Crit Surge has that healing utility though, which is pretty dang good for solo play. Or just play in general. Power Surge is pretty lackluster though, I won’t lie.

I don't think that every source should necessarily be also tied to an offensive skill component(this should be addressed with morphs), but I do think that every source should receive the ''While slotted on either bar'' treatment.

ZOS ''updated'' like 1 DK and 1 NB skill with this functionality and then completely forgot about it. Same deal with the ''Cost determined by highest/lowest max resource'' functionality that was never implemented for non-Arcanist Class skills, and judging by the DK rework, won't be any time soon.

This is why context is important.

Crit Surge is one of if not the best overall.

For solo PvE, and PvP, the self-heals are really strong and is part of a very strong skill line with access to Hurricane, Streak, and Overload.

It's arguably the most common Major Brutality/Sorcery buff in PvP, with Warden Merch as a contender.

As a Gravelord on all specs player at the moment, I agree with the ranking of Skeletal Minion, it has excellent versatility.

However I'd rank Netch as the Number 1, by a long shot, however this is purely a smallscale PvP perspective and the Arc damage line is sadly underwhelming overall. Great passives and cool graphics tho.

This will always be controversial since there are so many differing use cases where these abilities are better or worse than others (completely ignoring players biases for and against specific classes), however I would rank them something like the following:

PvE (group content)
Inspired Scholarship
Molten Armaments (post refresh)
Recuperative Treatise
The rest.
This content wants as much DPS as possible, hence why these 3 make this list. Recuperative is 3rd because it has less damage, but gives sustain so makes it more beginner/casual friendly than Inspired.

PvE (solo content)
Recuperative Treatise
Netch
Crit Surge
Molten (post refresh)
The rest.
This content requires more utility than above since there typically won't be healers, tanks or coordination to cover these aspects. Hence why we see sustain and healing more here.

PvP (general builds)
Netch
Huge Gap
Recuperative Treatise
Crit Surge/Molten (post refresh)
The rest.
Similar to solo PvE above, utility is king here and no other ability comes on a line that matches animal companions for sheer utility/versatility. Players have started figuring out builds with Treatise and with the refresh to Earthen, Molten is making it's way into this list as well, but crit surge is starting to fall off a bit since all it is is a non-scaling heal + the buff, and would not be here at all if not for streak and hurricane carrying the line to 3rd in PvP since Netch just completely outshines crit surge here.


What it boils down to is the bonus utility each ability gives and the rest of the line they are attached to.
- Crit Surge, while still decent, is falling behind in PvP now with how strong charm and the rest of the animal companions line is, making it a real decision to include crit surge for the ever shrinking heal (since it doesn't scale at all) or use that bar slot for something else and just run with netch only.
- Netch has the most utility for any content outside of organized PvE groups since it grants the animal companions passives (sustain, crit damage, heal, etc) all of which are already covered in organized PvE raids, but are very strong utility on their own (let alone combined) outside of organized PvE groups.
- Recuperative is making it's way into more PvP builds as players figure out how strong status effects are now, so having permanent major brut/sorc + the passives + sustain (that works with block) + bonus free damage procs is really bringing it up as more players realise how strong it can be when built right.
- Molten is caveated with post refresh since it does a lot post refresh despite being so simple inherently. This is due to the extra ticks of fire damage that can proc burning (sustain via ardent flame passive being a big one). It also helps this one that Earthen is becoming a lot better for more than just pure PvE tank builds with the refresh and the armor buff is probably on par with something like hurricane and the line comes with corrosive on top of this.

The issues with the others not mentioned above are:
- sap essence requires hitting a target, makes it janky to use when other class skills can pre-buff.
- jabs doesn't have a mag morph, so only works for some plars, not all plars, although the ability itself outside of being the source of major brut/sorc is really good, just not a good source of this buff.
- mage/archer are lackluster in terms of utility since all they are, are DoTs + the buff.
- Power Surge is limited to healers only and the tick frequency is very conflicting with the standard HoT tick rate. This just severely limits it's use cases making it too niche to see widespread general use.

I will note though, that imo Crit Surge would completely fall off this list and join power surge if Storm Calling didn't have Streak + hurricane specifically. Netch is just better and the rest of the animal companions line is better overall as well outside of streak (although wings gives streak a run for its money in terms of mobility) and hurricane for easy access to a decent armor buff in a line that also gives damage (something will no longer be unique to storm calling next patch with the refresh to earthen heart).

Just want to clarify that Skeletal Mage is NOT a DOT it's Direct Damage.

Which is darkly amusing because it got nerfed to DOT standards back in The Missing Deeps patch on the mistaken assumption by the devs that it was a DOT. That also means that it did not benefit from its own class passives buffing DOTs, which was just a wild thing to behold.

Like stronghold Orcs, we Necro appreciators remember the many slights that we have endured over the long years.