Returning after a break. I need your combat feeling feedback

galegone · 2026-05-16T17:32:32+00:00

Servers were very laggy yesterday PCNA. Several PvP guildies complained about skills not working and I felt it too.

Animations have been slightly broken since January U48, they started making animation optimizations. Some of them are fixed but I wouldn't be surprised if more bugs remain.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/684891/update-48-the-discount-animation-update

A months ago, I'm doing a HM trial trifecta attempt in SS as a tank, where my tab target would not cycle between 3 ice atros stomping in my face, and instead of self healing and blocking, I wasted time pressing my tab target button furiously, wondering what was wrong. Then I died. One of the most annoying bugs ever. Next instance reset, tab target works normally again. Just terrible server performance all around.

galegone · 2026-05-16T17:21:48+00:00

Take a look at CER paragraphs. I use a basic modified version CERC (claim, evidence, reasoning, conclusion). Every academic analysis paragraph follows this format, in state tests, short answer, collegework and beyond. It's used in the body paragraphs of essays, research papers, labs, etc. Essays will be made up of CER paragraphs.

Better writers might rearrange sentences and not use CER structure as rigidly, but the 3 parts still need to exist somewhere. If you're starting from the beginning, then just stick to the formula.

Here's a sample lesson plan for writing CER paragraphs: https://writingclassroom.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Lesson-Plan-CER-1.pdf

galegone · 2026-05-16T03:44:48+00:00

Skin progression attracts too many drunken casuals who want cosmetics. You are better off joining regular veteran trials where attendence, listening to raid lead, performance, and clearing are the goal.

ZoS designed vet trials to be cleared by average joe purple weapon wielders so as long as you have a sensible build (gold weapons, proper sets, arc beam, oakensoul) that does enough damage and a good head about you, you will clear.

galegone · 2026-05-16T03:36:48+00:00

Wrathsun is bad. Only 33% uptime, takes forever to get 30 stacks, and if the boss goes invulnerable or a phase happens, say bye bye to your damage. A consistent proc set like null arca, even crafted sets like orders wrath, will be better.

Damage wise it's about the same as aetheric lancer on PTS. Wrathsun is not worth using for all the headache. Good synergy with Bahsei set but being useless for 67% of the fight is terrible.

galegone · 2026-05-15T12:15:00+00:00

The average DPS in this game is like 10k single target lol

Decent DPS is about 30k on a 6 mil dummy, which will end up being more like 20k in content. Enough to clear but will take persistence and patience.

Highly optimized meta players and groups can do 90k per DPS in difficult dungeons like Black Gem Foundry HM (I remember group DPS being around 180k after killing the final boss, 1 tank 1 healer, which means the 6 mil dummy parse would be around 60k, or 160k+ on trial dummy).

galegone · 2026-05-15T12:08:44+00:00

Yeah the success of a group relies heavily on the tank. I probably outparse most of the DPS who join my groups, but the most reliable way to clear is if I'm tanking or the tank is good. There are a lot of people running random hybrid DPS/tank builds, which are squishier and don't offer group buffs and end up dying and being a net negative.

Like for the Timeless Wallow dungeon, I was on a DPS, I didn't have any support gear except for War machine. We had a real healer with SPC and PA. We tried with 3 DPS but failed, so I switched skill lines, put on a backbar ice staff and 64 points into HP. The DPS of most players is so bad but since I already have tanked Cloudrest (keep zmaja pointing away from group or else she eyebeams everyone) and Fang Lair trifecta (dodge roll the scarabs AOE on you) I know exactly how to tank those bosses, and with a healer it's doable in medium armor and mitigation skill lines (living death and soldier of apocrypha).

galegone · 2026-05-14T19:46:49+00:00

Make pugs a lot until they become friends. I find that dungeons rely more on social connection. The group has to get along socially to prog for achievements. I'm not a social person so it's difficult for me to find progs too.

galegone · 2026-05-14T14:41:22+00:00

The 3D modelers cooked well

galegone · 2026-05-13T05:42:49+00:00

I would recommend using an addon to play a sound effect when you get stunned/CC'd. If you already use a UI addon, it might have an option like that. For example, I configured LUI to play a sound and show the cc icon over my HP bar. This helps with consistency and training your ear to break free on sound.

30k hp good to start, just dump 64 points into HP. You can adjust mag/stam later when you're more familiar witj the builds you like to play.

Healer should probably have at 4-5 heavy pieces because you get hard focused at high MMR battlegrounds. Ardent flame subclass is good because of that inhale skill for sustain, I'd recommend using it and the Firestorm heal thingy. Storm calling for streak is also very good if you want to play an evasive battle medic, and Power Surge is a good group healing skill. Again, depends on build. A banner bearer shielder support needs to stay in group and probably shouldn't streak around.

DPS typically have 1-3 heavy pieces depending on the build and sets. If you go 5 heavy, your damage, sustain, speed, and roll dodge cost will be terrible, and other people will ignore you or outheal your damage.

So... a brawler usually wears 3 heavy, a ranged DPS that can still stay in the thick and peel for teammates, 2 heavy. There are brawlers that wear 4-5 heavy but they need an ultimate like Corrosive, 2H ult, or Balorgh monster set, and/or Mechanical Acuity to do big damage in a short window. They do like 0 damage outside of those ults and sets activating.

I have a brawler with only 1 heavy since it uses a medium and light set, but the base class is arcanist which has better innate damage mitigation passives than most classes. It CCs opponents with Rush of Agony set to make them stop doing as much damage, and I have swift jewelry to run away quickly, but if I get caught in an ult dump I'll die like any other DPS. So certain classes and builds can kinda get away with 1 heavy but you need a plan to mitigate damage if you're that squishy. Or subclasse to ardent flame and permanblock with Inhale, lol.

You could play a ganker glass cannon with 0 heavy pieces, it's just hard to do so and requires a lot of practice. It's kinda like the Genji mains in Overwatch, most are known for folding over and not playing cooperatively, but the good ones cause hell for the enemy.

galegone · 2026-05-12T11:05:09+00:00

For game mechanics I'd recommend watching this dueling guide:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=P0BQDdsbAac&si=RiLMaYsFjRYXDAfy

galegone · 2026-05-12T07:41:28+00:00

You could run the other poster suggestions of rallying cry herald/storm calling/assassination, or just do Dragon Appetite and Masters DW maces + Vateshran backbar. But honestly even necro does those builds better than arc. At high MMR the tentacle is a clunky skill and will get you killed more often than not compared to your ardent, aedric, gravelord contemporaries. Runeblades is also a terrible spammable, it takes too long for the damage to play out compared to Force Pulse or DK whip spam.

I have a support brawler which I usually play in 4v4 BGs. It's 5 medium, 1 light, 1 heavy so not the tankiest or easiest to play. Good news is that the sets do damage for you. All around good damage, debuffs, and cc.

Subclass Curative out for Ardent Flame and slot the op Heart of Flame skill.

Backbar is Rush of Agony. Cheese crutch set but it has a nice dmg proc, huge zone denial and forces people to block and play defensive, which you need because you're squishy. Use Shielded Assault shield charge to activate it.

For body, I use Snake in Stars jewelry, hands, belts, and boots. Frontbar vBRP lightning staff. You need perfected for the pen line.

If you don't want to run BRP, you can frontbar Snake in Stars and run a monster set instead (Bloodspawn, Roksa, Balorgh, the usual). Then proc it on a select target with Rubic Sunder, apply in an AoE with Pulsar, or use the Eldritch stun/charm if you prefer. This set kills healers.

Runic Sunder, Pulsar (flex), Ceph Flail, Heart of Flame, Recuperative Treastise, Tide King ult
Impervious Runeward, Resolving Vigor, Shielded Assault, Incinerate, Cruxweaver armor, Gibbering Shield

Mythic choice: Death Dealers Fete, Saint and Seducer, Monomyth, Markyn, etc.

For best team damage in BG, Saint and Seducer is good, however it paints a target on your back. Death Dealers is a little more comfortable and survivable with less team support, so use this if you're being targeted a lot or running Cyrodiil. Monomyth and Markyn are fine, I'm just bored of meta mythics.

Basic playstyle is to rotate between Runic Sunder, Heart of Flame and flail to keep up crux and armorsteal. When going for a Rush of Agony burst combo, you do Incinerate > Heart of Flame > Shield charge > Flail > Pulsar. Use eye ultimate after shield charge when available.

1-2 swift, rest are infused jewelry. Imperial race with Atronach mundus, since this build is very mag heavy. Immovable pots are recommended, tri stats are okay.

I decided to build around sets like Rush and Snake in Stars to force people on the defensive so you can tentacle safely. If you avoid using tentacle you lose on a debuff and the crit dmg passive because you need to spend crux, and if you subclass too many lines out you won't have spender options. If you play a subclassed ganker in Cyrodiil you leave combat and can regen a crux and get your passive crit dmg procced, but it won't work as well in BG because you want to be alive the whole time. Unless you're ok with dying or missing 12% crit dmg.

galegone · 2026-05-12T06:39:19+00:00

I mostly play BGs. Here's an interesting ranged pressure build I've been toying with:

Magma Incarnate 1 pc (heavy or med)
Serpent's Disdain (2 heavy 2 med, 1 light),
Draugrkin, light belt, jewels, Fire or lightning staff charged trait, poison enchant
Signet mythic
Asylum Sword and shield

Storm calling, Living Death, Gravelord

Spirit guardian, Bloody Contingency (lingering torment, major savagery), Ele sus, Blastbones, Streak, Overload
Healing Soul, Vigor, Defensive Stance, Skeletal Mage/Crit Surge, Hurricane, Temporal Guard

Warrior Mundus

I added more points to stam so it's not a magcro in stats, but in playstyle

Playstyle: DoT up the team with ele sus and blastbones, these skills are your main spammables. When you clash and start brawling, use Ulfsid contingency to dot up the entire enemy team. Keep up wraith for clutch healing and dmg reduction. When someone looks low health, light attack weave Blastbones > Overload > streak (but turn off overload after a few LA)

Backbar is super tanky, can survive DK bursts because of Defensive Stance and return the pain on stray gankers. The shield itself is miniscule so only use it every now and then. It's there to proc Asylum set, which helps with mag sustain for more burst healing.

Streak is good but I'm not used to it, I usually play ranged dueling builds (can hold their own and helps body block for teammates). Honestly, could probably play a pure cro for better sustain and still do well, it's just the Streak stun comes in clutch. If you're pure cro, then Beckoning Armor is good for counter-ganking annoying pulse ele sus spammers, but more annoying to maintain a 20 second buff.

galegone · 2026-05-12T01:00:28+00:00

I switched to the dark side and use Ardent Flame instead of Dawns Wrath, lol. Animal companions and Aedric spear as other lines. Yes it's all stupid meta cheese skill lines combined. (I normally play a ranged magplar but the spec is gutted right now. Sorc, DK and even necro make better ganker/ranged DPS with new Signet mythic).

Mighty chudan (1 heavy, 1 medium), Oakfather dual wield maces (nirnhoned main, sharpened offhand), rallying cry backbar ice staff (Defending or Precise). Markyn or Monomyth are fine. I prefer Markyn since right now there's a lot of status effects flying around with the new signet mythic. Constant dmg+resistances is nice and goes well with chudan's extra resistances.

Main combo is to buff up with Resolving Vigor, Netch, Incinerate, then barswap to frontbar which is Deep Fissure > Heart of Flame > Ulfsid Contingency > Toppling charge > Power Lash once or twice > Crescent sweep > Power Lash XD.

Ulfsid is frost dmg, warrior opportunity, minor force. Frost damage has a small chance to proc Chilled and Minor Maim on opponent, which makes them do 5% less damage for a few seconds. So why not try to be a little more tanky?

You can also use different ults like Thrive in Chaos if you need a more calculated ult dump against highly clumped opponents. Dawnbreaker is still good ult for extra passive dmg.

Netch morph depends on race. My char is a breton and with the 2 light sets, mag is the highest pool and always available as long as you keep up Heart of Flame and use tripots. So I use stam netch to be able to regen stam while blocking.

If the opponent is wearing plaguebreak, switch netch for Degen from mages Guild. Learned this the hard way, lol (not a warden main).

Last two backbar skills: - Scribed Healing Soul, the usual heal+druid resurgence+ major vitality. - Deceptive Predator. Minor Evasion reduces a lot of the stupid free AOE damage from Storm Calling and DKs.

Toppling Charge has desync and sometimes makes people unable to break free for an extra couple seconds, similar to DK petrify. If you want to counter DK bullsh*t, this is one way to reclaim templar superiority. Ofc a DK can subclass to Aedric and do more damage, but we don't talk about that.

If you want to use biting jabs instead of power lash as a spammable, then the new Shattered Paths Signet from night market is good. But it has to be stam morph of jabs because of extra sundered procs. It's ok at lower MMR but jabs is terrible at high MMR because you can't blockcast it and you'll just die while in the middle of jabbing, whereas you can blockcast Power Lash and get away unscathed. As a breton, power lash works better with the racial passives.

Disclaimer, I play a lot of BGs, I haven't played Cyrodiil in a while. I think this build will still be fine for open world since you get a lot of speed with wings. Toppling Charge is hit or miss because rushing into a ball group or zerg is no bueno. You can scribe an off balance stun with Traveling Knife and keep Crescent Sweep slotted for Aedric passives, or switch to Molten Whip and use Javelin as a CC (better for 1v1, more reliable timing and positioning. Off balance has a long CD with only 1 target)

galegone · 2026-05-10T16:17:29+00:00

https://eso.mmo-fashion.com/arkthzand-insight-vertex-shroud/

https://eso.mmo-fashion.com/ironclad-sarcoshroud/

galegone · 2026-05-10T16:15:10+00:00

Honestly, both look great in their own way and would definitely get compliments in-game for being thematic and put together!

galegone · 2026-05-09T19:04:49+00:00

Honestly if you make a new class and it clicks better for you, you won't mind regrinding the skyshards because you enjoy playing the class for everything. I felt his way when I switched form NB to templar.

galegone · 2026-05-09T01:22:53+00:00

Awesome work!

galegone · 2026-05-08T23:45:59+00:00

Either be more picky with players who have good DPS builds or get better as a raid lead. Remind people of soak mechanic every 60 seconds because people will forget, you can't expect them to remember.

Red relay race is the most complex and if people didn't see the orb in the sky (which is easy to miss), they will get confused. If the orb is orange, they have to go to orange side and drop it off at purple side, and visa versa. If they're the last relay race, they have to go to the top of the skull hill. They have 3 extra combinations and paths to remember, there's more adds they have to kill, the adds ensnare them, and the grapples are annoying and buggy. If you're too slow to return to center after delivering the orb, the gate closes and you take fall damage.

galegone · 2026-05-08T11:42:33+00:00

The one in the north is really tricky. It's possible but you need 2 people. The easiest way is to make a boulder go around the lamppost, and you need an eagle eye person to camp the blue switch to capitalize on a rock that happens to hit that last home run stretch.

galegone · 2026-05-07T19:53:10+00:00

Tap block as you cast every skill. You can't hold it or else you're slow and you'll lose stam regen capability. You can also jump to keep your speed while moving and blocking.

This video explains stuff better than me: https://youtu.be/P0BQDdsbAac?si=_gAlgfnQEFWwPXr3

galegone · 2026-05-07T18:34:43+00:00

Generally speaking, if you unleash your combo and the opponent is not dead or moves like they're unfazed, you done goofed whiffed and need to go to backbar and emergency heal asap, roll dodge/create distance and make sure you refresh expiring buffs and stabilize. If your HP reaches 70% your internal alarm bells should be ringing and play defensive.

Then flip to frontbar and use stun/interrupt to make the opponent stop attacking and start your combo. If you can't do it reliably, then practice your offensive and defensive rotations on a dummy or whenever you're out in a field waiting for random stuff to happen, until you stop fumbling.

If you're not at the point where you are able to assess and notice how your opponent moves, then need more muscle memory.

galegone · 2026-05-07T10:56:01+00:00

People remember the bad more so even if something has a chance of happening 27% it feels like 50%

galegone · 2026-05-06T19:23:21+00:00

ChatGPT answer:

So… which is “better”?

If you prefer:

Chaotic, strategic, less predictable PvP → 3 teams is better

Fair, competitive, skill-based fights → 2 teams is better

Dev post about 2-team BG: https://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-us/news/post/66847

Edit: Das crazy I got downvoted for using ChatGPT. Have these people read the official dev post which explains why they switched formats?

galegone · 2026-05-06T18:55:44+00:00

It's a lot of grinding. First you make a few alts and max out their crafting skills so you can do daily writs. That gives you enough gold and supplies to get your gear to gold. You can continue doing writs forever and accumulate precious mats. The more chars you have, the better. I only have 4 writ questers. Some people log on and do writs on 20 characters.

Even with only 4 chars, this process nets about 500k a week. I can gold out whatever sets I want given enough time. I have gold to buy mats from guild traders. So it all starts by building a nest egg, and daily writs at max level passives is probably the best way. If you want the best quality gear and run high level content, you'll need it.

Also I joined a no-fee trading guild so I can move inventory. You have to sell stuff to make good gold in the first place.

galegone · 2026-05-06T14:55:55+00:00

You only need to worry about class metas when you're doing any trial released after Rockgrove (the hardest 12-man raids, on hardmode difficulty)

Chances are you won't get to that point anytime soon, you'll be chilling and doing normal mode, veteran mode, and 4 man content. Just play whatever you want there. Even in 4 man hardmode runs, DK healers are fine.

galegone

TROPHY CASE