From a magicka vs damage standpoint, is it worth it?

Staggering your opponent is nice, but the stagger is brief.

Going for a non-100% Magicka cost build.

Essentially, one spell dual casted gains 20% damage, costs 80% more. Two spells dual casted gain 40% overall at the cost of 160% more mana, This is almost two more casts of the spell for 20% damage a piece.

Thoughts?

I'm beginning to think it's a waste, it decreases your overall magic DPS. That second hand could be used for a fear spell, or something else that could cause some form of crowd control instead of the stagger.... I'm just not sure, and this would mean starting my character over pretty much.

Someone come up with an argument as to why it's valid. I'm not looking for overpowered stunlocking, that just feels more like a gamebreaking mechanic to me.

Casting a spell from each hand costs twice the magicka and deals twice the damage(duh)
Dual casting will deal 20% more damage then the above but cost 60% more magicka.
The enemy is staggered long enough so that you can stagger them again, if your not going to take impact there is no point in dual casting destruction as the damage bonus isn't worth it. The staggered effect is long enough to hit them with a spell from each hand(non-dual) or stagger them again with another dual cast spell.

Now here's my question... how much cost reduction are you going to go for if not 100%. If you take enough cost reducers that destruction becomes a viable choice for combat then you've taken enough that dual casting and impact are worth it. If you haven't taken enough cost reducers then destruction won't be viable anyway due to the damage vs magicka cost without dual casting.

I plan to have between 60-80% reduction.

You'll probably end up wanting it, crowd control with illusion spells will end up requiring dual casting anyway to overcome the spells various level limits. And if you think stunlocking with destruction is gamebreaking.... illusion is more so except when dealing with a single foe.

As for cost reduction remember the perks don't stack with items. Say your wearing three items of fortify destruction 25% for a total of 75% reduction. The perks will reduce the remaining cost by 50%. My advice is put it off for a while until your cost reducers are in a comfort zone then save your game and try the perk out and see how you like it. If you don't revert to a previous save.

I wouldn't worry about it. Just use the restoration glitch and get your enchanted armor ridiculously high so you never run out of magicka. I can cast all day and not run out! With that in mind, I don't have to duel cast and just cast off of one hand and conjuration a dremora lord on the other. "A challenger is near" all day!

You didn't pay much attention to his original post did you? he doesn't want a cheap 0% cost build.

That settles it then doesn't it.

I had opinion about dual casting and cost efficiency a lot like yours yesterday but I changed my mind today. I noticed that it is fairly easy to control your attacks so you do not attack with dualcast even when you have the dualcast perk. You do this by pressing one mouse button slightly after the other, instead at same time. So you can use dualcast when you need it and have magicka and need impact, or use 2x single cast when you are worried about cost efficiency. Having the ability to do 20% extra damage when you want is nice. It's a pretty big deal. And having this choice of cost efficiency vs. damage + impact makes the game more fun and less one dimensional.

About using second hand for something else. The way I play, when I need conjuration, I quickly switch out one hand to cast and go back to dual wielding whatever destruction I'm using. And when I need healing, I change both hands to restoration. I have not tried mixing illusion with destruction much yet.