[ARCHIVED] Magicka Dragonknight PvP Build ESO – Darkfire

[ARCHIVED]: This build has been archived, which means it is no longer being updated. However, this web-page will be left up for those who still would like to refer to it.

Build Written By: Dottz Gaming – PC NA

Role: Damage Dealer

Patch: Flames of Ambition

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Setup
   1. Gear
   2. Attributes
   3. Skills
   4. Vampire vs. Mortal
   5. Champion Points
   6. Other Important Info (Food, Mundus, Race, Potions, Passives)
3. Tips & Misc
4. Contact Info
5. Update Log

Introduction

Welcome to DottzGaming.com’s Magicka Dragon Knight DPS PvP Build, Darkfire, for the Elder Scrolls Online! This build is intended for PvP of all kinds: battlegrounds, Cyrodiil, dueling, and Imperial City. This build can be played in both CP and no-CP pvp without any changes to the build!

This build is one of my favorite builds I’ve put together for my MagDK in quite some time! This build’s offensive strategy focuses heavily on unrelenting DoT pressure, utilizing skills and sets to rapidly rot your opponent down, giving them limited room to recover! We also run the build in heavy armor, as I believe it is a bit stronger than light at the current moment in time. The reason I think that is because it helps bolster the build’s primary defensive mechanic: health recovery. Dragonknight is able to very effectively utilize health recovery not only due to heavy armor passives, but also due to their Draconic Power passives offering boosts to health recovery, allowing you to get a ton of additional percent modifiers on this stat! When all is said and done, we have a build that is tanky, deals a ton of damage (due to chosen skills and sets) and has enough sustain to keep up the pressure through a long fight! The build lacks a bit in the mobility department, but has more than enough tankiness and mitigation to make up for that fact!

Keep in mind that PvP builds are very personal. This is what worked for ME. If you don’t like something about it, change it to fit your playstyle.

Setup

Gear

Gear Explanation

• Zaan: Absolutely insane monster set for magicka dragonkinght. This set deals a ton of damage over six seconds, increasing as the beam holds, and if you can stun someone around the time this set procs, you can guarantee they are going to be feeling the pressure.
• Oblivion’s Foe: This set makes your Soul Trap DoT hit like a truck. The best part is that this set will effect everyone effected by your Soul-Splitting Trap (the AoE morph), meaning that you have an extremely hard hitting AoE dot that you can basically maintain 100% uptime on on all enemies around you.
• Endurance: Since we are using a Mythic ring, we dont have enough room for another 5 piece set bonus, so instead we are using Endurance! Endurance is an incredibly strong 3 piece set, giving us a load of bonus HP and HP recovery, which is one of the primary defensive mechanics for the build. Combine that with the health recovery bonuses from being a dragonknight and heavy armor, and this set becomes an extremely potent choice for the class! Now while technically you can fit 1 piece of trainee on this build for more health, I personally strongly dislike having different health on my front and back bars. My reason being that if you take a big chunk of damage on your front bar and then swap to your back bar to heal and your health increases, you’re actually going to be increasing how hard executes can hit you. What you can do if you arent a fan of the dead piece (and what I do myself) is get a special shield from running the quest for Imperial City Prison called “Grievous Leeching Plate”. We dont run this set for any set bonus, but rather for a unique enchant that it has on it: a health recovery enchant (since you cant normally enchant armor with HP recovery). This enchant gives the same amount of HP recovery that a jewelry enchant would give, allowing us to essentially get another 1.3 lines of HP recovery!
• Vateshran Destruction Staff: This set makes an already amazing skill, Elemental Drain, even better by also creating a beam between us and our opponent, dealing damage to that opponent and anyone who touches the beam, and the damage just gets stronger the longer the beam holds (similarly to Zaan). Between Zaan, Oblivion’s Foe and this set, we have 3 different proc sets dealing massive DoT damage on top of the DoTs in our kit, allowing us to quickly and easily rot someone down.
• Malacath’s Band of Brutality: This set is what unlocked the potential of DoT builds. Malacath’s gives us a 25% damage boost to all of our skills, Zaan, Oblivion’s Foe and the Vateshran Staff, but prevents our damaging skills from dealing critical strikes (which isnt a big deal since we have low crit on our front bar & proc sets cant crit). Thankfully, this doesnt prevent our heals from dealing critical healing, so we set up our bars in a way to give our heals the greatest chance to crit.

NOTE: For the Cyrodiil tests, much of this gear is not able to be used. Replace the sets as Follows:

Attributes

All points into Magicka.

Skills

Main Bar – Destruction Staff: Flame Lash, Burning Embers, Fossilize, Elemental Drain, Soul-Splitting Trap (with Oblivion’s Foe) or Engulfing Flames (for Cyrodiil), Ferocious Leap

Back Bar – 1h and Shield: Degeneration, Flames of Oblivion, Coagulating Blood, Volatile Armor, Protective Plate, Temporal Guard

Vampire vs. Mortal

For this build I am playing as a Mortal. While mist form is a great addition to a build, right now, Vampirism just feels bad on magicka dragonknight. I miss using it, but it’s frankly better being a mortal to be able to really utilize HP recovery as a defensive mechanic.

Champion Points

Champion points were updated in the recent Flames of Ambition patch. The list below showcases the order in which the points should be acquired, the number of points you need to place into that perk and whether or not it needs to be slotted in the new CP bar. The Warfare CP perks increase your damage and mitigation and are the most important, the Fitness tree has some miscellaneous sustain and defensive perks and the Craft tree has crafting and non-combat bonuses. The Craft CP points are entirely customizable to however you want, or you can follow the list below.

CHAMPION POINT SETUP
WARFARE (BLUE)

• Eldritch Insight – 40
• Piercing – 40
• Deadly Aim – 50 (Slotted)
• Quick Recovery – 10
• Elemental Aegis – 40
• Hardy – 40
• Resilience – 50 (Slotted)
• Duelist’s Rebuff – 50 (Slotted)
• Unassailable – 50 (Slotted)
• Blessed – 40
• Quick Recovery – 30
• Tireless Discipline – 40
• Flawless Ritual – 40
• War Mage – 30
• Precision – 40

FITNESS (RED)

• Rejuvenation – 50 (Slotted)
• Tumbling – 15
• Mystic Tenacity – 10
• Hero’s Vigor – 40
• Defiance – 40
• Peace of Mind – 50 (Slotted)
• Survival Instincts – 50 (Slotted)
• Juggernaut – 50 (Slotted)
• Tireless Guardian – 40
• Fortification – 45
• Nimble Protector – 15
• Savage Defense – 45
• Bashing Brutality – 40
• Hasty – 32
• Sprinter – 40
• Tumbling – 30
• Piercing Gaze – 10

CRAFT (GREEN)

• Steed’s Blessing – 50 (Slotted)
• Breakfall – 10
• Wanderer – 15
• Steadfast Enchantment – 10
• Rationer – 30 (Slotted)
• Liquid Efficiency – 75 (Slotted)
• Breakfall – 40
• Wanderer – 60
• Steadfast Enchantment – 40
• Treasure Hunter – 50 (Slotted)
• Fortune’s Favor – 50
• Gilded Fingers – 50
• Out of Sight – 30
• Fleet Phantom – 40
• Soul Reservoir – 33
• Inspiration Boost – 45

Other Important Info

Buff Food

Bewitched Sugar Skulls: Maximum Health, Health Recovery, Magicka and Stamina

Mundus

Atronach – Increased Magicka Recovery

Race

Breton – Definitely the best race for this build. Magicka Dragonknight does not have the best sustain, and playing as a Breton prevents us from needing to run a sustain set on our build due to the 7% cost reduction and extra magicka recovery. Besides the great regen, we also get a big boost to our magicka and a ton of extra resistances.

Potions/Poisons

Essence of Health (Restore Magicka, Health and Stamina)
(Bugloss, Columbine and Mountain Flower)

Passives

Class (all), Light Armor (all), Heavy Armor (all), 1h & Shield (all), Destruction Staff (all), Mages Guild (all), Undaunted (all), Racial (all), Psijic Order (Clairvoyance and Concentrated Barrier), Alchemy (Medicinal Use), Assault (all), Support (all except the first)

Tips & Misc.

• Maintain your buffs & debuffs/DoTs to maximize the amount of tankiness and damage potential that the build offers.
• Your offense is also your defense. If you need a BIG heal in a pinch and don’t have an ultimate or a potion up, re-apply Burning Embers. The re-application of burning embers will cause you to be healed since the original DoT “ended”, and you’ll be maintaining the damage pressure on your opponent. You could also CC your opponent with Fossilize or Burning Talons and hit them with Flame Lash in order to get the heal from the Power Lash proc!
• Elemental Drain maintenance is very important for damage and sustain. Always make sure this ability is up on your opponent.
• Your Coagulating Blood is your bread and butter burst heal; use it when you’re taking massive amounts of pressure.
• Stunning someone before you use an ultimate will cause them to take the full brunt of your assault, so use Fossilize in those key moments.
• Use Protective Plate to defend against ranged attacks and remove snares from yourself to be able to move. This build’s biggest weakness is its lack of mobility, so keep your positioning in mind when you’re fighting!

Contact

If you have any questions about the build, join our discord server and ask @Dottz about the build!

Update Log

3/22/2021 – Build created.