Magma Incarnate

(1 item) Adds 129 Magicka Recovery, Adds 129 Stamina Recovery
(2 items) When you heal yourself or a group member with a single target heal ability, grant the lowest Health group member within 28 meters Minor Courage and Minor Resolve, increasing their Weapon and Spell Damage by 215 and Armor by 2974 for 10 seconds. Daedric Energy will then bounce to a nearby group member within 8 meters, up to 3 times, applying Minor Courage and Minor Resolve for 10 seconds. This effect can occur once every 15 seconds.

Magma Incarnate seems like cool option for tank in mixed DD group in 4-man content. Encratis's Behemoth is considered BiS for mag DD group and Tremorscale - for stam, so it seems like Magma could have its use in PUGs or mixed groups. Unfortunately it's proc mechanic will make it proc on tank in most cases and with short range of bounce mechanic (only 8 meters) ranged players may often not get the buff. To be clear: I'm excluding trash pools (esp in tight corridors) and tank n' spank bosses - this set will work just fine there if team is hugging each other.

It's tooltip desription isn't very clear, so here is how it really works.
Magma Incarnate procs on group member who is being healed and has lowest Health. Important thing to note is that mechanic works on person with lowest relative HP (%). So if tank and DD is being healed then one with bigger perentage of missing HP will get the buff. In other words, if in given moment tank has 30k HP (with 50k max) and DD has 19k HP (with 20k max) then tank will get the initial buff. It is also important to rememeber that proc will start on person who is being healed. So in case where tank has 49k HP (with 50k max) and DD has 5k HP (with 20k max) and only tank is being healed then tank will get the intitial buff.

Bounce mechanic works immediately (and only once per player) and it's short range (8m) makes it problematic. Initial proc will most likely happen on tank (since he will be one with "lowest HP" in most times) and mag DD/healer will be often too far to get the buff from the bounce (there is no way of knowing if you are in range). Stam groups will prefer Tremorscale because it is easier to get and is has 100% uptime. Magma Incarnate max uptime is 66% and will be even lower in real-use because of procs conditions (someone needs to be actually healed).

So ATM Magma seems like really niche set and maybe some coordinated groups will use it in fights where you can stack (8m is really short). It wont be good option for healer either because most single target heals are smart (so usually tank will be healed too). Radiating Regeneration, Breath of Life, Sorc Pet will most likely proc first buff on tank since tank will be one with biggest % of missing HP.



So how to fix it? Easiest way would be to make it proc on person with lowest Max HP regardless if he is being healed or not. Initial conditions would still have to be fulfilled (someone would have to be healed) so set wouldn't behave in much different way than it does now. Short range of bounce would still be problematic, but at least tank would never get the intial buff and It's easier (and more natural) for DDs/healer to stay together...


UPDATE

There is some redeeming quality of that bounce mechanic that I didnt consider in first post. That 8 meter distance is counted everytime the "buff ball" bounces from one group member to another. So if you line up 4 people that they are 8 meters apart (the line has 24 m in total) and tank is first in the line, then everyone will get the buff (ball should bounce from tank to 2nd player, then from 2nd player to 3rd player, and then to 4th). [I didnt actually line up anyone like that, but it seems it would work that way ]

So in real case scenario if there is stam DD on the opposite side of boss from tank (tank is facing boss away from group) and he is 4 meters from tank, then this stam DD gonna serve as link that extends the reach of buff up to 12 meters. Still, people would need to be up-to-8m aprat from each other and, as @karekiz mentioned, in harder content (many HMs, but vet arenas also) people wont be able to do that consistently (not talking about some really well coordinated groups). Keep in mind that people wont have any way of knowing if they are in buffs range (no in-game way and no addon that could help with that).



So while maybe I can't call this set useless, I still think it is pretty unreliable (to the point of being useless). You dont have much control over proc (while you have 100% with tremor or encrantis). Some semi-reliable way would be to cast ability that cost HP (ie Balance) and then self-heal. However, if there is another source of healing (ie aoe or healer) then you may be too slow to proc it... Also you may be not too eager to debuff yourself all the time (with Balance) in harder fights, just to proc minor damage buff.

So if you wont be able to proc buff on whole team consitently, then - why bother with this set? Wouldnt it be better to just pick Tremor for that one stam DD? Then you can live a happy life of tank who doesnt need to care about timing balance/self-heal and way-too-short-buff-distance. Or maybe get bloodspawn for ulti reg or go 'selfish' with guardian? Just pick something that is reliable?


UPDATE 2 (solution for fixing the set)

i noticed my original solution is stupid (there would be big chance that 4 th person wouldnt get the buff). I got fixated on that HP idea for some reason. So the solution would be that initial proc should happen on player who is furthest away from person who is wearing the set. This would cause chain reaction that would go back to the tank (if tank is wearing the set ofc). People would still need to care about proper distances (8m) but at least in worst case scenario buff would always hit some DD/healer and not the tank only. This solution would also encourage tanks to use smart heals to "maintain" the proc (ATM one may be afraid that proc will happen when there is no DD around who could get the bounce buff).

/script JumpToHouse("@Paramedicus")