Too much to consider for one topic, I want to leave a detailed response and go into why some of these ideas would be healthy or unhealthy but feel it would be more TLDR than your post.

I would make separate topics in combat & character mechanics and simplify/visualize the most important changes a bit. You also made a point to talk about stuff like force pulse, which isn't magsorc specific as it's a destro ability, degeneration which is a mage's guild ability, and harness magicka which is a light armor ability. None of these are specific to magsorcs and need to be considered apart from everything else.

I'm not sure if I'm reading this correctly but it seems less like saying magsorc should be buffed and more like 1 specific way of playing magsorc should be given that several of the buffs you mentioned aren't even sorcerer specific.

You would have to prove that streak is OP in any way. I am not convinced.

axi wrote: »

There can be no buffs to magsorc before heavy nerf to streak or to dark deal. And I mean real nerf not just for example increase to cost penatly of streak proposed by OP. That cost penatly is an outdated idea which really doesnt work these days. Main reason for that is many buffs that dark exchange recived throughout the years allowing for it to completly negate cost penalty of streak while streak itself is propably the strongest ability in the game PvP wise.

I am all for buffing magsorc toolkit because it's really outdated but lets not pretend there isnt also an elephant in the room that streaking is. If OP really played magsorc for 6 years than he should know best that when magsorc damage and defense becomes comparable to other classes then sorc becomes instantly top dog because of how much adventage is provided with streak.

I counter your argument with the fact that nbs got so many overtuned buffs over the past few patches while getting retain full power invisibility and full power shade which are so much more problematic for balance than anything sorc currently has access to.

So why does streak need to be nerfed before the class is buffed and why and does dark deal need to be nerfed at all? Streak is mediocre due to its conal targeting shape making its stun unreliable, especially in lag, its maddening ability to stop short when hitting even the tiniest non-existent pebble/change in terrain height in front of you, or leaving you completely unbreakably stunned when you streak off a ledge. It is also affected by every and all gap closing bugs and location desyncs in the game and straight up lag/performance issues as well.
Then we look at dark deal, it is the worst burst heal in the game currently with a tooltip value equal to actual heal values all other class burst heals heal for, it is also still affected by battle spirit, meanwhile it also can be interrupted very easily, especially in lag, and if it is interrupted, it hard locks the skill for 3GCDs leaving you with no healing. No other class has it's burst heal tied to a channeled cast that locks itself for 3 seconds if interrupted, the only reason dark deal is ran at all is because the alternatives (pets) are just as bad in pvp due to being designed for 2017 combat standards (see the 20k max health, no crit resist, low armor and horrendous, suicidal AI) and they also take up 2 bar slots to use them instead of just 1.

I'm not saying that streak shouldn't ever be looked at, but make the rest of the kit comparable to modern standards before gutting the 1 remaining good skill the class still has or at least do both at the same time.

Think of templar, jabs got gutted last patch (U35) and PotL as well this patch (U36), but radiant oppression, javelin, shards and many other skills got significantly buffed before those 2 skills got nerfed and the defensive options the class has remained just as strong as ever.

So again, why must sorc be treated different, why must sorc lose its only remaining good skill before it's allowed to have its other skills buffed/modernised, especially when the other classes (see nb, plar, and dk) are allowed to receive huge game-warping/meta-shifting buffs before having their problematic mechanics/overtuned skills nerfed, if their mechanics/skills even get nerfed at all?

P.s. not sure if anyone has noticed yet, streak has been stealth nerfed already, it has been made much more clunky to use now, it moves you in the direction your character is facing, not the direction you are looking. So to line it up properly, you now not only need to look in that direction, but you also now need to spend time turning your character around to face that direction as well.
I feel sorry for console sorcs, not only is turning the screen much slower there, but now you need to turn the character as well to streak in the right direction, harsh penalties for a class whose only other stun (rune cage) has been pure garbage and unusable since it got over-nerfed 3+ years ago.

Bouldercleave wrote: »

So in other words, you want to be invincible in PvP and never die again.

Magsorc doesn't need 5% of what you are asking for to be OP to an insane degree.

So in other words, you want Magsorc to never be competitive in high-tier PvP again?

Bouldercleave wrote: »

I think that you confuse "hate" with "disagreement".

Perhaps the reason that they haven't adjusted sorcerers in a while is that:

1. Sorcerers are the benchmark that they are using to adjust other classes to.
2. They feel that the class plays out how THEY want them to.


I don't disagree that a few tweaks and adjustments would be a bad thing. I do disagree that they are completely broken and not viable in PvP. I also disagree that they need a HUGE overhaul and gigantic boost.


None of these statements equate to hate of the sorcerer class. Just a disagreement on your course of "fixing" the issue.

People use the term hate so often now that I feel many people have lost sight of what is means.

"Hate" usually means "You don't agree with me unconditionally". Like "Toxicity", the meaning changes based on who uses it.


Every day when any class is discussed it's either "so weak and under-powered" or "so OP and unstoppable". It's no surprise some just overtly want their class to be better than anyone else's. It's a neverending cycle of one-upsmanship.

axi wrote: »

Turtle_Bot wrote: »

axi wrote: »

AdamLAD wrote: »

axi wrote: »

There can be no buffs to magsorc before heavy nerf to streak or to dark deal. And I mean real nerf not just for example increase to cost penatly of streak proposed by OP. That cost penatly is an outdated idea which really doesnt work these days. Main reason for that is many buffs that dark exchange recived throughout the years allowing for it to completly negate cost penalty of streak while streak itself is propably the strongest ability in the game PvP wise.

I am all for buffing magsorc toolkit because it's really outdated but lets not pretend there isnt also an elephant in the room that streaking is. If OP really played magsorc for 6 years than he should know best that when magsorc damage and defense becomes comparable to other classes then sorc becomes instantly top dog because of how much adventage is provided with streak.

I agree that the streak dark deal combo mitigates the ramping cost. However there is so many immobilisations, stuns, snares, projectiles and gap closers to counter it. If you have to constantly keep pressing darkdeal. Your stamina is gonna go down fast, which you need to breakfree and rolldodge out of stuns and immobilisations. Plus it can be interrupted AND you have to slow down to press it as its not instant cast. A while ago I'd agree that both need nerfing However the current state of eso. With all of its ways to stop you from moving and catching up. I wouldn't change darkdeal. The fact streak would cost more means you would need to cast darkdeal more, slowing you down and costing more stamina. Which is a fair tradeoff

Sorry but argument that snares, immobilizations stuns and gap closers are countering streak is kinda silly. Streak is literally designed to counter those. You can still streak while snared or immobilized given that with immobilize You will have to make sure You are streaking in desired way. Stuns? We could have even 10x more stuns then in the past but CC immunity after break free is still a thing and You get stuned as often as usual. You could even say that streaking away protects you from getting stunned too often because while at range big chunk of stuns cannot reach You. CC immunity became also a powerfull tool in the hands of sorcerers ever since it's tied to interruption immunity so Your dark deal or pet resummon cannot be countered while CC immune. Gap closers? How many people is using those these days? They are really ghost of the past since limited toolkits very often do not have space for those but even if You meet someone with gap closer just 1 stun with streak allows You to do another streak while he is breaking free which will already put You out of the gap closer range. In the past atleast You had to be more creative to avoid gap closing You down and roll dodge backwards to streak through enemy but with buffs to streak stun size now You are also stunning people few meters behind You making avoiding gap closers much easier then before. If snares and immobilizes would be that big of an issue for sorc everyone would run with other morph of streak but suprisingly that's not the case.

When it comes to dark deal stamina cost is laughably low so lets not pretend like spamming it is an issue especially with sets like wretched vitality being an option. You need to take under consideration that if sorc toolkit would potentially be updated then there is a big chance he would have acces to all sets not just those with high magicka buffs and to all food buffs including orzoga which would make sustaining way easier. As for dark deal being interrupted we both know ever since CC immunity is tied to interruption immunity spamming dark deal few trimes is a childs play on top of it slready not being that hard after serie of 3-4 streaks.

Streak needs a rework and more meaningfull drawback otherwise bringing magsorc defense and dmg close to others will make the class outshine everyone else. This issue is always occuring with sorc and nb because evasivness and opption to disengage is the strongest type of defense in ESO. If You disengage from fight that is basically 100% dmg mitigation for a period of time. Just look at nightblade atm. Class was in a bad shape few patches ago so it recived bunch of buffs to defense and offense withinh last few patches propably to elovate weak state of mag nb but in the procces already strong stam nb got out of hand simply because high evasivness of the class was not dealt with before applying buffs to other areas. The same thing will happen with sorc and it's not just blind prediction, It's a fact based on what we've seen in the past. Nerfing streak could also lower a strenght of stamsorc which in all honesty is also something that could happen since especially in BGs stamsorc is getting out of hand.

Again, I repeat, why must sorc be the ONLY class to get nerfs to its skills before it gets buffs where they're needed when EVERY other class that gets buffed never gets that same treatment why can we not let sorc run around for 1 patch and be busted or simply do the nerfs at the SAME TIME as the buffs.

Again, NB has invisibility and shade which are far superior to streak for evading/disengaging enemies, shade even provides mitigation (maim) on top of vertical and LoS gap creation and invis allows for very unfair engagement choices and a guaranteed crit (extreme burst of damage) and yet nb got to get all of their buffs without any sort of nerf to either of those skills. NB even got insane healing to go along with their already insanely high damage and evasiveness.

so once again, yes sorcs will become op, but why are sorcs not allowed to have that moment of being op when every other class is allowed that moment whenever they get a series of buffs.

Do you realise just how unfair that is and how much of a slap in the face to every sorcerer player in the game that is?

Edit: Don't get me wrong, I can see streak becoming a potential issue with sorcs getting a buff to their kit, but my point is, why must the class be treated unfairly differently when it comes to getting buffs, why is it ok for NB, plars, wardens and dks to all receive game warping buffs to pair with their "broken skills" that instantly make them the best class in the game, yet when it comes to sorcerers they aren't allowed to receive anything at all unless the class has been essentially deleted from the game first.

I've already gave You an answer to your question. First of all once again I will repeat nerf to streak shouldn't happen before buffs to other parts of class toolkit but alongside them. I literally made whole paragraph about that. Why not let sorc run 1 patch as obvious top dog? Well maybe because after almost 9 years that procces of having 1-2 top dogs dominating PvP by being miles ahead of others is getting boring and is one of the factors that drives PvP into the obscurity. Maybe it's time for a change instead of making the same mistake 9th and 10th year in a row. Maybe it's time to recognise that this is one of the reasons things can never be balanced because overbuffing one class for one patch messes the things so badly that sometimes it takes next 4-5 patches to resolve created issues but in the meantime new issues arise because some other class got overbuffed along the way.

Yes nb got overbuffed but does that mean the same mistake now need to always happen for every class to make things "fair"? As for invisibility and shade being superior to streak I would argue it's comparing apples to oranges. Both despite being evasive tools can work insanely great in different scenarios but also can sometimes fail to do their job. Buffing nb without dealing with his evasivness was a mistake, an obvious one so why the same mistake should be repeated always? So You can feel the sense of "fairness" by getting 1-2 patches of glory to sorc in the future? That is super childish way of thinking that brings the game only deeper into the void of issues it already have. I guess You then will expect for sorc to be gutted and for other class to rise into the glory and same procces to happen forever? Oh and for the record if You think that nerfing the class before buffing it never happened before You dont have to look that far because mentioned by You nb recived series of buffs after it recived series of nerfs first. What I want to happen for sorc is way more fair.

What is the point of balance if You are openly trying to achieve the state where changes will cause certain one or two classes to become OP and dominate the battlefield? That is the literall opposite of the word balance. For the record sorcs already had their 5 minutes in the past that is why we know what will happen if they get their toolkit comparable to others without dealing with streaking.

You do realise that every time when one class becomes top dog leaving others behind it's a slap in the face of all those other classes? is that fair for You? if you are such a big proclamator of fariness I guess You will be the first one to advocate for gutiing sorc down after 1-2 patches of it being OP right? You are really that deep into the current bad design of balance that You want things to stay bad just for the sake of it being "fair" in a long run?

Maybe just maybe it's worth to try different approach instead of repeating the same one that has been failing for 9 years. Maybe it's time to start making things more fair by making all classes viable and more or less equal at the same time (although true equality can never be achieved) instead of creating rooster of 1-2 top dogs than few setups in the middle and rest being lackies.

Your reply to my other comment didn't show up when I typed my reply, yes, you do say that it would be preferable to have both occur at the same time, I couldn't see your reply stating that as it had not shown up at the time of me writing my reply.

I do agree that doing both at the same time would be preferable and even stated this as the least they could do to balance the class if they are dead set on nerfing streak.

My point about fairness was meant to be taken as if the current system of overnerfing and overbuffing was to be continued (sorry if I didn't explain this part), as it is something that doesn't seem likely to change with the way balancing is currently going.

Of course, it would be preferable to have all classes be equally balanced, but in the current game and the way the game is currently being balanced, this is simply not the case and if this method of balancing is not going to be changed to truly balance the game and make all classes equal, then it most certainly isn't fair for 1 single class to be treated differently to all the others while this method of implementing wild and over the top balance changes is continued.

I would argue streak vs shade/invis is an oranges to mandarins comparison (much closer than apples to oranges, but some very minor differences). both have the same overall idea behind them (evasive skills), just implemented in different ways. So it is definitely an apt comparison to bring up in this regard, especially since nb gets 2 skills that are each on their own very comparable to the sorcs 1 skill for evasiveness.

As for the pets vs dark deal argument, I would agree that the pets would be the "burst heal" if
1. they were not stuck using 2017 combat standards
2. they didn't take up multiple bar slots to every other class's single bar slot
However, since the pets are a liability in pvp due to the current power level of everything else, especially the multitude of bomb set-ups that currently plague pvp which the pets are notorious for triggering with their outdated stats, resistances and AI and the fact that they take up multiple bar slots compared to every other classes instant cast burst heal that has other defensive utility on top of a stronger heal that also only takes up 1 bar slot, it is quite easy to see how dark deal/dark conversion could be considered the class burst heal for the pvp environment.

I haven't stated it here as I went through this in-depth on another thread, but the heal would ideally be moved from the pets (at least from the clannfear) and dark deal/dark conversion reworked to be like a more traditional burst heal where the focus is on the heal and the sustain is a secondary utility effect equivalent to the secondary utility effects of other class heals such as resistant flesh armor buff, warden stun, nb mending, dk extra healing on low health, plar cost refund etc.

Sorc is also the only class to have some sort of locking penalty attached to its defensive kit, sure other classes have this penalty on their offensive skills (example plar beam gets interrupted), but this is much less impactful than it is when it is applied to the defensive kit where it becomes a literal matter of life and death. Imagine coag, resistance flesh, HtD, polar wind or offering had cast times attached to them allowing them to be interrupted. Players of those classes would be screaming for the removal of that cast time and now imagine if the response to those calls was to call those abilities "armor buffs with a heal attached" (necro), or "a sustain with a heal attached" (plar) or "buff to healing with a heal attached" (dk/nb) or "a stun with a heal attached" (warden) and that it should be nerfed or they should just slot this other heal that has zero utility, takes up 2 bar slots instead of 1 and also becomes a defensive liability due to triggering enemies bomb chains that wipes entire zergs or just gets 1 shot within a single gcd that also has an interruption mechanic when you try to set it up again.

I would also agree that the argument would be less valid assuming that CC immunity worked, but it is unreliable at the best of times, we all have stories about getting pulled by dark convergence despite being out of range and/or CC immune, or dragged back across the map by meteor despite popping an immo pot. Just because interrupt immunity is granted alongside CC immunity now, doesn't mean both or either work reliably, especially during periods of poor server performance.

So the argument still stands that having crucial defensive options such as healing tied to an interruptible skill is horrible game design and needs to be reworked. Especially since it goes alongside a lack of passive healing that every other class has easy access to within the class kit alongside their uninterruptable burst heals that also have strong utility.

Not going to bother responding to the rest of your reply, since it is quite clearly and attempt to bait me into breaking the forums ToS.

I do hope however that this does clear things up for you for your more reasonable responses to my previous post and clears up any misconceptions.