How Does Ultimate Generate?

MilwaukeeScott · January 2017

I've searched for a few hours and there is a lot of contradictory information.

"Only light attacks generate Ultimate"
"All damage and heals generate Ultimate"
"Rich Lambert has secret fairies who whimsically spread Ultimate"

Ignoring armor sets, passives and skills that boost or generate Ultimate, what are the basic means of generating Ultimate?

susmitds · January 2017

Light attack and heavy attacks gives you 3 ultimate/sec for 8 secs.

Certain skills and passives can do it too.

MilwaukeeScott · January 2017

Ignoring armor sets, passives and skills, Light and Heavy attacks are the ONLY way to generate Ultimate then?

Curragraigue · January 2017

Yes the all damage and heals generate ult was the original method for ult gen. They changed it in 1.5-1.6 I think to light attacks and heavy attacks starting ult regen every eight seconds to make people weave and to stop the healing springs spam to ult gen (which was a thing). A few passives, skills and sets also boost or add set amounts of ult.

Jim_Pipp · January 2017

I'm not meaning to spread misinformation but I am pretty sure blocking damage also generates ultimate.

Source - I was solo-ing wayrest sewers the other day on my stam sorc who has no ranged attacks... there is a boss who you can only fight at range and I only realised when I was already in combat so couldn't adjust skills... I found two skeever in the corner of the room and let them beat on me to generate ultimate, and then over about 20 minutes beat the boss by using overload light attacks. I was healing occasionally, but not often because they are skeevers... (p.s. I had an increasingly rare 'I love ZOS' moment because I was so glad they put those skeevers there).

susmitds · January 2017

Jim_Pipp wrote: »

I'm not meaning to spread misinformation but I am pretty sure blocking damage also generates ultimate.

Source - I was solo-ing wayrest sewers the other day on my stam sorc who has no ranged attacks... there is a boss who you can only fight at range and I only realised when I was already in combat so couldn't adjust skills... I found two skeever in the corner of the room and let them beat on me to generate ultimate, and then over about 20 minutes beat the boss by using overload light attacks. I was healing occasionally, but not often because they are skeevers... (p.s. I had an increasingly rare 'I love ZOS' moment because I was so glad they put those skeevers there).

You don't generate ultimate with blocking without special sets like Werewolf Hide and Tava's. Also which boss is only ranged?

MissBizz · January 2017

When you do a light attack (or heavy attack whatever) you will gain X ultimate over 8 seconds. So for the 8 seconds you have the "gain ultimate buff" let's say.

If you heal someone who has that "gain ultimate buff" you gain ultimate. Pretty much this way a healer who is JUST healing still gains ultimate.

So yeah, ignoring sets etc. you need to do basic attacks to gain ultimate, or heal someone who is doing that.

MilwaukeeScott · January 2017

MissBizz wrote: »

If you heal someone who has that "gain ultimate buff" you gain ultimate. Pretty much this way a healer who is JUST healing still gains ultimate.

Wow!

Is this documented? Can you point me to a source for this information?

Jim_Pipp · January 2017

@susmitds thanks for clarifying - It must have been generating off heals because I was trying not to kill the skeevers.

I'm googling the wayrest sewers and I can't see anyone describing the boss - I'm finding it weird because I literally did it the other day and you don't forget a fight you win so slowly.

It was a breton in a large square room. You come in through a door onto a ledge, by dropping off to the left you land in a stack of mucrabs. Opposite the the ledge you come in on is a mirror image ledge, and on there was the boss. I couldn't find any way up, and he couldn't find any way down. He has a fair few range abilities, but only one that hit hard and knocked me back. There is no way to leave the room once the fight starts, you can't get back up to the door you came in on, and the sewer gate (on the far left of where you come in) is locked until the boss dies.

Does that ring any bells? At the time I wondered if it was a glitch in where the boss was placed as I didn't remember the fight from when I used to run dungeons regularly, but I've never had a character without ranged attacks before.

Integral1900 · January 2017

The game doesn't bother to tell you, most of this information comes from people designing addons which gather data from the game engine, also trial and error basically. The in game guide is useless, the only thing to be done with it is bin it and have someone from the outside come in and re write a new one.

The only reason I knew light attacks generaletd ultimate was because I saw in on YouTube vids, two years after launch

then went in game, turned on the bit that shows your actual ultimate number and tried to generate it without using light or heavy attacks, just abilities, and as expected the ultimate level didn't move. Only the basic attacks and one or two niche abilities with minor heroism made it move.

I love this game, I really do but even I have to admit it's explanation of its own system is useless. To find out just how bad try this, stand in any city in the game and ask chat what, stunned, silenced and snared mean. Yes I am serious. You will find that out of all the players in that zone, possibly hundreds of them, less than five percent can describe more than one or them.

Kamatsu · January 2017

I'm puzzled by the comments above that state you only get ultimate when you light/heavy attack , and that ZOS made it thus to force light/heavy weaving... because I do not light/heavy weave and get ultimate.

I have played all 4 classes, to at least level 30, and only ever used class or weapon attack skills and still get ultimate. Yes some of the classes have passives which have ultimate generation tied to skills/potions... but not every class has these, and these passives are only in play when you have skill points in them. I have gotten ultimate from class/weapon skills without any of these passives having skill points in them.

Passives they are likely talking about:

NB Siphoning: Catalyst = x Ultimate when using a potion
NB Siphoning: Transfer = x Ultimate when using a Siphoning skill
DK Earthen Heart: Mountain's Blessing = x Ultimate every 4 seconds when in combat
Templar Dawn's Wrath: Prism = x Ultimate when using a Dawn's Wrath ability

These are the only passive's which specifically state a Ultimate generating ability.

While doing basic attacks might help generate more ultimate, it's not the only way. You do generate ultimate just by using skills - else I would never ever have ultimate at all, and I re-cast ultimate's fairly often while questing... so I'm generating ultimate without using light/heavy attacks or any of the above passives.

PS. Yes, I realize weaving is the 'best' dps, but no I don't because of reason's (lag, don't feel like it, prefer not, etc). And no, I don't do group stuff so my lower dps is not hurting anyone other than my own dps.

Jciampi · January 2017

I get 3 ultimate per light swing. Six per heavy. I tank all the time, you do get ultimate for blocking. 3 per hit. So it can add up fast. I also put passives into the fighters guild to gain 3/6/9 ultimate everytime you kill undead/daedra

MilwaukeeScott · January 2017

MilwaukeeScott wrote: »

I've searched for a few hours and there is a lot of contradictory information.

susmitds · January 2017

MilwaukeeScott wrote: »

MilwaukeeScott wrote: »

I've searched for a few hours and there is a lot of contradictory information.

Quite an irony, right?

FriedEggSandwich · January 2017

The amount of opponents affects it too but not sure how. If I drop an atro on a single player it will take ages to get another, but if I drop an atro on a blob I get another almost immediately.

Curragraigue · January 2017

From the old patch notes

•Adjusted how Ultimate generation is gained to make it more even across different classes and builds: •When you damage an enemy with a light or heavy attack, you will receive a buff that grants three Ultimate per second for eight seconds. •This buff is refreshed with each light or heavy attack.

•If you heal an ally that has the Ultimate gain buff, you will also receive the Ultimate gain buff for eight seconds. •This only works if the ally being healed was not at full health prior to the heal.

•Abilities that previously gave Ultimate will now provide the Minor Heroism buff that will give you additional Ultimate over time.
•Ultimate can also be gained from blocking, dodging, or attacking targets with a damage shield.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/154426/patch-notes-v1-6-5#latest

Looks like blocking and dodging count towards ult regen as well.

Kamatsu · January 2017

Curragraigue wrote: »

•Ultimate can also be gained from blocking, dodging, or attacking targets with a damage shield.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/154426/patch-notes-v1-6-5#latest

Looks like blocking and dodging count towards ult regen as well.

I have to reply and quote the above, so as to retract what I stated earlier about gaining Ultimate via skills.

I was just playing on a low level sorcerer and decided to keep an eye on my Ultimate as I did stuff. Something I'd never really done before, even though I'd always been gaining Ultimate after using it. Spotted straight away that my skills were not increasing my Ultimate at all - and this made me stop and think about why I was always getting Ultimate on my other chars even though I never did weaving or used light/heavy attacks.

The quote answer's this - the characters I've played the most have been Templar, Nightblade and to a lesser extent Dragon Knight. I played them all as melee and relied on blocking & bashing to save myself as I can't dodge very well (due to combination of latency and disability). I was gaining Ultimate simply due to blocking big bad attacks, and not from using my skills.

Now playing on my Sorcerer, I'm actually attacking at range and so not blocking skills, or dodging stuff, so no longer gaining Ultimate as I fight... I've had to remember to toss in some light attacks to build ultimate if I need it.

An easy way to check what gains you Ultimate is to turn "Ultimate Number" on, it's somewhere in the settings (sorry, can't remember where). Use your Ultimate so you have no points left, then go fight mobs... and keep an eye on your ultimate as it will show any/all generated ultimate resource.

This is how I worked out skills were not giving me ultimate, and made me realize I was getting it on other characters via blocking.

Ilsabet · January 2017

The other day in SO I filled up my ultimate by spamming Vigor on the group as we ran around looking for the meat grinder room while everybody had herpes poison. It had been over 8 seconds since we had fought anything, but all of that healspam filled up my Veil of Blades pretty quickly.

Just to add to the anecdotal evidence.

drakhan2002_ESO · January 2017

Just try your normal light/heavy attacks; they will generate Ultimate...or at least that's what I do and it works every time for all my toons...

Catnight · January 2017

Does someone know if hits with catapults/ballistas are generating ultimate?
My friend and I were in PvP lately and we were shooting with only these after we both used our ultimates on storm atronach (both of us sorcerers).
After using these siege weapons (he used ballista, i used tribok) we turned to the gate where the enemies came running at. He had his ultimate ready again but my counter was still zero. So... who is bugged?

Side-info: he stated clearly that he hadnt gained ultimate any other way. I was with him the whole time so i can confirm he didnt hit some enemies with light attacks. (He had no chance to hit an enemy with light/heavy attacks because they all were too far away) Also he stated that i hit some enemies with my tribok.

Nocturnalan · January 2017

Jim_Pipp wrote: »

@susmitds thanks for clarifying - It must have been generating off heals because I was trying not to kill the skeevers.

I'm googling the wayrest sewers and I can't see anyone describing the boss - I'm finding it weird because I literally did it the other day and you don't forget a fight you win so slowly.

It was a breton in a large square room. You come in through a door onto a ledge, by dropping off to the left you land in a stack of mucrabs. Opposite the the ledge you come in on is a mirror image ledge, and on there was the boss. I couldn't find any way up, and he couldn't find any way down. He has a fair few range abilities, but only one that hit hard and knocked me back. There is no way to leave the room once the fight starts, you can't get back up to the door you came in on, and the sewer gate (on the far left of where you come in) is locked until the boss dies.

Does that ring any bells? At the time I wondered if it was a glitch in where the boss was placed as I didn't remember the fight from when I used to run dungeons regularly, but I've never had a character without ranged attacks before.

This is a glitch and has happened to me a couple times. He gets stuck up there on the ledge and you have to attack from the ground unless you want to continue on and meet him up there later. Although I haven't tried to do this I've always just attacked from the ground but I would imagine you could fight him up there if you wanted to.

LordSlif · June 2017

Puncturing strikes needs more damage, its a channeled skill and easy to get away

Magdalina · June 2017

Jim_Pipp wrote: »

I'm not meaning to spread misinformation but I am pretty sure blocking damage also generates ultimate.

Source - I was solo-ing wayrest sewers the other day on my stam sorc who has no ranged attacks... there is a boss who you can only fight at range and I only realised when I was already in combat so couldn't adjust skills... I found two skeever in the corner of the room and let them beat on me to generate ultimate, and then over about 20 minutes beat the boss by using overload light attacks. I was healing occasionally, but not often because they are skeevers... (p.s. I had an increasingly rare 'I love ZOS' moment because I was so glad they put those skeevers there).

I think they altered it at some point so tanks can get ulti too. Pretty sure blocking damage will give ulti too.

Also killing Daedra with Fighter's guild passive, killing players with Alliance war passive and probably something else I'm forgetting.

adriant1978 · June 2017

Curragraigue wrote: »

They changed it in 1.5-1.6 I think to light attacks and heavy attacks starting ult regen every eight seconds to make people weave

And screw over people who suck at weaving.

Urza1234 · October 2017

adriant1978 wrote: »

Curragraigue wrote: »

They changed it in 1.5-1.6 I think to light attacks and heavy attacks starting ult regen every eight seconds to make people weave

And screw over people who suck at weaving.

1 Light attack per 8 seconds is not an onerous burden.

Arkangeloski · October 2017

Dodging an atack generates ulti, Example: dodge rolling an incoming atack. I know this because we do it often in friendly duels for ulti gen in order to test rotations , builds etc.