Seeking Solo Magicka Sorcerer PvE build that doesn't use a Pet

SilverBride

I am looking for a Solo Magicka Sorcerer PvE build that doesn't use a Pet. I just cannot stand having these things hovering around in my way. Right now I am a Vampire but thinking of curing, so looking for a build that would work well for me. I prefer a single bar build if possible as I have never liked bar swapping.

Thank you.

fred4

Here you go: https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildData?id=457985

This is entirely theory-crafted and untested. I do, however, have experience making builds and playing solo. Let's go over why things are the way they are.

Gear, mundus, food

Hexos Ward + False God is an almost ideal and tested combination for solo play. False God is a trial set. You'll have to run normal Sunspire to get it, but it is worth it. So worth it.

Oakensoul is the obvious mythic, since you asked for a one bar build. An insane amount of power for such a build.

1x Magma Incarnate is one of the strongest single pieces to round out the build. The stam regen helps with Dark Conversion. If you don't have that, you might use 1x Slimecraw for more crit and find sustain elsewhere (you may have enough anyway).

3x prismatic enchants are recommended on the big pieces to get your health up, plus free extra stamina. Magicka enchants for the small pieces.

Bloodthirsty jewelry is optimal, if you are able to transmute. Jewelry enchants are up for debate. Adjust as necessary, once you have played the build. You're going to get a tri-stat with Oakensoul. Keep that.

All Divines and Thief mundus is optimal for damage and Crit Surge healing.

A gold, Precise lightning staff is important and optimal.

Race doesn't matter.

Witchmother's Potent Brew is your cheap and good food.

Potions are whatever you want, e.g. magicka trash potions or tri-stat potions from daily logon rewards (or crafted).

Skills

There is little room in this build, due to one bar only. I find that having an AOE spammable plays better under these conditions than anything else, for example if you ever go into vet Maelstrom Arena. I've tried to use Unstable Wall of Elements in Maelstrom, but it was horrible. And instant cast AOE spammable plays better. That's why we use Pulsar.

Crushing Shock allows you to attack single target from range and interrupts casting NPCs. It's also much cheaper than Pulsar. In my experience you can't get away with just using Pulsar due to cost reasons alone. This is why we use Crushing Shock.

Critical Surge is your main source of healing and one of the reasons why we have built for so much crit (62%) so it reliably procs all the time. Indispensible and one one of the very best ways of healing in solo play, especially when combined with the automatic Hexos Ward shield.

Dark Conversion serves several purposes. One is sustain. Two is that it's an on-demand heal. You may very well need this when on the move to your next target, e.g. when Crit Surge isn't proccing, because you're not hitting anything. Three is that it activates Minor Prophecy for more crit from class passive.

Bound Aegis is here entirely passively. It passively increases your magicka, health, stamina regen, health regen, and gives you resistances. We are using Strategic Reserve CP. You have a ton of ulti-gen with Oakensoul. You can use your ultimate, or you can withhold it to gain up to 2.5K health regen. This is what's also going to tie you over when Crit Surge isn't proccing.

Destro ult. It's one choice. The sorc atronach ult is an alternative worth considering, but you said no pets. Does that count as a pet for you? The atronach ult would give you some of the same passives you get from Bound Aegis, which means you could ditch Bound Aegis for something else. For example Streak is a PvP skill, but also just a lot of fun. Or you could slot another heal, such as Resolving Vigor.

fred4

Proof, if proof were needed, that the build works. Even the sustain is where I wanted it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdlyPX4rssk

00:00 Skyreach Caverns
01:35 Stonefalls World Boss
03:38 Fungal Grotto 1 Vet Hard Mode Final Boss
09:15 Veteran Maelstrom Arena #5

Note there was another sorc towards the end of the Stonefalls boss fight. Those were not my pets.

SilverBride

Awesome information. The only roadblock I see is the trial set because I don't do trials, but it's a roadblock I'm willing to overcome for a great solo build.

I'm fine with the Atronach ultimate because it's only there for a short time. It's the pets that are constantly in my face that I can't stand.

I appreciate the time and thought you put into this. It may take me a bit to get it all set up but I'll let you know how it works for me.

Thank you.

Stx

I also play sorcerer without pets, except I always use the atronach ult, it's just too good of dps to pass up. And if you have oakensoul you regenerate ultimate so fast he will always be up.

Tannus15

unless you're doing dungeons or arenas you don't need false god. i'd actually go so far as to say it's a bad set since minor slayer doesn't apply. it's basically crit, crit, and sustain.

since the mag on kill and expedition on kill are both in red CP now you're better off just slotting those 2 cp and using julianos.

i recommend bound armaments over bound aegis. it'll increase your light attack damage and give you a high damage proc every 4 light attacks while you still get the max health passive

lighting staffs are terrible for dps. almost all your damage there is coming from crushing shock and light attacks so the 10% aoe damage is doing nothing where an inferno will give you 10% single target damage.
burning is also good damage while concussed is ... unimpressive.

another 1pc option which is good can be trainee for 1450 max health

SilverBride

Tannus15 wrote: »

unless you're doing dungeons or arenas you don't need false god.

I'm not. What I do mostly is quest. However I do enjoy soloing dungeons and world bosses and want to be able to contribute adequate damage when I group for things like Harrowstorms and Dragons.

I was wearing Mother's Sorrow and Vampire Lords (was curious if it was actually useful as a Vampire which I no longer am) but I replaced that with Julianos because I was able to pick it up fairly cheaply for now.

I'm wearing the Pale Order ring but plan to start farming more leads for Oakensoul.

For weapon I have a Mother's Sorrow inferno staff, gold quality, on main bar.

I'm already killing things much faster than when I was a Vampire but just want a decent no pet build for how I like to play. And I've only done it in normal so far, but would like to try Vet Maelstrom Arena just too see what I can do.

Tannus15

SilverBride wrote: »

Tannus15 wrote: »

unless you're doing dungeons or arenas you don't need false god.

I'm not. What I do mostly is quest. However I do enjoy soloing dungeons and world bosses and want to be able to contribute adequate damage when I group for things like Harrowstorms and Dragons.

I was wearing Mother's Sorrow and Vampire Lords (was curious if it was actually useful as a Vampire which I no longer am) but I replaced that with Julianos because I was able to pick it up fairly cheaply for now.

I'm wearing the Pale Order ring but plan to start farming more leads for Oakensoul.

For weapon I have a Mother's Sorrow inferno staff, gold quality, on main bar.

I'm already killing things much faster than when I was a Vampire but just want a decent no pet build for how I like to play. And I've only done it in normal so far, but would like to try Vet Maelstrom Arena just too see what I can do.

sorrow + julianos is a solid build. there are "better" options out there, but unless you're looking at vet DLC or vMA i wouldn't worry about it. if you're using 1 bar then definitely get oakensoul, it's really strong.

i recommend dropping pale order, crit surge is more than enough to keep you alive as long as you remember to keep it up. for bosses you can also slot structured entropy as it also heals as long as it's doing damage.

SilverBride

Tannus15 wrote: »

sorrow + julianos is a solid build. there are "better" options out there, but unless you're looking at vet DLC or vMA i wouldn't worry about it. if you're using 1 bar then definitely get oakensoul, it's really strong.

i recommend dropping pale order, crit surge is more than enough to keep you alive as long as you remember to keep it up. for bosses you can also slot structured entropy as it also heals as long as it's doing damage.

I'll give that a try. Thanks for the great info!

fred4

Tannus15 wrote: »

unless you're doing dungeons or arenas you don't need false god. i'd actually go so far as to say it's a bad set since minor slayer doesn't apply. it's basically crit, crit, and sustain.

since the mag on kill and expedition on kill are both in red CP now you're better off just slotting those 2 cp and using julianos.

Since I completely overlooked the CP 2.0 option of restoring 1.5K magicka on kill, I'd say you have a point. That said False God returns more, the cost reduction and Minor Slayer aren't nothing, and the Major Expedition would cost you another CP star to (almost) match as well. How much you value the speed is perhaps in the eye of the beholder. I love speed and have found it useful in vMA. Not so much these days, because the better you know the mechanics, the less you need help, but moving around arena 7 or dancing around the ghosts in the final arena, I've found the speed - even using Wild Hunt - helpful in the past.

I'd recommend Julianos only in so far as the OP already has it. These days Order's Wrath seems like an obvious also crafted upgrade, does it not?

i recommend bound armaments over bound aegis. it'll increase your light attack damage and give you a high damage proc every 4 light attacks while you still get the max health passive

Yeah, that sounds like a good idea, but it's apples and oranges. Aegis gives you resistances. To be honest, I saw this as a flex spot. I wanted the +20% health regen, because health regen is surprisingly OP. This build doesn't make the most of it, so it's kind of "meh", I suppose. Lightning Splash or some other damage ability also looks good in this spot to me, especially if you use the Atro to get the health regen passive that way. I suppose Armaments gives you the best of all worlds, sustain permitting.

lighting staffs are terrible for dps

I disagree, because we're talking about a sorc and we're talking about a solo build. Flame staves add +10% single-target damage. Lightning staves add +10% AOE damage and +5% all target damage from a sorc passive. Crushing shock is the exception, but this applies to light attacks, Pulsar and the destro ult. That said, the build is terrible for single-target DPS, no question. That's a conscious tradeoff. It's good for something like Skyreach, it's good for Vateshran, and it's good for some places in vMA, such as round 5, where some players run into trouble in wave 4 for the first time, as that wave spawns a greater number of hard-hitting adds than before.

Low single-target damage is not sexy, but it's surprisingly easy to live with, because overall damage is high by historical standards. vMA mobs melt so fast, that you have no trouble keeping up. It's killing bosses where I mainly notice the difference between a build like this and, let's say, a trial meta build. This would be an issue, if you missed a DPS race. Killing the vMA round 5 boss is such a race once you get to the last platform. Not a particularly hard one, but one where you would notice your lack of DPS going in, for the sake of the argument, as a pure tank. I've noticed that on a Brawler tank build I use for actual tanking. This build, however, has no such problem, as you can see from the footage.

@SilverBride, should you have a problem with the ring of shades in vVateshran, then I recommend slotting Streak in the flex spot. Once the ring as closed in on you a little, streak through one of the shades and you bypass that DPS check mechanic on sorc.

almost all your damage there is coming from crushing shock and light attacks so the 10% aoe damage is doing nothing where an inferno will give you 10% single target damage.

Being so single-target-focused isn't the be all and end all in solo play as it is for a DD in group play. The difference is less than 10% as well, because light attacks and the lightning portion of Crushing Shock get buffed by 5% from sorc passive. You have a point, but the other reason I like lightning staves is that the channel is easier to target if you ever need to restore resources from a heavy attack.

As to using Crushing Shock, incidentally, it's to give the best chance of landing a crit every single second and, therefore, making the most of Crit Surge healing.

burning is also good damage while concussed is ... unimpressive.

I was incidentally using a flame enchant in the footage.

another 1pc option which is good can be trainee for 1450 max health

Sure. I think Magma, Slimecraw, or Trainee are all viable. The sustain on prolonged boss fights was just about right with Magma, so I liked that. I also always like the stam sustain for dodge rolling and since we're using Dark Conversion.

@SilverBride, @Tannus15 and I are getting into nitpicking territory here, I hope that's obvious. The main shape of the build is to get some soloing comfort from the Hexos Ward shield, to heal from damage via Crit Surge, to sustain from killing via CP or False God, and to build for crit in order to optimise damage, Crit Surge healing and take full advantage of Oakensoul, e.g. the Major Force.

SilverBride

I find you both have given very useful information and I'll test out parts of each. I really appreciate all the help.

Tannus15

Yeah, as @fred4 points out, we have slightly different approach and thoughts on it, but honestly it's 6 of one and half dozen of the other.

I think with a 1 bar build it's important, where possible, to recognise the task at hand and then slot the appropriate skills.

You can have an inferno and a lightning staff in your pack and just swap them out if you're dealing with a lot of trash or a large single target boss.

likewise crushing shock vs elemental weapon vs crystal frag. i recommend just setting up the basic build and seeing what works for you. if you have any questions or run into any problems just tag either of us and i'm sure we'll have some thoughts

fred4

SilverBride wrote: »

I'm not. What I do mostly is quest. However I do enjoy soloing dungeons and world bosses and want to be able to contribute adequate damage when I group for things like Harrowstorms and Dragons.

As soon as you're in a group situation, Pulsar becomes a questionable skill. I prefer it over other options in vMA, because it's direct and reponsive. I think it will be good for Harrowstorms too. In dungeons you should probably switch to Unstable Wall. That skill can be layed down under a boss for the duration, or it can be spammed and does as much AOE damage as Pulsar. It's just that the delayed nature of that skill plays badly in high pressure solo situations, such as vMA, which is why I prefer Pulsar there. I would probably also look at Lightning Flood in the Bound Armaments slot. Unstable Wall, Lightning Flood, the Atro or the destro ult, are all AOE lightning abilities that can also increase your single target damage. There is a method to using a lightning staff in this build. Whether a flame staff is ultimately still better single-target in an Oakensoul build, I don't know. I haven't tested that. I think what lifts flame staves in a conventional 2-bar build is, in part, the vMA destro back bar people use in those builds, e.g. the buffed light attacks.

If you want to hang on to one of your sets for now, I'd probably keep Sorrow over Julianos, but then again you are looking to make a mostly light armor build for the sustain and crit, so a Hexos weapon is recommended. You could try 3 medium on the body and 2 Hexos jewelry, I suppose.

Zodiarkslayer

Hi, @SilverBride,
your initial request has set me on a quest to do the exact same thing. Here are my findings, if you'd like:

1) One bar restrictions can be leveraged by using multi purpose skills and of course the Oakensoul Ring:

• Ustable Wall of Elements (it is both a glyph proccer and a backup AoE Spammable)
• Crystal Frags (so many Passives activate from this and self procs, obviously)
• Razor Caltops (Major Breach is the most important Debuff to have and you get free Crowd Control + it costs Stamina)

2) The Sorcerer Class has only little incorporated Crit Chance (Exploitation Passive) and no Crit Damage. That means I want to run at least one set with BOTH, meaning either

• Medusa
• Order's Wrath (easily crafted, even on jewelry)
• Tzogvin, but stacks are a real bother to me and the uptime is questionable outside of longer Boss fights.

3) The passives of the Sorcerer Class fantastically synergize with higher Spell Damage. I choose Burning Spellweave for this.

• The set itself synergizes great with Wall of Elements (BSW proc applies Burning satus effect and WoE does additional 20% damage to burning enemies)
• The glyph spot is freed for either Poison Glyph or Weapon Damage Glyph
• Crystal Frags weaving is easier with an Inferno Staff
• Jewelry glyphs should be Infused, rather than Bloodthirsty, for the same rational. Higher spell damage up front means better damage via Amplitude and Expert Mage passives and we have no bar space for an execute ability (not that Mages Fury would be an option, anyways).

4) The Defense Flex spot can be

• Crit Surge for additional healing,
• Bound Aegis for balance of additional Armor and MaxMagicka increase, or simply
• Hardened Ward (60% of MaxHealth shield)

5) The last skill slot is adjustable to my needs or preferances.

• Another defense skill for difficult Bosses
• Lightning Flood for weaker Bosses or large Mobs
• Channelled Acceleration for mobility and minor Force (100% Crit Damage!), except when running Medusa
• Or I choose Force Pulse as spammable and only use the Frag Proc. Force Pulse also has cleave damage, because everything inside the Wall of Elements is Burning. I only loose the Blood Magic heal, wich is 2k per Crystal Frag cast

6) In SOLO context, Penetration is your best friend for damage increase.

• That is why I always use a Sharpened front bar
• Precise only works better when someone is doing the Armor Debuffing for you
• I can keep the Thieve Mundus this way

7) CPa are easy, too:

• Wrathful Strikes
• Master at Arms
• Fighting Finesse
• Thaumaturge (because in hectic fight I miss Light Attacks more often, than I would like to admit. So no Deadly Aim)

Here is my complete build on UESP. I hope I could also adequately explain my choices and the rational behind them. All in all, a very synergizing build.

I thank you for bringing up such a build in the first place and inspiring me to try out myself. It has been such fun to run around and role play my Altmer Psijjic Mystic, finally without the "Flappy the Twilight and Bumpy the Clannfear".
Zodi

jaws343

Oh, solo sorc is my jam. I get around 50K DPS on this build, which is pretty solid for a build that can solo vet dungeons and world bosses with ease.

Running 5 False God body, 5 Mother's sorrow Front Bar, 1 Slimecraw, Death Dealers, Maelstrom inferno back bar. All bloodthirsty spell damage jewelry and bewitched sugar skulls food. If you don't have False God and don't want to run trial sets, you can get away with running something like Order's Wrath, or even Burning Spell weave, you will just have to change a few jewelry enchants to get sustain.

With the following bar setup:

FB: Hardened Ward, Crushing Shock (You need the interrupt solo, it's just too good to not run), Haunting Curse, Frags, Inner Light, Meteor

BB: Harness Magicka (Double Barring shields on a solo build is a life saver), Crit Surge, Boundless, Wall of Elements, Orbs, Elemental Storm (Or Storm Atro depending on preference or situation)

My stats with this setup are around: 50% crit chance, 5K spell damage buffed, 20K resists buffed, 37-40K mag, 23-26K health, 19-22K stam (stats depending on Death dealers stacks).

jaws343

Now, to follow up on that, if I were to convert my current build into a 1 bar, no pet build, I'd probably do something like this:

5 False God, 2 Bloodspawn, 1 Oakensoul, 1 Maelstrom lightning, 2 piece trainee jewelry

For skills I'd go:

Hardened Ward, Wall of Elements, Crystal Weapon, Crit Surge (for the heal), Elemental Ring (maybe, or some other AOE skill), Meteor

With Meteor, the ult gen from Oaken + the ult return from meteor will mean you can cast it a lot. Crystal weapon is a strong spammable, and with the lightning staff, you can do more potent heavy attacks within your Wall of Elements to multiple enemies.

SilverBride

I got the Oakensoul ring and made a one bar build based on @fred4 skill suggestions in post #2. I have Critical Surge, Crushing Shock, Pulsar, Dark Convergence and Bound Aegis slotted, with the Destro ultimate.

I would really like to use another damage dealing skill and am considering removing Bound Aegis and using the Atronach ultimate so I would open up a slot but still not lose the passives. I don't consider the Atronach a full time pet since I'd probably only use it on bosses and other similar situations, and not just general questing.

I am considering using a damage dealing skill from the Mages guild skill line so I could then benefit from those passives, too. Does this seem feasible?

jaws343

SilverBride wrote: »

I got the Oakensoul ring and made a one bar build based on @fred4 skill suggestions in post #2. I have Critical Surge, Crushing Shock, Pulsar, Dark Convergence and Bound Aegis slotted, with the Destro ultimate.

I would really like to use another damage dealing skill and am considering removing Bound Aegis and using the Atronach ultimate so I would open up a slot but still not lose the passives. I don't consider the Atronach a full time pet since I'd probably only use it on bosses and other similar situations, and not just general questing.

I am considering using a damage dealing skill from the Mages guild skill line so I could then benefit from those passives, too. Does this seem feasible?

You could also probably swap over to Bound Armaments. Costs stam, but buffs your light attacks, and provides a bit of burst damage. Plus a bit more stam, which is helpful solo. And then swap out Destro ult for Shooting Star to get mages guild passives. Plus, shooting star has an ultimate return function to it, so when you hit large group of enemies, paired with Major Heroism from the ring, you are going to get that ult back very quickly.

malistorr

I'm sure the DPS is far from elite. But I've been playing some iteration of the lightning staff heavy attack build for years. It's been nerfed a bit over time but I still do just fine in all normal content. I haven't really tried it much in vet recently. I use the Maelstrom Arena lightning staff on the back bar. You can get this doing the arena on normal which I find to be very easy. You just don't get 1 small extra bonus vs. the version you get from doing the arena on vet. When on the back bar I cast Crit. Surge and Boundless Storm and then Wall of Elements morph to proc the heavy attack damage buff from this staff. I go infused with shock glyph on the staff. Then I swtich to front bar and mostly just heavy attack (lightning with shock again, probably sharpened). You can do all spell damage on jewelry and you don't have to worry about sustain at all. I use a full Slimecraw monster set as well since I find I survive with ease. I use the Undaunted Infiltrator and Noble Duelist Silks sets as these both give large buffs to heavy attacks with the staff as well. So that's 3 large buffs to that attack meaning each tick could go 10k+ especially if you trigger concust and off-balance and hit the enemies in your wall skill. This is about the easiest rotation possible in the game and even some people with disabilities or bad hands can do this and pass any normal content. It just depends how lazy you want to be. I'm sure you can fit more damage skills on the front bar but if you're going to do that you'd probably want to switch gear and ditch this build. There's no point in buffing your heavy attacks 3-ways unless that's about all you're going to do. Has worked for me for 4-years on PC and Xbox. This will not work with Oakensoul as you want the Maelstrom lightning staff on back bar and Undaunted Infiltrator or Noble Duelist lightning staff on front bar.

fred4

SilverBride wrote: »

I got the Oakensoul ring and made a one bar build based on @fred4 skill suggestions in post #2. I have Critical Surge, Crushing Shock, Pulsar, Dark Convergence and Bound Aegis slotted, with the Destro ultimate.

I would really like to use another damage dealing skill and am considering removing Bound Aegis and using the Atronach ultimate so I would open up a slot but still not lose the passives. I don't consider the Atronach a full time pet since I'd probably only use it on bosses and other similar situations, and not just general questing.

I am considering using a damage dealing skill from the Mages guild skill line so I could then benefit from those passives, too. Does this seem feasible?

I've been going over some of the other comments here, particularly the ones from people who appear to be sorc mains, which I am not. Well worth reading.

My rationale for using Crushing Shock was the interrupt and that it offers 3 chances of proccing Crit Surge. Due to Oakensoul we're not running Lightning Form, a skill that normally ups your chance of keeping Crit Surge procced consistently. I wanted to optimise the build for consistent Crit Surge healing. Force Shock is good for that. What I overlooked is that sorc also heals from attacking with Dark Magic abilities, e.g. Crystal Frags / Weapon and that the Crystal Frags cast time has been shortened to 0.8s, e.g. it seems to be truly spammable now (albeit you can't block cast it). That skill does more damage than Crushing Shock and you're not going to need the interrupt all the time. I would try Crystal Frags as an alternative to Crushing Shock for one thing. If you rejig the sustain, you could also try Crystal Weapon.

If you (want to) become more single-target focused, an Inferno Staff is something to consider, but I wouldn't make it a priority just yet. Use whatever gold weapon you have. One of the benefits of the lightning staff is that it's heavy attacks have multiple ticks and thus offer, again, the chance to proc Crit Surge every second. The harder the content, the more I find you have to be able to stay on the attack and heal from attacks. You may eventually get to know mechanics so well you kill stuff before it damages your health (much). That's not where I am and I'm assuming you aren't either.

By the way, lightning heavy attack builds are an entire thing unto themselves, entirely different from my build, from "normal" builds, in terms of armor sets and playstyle. I believe Storm Master + Infallible Mage is meta for lightning heavy attack builds. I'd ignore than option, for now, cause it's a different road.

I may have overstated the importance of slotting a Daedric Summoning skill. This is because I play a sorc tank and making the most of health regen is part of my strategy in that build. In other words, feel free to play around with skills instead of Armaments and the Atro. As far as I know the Atro is a good damage ultimate, so you may choose to slot it anyway, but play around with it.

Like I said, in high pressure solo content I like Pulsar, because it's immediate damage. That skill is especially useful, if you don't know content well, don't remember all the spawn points in vMA for example, and perhaps want to retain some sense of adventure rather than predicting everything. That said Unstable Wall is the alternative, a more controlled and flexible skill as it ups both your single-target boss fight damage and can be used as an AOE spammable skill, particularly if a tank has the aggro and pulls everything together. In other words, I'd probably run Unstable Wall by default for easier solo content or group content. It would have been the better skill for the Fungal Grotto boss. Only when you're pulling many adds, as in Skyreach, or in that one particular add wave in round 4 of arena 5, does Pulsar tend to make your life easier. Hitting your targets in a timely fashion with Pulsar means you nuke the weak ones quicker and you possibly heal earlier from Crit Surge.

As a PvPer and solo player, I would always recommend one self heal that isn't tied to doing damage. Dark Conversion currently fills that role and is also a sustain skill. If you use Crystal Frags, you could try a different heal, though, such as Resolving Vigor.

Whoever said that sorc doesn't have native crit and particularly benefits from spell damage may be confusing sorc with templar. Sorc has Minor Prophecy (crit), templar has Minor Sorcery (spell damage). Tzogvin's, Mother's Sorry, Medusa, Order's Wrath are all good sets, but Hexos + False God and a Precise weapon already gives you 62% crit. That is quite a lot, certainly enough to make it likely Crit Surge is procced near 100%. The reason to go for a Precise Weapon over Sharpened is, in part, to keep Crit Surge happy. Hexos Ward pushes the envelope of what you can comfortably solo, so I wouldn't drop that. False God could be replaced with CP as previously pointed out, although I think it's hard to replace as a package. I still think it's an overall stat-dense set as long as you like everything it does, including the speed. Given you don't have False God, some of the other crit sets and, perhaps, the CP that gives you 1.5K mag on kill seem like good replacements.

Your last slot, the Armaments slot, could be taken up by a damage skill, maybe Lightning Flood, or a sustain / support skill, such as Elemental Drain or the Undaunted bubble skill (Necrotic Orb), the latter being particularly good for group play. I can't think of a Mage's Guild skill I'd slot in an Oakensoul build. Meteor maybe.

Zodiarkslayer

fred4 wrote: »

...Whoever said that sorc doesn't have native crit and particularly benefits from spell damage may be confusing sorc with templar. Sorc has Minor Prophecy (crit), templar has Minor Sorcery (spell damage)...

I said that. I stand by it. And I am not confused.

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

2) The Sorcerer Class has only little incorporated Crit Chance (Exploitation Passive) and no Crit Damage.

That is pretty much what you said, only I name the passive that gives the buff, not the buff itself.
And this:

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

3) The passives of the Sorcerer Class fantastically synergize with higher Spell Damage. I choose Burning Spellweave for this.

does NOT say the Sorcerer Class HAS spelldamage, it says it SYNERGIZES well with spell damage. Please, see: Expert Mage Passive, for referance.
For, say, a 490 Spelldamage bonus (BSW), a Sorcerer with four class skills slotted gets 529 spell damage added, making more effective use of a spelldamage buff, than of a crit chance buff by comparison. And I am not even accounting for Major Sorcery or any other damage buffs here.

fred4 wrote: »

...but Hexos + False God and a Precise weapon already gives you 62% crit. That is quite a lot ...

By the way, Burning Spell Weave, Order's Wrath and a Sharpened trait give 61,1% crit chance. That is not the point here.

"Higher crit chance equals higher damage" is only correct IF you have a certain number of damage sources ticking in parallel per second, i.e. the more DoTs, the more effective a crit chance source is, by comparison.
That is also why I have five damage sources (six, actually, if you count the Attro Ulti with 80% uptime).
To also reliably proc Crit Surges healing, if I need to run it, is an additional bonus. Or a synergy effect, i you will.

Sharpened however is a more efficient use of a trait in SOLO, because you can get more damage through the armor of the Bosses. Assuming you run Precise trait and then Dark Conversion instead of a source of Major Breach.
At 18200 armor, the Boss will mitigate 25,61% of all your incoming damage if you only have 5395 penetration.
(18200-5395)/500=25,61%, because 500 armor equal roughly 1% mitigation in ESO PvE.

However, if you run Sharpened and Major Breach, you get
(18200-8671-5948)/500=7,16% , and so you have roughly 18% more damage across the board. That outweighs 7,2% crit chance and some over sustain, in my opinion. Again, only by comparison and if I emit every other influence.

Additionally, it is easier to just switch to a Precise Staff, when you are going into group content, where a Tank/Support debuffs the Bosses armor, than to switch your Mundus from Lover to Thief and back. Those are the easiest sources of penetration in SOLO PvE, but usually not needed in Group PvE.

Also, Hexos Ward looks good on paper, but has two main drawbacks. The proc condition is a minor one at 62% crit chance, but the Cooldown of 7s is a major problem. One practically has no control over the proc. I'll take my Hardened Ward instead, any time.

@fred4 I get where you come from. I do. I really do. But the multiple redundancies, that TOTALLY save your life in PvP, are inefficiencies in SOLO PVE. The more so on a One Bar build. And those inefficiencies ultimately cap a builds potential.

SilverBride

@fred4 @Zodiarkslayer

This is my current setup:

Mother's Sorrow and Julianos, all purple quality, all Divines, with the Oakensoul ring.
Mother's Sorrow Inferno Staff, I believe it's Precise, gold quality.
All pieces are enchanted for damage and mana regeneration, and I use the Thief Mundus stone.
For skills, I have Critical Surge, Crushing Shock, Pulsar, Dark Convergence and Bound Aegis slotted, with the Destro ultimate.

This is my playstyle and what I seek to accomplish:

I am a casual PvE player. I do not PvP. I quest and like to solo normal dungeons and base game World Bosses. I would like to be able to solo DLC normal dungeons and World Bosses but these have proven a bit too challenging for me so far. I also want to contribute decent damage for things like Vents and Dragons and Harrowstorms.

I feel that this setup has more survival qualities than dealing damage. Survival is important but has not been a major problem for the way I play. I'd like to replace some of these with more damage dealing skills. What skills would you recommend to meet this goal?

I have never been good at theory crafting and creating builds and I greatly appreciate all the great advice.

fred4

@SilverBride, in that case I'd switch to a skill bar like what @Zodiarkslayer is suggesting, but don't just look at UESP (my mistake, I did that first) and read his comments in detail, e.g. what healing and defensive skills to substitute as needed. You can probably use your sets or my sets or his sets, if you don't want to farm what you don't already have, but with his skill layout. I actually think his skill bar is better.

That said please clarify what you mean by DLC dungeons. I get the impression you and I mean different things. In my book dungeons are 4-man dungeons. Many 4-man dungeons can be soloed. Some are quite easy, even on vet. Fungal Grotto 1 is easy enough even on vet hard mode, as I showed in the video. Is that what you mean, or are you only referring to delves and public dungeons. Big difference. My builds use a shielding set and the amount of self-healing that they do to cater for soloing (some) 4-man content comfortably.

DLC world bosses also run the gamut. Some are easy, some are hard. I'm not sure you will be able to do the Unfinished Dolmen in Wrothgar solo with either build. Maybe someone will prove me wrong, but for a casual player I know builds that would at least do this more comfortably.

@Zodiarkslayer, thank you for the clarifications! I can see where you're coming from now. It seems like you have a finely tuned understanding of the class passives, which I may lack. I had certainly overlooked the spell damage percentage boost passive. The main thing in my head had been Oakensoul's Major Force, a reason to push crit.

I have used Hexos Ward. I like shields that proc automatically, even though I acknowledge the limitations. The shield is quite large and lasts for up to 6 seconds. It can proc again 1 second later. Yes, it's not perfect. It has a guaranteed 1 second gap where you can get caught out. However in terms of soloing content, the health extension you get from shields, combined with a steady heal (Crit Surge) is just about the most powerful thing you can do as a beginner and even if you're not. It's certainly one of the best compromises. I find that if you build outright tanky, even in light armor, with something like Aetherial Ascension, you tend to lose significant damage. Hexos Ward has the right 2/3/4 piece bonuses (crit, damage, crit). That, together with yielding the biggest shield of all shielding sets, is what makes it a good option. That said, while I have only used shield skills in PvP, I know Deltia actually prefers them over a heal or perhaps a shielding set in PvE, just so long as you have other healing coming in, e.g. from Crit Surge or Sweeps.

SilverBride

fred4 wrote: »

That said please clarify what you mean by DLC dungeons. I get the impression you and I mean different things. In my book dungeons are 4-man dungeons. Many 4-man dungeons can be soloed. Some are quite easy, even on vet. Fungal Grotto 1 is easy enough even on vet hard mode, as I showed in the video. Is that what you mean, or are you only referring to delves and public dungeons. Big difference. My builds use a shielding set and the amount of self-healing that they do to cater for soloing (some) 4-man content comfortably.

DLC world bosses also run the gamut. Some are easy, some are hard. IMO there is no way @Zordiakslayer's build, with the skills from the editor, would survive the Unfinished Dolmen in Wrothgar solo, nor would mine. Maybe someone will prove me wrong. Mine might be able to do it, but it would be borderline. For a casual player I know better builds that would do this more comfortably.

I mean dungeons and World Bosses that are not part of the original base game zones, i.e. the ones we do for the current Cadwell's Silver and Gold quests. And by dungeon I mean the 4 man dungeons. I have no problem with any of the delves and public dungeons. But the dungeons and World Bosses in all the other zones I just can't get the job done solo.

berunhieyes

SilverBride wrote: »

I got the Oakensoul ring and made a one bar build based on @fred4 skill suggestions in post #2. I have Critical Surge, Crushing Shock, Pulsar, Dark Convergence and Bound Aegis slotted, with the Destro ultimate.

I would really like to use another damage dealing skill and am considering removing Bound Aegis and using the Atronach ultimate so I would open up a slot but still not lose the passives. I don't consider the Atronach a full time pet since I'd probably only use it on bosses and other similar situations, and not just general questing.

I am considering using a damage dealing skill from the Mages guild skill line so I could then benefit from those passives, too. Does this seem feasible?

I won't claim to be an expert, but here are some of the skills I use on my Sorc for single-target damage:

Crystal Fragments: In addition to the bonus proc damage, it triggers three passives: Exploitation (Minor Prophecy, also triggered by Dark Exchange), Blood Magic (Health restored), and Expert Mage (2% damage)
Haunting Curse (provides Daedric Summoning passives if you want to use a different ult)
Degeneration (Mages Guild) is a fairly cheap DOT that also gives Major Sorcery and the Mages Guild passives
Consuming Trap can be useful on mobs for the resource restoration when the target dies.
Endless Fury can be a decent execute skill once the target is under 20% health

I know you said you want a 1-bar build, but if you're not using Oakensoul Ring, it might be worth putting a couple skills on your back bar and casting them at the beginning of the fight. Here are some possibilities:
Elemental Susceptibility: 60 seconds of Major Breach and applies burning/chilled/concussed
Channeled Acceleration (Psijic): 36 Sec of Minor Force (+10% Crit Damage) + 12 sec Major Expedition
Critical Surge (if not on front bar): 33 sec of Major Sorcery and heal on critical damage
Boundless Storm: 30 sec of Major Resolve + AOE damage

With these, you'd only have to switch to your back bar every 30 seconds to keep them up, and three of them are cast on yourself, so you don't even need to be targeting anything.

If you're soloing dungeons/bosses, you may want to consider setting up a single target bar and a more AOE focused bar and then use whichever fits the situation.

As a side note, I use Mother's Sorrow and War Maiden on my Sorc and mainly use skills that do magic damage (vs elemental) to take advantage of the War Maiden 5 piece bonus.

fred4

Well, then let's summarize where we are:

• Keep your sets or run with mine or Zodiarc's suggestions. If not using False God, use the CP that gives you magicka from killing.
• Skills:
• Crystal Frags
• Unstable Wall (mostly), or Pulsar if the delayed nature of Unstable Wall as an AOE spammable causes you grief.
• Crit Surge - I would use this as the preferred skill over Bound Aegis / Armaments or a shield.
• Razor Caltrops
• One of the additional skills suggested. Could be a heal, shield, Lightning Flood, and so on.
• Atro ultimate

fred4

Not all dungeons can be soloed.

Direfrost Keep and IC Prison have dual pressure plates or switches that require two players. Some workarounds have been known. Not sure they still work.

Some dungeons have bosses or mobs that will CC you for an extended amount of time, possibly ending in a guaranteed one shot. This includes Ulfnor in Fang Lair and one of the dudes in Cradle of Shadows. You can break the game and free yourself by using the Precognition ultimate, with weird effects in Fang Lair, but it works.

Some mobs in Moon Hunter Keep will CC you for an extended amount of time and you can't break free, not even with Precognition I think, or it just happens too frequently. On normal mode at least, having a high resistance setup and high health regen keeps you alive long enough to survive through the long stuns. I run Aetherial Ascension, Gaze of Sithis and Strategic Reserve CP on my magplar for that purpose.

The first boss in White Gold Tower will imprison you and, if no other member of your group remains outside, fighting, the fight ends. The way around that is with a companion to keep the fight alive and having the Legerdemain passive to break the cage lock quickly. A companion is also a good tank against 2-handed bosses, such as Ulfnor incidentally.

I'm not sure how you'd do in Scalecaller. In the Doylemish fight you need to kite the orbs and have good single target damage to nuke them quickly. People have done this on vet with lightning heavy attack DK builds.

Black Drake Villa may present a problem in that the first Minotaur boss enrages when a Salamander comes near. I was trying to solo this on vet, so not sure how hard that hits on normal, but one solution is to hit Salamanders with a root skill that locks them in place for several seconds and prevents them from approaching the boss. If you can't nuke them quick enough, that is.

I don't play magsorc solo, but I do play a magplar along the same lines that I outlined. I have a Hexos Ward setup and a Sithis / Aetherial Ascenscion health regen setup. Both are useful at different times. Most world bosses are soloable with the templar.

Zodiarkslayer

SilverBride wrote: »

I am a casual PvE player. I do not PvP. I quest and like to solo normal dungeons and base game World Bosses. I would like to be able to solo DLC normal dungeons and World Bosses but these have proven a bit too challenging for me so far. I also want to contribute decent damage for things like Vents and Dragons and Harrowstorms.

That is me a year ago. 😅 Now I occasionally PvP and SOLO DLC Bosses and dungeons as well. I believe you can get there too. 💪
Your gear is solid. Nothing too fancy. But good. Just be sure to have Magicka Glyphs on the body and spelldamage on the jewelry.
Upgrading everything to gold will give you a power boost, too. It will not be by a lot, but still.
And consider a backup staff with sharpened trait.

You haven't talked about food buffs. So I assume you have options. Blue food, if you need more health, for those one shot mechanics. Ghastly Eye Bowl for super sustain, and Mommy's Potty Brew for a bit of both. 😁

Skillwise, I recommend using either Crushing Shock or Pulsar, or better Crystal Frags. A one bar setup kinda forces you to do that.

The freed up space you can then use for a DoT of your choice. My preferance would be Unstable Wall of Elements for Pulsar, for the AoE explosion at the end. I just like it. 😊 But Lightning flood is good, too. Mainly for its size.

I would also exchange Dark Convergence (lol 😂, see what I did there?). Your build needs Major Breach. And since Razor Caltrops is off the table (because no pvp, right?), Elemental Drain is the remaining option. It also gives you a little bit sustain in form of minor magicka steal.

What remains is the question of crystal frags. Are you willing to run it? Can you weave it as a spammable? I learned it after seeing others do it. So maybe you can do, too? 😉

I think SOLO builds are always personal preference. And the learning process to understand how a class works is long. But it is also a part that i love about ESO.

Zodiarkslayer

I found it intriguing to theory craft a sort of Lightning themed Sorcerer. Sadly, I wasn't able to make that a one bar build.
Here is my take, and it has a LOT of survivability in it.
It is suboptimal, though. More like a theme build, really.

Damage will be somewhere between a wet noodle and a wet towel. But it'll get you through Base Game Veteran Dungeons.

Faulgor

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

I found it intriguing to theory craft a sort of Lightning themed Sorcerer. Sadly, I wasn't able to make that a one bar build.
Here is my take, and it has a LOT of survivability in it.
It is suboptimal, though. More like a theme build, really.

Damage will be somewhere between a wet noodle and a wet towel. But it'll get you through Base Game Veteran Dungeons.

Storm-Cursed's Revenge + Heartland Conqueror + a Mythic or Monster set of your choice.

The secret is to use Charged trait with Heartland Conqueror to proc the shock status effect a ton, which deals a little bit of shock damage up front and helps to proc the Storm-Cursed set. I couldn't believe what a difference it made, but my DPS jumped almost 20% with Heartland Conqueror (I used Infallible Aether before).
It's the ultimate shock sorc and it rocks. Single target is respectable and the cleave damage is nuts.

Zodiarkslayer

Faulgor wrote: »

Zodiarkslayer wrote: »

I found it intriguing to theory craft a sort of Lightning themed Sorcerer. Sadly, I wasn't able to make that a one bar build.
Here is my take, and it has a LOT of survivability in it.
It is suboptimal, though. More like a theme build, really.

Damage will be somewhere between a wet noodle and a wet towel. But it'll get you through Base Game Veteran Dungeons.

Storm-Cursed's Revenge + Heartland Conqueror + a Mythic or Monster set of your choice.

The secret is to use Charged trait with Heartland Conqueror to proc the shock status effect a ton, which deals a little bit of shock damage up front and helps to proc the Storm-Cursed set. I couldn't believe what a difference it made, but my DPS jumped almost 20% with Heartland Conqueror (I used Infallible Aether before).
It's the ultimate shock sorc and it rocks. Single target is respectable and the cleave damage is nuts.

That is a good hint. I was contemplating that set as well, but I ultimately decided against it, because of the proc chance.

To have that damage proc reliably per second, I would need to run at least 6 shock damage sources in parallel. It is only 15%. That is really low. And to have six shock sources is really stretching the Sorcerer Class's capabilities. And of course the original request of the OP, because there would need to be at least one pet
Or you need at least six enemies at the same time, which is also a stretch.

And the Charged trait, that you describe is only affecting the chance of the status effects. Meaning in our case only concussed. Your felt damage increase is probably a combination of the additional penetration and weapon damage from the set bonuses, plus the near 100% uptime of the minor Vulnerability debuff, that comes with the concussion status effect. And possibly the added uptime of off balance from your wall of lightning (Unstable or Blockade).