How do you get your dps so high?

Arnessia13 · February 2021

This may sound like a silly question to a lot of you but I’m honestly at a loss and it’s really starting to get me down. And before anyone starts on the it’s only a game route I want to point out I am disabled, eso is about the only thing I’m currently able to do hobby wise.

So anyway I have a mag sorc, 810, all gold gear, some of it from trials (false gods and mother’s sorrow) covering a 4 and 5 pc each I can generally hold my own against most things pve but of course trials and vet dungeons are tougher. However despite the gear and being able to weave my light attacks (a crit chance of just shy of 50%) spell power and crit potions that I use on cool down and spell dmg buffs I can not for the life of me get past about 16k dps on my target dummy.

What the hell am I missing? I have spent so much money (in game crowns from farming lol) trying different builds I have found recommended online and given them a go but still gotten the same damn result.

Main bar skills are - critical surge, force pulse, mages wrath, crystal fragments, haunting curse and shooting star. I only use fragments when it procs and light weave between the attacks.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

spacebandit · February 2021

i don't know how many times you have parsed on your dummy but it takes a lot to get to good numbers. once you get the memory down though doing it on other characters becomes easy.

i say this because i want to say i practiced several hundreds of times before i started improving. gradually getting to 22k then moving p to 27 or 28k and finally breaking the 30k barrier felt good. it starts out with slow gains and the more you do it the more it just clicks. then small things like one final weave before weapon swapping to gain that little extra bit

Nestor · February 2021

With my Mag Sorcerer, I wear scrub gear, New Moon, Julianos and Slimecraw, and with a simple 3or 4 skill rotation and backwards animation canceling do 26K to 35K.

So, how are your CPs allocated? Are you using a rotation similar to say Alcast or Dotz?

Animation Canceling is another key to getting better, but I think you need a better rotation to start with and a CP Tune Up.

the1andonlyskwex · February 2021

If you only have 4 pieces of one of your sets, that's a problem.

Also, what's on your back bar? I don't usually DPS, but I think high numbers rely on keeping up DoTs from your back bar.

Lastly, are you parsing on the regular dummy or the trials dummy? All of the big numbers people post are from the trials dummy.

Arnessia13 · February 2021

I have four of the false gods set purely because I haven’t had another piece drop, I’ve got the ilambris monster set and mother’s sorrow 5 piece.

Back bar is pretty much buffs and just a regular dummy.

Vevvev · February 2021

16k DPS is where I was 3 years ago and it took me a while to get the sets necessary to boost it. Now against the Precursor I'm at 35-45k DPS depending on what build I bring. Against the trial dummy after a ton of research and farming I hit 62k on it and I was in disbelief lol.

So what changed that let me hit higher? As a magDK I got ahold of a Maelstrom staff and replaced my resto staff backbar with it. Then I morphed some abilities into their meta counterparts like Elemental Blockade to Unstable Wall, and then I started parsing. At first I did the same DPS as my PVP build and it made me feel pretty bad "All this and I still only hit 45k?" And so I tried again.... And again.... Each time I attacked the dummy I did my best to keep eyes on the ground DoTs so I knew when to refresh them, and thankfully I could see the things like Engulfing Flames and Burning Embers ticking on the dummy with the help of showing debuffs placed on enemies I enabled in options.

Once I got more refined I switched out one of my sets to Elf Bane and thanks to the higher uptime on skills my DPS went up despite having less stats!! That's when it finally clued to me that the reason I was not doing so well on my parses was my rotation and reaction time to things. Also explained why my more simpler setups did the same DPS as my setups where I shoved as many DoTs together as I could. My advice is start off with a simple rotation and once you've gotten it as good as you can with it try throwing in another ability to juggle in with the others. Once you've gotten good with it throw in another and another till you've hit the peak of what you can reliably manage. Then try to figure out which abilities work best until you have as refined of a build as you can.

KaGaOri · February 2021

Not sure how helpful will it be, but two days ago have tried to kill trial dummy for the first time (got inspired by all these fake tank / healer threads poping up, with bad - or "fake" - dps DDs used as excuse for this behaviour). Got 810 cp no-pet MagSorc, wearing 5x julianos, 5x mother's sorrow and ilambris monster set, all traits divines, jewelry 2x arcane, 1x bloodthirsty. Both weapos are lightning staves with precise trait and shock glyph.

Front bar: crushing shock - crystal fragments - unstable wall of elements - mage's wrath - inner light + shooting star
Back bar: critical surge - boundless storm - hardened ward - mystic orb - inner light + greater storm atronach

CPs are set like in this build, except 20 points moved from shadow ward to tenacity (can't live without windrunning pasive): https://alcasthq.com/eso-magicka-sorcerer-build-pve/

Can't animation cancel to save my life (literally), so any LA is comming through by pure accident and will be first to addmit my rotation is far from tight, as I often french-fry when I should have pizza. Result's here (was pleasantly surprised):

Have used bewitched suggar skulls + essence of magicka poitions (the common ones enemies drop) - the same stuff I run dungeons with. The jump between try one and tries two and three was due to replacing hardened ward with elemental drain and coming to stand closer, so boundless storm can reach (realized dummy won't hit back

).

Lacking fifth piece bonus from any set is never good (unless it's temporary on one bar and with some other benefit to compensate) and probably not helping things. Maybe use law of julianos, or something, till RNG graces you with fifth piece of false gods?

You could most likely benefit from higher crit chance. Try taking something off main bar and slot inner light from Mages guild skill tree instead (starts as mages light, if you don't have it). You won't ever cast it, but simply having it there grants extra crit chance by major prophecy and raises magicka by 5% (raises it further with appropriate passive). With that, all equipement in divines and thief mundus, my sorc has 75,7% crit chance.

And perhaps try on trial dummy. Won't pretend to understand it all that much, but it should apply debufs and offer synergies as if you were with a group, which could possibly help things. There's good chance any bigger guild would have one at their guild house, or maybe one of your friends have it if you ask them.

Good luck

.

jaws343 · February 2021

I main mag sorc in PVE. Currently running a more solo/4 man oriented build, so this isn't trial min/maxed at all. But I hit 30-40k+ dps on the 3M and more in group settings with the right buffs.

Front bar: crushing, curse, frags, hardened ward, ele drain, Meteor

Back bar: wall of elements, orbs, crit surge, boundless, harness magicka, Elemental Rage or Storm Atro

Running False Gods body. Mothers Sorrow front bar with Lightning staff (fire staff flex for grouped content). Maelstrom lighting back bar. And either pale order and 1 piece domi or illambris depending on content.

The key is to keep buffs up and keep aoes and curse up on cooldown. My usual rotation to start a fight is:
Ele drain>curse>bar swap>WoE>Orb>bar swap>crushing spam

With light attack weave mixed in and frags on proc. And redropping aoe and delayed skills on cooldown. And Boundless and Surge are precast and kept up on cooldown as well. Heavy attacks where necessary.

Merforum · February 2021

Arnessia13 wrote: »

This may sound like a silly question to a lot of you but I’m honestly at a loss and it’s really starting to get me down. And before anyone starts on the it’s only a game route I want to point out I am disabled, eso is about the only thing I’m currently able to do hobby wise.

So anyway I have a mag sorc, 810, all gold gear, some of it from trials (false gods and mother’s sorrow) covering a 4 and 5 pc each I can generally hold my own against most things pve but of course trials and vet dungeons are tougher. However despite the gear and being able to weave my light attacks (a crit chance of just shy of 50%) spell power and crit potions that I use on cool down and spell dmg buffs I can not for the life of me get past about 16k dps on my target dummy.

What the hell am I missing? I have spent so much money (in game crowns from farming lol) trying different builds I have found recommended online and given them a go but still gotten the same damn result.

Main bar skills are - critical surge, force pulse, mages wrath, crystal fragments, haunting curse and shooting star. I only use fragments when it procs and light weave between the attacks.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

From what I understand the trial dummy gives you every major and minor buff in the game which may be legit if you are in a trial with coordinated group but is almost impossible in any other situation, so don't be too discouraged by people with 80-100k dps vids. That's all I got, other than chasing optimal DPS for me makes the game boring (even though you can get better results). I rather go by things like can I solo most overland/all delve bosses or with a good group can we complete vet content or with 2 people can we do most normal vet dungeons. And have fun.

Minyassa · February 2021

I feel you. I built Alcast's one-bar Maelstrom sorc and immediately felt more powerful than I ever have in the game, started being able to solo world bosses and quite a few dungeons and actually carried a group through a dungeon and got comments on badass performance and was feeling pretty darn good about myself, and then I went and fought that damn iron atronach and got TWELVE K. TWELVE. I don't know if my self-confidence will ever recover. I mean, yeah, it's a one-bar build. But ffs. 12. I feel like my cat could do better walking all over the keyboard.

Araneae6537 · February 2021

As has been pointed out, using the trials dummy makes a HUGE difference, perhaps unrealistically so, as it has 100% uptime on warhorn, etc. With one character I tried, my DPS was a pitiful 14k on a skeleton dummy but 26k on a trial dummy (still pitiful, I know, but my point is the huge increase without me doing anything different beyond switching dummies).

As to the real improvement you want for harder content, I think getting the timing down on light attack weaving / animation canceling is a major portion of it. It is definitely something I am still struggling to get.

WrathOfInnos · February 2021

Try this video, it is the most current and comprehensive Sorcerer guide.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wVFeDuzf7jI

Goregrinder · February 2021

Gear only provides a percentage of your damage output. The main factor is the choice of spells ands buffs you slot, and in what manner you click on them ( your rotation). The name of the game here is muscle memory, and being able to stop and restart your rotation on a dime anytime you have to dodge roll, break free, block, move out of AoEs, etc.

Another big part of your rotation is weaving in light and heavy attacks. Other MMORPG's do this part for you in the form of "auto-attacks", but ESO has action based combat, which requires you to manually click every time you want to perform an action. Light attacks can account for almost 30% of your total damage in a boss fight by themselves, so if you aren't weaving them in then you're basically giving up that extra 20-30% of damage.

But at the end of the day it just comes down to practicing a rotation over and over on a dummy until you memorize it. Just like practicing a song on guitar, or juggling, or practicing a speech or anything really. You're going to fumble it up constantly at first, but after a while you'll fumble it less and less as your brain starts to map out the movements. With enough time, you will get to a point where 8 times out of 10 you hardly ever fumble it up. That's what everyone who can hit 90k/110k/etc dps had to do. All of them went through this when they first started, there is no secret sauce trade secret to skip this.

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe · February 2021

Minyassa wrote: »

I feel you. I built Alcast's one-bar Maelstrom sorc and immediately felt more powerful than I ever have in the game, started being able to solo world bosses and quite a few dungeons and actually carried a group through a dungeon and got comments on badass performance and was feeling pretty darn good about myself, and then I went and fought that damn iron atronach and got TWELVE K. TWELVE. I don't know if my self-confidence will ever recover. I mean, yeah, it's a one-bar build. But ffs. 12. I feel like my cat could do better walking all over the keyboard.

Keep in mind, solo builds like the one you were using are completely unique. The trial dummy is made pretty much specifically for trials builds, and as such the optimal set ups for that dummy will be much, much different than a solo build (for example, a solo build brings its own debuffs/buffs/heals, and a trials build is strictly 100% dps with the exception of trap or channeled acceleration, and is built assuming it will be healed and buffed by other group members). A solo build can have a horrid reading on that dummy and still be very very effective for what it was built for, and likewise I've seen strict trials builds set ups try to solo things or even do dungeons in some cases, and get the floor mopped with them. It's really just comparing apples and oranges. If you really, really want to parse with your solo build, try it on the 3 mil dummy or really anything else but the 21 mil, and use your own ele drain. That's a much better indicator of where you're at for the type of content you'd be looking at with that build.

Araneae6537 · February 2021

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I feel you. I built Alcast's one-bar Maelstrom sorc and immediately felt more powerful than I ever have in the game, started being able to solo world bosses and quite a few dungeons and actually carried a group through a dungeon and got comments on badass performance and was feeling pretty darn good about myself, and then I went and fought that damn iron atronach and got TWELVE K. TWELVE. I don't know if my self-confidence will ever recover. I mean, yeah, it's a one-bar build. But ffs. 12. I feel like my cat could do better walking all over the keyboard.

Keep in mind, solo builds like the one you were using are completely unique. The trial dummy is made pretty much specifically for trials builds, and as such the optimal set ups for that dummy will be much, much different than a solo build (for example, a solo build brings its own debuffs/buffs/heals, and a trials build is strictly 100% dps with the exception of trap or channeled acceleration, and is built assuming it will be healed and buffed by other group members). A solo build can have a horrid reading on that dummy and still be very very effective for what it was built for, and likewise I've seen strict trials builds set ups try to solo things or even do dungeons in some cases, and get the floor mopped with them. It's really just comparing apples and oranges. If you really, really want to parse with your solo build, try it on the 3 mil dummy or really anything else but the 21 mil, and use your own ele drain. That's a much better indicator of where you're at for the type of content you'd be looking at with that build.

That’s a good point and I’ve been wondering about the utility for practicing for PvP — probably for that dummies are only useful for optimizing animation canceling, putting attack sequences in muscle memory, etc.

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe · February 2021

a

Araneae6537 wrote: »

Suna_Ye_Sunnabe wrote: »

Minyassa wrote: »

I feel you. I built Alcast's one-bar Maelstrom sorc and immediately felt more powerful than I ever have in the game, started being able to solo world bosses and quite a few dungeons and actually carried a group through a dungeon and got comments on badass performance and was feeling pretty darn good about myself, and then I went and fought that damn iron atronach and got TWELVE K. TWELVE. I don't know if my self-confidence will ever recover. I mean, yeah, it's a one-bar build. But ffs. 12. I feel like my cat could do better walking all over the keyboard.

Keep in mind, solo builds like the one you were using are completely unique. The trial dummy is made pretty much specifically for trials builds, and as such the optimal set ups for that dummy will be much, much different than a solo build (for example, a solo build brings its own debuffs/buffs/heals, and a trials build is strictly 100% dps with the exception of trap or channeled acceleration, and is built assuming it will be healed and buffed by other group members). A solo build can have a horrid reading on that dummy and still be very very effective for what it was built for, and likewise I've seen strict trials builds set ups try to solo things or even do dungeons in some cases, and get the floor mopped with them. It's really just comparing apples and oranges. If you really, really want to parse with your solo build, try it on the 3 mil dummy or really anything else but the 21 mil, and use your own ele drain. That's a much better indicator of where you're at for the type of content you'd be looking at with that build.

That’s a good point and I’ve been wondering about the utility for practicing for PvP — probably for that dummies are only useful for optimizing animation canceling, putting attack sequences in muscle memory, etc.

In a case like that, yes. The actual damage output reading on a dummy would be one of the last things I would concern myself with on a pvp build, as long as your hits and gear are effective in pvp. For practicing combos and animation canceling though, absolutely.

tuxon · February 2021

Vevvev wrote: »

16k DPS is where I was 3 years ago and it took me a while to get the sets necessary to boost it. Now against the Precursor I'm at 35-45k DPS depending on what build I bring. Against the trial dummy after a ton of research and farming I hit 62k on it and I was in disbelief lol.

Same story. I just farmed the gear and CP and I do 60k+ on trial dummy and 40k in dungeons and trials on bosses and over 80k on trash. No weaving or other ***. Just AoE and CP&gear.

Ashfordd · February 2021

Low spell penetration might be the reason why your dps is quite low. I am mostly a solo player and I realized that investing into spell penetration (for magicka chars) is one of the best ways how to increase damage output when soloing. This stat is not shown on the stat UI (it will change with CP 2.0), but luckily there are some addons which will show it for you.

Dungeon monsters and the 3 mil. dummy have a spell resistence of 18200, so the ideal value of your spell penetration is slightly over 12000 so that it reaches close to 18200 with ele drain. Possible sources of spell penetration include light amour passives, sharpened trait on weapons, mundus stone The lover and the spinners garment set.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · February 2021

Same way that you get to Carnegie Hall.

PRACTICE!!!

Everyone is looking for an answer with their build, but this game is about rotation. Now admittedly, your rotation is limited by your build to some degree. You probably arent going to do a ton of DPS with only one bar. If this is for PVP, I wouldnt really worry about sustain target DPS. PVP is all about burst.

A classic PVP Sorc burst combo if you were to script it looks something like this. LA>Curse, LA>Wrath, LA> Meteor (or your spammable if not up), Streak (or any stun), LA Frag Proc. The idea is that curse, meteor, and crystal frag all hit while stunned, and if this brings them below 20%, mages wrath finishes them off.

For PVE, if you are trying to do one bar, my guess is you would do better to run pets, but I guess I am not positive on that. You leave a lot of damage on the table if you only run one bar.

preevious · February 2021

Yes, I made several posts like this one on this very forums.
I play a magsorc, too, with both pets out.

Everyone tells you to practice. They are right, but there are more immediate things you can check that have a impact on your damage output.

here are some things you may miss :

Your weapon MUST be golden. It is not an option. On weapon, gold quality have a very noticeable impact. (a bit less so on armor, so, you can delay the upgrade of your armors)
Did you pick a mundus? Lots of players forget to pick one. Pick thief or shadow.
Use greater storm atronach on the dummy. Less AoE DPS for a load more single target DPS.
Backbar infused with berserker enchant tend to have the best results. +500 spell damage with 100% uptime is too good to pass up. Be sure to cast wall of element from backbar to keep it roced all the time.
Fronbar is a little more open ended. I prefer precise, with a flame enchant (DPS added by the burning procs)
Every stat points to magicka, every glyphs on armor to max mag. You'll get to 17-18k health with food on. It's enough, especially since you can put your big shield in your backbar.
Enchants sould be gold, kuta's not that expensive.
Stay on your backbar as little as possible. Just 1-2 skills (including wall of element).
any spammable is good. I find elemental weapon clunky and get less dps with it, despite it being meta. I'd use crushing shock, or even crystal frag as a spammable. (I actually use crystal frag as my spammable, and thus hard cast it. I reach high number with that setup.)
farm an malstrom inferno staff . In normal, it's not so bad of a farm, and will increase your damage, especially since you weave.
Maybe farm siroria? It's pretty neat for parses, and also pretty usable in real fights.
If I were you, I'd switch mother's sorrow with medusa. A little less crit%, but you'll never worry about minor force again. It resulted in much more damage, for me.

There. It's a bit of an infodump, I'm sorry.
In theory, you should have 2 5 pieces sets and 1 monster set. (your illambris is fine)
On backbar, you'll loose 2 pieces of one of those sets, but you won't stay there very long, and the bonus given by a maelstrom staff is so much worth it.

I personnaly reach over 85k with this simple rotation :

backbar : wall of element, structured entropy, SWAP BAR, volatile familiar, daedric prey, 6x cristal frags.

Both pets slotted in each bar, obviously. I slot a survival skill on back bar (shield or critical surge), and I slot bound aegis on frontbar (8% more magicka + 2% spell damage thanks to your passives means more damage).

Good luck, those numbers WILL increase, worry not.

Also, if you are on PC-EU, feel free to send a message there if you want further explanations.

Grianasteri · February 2021

Arnessia13 wrote: »

This may sound like a silly question to a lot of you but I’m honestly at a loss and it’s really starting to get me down. And before anyone starts on the it’s only a game route I want to point out I am disabled, eso is about the only thing I’m currently able to do hobby wise.

So anyway I have a mag sorc, 810, all gold gear, some of it from trials (false gods and mother’s sorrow) covering a 4 and 5 pc each I can generally hold my own against most things pve but of course trials and vet dungeons are tougher. However despite the gear and being able to weave my light attacks (a crit chance of just shy of 50%) spell power and crit potions that I use on cool down and spell dmg buffs I can not for the life of me get past about 16k dps on my target dummy.

What the hell am I missing? I have spent so much money (in game crowns from farming lol) trying different builds I have found recommended online and given them a go but still gotten the same damn result.

Main bar skills are - critical surge, force pulse, mages wrath, crystal fragments, haunting curse and shooting star. I only use fragments when it procs and light weave between the attacks.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

@Arnessia13

My advice would be to search for a decent, friendly pve guild. Try different ones. Most good guilds will have players more than happy to help others with build, rotation, advice etc. Some of us really enjoy this aspect of ESO.

I am sure there will be plenty of decent advice in these forums, but there is no substitute for 121, live tuition and feedback.

When I joined my first guild I was really able to progress dps and experience wise because I was surrounded by helpful, friendly and more knowledgeable people. You do not have to be particularly sociable or particularly active in many guilds, nor should you have to use voice coms or discord or pay subs etc, if you prefer otherwise. There are plenty of casual but good guilds out there, and of course also plenty of more serious and end game guilds should you wish.

I remember being exactly where you are dps wise and feeling frustrated and at a loss. Years later and I now enjoy helping others if I can. You can do it, we have spent time with an 810 player who initially parsed at about 12k. After one evening and a bit of practice, they were parsing in excess of 20k.

Vevvev · February 2021

tuxon wrote: »

Vevvev wrote: »

16k DPS is where I was 3 years ago and it took me a while to get the sets necessary to boost it. Now against the Precursor I'm at 35-45k DPS depending on what build I bring. Against the trial dummy after a ton of research and farming I hit 62k on it and I was in disbelief lol.

Same story. I just farmed the gear and CP and I do 60k+ on trial dummy and 40k in dungeons and trials on bosses and over 80k on trash. No weaving or other ***. Just AoE and CP&gear.

I hit those numbers with weaving... I'm a Dragonknight so that must be why it's not higher due to the lack of offensive passives x.x