10 difficult DPS Questions - (crit / spell / damage) / ...)

eMKa8 · June 2020

Hi 👋🏻

I got a lot of questions about DPS and was hoping to get some solid interesting answers.
Currently i am CP 225 so not new to the game, however i do like to understand the game better , especially how damage truly works.

I am using magsorc and have always used apprentice because i heard from 1 person it was the best , however now i realise that thief or shadow are better , and it all comes from the crit chance and damage.

Here are my statistics
- spell damage - 1975
- Spell critical - 36,3%
- Spell penetration - 5400 (8,1%)
- spell critical damage - 52%
- block mitigation - 60%
- Block cost - 1107

Question 1: What is block mitigation?

Question 2: Does block cost of 1107 mean that it will cost me 1107 stamina when blocking an attack ?

Question 3: i understand what spell penetration is about, however what does that 8,1% behind the value mean??? Does that mean with the current value i will have 8,1% more damage due to penetration?

Question 4: i have a spell damage of 1975 . Now i am a bit lost here. If i use a Certain spell like crystal fragments which inflicts 4500 spell damage, what does this 1975 then mean ? Is this extra spell damage for every spell i use ? I guess not

, but how does this spell damage relate to the spell damages of my actual spell skills ??

Question 5: my spell critical is 36%. What seems to be a good critical % in general ?
If i understand correctly this number means that for every spell i cast , i will have a 36% chance of a higher damage right ? Is this only with spells ? Or is this also for light and hard attacks from my destruction staff ? And is the increase 50% of normal damage or does it depend on something else like critical damage ?

Question 6: Spell critical damage is 52% but what does this really mean? Does this mean that if i have a critical Spell strike that my general damage will be 152% total (100+52) from the normal spell damage? Or is critical strike always a specific % higher damage and is this 52% just an extra additional damage ? Is this 52% referring to the normal spell damage of 1975 or will this 52% be calculated on the the spell damage of your specific skills you just used ?

Question 8 : do light and heavy attacks from staffs also have the same spell critical chance ? Or is this only for spells ? Or do staffs have weapon critical chance instead of spell critical chance ?

Question 9: If you have a normal critical strike, is it then correct to say (without looking at other stuff for now) that the damage will be increased with 50 or 100 %?

Question 10: It all began with deciding which mundus stones i should use

. So , when would you generally use apprentice , thief or shadow ? What are the statistics you need to have to use one or the other ?

Thanks a LOT 🙏🏻

probo11 · June 2020

I'm going to assume that this is for pve.

Question 1 and 2 are useless since you are a dd and you dont have to worry about blocking too much.

Question 3: Spell pen means how much magic resistance on mobs you negate. 5400 is what you want to have for most (if not all) pve content

Question 4: Spell damage increases how much damage or healing your magicka based abilities do (not the flat amount but the bonus damage is calculated with some math magic).

Question 5: 36% spell crit is pretty low. I would recommend using alcasts guides to see where you can inprove in terms of gear, cp and skills https://alcasthq.com/eso-magicka-sorcerer-build-pve/. Like you said the spell crit % means how much of the time you should get a crit, it's the same for light and heavy attacks.

Question 6: Spell crit damage is the bonus damage that your crits do

Question 7 (or 8): Spell crit works for almost all damage (weapon attacks, skills, item sets). Spell damage and crit work for skills that consume magicka and staves. Weapon damage and crit work for skills that consume stamina and the other weapons.

Question 8 (or 9): The base spell crit damage is 50%, so without any buffs you would do 50% more damage if you crit.

Question 9 (or 10): The break even point of thief and shadow is 48% spell crit https://alcasthq.com/eso-shadow-vs-thief-mundus-stone/. So you should use shadow if you have above 48% unbuffed spell crit (which you should be able to get if you use the right build).

eMKa8 · June 2020

How high must your penetration be before using thief or shadow mundus?

So until what amount does your penetration have before switching from lover to either thief or shadow

I have now 5400 penetration level.
Is it better now to still do lover first ?

probo11 · June 2020

Pen has nothing to do with the choice between both mundus. Spell crit is the deciding factor.

5400 pen is enough for all the content (unless you are really trying to min/max it).

If you get higher pen you will most likely (with a good tank and healer) overpen which means that your amount of magic pen is greater than the magic resist of the boss that you are killing, which will result in you losing out of damage since you could have used different cp or a mundus to get a boost elsewhere.

Here is a guide that goes over a lot of stuff that you asked: https://alcasthq.com/eso-dps-damage-dealer-beginner-guide/

tsaescishoeshiner · June 2020

Looks like the other person answered most of your questions. I'll try to fill in some gaps.

1. Block mitigation is what portion of damage you avoid when you block. So with 60% block mitigation, you only take 40% of blockable damage when you block
2. I'd assume that's what block cost means
3. Armor (Physical and Spell Resistance) and penetration directly counter each other. 1000 Spell Penetration bypasses 1000 Spell Resistance. ~660 Armor = 1% reduced damage received. So 5400 Armor is = 8.18% reduced damage received, so that's what the 8.1% next to your Penetration means. Not very helpful, since it doesn't actually increase your damage against a high-armor target by exactly 8.1%, since 5400 Armor reduces your incoming damage by of the BASE damage you'd be receiving by 8.1%, before factoring in the rest of your Armor (like if you had 20k armor) and other reduced incoming damage sources
4. Skills that cost Magicka mostly scale with Spell Damage and Max Magicka. 1 Spell Damage = 10.5 Max Magicka for skills that scale based on both. This also applies to all magicka weapon (staves) light attacks, all Ultimates, and magicka-costing heals — but some skills work differently. And it's all true for Stamina-costing skillsand Max Stamina + Weapon Damage
5. Answered above. It also applies to Ultimates, which pick whichever stat is highest (Weapon Critical or Spell Critical). And most healing skills that cost Magicka.
6. Answered above.
8. Answered above.
9. Answered above.
10. Answered above.

I'll add you should find a source of Major Prophecy (increases Spell Crit) and Major Sorcery (Increases Spell Damage). It's hard to get 36% Spell Crit with Major Sorcery lol. You can use the Magelight skill from the Mages Guild skill line for easy Major Prophecy, and Entropy for Major Sorcery. Many classes have an alternative source of Major Prophecy and Major Sorcery. I use Inner Light (Magelight morph) on most of my mag chars, and Entropy or Spellpower potions for Major Sorcery depending on whether the content is worth using Spellpower potions on lol

eMKa8 · June 2020

Hi @tsaescishoeshiner

Thank you for some of your answers.
You gave me some insights and also gave me some other questions ;-)

If i may...

Question 3: your answer was not really clear for me ...! Is it correct to say that if an enemy has 6600 armor (10x660), that then they have 10% more resistance ? So if i attack them , only 90% of my damage hurts them? Right?

Question 4: i think i understand
So spell damage is 10.5 times extra magicka (i get that). But do i understand correctly that if i have 1600 spell damage that then this number increases the value of my magicka skills (increasing their damage).
Why going for spell damage instead of magicka ? What are other advantages or differences between spell damage and more magicka ?

Thank you !

tsaescishoeshiner · June 2020

eMKa8 wrote: »

Question 3: your answer was not really clear for me ...! Is it correct to say that if an enemy has 6600 armor (10x660), that then they have 10% more resistance ? So if i attack them , only 90% of my damage hurts them? Right?

Long story short, yes. If you deal 100 damage to a target with 0 armor (and NO other buffs/debuffs), you'd deal ~90 damage to a target with 6600 armor.

I say long story short because damage mitigation also includes "reduced damage taken" buffs like Minor Protection, and debuffs like Minor Vulnerability, both of which don't just add or subtract from armor mitigation. This post has more details - might be a bit outdated, but it's how the damage mitigation formula works.

eMKa8 wrote: »

Question 4: i think i understand
So spell damage is 10.5 times extra magicka (i get that). But do i understand correctly that if i have 1600 spell damage that then this number increases the value of my magicka skills (increasing their damage).
Why going for spell damage instead of magicka ? What are other advantages or differences between spell damage and more magicka ?

Getting more Max Magicka gives you a larger Magicka pool to use spells with. Other than certain skills that ONLY scale with Magicka (and not Spell Damage) such as certain damage shields and non-ultimate sorcerer pets, there's no difference. I think there are skills that scale more with one vs the other, but I'm not aware of the differences.

Because Spell Damage DOESN'T increase how many spells you can cast like Magicka does, most sources of Spell Damage are higher. For example, Max Magicka set bonuses give you 1096 Max Magicka, while Spell Damage ones give you 128 Spell Damage. So you get more of a bonus for Spell Damage, but you can't cast many spells at once with too little Max Magicka.

One last difference is that Max Magicka and Spell Damage have different multipliers. Mainly, CP increases your Max Magicka by up to 20%, and the buff Major Sorcery increases your Spell Damage by 20%. Skills and passives increases each of these further, but in different amounts.