Classes and Builds for Someone With Bad Hands

Lance_Caugheyb14_ESO · May 7

Hey everyone!

I've gotten back into ESO recently and I'm having a great time working my way through the PvE content. I have been having a problem though; my hands are not the best and I can't really keep up with light attack weaving or 'spamming' abilities. I chose the Nightblade class first, but have discovered that keeping up with the ability spam is really rough on my hands. I have some friends who are into the veteran content and would like to play with them as I catch up in level, so I was wondering what classes and builds might be slower paced so that I'm not hurting my hands as much. I'm not really a fan of tanking, but slow paced DPS or healing would be perfect.

fizl101 · May 7

heavy sorc using oakensoul, one bar and slow paced weaving heavy attacks with skills

birdik · May 7

Arcanist

TybaltKaine · May 7

I've got bad hands too, and I run a heavy attack build on one of every class.

The first bit you are gonna wanna secure is the Oakensoul mythic. That's gonna limit to one bar, but it gives so many buffs you won't mind the tradeoff.

For leveling my characters I like to wear Innate Axiom and Adept Rider, with two pieces of Druid's Braid thrown in for extra stats. This gives me a nice speed boost and a boost to my class skill damage. If you are worried about speed of leveling Heartland's Conqueror is an option. These are all craftable sets, so no grinding necessary if you are in a guild.

When you get to champion level, Oakensoul is gonna make life a lot easier. I pair it with Sergeant's Mail and War Maiden specifically on my Nightblade. With the recent changes to Grim Focus and it's morphs, Merciless Resolve becomes a no brainer. I also slot Concealed Weapon and Swallow Soul so I get access to all my passives.

From there I tweak the build with Silver Shards from the Fighters guild and Razor Caltrops from the Assault line. These give me some options for AOE attacks. Heavy attacking with a Lightning or Resto staff is gonna make sustain a non--issue.

You can really do a ton of damage with this setup. I solo most WB's and base game dungeons with this build. Even a couple of DLC dungeons. True solo, not with a companion.

Sergeant's Mail is probably the foundational piece here, but you can really tweak it with any set you want. Oakensoul and Heavy Attacks do all the lifting since you are getting the Empower bonus with fully charged HA's.

EDIT: If you really wanna make it fool proof, running Arcanist in Innate Axiom is a game changer, though I've found that they don't really hit as hard as my NB or Sorc. Templar also outpaces them a bit with my particular playstyle. But really any class will work with this basic setup.

Malyore · May 7

I'd agree with either an oakensoul heavy attack sorc, or a velothi amulet arcanist that doesn't have to do weaving

Mesite · May 7

I thought holding a button for heavy attacks would be more taxing on tendons. I prefer to play Arcanist because I click and he beams for ages before I need to click again.

I used to be able to switch between having the mouse on the left of the laptop and the mouse on the right.

On the Xbox I always have the same fingers doing the same.

TybaltKaine · May 7

You can get custom done click trigger controllers that give you much more sensitive triggers, equivalent to a mouse. But yeah, holding down the trigger does get taxing after a while. Not for nothing, you can also remap the control on PC. Not so much on console.

MudcrabAttack · May 8

Mesite wrote: »

I thought holding a button for heavy attacks would be more taxing on tendons. I prefer to play Arcanist because I click and he beams for ages before I need to click again.

I used to be able to switch between having the mouse on the left of the laptop and the mouse on the right.

On the Xbox I always have the same fingers doing the same.

Yeah I feel the same way about it, when playing heavy attack builds on PC it involve holding left mouse button down a really long time - sometimes during boss fights. The back of my hand hurts after a couple hours playing that

Perhaps a toggle-type of button could fix it, then you just cycle through skills every few seconds as your character continually heavy attacks

Arcanists can get by with very few actions over time these days. I only land 1 light attack each time just before beaming. With fights involving lots of enemies clustered together arcanists can max out their dps with so little action, just wear azureblight on body/jewelry, cast AOE DOTs and then beam and beam again. With so many DOTs ticking and azureblight exploding everywhere, there’s no need to use a spammable like Cephaliarchs Flail - since that actually reduces dps

Lance_Caugheyb14_ESO · May 8

Thank you all so much! I've seen a lot of people point to one bar Arcanist and I'm really excited to give it a try

katorga · May 8

Malyore wrote: »

I'd agree with either an oakensoul heavy attack sorc, or a velothi amulet arcanist that doesn't have to do weaving

HA Necro works pretty well too, standard oakensoul build with the stamina scythe for aoe off-balance.

I think Velothi Arcanist is best, then HA sorc, then HA Necro.

Nerouyn · May 9

birdik wrote: »

Arcanist

Definitely this.

My hand are fine and when playing properly I do like to use their full arsenal, but this is a solid damage ability which doesn't require constant keypressing, because it's a 4 sec beam.

Even without being powered up from crux most overworld enemies will die just to that + companion, and to end the beam so I'm not just running around spraying it everywhere, I weapon swap. But you don't need to.

And since you enjoy healing, they have a healing beam equivalent which is also brilliant.

Something I was just talking about in another thread, the crafted Telvanni Efficiency set reduces companion cooldowns by 50% and only require 3 traits to craft.

It supercharges companions. Gear them up even moderately well (I go crit trait myself) and they can outdamage you.

Uvi_AUT · May 12

I would try Healing. I always found it to be the most relaxing role in Dungeons. There is very little spamming involved. Most Heals are proactive and there are a lot of HOTs.

Turtle_Bot · May 12

Oakensoul heavy attack sorc and Velothi amulet Arcanist would be the best 2 options imo, but I have seen some heavy attack wardens and necros do ok, so if you enjoy those classes a bit more, that might be something to look into as well.

velothi amulet on templar (magicka) isn't the worst either with heal jabs, not as easy as they used to be though, but like arcanist they aren't dependent on perfect weaving so they also get good use out of velothi.

Sakiri · May 14

I'd also like to recommend, if you're using a mouse and keyboard, a vertical mouse.

https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/mice/mx-vertical-ergonomic-mouse.910-005447.html

These have been a gamechanger. They do not have a lot of extra buttons like MMO mice do, but they keep your arm in a more natural position while you're using the computer. They do take a little bit to get used to.

I've been using one for almost 10 years. I have a history of carpal tunnel and ulnar nerve issues, and this fixed them entirely, I cannot use a regular mouse for extended periods of time.

I play mostly HA sorc, with a one bar bow warden alt.