Replies: 41
[spoiler title = "Change Log"]
10/8/16 – Updated for One Tamriel DLC
10/9/16 – Updated monster set section
10/27/16 – Updated Mundus and Jewelry sections
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Intro: This guide is intended to help you and your Magplar clear vMA as efficiently as possible – this guide is not meant to be of any use to you in getting through other trials or dungeons, for that, I would recommend you go here. This guide is a collection of my experiences in vMA which have allowed me to obtain 500k+ scores, and I’m confident that with my set up and some practice, you too can push for competitive times.
Shout-outs: I would like to thank @Dethier for his help in getting me set up for vMA, his videos (here and here) and advice were a huge help; @Nifty2g who’s guide has been a great resource for helping me figuring out the inner workings of all things magplar; @GeoGeronimo who has helped me by comparing notes during our forays into vMA; and of course the fine folk at Requiem and From the Dust who have allowed me to raid with them and grow as a player.
CHARACTER SHEET
[img]https://s12.postimg.org/bljmqnegd/Yolo_Superstar.png[/img]
Race: I rolled a Breton for the sustain and because I’ve had aspirations of healing on this toon as well. For more dps, however, Altmer is a better choice, and Dunmer is good as well.
Attribute Points: All into Magicka.
Mundus Stone: Thief – to increase your damage output. If you are running Twice Born Star, be sure to grab the Shadow as well.
Champion Points
Warrior: Everyone has their preferences, but you will want the majority of your points into Elemental Defender and Hardy, and maybe some into Thick Skinned and Quick Recovery as well.
Thief: Max out cost reduction, then put the rest into recovery.
Mage: I currently run 81 Elemental Expert, 81 Thaumaturge, 22 Elfborn, and 3 Spell Erosion. This may vary for you depending on your gear and setup, so I encourage you to check out Asayre’s website and do your own dps test to find your optimal distribution.
Gear
Run 5 Light/1/1 to take advantage of Undaunted Mettle. Use Divines on everything with max Magicka enchants. Make sure that your armor is at least purple quality, and if you can afford it, gold your sets out.
Head & Shoulders – Grothdarr. Max Magicka and a sick AoE, yes please! If you don’t have this set yet in divines, Skoria is good too, as it provides a decent damage proc and some welcome extra health. NOTE: You will want to swap this out during the Stage 7 boss encounter, as I found out the hard way. . . Be sure to have Skoria or some other contingency plan ready for that one round – if you don’t have it yet, I would recommend the addon Dressing Room for quick one-button gear & skill swapping.
Jewelry – Infallible Aether with Spell Power enchants. But if you haven’t farmed that yet, Moondancer or Willpower will do fine, just make sure to enchant them with Spell Power. For a great thread discussing the differences between all these jewelry sets, go here. Note: If you are having sustain issues, you can enchant a piece of jewelry or two with a Reduced Cost glyph instead. As @DavidTheNomad has pointed out to me, this is preferable to swapping in the Atronach Mundus stone.
Other 5 Pieces – Julianos is what I use, although if you are new to the arena, 5 Seducers will be helpful to you as you may need the assistance in keeping your magicka up. As you get more comfortable and push for increasingly competitive scores, you will want to move away from sustain set ups and look to push more damage. TBS offers slightly less dps but an extra 1k Health, so it is a viable choice as well, just make sure you also grab the Shadow Mundus.
Weapons: 2 Torug’s Pact Swords (sharpened) and vMA Inferno Staff (sharpened). If you don’t have a vMA staff, then any random inferno staff will do as long as it’s sharpened. You get the greatest return on investment by upgrading your weapons to gold, as opposed to any other piece of armor. So even if you’re cheap, GOLD OUT THOSE WEAPONS!!! If you then have the funds left over, upgrade your armor as well.
Food: Blue Health and Magicka.
Potions: Essence of Spell Power. Ideally you want to have these on cooldown and be 3/3 in Medicinal Use so that you have constant uptime on your spell damage bonus. For me, this is the greatest cost in running vMA, I burn through about 60 or more of these per run.
Skills
[img]https://s14.postimg.org/k1xopmyk1/Yolo_Skills.png[/img]
Bar 1 (DW): Puncturing Sweep | Harness Magicka | Radiant Oppression | Inner Light | Repentance Ultimate: Shooting Star
Bar 2 (Staff): Elemental Blockade | Channeled Focus | Flex | Inner Light | Honor the Dead Ultimate: Shooting Star
Rule #1: Keep Channeled Focus down at all times. Sustaining resources is challenging on Magplar as it is, but this skill will certainly help with that. Additionally, the Major Resolve and Major Ward buffs are really nice and help out a lot during various trash pulls when the incoming damage is pretty high. You don’t have to constantly be standing in your rune, but rather make sure that you are stepping in/recasting at least every 8s.
Once you get comfortable learning where all the spawn points are, I like to drop blockade on portals so that mobs start taking damage right as they spawn. Jabs (Puncturing Sweep) will be your bread and butter for most of your dps and will constitute the majority of your healing as well. I know that a lot of people run staff on their front bar so that they can weave, but I like to DW so that I can maximize my Jabs and Jesus Beams. If I start to run low on Magicka, at the end of a wave I’ll switch to my back bar to get in a heavy attack or two.
I use Honor the Dead sparingly, as it’s more of an oh-shit heal than anything. Really, the majority of your healing will come from your jabbing, and when needed, you can always throw up Harness, although as time goes on and you learn to avoid damage, you won’t need to shield that often. I run Honor the Dead instead of BoL as it’s a cheaper cast, and healing an ally clearly has no use here. If, however, you already have BoL and don’t feel like re-morphing it’s not a big deal.
I have one “flex” spot on my back bar, and that really depends on the stage. For stages 1 – 3, I run Elemental Drain. I really only use this on bosses to make the fights go a bit faster and to help out with my sustain. Starting at Stage 4, I switch over to Toppling Charge. I find this helpful for gap closing/stunning the small adds in Stage 4 before they set up and pop their shield. In Stage 5 it helps out with getting to trolls, and will serve you well in other stages as well, particularly the final boss in Stage 9 when you need to interrupt his channel.
Repentance is a skill that I don’t find too many other Magplars running in vMA, but I really love it. For one, just having it on our front bar (where we spend most of our time) passively helps us recover Magicka, which we very much need. Additionally, although this is a Magicka build, I do find myself using Stamina a good bit as I run from portal to portal, anticipating where adds will spawn to drop my Blockade, and I dodge roll a good bit. With Repentance, I’m always topping off my Stamina in between killing adds, not to mention keeping my Health maxed without having to cast a somewhat costly HtD.
Another fun skill that has been recommended to me by @GeoGeronimo is Eclipse. Throwing this on a ranged add effectively negates that target and you get to watch it kill itself. This can be particularly useful on Stages 5, 7, and 8. I have played around with this skill and like it, unfortunately I just don’t find that I have room for it on my bar, but you might.
I typically don’t bother with Jesus Beams on trash as it’s easiest to just clump everything together, drop Blockade, then AoE everything down with Jabs. I start to execute on bosses around 36 – 38% – if it’s a longer fight, be sure to keep Blockade running as well.
I run Shooting Star on both bars as the Magicka Controller passive helps out a little bit and I like knowing that I can always cast Shooting Star without having to worry about what bar I’m on. I have seen other builds that will use a Nova or Dawnbreaker of Smiting on one of the bars – either of those are probably fine as well, but I have tried them both but keep finding myself coming back to Shooting Star.
That is all, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to reply below. I’m always open to feedback and looking to improve my builds whenever possible.
Happy Gaming,
Duck
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Duckbutta.
