Welcome to the Magicka Sorcerer Beginner Guide for ESO (Elder Scrolls Online). Leveling up a character can be difficult, this guide will help you to level up your character in an efficient way and explain everything in great detail. I will showcase what you have to do, give appropriate stats and will tell you what kind of skills you need to prioritize and have on your bars all the time.
If you don’t understand something and it isn’t covered here you might find it in the general New Player Beginner Guide, otherwise join the Discord where you will find a helpful community!
Table of Contents
- The Start
- Level 2 (Attributes & Skill)
- Level 3 (Gear & Skills)
- Destruction & Restoration Skill Lines
- Buff-Food & Drinks
- Training Gear
- Mages Guild, Fighters Guild, Undaunted
- Mundus Stone
- Level 10
- Level 15
- Level 20 Skill Setup
- Level 30 Skill Setup
- Level 40 Skill Setup
- Level 50
- What’s next?
The Start – Leveling a Sorcerer
This Magicka Sorcerer Beginner Guide will teach you how to build your character to successfully reach level 50. The guide will touch on the most important things that you need to know to make your character good and efficient, after this guide you should have a good base understanding of some of the skills and the class itself.
Level 2 (Attributes & Skill)
- Assign your first attribute point with level 2, keep putting all the following attribute points into magicka.
- Assign your first skill, go to Daedric Summoning in the class skill lines and activate the Summon Unstable Familiar, this pet will help you fight and the good thing about it is, that it also sometimes takes aggro of mobs so it kind of tanks for you.
Level 3 (Gear & Skills)
With level 3 you receive a reward box that you can open to get some gear and other stuff.
- You will receive buff food, make sure to activate it by double clicking on the food, you will see that your character stats increase.
- You will also receive some training gear parts, make sure to use the armor and weapon, training trait on gear will increase your experience gain, you can find more information on how to increase experience gain in my Power Leveling Grind Guide.
- Upon reaching level 3 you can claim your level up reward and you will gain 1 additional skill point. In addition, after completing the tutorial/quest you will get a reward which includes another skill points like shown in the tutorial video here. Make sure to pick a skill from each of your Class skill lines. You should now have the following skills on your active bar:
- Summmon Unstable Familiar
- Crystal Shards
- Mages’ Fury
Once you have all three skills slotted you will start gaining experience for all those abilities on your active bar and their specific skill lines. Remember, like I explained in the New Player Beginner Guide, skills start gaining experience the moment you place them on your active skill bar.
Buff Food in the Reward Box
Gear in the Reward Box
Skills that you have to slot with level 3
Destruction & Restoration Skill Lines – Sorcerer Beginner Guide
Magicka Sorcerers use either two Destruction Staves or a Destruction and a Restoration Staff. Your next step is to find a Destruction and a Restoration Staff while you are exploring, questing and killing monsters. The moment you slot a Destruction or Restoration Staff and kill one monster while you have one of the weapons slotted, the Skill lines for each of those will become available and you can start leveling them up. They will both be at level 1. What you want to do now is, once you have a skill point go to the Destruction Staff or Restoration Staff skill line and unlock the first skill in there and place the skills on your bar slot 4 and 5. Once they are placed there both the Destruction Staff and Restoration Staff skill line will start leveling up.
Buff-Food & Drinks
I do recommend saving some money to buy the “Witchmother’s Potent Brew Drink” in a Guildstore, or simply ask a guild member to give you some (if you are already in a guild). This will increase your character stats by a lot and this will also make your sustain a lot better.
- Witchmother’s Potent Brew Drink
- Increase Health, Magicka and Magicka Recovery
- Can be used at any level
- Not that expensive in the guildstore
Training Gear
You want to get as much training gear as possible because you will level up a lot faster. If you want to check out all the experience boost options available I recommend checking out my Power Leveling Grind Guide.
If you are already in a guild, ask a guild member of yours to craft you some training gear:
- 5 Light Armor level 10 with training trait.
- 1 Heavy Armor level 10 with training trait.
- 1 Medium Armor level 10 with training trait.
- 1 Destruction Staff for level 10 and level 16 with training trait.
- 1 Restoration staff level 16 with training trait. (will be used later).
Mages Guild, Fighters Guild and Undaunted
The most important thing that you must not forget is to acquire the Fighters Guild, Mages Guild and Undaunted Skill-line when you enter the start town. In my Fighters Guild, Mages Guild, Undaunted Video I showcase one example on how to get those skill-lines. All you need to do is talk to the right person and you will get a quest. Those three skill lines are also leveled up in different ways.
- Undaunted: To level you need to complete dungeon achievements
- Fighters Guild: To level up you need to kill Undead and Daedra
- Mages Guild: To level up you need to gather lorebooks
Mundus Stone
When you have the chance, make sure to get your first Mundus Stone as soon as possible, this will increase your character stats by a lot. You can find the Lover Mundus Stone in the first zone of your alliance, the Mundus Stone will increase your penetration and thus your overall damage will be better. For an overview of all Mundus Stones please visit the Mundus Stone Overview Page.
- Aldmeri Dominion – Auridon
- Daggerfall Covenant – Glenumbra
- Ebonheart Pact – Stonefalls
Aldmeri Dominion – Auridon
Daggerfall Covenant – Glenumbra
Ebonheart Pact – Stonefalls
Level 10
Level 10 Milestone Reward
Once you reach level 10, you will get your first useful milestone reward. This will include:
- 3 Skillpoints
- 3 Attribute Points
- Horse
- Dungeon Finder access
- Battlegrounds access
- Cyrodiil access
Now you can use that horse to travel around faster. Make sure to feed the horse at a stable every day if possible, so you can increase the speed, stamina or weight capacity. The Dungeon Finder will allow you to queue for normal dungeons, I do recommend waiting a bit more tho because with level 10 the normal dungeons are quite difficult. You will also get Battlegrounds and Cyrodiil access with level 10.
Level 10 Skill Setup
With level 10 we want to make sure to have all our 3 class skill lines slotted in combination with one Destruction Staff and Restoration Staff skill, that way we can level up 5 skill lines at the same time. Make sure to swap out skill on the go, because once you leveled up a skill and the morph of it, you can choose something else to slot there.
Note: From here on I recommend swapping out fully leveled abilities and morphs, so you can level up new skills as well when you unlock them. Just make sure that you have an ability of each Skill-line slotted, otherwise the Skill-line will not level up.
- What is morphing? Each base ability has two morphs which you can choose from. For example Nr.1 we morph the Crystal Shards base ability to the Crystal Fragments morph, and each morph adds different new funtions to the base ability.
Skill bar level 10:
- 1. Crystal Shards
- Morph to Crystal Fragments (if possible)
- 2. Summon Unstable Familiar
- Morph to Summon Volatile Familiar (if possible)
- 3. Lightning Form
- Morph to Boundless Storm (if possible)
- 4. Wall of Elements
- Morph to Elemental Blockade (if possible)
- 5. Grand Healing
- Morph to Healing Springs (if possible)
Once we reach a high enough level, we can also slot an Ultimate, this will allow us to have one flexible slot to keep swapping out abilities to level them up.
Level 15
Level 15 will teach you the last piece of the big puzzle, weapon swapping. After this point here you should know most of the basics, you might not be able to perform most of the mechanics yet, but at least you should have the knowledge if you followed this Magicka Sorcerer Beginner Guide and the New Player Beginner Guide.
From here on I will mostly guide you through the skill setups that you should slot to level up as much skills as possible and still maintain good damage and survivability.
Level 15 Milestone Reward
In this milestone reward you can choose a weapon of your choice. If you already have a Destruction Staff, make sure to select a Restoration Staff, if you do not have a Destruction Staff yet (which should not be the case) then choose the Destruction Staff.
The reason why they give you a second weapon is, because now we can actually weapon swap! This allows us to fill another skill bar with abilities. Make sure to slot the second weapon on the second weapon slot which should now be unlocked. However, keep in mind, you only get experience for the active skill bar when a monster dies. So if you have your first skill bar active and a monster dies, you will only gain experience on that bar.
Level 15 Skill Setup
With reaching level 15 as a Sorcerer, we should now be able to set up our most basic setup for single target damage. We also now should have our first Ultimate slotted. We also now have two bars available, so we can fill two bars if we want to. However, I will place the most important skills on our “frontbar” and the less important skills on the backbar. I do recommend that you learn to weaponswap as fast as possible as this becomes a very important feature later in the game. Also keep in mind that skills like our Volatile Familiar have to be slotted on both bars to stay activated when we weapon swap.
- Our main single target ability is “Crushing Shock” (Morph of Force Shock). Weave Light attacks between each Crushing Shock. Crushing Shock also interrupts enemies that are channeling an attack.
- Area of Effect damage is our Elemental Blockade and the Summon Volatile Familiar.
- Make sure to have a Destruction Staff on the frontbar and a Restoration Staff on the backbar.
- Overload is now our Ultimate, it is a toggle Ultimate. Activate it to use it, click it again to deactivate it.
Level 15 Frontbar (Destruction Staff)
- 1. Rapid Regeneration (Base-skill: Regeneration) (Only slotted to gain experience for Restoration Staff skill-lline.)
- 2. Crystal Fragments (Base-skill: Crystal Shards)
- 3. Crushing Shock (Base-skill: Force Shock)
- 4. Elemental Blockade (Base-skill: Wall of Elements)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Overload
Level 15 Backbar (Restoration Staff)
- 1. Random free slot
- 2. Random free slot
- 3. Rapid Regeneration (Base-skill: Regeneration)
- 4. Boundless Storm (Base-skill: Lightning Form)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Overload
Keep in mind, as you can see we have all 3 Class, Restoration Staff and Destruction Staff skill-lines slotted on the frontbar. This way we will gain experience when we kill a monster or finish a quest for all of them. So in total we gain experience for 5 different skill-lines. We do have two Destruction Staff skills slotted, which means we will gain more experience for this skill-line compared to others, because two skills gather experience at the same time for this skill-line.
Level 20 Skill Setup
From here on you should already have a fully playable character with your skill setup. Now it is just leveling up skills and skill-lines. Complete quests, level up Mages Guild, Fighters Guild, Undaunted etc.
Character Stats
Skills
Here is the recommended setup. You will see that some skills are twice on your bar. Most people will still have a lot of issues weapon swapping in combat. Therefore I made sure that most important skills are on the frontbar to use and level up.
Level 20 Frontbar (Destruction Staff)
- 1. Rapid Regeneration (Base-skill: Regeneration) (Only slotted to gain experience for Restoration Staff skill-lline.)
- 2. Crystal Fragments (Base-skill: Crystal Shards)
- 3. Crushing Shock (Base-skill: Force Shock)
- 4. Lightning Splash
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Summon Storm Atronach
Level 20 Backbar (Restoration Staff)
- 1. Blessing of Protection (Burst heal)
- 2. Boundless Storm (Base-skill: Lightning Form) (Extra Resistance boost and speed buff)
- 3. Rapid Regeneration (Base-skill: Regeneration) (Keep this up for extra heals)
- 4. Liquid Lightning (Base-skill: Lightning Splash)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Overload
On the backbar you should always keep up Rapid Regeneration, it will be nice healing over time that is applied on your character. Boundless Storm also gives you more resistance so you take less damage and applies speed buff to your character.
Important Passives
Keep gathering Skyshards and do zone quests or storyline quests to get more skill points. That way you can unlock very powerful passives from your light armor and class trees. Keep adding more and more passives to the list as soon as you can unlock them.
- Evocation (Light Armor passive)
- Unholy Knowledge (Dark Magic passive)
Remember, keep swapping out skills from different skill-lines, that way you will always level up different skill-lines and skills. Also swap out skills that you do not need often with other ones to also level them up.
Level 30 Skill Setup
Level 30 Frontbar (Destruction Staff)
- 1. Annulment
- 2. Crystal Fragments (Base-skill: Crystal Shards)
- 3. Crushing Shock (Base-skill: Force Shock)
- 4. Elemental Blockade (Base-skill: Wall of Elements)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Negate Magic
Level 30 Backbar (Restoration Staff)
- 1. Blessing of Protection (Burst heal)
- 2. Boundless Storm (Base-skill: Lightning Form) (Extra Resistance boost and speed buff)
- 3. Rapid Regeneration (Base-skill: Regeneration) (Keep this up for extra heals)
- 4. Liquid Lightning (Base-skill: Lightning Splash)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Overload
Level 40 Skill Setup
With level 40, we are finally changing to a double Destruction Staff setup. You can still use a Destruction/Restoration staff setup if you prefer that, but if we want to aim for the Magicka Sorcerer Beginner Build then we want to focus on Destruction/Destruction Staff setup.
With level 40 you should have access to the Surge skill that will heal you while doing damage. If you can already morph it, make sure to use the Power Surge morph, to also gain Major Sorcery.
Level 40 Frontbar (Destruction Staff)
- 1. Conjured Ward (Useful Guides: How do Shields Work?, How do Shields Scale?)
- 2. Crystal Fragments (Base-skill: Crystal Shards)
- 3. Crushing Shock (Base-skill: Force Shock)
- 4. Surge (If you can, morph it to Power Surge, gives you access to Major Sorcery)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Suppression Field (Base-skill: Negate Magic)
Level 40 Backbar (Destruction Staff)
- 1. Elemental Blockade (Base-skill: Wall of Elements)
- 2. Liquid Lightning (Base-skill: Lightning Splash)
- 3. Weakness to Elements
- 4. Boundless Storm (Base-skill: Lightning Form) (Extra Resistance boost and speed buff)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Energy Overload (Base-skill: Overload)
Level 50
This will be our final setup for now. You will notice that not all Skill-lines are leveled up. Do not worry, that is normal. Keep doing what you have been doing till all the Skill-lines reach level 50. It will take quite some time to level all of them up and level up all the morphs to level 4. Your next step is the Magicka Sorcerer Beginner Build CP 160. In that guide I will also talk more about specific sets and skills, so you can understand why we use certain abilities. Your next goal is to focus on that build and get 160 Champion Points. This will not take that long because you get Enlightenment, so you will gain Champion Points at an accelerated pace.
Level 50 Frontbar (Destruction Staff)
- 1. Conjured Ward (Useful Guides: How do Shields Work?, How do Shields Scale?)
- 2. Crystal Fragments (Base-skill: Crystal Shards)
- 3. Crushing Shock (Base-skill: Force Shock)
- 4. Power Surge (Base-skill: Surge)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Suppression Field (Base-skill: Negate Magic)
Level 50 Backbar (Destruction Staff)
- 1. Elemental Blockade (Base-skill: Wall of Elements)
- 2. Liquid Lightning (Base-skill: Lightning Splash)
- 3. Elemental Drain (Weakness to Elements)
- 4. Daedric Curse (If you can, morph it to Haunting Curse)
- 5. Summon Volatile Familiar (Base-skill: Summon Unstable Familiar)
- 6. Ultimate: Energy Overload (Base-skill: Overload)
