Templar Build for troubled Templars

Thechemicals · June 2014

Hiya vr10 Templar here, my guild asked me to post my build on their site and i decided to copy/paste if here as well. I have noticed people having problems with Templar on this site and even saying Templar needs improvements, but i think Templar is extremely powerful and a very cerebral class to play. My current dps numbers from my CLS addon are about 900-1000dps without any Crit potions or group bonus/world bonus. My crit is low as well only about 23%. I think crit is not imperative for Templar, but you should have at least 20-30%crit. If this thread recieves some decent positive feedback, i will add my pvp Build for Templar which is completely different than this pve build. I have had no issues killing Dks,Sorcerers in small scale engagements and actually excel at killing sorcerers.

My Attributes are: 5 Magicka/44 Health/0 stamina but i have done 0/49/0 with equal success.

Gear :
1. 3 Seducer, 3% less on all spells.
2. Warlock, possibly the best set in the game.The alternative is Magicka Furnace.
3. Magnus
4. Dragon or Convenant reduce ultimate set.

My race:Redguard. Instead of choosing a race that would complement what i wanted to maximize, I chose a race that would strengthen my weakness, stamina. Plus, Redguard are cool.

Weapons: 1h/shield and Resto staff. I attempted 2h for a while but my survivability plummeted. It could work with better defensive sets and sunshield but that would require investments into stamina.

The build: Templar5/44/0 (click on skills tab to view)

1. Solar flare. Solar+reflective. Solar+Crescent sweep. Try not to weapon attack after a solar or your next spell wont get the bonus dps.
2. Reflective Light. Spell changes on morph from single target to ground target and damages 3 targets+3dots. I sometimes just spam this by itself to kill a monster or player.
3. Blazing shield. at 2400 health i get a 720 damage shield minimum, and return 380dmg+150-250 burning light proc. . *The magicka penalty only affects the magicka recovery stat, so resto staff, potions, etc still regenerate magicka. Lasts even longer when blocking.
4. Shielded assault. This is my opener: Assualt+Solar+Reflective Solar+reflective. Gives 200-250 damage shield every 4 seconds. Not sure how it interacts with sunshield, so i dont cast both. When its down, i use sunshield vice versa.
5. Mage light with 20% crit. Its just awesome for spell dps and heals. I have it on both weapon swaps so i dont lose the effect. This spell is a staple skill for me.
Ultimate: Crescent sweep. Key to this build is this ultimate. Both solar and reflective contribute to its ultimate generation via prism passive, and its already very cheap at 75 cost. It can proc burning light passive too. I ussually get about 647 dmg+175 burning proc without crit proc.

other skills:

2. Reflective light for Volcanic rune for tough mob fights. Solar buffs this spell and Volcanic buffs solar with 20% more dmg from *might of the guild passive.
4. Sheilded Assualt for Purifying light (either morph). It has procced up to 1400dmg.
Ultimate. I sometimes swap out crescent sweep for Soul strike for single targets and pvp. If you open with Purifying light then Solar+reflective+Solar+Soul strike youll get massive single target dps.
4. Degeneration from Mages Guild. The spell is decent but the real benefit is the extra 20% dmg from Might of the guild passive. Cast it then use Reflective or Crescent sweep for 1k+ damage. It is good damage with Solar Flare as well.

Resto:
1. Combat Prayer. If im about to die, i swap to resto and use this but i also use this as an opener sometimes and swap back to 1h/shield. You can swap back and still have its dps
2. Quick siphon. You can open with this spell then swap to your main weapon and still get its effect.
3. Purifying ritual. Its extremely cheap with morph, debuffs, heals you, heals others, and 30% more healing for anyone inside it from focused healing passive. Pretty much click 1,2,3 as soon as a i swap to resto for a shield,a life on hit, and a debuff spell.
4. Breath of life for group play. Standard heal for you and others. The magicka morph is either broken or to little return to use, but id get it in a heartbeat if they fix it. Regeneration in resto tree is a better replacement when soloing but both are good.
5. Mage light.
Ultimate: Soul strike with increased channeling morph. Cost is cheap at 144 and it is deathblow type dps for bosses and players.

other stuff:

*Blocking and fast attacking is key. You can actually get the same mob amounts as the popular destro/resto builds and take very little damage with good use of degeneration,sunshield, or force siphon.
* I carry up 250 magicka potions and drink them regularly. For pvp or boss fights i drink critical hit potions with magicka gains.
* I eat fort sweetrolls for health and magicka
* My weapon traits always have crit hit on them.
* My gear enchantments have a mix of magicka and health
* Gear traits have mundus stone+ i use the thief (crit) and lord(health) stones.
* You can destroy your own Sunshield by casting it again to refresh it.
*You can force siphon in resto and weapon swap back to your main weapons and still get its effect.
* You can place sunshield in your resto tree and just use heavy attacks+Force Siphon+regeneration and continously refresh your Blazing shield and be nearly invincible and not run out of mana.
* I have 2000 magicka and 2550 Health.1400 stamina
* 2light 5 heavy for armor.

RivenCsky · June 2014

Thanks for posting your build. I did a little testing with CLS and was unable to reproduce your DPS results. It appears some of the abilities are group target and could alter you true DPS.

If you would please post the npc mob that you are solo killing (without ultimate, ect) and this will allow other classes and builds to run DPS tests against your results.

Calgrissom · June 2014

You combo is good but impossible to sustain. You may have huge burst dps in PVP as a DPS class in something like trails your DPS will drop quickly. You cannot sustain the spells you are spamming for very long.

Blud · June 2014

Interesting build. I find I'm not using destro skills that much. Maybe 1h/shield can work as you say. I enjoyed it before when I was running heavy armor.

In your armor, is it 7/7 light or 5/7 light/heavy?

temjiu · June 2014

Thanks OP!

I really appreciate people trying different things and being actually creative. its good to see someone post something other then the Destro/Resto uni-build. A few personal points:

It definitely seems doable...but we are still behind other classes in relation to overall damage. surviving is key....and it's sort of sad that we have to go to extremes just to survive...but once were past that performance will still be very important. In an age where a DK can almost literally faceroll content and group content, Templars barely scraping by with only about 60% of the DPS of a DK is just...I dunno...seems broke. in a bad way.

I never see DK's or sorcs going through as many pots as you do. though it makes it "doable" it doesn't seem to me to be by design. more like shoring up weaknesses. perhaps we should highlight those weaknesses rather then finding extreme ways of covering for them?

And while I enjoy melee builds...the prevalence of the magick resource in your build again is disconcerting for me. you are not really running a 1h+S build...you are running a defensive magic user build while wearing a shield. you have one shield skill on your bar (it certainly is a good one...the saving grace for the 1h+S line). but unfortunately, you could swap out with a staff...a bow...a noodle, and still be at 75% efficiency with that build. Not that its bad...its good! but it again just highlights our weakest points.

And those points are simply: we are too magick hungry for the skills we have. and stamina based skills are horribly under-performing, making the only viable builds involve 85% magick skills...with light armor of course to keep up the magick regen...and again, we are back to the unfortunate fact that this game is all about wearing a dress and carrying a staff (I am being partially facetious here).

All in all a great build OP, and i respect you for thinking outside the box...and I may actually do this in the interim (though having to shelf my 2h makes me queasy a bit). But even with that...we still have far too many weaknesses as a class on the whole for me to be OK with a few builds that "just make it".

Jimm_ay · June 2014

I am VR3 and just moved to a vr4 zone. I had problems before with 3 mobs but no more. I found this combo to work very well for any mobs, even bosses when I throw in my nova. Destro staff - I throw elemental drain on all targets (does not agro) if there is an archer or mage in the group I throw crushing shock on them (does agro) and run in and hit one him (or her) one more time, then hold block and run around them with Elemental ring (perma blocking). This is a very magicka heavy attack but I am capped at 100 magicka regen, the drain regains me magicka when I attack with fire so I am usually good. Just in case I keep Practiced Incantation on my ulti if I find I am taking too much dmg before they die.

This works great on most trash mobs unless they have a healer..the healer will die but one of them will still be up in health while you are low on magicka. In which case I swap out to my second bar with solar disturbance and nuke. I am finding my ulti up all the time due to the spamming of attacks and dot.

Not strictly a destro build though - I use my templar powers for bosses and re set up depending on the boss and situation (most have been human or undead so far so it can vary). Elemental drain is my bread and butter though - since one of my skills is fire based and I am a dark elf so we love teh fiah!

reggielee · June 2014

nice post, will give it a try. thanks for the positivity

danno8 · June 2014

Jimm_ay wrote: »

I am VR3 and just moved to a vr4 zone. I had problems before with 3 mobs but no more. I found this combo to work very well for any mobs, even bosses when I throw in my nova. Destro staff - I throw elemental drain on all targets (does not agro) if there is an archer or mage in the group I throw crushing shock on them (does agro) and run in and hit one him (or her) one more time, then hold block and run around them with Elemental ring (perma blocking). This is a very magicka heavy attack but I am capped at 100 magicka regen, the drain regains me magicka when I attack with fire so I am usually good. Just in case I keep Practiced Incantation on my ulti if I find I am taking too much dmg before they die.

This works great on most trash mobs unless they have a healer..the healer will die but one of them will still be up in health while you are low on magicka. In which case I swap out to my second bar with solar disturbance and nuke. I am finding my ulti up all the time due to the spamming of attacks and dot.

Not strictly a destro build though - I use my templar powers for bosses and re set up depending on the boss and situation (most have been human or undead so far so it can vary). Elemental drain is my bread and butter though - since one of my skills is fire based and I am a dark elf so we love teh fiah!

No offense but what does this have to do with the op's build? Should start your own thread instead.

Oh and Elemental Drain only works on one target at a time, and never procs on DoT effects (like Elemental Ring). It was severely nerfed last patch. You are far better of using Siphon Spirit for magicka return now.

Jimm_ay · June 2014

Sorry thought i was contributing to the discussion. Your saying elemental drain only works on one target at a time for what - the magicka return or the 40% reduction in resistance to elemental damage or both?

danno8 · June 2014

I believe both. Look what happens to the visual effect when you cast the second spell. It vanishes on the first mob.

Siphon Spirit however can be cast on as many mobs as you can get it on (it does have a cast time though) returns magicka and health on all attacks.

Thechemicals · June 2014

Calgrissom wrote: »

You combo is good but impossible to sustain. You may have huge burst dps in PVP as a DPS class in something like trails your DPS will drop quickly. You cannot sustain the spells you are spamming for very long.

You are correct,i have to make changes for specific content. In group content or trials i would not use sunshield. Instead it would be:

1. Equilibrium with spell symmetry - This spell with degeneration is low cost and gives 27% less casting cost on next spell.
2. Degeneration- this with combat prayer or regeneration or by itself makes the cost of equilibrium almost free.

The build i posted for this thread is standard solo play. Its for players who travel alone and need to kill large amounts of monsters and hard bosses. You can kite monsters, as many as you like and kill them with 2-3 rotations while *blocking though you may need to use a magicka potion sometimes. For an unlimited mana destro/resto build style all you need is siphon from the resto tree,sunshield with blazing shield morph, degeneration, and you can pick w/e else. Its clear that all classes can reproduce the destro/resto sustainability build because of siphon spirit and heavy attacks. Templar would do it with Blazing shield and heavy attacks. I didnt go much into that because i didnt want to make this about staffs. But yeah, you can do that and never run out of magicka...

eduardo_goncalveseb17_ESO · June 2014

dude.. your build is a freaking mage, wasting potions over potions to stay alive and be effective.. its insane.

with all respect, ( and thanks for sharing your build with us ), if i were to play a build like yours, id rather roll a sorceror.

audabon2013 · June 2014

I agree with eduardo. nothing special. Just a Templar mage-tank.

Glad you're enjoying it, but no matter how we adapt our temps (even to builds we may or may not have wanted to run) our base skills still hold us back from other classes who can leverage better , similar builds.

Keep the faith that we might get a buff or revamp tho.

Thechemicals · June 2014

eduardo_goncalveseb17_ESO wrote: »

dude.. your build is a freaking mage, wasting potions over potions to stay alive and be effective.. its insane.

with all respect, ( and thanks for sharing your build with us ), if i were to play a build like yours, id rather roll a sorceror.

4 templar abilities,1 mage guild, and a wpn skill. Which one makes me a mage? If you are referring to the first three,well magicka is the price of using class based skills. It costs magicka to use class based skills so then we are all mages. Also, everyone is chugging potions in this game, its how you get 100% crit+magicka in endgame. If you arent then you havent reached that point yet.

1. Solar Flare- a templar ability that costs magicka
2. Reflective light-a templar ability that costs magicka
3. Blazing Shield-a templar ability that costs magicka
4. Shielded assualt - a 1h/shield skill
5. Mage light- a Mage guild skill
6. Crescent sweep-a templar ability.

Yes i drink a lot of vendor pots, because i chose 1h/shield for damage mitigation and i am 5 heavy 2 light armor, id still have to drink them anyway in any scenario. Im playing the game the way it was designed, and for that i need gear that is popular for mages but beyond that, its a Templar the whole way.

RivenCsky · June 2014

Still waiting for a post on the solo mob tested (under the parameters as previously stated above) with CLS so we can reproduces these claims.

Jimm_ay · June 2014

how does spell symmetry work? The description is confusing - does it trade health for magicka or vice versa?

Nidwin · June 2014

eduardo_goncalveseb17_ESO wrote: »

with all respect, ( and thanks for sharing your build with us ), if i were to play a build like yours, id rather roll a sorceror.

Sorc is ranged while OP's build isn't ranged at all.

Crescent Sweep (ult) is melee as is Solar Flare (Solar Barrage for PVE)
Reflective light is nice to pull and getting 2-3 spams out before being in contact.

Thechemicals · June 2014

Jimm_ay wrote: »

how does spell symmetry work? The description is confusing - does it trade health for magicka or vice versa?

It trades your health for magicka. The spell is costly but it is affected by any casting cost reduction gear/passives/skills, so you can get the health cost down significantly and with degeneration or other regeneration heal spells, you can nullify the cost altogether. Spell symmetry gives you about 385-400 magicka and the morph reduces the cost of your next spell by 27%.

RivenCsky · June 2014

Or you simply use the ability (Balance which helps on the health regen) then with a Resto Staff aoe target Healing Springs and this will heal you up and then you basically have unlimited Magicka and healing abilities. Rinse and Repeat!!

Still waiting on the mob information.....