the videos I've seen so far it's a 2 second cast time in a lag free solo instance which means in pvp, trial, or vma it's going to be at least a 3-5 second cast time and then when you also nerf healing ward, dark deal, and rune cage on top of it just shows how out of touch they are with the game.

There's so many things they could have tried first with crits, status effects and cc going through, no stacking, cost increase, shields size reduction, streak treatment, cooldown, only work on direct damage, etc....

Instead they went from an op mechanic to a completely useless one.

Kova · September 2018

Sanctum74 wrote: »

It wouldn't be so bad if it was actually a 1 second cast time, but all the videos I've seen so far it's a 2 second cast time in a lag free solo instance which means in pvp, trial, or vma it's going to be at least a 3-5 second cast time and then when you also nerf healing ward, dark deal, and rune cage on top of it just shows how out of touch they are with the game.

There's so many things they could have tried first with crits, status effects and cc going through, no stacking, cost increase, shields size reduction, streak treatment, cooldown, only work on direct damage, etc....

Instead they went from an op mechanic to a completely useless one.

That's because, and this is a little known fact, without animation cancelling shields already have a 1-second cast time.

Savos_Saren · September 2018

Hi ZOS here's some constructive (non QQ) feedback-

I've given a try on the PTS with the new changes. I can accept the delay to Hardened Ward. (Though, I would recommend dropping it to a .75 second delay vs 1 second delay because of lag in Cyrodiil) I've determined that I can build around a MagSorc without any need for Hardened Ward.

My only pain points are:

- Perhaps change the Overload light attack damage to 75% of it's original damage instead of 50%. Cutting it in half is a little too much.

- Change the duration of Bound Aegis to 10 seconds vs 3 seconds for the block mitigation. A tank would have to spam that a little too much if it were every 3 seconds.

-Your clarification of the 15% range bonus and the 50% width bonus doesn't help if we don't know what the actual range/width is for the base light/heavy attack.

Thanks for your consideration.

kadar · September 2018

Savos_Saren wrote: »

Hi ZOS here's some constructive (non QQ) feedback-

I've given a try on the PTS with the new changes. I can accept the delay to Hardened Ward. (Though, I would recommend dropping it to a .75 second delay vs 1 second delay because of lag in Cyrodiil) I've determined that I can build around a MagSorc without any need for Hardened Ward.

My only pain points are:

- Perhaps change the Overload light attack damage to 75% of it's original damage instead of 50%. Cutting it in half is a little too much.

- Change the duration of Bound Aegis to 10 seconds vs 3 seconds for the block mitigation. A tank would have to spam that a little too much if it were every 3 seconds.

-Your clarification of the 15% range bonus and the 50% width bonus doesn't help if we don't know what the actual range/width is for the base light/heavy attack.

Thanks for your consideration.

I'm just going through and giving every comment that isn't a threat to un-sub, a threat to delete a mag toon, or a challenge to the devs to clear some sort of content an automatic

They are that rare in this thread. I'm so far into the theory-crafting-for-next-patch state of mind already, like I have sooo many ideas on how to take advantage of the coming mitigation changes!

It's depressing reading thru this thread and seeing how few people are able/willing to do the same.

Sange13 · September 2018

bardx86 wrote: »

Sange13 wrote: »

Minalan wrote: »

joaaocaampos wrote: »

@ZOS_RobGarrett The best way, the best solution.

Instead of increasing cast time to 1 second, the cost should be increased. Healing Ritual is an example: the ability had 1 sec cast time and now is instant cast, with increased cost.
Annulment costs have been increased to 7290 Magicka from 4590 Magicka. That is, an increase of 59%.

Conjured Ward costs have been increased to 5580 (+59%), 5890 (+68%) or 6210 (+77%) Magicka from 3510 Magicka. Respectively, the Empowered Ward cost would be 5570, 5440 or 5740.

Unfortunately, something needs to be done. Increased cost has worked before, may work again. No shield spam!

If you want increased cost, press "Agree".
If you want cast time, press "Insightful".

How about neither, would that be "Awesome"?

I still think a 3-6 second cooldown would be a better solution.

Horrible Idea. Why would you want to stop someone from being able to defend themselves?

It wouldn't stop anyone from doing anything. It only stops them from spamming it, and ZOS clearly wants to do something about shields. I'm only proposing a better option than the lag-tastic "1 second cast time" that is actually 2-3 in real play.

eso_lags · September 2018

@ZOS_RobGarrett With all this rage because of shields stam sorcs are going to end up getting overlooked. The nerf to dark deal is stupid. But thats not even my concern for murkmire. My concern is that youve nerfed overload . Overload is one of the 2 skills that make a stam sorc worth playing.

I mean really just go look at everything you're giving to stamplars or everything they have. Or look at nightblades and everything they have. You never touch stam sorc. You never give us anything. And now you want to nerf the overload bar? for what?

Without that bar i cannot makeup for the damage and buffs that i dont have as a class, while every other class does. like what the hell. Hey @ZOS_RobGarrett, or whoever from zos, try this. Write down every class skill and passive that the stamina versions of each class can utilize. Do that and then tell me where a stam sorc lines up. Right at the bottom. Then you want to nerf the only uniqe skill we have, dark deal, and remove the only thing that makes the class even viable, overload.

Im starting to feel like you guys really dont like us very much.

oxygen_thief · September 2018

joaaocaampos wrote: »

@ZOS_RobGarrett The best way, the best solution.

Instead of increasing cast time to 1 second, the cost should be increased. Healing Ritual is an example: the ability had 1 sec cast time and now is instant cast, with increased cost.
Annulment costs have been increased to 7290 Magicka from 4590 Magicka. That is, an increase of 59%.

Conjured Ward costs have been increased to 5580 (+59%), 5890 (+68%) or 6210 (+77%) Magicka from 3510 Magicka. Respectively, the Empowered Ward cost would be 5160, 5440 or 5740.

Unfortunately, something needs to be done. Increased cost has worked before, may work again. No shield spam!

If you want increased cost, press "Agree".
If you want cast time, press "Insightful".

how would you sustain it in non cp? it's ridiculous

Tonturri · September 2018

oxygen_thief wrote: »

joaaocaampos wrote: »

@ZOS_RobGarrett The best way, the best solution.

Instead of increasing cast time to 1 second, the cost should be increased. Healing Ritual is an example: the ability had 1 sec cast time and now is instant cast, with increased cost.
Annulment costs have been increased to 7290 Magicka from 4590 Magicka. That is, an increase of 59%.

Conjured Ward costs have been increased to 5580 (+59%), 5890 (+68%) or 6210 (+77%) Magicka from 3510 Magicka. Respectively, the Empowered Ward cost would be 5160, 5440 or 5740.

Unfortunately, something needs to be done. Increased cost has worked before, may work again. No shield spam!

If you want increased cost, press "Agree".
If you want cast time, press "Insightful".

how would you sustain it in non cp? it's ridiculous

Ward is nowhere near as powerful as what basically amounts to an AoE Honor the Dead cast. Buff it accordingly if you want to increase the cost so much. Unless it's also fine to apply the shield to people in AoE - whih tbh would be cool and I am all for. Let's goooo. One morph for an aoe shield, another morph for a larger, high costing personal shield.

Jaimeh · September 2018

They seem to be determined to implement the shield cast time changes, but I wish they would leave Dark Deal and Overload alone; the third bar in particular helped sorcs bring some utility to a group, and this was important since they have been considerably sub-par as tanks and healers compared to other classes (and even as DDs they have been underperforming for a long time). The developers are crippling a class's entire presence in PvE in any capacity, because of PvP concerns... the mind honestly boggles.

cpuScientist · September 2018

The new dark deal feels really bad ZOSY. It's still never to be used in PVE and now really really hard to justify in PvP.

Reduce the heal make it instant cast and increase the amount you get over time. Adding health to that. MagSorc PvP can really use an instant bursty heal and having it cost the other pool is very nice it'd feel "tactical" do I go for the burst heal or conserve stamina and let the hot heal me under this healing ward. It would be good for PvP PVE.

But this new dark deal is very clunky and unappealing.

cpuScientist · September 2018

This new overload is really REALLY MEHHHH. It isn't more damage than anything because it replaces binstead of adding to current light attack. So that must be subtracted and when it is. It's really aubpar damage. Honestly all that's happened is the skills really dead. It won't be good in PvP and people will just use the atro or destro ulti in PVE. Either increase the damage it does or let it add either Current light attacks. I understand having it add will be impossible for heavies. So the best choice is to increase both heavy and light attack DAMAGE honestly.

cpuScientist · September 2018

Please PLEASE remove bound armors stat increase. Add it to a passive. Make bound armor passively reduce block chance for one morph and passively increase resource restore on heavy for the other. Or some BS like that. But for the love of all that is SORC unbind our bars.

maboleth · September 2018

^ Abysmal changes to sorcery. Honestly, they just ruin the fun. Whoever thought about the cast time does not play the game. Period.

Even if it's not implemented in the live... going for that idea and maintaining it in the pts is totally worrysome about any future changes. Like, devs are wasting their precious time and the best they could come up with is the cast time... Okay. What's next, making Cyrodiil fights chess-like?

Sange13 · September 2018

Normally a controversial change like this would have... controversy. It would have people defending it. This change is pretty much universally disliked and they still want to go through with it. Not a good look.

LMar · September 2018

I agree with comments above saying that when you cast a shield it is for defensive purposes, you can't do much damage while you spam shields, so shield spammers are not offering full offence and defence. You have to time it carefully without much spamming if you want to do damage and defend yourself already. Cast time means you are just standing there waving while people are focusing on you

Biro123 · September 2018

The problem with all of this is that it's based on the false premise that shields are massively over-performing.

The simple fact is that they are not. But now we're all trying to think of a way to nerf them, without making them useless which frankly I think isn't possible.

They don't need nerfs, they need a change in mechanics - which is what was done with the crit/resists/status effects change. So I applaud that ZOS are on the right track with that sentiment (not yet convinced about the implementation)
But then the cast time was a completely unwarranted nerf slapped on the top..
Zos, you almost had something there....

Ecara · September 2018

I am clearly AGAINST cast time or just increasing the costs.

But what if it will be changend like Streak.

The sorc shields last regulary 6 secs. If you re-do it or use another shield within this time, there will be an increase of costs.
If you would change it that way, you would prevent shield-stacking and not completely kill sorcs.

I dont like the idea of changing shields, but that could be a solution, that I could accept.

maboleth · September 2018

I'm still sticking to the rule - no sub if this idea goes live. I know we are extreme minority but voting with your wallet is the only way a single person can fight against these kind of crap and their stubborn egos.

I'm all for changes, tweakings, upgrades... But the ideas behind the cast time and 3rd bar removal are just very bad extremes with zero fun factor.

Biro123 · September 2018

Ecara wrote: »

I am clearly AGAINST cast time or just increasing the costs.

But what if it will be changend like Streak.

The sorc shields last regulary 6 secs. If you re-do it or use another shield within this time, there will be an increase of costs.
If you would change it that way, you would prevent shield-stacking and not completely kill sorcs.

I dont like the idea of changing shields, but that could be a solution, that I could accept.

That would be even worse. When they already only last 1-2 seconds while under pressure, to even replace the same shield as fast as it gets taken down (no stacking) would have you oom in around 4 seconds

Fantalior · September 2018

I think with the shields we agree that these nerfs are simply unnecessary, maybe you could let the shields in the PVP back to normal size instead of halving them, maybe it would be a start.

But other than that, why in the world was overloade classified as op? I just do not understand that 70% was dodged on battlefield and 40% even got them killed self(shield, sword and the DK noob wing spammer) I am referring here to the Bg PVP
So the attacks were useless before, the only reason for using this Ulti was the 3rd bar, which is not needed anymore !! In the PVP or the vMSA to regenerate also handy.

But not only that this third bar disappears, no it is halved also the damage, I mean that should be so now if the skill ever makes it then just no harm. I thought you would try to make abilities that are not used enough (like this one in PVP) more attractive and not completely exhausted from the scene but maybe one of you knows the reasons. In the PVP, everyone is already running around with the meteor and soul beat.

Of course it's nice if you want to provide a different way for these Ultimate, but for that the old one does not have to disappear. You have 2 change options per skill, but one could be included in the weapon skills rota with only 25 Ulti. cost, restore magic and do less damage.
And the other morph stays as it is, so for my sake it can do its full damage on 120 Ultimate Costs, + granting 6% and 3rd Bar.

Ecara · September 2018

Yes, in PvP your shields are down very quickly. But if you are just re-doing shields, you cant call that a fight.

But, you could not take the full 6 secs, until you can do it again, but maybe 4.

Aedaryl · September 2018

Ecara wrote: »

Yes, in PvP your shields are down very quickly. But if you are just re-doing shields, you cant call that a fight.

But, you could not take the full 6 secs, until you can do it again, but maybe 4.

The cast time is exactly the reason why shields are dead next patch.

The only way to not be stuck in a "I just shield every second" chain is to buy global cooldown where your shields isn't damaged.

Good sorcerer cancel shield with a dodge roll so the shield isn't destroyed immediatly (dodge avoided damage) and so the next GCD, the sorc can do something else than re-shield.

An other way is to LoS or take enough distance to not being touch with streak.

Cast time mean no more dodge cancel on shield. Cast time also mean you are dead when on live you needed to shield every GCD.

Crit on shield also mean a heavy armor mag sorc with boundless strom and bloodspawn up is taking 40% more damage on shield on the PTS vs a light amor no bloodspawn no boundless strom on live.

The harness nerf and dark exchange nerf also mean sorc cannot sustain streak like before.

Healing ward was spammed at low hp until you life goes above the execute range 25% then it was covered by hardened and harness until it heal you. With the lost of healing ward front heal, you can no longer leave execute range so you take huge damage and you cannot have the final healing ward heal because you cannot protect the shield with others.

Shields doesn't have damage reduced by block, so the smart block playstyle used by tanky damage stam user is also not avaible to sorc.

All the ways to defend yourself as a sorc got destroyed.

And nothing got added.

This is why experimented sorc player will leave.

Hymzir · September 2018

Wasn't going to comment on this anymore, until the next PTS iteration, 'cause all that is worth saying has been said already. It's now up to ZOS to make their decision on how to proceed. But there's a trend among the feedback I want to comment on - a lot of the anger is placed on the fact, that so many other options available for light armor based magicka builds, are not really all that good. Especially in the case of mag sorcs.

People have noted that there are no similar damage sets for magicka that are available for stamina, that there is no monster set that gives magicka penetration and so on. That many of the other options available are weak or clunky or tied to crappy skills and passives. And that sorcs are ruined now since everything else is ***.

The point I want to remind everyone is, that for any of that to change, the meta has to change first.

If they add those sets, and buff those weak skills, and leave shields as they are now, then magicka is going to reign supreme. And sorcs are gonna be nigh invincible.

The shield change has to go forth, or some other variation of it at least, before any of those buffs and sets can even be contemplated.

I am quite aware how this change, particularly the proposed version of it, is going to wreck the dominant sorc play style. And if that is the one you use, and have grown accustomed, you are understandably angry. I blame ZOS for letting things get to this point, they should've intervened earlier, when it became evident that things were starting to head towards a certain direction, and that all other options and build ideas very made redundant. They should've changed things earlier and buffed the weak options before. But they didn't, and thus the change is going to be that much more painful.

In an ideal world, they would, of course, implement buffs to those weak options at the same time as the nerf to shields, but we don't live in a perfect world. And ZOS has it's own way of doing things, which I do not particularly like, which is wildly swinging heavy handed nerfs and buffs every three months or so, with a complete redesign of the games core mechanics every year or so.

It is what it is, and no matter how much you might not like that, it is not gonna change. I used to rage against the machine too, but eventually learned to live with the bomb. Ultimately I don't care what route they will choose, as long as they implement some sort of change. I already play my sorcs against the meta anyway, and can adapt to the changes with my other magicka characters. If they choose to go some other direction, do some other change than cast times, I'll be happy too since I too use shields. But if this is the way they are gonna go, so be it.

If you feel differently, or find your favorite character ruined, I feel you. I really do. I've been there before with this game. I wish ZOS handled balance and game tweaks with more finesse, but they don't, and it's something we all have to learn to cope with. Long time sorc players may find it hard, but I encourage all to look at this change from the point of view of new possibilities. A change to the way shields work will open up development options in other directions, and after an update or two we may have various new ways to play our magicka characters.

Or you can rage and froth and belittle me and my opinions, claim I do not know anything about the game, need to L2P, and that I have an anti sorc bias or something - that's cool too. If letting off steam will help you to cope with things, then am glad to be of help in that regard too.

Chilly-McFreeze · September 2018

OrdoHermetica wrote: »

Massacre_Wurm wrote: »

Add 1 second cast to light armor's shield but leave sorc's ward like it was before.
Sorcs will still have their 911 button in pve but shield stacking will be harder.

I would flip that. Leave the non-class-specific shield instant, as every class has need of an instant-cast "911" shield (and some classes, like magplars, rely on the LA shield), and then give sorcs a more powerful cast-time shield instead. That way all classes have an emergency shield, and sorcs have the option of taking the time to add extra shields if needed.

I mean, if they're dead-set on a cast time, anyway. I know I won't run a sorc shield with a cast time if I ever finish getting my magsorc set up, but I guess some people might.

You realize that every other class has access to other means of defense while sorcs are strictly forced to use shields? Makes no sense to punish them for using their own skills over some open line's skill. Take a look at stamsorcs if you want to know how a classless "class" looks like.

DKs, Temps, Wardens, NBs all have some easy to use hots/ instant heals. Some even have class shields or cloak. Sorcs instead are bound to use a tiny RNG heal with a cooldown that is useless when not in offense, a 2-slot bad AI pet (which you can't keep alive without your own instant class shield) or an 1.4s cast time ordinary heal (4k in pvp without defile). And to top all of that, LA shield also returns resources while sorc's shield don't.

Destary · September 2018

So, ZoS have crapy ideas. That changes kill the magsorc.

Same, now on Magsorc we die cause the game is laggy and isn't reactive at all. On magsorc, we need SHIELDS WITHTOUT CAST TIME, we need DARK EXCHANGE NOT NERF and we need more REACTIVITY than all others classes. So, you nerf both skill that do the sorc viable in PVP, and you never correct bugs and lags.

Just remember, you nerfed Crystal frag (10% damage less + no stun), you nerfed the streak (50% of the next cast, oh and morph ball of lightning never work at all) you nerfed all sustain CPs too.

Another point, we need a real instant ultimate in magsorc, negate isn't really good, Atronach is a joke cause he can't move and we can't benefit of major berserk ^^ and overload will be nerf and can be reflect, can be dodge and need to play on a 3rd bar.
So, look at all classes : Dk have Leap, NB have Incap and Templar have Radial Sweap. Now we only have 2 good ultimate in magicka : metore and soul assault, but metore is so easy to hear and to block/dodge and soul assault isn't really good on Magsorc cause we play on direct damage and not dots.

Last idea : Sorcerer is the only class who don't have any debuff of class, and lowest buff. If my memory is good, Sorcerer and Nightblades are the both damage classes in this game, but magsorc take his damage on biggest tooltip that did nerf all patches ^^ So now, magsorc is not bad but not good, we can't tank and we can't do full damage, we can be "medium".

That my opinion so if you don't have same, don't insult me, thx.

(PS : Sorry for my bad english)

Aedaryl · September 2018

Destary wrote: »

So, ZoS have crapy ideas. That changes kill the magsorc.

Same, now on Magsorc we die cause the game is laggy and isn't reactive at all. On magsorc, we need SHIELDS WITHTOUT CAST TIME, we need DARK EXCHANGE NOT NERF and we need more REACTIVITY than all others classes. So, you nerf both skill that do the sorc viable in PVP, and you never correct bugs and lags.

Just remember, you nerfed Crystal frag (10% damage less + no stun), you nerfed the streak (50% of the next cast, oh and morph ball of lightning never work at all) you nerfed all sustain CPs too.

Another point, we need a real instant ultimate in magsorc, negate isn't really good, Atronach is a joke cause he can't move and we can't benefit of major berserk ^^ and overload will be nerf and can be reflect, can be dodge and need to play on a 3rd bar.
So, look at all classes : Dk have Leap, NB have Incap and Templar have Radial Sweap. Now we only have 2 good ultimate in magicka : metore and soul assault, but metore is so easy to hear and to block/dodge and soul assault isn't really good on Magsorc cause we play on direct damage and not dots.

Last idea : Sorcerer is the only class who don't have any debuff of class, and lowest buff. If my memory is good, Sorcerer and Nightblades are the both damage classes in this game, but magsorc take his damage on biggest tooltip that did nerf all patches ^^ So now, magsorc is not bad but not good, we can't tank and we can't do full damage, we can be "medium".

That my opinion so if you don't have same, don't insult me, thx.

(PS : Sorry for my bad english)

Destachat, they also nerfed the healing ward front heal, to be sure you will never leave the execute range.

Ethyarion · September 2018

Idinuse wrote: »

ccmedaddy wrote: »

Twohothardware wrote: »

Most Sorcs haven't been making full use of the tools they're given to evade high damage. Most don't run pets, they don't use Streak unless they're running away, they don't make use of mines unless it's a duel, and they definitely don't switch to heavy armor like Stamina players have to,

Most Sorcs don't run pets because they're simply garbage in PvP outside of duels. And plenty of magsorcs already run Mines.

And magicka toons don't wear heavy because unlike stamina toons who have a plethera of high dmg heavy sets available to them there's nothing like that for magicka. If there was a magicka Fury or 7th then maybe your point would be valid.

There isn't even a Monster Set that gives Spell Penetration ffs. Stamina has 2 Monster Sets that give Physical Penetration. What a joke.

Light Armour tree passive Concentration gives 4884 spell penetration at rank 2, Medium armour has no similar passive and are more reliant on equipment, abilites or CP to redress.

Zer0oo · September 2018

Oh can we also fix ball of lighting so it actually absorbs things and not just random rng if it actually works?

The_Last_Titan · September 2018

what if the cast time was removed but became a shield every 2 seconds for 4 seconds

Zer0oo · September 2018

Also why are chains undodgeable?
Why does fossilize work like the prenerfed rune cage just even better?