Replies: 3

Hi all, most of you won’t remember me but I used to be a regular here on TF. I’ve returned to the game for One Tamriel and spent the last few weeks building and theorycrafting this build. It’s nothing especially unique, but it is much different than the “meta” and I really enjoy how it performs in Cryodiil. It *is* competitive with meta builds assuming you can play well, contrary to what people will tell you on the main forums (“use HA + procs or bust derp”).

Stats in the screenshot below are at CP345 with purple quality weapons, enchants, non-optimal traits, and a mix of blue/purple gear, rally buffed without weapon enchant proc’d and not in stealth. Yes I am terribly poor feel free to make fun of me. You should hit around 4k weapon damage and ~39-40k stamina (~27k health in Cyrodiil) at CP561 while your weapon damage enchant is proc’d and you have gold weapons + gold enchants.

GOALS

• Medium armor DW/2h build with enough health to avoid getting 1-rounded by proc setups.
• Burst to kill people quickly without having to make it a sustained fight.
• Not relying on cheesy 1-shot mechanics or RNG procs, just b/c I like fighting people not just instantly killing them.
• Still usable for PVE without being *too* bad, because I don’t have the cash to drop on multiple setups.

RACE

1. Redguard - Simply great for sustain and max stamina. This is my personal top choice.
2. Imperial - Always a good choice for this type of build because of the huge amount of max stats. You’ll have ~3k more health than other races and red diamond can add up over the course of a fight.
3. Wood Elf – Stealthy passive is always welcome, and disease/poison resists are nice against procs and nightblades/DKs. More stamina regen, but this build doesn’t take much advantage of that. This is a somewhat distant 3rd place for me.

GEAR

5(m)/1/1 to maximize stam and health pools.

5x Hunding’s Rage

3 Impen armor and 2 sharpened 1h weapons (weapon damage + crushing enchants). Armor pieces will be Legs, Gloves, and Boots. Swords or Maces would probably be best in PVP, but I am using Daggers because I will be using this hunding’s gear for PVE and the 10% crit is massive there. This set is easy to attain (especially the sharpened weapons compared to farming sharpened weapons of other sets) and gives solid consistent damage.

Alternates for Hunding’s:

• Clever Alchemist - On demand burst in exchange for lower average damage. I like to fight out in the open and wouldn’t want 30 seconds of poor damage out of every 45, but to each his own.
• Draugr Hulk – Stack that stamina to extreme levels and doesn’t add the somewhat-less valuable in pvp crit chance that Hundings does. This set will likely result in higher damage output in PVP than hundings. I am working on farming it now and will probably switch out.
• Bone Pirate’s Tatters – Since you are required to use drinks, this set represents a tremendous increase in stamina/magicka sustain (well over 2800 stam regen on a wood elf). I’d only use this if you are bad at weaving light attacks with Siphoning Attacks.
• Black Rose – if you want to swap to heavy armor this is probably the set.

5x Armor of the Trainee

3 jewelery Robust (all weapon damage enchants), 1 Reinforced Heavy chest from the quest reward (Gallant Chain of the Trainee), 1 Light belt. Yes I do realize you give up 2 Impen for less than ideal traits, but the Reinforced heavy chest at least gives some nice armor. The Trainee set is extremely strong in raw stat points and in situations where you need to add health to your build through stat points or Healthy jewelery, such as PVP and vMA, this set comes out close to even on damage with other high-damage sets while giving great stat pools. The stamina and health synergize very well with Redguard and Imperial passives, and the extra magicka is valuable for PVP.

1x Kra’gh

Amazing 1-piece set bonus, almost as much as a sharpened weapon. You can get around ~15k armor pen with Fracture, Sharpened, Kra’gh, and some CPs.

1x Kena or Velidreth

Again, more damage from a 1-set bonus. Alternately you could run 2x Selene’s or 2x Velidreth and get better performance, but I enjoy killing people without procs.

SKILLS

DW (front) bar

This is the bar that we do most of our fighting on while out of stealth.

• Surprise Attack – Simply can’t be beat for spammable DPS with fracture and shadow barrier. Also gives more health.
• Resolving Vigor – I like to keep this on the front bar so I can keep it up pre-emptively when I feel enemy burst is coming. If you’re braver than me, swap cloak here and put Vigor on the 2h bar.
• Ambush – Empower, gap closer, extra health, simple choice.
• Mass Hysteria – Maim and Fear, plus procs shadow barrier and gives more health. Again simple choice.
• Relentless Focus – I use this ability for finishing burst against tanky opponents when combined with Empower and Incapacitating Strike. You *must* religiously weave your light attacks to take full effect of this ability. I have crit players for 18k with this ability in PVP with optimal circumstances! I feel this ability is necessary when we aren’t running procs to depend on for burst.
• Incapacitating Strike – Very cheap, big burst, heal reduction. There is simply no other choice.

2H (stealth) bar

I run a Defending Hunding’s 2her on this bar. Stay on this bar while traveling, while in stealth, or when you need to flee a battle – it has almost everything you need to survive aside from Vigor which could be swapped if desired. I regularly swap out some of these abilities for – Piercing Mark, Rearming Trap, Razor Caltrops – as needed.

• Shadowy Disguise – I mostly use cloak for escaping or juking people in Xv1 situations.
• Radiant Magelight – Reduce stealth attacks while on travel bar, hunt and reveal other stealthers, proc Might of the Guild for opener burst! Wonderful ability.
• Siphoning Attacks – This build has next to zero natural magicka and stamina regen – weaving light attacks with Siphon is essential to sustain
• Double Take or Shuffle – Dodge chance makes us more tanky and can really save your butt when it avoids ultimates and the like. I prefer Double Take because of the speed boost that costs Magicka and having an Assassination ability on this bar. It’s also great for getting around fast while stealthed/invis
• Rally – Burst heals are IMO absolutely required with the kind of burst people are pulling off with procs. Even with bad weapon damage on the back bar (no 5piece hunding) the burst heal still crits for 8-10k. This also allows us to use different potions than the brutality/weapon crit potion.
• Meteor, Soul Tether or Dawnbreaker – AOE ultimate for outnumbered situations. I usually slot Soul Tether.

Food/Mundus/Potions/CHampion Points/etc

There are some decisions I’ll leave to you. I tend to run Stam/Health food and Warrior mundus in PVP. There are lots of viable potions – Immovable, tri-stat, mending, etc. I carry a handful of each and use them as needed.
I am also a Vampire because I love dark stalker, but I would like to see the results of going Werewolf and using WW ultimate on back bar – could be fun.

• This topic was modified 3 hours, 14 minutes ago by  Kutsuu.