Tips on my Magicka DK Tank Build

Ariisen · October 2015

Hi everyone, I'm currently working on a Magicka DK, focusing on PVE and small scale PVP CC.

I don't care about having a good damage output because i rarely play alone on Cyrodill and this build is an attempt on being an immortal punchingball.
I want to have 30K healht without using food (35K in Cyro), so i can drink to heavily improve my regen.

I currently have 147 CP.

Basic Idea

Considering the IC patch changes on stamina recovery and tanking in general I'm considering a build heavily focused on sustain and resource management while also having a large supply of health, 30K~ a decent amount of magicka 25K~ and a decent pool of stamina 15K+.

The problem is I don't really know how to get to those numbers because I've always played as a DPS and this is my first attempt on building a tank.

Race and Attribute Points

My early decision when starting the character (currently I'm VR1) was the Imperial, because its bonuses on health and stamina would have allowed me to focus more on magicka later on and have a larger resource pool.
I'm thinking on this attributes setup for VR16:
MAGICKA 20, STAMINA10, HEALTH 34

Gear

For the armor 5 heavy, 1 medium, 1 light for the Undaunted Mettle.

2 Engine Guardian for the sustain, 5 Twice Born Star to have two mundus, all divines (maybe chest and legs infused?)
2 Endurance\2 Endurance (Sword and Board on both bars) and 3 Willpower for the jewelry.

For the enchantments I think of going mostly Health with Magicka on 1-2 pieces (legs and chest?) and Stamina on both shields.
Arcane Rings and Necklace with enchantments on Magicka Recovery.
As the Imperial passives gives me back health after physical attacks, I'm thinking about enchanting both swords to return Magicka.

Mundus

The Mage and The Tower.

Skills

First bar
Ransack, Dragon Firse Scale, Choking Talons, Hardened Armor, Green Dragon Blood ULT: Standard of Might

The Second bar is still pretty much empty because currently I'm still testing\levelling some skills up.

Champion Points

I have no idea whatsover, currently I'm putting the reds on The Steed (Block Expertise, Resistant), the greens on Magicka Recovery (I think The Lover?) and the blues on Blade Expert because I like the later bonuses of the Atronach most.

Do you think I can get the number I want with this setup?
And, more importantly, do you guys wich have tanked for longer than me and are more expert than me in building for endgame PVE think this build is viable?

Anticipated thanks to anyone who read all of this!

Ariisen · October 2015

Shameless bump.

Shinra · October 2015

Looks like an interesting idea and could work pretty well. Of course, there are some improvements you could make:

1. Mundus: Attronarch -- The stone which lets you spam dragonblood without ever going out of magicka.
2. It's already hard reaching your attribute goals with food. It will probably be impossible with regen-drinks.
3. Your skills need refinement. basically you will probably want one bar for tanking bosses and one for mobs.

... You don't really need regen-drinks anyway. Staminaregeneration is a lost cause and you are better of regenerating your stamina with obsidian shard (the one which heels you) and obsidian shield. For magicka recovery, I would suggest Attronarch as mundus stone, and the enchantments on your jewelry will do the rest.

BeanBagGamer · October 2015

Honestly its a terrible idea to try be a magicka DK tank, its totally unsustainable with high end content even if you had 40k health. I tried it when IC first came out and I have had a few friends playing with it for the last month and its horrible.

You will need healing permanently and still wont have the survivability of a block stamina tank. You'll probably spend so much time ensuring you are always buffed and shielded with abilities you'll lose aggro and with the healer having to spend so much time on you and aggro lost your team mates will die. You'll pretty much just end up more of a burden than anything.

I can give you a good sustainable stamina tank build if you need, but forget magicka tank for a DK.

BeanBagGamer · October 2015

If you can get this to work I would like to see the finished build so let me know how it goes.

I'd ask your team mates most importantly the healer what they think to see if you have something worth using.

Ariisen · October 2015

Thanks for the answers.

Shinra wrote: »

Looks like an interesting idea and could work pretty well. Of course, there are some improvements you could make:

1. Mundus: Attronarch -- The stone which lets you spam dragonblood without ever going out of magicka.
2. It's already hard reaching your attribute goals with food. It will probably be impossible with regen-drinks.
3. Your skills need refinement. basically you will probably want one bar for tanking bosses and one for mobs.

... You don't really need regen-drinks anyway. Staminaregeneration is a lost cause and you are better of regenerating your stamina with obsidian shard (the one which heels you) and obsidian shield. For magicka recovery, I would suggest Attronarch as mundus stone, and the enchantments on your jewelry will do the rest.

1. If I remove the Tower to put the Atronach won't I have a too low Stamina pool unless I switch to food? (Point 2)
2. That's bad news... I might consider changing the Tower\Regen-Food combo with Atronach\Food.
3. That's for sure lol, I'm still testing the various shields\buffs as well as the S&B skills to understand what to use and what to avoid.

BeanBagGamer wrote: »

Honestly its a terrible idea to try be a magicka DK tank

I can give you a good sustainable stamina tank build if you need, but forget magicka tank for a DK.

I don't know... a friend of mine is a Stamina tank and I dunno if it has something to do with is build being bad or with the lack of stamina morphs but he literally uses no DK skills outside Dragon Blood and the Ultimates.

I will gladly listen to your build and consider the stamina way. But I still want at lest to try being magicka so I'll craft a purple V14 and try to tank some veteran content before wasting 650 rubedo in a V16 set for something unplayable...

BeanBagGamer · October 2015

If he's only using dragons blood then he's a terrible tank lol Dragon blood sits on my back bar and is never used unless its a last resort.

All points in Stamina and the Tower Mundus stone.

I would farm yourself the vet 16 Engine Guardian set if you don't have it along with a 5 piece Footman's although this is still only max VET 14 it cant be missed due to the 12% block mitigation. (why all sets don't drop at VET 16 is for a whole other thread, lets just say its dumb lol). You can play around with the second set a bit but I still prefer 5 piece Hist bark, if its not broke don't fix it, Although I have thought about playing around with twice born star to see if I can get some extra magicka recovery.

5 Heavy - 1 light - 1 medium Mundus on small pieces and infused on Large all pretty standard. Use health glyphs.

1st Bar
Ransack or Piece Armour, Defence Stance, Hardened armour, Igneous Shields, and chocking Talons. - Corrosive Armor

2nd Bar
Inner Rage, Extended Chains, .Burning Embers, Eruption and Coagulating blood. - Standard of Might or War Horn.

Champion points in reduces cost of stam abilities, Blocking expert, hardy, spell resistance, maybe some in heavy armour and Blessed.

The aim is to have a large stamina pool with at least 25k health and use potions to restore magicka for buffs.

Spam Igneous shield for stamina and ultimate, make sure defensive stance and hardened armour are always up this will all prox engine guardian to restore stamina. Burning Embers & Eruption to control mobs and use chains to bring them to you.

Unfortunately tanking with the stamina recovery changes you will sometimes still find yourself low on stamina so just make sure the healer is running shards and can throw you one, any good healer should be doing this anyway.

xarguideb17_ESO · October 2015

Tried magicka dk tank. Didn't like it. You can't have too much magicka bc you need other stats. So your damage is kinda going to suck. If you go heavy into stamina like a true tank, you can't make much use of the magicka abilities. However you can concentrate on magicka and ult regen and stam skills will hit decently. You can forget about stam regen bc you block a lot. This idea works for me, but it just makes me sad I can't use whip. Whip makes dk cool IMO. I wish there was a stamina morph for it.

Ariisen · October 2015

BeanBagGamer wrote: »

All points in Stamina and the Tower Mundus stone.

I would farm yourself the vet 16 Engine Guardian set if you don't have it along with a 5 piece Footman's although this is still only max VET 14 it cant be missed due to the 12% block mitigation. (why all sets don't drop at VET 16 is for a whole other thread, lets just say its dumb lol). You can play around with the second set a bit but I still prefer 5 piece Hist bark, if its not broke don't fix it, Although I have thought about playing around with twice born star to see if I can get some extra magicka recovery.

I had Footman's in mind when I first started to think about my tank. But considering I wanted to maximize stats as much as possible I opted for 3 Willpower-2 Endurance.

1500 Magicka\Health is better Imho than Health, Spell\Physical Resistance.
The difference is the 12% mitigation instead of spell damage.. wich indeed puts Footman's on a better spot.
In the end tough, having 5 Footman, 5 Twice Born Star, 2 Engine Guardian wouldn't allow any changes.

If I instead start building with 3 Willpower\2 Endurance and the RNG is good with me I can switch to 2 Endurance\2 Willpower (changing only 1 ring) and put the Master Sword\Maelstrom Sword (one day...) and be overall better.

Your build seems very good to me even tough I think I'll forget to drink potions a lot of times if I were to use it...
If my magicka build proves ineffective and going stamina is necessary I think I'll try playing around with yours to see what I can do.

Darsaga · October 2015

I have been testing a pretty odd build myself. So far I disagree with all the naysayers in this thread. The best test for the build so far has been on V16 WGT.

This may only work because I have a fair amount of CP for being a console only player, who knows. Currently around 230

Race is Nord I selected this when the game first came out not intended on this build. I do how ever feel it helps it work very well.

I have all my skill points in Magicka and Attronach Boon

5 Piece Seducer Heavy
2 Piece Engine Guardian Heavy or 2 piece Blood Spawn light/medium
3 Piece Endurance Amulet Sword and Board
2 Piece Will Power Rings

Engine Guardian are both critical resist (still trying to farm better traits)
Chest piece is infused
Boots are nirnhoned
Everything else divines

All enchantments on armor Health
Two reduce magic cost on jewelry one magic regen
Restore stamina on weapons

Bar One
Inner Rage, Igneous Shield, Green Dragon Blood, Hardened Armor, Defensive Stance, Magma Armor

Bar Two
Pierce Armor, Extended Chains, Essence Drain (works as aoe taunt), Heroic Slash, Choking Talons, Standard of Might

I use purple V15 Food Stats buffed come in around:
24k Magic, 24k Health, 17k Stamina, 28k Spell Resist, 20-22k Physical
Magic Recovery 1100, Health Recovery 500ish, Stamina Regen w/green blood 1k, 700ish w/out

The numbers look scary for a tank but it has been working very well. Believe it or not I almost never need a spear shard because if I get low on Stamina I spam Igneous Shield and fill it up. By the time stam runs out magic is nearly full or an Ultimate is ready. It also helps proc Engine Guardians if I'm running that set.

The build does take a disciplined tank. No Spaming taunts, blocking when needing to block not just holding it relying on a huge stamina pool, and filling your ult with the use of igneous and heroic slash.

Champion Points need to be spent on reduced block cost self healing (blessed and quick recovery), and reduced magic/magic regen.

The build isn't exactly where I want it due to random drops and I'm still pondering other things that I may change but this build works really well. The best part is a quick gear change and you are also a max spell damage DK.

I got these numbers as close as I can remember if I left something out let me know.

americansteel · October 2015

I have a V2 DK magic DPS not a tank although I use shield and board only because of the extra armor resistance and I can put a trait on it like divines, shield assault and of course for looks with my heavy armor.
I use 5 seducer and 2 torugs pact with my shield being the third torug pact for the extra health.
my rings are just what I find at the moment in PvE areas is like add extra magicka and or health or recovery.
I use apprentice for my Templar and DK for the extra speel damage my Templar all heavy is 2700 spell damage.
I have ran several dungeons with my dragon knight with a taunt on but its not the greatest I don't use health recovery or stam recovery like a PvE tank should use.
5 heavy 2 lights is a good thing to do with magick DPS build like a DK or Templar.
I don't do much PVP but last night I went into IC and managed to kill a few banana NBs and 2 sorcs, the same players of course but I managed it with my small group.
I used extended chains talons and then lava whip, when I use reflective scales the spells those sorcs casted at me were hitting them I see their health bars go down so that was nice to see that. I eel thought a DK is nothing more than a defensive support role for a group but that's just me.
I put most of my atts into magick atleast 12 in health and 10 in stamina. most in magicka. when I get to V16 ill build new armor with divines trait.

caperon · October 2015

BeanBagGamer wrote: »

Honestly its a terrible idea to try be a magicka DK tank, its totally unsustainable with high end content even if you had 40k health. I tried it when IC first came out and I have had a few friends playing with it for the last month and its horrible.

You will need healing permanently and still wont have the survivability of a block stamina tank. You'll probably spend so much time ensuring you are always buffed and shielded with abilities you'll lose aggro and with the healer having to spend so much time on you and aggro lost your team mates will die. You'll pretty much just end up more of a burden than anything.

I can give you a good sustainable stamina tank build if you need, but forget magicka tank for a DK.

Thats not true.

I'm a magicka heavy tank and I do perfectly fine. I've completed hard mode vIC and hard mode vWGT with the build i posted here:

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/2375620/#Comment_2375620

I even could drop hist bark and use seducer or magnus and i would do fine. Or drop footman for willpowere jewelry and 1 regen bonus if I want to do dps (I like being a true tank, althought the game discourages it).

Armitas · October 2015

I guess you are looking for a PvE magicka tank mostly? Here is what I use for PvE tanking.

5 Seducer, engine guardian, 2 werewolf rings (Robust), potentates set (s/b +ammy) and deaths wind S/B for my boss bar. Jewelry glyphs are 2 reduce magicka cost and 1 block reduction...or reverse, I forget attm.

AOE Bar for mob waves and trash. (Pact S/B + Dawn Breaker)
1. Reflective Scales
2.Draw Essence
3.Choking Talons
4.Mystic Orb - If someone is already running this use burning embers for a cheap chance at engine proc. Or put any group buff here that does not cost stamina.
5.DK chains

Boss Bar (Deaths Wind S/B + variable Ultimate)
1.Defensive Posture
2.Coagulating Dragon Blood
3.Igneous Shield
4.Volatile Armor
5. Inner Rage

You can perma block in this build by using igneous shield for stam return, pact set + Dawnbreaker for battle roar return, and to avoid having to block add waves you can CC them with talons and step back. You can avoid having to block projectiles via Reflective scales and igneous shield. Make sure you hit light attack and immediately cancel it with block fairly reguarly to keep your ulty charging and hit igneous shield for the 3 extra ultimate every six seconds. The faster you cycle your ulty the more stamina you will have.

If I could get my hands on two defending warrior rings I'd use those instead of the werewolf rings.

Also you can use your DK chains to Teleport across the battlefield further avoiding melee hits from mobs like the ghosts in COH or the daedroth in banished cells final boss. Just hit the boss and you will move to him. This will save you on a lot of stamina as well, because you don't need to block enemies that can't reach you.

Do not attempt this build in PvP.