[PTS] Sorc feedback

[lumpi33]

Alright, so I have taken a closer look to the sorc on PTS.

Sorc gear build - Nothing special, same as on live.
* 5 SOV (15% crit damage bonus), 4 triumphant with the ring (tough debuff, int buff). This gives close to capped int with potion and I don't need Endless Knowledge, so I have an additional slot for a goody tactic.
* Fortress staff on PTS (don't have a Bloodlord available there)
* 230 magic damage bonus (this can get higher probably, but I have chosen this value to compare it with BW on PTS and live where I have a BW)

Sorc build - I was focusing on maximum burst.
* Mid tree (Calmity): I took all stuff up to 13. Great tactics and abilities I will explain later
* Left tree (Agony): I took Impending Doom. It's a nice instant and the points in Agony give me better Frozen Touch and Gloomburst.
* Tactics: Shadow of Disaster (MUST HAVE, debuffs spirit damage), Vision of Domination (stronger WOP), Chilling Gusts (I like it since it procs of Chillwind and Ice Spikes which I'm gonna use a lot), the last tactic is personal preference. Id take Infernal Gift since it gives the group (not me) 10% damage boost. Doesn't increase my damage but the damage of the others.

The rotation - I don't have a sorc on live so I was trying around to get the highest burst.
* To me the best is to stack AOE first then start with single target rotation.
* You want to surprise the target with the burst so you start with stuff that stacks up but isn't moving the health bar a lot.
* In the beginning you want to cast Gloom of Night (1.5s), Ice Spikes (instant) and Infernal Wave (instant) (all AOE to trigger procs, weaken them a bit and have ticking damage on them). You can also start with Chillwind to have the debuff already and Obsessive Focus if you have it up, but then you should do the AOEs.
* After that start your single target rotation with Vision of Torment, Word of Pain, Chillwind. Chillwind last because VoT and WoP anyway need time to hit and then you still have the debuff for the follow up. Or you have Chillwind still up because you opened with it.
* If you have Absorb Vitality up, then throw it in.
* Follow up with Gloomburst, Hand of Ruin to hit them on the timestamp of VoT and WoP.
* After that you basically start over with the AOE again to build up pressure before the single target rotation.

So basically, stack up, burst, stack up, burst, stack up ... It plays nicely. I like it. Regarding the rotation it is I think the same as on live.

So what is actually new?
* Absorb Vitality: Damage increased from 5 * (161 + 0.3*DB) to (191 + 0.9*DB) Corporeal Damage.
If you have 230 damage bonus which is pretty standard in BIS gear then it increased from 161+69 to 191+209. I was able to get 620 crits with 100 power and it ticks 5 times so it is worth taking. It's a pretty decent buff. It scales better with magic damage bonus now. Cooldown of 20s though.
* Hand of Ruin: Damage per interval changed from (448 + 1.0*DB) to (262 + 2.0*DB).
This is a slight buff as well. 448+230 old, 262 + 460 new. It scales better with magic damage bonus now.
* Gloom of Night: Cast time reduced from 2.0 to 1.5 seconds.
This is a slight buff as well. Easier to apply it now on opening.
* Obsessive Focus: Duration reduced to 15 seconds. No longer reduces damage to other targets. Damage increase reduced from 10% to 5%, but Obsessive Focus now additionally reduces your chance to be disrupted by the target by 10%.
Without tactic this is a slight damage nerf from 10% to 5% but you gained 10% less disrupts with it. With tactic it is 10% damage bonus again and 40s reduced cooldown, so it can be used every 20s. It would be an option to replace the 4th tactic I have used (Infernal Gift) with this one.
* Daemonic Chill: Reworked to: Enchantment. 30 AP. Self. Instant. 30s CD. - Everyone in your group that is within 100 feet of you is surrounded by a demonic chill for 1 hour, giving them a 25% chance to reduce the auto attack damage of the attacker by 10% for 3 seconds when they are struck by a melee attack.
This is instead of the old damage back buff. Slight survivability buff.
* Shroud of Darkness: Now additionally increases your chance to disrupt attacks by 10%.
Basically a survivability buff.
* Dhar Wind: Damage with 91-100 Dark Magic increased from 750 to 900.
Not many use it because it drops your power. But it got a damage buff.
* Shades of Death: Reworked to: Curse. 30 AP. 100 ft range. Instant. 10s CD. Your target is haunted by spectres of death and doom for up to 10 seconds, causing an additional 199 Spirit damage each time that they are hit by any group member. Cannot occur more than once every half second
Hard to test without people but I think it is not worth getting. No points for it.
* Shadow Knives: Damage increased from (299 + 0.75*DB) to (299 + 1.0*DB)
Didn't test it but it is obviously a bit of a buff. A buff of the AOE tree.
* Disastrous Cascade: Damage changed from (225 + 0.67*DB) to (187 + 1.0*DB)
Another buff of the AOE tree. Didn't test.

Conclusion:
* I think rotation wise it plays pretty nicely with the 3 AOEs and the strong single target rotation. In scenarios for example where people are usually close you hit a lot of them with your AOEs, also making Chilling Gust proc of your Ice Spikes.
* I think with the Infernal Gift tactic (10% damage for group proc), the Frozen Touch and Demonic Chill it offers VERY decent group utility.
* They have a baseline disarm and a baseline silence. That's pretty huge, not only to reduce incoming damage but also to finish healers by preventing them to cast.
* Their Shroud of Darkness now gives them not only 360 resistances to all but also 10% increased disrupt. That is also pretty good.
* Sorcs have no cooldown on Ice Spikes, so they can use it to pump their power and it is good in between because it procs Chilling Gust.
* Their dps is around 800-1200 on the training construct. With Bloodlord and optimized builds I think 1300 and 10k 3s burst are possible.

What's weird for me and needs more work:
* The issue with the high disrupt rates haven't really been fixed. Especially vs healers. They got -10% disrupt on the Obsessive Focus now but without tactic that's on a very long cooldown. They would need something like the Withering Heat of the Magus, where the opening cast already reduces the disrupt by -5%. Something like that. The high disrupts are not really a sorc class problem. It's the wild willpower contribution to disrupts and the cheap Deft Defender. There is the real problem.
* The sorcs are balanced with 100 power in mind. They have to run 100 power to get to the damage of other rdps classes. By doing so they constantly hit themselves with 750 backlashes. This is weird. Sure they can do good burst but other classes can do that too these days without having that backlashes.
* The sorc is still having VERY bad escapes. Other rdps either has better escapes like SW/SH or they are tankier like Magus/Engi. That doesn't add up with the backlashes on top.

Overall I like how they play. Only the disrupt thing needs to be fixed, like really. Then they are probably fine. It's more of a Magus/Engi being overtuned on PTS than sorc being bad.

Here is one of my best attempts on the dummy:
https://ibb.co/BHpzr59w

[Bozzax]

Why do you feedback on classes you don’t play? Or at least use Bomblings thread to keep stuff in the same thread

[iagdtod]

Agree on adding this to bombling's thread. And can't help but comment (I play sorc) that your rotation is a bit unusual as in rvr rotation tends to split ae or st, in fighting there's usually not time to do three gcds of ae and then start an st rotation. If you're ae'ing then you keep doing that and if you are st'ng a target then you try to get the timestamp done. And it depends if you start at 100 or not, you often don't because ice spiking keeps you dismounted and vulnerable to wb moving or to being caught out if small group or solo (I don't do scs on my sorc so maybe it works there?). If you aren't at 100 you would often start with impending doom to build dark magic. But thanks for the testing.

[lumpi33]

Why do you feedback on classes you don’t play? Or at least use Bomblings thread to keep stuff in the same thread

It's about comparing pairs. I have a lot of 80+ so I think I'm able to figure things out fast and I'm able to see the differences between the two sides. People should do that as well. It is wrong to play only one side without having seen the other. How else do you wanna keep the sides in balance?

[lumpi33]

Agree on adding this to bombling's thread. And can't help but comment (I play sorc) that your rotation is a bit unusual as in rvr rotation tends to split ae or st, in fighting there's usually not time to do three gcds of ae and then start an st rotation. If you're ae'ing then you keep doing that and if you are st'ng a target then you try to get the timestamp done. And it depends if you start at 100 or not, you often don't because ice spiking keeps you dismounted and vulnerable to wb moving or to being caught out if small group or solo (I don't do scs on my sorc so maybe it works there?). If you aren't at 100 you would often start with impending doom to build dark magic. But thanks for the testing.

I disagree. I've seen Astroice doing it a lot on stream. You might not be wrong, but I am neither.

btw: if you have a better build then explain it to us and show some numbers.

[Bozzax]

Agree on adding this to bombling's thread. And can't help but comment (I play sorc) that your rotation is a bit unusual as in rvr rotation tends to split ae or st, in fighting there's usually not time to do three gcds of ae and then start an st rotation. If you're ae'ing then you keep doing that and if you are st'ng a target then you try to get the timestamp done. And it depends if you start at 100 or not, you often don't because ice spiking keeps you dismounted and vulnerable to wb moving or to being caught out if small group or solo (I don't do scs on my sorc so maybe it works there?). If you aren't at 100 you would often start with impending doom to build dark magic. But thanks for the testing.

I disagree. I've seen Astroice doing it a lot on stream. You might not be wrong, but I am neither.

btw: if you have a better build then explain it to us and show some numbers.

Any build ST or AOE wo SoH … if this gets pushed will be a fail

- Sleight of Hand: Reworked to: Reduce all your cooldowns by 2 seconds.

You won’t be taking IG ever and so on

[OceanSoul]

Dude, i don't wanna be rude, but plinking constructs is not a good proxy to what class feels like to play. The gameplay has stayed pretty much the same, so go on production servers and try it yourself against real ppl, thats all i could say.

Glad you having a blast killing dummies tho.

[lumpi33]

Please explain why 2s reduced cooldown is better than 10% damage bonus for the group.

[lumpi33]

Dude, i don't wanna be rude, but plinking constructs is not a good proxy to what class feels like to play. The gameplay has stayed pretty much the same, so go on production servers and try it yourself against real ppl, thats all i could say.

Glad you having a blast killing dummies tho.

That is actually pretty rude. I'm testing out things on the PTS and giving feedback. Your comment contributes nothing and was unnecessary.

[Bozzax]

Go watch bombs vid he explains it

What is not mentioned is that it will 100% mandatory for group, or solo (yes i do that as well both bw and sorc)

IG is +10% for one dps and 2 tanks , a net loss for you the main damage dealer….. there are better choices

1/3/2 group IG is reasonable