The issue with solo play

SoLooney · September 2017

"im a magicka toon and use dual wield abilities" well there you go, youre trying to use stamina abilities lol, youre not playing a magplar either.
no offense but overland content and quests are incredibly easy. until you hit those vet dlc dungeons and vet trials, everything else is truly a joke

MehrunesFlagon · September 2017

Jhalin wrote: »

Solo content is braindead easy. You hardly need any dps for it and even bare minimum sustain or defensive abilities are enough to never die.

If you've been paying attention to your gear, then there is no challenge to be had in overland content

even if you aren't even paying attention.

Magdalina · September 2017

Seems you have already gotten some good advices, I'll just add a couple more things.

This has already been said but once again, hybrids are not very viable because your magicka costing skills scale with max magicka, spell dmg, spell crit and spell penetration, whereas stam costing skills scale with max stamina, weapon dmg, weapon crit and weapon pen. Therefore if you spec for magicka(which is easier as a first character I'd say) your stamina skills will hit like a wet noodle so you might as well ditch them.

This means you'll want sets that buff your max magicka, spell damage, spell crit etc. At low levels basically anything you find will do though(it's more important to have gear of your level than of a good set at low levels), or you can ask someone to craft for you, Julianos and/or Seducer would be great sets to start with. You'll also want to wear light armor if you go the magicka route - pay attention to dem armor passives, they're really really really good.

And food. You really want food if you're struggling with surviveability, either blue max health+max magicka or purple max health+max magicka+mag regen.

You also want light armor active skill - Annulment, it's a great damage shield, biggest source of magicka users surviveability. Unlock it as soon as it becomes available, its power cannot be overrated. Until then, a resto staff on backbar should keep you safe.

The game does an awful job explaining the basics but once you sort that out it really does becomes incredibly easy in its overland part, you'll soon laugh at this

Also you can change most everything about a character lateron - skill morphs, attribute points, even race(for crowns) so no need to give up on it.

If you're on PC I can craft you gear and some food to get you started.

Waffennacht · September 2017

1. Gear must only be a level or 2 below, it's a sharp decline as you out level gear
2. You must "specialize" your character, all mag or all Stam and corresponding abilities and weapons
3. You must learn AC/Weaving
4. Complete gear sets help immensely
5. Always have food/beverages active
6. Mundus
7. Jewelry enchantments
8. Armor enchantments

After you play and learn you can vary stuff, but right out the gate you can't be a "bow wizard"

buttaface · September 2017

Disregard the ignorant comments from elitists ("as if" in a video game) who don't add anything to the discussion. This game would be pretty tough in first person as a newer player, mostly because you haven't learned the main routines and rotations that kill fast and keep you safe yet.

For magicka NB:

1. Strife then morph to funnel health is important. An extremely powerful, cheap skill you can spam on all the mobs you face that will kick in and start healing you. After you put up your refreshing path (see 3 below), make sure to spam this on each mob you are fighting.
2. Siphoning strikes morphed to siphoning attacks. Again important, always have this up and use light attacks between all the weapon and other skills you use.
3. Path of Darkness morphed to refreshing path. This should be your opener when approaching mobs, cast this, make sure you stay in it, make sure mobs are in it, recast as mobs move to keep you and them in it.

4. AFTER getting comfortable with all the above, if you -still- are having trouble surviving, level the skill "blur" into mirage or double take and always keep it up. Also see "harness magicka" below. IMO, you really don't need these much in garden variety pve, and they take up spaces that can go to damage skills, so I'd try to make the above 1-3 be your survival engine and dedicate the other skills to killing. You will probably want to level annulment and mirage eventually though.

As others say, if you are magicka, drop the daggers and other stamina weapons. There ARE magicka builds that use those weapons, but not for beginners. IMO, put a fire or lightning destro staff on both bars. Get the destro passives as soon as they become available. Laying down blockades and your refreshing path will begin to kill things very quickly, so quickly that you may only have time to get off one siphon or none.

Once you are doing all three of the above 1-3, and start using destro staff for elemental blockade, Magicka NB becomes one of the easiest classes to level and quest solo with. There are many nuances, but those are the basics

When coming to mobs, make sure siphoning attacks is up, cast refreshing path, then elemental blockade, then hit each mob with funnel health, spamming a quick light attack between the funnel healths.

Other concerns, as a NB, make sure to have one assassination skill on each bar. While leveling, make sure to have a diverse array of skills from different skill lines on each bar, one from each nightblade skill line on your killing bar if possible to keep progression even, especially the bar you are on when mobs die, and at least one piece of heavy and medium armor on, although it's more important to have at least one heavy than one medium. Make sure to have at least five light armor on, and to fill out the light armor passives before others.

Don't worry about sets too much leveling to 50. DO worry about having "arcane" jewelry with weapon damage glyphs on it of your level if at all possible, and if you join a guild, maybe someone nice will craft you a set of Julianos starting at lvl 25-30. having sets before then is generally a waste on a first character.

If you are still having trouble surviving doing the above, level the skill "annulment" into "harness magicka" This will give you a good damage shield to use in tough fights. However, once you get the hang of the above 3 important skills I listed, you really don't need it in pve. As a magicka NB, you really don't need the resto staff either, but choosing one or the other, I'd choose using the harness magicka damage shield over resto. Later, if you want to heal a group or pvp, you will probably pick up the resto line. As a new player, though, the assassin skills are more important.

Slick_007 · September 2017

Twinner_69 wrote: »

My character has all points in Magicka currently, I've taken Deathstroke II, Impale I, Lotus Fan I, Concealed Weapon I, Rapid Strkes I, and Soul Trap (to refill soul stones). I have dual wield as my main right now, but plan on adding staff soon, either destruction or restoration. Honestly, I feel it has to do with visual queues more than my build or gear. I've been questing pretty hardcore and getting good gear.

you are doing it wrong. my nightblade was for a while too, but really? you're complaining content is too hard while using soul trap on your bar? theres a passive that will get you soul gems for starters.
it is you and your build.

Magdalina · September 2017

buttaface wrote: »

Don't worry about sets too much leveling to 50. DO worry about having "arcane" jewelry with weapon damage glyphs on it of your level if at all possible, and if you join a guild, maybe someone nice will craft you a set of Julianos starting at lvl 25-30. having sets before then is generally a waste on a first character.

*spelldamage. On a magicka build they'll only want spelldamage(imo mag regen/reduced spellcost or basically whatever else works fine on jewelry at low levels though). Sorry, I assume it's a typo but just pointing it out to avoid any possible confusion, don't mean to nitpick.

MrBetadine · September 2017

magplar > warden

MLGProPlayer · September 2017

Solo content in this game is extremely easy. I'm willing to bet that it's a build issue with you (you are using the wrong gear/weapons for your class/role, you are assigning points to all 3 attributes instead of specialising, etc.).

houjo2000b16_ESO · September 2017

Check for guides online- there's likely a lot of things that you're missing that you need to do in order to be decent.

Keep up with gear, practice the guide on animation cancelling (it pretty much doubles the amount of attacks you can do, if you can't learn to do it easily this game will be impossible for you)- and definitely use a guide on a levelling build. The right abilities and stat allocation will double both your damage and survivability and playing the game blind (without checking the right builds) makes you pretty much worthless.

I was running into the same problems- but did all that stuff I just mentioned and difficulties I had for months suddenly have become absurdly easy, it's truly amazing the difference.

You can't just go into ESO without joining the meta, it's the difference between doing 10k and 50k dps, it's that massive a difference.

max_only · September 2017

Sounds like me. I picked nightblade because I was like "stealthy archer, dual wield up close? Yeah boi" but then it took me a few months to realize,

ZOS doesn't know what they want nightblades to be.

Blood mages maybe.

I then played a Templar healer (very straight forward: all magic resto/destro, 5 light 1med, 1 heavy) as I learned the game. It's been a year now and I'm a great nightblade tank imho (not where I thought I'd end up btw) but it's not easy starting off. Nightblade isn't the class I'd pick for new players. They *can* be really great in pvp (ganking if you're into that, although any class can gank just as well) and they are just now starting to pull their weight in endgame pve with this patch but for new players... yeah I'd pick something else.

Rainraven · September 2017

I hear you. I picked nightblade first because I love illusion magic and that was all of it there was, but omg the character I created, I think I made EVERY newbie mistake, including the bow - resto staff cliche.

This game explains nothing, and people who already understand it forget that very easily.

You've gotten some great advice here, I second everything @Rohamad_Ali said, including recommending Lone Wolf Help, there are some fantastic people in that guild.

If you're a top-down thinker who likes and needs the why of how things work, look up Gilliam the Rogue on YouTube.

It won't be too hard for you when you get more info and a better understanding of all the things.

Twinner_69 · September 2017

I switched to Sorcerer and I'm almost the level of my nightblade, so, I guess I'm a Sorcerer now. I'm putting 1/5 Stamina/Magicka. I'm speccing a lot of Daedra Summoning and Dark Magic, so far I haven't died, except when I accidentally attacked a guard setting down my controller. Sigh... I really had my heart set on an Argonian Nightblade, but I just can't take the abuse.

Gilvoth · September 2017

Twinner_69 wrote: »

I switched to Sorcerer and I'm almost the level of my nightblade, so, I guess I'm a Sorcerer now. I'm putting 1/5 Stamina/Magicka. I'm speccing a lot of Daedra Summoning and Dark Magic, so far I haven't died, except when I accidentally attacked a guard setting down my controller. Sigh... I really had my heart set on an Argonian Nightblade, but I just can't take the abuse.

someday they will increase the survivability and damage output of nightblades.
but for now sorc is the strongest.

disintegr8 · September 2017

Having never tried a full pet sorcerer, the easiest character for me to run solo on has been a magplar. I don't think that is to do with damage done as much as easy self heals and good resource management - taking down mobs and world bosses over time without dying or running out of resources. I have even soloed a couple of the Vvardenfell world bosses with her.

I have never had any luck with my nightblades - magicka or stamina - they simply run out of resources and don't have the self heals I can manage. My Nord tank is easier to do solo content on than my nightblades - slower but easier.

Having recently tried sorcs - stam and mag - I suspect with a half decent sorcerer pet build, most of the map could be soloed.

sevomd69 · September 2017

buttaface wrote: »

Disregard the ignorant comments from elitists ("as if" in a video game) who don't add anything to the discussion. This game would be pretty tough in first person as a newer player, mostly because you haven't learned the main routines and rotations that kill fast and keep you safe yet.

For magicka NB:

1. Strife then morph to funnel health is important. An extremely powerful, cheap skill you can spam on all the mobs you face that will kick in and start healing you. After you put up your refreshing path (see 3 below), make sure to spam this on each mob you are fighting.
2. Siphoning strikes morphed to siphoning attacks. Again important, always have this up and use light attacks between all the weapon and other skills you use.
3. Path of Darkness morphed to refreshing path. This should be your opener when approaching mobs, cast this, make sure you stay in it, make sure mobs are in it, recast as mobs move to keep you and them in it.

4. AFTER getting comfortable with all the above, if you -still- are having trouble surviving, level the skill "blur" into mirage or double take and always keep it up. Also see "harness magicka" below. IMO, you really don't need these much in garden variety pve, and they take up spaces that can go to damage skills, so I'd try to make the above 1-3 be your survival engine and dedicate the other skills to killing. You will probably want to level annulment and mirage eventually though.

As others say, if you are magicka, drop the daggers and other stamina weapons. There ARE magicka builds that use those weapons, but not for beginners. IMO, put a fire or lightning destro staff on both bars. Get the destro passives as soon as they become available. Laying down blockades and your refreshing path will begin to kill things very quickly, so quickly that you may only have time to get off one siphon or none.

Once you are doing all three of the above 1-3, and start using destro staff for elemental blockade, Magicka NB becomes one of the easiest classes to level and quest solo with. There are many nuances, but those are the basics

When coming to mobs, make sure siphoning attacks is up, cast refreshing path, then elemental blockade, then hit each mob with funnel health, spamming a quick light attack between the funnel healths.

Other concerns, as a NB, make sure to have one assassination skill on each bar. While leveling, make sure to have a diverse array of skills from different skill lines on each bar, one from each nightblade skill line on your killing bar if possible to keep progression even, especially the bar you are on when mobs die, and at least one piece of heavy and medium armor on, although it's more important to have at least one heavy than one medium. Make sure to have at least five light armor on, and to fill out the light armor passives before others.

Don't worry about sets too much leveling to 50. DO worry about having "arcane" jewelry with weapon damage glyphs on it of your level if at all possible, and if you join a guild, maybe someone nice will craft you a set of Julianos starting at lvl 25-30. having sets before then is generally a waste on a first character.

If you are still having trouble surviving doing the above, level the skill "annulment" into "harness magicka" This will give you a good damage shield to use in tough fights. However, once you get the hang of the above 3 important skills I listed, you really don't need it in pve. As a magicka NB, you really don't need the resto staff either, but choosing one or the other, I'd choose using the harness magicka damage shield over resto. Later, if you want to heal a group or pvp, you will probably pick up the resto line. As a new player, though, the assassin skills are more important.

I agree with most of what you're saying... but wouldn't it be easier just to put rest on back bar and start leveling rest skills while levelling?

buttaface · September 2017

Magdalina wrote: »

buttaface wrote: »

Don't worry about sets too much leveling to 50. DO worry about having "arcane" jewelry with weapon damage glyphs on it of your level if at all possible, and if you join a guild, maybe someone nice will craft you a set of Julianos starting at lvl 25-30. having sets before then is generally a waste on a first character.

*spelldamage. On a magicka build they'll only want spelldamage(imo mag regen/reduced spellcost or basically whatever else works fine on jewelry at low levels though). Sorry, I assume it's a typo but just pointing it out to avoid any possible confusion, don't mean to nitpick.

Yep, good catch, spell damage

GreenhaloX · September 2017

Smmokkee wrote: »

Let me be completely honest.. everything aside from a select number of vet dungeons and vtrials is a joke. You have to be doing something wrong with your builds.. are you just light attacking?

Ha ha ha.. you must be smoking something strong, if you call soloing those DLC world boss pits in Wrothgar, Gold Coast or even Hew's Bane a joke. How about those two tigers world boss in Graftwood, or Rage Claw in Eastmarch; perhaps the Gargoyle boss pit in Rivenspire or the Bittergreen boss in Deshaan.. just to spout a few. Solo those and see how much of a joke it is. Sure, if you go everywhere and do everything in a group with healers spamming and a tank or two and other dpsers galore; yeah, all things ESO can be easy, even hardmode. There are many things ESO still a bit rough even for a maxed CP dude who has been on this game for years. Especially with the resistance nerfed from Morrowind patch, a lot of other things, not just vet dungeons or trials, aren't much of a joke anymore.

buttaface · September 2017

sevomd69 wrote: »

I agree with most of what you're saying... but wouldn't it be easier just to put rest on back bar and start leveling rest skills while levelling?

I would keep destro on both bars and -maybe- level a resto skill on one bar. Would probably level more destro skills though at least until you get deep into the destro passives. Heavy lightning attacks are so good on pack mobs, Fire staff boosts single target abilities. Most of all though, the three numbered skills in my prior post turn magicka NB into easy mode in open world. This is, of course, basic stuff, but OP is obviously newer to the game.

Resource management should be no problem making sure to always use siphoning attacks, refreshing path, blockade, funnel health, all are relatively cheap, and once OP gets the hang of those and uses assassin's blade/impale to kill, also cheap, the magicka return from that due to the executioner passive and siphoning should be all that is needed for overland resource mgmt.

Sixsixsix161 · September 2017

I'd like to ask a question, and not nasty or anything, but do you do any research before you put your character together?

I mean, what's the best character for what you want to play, what role does the racial play, if any. Did you use a high elf for your sorc, or any other character that has some decent additives for magicka? You say you're putting points in magicka and stam, but why? If you're a magic user sorc, then your points need to go into magicka. Maybe later some in health, but only till your health gets to about 17k.

You should only use stam if you're building a stam-based sorc.

There are several good websites that have excellent builds for different characters. I visit them all and take notes, and then try to get to a point where I'm satisfied with the info you have and can proceed to make your character from scratch.

If you liked the character you deleted, why didn't you pay the money and respec him/her. You would have gotten all your points back and then re-build it so it can do better.

The one issue I want to pass along, and this is just my opinion, but builds in ESO are pretty narrowly developed. What I mean by that is there is a limit to the useful and/or good builds that are available. You might think that putting points in stam in a sorc when you're building a mag-based character helps you in some way, well, it doesn't. There's not a lot of freedom in the way you build a character in this game.

Also, I know how you feel about first and third person games. I grew up on FPS, and eventually came to WoW, and talking about a difference having to play in third person, but simply said, third person is a much better way to play these games then first person, you must see the entire area around you, not just the first person view in front of you. Please change and in another year, 6 months, or whatever, you'll be used to it.

I wish you the best of luck.

NOTE: Forgot to tell you, don't know if you know this, but in this game the more magicka your character has, the more damage your staff and spells do. The more stam your stam-based character has, the more damage they do. So get gear accordingly.

Chronicburn · September 2017

Put a magplar in heavy armor and hit everything with those spears that heal you

MasterSpatula · September 2017

OP makes it pretty plain he's brand new and just learning the game.

Some players immediately take opportunity to jump on the "LOLgametooeasygitgud" bandwagon.

The overland game is "easy" precisely because it's aimed directly at players like the OP, who don't yet have a clue what they're doing. Minibosses are hard for players in crap gear with no CP and no notion of a rotation (or who may not even have unlocked weapons swap OR may not even have 5 skills yet).

OP, I'd suggest finding a guild, preferably with someone willing to craft you a couple of leveling sets for armor/weapons. Also, don't be afraid to ask for help in zone chat. Not everyone's like the first couple of people who responded to you here. Freely tell people you're new. There are plenty out there who will be happy to give pointers. Some times just sitting back and reading guild chat helps you learn the game by itself. Morph your skills when you get a chance. Try out different ones as you get more skill points to see what works best for you.

And remember, there are good people in this community. The people who like to mock others for not being as good at a video game as they are are a vocal minority, but they are a minority.

sevomd69 · September 2017

MrBetadine wrote: »

magplar > warden

my 90 yo blind grandmother playing stamplar > warden...

sevomd69 · September 2017

Also all those people talking about gear being too low... I've leveled 14 toons... and I only use level 4 then level 14 crafted training armor. (all blue btw).. until 50... I do upgrade weapons every 10 levels...

Everstorm · September 2017

sevomd69 wrote: »

Also all those people talking about gear being too low... I've leveled 14 toons... and I only use level 4 then level 14 crafted training armor. (all blue btw).. until 50... I do upgrade weapons every 10 levels...

Knowing what you're doing is a much bigger boost than proper gear. For a new player having on level gear may just be the edge he/she needs. Leaves more room for errors.

Ps: using lvl 6, 16, 26 etc would be more logical because at those lvls the next tier begins and thus require the least materials.

PlagueSD · September 2017

kaithuzar wrote: »

Some of you guys tldr; put on a resto stave & watch build videos, check out alcast
Duel attacking isn't good for solo, you need a defensive bar

Umm, for stamina characters, dual wield is GREAT for soloing. Lots of survivability built in. Rend, Blood Craze, Blood Thirst all heal and Deadly cloak reduces AoE damage taken. You just need to morph skills for the healing passive. Combined with Armor sets such as Baharah's Curse and Briarheart, you have quite a bit of self healing built in.

Briarheart:

(2 items) Adds 833 Weapon Critical
(3 items) Adds 1096 Max Stamina
(4 items) Adds 833 Weapon Critical
(5 items) When you deal Critical Damage, you have a 10% chance to increase your Weapon Damage by 449 for 10 seconds. While this effect is active, your Critical Strikes heal you for 609 Health. This effect can occur once every 15 seconds.

Baharah's Curse:

(2 Items) Adds 1206 Maximum Health
(3 Items) Adds 1096 Maximum Magicka
(4 Items) Take 40% less damage from traps
(4 Items) Adds 1096 Maximum Stamina
(5 Items) When you deal damage, you have a 25% chance to create desecrated ground for 5 seconds, which reduces the Movment Speed of enemies within by 70%, damages them for 860 Magic Damage every 1 second and heals you for 100% of the damage done.

sevomd69 · September 2017

Everstorm wrote: »

sevomd69 wrote: »

Also all those people talking about gear being too low... I've leveled 14 toons... and I only use level 4 then level 14 crafted training armor. (all blue btw).. until 50... I do upgrade weapons every 10 levels...

Knowing what you're doing is a much bigger boost than proper gear. For a new player having on level gear may just be the edge he/she needs. Leaves more room for errors.

Ps: using lvl 6, 16, 26 etc would be more logical because at those lvls the next tier begins and thus require the least materials.

Actually having my training gear asap and when I'm able to weapon swap is more logical to me... Also the mats didn't matter to me at all, since after leveling all my toons those mats are useless now...

Jawasa · September 2017

@Twinner_69 I see that you lack any sort of heals on your bar that's probably a large part of the problem. On a magicka nb start with strife, shadow cloak, assasins blade. Then you morph then you morph all to the magicka cost version. Put all of your attribute points into magicka aswell. Then I'd go for path of darkness and cripple. This is a good starting bar.

code65536 · September 2017

@Twinner_69 - The best advice that I can offer is that the best defense in this game, for a new character doing overworld content, is a heal. You may be tempted, when faced with the problem of survival, to put points into health or worry about health recovery or don some heavy armor. None of those things will help you nearly as much as being able to just heal yourself. Ideally, passive heals can come as a side effect of doing damage.

This is also why the two most newbie-friendly builds are the magicka Templar (Puncturing Sweeps is your main offensive ability, and it heals you) and magicka Nightblade (Strife, similarly, is a main offensive ability that heals you). Sorcs don't get access to passive heals or their wards until later levels.

If you're not specializing your character into magicka (i.e., if you are putting points into stamina and using physical weapons instead of putting all points into magicka and using staves), consider the healing morphs of dual wield's Flurry and dual-wield's Twin Slashes.

To everyone laughing at how someone can have problems with "easy" content: I started playing on the EU/PC server on the side a few months ago. Starting completely from scratch. I had no gear except for what I found. I couldn't craft gear because I didn't have the traits, the appropriate level in crafting, the necessary mats, or even the skill points to put into crafting. I couldn't ask a friend to craft me proper gear because I knew nobody on EU. I couldn't buy proper gear because I was penniless. When I got myself a Witchmother's Potent Brew recipe, I found that I couldn't craft it because I didn't have the provisioning craft leveled enough to craft purple recipes, and leveling provisioning without an massive hireling-supplied store of mats is actually kinda tricky.

Oh, and needless to say, I also had no CP. Not surprisingly, when I tried normal Maelstrom on EU, it took over an hour and at some points it felt more difficult than my vMA runs (I have multiple Flawless Conquerors on NA). Each of these handicaps--gear that's mismatched, underleveled and low-quality, improper food, no CP, limited passives and skills due to being on a skill-point-starved low-level character--are minor on their own, but when combined, you can definitely feel the effect. (Yes, I still cleared nMA without too much pain, but afterwards I scrapped my plans of using nMA as a grind spot to level my EU character.)

When your stats are so weak that abilities hit like that of a tank, when your self-heals have trouble keeping up with some of the incoming damage, when your character has ***-poor mitigation and things actually hurt, it doesn't matter if you know how the play the game or how to do a rotation--"easy" content isn't going to be the kind of blindfolded cakewalk that you're used to it being.

Now imagine adding one more handicap to that list: the lack of player experience. Because at least I still had my experience. I knew exactly how to spend my attributes, what skills I should prioritize getting, how to weave, etc.

Yes, overworld content is a joke... for me and you. But not for someone who's just starting out.

idk · September 2017

WBs can offer a slight challenge outside of the DLCs and besides that almost everything overworld can be done solo for any player who has been around for awhile unless their build is bad.

The main reason Zos does not make it more difficult is for new players. Coming into the game without CP and the ability to make most worthwhile gear is the only way overworld, outside of the DLC bosses mentioned, is a challenge.

There may be some changes that OP can make to their build or try a different approach if what I have said is not what he/she is experiencing.