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What skills to level as a leveling Stamina Warden?

DontTread
DontTread
Hello all,

I am a level 15 Stamina Warden who is struggling to figure out what skills to prioritize as I level up. Can anyone give me some advice?

1. What skills will make me the most powerful as I level up?
2. What skills should I morph into?
3. What weapons should I use? Right now I am using two-handed greatsword. I have recently unlocked the second weapon bar. I am leaning towards bow, but interested in your opinion. Should I consider dual wield for primary bar?

Thank you for your help,
DontTread
  • Nestor
    Nestor
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    While leveling you should be preparing your self for the future, not your build (as that will change). So:

    1. While leveling, have one class skill from each class on your bars at all times. Classes level the slowest, so get them done now.
    2. Have at least one weapon skill on your bar at all times
    3. Have a flex or support skill you want to level at all times
    4. Once the skill gets to the Morph stage, then put another one on the bar to level that rather than take the morph.

    Your not going to have the best DPS now, but you will have the most flexibility later. You can apply this to both bars equally or some other way, but this is the best method while leveling 1 to 50. Reason, the game handicaps you right now to make you stronger than you really are. So, take advantage of that. You don't need the optimal skill load out, you need the optimal leveling load out.

    Also, try to wear at least one of each weight of armor to get all those lines leveled.

    Once you get up to or near 50, you should have all the skills that matter at Morph stage, your armors at 50 and most important, your classes at 50. Then, you can optimize your build.
    Enjoy the game, life is what you really want to be worried about.

    PakKat "Everything was going well, until I died"
    Gary Gravestink "I am glad you died, I needed the help"

  • DontTread
    DontTread
    Nestor wrote: »
    4. Once the skill gets to the Morph stage, then put another one on the bar to level that rather than take the morph.

    Could you explain this? I thought that I needed to continue to level the new morph skill to move to the next morph choice.
  • davey1107
    davey1107
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    I'll expand. Using this guide for skills list:

    http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Animal+Companions+Skills

    1. As a stam character, you want to unlock and level and skills that morph into stamina versions. These are typically your attacks...I won't list them, if they cost stam you'll use them. Magic based skills are still important. These "magic dumps" can allow stam characters to cast buffs, shields, etc without sacrificing their stamina pool. Examples are the netch, bird of prey, green lotus, etc. These cost magic, but deliver buffs good for stamina characters.

    But generally, there are so many skill points in the game that you could unlock every class ability and play with them if you like. But if you want to save time and money, avoid ones that deal magic damage, as well as fire, frost or shock, and look for ones dealing physical damage, or disease and poison.

    2. Most morphs offer an obvious choice, like Dive, which has a stamina option and a magic option. As a stamina character, you want that stam option. Others are less obvious. Don't stress...pick the one that sounds best and play with it. Down the road, if you want to undo morphs and get the points back you may. My super vet only pays 1500 gold to recast a gazillion morphs, so it's not expensive. When your character is young, it's a couple hundred, no biggie.

    As you level, keep note of which skills you use a lot and look up what the alternative morphs are. If something seems like it might play better because you've learned the mechanics better, go recast and try out the alternative. As a new player you'll likely recast several times through your character's life...don't hesitate to do this often.

    3. Stamina Wardens may level all four physical weapon lines. Dual is very important, 2h is important, bow is important. 1h/shield is the least useful...it's a very defensive line and stam Wardens needs some weapon attacks...feel free to set this one aside unless you want to play around with it.

    As a rule, dual wield skills pump out single target damage while offering some sort of buff, 2h is about raw power and multiple targets, and bows offer range and DOTs. You'll be using them all in your characters life, feel free to unlock and play around with every single skill in these lines.

    On a side note, level both medium and heavy armor. You'll probably wear a blend of differing pieces at times, so try to wear 4/3 or 5/2 now and keep them leveling up.

    Some addl tips:

    - everything Nestor says is 100% correct, so I won't repeat that, lol.

    - don't stress too much about leveling skills, other than practicing the general guidelines. When you get to vet, there's a "catch up mechanism" called enlightenment. This delivers you a daily dose of 400,000 xp at 4x the normal rate. Levels 1-50 entail about 3 million xp all together...this is what is applied to level your skills. So at vet level, you earn about as much xp in a week as everything you earned all together as a nonvet.

    Long story short, any skill lines or abilities that get behind are very easy to level as a vet by earning your enlightenment xp with those abilities equipped. I just leveled my stam Wardens 2h. He'd never used one before...in a week of enlightenment I had the line to level 45, with every skill morphed and at morph level 2-4. And I wasn't playing him hard, just an hour a day running some delves and dolmens he needed.
  • Opticon
    Opticon
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    Totally agree on what the kind Nestor and davey1107 said, but I would like to add some advice as a very recent new player / stam warden.

    Here is what I've found to be, so far, the best stam warden skills while leveling. This is focused on Warden only to supplement the previous posts which are very helpful.

    Subterranean Assault (morph of Scorch)
    Cutting Dive (morph of Dive / your main spammable)
    Green Lotus (morph of Lotus Flower)
    Bull Netch (morph of Betty Netch)

    For my 5th skill (not necessarily in this order on the bar) I use Poison Injection from Bow as a combo dot/execute, but many like Endless Hail to fill the dot role (not sure what they do then for execute though).

    Anyways those first 4 skills are what you want to learn to use properly as a leveling stam warden, imo.
    Edited by Opticon on July 18, 2017 4:59AM
  • tedsini_ESO
    tedsini_ESO
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    Unable to log in from Acampo, CA - 30 miles south of Sacramento, 15 miles north of Stockton. Error 3.1.650.90098. Since around 8:30 PM PST. Go maintenance crew!
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