...and they are starting to burn a hole in my pocket. But not as big as the hole would make if I choose badly and am forced to respec.

I'm Level 42.

My main loadout looks like this -

1) Ransack - Sword and Shield weapon line - uses stamina

When tanking , it acts as my taunt, but it also debuffs your opponent's armour while buffing your own. The downside, it only does about 2/3 as much damage as the stamina cost of the skill, so spamming it as an offense is wasting resources.

2) Honour The Dead - Restoring Light instant cast heal - uses magika

nuff said

3) Absorb Magic - Sword and Shield weapon line - uses stamina

highly situational, but can help me out on health if i'm running low on magicka but have plenty of stamina, and am facing a caster. Since the buff lasts 30 seconds, I put it on myself before pulling a big group.

4) Vampire's Bane - Dawn's Wrath line - uses magicka

ranged damage over time fireball, does more damage than it costs in magicka which is nice since all 3 of my stats are under pressure given my class and role. It also slows enemies and can be used for kiting, though as a melee, I don't often want to kite.

5) Repentance - class skill

On defeat heal for stamina/health.

I've got all 3 regens at or near softcap, health is approaching 1900, stamina and magika and armour a bit over 1000.

I'm set up for sustainability and outlasting opponents, it astonishes me how fast my peers are able to kill and aoe in comparison.

With a mind to the Mannimarco and Molag Bal fights coming up, is there anything I should add? I look at various options, but they all seem to use more magika and stamina than actual damage done. I'm worried about squandering my stamina or magicka. Then again, some fights require you to burst dps and take care of a difficult mob to become manageable.

Hmm options ..

1. Burst DPS with Knockback - like puncturing strikes or whatever.

Drawbacks - could get mistaken for a BOT. How often, really , do I want a knockback? I'm a tank. Someone wants to melee me that's fine. A long lasting mezz or CC on a caster would help me more..

2. Burst DPS...

3. Root skill, like trapping webs?

4. Upgrade Blood Altar

drawback is it heals with a worse health/magika ratio than my class skill Honour the Dead, and forces you to stay in one place to benefit, and is not insta cast.

5. Silver Bolts

Been trying this out on my low level sorcerer alt, it's a lot of fun. In general, no better than spamming shield attack, but against Daedra.. and the main story quest has us mainly fighting daedra. If I upgrade my fighter's guild passives, I can maybe get better ratio on cost vs damage.

6. Fear

I already have such a skill, turn undead. The problem is, as a melee, I want them to come to me mostly, yes it can interrupt bunched casters all casting together but that is a rare occurance, so I don't slot it.


My skill costs all have a rather low return on heal/damage vs magicka/stamina cost. I guess that's because I put most points into health, and because I have only a 1 handed weapon