Shineko wrote: »

Whenever you level up you will always be met with a decision, what do I spend my Attribute points on? For some, this is quite obvious. A pure mage may only want to spend a lot of time buffing their mana pool with some to their HP, but if you choose a more hybrid route, choosing the wrong points for too long can lead to some problems all across the board.

Quick notes about HP, Stamina and MP

Health: Upgrading this increases your survivability all classes should ideally have some points in this but how many depends largely on your playstyle.

Stamina: Improves the amount of time(s) you have to run, roll/dodge, and use non-staff weapon abilities.

Magic: Essentially every 'Class' ability will in some manner use Mana. At least most of the time. This increases your mana pool allowing you to spam non weapon abilities.

NOTE: Your armor choice should also reflect the intentions of your character but is not absolutely necessary. Light Armor has passive buffs for Mana, Medium for Stamina, and Heavy for HP.

The Golden Rule
If your focus is on Class Abilities you need Mana. If your focus is on non-staff weapons, you need Stamina. If you need more survivability to deal enough damage to kill things of your level, you need Health or better Armor or both.

If you find yourself running out of Mana and not Stamina but you use both. You probably need more Mana and vice-versa.


When it comes to actually allocating your points, I like to think of them in ratios.
MP : HP : STA

A pure hybrid class would simply allocate 1:1:1 or 1:2:1. For every 1 or 2 Points of HP, you put 1 in STA and 1 in MP.

You have 5 Abilities on your cast bar at max and should do some planning and thinking ahead before selecting them. Keep late game in mind as well.

Salvaging a Mistake!
Perhaps you put the wrong point in. Perhaps you decide to switch play styles. Mistakes can be costly or they can be nothing at all.

If you switch from a class that uses pure mana to one that uses nothing but stamina, it's going to hurt. A lot. You will likely need to do an attribute reset, the sooner the better.

However, if you are switching from something of a 1:3:0 ratio to something more along the lines of 1:2:1 and you aren't an incredibly high level, you can even out the score by spending points on stamina and mana and nothing else. You always get all 3 attributes when you level you just have the choice of making one even better with an attribute point.

Class Examples
Pure Tank
Become nigh unstoppable.
Recommended Attribute Ratio [MP:HP:STA]: 2:5:1, 1:5:1, or 1:5:2

• Select a class that has healing or allows healing from damage dealt.
• Select abilities that largely provide crowd control and sustain at the cost of lower damage output.
• Prioritize on health but do not let it be the end all. You need mana/stamina for abilities that refund you HP.
• Heavy armor adds more survivability and is augmented by heavy armor passives. Medium armor is viable but less so and Light Armor will get you killed a lot.

Pure Mage
Rend your foes with magics.
Recommended Attribute Ratio [MP:HP:STA]: 3:5:0, 4:5:0, or 1:1:0

• Select a class that prioritizes on spell casting.
• Use any Staff of your choice.
• Prioritize on a mix between Heatlh and Mana. Only get as much mana as you need. HP becomes more important against strong enemies, esp if you opt for light armor..
• Light armor augments your mana and mana regen so that you can stay casting in combat longer.
• Alternatively, Heavy Armor will add health sustain at the cost of mana regen. If you opt for this, expect to spend more attributes on Mana. Medium armor is almost worthless to a stamina-free mage.

Pure Weapons Master
Be unparalleled in physical weapon combat.
Recommended Attribute Ratio [MP:HP:STA]: 0:2:1, 0:4:3, 0:5:4, or 0:1:1

• The class you choose is largely unimportant as all classes can use all weapons.
• However, you might opt for an ability or two from your class inside your weapon swap rotation so don't completely ignore it.
• Prioritize on a mix between Heatlh and Stamina. Only get as much stamina as you need. HP becomes more important against strong enemies.
• Medium armor is incredibly useful due to the Stamina perks as well as offering moderate protection.
• Alternatively, Heavy Armor will add health sustain at the cost of stamina regen. If you opt for this, expect to spend more attributes on Stamina. Light armor is almost worthless to a mana-free / low mana user.

Battle Mage / Spell Sword / Hybrid
With spell and sword, foes will be torn apart.
Recommended Attribute Ratio [MP:HP:STA]: 1:4:1, 1:3:1, 1:2:1, or 1:1:1

• Pick the class you prefer the most. Spell sword is incredibly diverse and most people, inadvertently, are this.
• Prioritize on a mix between Health, Stamina and Mana. Only get as much stamina and mana as you need. HP becomes more important against strong enemies.
• Whichever Armor suits your play style. Light = squishy mana, Medium = stamina, Heavy = resilient health

Pure Healer (for off Healer see Spell Sword or Mage)
Everyone shut up, I'm trying to heal.
Recommended Attribute Ratio [MP:HP:STA]: 4:3:0, 4:2:0 (blaze it), 4:1:0, 1:0:0

• Pick a class that has a healing specialization [such as Templar]
• Your absolute main priority is going to be Mana. Unlike other classes who rely on killing things, yours is keeping things alive at all times.
• This is most viable for group PvE and PvP but is terrible at Solo PvE.
• Light Armor will be very beneficial for the Mana Regen. Heavy armor is a waste of HP Regen. Just augment it with HP Attribute Points.
• This is one of the only classes that can get away with more Mana than HP. Always have enough HP to survive a burst attack, other than that. You need mana. 4:2:0 works best. 4:1:0 is riskier. 4:3:0 is safer but might result in sub-optimal burst healing.

Ffastyl wrote: »

I ended up with a hybrid Templar build that, counter to hybrid stereotypes, defeats most builds in single-combat. I focused on Stamina with an attribute distribution of 0:40:22 (MP:HP:SP), applying Stamina glyphs to all my armor and focusing on regeneration. It looks like a Stamina build at first glance, and initially it was, but I have 5 Magicka abilities slotted across both bars, classifying me as a hybrid. I use primarily Heavy Armor with one to two pieces of Medium Armor for Stamina management. I am a Breton, so I get a +10% to Max Magicka and +3% Cost Reduction for spells, allowing me to get away with 0 Magicka attribute points.

But verifying the viability of hybrid builds aside,

oneshot_onekill wrote: »

1. Long range dps (bow) with crowd control/AOE abilities. Some buff and probably 1 or two healing abilities. What I'm trying to do with this build is stay far, do some good AOE damage with my bow, control crowds and have 1 or two healing abilities to help me and others. I would probably run a 5 light armor pieces and two med armor pieces for the magicka passives and since i won't be up in there face a lot i don't need the armor. This is more for like group play and not 1v1, obviously.

No secondary weapon is mentioned here, which will play a big part in bridging your weaknesses or bolstering your strengths. So for now I will assume a double Bow setup.

This build will be effective and long to medium range, requiring some gap maker for close range encounters. Dodge roll can fulfill this with the Hasty Retreat passive, but using CC such as Magnum Shot or Binding Javelin can work too.

Bow is lacking in the punch melee weapons offer, simply because it's ranged, not on the fault of the bow. This means you will not score as many kills, however neither Templar nor Bow is lacking in debuffs and CCs. From a range, you can easily debilitate enemies, making them easy kills for your allies (Healing debuff, snares, roots, poison DoTs, knockback, etc.).
If you truly want to up your damage, focus on the poison morphs of Bow skills.

Being in 5 Light Armor makes you extremely vulnerable to physical attacks, which includes poison. You will be weak to any melee encounters and fellow archers on the battlefield. The Light Armor and healing spells will identify you as a healer, causing experienced players to target you.
This is where your defensive abilities become imperative. Without some defense against physical attacks such as a damage shield, you will crumple fast under pressure.

"oneshot_onekill wrote: »

2. One hand and shield, more tank-like play style than above, almost all if not all crowd control healing/ buff abilities. I would run 5 pieces medium armor and 2 pieces light armor, more med armor for the stamina and defense over light armor and the two pieces of light armor for magicka passives. I May use two pieces of heavy armor instead of the light armor, I just need to be able to consistently heal others and don't know which I should pick. I need help on that lol.

Medium Armor does have thrice the protection of Light, but it is not on par with Heavy Armor. Medium Armor will stop a fatal blow but it will not allow you to stand in harms way as you please. Like the build above, you will need to be weary of incoming players. You will have to get out of dodge when more than one or two are coming your way. Luckily, Medium Armor offers reduction to roll dodging so you can flee a bit easier.

I recommend Dual Wield as a secondary, for Quick Cloak combined with Medium Armor's Evasion makes for a reliable escape tool.

In Medium Armor, it requires a focus on evasion to be tanky. If you have the skill to stay on your toes, your combined offense and defense will make you someone that cannot easily be ignored.

In the thick of battle I still recommend holding back a bit from the front line until you see an opportunity to charge, such as an exposed flank.


The best way to improve builds is to duel. 1v1's reveal your shortcomings which would otherwise be covered by the group in larger fights.
However the best way to invent new builds is on the battlefield, where there are others to cover your newfound weaknesses.



Hybrids have versatility. They will not be the best at something, but they will be good at everything.
"My strength is that I have no weaknesses. My weakness is that I have no strengths."

Ffastyl wrote: »

Considering enchantments play into max resources as well, an attribute ratio is not definitive. I tweaked my resources until the max values were at comfortable levels. The servers are offline now so I cannot provide specific numbers, but I have about 11k Magicka, 17k Stamina, and 21k Health. These maximum values are more important than the attribute distribution.
I find 11k Magicka paired with my 1k respective regeneration is enough for my needs. Magicka abilities to me are utility, not offense. They buff myself and debuff enemies, with a little healing. My damage comes from Stamina, primarily weapon abilities, so I squeezed out as much Stamina as I could once I found where I was comfortable with the other resources. I also primarily tank in PvE, so Stamina is necessary to block, taunt, and dodge.

I originally was 7:30:25 and switched to 5:31:26 when I wanted a little more Health and Stamina, and later removed Magicka entirely as Breton racial passives give me all I need.

My focus is regeneration, with 1.4k Health and Stamina regeneration and my 23k - 32k (unbuffed - buffed) resistances, I do not use big heals.

The best advice anyone can give you in terms of resource distribution is "Put points into the one you run out of most."


Light Armor is light armor. If you plan to take hits, it's not the best choice, however a shield provides immense bonuses to blocking. Light Armor tanks are possible, but much harder to create than Medium and Heavy Armor tanks due to the lack of Armor. While all armors have each mitigation option available, they each specialize in their own:
Light Armor has damage shields
Medium Armor has evasion
Heavy Armor has armor

To be truly tanky you will need to combine multiple or all mitigation options, focusing on the one your primary armor is good at.
One Hand and Shield also has Low Slash in its arsenal, which reduces the target's outgoing damage by 15%. Making use of this in melee encounters can be imperative to survival.

Your race is Redguard which gets bonuses to Max Stamina, Stamina Regeneration, and Stamina Regeneration in melee combat. You will likely not need to put as many points into Stamina as your racial passives cover it somewhat. "Somewhat" because only you will know if the Stamina offered by your racial passives is enough for your playstyle.