How does someone get so powerful in this game?!

Pyr0xyrecuprotite

There is a very big difference between getting to vr16, and actually getting GOOD. As stated earlier, a lot of this is experience, i.e. knowing when to use which skills, knowing how to animation cancel etc, and both maxing out your CPs and allocating them wisely.

Once you get to vr16, you should look at various online sites (e.g. Deltia, Tamriel Foundry) for what theory-crafters have suggested as good builds, i.e. good armor sets and skills lineups for your class and type of player (tank/healer/damage, magicka/stam based, and PvE or PvP). Many of these builds will change after each major game update (DLC), due to the way ZoS tends to change skills or introduce new stuff, from time to time.

Once you have decided on a build suited to your preferred game activities, figure out what you can actually GET, then go out and buy or craft your new armor and weapons (upgraded to at least purple, and with gold enchants). Try to ensure that your shoulder and head pieces are NOT part of your main 5-piece set, so that you can try out (or replace) various 2-piece monster sets (either bought from the Cyrodiil special merchant on weekends, or get shoulder pieces from undaunted chests and hats from the final boss in specific veteran dungeons). Ideally you should have levelled all of your class and most weapon+guild skills by now; if not, work on those, but hopefully you have unlocked all the skills that you need for this build, and all the passives in the corresponding class and weapon/guild skill lines. (If you don't have enough skill points, spend a bit of time going through Cadwell's Silver and gold, and grab all the skyshards in those zones. Also finish all the group and vet dungeons and trials at least once, for their skill point).

Now, practise using your new skills setup. Do a lot of group dungeons in nonvet mode, then veteran dungeons. Get used to moving out of red, get to know the boss mechanics, etc. If you are a PvE damage dealer, install either Foundry Tactical Combat or AUI (Advanced User Interface) addon, to see how much damage you are doing, i.e. your "DPS" or "Damage per second". Go up against the Gargoyle boss in vet Spindleclutch, with a tank holding the boss, and check your average DPS for the fight - the higher the better, and it should be at least 15k. If you prefer PvP, do a lot of that instead. Join guilds which do a lot of your preferred activity type.

Adjust your build, e.g. try a different mundus stone. If you are dying too frequently, put more attribute points into health (generally it is helpful to have at least 20k with food buff, for most vet dungeons). If you are running out of resources, try change your jewelry enchantments, for either reduction in cost or increased recovery. Use tri-pots and blue or purple food. (Level up alchemy and provisioning to unlock any useful passives to extend and enhance your use of potions and food). Try to ensure that you have high spell damage, spell crit and (close to 40k) magicka, if you are magicka/spell-based; or high weapon damage, weapon crit and max stamina if most of your damage comes from stamina-based abilities and weapons. For healers, you want to never run out of magicka, so recovery is important - you also want to have a broad selection of team support skills, that improve their damage done, or magic/stam recovery, in addition to healing and doing some damage too. And remember, if the chosen build isn't working for you, try a different gear and skills build instead. Respec your skills to choose different morphs if necessary. (Note that for vet Maelstrom Arena, you may need a completely different build than you do for other activities).

Finally, start grinding specific activites to try get "Best in Slot" gear. If you are doing Trials, the Maw of Lorkhaj drops some sets that are very useful to the group. Completing Vet Dragonstar Arena gives you a small chance of getting a Masters weapon, which has a great unique enchantment, even if the weapon is only max vr14 at present. Likewise, completing vet Maelstrom Arena (in the Orsinium DLC) can give you a Maelstrom weapon, which has an excellent one-piece bonus. Certain vet dungeons can rarely drop specific special set items, e.g. Spell Power Cure set from vWGT - and you can also get set items from their trophy vaults. Doing a lot of PvP can get you some good PvP-type "Rewards for the Worthy", and the top AP earners in each campaign can get nice set items from end of campaign rewards. Trial leaderboards can give gold reward items. All of these require a lot of practise and grinding though. You may also need to completely redo your armor and weapon sets to include the new set items, so it is an iterative process.

Jazbay_Grape

I've learned a ton about how to improve just from reading these forums. I still suck, but at least I know why I suck.

MarcoPolo

Listen to the advice on here its good advice and tips, my sorc has gone from crystal hitting at around 6k to it hitting around 19k easy cause of all the tips and advice on here

Nogawd

Drink some skooma......

Volkodav

GreenhaloX wrote: »

Thank you for the feedback, Roehamad_Ali and AlnilamE . I see I still have a lot to learn and experiment. With more CPs and allocating it right, and gold armors and weapon, I should be better off. I am understanding the bigger picture of this game.

It will take a lot of time and work,but hang in there and keep at it.You seem to have the desire to do this,so I am sure you will win through and become one of those you mentioned.

CasNation

Please for the love of Azura do NOT make a full set of gold heavy armor until you consult with someone knowledgeable about what you should make...it will save you a lot of money and save the rest of us a death by cringe-factor.

I don't mean to imply you don't know what you are doing, but at least get a second opinion before you make that much of a commitment.

PurifedBladez

You're gonna just have to play man. Suffer through the learning curve that's the way it is. If this is your first mmo the suffer will be real.

Judas Helviaryn

People are never as powerful as you think they are. Edge builds and specialists always sacrifice something to get where they are. Trust me, just because I know my weaknesses doesn't mean you will.

Daishichi

darkstar2084 wrote: »

If you want to be OP, its all about mindset

Nascent
Optimism
Learned
Inquisitive
Fortitudinous
Experienced

This clever gent has the key...and knows enough not to upset these forum regulars by being direct about it.

I've put enough time in to have all the best gear, but I will sometimes need to think for half a second before deciding what the best next move should be, and that's all it takes to get killed by someone who spends every waking hour playing. I'm okay with that; they've earned their skill.

But when I see the level some folks take it to...well, I'm not sure it warrants as much pride as people display. Next time someone teabags your corpse for not scouring the internet for ways to max your crit rate, get your revenge by reading a book, or going on a date.

And hey, if your research leads you to something you can't craft or afford, send me a message and I'll see if I can help.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

This is a combo of CP, Skill, and a basic understanding of a build. Save for Wrothgar, world bosses, dolmens, and public dungeons can be solo'ed by any class with a handful of skills, and you don't even need to be at max level.

CP: CP is huge. It buffs your stats, increases your sustain, increases your mitigation, and increases your damage. If you are at the CP cap, you really dont even need gear in open world conent. Even with low CP, you should be able to handle any solo content at your level.

Skill: people tend to dismiss skill in this game, but it is a huge factor. What might look like 3 or 4 skills to you is probably 3 or 4 weaves with some animation canceling. Some call it an exploit, but like it or not, its part of the game, and it takes skill to do it effectively.

Understanding of your build: Most builds are desinged for skills to play off of one another. For example, I could walk up to a world boss and kill him by spamming whip 10-15 times. Or I could Charge a heavy attack, cast Elemental Blockade for a dot, weave a medium attack and cast engulfing flames for a Debuff and DOT, weave and cast Burning embers for a DOT and a heal, and then spam a whip weave. The latter is going to kill a world boss in 1/3 of the time, and probably only look like I am casting 3-4 skills, and that is just the tip of the iceberg.

If you are interested in some bullet proof soloing bars and basic rotations for any class, let me know and I can try to help.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

GreenhaloX wrote: »

Thank you for the feedback, everyone. I see that CP is where it is at. I'm about at 200 CP.. so, I see, 200 compared to 501 makes a world of different. It's the PvP where I get my butt thrown back at me. I see now I probably went up against those with much more higher CP.

sirrmattus wrote: »

Are you wanting to pvp or pve? Do you have set peice gear or random items? Are you light or medium or heavy armor? Do you have set jewelry? Are you weapons gold? What class are you?

I'm Ebonhart DragonKnight with heavy armors, right now pretty all epic levels. For the past week, I been mining rudebite ore my butts off trying to refine and get enough tamporing alloys to upgrade all my stuff to legendary. I been using two-handed weapon up to reaching V16 and beating the main quest. I since took a liking to the bow, so the bow's been my primary and axe is my back-up. I just finally upgrade my bow to legendary and working on the rest. I'm not really wanting to PvP. It just when I was in Cyrodiil doing quests, I saw one of my pact castle being attacked. So, I went to check what's going on and to lend a hand. That's when I ran into the other pact members and yeah, I got thrashed. Same when doing the lumber quest, I run into the other pact member and thrashed by a Captain ranked. So, I been trying to CP up more before I head back into Cyrodiil. just in case I run into the other powerful pact members and have somewhat of a fighting chance. I'm only about a month into this game and not yet acclimated into the group thing yet. Maybe that would be a good thing to do.

Unless you are actually trying to tank, you need to ditch the heavy armor asap. It does nothing for your damage. If you arent using set pieces, that is step one. I would NOT make anything gold until you are dead set on your build/ It's very pricey and you probably wont notice the difference at first anyway.

My advice for basic crafted gear would be 5 Hundings Rage (Chest, Pants, Belt, Gloves, Shoes) and 3-4 of Nightmothers or Night Silence (Head, Shoulders, Weapons). I suggested these pieces because it makes it easier to insert Monster Sets or VMA weapons down the road. This can be crafted very easily. 7/7 medium armor is plenty of defense. In PVE, you will want to go DW/Bow, in PVP you will probably want to go 2H/Bow. Stam DK is probably going to be the top of the charts for PVE DPS next patch, so get excited.

LadyLethalla

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

If you are interested in some bullet proof soloing bars and basic rotations for any class, let me know and I can try to help.

@Oreyn_Bearclaw
I have a RG NB at v13, with pretty much maxed Stamina (I did put one point in Magicka when I was trialling Swallow Soul)... I'm currently using Rally/Evil Hunter/Surprise Attack/ Wrecking Blow and Reaper's Mark plus Soul Assault Ult - mainly because it does so much more damage than the other Ults (though it does have a long cast time). I've got 6 or 7 pieces Medium Hunding's with Divine traits on most (there may be one or two missing? Jewellery really needs replacing too) and Precise on weapons, Greatsword main and Bow as backup (only on level 28 or 29 as I rarely use it). I can't remember any of the skills on the backup bar other than Malefic Wreath. I also have all the Medium and RG passives.

What would you suggest for both PvE and PvP? So far as the latter, for armour, I've been thinking about crafting a complete separate set of medium with Impenetrable, but I don't have that trait researched on all 7 pieces yet.
thanks.

GreenhaloX

Wow! These are some top notch feedback. Thank you all. Very good instructions and advices. I can tell there are many legendary players on here. It seems there are much, much more to this game than just playing. From I gather from many of you, playing this game is more like science and chemistry.. from animation cancelling (thank you for that instruction video clip from leepalmer95) to theory crafting to weapon-armor sets to knowing how to fight. I feel like young Luke Skywalker trying to absorb all these information from Obi-wan and Yoda trying to get to Jedi master. These info, advice and instruction will help many players.

I have always favored heavy armors in these type of games. Normally, heavy armors are what help stop penetration, but seem not likely in this game. I currently have all rubedite epic-class armors with every pieces (minus the girdle) in the high 2000 armor rating. It would be an adjustment to switch to the lighter sets as most have suggested. Yes, the impenetrable factor is something I would need as well as more stamina.

The video clip on animation cancelling will come in handy, just have to figure it out and knowing how to work it. This is very beneficial for combat. There is definitely a science to effective combat in this game.

You guys are awesome. Pyr0xyrecuprotite, awesome input. Thank you for taking the time to write all those down on here. You seem to be the Jedi-master, if I may say so. Much appreciated, all. I still have a lot to learn and figure out how to play better.

SkoomaAddict420

Because of this. I always wondered why we can even enter the pvp zone at all at lvl10. What's the point after 2 years out on console. Unless they were to make other pvp instances for lower levels and such, had to add the such....

Mojmir

SkoomaAddict420 wrote: »

Because of this. I always wondered why we can even enter the pvp zone at all at lvl10. What's the point after 2 years out on console. Unless they were to make other pvp instances for lower levels and such, had to add the such....

leveling alliance skill line, blackwater blade is actually really fun BTW.

DUTCH_REAPER

Roehamad_Ali wrote: »

Great post ! I would rather read a honest post like this then many others asking to bring the game down to their level .

There are many resources . Like em or not , they're great tools .

Tamriel Foundry

Deltia's Gaming

SypherPK Web page

ESO Acedemy

And

Players helping players forum here .

Joining a great guild helps too . For really learning , it's not always the big ones . Ask questions on the forums here about gear setups , Champion point set ups and skill templates . Get use to the basics , start winning . Then start your own experiments "Theorycrafting" . Best of luck to you . It's work but so worth it when you are dominating your play style .

Agree. Good to see an honest question asked. And you gave him great advice btw.

ArchMikem

I'd like to know as well, considering our group of three Veterans got completely owned by a Level 20 Dragonknight the other night.

DKsUnite

L2P?

KingYogi415

ArchMikem wrote: »

I'd like to know as well, considering our group of three Veterans got completely owned by a Level 20 Dragonknight the other night.

A level 20 fully geared out in purple set gear could have 40k magic 2500 spellpower and 2200 regen easily!

yay battle leveling.

Aisle9

PvE world bosses are not that hard, I soled most of them since lvl20 or something. At the beginning I got my butt handed to me, then, eventually, learned how to kill them effectively.

I'm not sure what will happen at vr16 (or cp501 when DB goes live), because I'm still v7, but I'll let you know as soon as I hit it. Took me a couple of weeks to get here, I expect 1 or 2 more to cap.

Here's some advice that helped a lot in previous games:

When choosing a weapon, if you want to be effective, don't go with what you like the most, go with what's effective. Most of the time, people go for the pretty weapon, while the good old board with a nail in it does way more damage. I'm not saying go with the FoTM build, but, hey, asking doesn't hurt. On a side note, yeah, maces ignore some armor bonus, they're pretty awesome.

Stack critical rating and critical damage. In every damage orientated game critical hits do from double to 3-4 times the damage. Not sure about ESO, but seems to be somewhere from 1/3 to more than twice the damage. I might be wrong about that, but the point is valid, the more you crit, the more damage you do, which is a good thing.

Hybrids are not as effective as pure builds. If you split attributes evenly you will be a very poor jack-of-all-trades, min/maxing will give you better results, meaning, if you decide to be a stamina build (stamina = weapon damage) go for full stamina, and use abilities wit a stamina cost, if you want to go for magicka (magicka = spell damage), same, but with magicka. Abilities with a stamina cost will scale to your stamina, while abilities with a magicka cost will scale with magicka, meaning that if you have more magicka than stamina and use spells, you are effectively gimping yourself.

Make sure to know how to manage your resource pool. If you run out of resources, you're dead meat. Make sure to understand which item/set is better to do what you need to do (tank/heals/damage dealing).

If possible, make sure to know which damage buff is additive and which one is multiplicative. Multiplicative is better, so, if you have to choose, go for that one. In any case, make sure to always have (and use) one or more damage buffs (increase damage by %). Also, check the descriptions for effects that trigger (proc) out of attacks or effects, like "when you use this ability you gain <Minor Damage Buff> for <XX> seconds" or "when you critical hit you gain <Major Damage Buff> for <XX> seconds". Try to stack as many different ones as you can, make sure they are not the same one. 2 major brutality won't stack with each other, so, one will be wasted, major brutality will stack with minor brutality for more damage buff. Try to keep them up as much as possible.

I'm not saying to theorycraft like crazy, but following someone that does will help. If a build, or a set, is the FoTM, it means is good. If you're capable enough to make a different one that works as good, awesome, if you're just being a hipster... well, you will have issues.

Learn the tricks. Here you have animation canceling. It's not an exploit, it's not cheating, but it takes skill and practice. It's not hard. Other people use it, so, if you don't, other people will be more effective than you, and, in PvP, have an advantage over you. That goes to the other advice, learn a rotation for your build. If you can burst (do a lot of damage over a short amount of time) is all well and good, but you want to be able to sustain (do decent damage over a period of time) as well, to a certain extend.

Other than that, knowing what other classes (or mobs/bosses in PvE) do will be a massive advantage. If you know what they do, you know how to counter potential oneshots.

I'm running a magicka nightblade right now, for my build I have a gap closer (lotus fan) for mobility, a damage ability (concealed weapon), a DoT (cripple, for damage over time + snare for more mobility), plus cloak. When I attack from cloaked, the attack is always a critical hit. Forcecrits are awesome, see if you have one. Utility I have a self heal, a damage buff, and a finisher. A finisher lets you deal massive damage on enemies under 25% health, but does less damage on enemies with more, so, use only to finish off.

Mods and addons help, don't shun them, FTC is an incredible tool that will take your hand and carry you into the future. Download it, learn how to use it.

Hope this helped, I'm fairly new myself, so, that's the best I can do for now.

Enjoy the game

Sorry for the WoT, here's a good old board with nails in it:

Duiwel

Come end of the month and the removal of VR the flock of max lvl players that don't know how to play this issue will only get worse.

I wonder how many ppl will cry "hacker" in pvp

I_killed_Vivec

GreenhaloX wrote: »

I have always favored heavy armors in these type of games.

When I started I wanted to be a heavy armour wearing, dual axe wielding dragonknight. It was difficult, particularly as I wanted to be a hybrid to make use of the DK skills while also using the weapon skills. To make matters worse, I found I needed a ranged weapon and I'd picked up a purple restro staff...

Maybe the templars will disagree, but it's hard to imagine a worse build.

But I persevered because I was playing the game the way I wanted to play it!

I eventually got bored with most mobs being immune to the axes bleed DoT, so I switched to daggers - a revolution, because daggers give crit. And so does medium armour - particularly if you have a full set of Hundings, and later Briarheart. I also ditched the restro for S&B.

The final move was to say goodbye to most DK skills and put ALL my points into stamina.

Suddenly the game was as easy as everyone else was saying it was!

The Stamina DK crit build definitely works, at least in PvE.

Though I still prefer my Magica DK - just because I get to use the DK skills like they were designed to be used.

CaptainBeerDude

sirrmattus wrote: »

@GreenhaloX

Please ditch the heavy armor and go medium. Dk is the hardest hitting class in the game for stamina

U have the bow and 2h choice right but you should craft a medium impenetrable set if your going to be in cyrodil. Hunding works great or whatever you like.

This. Switch to MA, get it in 5 pc Hundings Rage and 3 pc Ashen Grip (maybe). 2H and Bow is good. And make sure any magicka abilities you use are support only. If they scale on magicka for damage or healing, they will be quite weak. Other than that, practice.

GL OP.

Reevster

Get gear that gives you 3 procs, 1st is Monster helm/ shoulders set( kinda hard to get,one item is on PvP vendor every Friday) and there are 2 other 5 piece gear sets.(these sets can be found on guild vendors relatively cheaply) If you get the right pieces you can have 3 procs.( using DW or S/B) Its helps those with "less" skills , its not Oped but does give you a bit of a boost , works really well in PvE. Bahraha's and Serpents spirit. But if your skilled /have the best gear, high SD/WD you wont want these 2 sets.

Rune_Relic

Wollust wrote: »

Skill
Hidden Knowledge
CP
Gear

Corrected for accuracy

Junkogen

People recommend theory crafting sites, but then suggest impen. All the sites always have builds with divines for PvP. What gives? Impen or divines?

Curtdogg47

Knowing my build, the right skills and the best rotation is really helping me. You can't just spam random skills, and expect to win. And practice practice practice! And you will die a lot. But eventually you still start to win more. Try different skills and combos, try various buffs. See what skills stack nicely. Also your gear should complement your play style to.

SkoomaAddict420

Eating Spinach... Haa, ga, ga, ga... You know Popeye, lol...

Averya_Teira

GreenhaloX wrote: »

Thank you for the feedback, everyone. I see that CP is where it is at. I'm about at 200 CP.. so, I see, 200 compared to 501 makes a world of different. It's the PvP where I get my butt thrown back at me. I see now I probably went up against those with much more higher CP.

sirrmattus wrote: »

Are you wanting to pvp or pve? Do you have set peice gear or random items? Are you light or medium or heavy armor? Do you have set jewelry? Are you weapons gold? What class are you?

I'm Ebonhart DragonKnight with heavy armors, right now pretty all epic levels. For the past week, I been mining rudebite ore my butts off trying to refine and get enough tamporing alloys to upgrade all my stuff to legendary. I been using two-handed weapon up to reaching V16 and beating the main quest. I since took a liking to the bow, so the bow's been my primary and axe is my back-up. I just finally upgrade my bow to legendary and working on the rest. I'm not really wanting to PvP. It just when I was in Cyrodiil doing quests, I saw one of my pact castle being attacked. So, I went to check what's going on and to lend a hand. That's when I ran into the other pact members and yeah, I got thrashed. Same when doing the lumber quest, I run into the other pact member and thrashed by a Captain ranked. So, I been trying to CP up more before I head back into Cyrodiil. just in case I run into the other powerful pact members and have somewhat of a fighting chance. I'm only about a month into this game and not yet acclimated into the group thing yet. Maybe that would be a good thing to do.

From the sound of this post, you just ugraded to epic whatever quest rewards you got. Are you even using armor sets ?

GreenhaloX

leepalmer95 wrote: »

5. Watch this vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLZzGoPp9Ug You should likely just get used to pvp first, what abilites to use, whats good, what sets etc... before you delve into animation cancelling. The most basic form is literally just tapping your attack button then using a skill , this is called weaving and increases your dmg.

Can't think of anything else off the top of my head, theres still a lot more though.

Thanks much for this clip. I'm getting a hang of this animation cancelling technique. It works. When connected, it does some serious damages. Tested out on giants, mammoth and trolls and seems to get the job done in half the time as I would before and seems not to use as much stamina as I would before as well. Also works great in the public dungeons. Still learning how to use it better for the big bossed at the skull/crossbone locations, though.

I can how many folks see how this game can become soon easy. With this techniques combined with high CP and other veteran skills and the right weapons and armors, I can see how someone can be so formidable.