ESO: Update 32 Deadlands brings 4 major combat changes

The new update 32 Deadlands of the MMORPG The Elder Scrolls Online will be released on November 1st, 2021. The big topics are proc set balance, a hard cap for critical damage and the further hybridization of equipment sets, which was already started in the previous update.

There are many changes in the next update, which mainly affect the endgame. Raid groups will have to make changes to their group setup after the release. Here you can find out in advance what you have to be prepared for.

ESO gets a 125% hard cap for critical damage

Due to the amount of equipment sets that have been added in recent years, the potential value for critical damage has increased significantly. So that other status values ​​gain more importance again, the developers have decided to introduce a hard cap of 125% for critical damage.

This mainly has an impact on the PvE endgame content. In the trials, some sets or skills have been used within the group that increase critical damage in some way. With a hard cap, some of the buffs and debuffs obtained so far become superfluous.

So there will be a major meta change with regard to raid groups and the composition of equipment will look significantly different than before.

This eliminates some slots for sets, buffs, champion points or skills. These are replaced by other groups by the groups in order to increase the group damage.

Hybridization of all item sets

Hybridization refers to the attributes of stamina and magicka. All sets in the game will be adapted to the following rules:

• Sets that grant magic OR weapon power will grant both in the future.
• Sets that grant physical penetration OR magic penetration will grant both in the future.
• Sets that grant critical magic OR weapon hits will grant both in the future.

The idea behind this is that the players have a more free choice of equipment according to the principle of “play the way you want”.

Proc sets will be able to hit again critically

More precisely, sets that scale with magic & weapon damage, maximum stamina and maximum magicka can hit critically again. Item sets that scale differently (e.g. cumulatively) will not be able to hit critically. The scaling of the sets, which can hit again critically, is also reduced by approx. 5%.

Burst sets get a global cooldown

Item sets that cause burst damage within 4 seconds get a global cooldown of 1 second. This means that sets whose burst damage works in the same way cannot be activated at the same time.

If a player wears several sets with this functionality in the future, the set created first will be triggered first. Another effect of this kind can only be triggered after 1 second. The only sets that are not affected are sets with counter chance, with 1 second cooldowns or no cooldowns. This change could be particularly noticeable in small scale PvP. That means in player fights of smaller groups, battlefields or duels.

The so-called gank builds will mainly be affected. These are builds that aim to cause massive (Proc) damage in the shortest possible time, so that it appears as if an opposing player is defeated with one blow. In the review of death, however, various damage effects can be seen.

Other minor changes with greater impact

Furthermore, smaller screws will be turned in the next update. Sometimes with great effects for certain combat situations.

The Mist figure of the vampire will only have a damage-reducing effect in the future when other players are attacked. With this, the development team is taking targeted action against the use of this damage-negating ability for many situations in PvE content.

Here’s the developers’ comment:

“This skill has become increasingly popular as an all-in-one solution to many different challenges in PvE that were actually intended to require players to strategize. This made a lot of situations completely trivial or sometimes it gave the impression that one would inevitably have to be a vampire in order to be able to cope with certain content. “Misty figure” is actually meant to escape from battles. The previous version allows it too easily to remain steadfast in PvE or to become invincible. Therefore, in the future we will limit the damage reduction to PvP in order to continue to offer this possibility, but at the same time make it impossible to use it as a defensive tool in PvE. “

This will have a big impact on the latest raid content. The ability has so far been increasingly used in the latest Raid Rockgrove. Healers, DDs and tanks are currently using it with the 2nd Boss Bahsei to defy the massive damage of the boss or his mechanics.

With the change of this ability, the use in PvE becomes unusable. Many raid groups will be forced to adapt their builds on this point as well.