Powerful Magicka Arcanist Build for ESO – Damage Dealer DPS

• Whorl of Depths gives us access to the powerful Minor Slayer buff, increasing damage against monsters by 5%. Additionally, it also deals massive single-target and AOE damage.
• Pillar of Nirn is a strong proc set that deals massive damage both for single-target and AOE damage. We frontbar this set.
• Velothi Ur-Mage’s Amulet is a Mythic item that gives us an incredible damage boost, but reduces our light and heavy attack damage, which is a small tradeoff!
• Crushing Wall is slotted on the backbar to boost the damage of our Unstable Blockade.
• Slimecraw is only here for the one piece that gives us an extra crit bonus.
• No Mythic? If you don’t have access to the Mythic item, replace the Mythic and the Slimecraw piece with 2x Maw of the Infernal Monster set.

Alternatively, you can also use the Necromancer class-specific Corpseburster set.

Advanced – Gear Setup 2

The Gear setup 2 for the Magicka Arcanist Build is made for players who don’t have access to trial gear.

Gear Setup 3 Beginner

The beginner setup for the ESO Arcanist Build is made for players that just started out, you can join a guild and ask someone to craft you Law of Julianos and Magnus’ Gift. Willpower can be bought in Guildstores for very little money.

Where can I get the gear?

Perfected Whorl of Depths: vDreadsail Reef Trial
Whorl of Depths: nDreadsail Reef Trial
Pillar of Nirn: Falkreath Hold
Velothi Ur-Mage’s Amulet (Mythic): Antiquities
Perfected Crushing Wall: vMaelstrom Arena
Slimecraw: vWayrest Sewers 1
Maw of the Infernal: The Banished Cells 2
Mother’s Sorrow: Deshaan, Guildstores
Perf. Ansuul’s Torment: vSanity’s Edge Trial

Law of Julianos: Craftable
Willpower: Guildstore
Magnus’ Gift: Craftable

Skills for ESO Arcanist Build

Skills explanation:

• Pragmatic Fatecarver: Powerful directional beam that deals great damage, and also applies a shield to you. Use with caution as your movement will be slowed a lot.
• Tentacular Dread: Deals great damage but more importantly increases your damage output by 33% per Crux consumed.
• Escalating Runeblades: Your main DPS skill, deals great single-target damage and the last rune that hits the enemies also deals AoE damage.
• Chakram of Destiny: Applies a shield to you or up to 4 allies. Only use this if you drop to low health.
• Inner Light: Increases your maximum Magicka. This is a flex spot, you can place another ability here if you want.
• The Languid Eye: Your main Ultimate. Deals great single target and area of effect damage to enemies that stand in the beam.
• Unstable Wall of Elements: Great damage over time effect.
• Fulminating Rune: Deals great damage over time and AoE damage.
• Scalding Rune: Strong stationary damage over time skill.
• Inspired Scholarship: Adds extra damage to your class abilities every few seconds. Buff on self has a long duration.
• Mystic Orb: Great area of effect damage that slowly moves forward
• Shooting Star: Your ultimate for trash packs. If you hit a lot of enemies you will regain quite a bit of ultimate points.

Arcanist Scribing Skills

The ESO Scribing System offers plenty of adjustable skills to add to our build. Right now none of the new ESO Scribing Skills maximizes our DPS. Therefore I don’t recommend slotting any of them. However, there are two viable options that you can test out and play with if you still want to give it a try. More great combos might be discovered over time because there are so many available combinations. Make sure to bookmark this ESO Arcanist Build and check back later for changes.

Important: Please read here how to get Grimoires, Focus Scripts, Signature Scripts and Affix Scripts for the ESO Scribing System.

Base Scribing Skill:

• Destruction Staff: Elemental Explosion
• World: Wield Soul

To unlock the Elemental Explosion skill, you need to reach level 25 in the Destruction Staff skill line. To unlock the Wield Soul skill you need to complete the Scribing Tutorial Quest.

Elemental Explosion

Elemental Explosion turns into Fiery Explosion with our Scribing scripts.

• Focus Script
  • Fire Damage
• Signature Script
  • Lingering Torment (Damage over time)
• Affix Script
  • Brittle (Applies Brittle to the enemy, increasing their Crit Damage taken)

Wield Soul

Wield Soul turns into Shocking Soul with our Scribing scripts.

• Focus Script
  • Shock Damage
• Signature Script
  • Lingering Torment (Damage over time)
• Affix Script
  • Empower (More Heavy Attack Damage) or
  • Courage (Adds Minor Courage, giving you 215 Weap/Spell Damage)

You can also test more combinations out with the ESO Scribing Simulator.

Champion Points – Magicka Arcanist Build

Below you can find the Champion Points setup for this build. Work your way from top to bottom in your allocation. For more information on Champion Points, please visit the Champion Points Overview Page on ESO-Hub.com.

Hovering over each perk will give you insights on what it does. Presets are also provided for each of the allocations below.

Click the tab below to open the allocation.

Important Info for Magicka Arcanist Build PvE

In this section of the Magicka Arcanist Build we are going to take a look at buff-food, mundus stone, race, potions, passives and attributes. These things are very important for the Magicka Arcanist Build as they help with damage and sustain.

Buff-food

You can use several good buff foods for this Magicka Nightblade Build in ESO. As a base we are using the  Ghastly Eye Bowl if you want the highest max magicka and magicka recovery boost. If you want more health in combination with max magicka and magicka recovery then you could also use Clockwork Citrus Filet or the much cheaper version Witchmother’s Potent Brew. All buff foods and drinks can also be found on the Buff Food and Drink Overview Page.

Ghastly Eye Bowl
(Max Magicka, Magicka Recover)

Clockwork Citrus Filet
(Max Health, Max Magicka, Magicka Recovery)

Witchmother’s Potent Brew
If you can’t afford Clockwork Citrus Filet, then I recommend getting the way cheaper Witchmother’s Potent Brew which has similar effects.

 

Mundus Stone

The Thief Mundus Stone increases our overall Spell Critical chance by a lot which will result in more overall damage. You can learn more about all the other Mundus Stones on the Mundus Stone Overview Page.

The Thief Mundus Stone (Increased Spell Critical Chance)

Race

Any race with magicka based passives will work with this setup. You can find out more about all the racial passives on the Racial Overview page.

• High Elf
• Breton
• Darkelf
• Khajiit
• Orc

Potions

Spell-Power Potions
(Spell-crit, Spell Damage, Magicka)
(Cornflower, Ladys Smock, Water Hyacinth)

Passives

• Herald of Tome: Fated Fortune, Harnessed Quintessence, Psychic Lesion, Splintered Secrets
• Curative Runeforms: Hideous Clarity, Erudition, Intricate Runeforms
• Soldier of Apocrypha: Circumvented Fate, Implacable Outcome
• Destruction Staff: Tri Focus, Penetrating Magic, Elemental Force, Ancient Knowledge, Destruction Expert
• Medium Armor: Dexterity, Wind Walker, Improved Sneak, Agility, Athletics
• Light Armor: Grace, Evocation, Spell Warding, Prodigy, Concentration
• Mages Guild: Mage Adept, Everlasting Magic, Magicka Controller, Might of the Guild
• Psijic Order: (Only if you use Channeled Acceleration) Clairvoyance, Spell Orb, Concentrated Barrier, Deliberation
• Undaunted: Undaunted Command, Undaunted Mettle
• Racial: All
• Alchemy: Medicinal Use

Attributes

All into Magicka

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Resource Management – Magicka Arcanist Build

The Hideous Clarity and Erudition passive both help with sustain on the Arcanist.

Energy Orb will always be present in a good group. When you get close to the Orb you can activate its synergy to regain resources.

Potions should always be used on cooldown to gain the maximum benefit from them.

Heavy Attacks help you restore Magicka, if you drop low on resources do a few Heavy Attacks between skills to refill your Magicka.

• Hideous Clarity Passive
• Erudition Passive
• Orb Synergy
• Potions
• Heavy Attack

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Area of Effect Setup

Here you can find an optimized AoE setup for the build. There are plenty of other good options available.

Gear	Set	Weight	Trait	Enchantment
Chest	Azureblight Reaper	Medium	Divine	Magicka
Belt	Azureblight Reaper	Medium	Divine	Magicka
Shoes	Azureblight Reaper	Medium	Divine	Magicka
Pants	Azureblight Reaper	Medium	Divine	Magicka
Hands	Azureblight Reaper	Medium	Divine	Magicka
Head	Slimecraw	Light	Divine	Magicka
Shoulder	Ansuul’s Torment	Medium	Divine	Magicka
Necklace	Velothi Ur-Mage’s Amulet	Jewelry	Bloodthirsty	Spell Damage
Ring	Ansuul’s Torment	Jewelry	Bloodthirsty	Spell Damage
Ring	Ansuul’s Torment	Jewelry	Bloodthirsty	Spell Damage
Weapon 1	Ansuul’s Torment	Fire	Nirnhoned	Fire Enchant
Weapon 2	Perfected Crushing Wall	Fire	Infused	Weapon Damage Enchant

 

Skills

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Maelstrom Arena & Vateshran Hollows Arena

Please check out the Solo Magicka Arcanist Build for the Maelstrom and Vateshran Setup. The build here focuses on group setups, therefore the Solo Magicka Arcanist Build is better suited to face the dangers of the Maelstrom and Vateshran Arena. I also highly recommend reading the full in-depth Maelstrom Arena Guide & Vateshran Hollows Arena Guide.