Does anyone even use Elemental Catalyst?

Langeston · September 2020

When I first saw the 6.1.0 patch notes, this set really jumped out at me because it filled a gap that needed to be filled in my opinion — for quite a while I've wished that there was a magicka set similar to Archer's Mind, allowing more flexibility for high crit damage builds. Aside from the 4 piece bonus, the sets were pretty much the same. The only difference was how the 5 piece bonus was procced.

Archer's Mind:

(2 items) Adds 1096 Max Stamina
(3 items) Adds 833 Weapon Critical
(4 items) Adds 833 Weapon Critical
(5 items) Increases your Critical Damage done by 6%. Increases your Critical Damage done by an additional 12% when attacking from Sneak or Invisibility.

Elemental Catalyst: (Original)

(2 items) Adds 1096 Maximum Magicka
(3 items) Adds 833 Spell Critical
(4 items) Adds 1096 Maximum Magicka
(5 items) Whenever you deal Flame, Shock, or Frost Damage, you apply a stack of Flame, Shock, or Frost Weakness to the enemy for 5 seconds. Each stack of an Elemental Weakness increases their Critical Damage taken by 6%. An enemy can only have one stack of each Elemental Weakness at a time.

Then for some reason ZOS nerfed it by 33%. What makes it even worse is that most builds are only going to get 2 stacks, unless they use Force Pulse as their spammable. (For instance on my magblade, the most I can really get is 6%.) For me at least, Elemental Catalyst went from a very interesting set, to decon fodder — all before it even went live. I was just wondering if anyone else is as disappointed as I am.

lolo_01b16_ESO · September 2020

Elemental catalyst applies to all group members. So in organized raids you'll almost always have someone running it. Usually a mag necro or a mag warden, as they both have an ice aoe without having to use an ice staff, so they can get near 100% uptime for all 3 elements on multiple targets.

LukosCreyden · September 2020

90% of sets are decon fodder. It primarily exists for flavor and to maintain the whole "new sets every dlc" thing. It's just a part of how the game is.

nesakinter · September 2020

It is not meant to be a PvP set nor a solo set. It is a PvE support set as it increases the damage of teammates.

Also, Archer's Mind is a very bad set for crit based stam builds. Even for stamblades(the regular rollerblade kind, not snipers), the stealth opener is almost always a bow heavy attack weaved into a Poison Injection which deals very little starting damage and the massive burst comes in the form of a ultimate followed up by Bow proc. So the high crit dmg of 18% only rely buffs the starting heavy attack and nothing else, the rest is only buffed by 6% crit.

The actually viable crit based stamblades generally build for crazy high weapon damage with Mechanical Acuity and use other things like Khajiit, Shadow to get their crit dmg up, so that they can maintain their burst without needing invisibility. If you want to compare these builds to magblades, it is basically very similar to bomblades without VD and higher survivability and raw damage output.

Langeston · September 2020

nesakinter wrote: »

It is not meant to be a PvP set nor a solo set. It is a PvE support set as it increases the damage of teammates.

I hadn't considered that. Perhaps that is indeed how it was intended. Regardless though, the set would have been viable on my PVP magblade prior to the nerf.

Also, Archer's Mind is a very bad set for crit based stam builds. Even for stamblades(the regular rollerblade kind, not snipers), the stealth opener is almost always a bow heavy attack weaved into a Poison Injection which deals very little starting damage and the massive burst comes in the form of a ultimate followed up by Bow proc. So the high crit dmg of 18% only rely buffs the starting heavy attack and nothing else, the rest is only buffed by 6% crit.

If that's your opener then I can see why you'd feel that way. On a mag toon it's a bit different though, (at least the way I play it) and that set might not be that bad for someone that wants to use a mundus other than the Shadow. For instance, with all divines & including NB passives, the Atronach/Serpent gives 760 regen — as far as stat density goes, it doesn't get much better than that. (Atronach/Serpent aren't working properly right now, but that's another topic.) My point was that whether or not it's BIS, having the option to use a set that grants crit damage gives you flexibility in your build.

The actually viable crit based stamblades generally build for crazy high weapon damage with Mechanical Acuity and use other things like Khajiit, Shadow to get their crit dmg up, so that they can maintain their burst without needing invisibility. If you want to compare these builds to magblades, it is basically very similar to bomblades without VD and higher survivability and raw damage output.

I understand all of that, however I spent a lot of time on the PTS & came up with a few builds for my Breton magblade that would have been able to take advantage of Catalyst. Even if it was just a magicka carbon copy of Archer's Mind it would have worked well with my playstyle.

You do bring up some good points, and if ZOS did indeed intend the set to be a PVE only support set then I suppose they achieved their goal. However prior to the nerf, it would have worked out quite well for me*, and I'm still kinda disappointed in the end result.

(*If ZOS ever fixes the Atronach.)