Aedric Warrior (Magicka Build Templar DD)

Replies: 130

Last updated: 12-05-15

[spoiler title="Changes"]17-04-15 Spell cost reduction on all jewellery for sustainability.

17-04-15 Slight changes to gear (same overall bonuses).

20-04-15 Added ranged bar.

20-04-15 Explosive Charge slotted on second bar.

01-05-15 Screenshots of FTC readout from Mantikora and Serpent fights.

12-05-15 Valkyn dropped and new gear changes, plus a few skill changes.

21-05-15 Min/maxed gear by swapping some pieces around.[/spoiler]

First off, this build will not put out as much DPS as a stamina Templar (see @Alcast for his stamina build) or the best magicka DKs. My intention for this build is much like other magicka Templars; I’m a healer first and foremost but want an easy swap to a potent damage build for when the situation arises.

Thanks go to @Alcast for constantly theorycrafting with me – hardly a day goes by that we aren’t testing something new. Thanks also to @timidobserver and his Lightbringer thread where we’ve discussed various points, I recommend checking it out: http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/the-lightbringer/.

Character information:

My character is a Breton templar for the increased magicka and reduced magicka cost passives. Other viable options are Dunmer, Imperial and Altmer, though I think Breton is best.

Attribute points:

Aim for 18-20K health (with food/enchants etc). As healer I have 14 points into health and the rest into magicka. Once you have a healthy dose of CP in The Lady defenses you can start reducing your max health and putting more points into magicka. I currently run with 18K health.

Mundus Stone:

There’s been talk of the Shadow stone (increased crit damage) being bugged, but I do see my highest dps with the Shadow. However, the difference between the Shadow and Mage (increase max magicka) is small and I recommend Mage for healer. So for this build I use the Mage mundus.

Champion System:

The Lady – I distribute the points evenly between Thick Skinned, Elemental Defender, Light Armour Focus and Hardy due to the diminished returns.

The Apprentice – 30 points into Elfborn (increase critical damage) to unlock the 12% spell critical passive.

The Ritual – All remaining points are going into Thaumaturge (increase poison, disease and magic damage dealt).

The Lover – 30 points into Arcanist (magicka recovery) to unlock the Synergizer ability (gain ultimate for performing a synergy).

The Tower – All remaining points are going into Magician (reduce magicka cost).

I put no points into elemental expert. The bulk of your damage is from Puncturing Sweep and Radiant Oppression, which are both magic damage, hence the rest of my points going into Thaum.

I’m aware that cost reduction is better than magicka recovery, but the Synergizer ability is great for getting ultimate ready faster.

Gear sets:

Armour

• Head: Twilight’s Embrace (heavy, infused/nirhoned, health enchantment)
• Shoulders: Martial Knowledge (light, divines, magicka enchantment)
• Chest: Twilight’s Embrace (medium, infused/nirhoned, magicka enchantment)
• Hands: Martial Knowledge (light, divines, magicka enchantment)
• Waist: Adroitness (light, well-fitted, magicka enchantment)
• Legs: Martial Knowledge (light, infused, magicka enchantment)
• Feet: Martial Knowledge (light, divines, magicka enchantment)

Note: light, medium and heavy pieces for the full undaunted passive bonus. Nirhoned/Infused depends on whether you want amazing spell resistance or to squeeze out a tiny bit more DPS. I recommend at least 1 piece of Nirhoned. Whether chest or head is heavy/medium doesn’t matter – they are both major pieces. But put the health enchantment on the infused piece if possible.

Jewellery

• Necklace: Adroitness (spell cost reduction)
• Ring 1: Cyrodiil’s Light (spell cost reduction)
• Ring 2: Cyrodiil’s Light (spell cost reduction)

Weapons

• Bar 1: Sword of Twilight’s Embrace X2 (poison damage and absorb magicka, currently both precise – nirhoned perhaps better)
• Bar 2: Inferno Staff of Twilight’s Embrace if ranged (precise, poison damage/absorb magicka – depends on your resource management). Otherwise DW as above or Master 2H Greatsword with infused.

Why Twilight’s Embrace? I dropped Valkyn due to it only adding ~600 DPS. Therefore, with DW I had 4 slots and decided to fill (2 weapons, head and shoulder). With Twilight I get the same spell damage as those using Torug (both give +1 spell damage) I get the health bonus of 1-piece Valkyn, but I’ve traded out the free meteors for increased spell critical. Considering Templars do more damage with critical thanks to Aedric passives, this has trumped my previous sets in recent tests. Screenshots and hopefully videos to follow with latest sets.

Skill Bars:

Bar 1 – Single Target DPS

• Inner light for the 5% increased magicka and Major Prophecy boost.
• Structured entropy for Major Sorcery boost.
• Balance for Mage Guild passive of increased magicka and magicka regeneration – I rarely if ever use this ability.
• Puncturing Sweep is your main DPS skill for single target until enemy is ~25% health.
• Radiant Oppression is your execute skill for when enemy is <25% health. Note: issues have been seen with this skill for some people, see the @timidobserver thread for more information. I recommend using Combat Analytics addon to keep an eye on this skill.
• Shooting Star (DoT) ultimate. Depending on the situation I use Nova instead if damage mitigation is needed. Note: with enough points in Thaum your Nova could be a better option than Meteor – at the minute I have ~23 points in Thaum and Shooting Star still does about 18K more damage overall.

Rotation details: activate Entropy and swap bars to throw Reflective Light as you close the gap, swap bars and drop down a Channeled Focus once in position, swap back to bar 1 then weave light attacks with Puncturing Sweep. Reapply Entropy as needed and rune if you think resources will start lacking, but otherwise keep jabbing until the enemy is ~25% health, then you start executing. I’ve found that other skills are a DPS loss to simply using the sweep, but you can have Vampire’s Bane/Reflective Light or Purifying Light here – the latter I occasionally use as it helps with the healing too.

Tip: If you have all the passives in Mage’s Guild then using Entropy grants you the Empower buff – refresh Entropy before activating Shooting Star for the Empowered Shooting Star.

Bar 2 – AoE DPS

Bar 2 – Ranged DPS

• Inner Light – see above
• Channeled Focus for resource management and armour/spell resistance buffs.
• Reflective Light will give the group Minor Sorcery and hits 3 targets for 8K base damage.
• Blazing Spear is a great AoE attack that the stamina builds/tank will thank you for using.
• Solar Barrage/Pulsar for high AoE damage.
• Crescent Sweep (DoT) is a cheap ultimate you can use if Shooting Star isn’t going to be ready in time. Unsure of whether this is actually a DoT – damage pulses now so could potentially proc Valkyn Skoria.

AoE rotation details: Activate Entropy on bar 1 then swap bars to throw an Empowered Reflective Light onto the group, throw in a Blazing Spear as you continue to close the gap then drop down your rune and spam Solar Barrage/Pulsar. Solar Barrage is stronger, but Pulsar has Minor Mangle for reducing enemy health by 10% instantly. Ensure Entropy is up at all times and refresh Blazing Spear as needed.

Ranged rotation details: Activate Entropy on bar 1 and swap bars to use Empowered Destructive Clench. Throw down your Channeled Focus then weave Force Pulse and medium attacks. Reapply DoTs as needed. Note: your ranged DPS will be much lower than Puncturing Sweep.

Additional note on ultimate: Crescent Sweep will do the same damage as Shooting Star if you normalise to the cost. If you aren’t going to get Shooting Star charged again in time then feel free to use Crescent Sweep.

Screenshots of DPS output with various builds:

1) The Serpent – Sanctum Ophidia: Dual Wield, Valkyn build.

3) The Serpent – Sanctum Ophidia: Luckily I died to a magicka bomb causing my DPS to reset after res to give you an idea of what the DPS is during the execute phase only. Someone asked for a spear (hence there being a blazing spear in here :P) and I kept Vampire’s Bane up for the minor sorcery buff on the group. Entropy of course was kept high. But >20K DPS on The Serpent is nothing to scoff about. Combine this with the first image above and you have an idea of what your final DPS would be – this 20K would certainly drag that 10K overall DPS up.

4) Mantikora – Sanctum Ophidia: Double destruction staff setup (single target bar was precise master inferno staff). I didn’t get a screenshot of the Manti fight with DW, sorry, but the DPS with DW was roughly 11K. Here with double destro I have nearly 13K. DPS from Puncturing Sweep was half as powerful but Vampire’s Bane and Heavy Attacks were better. However, this was an ideal scenario against the Mantikora – i.e. I didn’t have to dodge any green runes, whereas in the DW fight I was targeted a couple of times.

Final remarks: DW is still coming out on top of Destruction Staff. I think I had a lucky run that made me think Destro is better – I was wrong. I’ve dropped Valkyn now as the meteors only add about 600-900 dps, pure spell damage seems to be coming on top – screenshots to follow soon.

• This topic was modified 2 hours, 35 minutes ago by  EgoRush.