Because its sooooooo good.

And instead of just complaining and pointing at what doesn't work, here is a solution for mag sorc:

Adjust the endless furry. Let the explosions proc when the target's HP is 50% and lower and scale the damage with the missing health.

That way sorcs will be able to somehow keep up the pressure on the rolling targets.

And the execute will be more in line with the Templar's and NB's executes.

Didgerion wrote: »

RaptorRodeoGod wrote: »

It's tool tip added up is less than the total damage Crystal Weapon does, so there's basically no reason to cast it? What's the point of this skill?

Edit: I did my math wrong 🙃 whoops. It deals a whopping 18% more than Crystal Weapon. Considering the Crystal Frags proc deals 66% more damage than the base skill I'm probably better off using that than the Bound Armaments/Crystal Weapon combo.

Blame Crystal Weapon and Overload.

Problem with sorcs is they can land 4 skills into one second in this exact order:
Curse + Crystal Weapon + Bound Armaments + Overload + Frags
And if all the damage lines up then it is too strong of a burst.

The thing that ZOS didn't count in is that all the burst can be countered with a single rolldodge.
But even if the burst successfully lands you will never succeed to land an execute in time and there is nothing left to resume the pressure, everything is on cooldown.

How exactly does a sorc manage to cast crystal weapon and crystal frags in the same rotation to combo someone down?

Didgerion wrote: »

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

RaptorRodeoGod wrote: »

It's tool tip added up is less than the total damage Crystal Weapon does, so there's basically no reason to cast it? What's the point of this skill?

Edit: I did my math wrong 🙃 whoops. It deals a whopping 18% more than Crystal Weapon. Considering the Crystal Frags proc deals 66% more damage than the base skill I'm probably better off using that than the Bound Armaments/Crystal Weapon combo.

Blame Crystal Weapon and Overload.

Problem with sorcs is they can land 4 skills into one second in this exact order:
Curse + Crystal Weapon + Bound Armaments + Overload + Frags
And if all the damage lines up then it is too strong of a burst.

The thing that ZOS didn't count in is that all the burst can be countered with a single rolldodge.
But even if the burst successfully lands you will never succeed to land an execute in time and there is nothing left to resume the pressure, everything is on cooldown.

How exactly does a sorc manage to cast crystal weapon and crystal frags in the same rotation to combo someone down?

That's a good catch lol!

Even though that combo does not work, this is the right track. The skill, actively used, is for PvP. The timing bleeds into the next skill and, thus, contributes to burst.

There are also quite a lot of passives associated with it. You permanently gain +% health. That passive says you must have a pet active, but Bound Armaments activates it from just being slotted. It also grants +stamina, +stam regen and +health regen, if I'm not mistaken. For example I slot the skill on my PvE tank to passively gain all those stats. +20% health regen is nothing to be sneezed at, if you build for it on a self-healing tank. Though nerfed in PvP, there is a also at least one build pattern with 4K+ health regen in that environment (with CP) that is a balanced build and not a complete tank.

You could slot the Clannfear, but that has drawbacks of it's own. It's an expensive heal, and pets, if undirected, tend to tie up and isolate mobs away from the groups main damage area. It's not ideal for a tank.

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

fred4 wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

RaptorRodeoGod wrote: »

It's tool tip added up is less than the total damage Crystal Weapon does, so there's basically no reason to cast it? What's the point of this skill?

Edit: I did my math wrong 🙃 whoops. It deals a whopping 18% more than Crystal Weapon. Considering the Crystal Frags proc deals 66% more damage than the base skill I'm probably better off using that than the Bound Armaments/Crystal Weapon combo.

Blame Crystal Weapon and Overload.

Problem with sorcs is they can land 4 skills into one second in this exact order:
Curse + Crystal Weapon + Bound Armaments + Overload + Frags
And if all the damage lines up then it is too strong of a burst.

The thing that ZOS didn't count in is that all the burst can be countered with a single rolldodge.
But even if the burst successfully lands you will never succeed to land an execute in time and there is nothing left to resume the pressure, everything is on cooldown.

How exactly does a sorc manage to cast crystal weapon and crystal frags in the same rotation to combo someone down?

That's a good catch lol!

Even though that combo does not work, this is the right track. The skill, actively used, is for PvP. The timing bleeds into the next skill and, thus, contributes to burst.

There are also quite a lot of passives associated with it. You permanently gain +% health. That passive says you must have a pet active, but Bound Armaments activates it from just being slotted. It also grants +stamina, +stam regen and +health regen, if I'm not mistaken. For example I slot the skill on my PvE tank to passively gain all those stats. +20% health regen is nothing to be sneezed at, if you build for it on a self-healing tank. Though nerfed in PvP, there is a also at least one build pattern with 4K+ health regen in that environment (with CP) that is a balanced build and not a complete tank.

You could slot the Clannfear, but that has drawbacks of it's own. It's an expensive heal, and pets, if undirected, tend to tie up and isolate mobs away from the groups main damage area. It's not ideal for a tank.

the passives that support bound armaments aren't really that impressive, especially compared to nb which gets +15% to all 3 recoveries just for merely existing and +% max health per ability for slotting any shadow ability, which includes their incredibly overtuned spammable which more than makes up for the damage component to BA, a very strong group AoE HoT that also synergises with the spammable perfectly, invisibility and their gap creation skill shade that also inflicts minor maim as well as their class AoE stun meaning that they get a higher max health bonus more frequently than a sorc slotting BA would get. NB even gets a higher max mag bonus than bound aegis grants from a passive for simply slotting any single ability from the siphoning line (including their very strong burst heal and their source of major sorcery/brutality), the only bonus BA has over nb is the added max stamina, which isn't all that impressive with how little max stats help with everything in the current game with everything being focussed into raw damage/crit/pen/CP.

The other problem BA has is the same problem that merciless resolve has, it requires a global cd to cast it, but unlike merc resolve, it doesn't provide any inherent buffs from the skill itself that buffs anything else (it got its LA damage buff removed) and it hits nowhere near as hard as merciless resolve hits for and its damage instances are timed so close together that 1 roll dodge avoids the entire skill, just like 1 roll dodge avoids merciless resolve entirely as well. bound armaments is just a worse version of merciless resolve in its current form, at least with the light attack damage buff it had some uniqueness to it.

Sorc passives and skills in general have fallen behind because they haven't been adjusted for the past 4-5 years to keep up with hybridization. Use to be the best class for stacking damage (not accounting for minor brutality/sorcery which would stack in a group) because of the 2% per slotted.. now Mag Templar has their 6% apply to spell damage, DK's get 300 raw damage from using whip, NB/Warden another 300-400 raw damage for basic skills. Hell.. the fighters guild gives 3% per slotted now, which used to be balanced because it only worked for Weapon damage while Sorc's worked for Spell and Weapon damage.

300-400 raw damage trumps 6-8% multiplier for most builds.

And yeah everything you said about BA vs Mercilous. All projectiles have a minimum travel time built in, so in melee range, they're not instant. Now BA adds an additional delay of 0.3s per dagger spread over 1.2s. Then you look at the damage and it's like 60-70% of what NB's bow proc can reach. The skill is extremely unreliable and only works for ranged builds that have an easier time spamming ranged light attacks to proc it. For a melee build, you'll usually hold on to BA's daggers so long waiting for a good time to cast it that you end up using it once to twice every 40s.

The best difference we've got is we can stack multiple burst skills like CW/CF + Haunting + BA and/or Fury.. but I've found stacking all these burst skills over complicates things. Something more simple like Haunting + CW + Whirling Blades does the trick. It's less telegraphed, less setup required, less skill slots used, less punishing and "unfun" when things don't work.

Pretty sure ZOS thinks we're OP judging by their U35 comments on nerfing BA because we can stack multiple burst skills with hybridization, however.. I'd argue that it's a con now. It takes much more work and more slots to pull off. Plus, the skills are objectively weaker than other classes while being highly telegraphed. Haunting Curse and BA are just worse versions of Blastbones and Mercilous.

Put it this way.. If you had the choice between 30k damage over 4 skills vs 30k damage over 2 skills, wouldn't you choose the 2?

Didgerion wrote: »

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

RaptorRodeoGod wrote: »

It's tool tip added up is less than the total damage Crystal Weapon does, so there's basically no reason to cast it? What's the point of this skill?

Edit: I did my math wrong 🙃 whoops. It deals a whopping 18% more than Crystal Weapon. Considering the Crystal Frags proc deals 66% more damage than the base skill I'm probably better off using that than the Bound Armaments/Crystal Weapon combo.

Blame Crystal Weapon and Overload.

Problem with sorcs is they can land 4 skills into one second in this exact order:
Curse + Crystal Weapon + Bound Armaments + Overload + Frags
And if all the damage lines up then it is too strong of a burst.

The thing that ZOS didn't count in is that all the burst can be countered with a single rolldodge.
But even if the burst successfully lands you will never succeed to land an execute in time and there is nothing left to resume the pressure, everything is on cooldown.

How exactly does a sorc manage to cast crystal weapon and crystal frags in the same rotation to combo someone down?

That's a good catch lol!

i think they meant the psijic ability to imbue