Flarion

Armor Types

Gear and Item Set Info

5 Elegant: Need 4 armor pieces. Only comes in Light Armor. Sharpened Inferno Staff with Spell Damage Enchant

Bonuses: 2) X Spell Damage 3) Max Magicka 4) Max Magicka 5) Increase damage with light/heavy attacks by 20%

5 Clever Alchemist: Dual Swords OR Sword and Shield, Heavy Chest, Medium Legs, and 1 light armor piece.

Bonuses: 2) Max Health 3) Max Health 4) X Spell/Weapon Damage 5) Gain X Spell/Weapon Damage for 15 seconds when you use a potion

3 Willpower: 3 Jewelry

Bonuses: 2) Max Magicka 3) X spell damage 

Jewelry Enchants: All Spell Damage.

Armor Enchants: All Max Magicka

Armor Traits: All Divines

Elegant can be farmed in Auridon. Clever Alchemist is craftable in Hew's Bane. You can get Willpower from daily dungeon rewards or shop around in guilds.

Potions: Junk pots or switch between different pots to fit your needs.

Food: Any recipe that gives Max Magicka and Max Health.

Mundus: The Apprentice (spell damage)

TIP: If you do not have an Elegant Inferno Staff, you have a couple options: 

1) Swap a Willpower Jewelry piece with an Elegant Jewelry piece and use a Willpower Sharpened Inferno Staff; however, you will lose damage on your 2nd bar since Willpower's 3rd item bonus won't carry over. Still, the results will be the same on your 1st bar when heavy attacking. 

2) Swap a Willpower Jewelry piece with an Elegant Jewelry piece and use a non-set craftable sharpened inferno staff; however, your heavy attacks won't hit as hard because you no longer have Willpower's 3rd item bonus. 

I'm hitting 40k+ heavy attacks when fully buffed and that's without crusher enchant on weapon or Major Breach spell resistance debuff.

I tested infused and divines; swapping out the chest piece. Infused increased max magicka and raised the tool tip of skills, but spell damage dropped which in return lowered the damage of my heavy attack. 

Alternative race: High Elf for 1% more max magicka and 3% less damage with fire. The difference is extremely minimal. I just like having that extra stamina with Dark Elf for sneaking around. Wood Elf could be interesting with the stealth damage bonus. If you're rock'n a Wood Elf DK give this build a shot. They also have the same stamina bonus as Dark Elf which, again, is useful for this build.

General Info

This is a PvP build!

The theory behind this build is to create the peak experience of Magicka DK ganking! This is purely an open world pvp ranged heavy attack gank build! This is not meant for dueling, close encounters, or fighting in choke points. This is meant to be played out in the open with room to run. This build adjusts to the changes coming in the "Homestead" update. Therefore, this build cannot be tested properly until the update.

This build is centered around heavy attacks and escaping. Therefore, we must amp the damage of our heavy attacks as much as possible in a way that suits our playstyle. So, how do we do that?

Stacking Max Magicka will increase our spell damage, which in turn will increase our light and heavy attack damage. Staff light and heavy attack damage scales with spell damage, not weapon damage. To test this, do a fully charged staff heavy attack on a target. Now try it with a Major Sorcery buff by using either spell power potions or Entropy. The damage increases. If staff heavy attacks scaled with weapon damage then Major Sorcery would have no effect on our light and heavy attacks. So now we know staff heavy attacks do indeed scale with spell damage. The whole point of slotting Mage Guild abilities on our staff bar is to take advantage of the Magicka Controller passive to gain even more Max Magicka; purely for the sake of increasing our base spell damage to make our heavy attacks as potent as possible. Our gear setup will give us a huge boost of even more raw spell damage.

If you are not comfortable with the 1st bar skill setup, swap out balance and volcanic rune with other skills to fit your needs.

Note about Clever Alchemist: Our 5th piece bonus is on our 2nd bar, so you must be on your 2nd bar whenever you use a potion in order to proc Clever Alchemist. When you swap to your 1st bar, the proc of the 5th bonus will carry over. Reason being is because it is a buff. However, be aware that we will lose the 4th bonus when we swap bars as it is not a buff but a simple added bonus. So why have it setup like this? With this setup we can gain powerful bonuses from 3 sets for very potent heavy attacks on the 1st bar, on our destro bar. The only thing we lose on the 2nd bar is the 5th bonus of Elegant which is not as important during execute phase. Why not use Molag Kena? For two reasons: 1) Yes, Kena's spell damage bonus is slightly, slightly more than Alchemist's, but Kena's spell damage buff only lasts for 6 secs while Alchemist lasts 15 seconds 2) You have to do two light attacks to proc Kena which will pull you out of stealth. By the time we charge a heavy attack the enemy will already be aware. Flame staff fully charged heavy attacks are slow and will be slower in the Homestead update, so we need that element of surprise to play this build successfully.

PLAY STYLE

It is highly recommended you are a vampire for this build for movement speed in sneak and a quick escape with elusive mist. Plus, very nice defensive passives. You should have no problem with escaping. Roots, snares, etc. is nothing to panic about. Just mist form and get out. Survival Tip: Block when you come out of mist form or block cancel before mist form ends. Not many CC's drop block.  

You do not need magicka recovery for this build. Destruction staff passives will take care of that. 

So, first thing, buff with molten armaments. Use this before going into stealth! If you use this while in stealth the skill will pull you out of stealth. Line of sight behind trees, rocks, whatever. The buff lasts 40 secs at max level so you have lots of time to move around while it holds. That's 40 seconds of Major Sorcery and 40% more damage with heavy attacks while active. No other class has this!

Next, get into stealth. Pick your target and pop a potion to proc Clever Alchemist on your 2nd bar. Do not use structured entropy for the spell power buff! It will pull you out of stealth and you will lose the element of surprise. Plus, the duration is only half of molten armaments. It makes no sense to use it. The skill is just there to give you more max stats. You won't be using any of the mage guild skills on your staff bar other than inner light (does not pull you from stealth).

ROTATION: Use inner light to proc Empower (Might of the Guild passive in Mage Guild), and immediately charge a heavy attack. While holding the heavy attack button, spam your stone giant button. The two projectiles fire off together, maximizing your dps. Inner light will Empower your heavy attack, not your stone giant, since you initiated the heavy attack first. Don't let go of the heavy attack button, it will automatically charge again and then spam stone giant once more. That's it. This simple rotation has killed most players in PvP during my testing. It's a 2-shot combo win.

The point of stone giant is that it's a long ranged stun with a chance to knock back the enemy. Plus, the skill got a speed buff. It will project faster now. If he or she is not dead from the first heavy, you need to stun them because now they are aware of your presence. If you're feeling gutsy, clouding swarm and flame lash will get the job done if they're still not dead. Clouding swarm will be your gap closer due to the changes made in the Homestead update; however, it is best for the purpose of this build and play style not to be right up in the enemy's face all the time or you will die. Burst them down, and get out. Back bar you have utility for escaping. Immobilize an enemy with fossilize (15 meter range which does not get buffed in pvp) in case they get too close, and mist form. Templar beamers, line of sight or mist form out of their range. 

Interesting changes to Coagulating Blood in the next update. It will now heal you for 33% of your missing magicka instead of health. I'm not sure how well this skill will work, but it's the best heal we got since we are not using a resto staff. Burning Embers needs a target, and if that target is a templar they'll just cleanse it. Fossilize will proc your power lash heal which is pretty decent, but again.. you need a target. This is why escaping is an essential part of the playstyle. Again, this is not a 1vX build and go toe-to-toe with the enemy. You will die. Don't be on the front line. Pick people off from a distant and get out. Rinse and repeat.

Damage to "single targets" is getting buffed with flame staffs in Homestead update! ZoS has made some significant changes to the Destruction Staff passives. It is important to know that the passive to decrease the time it takes to fully charge a heavy will be completely removed and instead replaced with bonuses depending on staff type. This is why stealth is important for this build since heavy attacks will have a longer winded animation. You'll only buy the enemy time to kick your face in when trying to go toe-to-toe with them. They're not just going to wait for you to finish charging a heavy attack. 

Elemental drain will pull us out of stealth which is why I don't use it; however, it will significantly amp your dps. 

Final note: This build is just theory crafting and waiting to be tested properly till Homestead is released.

I welcome any comments or suggestions.

Champion Point Tips

This build still needs a lot of testing for best results. The following is just a general guideline.

75 in the Atronach tree will unlock the Butcher passive. Split between staff expert and shattering blows. Plus, Riposte passive is also really cool and can potentially save you.

Focus points into Elemental. This increases damage with flame attacks which includes flame staff light/heavy attacks. Points into Spell Erosion will give us more spell penetration. 

The rest is up to you though you really won't need magicka recovery. It's pointless for this build. Reduced cost will serve you much better due to high costing skills. A lot into tumbling just to help with escaping. A lot into Resistant in the Steed tree for survival since we're not wearing any impen.  

I will update this with exact numbers after proper testing when Homestead is released.

If you have a CP configuration that seems to provide solid results, then please share in the comments below.

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