I always thought balance my attributes at 32 magicka and 32 stam would make my nice and balanced as a Templar.

It does not....I exceed at being 'meh'. The Meh-plar.

Zama666 wrote: »

I always thought balance my attributes at 32 magicka and 32 stam would make my nice and balanced as a Templar.

It does not....I exceed at being 'meh'. The Meh-plar.

Right. I did that when I first started playing years ago. I wanted a balanced toon but I got that "meh" result. Though I did get through quest content, I never could take on mobs of enemies as effectively as I wanted. Stuff took way too long, beat these enemies took forever. At least in my experience. Later I heard from other players , that you need you "can't" balance your toon.

You can in fact balance them I think but it's all about also what result you want. Like you can be super super tanky, super super DPS , super Regen and super crit all at once. That would just let you make a OP toon that gets zero challenge in every and any way.

So the concept of the "glass canon" was brought to my attention. OP DPS, but fragile as a tulip.

All in all, the new update does seem to expand on build making to some degree.

I remember one of my builds , it was a "tanky vampblade" that basically was awesome for xp grinding and killing mobs of ads in a rotation , just pick your favorite xp grind spot and it was awesome.
I was invincible and still wiped the floor with ads.

I’ve been using a hybrid combination ranged/melee build in group content the past few years, most people do anyway I guess when they run a mage and set barbed trap on the ground. Mine is a stamblade with a bow, there’s incapacitating strike and killers blade when I can get close to mobs, and ranged bow skills/dark shade/assassins scourge/ twisting path for ranged combat. Close quarters fighting yields the best damage, but I always have the option to step away for a bit and keep hitting a target if I want or need it

Now on the PTS I was able to come up with a hybrid hybrid, with ranged and melee and stamina and magicka skills, it throws the entire kitchen sink at a target. Stacking stamina while using a master destruction staff front bar/ maelstrom 2H back bar



Pure ranged fighting with just the front bar yields 75%- 80% of the dps you get from melee fighting with both bars

My main's build is a bit weird. Long story short, he is built to solo content effectively, which means he needs at least decent damage but also survivability, so somehow he is a tank in medium armor and can be a tank in group content when needed, since his dps is solely lacking when compare to a proper dps. Doesn't even have anything put into critical chance.

But hey, for the most part, I can solo any dungeon in normal and at least any base game dungeon in Veteran. So, am succeeding at something at least. I still need to upgrade my build overtime though but not sure what I will use. I'm not a fan of using meta as I find meta chasing to be a bit boring. I want to use what works with my character in roleplay. Ya know, what makes sense to them and follow their rules...

Honestly, I think I've made some pretty interesting builds. There are some pretty cool things that can be done that are off-meta but still good, and there have been since early ESO.

I've kinda just given up, recently, however, because the balance changes that go through constantly break anything I put together. They want to rebalance some aspect of the meta, that while it doesn't change the meta builds much, it straight up kills a key ability for my build so that my character just doesn't work at all anymore. It's just hard to create a brand new unique build from scratch with just about every update that comes out; It's so much easier to just make a slight update to a meta build.

I'm sure I'll be able to remake my trials-ready Magicka Khajiit Nightblade off-tank healer eventually with the kind of stuff they're doing right now, what with hybridization and all, but it will be vastly different from how I originally had it, and probably not as good. My pure health recovery tank build will probably be functional again, once I get some more champion points and update the gear selection, but it will never be the invincible beast it was before the CP system overhaul.

Anyway, I say at this point to just take a meta build and put your own spin or flavor on it, if you're looking for something unique and interesting and also any bit effective. Anything really unique is just not as achievable as it used to be, and is even less sustainable over major updates these days.

Ultimate petsorc:

Someone asked me privately to elaborate on my light armor stamblade. I might as well do that here.

This is a highly personal build. I am a magblade main who's struggling with stamblade. Maybe I'll give "native" stamblade a go someday. In the meantime I configured my woodelf stamblade as something of a hybrid that plays very close to my magblade. This allowed me to take her into PvP to gain AP for transmute geodes without having to learn a new playstyle.

My playstyle revolves heavily around cloak and speed. Thus far I have not configured my "stamblade" for ultimate speed, like my magblade, but I did want Concealed Weapon for the speed in cloak and I wanted (near) perma-cloak sustain. I tried Darloc Brae for a while, but I hate the operation of that set. Thus I ended up building a light armor non-vampire stamblade to get the mag-sustain for cloak.

In terms of the power you normally get from a stamblade, this build is compromised. It probably has marginally more attacking power than my magblade and it has the nice Whirlwind as an execute against dodge-rolling targets. Shooting targets in the back with Vateshran Shrouded Daggers is powerful at times and fits naturally into a gank combo. On the other hand giving up the buffs and stun from Surprise Attack doesn't do you any favors. The build also feels less defensively sound than my maglade. On the latter I run a 1H+S backbar these days, with 1H+S ult and Shrewd Offering. That combination feels like a better heal than Vigor and Rally, at least for my playstyle.

Note this build predates the Ascending Tide patch. I'm not yet sure how to take advantage of the new patch:

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildData?id=431804

As always, the Atro mundus and Hissmir Fisheye Rye, along with Barrier on the backbar and light armor, is the best way to sustain cloak. This is the big compromise that affects both damage and defense. The idea is never to use the backbar ult, unlike the 1H+S ult I actually use on my magblade from time to time and which is, IMO, much better. Even with some skills being magicka, stamina sustain feels marginal too, making this a less carefree build than my magblade.

The Vateshran back bar proc carries over to the front bar. Burst primarily consists of a DW heavy attack into Incap into SHrouded Daggers or Assassin's Scourge. The 2H Vateshran explosion can be procced on the front bar (!) along with Caluurion. By the time you use Shrouded Daggers the target is ideally below 50% health for the DW Vateshran cost reduction (refund) and increased damage. I rarely use Whirlwind, but it does come in handy against dodge rolling targets. Something a pure magblade could not have in previous patches, except of course now it can.