A high burst damage melee based build with survivability and stealth revolving around Criticals, Bleed healing and rooting.CURRENTLY PENDING COMPLETE RE-WRITE SO LINKS MAY NOT WORK!---> Skill point distribution as requested <---Skills on Hotbar;
Critical Surge: critical damage healing as well as a damage boost, everyones friend except the guy you just stabbed, he didn't like it much, now works with all our damage though a much smaller amount, but more stable amount of healing.
UPDATE
Blinding Flurry Bloodthirst: great damage and the new heal at the end means more survival in combat and since it hits faster, less chances of being interrupted in combat by petty things like stuns or range.
Vigor: Part of how we will be healing ourselves over a long fight, it's not exactly Blood Carve, but it keeps us alive much better than Carve ever did and doesn't cost to much stamina so we can use it multiple times.
Bound Armaments:
Grants 11% bonus heavy attack damage and 8% max stamina (Rank IV) which can be very useful for initiating hard damage but unfortunately i would more likely recommend this one for the PvE side of The Dark Reapers way since you would be throwing away one of our only ranged hits unless you use a bow on your other bar, even though i myself use this one for PvP, the heavy attacks from stealth and bloodthirst can hit really hard
Updated
Invigorating Drain:it Restores our health by 10% of our missing health every second, it also can be used multiple times in combat on the same target which gives us a reliable control as well as generating that much needed ultimate.
Devouring Swarm: Our true Vampire damage dealing skill, the bat swarm, more specifically Devouring Swarm, allows us to deal huge Area damage, heal ourselves and is repetitively cheap on ultimate cost, giving us a great choice for our work.
NEW
Bow Skill Bar
This part isn't fully required but i found that a bow was needed at times, but an extra set of daggers also worked in a pinch, but the bows range served me better.
Venom Injection for burning down foes with poison damage, Focused aim for hitting them hard and from afar while lowering their armour, Vigor because the healing is still useful even to a ranged user, Elusive Mist so we can switch to this bar and retreat if needed while lowering incoming damage and moving faster, Bound Armaments so we dont lose the buff while weapon switching, Soul Assault since it does great damage and slows them meaning more chance for us to catch up to them or land further arrows on them.
Important Skill Notes;
Vampirism is a must: the passive [Dark Stalker] is a core part of how we will be initiating fights as well as moving around, we also need the [Supernatural Recovery] to enhance ourselves in mind and body (stam and health regeneration), [Unnatural Resistance] and [Undeath] are handy but not required as both are mediocre passives.
If it's not Medium it's not worth it: Medium armour is a must, it enhances our stamina in many ways and allows us to stealth better which is part of our core.
Racial Awareness: some races are better then others for the path of the Dark Reaper, the furry Khajiit have a better affinity for the way we work, but it's not required, i myself am an Altmeri
Legerdemain's Improved Hiding Passive ;
This passive is very useful for us due to our nature of relying on stealth and can be quite taxing on Stamina so with this we can sneak around for a much longer time without using up so much energy we should be saving for the next strike.
Champion Points Priorities:
best thing for us is physical damage increase, damage over time increase, damage resistances from red stars of your choice (i go half physical and magical) and a decent amount of stamina regen and cost stars with a tiny bit of dodge roll.
Vital Gear Bonuses For Success;
4 parts of the Ashen Grip set: this just gives us more damage to be able to deal deadlier strikes in combat.
Updated
5 parts of the Hundings Rage Set: Since shields are no longer a threat any more a flat damage increase was needed and what better way than a crafted set?
Update
Two Daggers with the Sharpened Trait: this will boost our damage a huge amount, well worth the investment.
Jewelery: Of Agility for the 3 piece set since it gives us that much needed bonus damage, not much else to add on this since it's straight forward and comes in 2 rings + and amulet.
Bonus tip regarding sets: Make 5 parts Shield breaker and 4 Ashen Grip parts (2 daggers 2 other armor pieces), this allows you to setup hotbar 2 for a Bow without losing to much of the set bonuses.
NEW
Poisons: with the new addition of poisons in this update it was worth noting that one of the more handy poison combo's you can use for PvP are ones that combine Snares, Magicka cost and increased damage intake while for PvE the best poisons for us to use is one that steals the enemies vitality and causes damage over time.
Though you will need a bit of initiative little vampires and work the combo's out for yourself
General Rule of Combat;
Updated
Basic Combat: Stealth, get behind, Stab with a heavy blow, Bloodthirst them down one by one, Vigor when they try resist and Drain them when we start to get below 50% health or need to stun them/slow their retreat.
Boss Fighting: this is where things can get tricky, some enemies cannot be Restrained, [Invigorating Drain] from our vampire background will save us in needed times of self healing for those fights where we cannot restrain them (gargoyles are great at this) we can use our [BloodCraze] and [Bound Armaments] allows us to take the extra beating and still whittle them down. sadly some enemies don't get held down, unfortunately there is no work around for this so you will have to use your own wit for this one.
Dark Reaper End Notes;
This is the play style i'v used from Veteran rank 1 to Veteran Rank 16 and i have had very little problems managing it it is a solid and reliable build that even functions well in Cyrodiil against those who would laugh at us.
Thanks for reading and hope this helps anyone out there
oh and side note, this is not a copy of a build, this is something i'v come up with purely through game play, apparently this is a build some would call "Storm Reaver" but i can assure you i'v not looked up any builds, no fun in copying people in my opinion, learn from trial and error so if you feel the build is missing something, adapt and share
PLEASE REPLY TO ME WITH @dsalter otherwise i'm likely to miss the reply if its not my own thread
EU - [Arch Mage Dave] Altmer Sorcerer
Fight back at the crates and boxes, together we can change things.