It's hard af the first time. Atleast it was for me. And drop rate of the weapon you want doesn't make it any better lolZ

It will be very hard your first run and the normal version wont prepare you. Here's some starter tips:

-Take your time and take breaks when it gets frustrating. As long as you keep the quest you can leave and do other things and when you come back you'll start at the beginning of the round you're on.

-You'll get through stage 4 and think "Well that's not so bad" and then wipe 100 times on stage 5 and twice that on stage 9. Just pay attention to mechanics and try to learn what spawns and where.

-On the topic of mechanics, RNG and the mechanics of each stage will kill you more often then the enemies will. Learning to take the boss round of stage 5 slow instead of fast, mitigating the damage of the spinning blades in round 2, avoiding the poison in stage 7, etc.

-To start, when you die, respawn at wayshrine. You'll start back up just outside the arena and you wont waste tons and tons of sould gems.

-Understand that your prize at the end is likely to be the opposite of what you want it to be. Keep at it

I have been curious about how shacklebreaker would work in there. Might be tough. As a mag sorc with no pet I'd recommend a skill set up like this as a beginner:

Bar 1: Sharpened or Infused Lightning with shock enchant
Inner Light
Endless Fury
Bound Aegis
Boundless Storm
Hardened Ward
Destruction Ultimate

Bar 2: Sharpened Lightning staff with damage enchant
Power Surge
Haunting Curse
Bound Aegis
Wall of Elements
Liquid Lightning
Shooting Star

Start with your backbar and drop your AOE then switch to front and use heavy attacks as your main attack. Use endless fury to finish off enemies and get back magicka. Use haunting curse on bosses and high HP enemies only. Always keep your power surge and ward up. I added boundless storm as the initial speed boost is helpful and gives you some solid damage mitigation as well as a decent AOE but it's a flex spot and you can add anything. If you have trouble with sustain maybe go with dark conversion there.

You can put wall of elements on the front bar and Boundless on the back if you'd like. This would allow you to slot shooting star on the front bar and destro ult on the back giving you more front bar magic. I find it's easier to have my buffs and AOE on the backbar though.

If you have trouble with Shackle/Slimecraw go with Spinners or Julianos and swap to Ilambris/Grothdar

Danksta wrote: »

Wrecking_Blow_Spam wrote: »

Honestly I don't wanna crush your dreams but all that grind for one weapon which you may never get? It's not worth it!

If you want to challenge yourself and beat VMA for fun then by all means but unless you have golden balls, I wouldn't put all your hopes in getting the singular weapon that you desire.

^This. I almost quit playing vMA after about 50 runs because I was grinding for weapons and not getting the ones I wanted. I then decided to just play to improve my times/scores and when I did that it didn't seem like a grind anymore, in fact I started to enjoy it. Also for PvP, a vMA destro staff isn't going to make or break your build. It's an extra ~200 spell damage with an enchant you'll end up overriding with a poison.

Yes, I was getting frustrated with my drops too. Here's an example for OP: I wanted a vMA lightning staff for my PvE build and on my third run I got one in powered. Probably the worst trait for me. I did it over and over again getting the best bows and two handed weapons, I got 3 sharpened Infernos, 1 charged, 1 nirnhoned, 1 infused, but no other lightning staves at all. Finally, on around my 100 something run I opened up the chest and hot damn it's a lightning staff! In powered Pretty much broke my spirit for the grind. Since then I went to running it for improved times and to try to make the weekly leaderboards. I've enjoyed it much more since then even though I often still go to bed enraged. At least I haven't shattered my TV screen yet. Silver linings ya know?

I suggest you Spinner, 4 infal aether, 2 illambris