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ESO Build: The Radiant Champion - OUTDATED

  • Member
    September 17, 2014

    I am the light in the darkness.
    I am the tip of the spear.
    I am the wrath of the dawn.
    And I know no fear!

    The Radiant Champion is a versatile Templar build which proves to be very effective in both solo and group PvE as well as in the Alliance War in Cyrodiil. Utilizing all 3 Templar skill lines, both Light and Heavy apparel, as well as two-handed weapons and staves, Radiant Champions are well-equipped to tackle any situation.

    Race: Altmer (Aldmeri Dominion)/Breton (Daggerfall Convenant)/Dunmer (Ebonheart Pact). Can't go wrong with a good Magicka boost.

    Stats: 16 Magicka | 18 Health | 16 Stamina. A fairly well-balanced stat spread allows the Champion to fill a variety of roles, depending on the equipment used.

    Stone: The Ritual. The Healing boost is useful for all roles.

    Skills: VR12 Build (Group PvE Setup)

    The Roles

    As a righteous Crusader, you rely on toughness, strength and Divine power to defeat enemies. Two-Handed weapons offer solid close-up damage output using Stamina as well as some other very useful effects. Heavy Armour vastly increases your durability, letting you stay in melee longer and providing some strong passives. Class abilities round out the Crusader skill-set with supporting abilities like heals and crowd control as well as some good damage options. I recommend this role for soloing and DPS in group PvE. Let's delve deeper into the key skills.

    Weapon: Two-Handed

    Cleave->Brawler: The Cleave skill isn't very useful in its base form due to the high Stamina cost, but once morphed its extremely useful in larger fights, granting a damage shield based on the number of targets hit. This can allow you to solo public dungeons and takes a lot of pressure off of your healer in groups.

    Critical Charge->Critical Rush/Stampede: An effective gap-closer, especially at lower levels with the Critical Rush morph for increased damage. The other morph applies an Immobilize with a solid duration, which is ideal for chasing down a fleeing enemy in PvP.

    Uppercut->Wrecking Blow: The premier Two-Handed skill (in my opinion) provides a high-damage attack, knockback, a short stun, and can be morphed to significantly boost the power of your following attack (typically a heavy attack). This is ideal for simply dishing out damage, and the knockdown can provide a small window to heal without being damaged. It's also perfect for sneak attacks. I sometimes swap this out for Silver Bolts when fighting Undead, Daedra or Werewolves.

    Reverse Slash->Guillotine: No-nonsense single target execute with a low Stamina cost. Even if you're healing, this is a good skill to have on your secondary bar to help finish off bosses.

    Templar Abilities

    Puncturing Strikes->Biting Jabs: One of the most versatile skills in the game, Puncturing Strikes deals high damage and staggers a single target, additional damage to the surrounding enemies, and when morphed it even becomes an effective execute. The Burning Light passive (25% chance to deal bonus damage) can proc on any target on each of the 4 strikes, increasing the damage further. Can't go wrong having this skill on your bar.

    Sun Fire->Reflective Light: A multi-target low-cost spell which deals decent damage and then damage over time. Like Puncturing Strikes, it's a versatile damage dealer you can't go wrong with while solo or with a group.

    Backlash->Power of the Light: An excellent ability for taking down bosses quickly in a group. While it does have a short cast time, the bonus damage is definitely worth it. Once morphed, it increases the power of your allies' attacks as well. I didn't find it too useful while soloing, other than combining it with ultimates like Soul Assault.

    Blinding Light->Blinding Flashes: While not too useful in its base form, the Blinding Flashes morph makes this skill great for soloing. It essentially provides a 50% chance to miss to all nearby enemies for over 7 seconds and off-balances them if they do, briefly stunning them and allowing for a nasty heavy attack combo. Sometimes when fighting two enemies you can simply throw on Blinding Flashes and alternate between heavy attacking each one.

    Rushed Ceremony->Breath of Life: A quick, powerful, multitarget heal. I almost always kept this on my bar in slot 5.

    Restoring Aura->Repentance: A free-cast area Health and Stamina restore based on the number of nearby corpses as well as a passive regeneration boost. Excellent for situations where you're fighting multiple weaker targets like in a public dungeon, however I found it loses effectiveness later on.

    Sun Shield->Blazing Shield: An excellent defensive ability that creates a shield for 30% or more of your maximum health. Once morphed it can be used very offensively against hard hitting targets, detonating for pretty hefty damage when it breaks.

    Other Abilities

    Fire Rune->Volcanic Rune: A great area CC ability, dealing some damage and effectively stunning targets for 4 seconds.

    Evil Hunter->Expert Hunter: Provides a chance to deal high bonus damage to Daedra and Undead on every attack, and can be morphed to return Stamina. If you're fighting these enemies there's pretty much no reason not to be using this. I usually put it on a secondary bar and quickly re-activate it when the duration runs out.

    Remember to mix and match the abilities to suit the situation - if first you don't succeed, try a different combination.

    Ultimates

    Nova->Solar Prison: Amazing area damage and a high-powered synergy. At higher levels I'll typically put this on a secondary bar in favor of...

    Dawnbreaker->Flawless Dawnbreaker: Once morphed, increases weapon damage by up to 13% simply for being slotted. If I want to actually use an Ultimate I'll switch bars and use Nova instead.

    Equipment

    I found a mix of 5 pieces Torug's Pact, 3 pieces of Warlock jewelry (two pieces modified to have Weapon and Spell power enchantments respectively) and 3 pieces of another set (I use Way of the Arena) was ideal. The Torug's Pact enchantment cooldown reduction when combined with a Powered weapon allows you to proc weapon enchants on every second strike. I recommend using a Flaming weapon, which has its effectiveness greatly improved by the Arcane Fighter passive in Two-Handed. A full set of Heavy Armour allows me to hit around 2000 Armour and about 1700 Spell Resistance, making me very durable. I used a mix of Health, Magicka and Stamina enchantments combined with Infused traits on head, chest and leg pieces to achieve roughly 2000 Health and Magicka and 1600 Stamina.

     

    As a restoring Lightkeeper, you aim to keep yourself allies alive with healing spells and other supporting effects. Wielding a Restoration staff provides additional Magicka and access to powerful healing effects. Stamina-based skills can provide additional utility without draining your Magicka pool. While I didn't exclusively use the skills below to level my Restoration Staff, they are what you will be using when supporting a group. I typically took 3 Healing skills, a Support skill and a Stamina skill on my bar, though in some high-strain situations like Veteran Dungeons you might need another heal or two.

    Healing Skills

    Rushed Ceremony->Breath of Life: Your emergency heal for when the party is split up or taking a lot of damage.

    Cleansing Ritual->Purifying Ritual: An excellent skill for both PvE and PvP, this skill lays down a healing area in which allies can use a synergy to heal themselves and remove negative effects such as damage over time. The Purifying morph reduces the cost and allows you to remove multiple effects from yourself on cast - typically better than the Extended Ritual morph since allies won't always stay in the area. When combined with the Focused Healing passive, allies in the area receive 50% more healing - a significant boost!

    Grand Healing->Healing Springs: An efficient area heal over time, this will be your go-to heal. With the Healing Springs morph, you have magicka returned based on the number of allies hit. A recent nerf halved the number of allies you can return Magicka from so the other morph is also a good choice.

    Regeneration->Rapid Regeneration: Simple, cheap, multi-target heal over time. I really only good at lower levels though it is useful for boss soloing.

    Force Siphon->Quick Siphon: A very useful ability for fighting bosses, particularly in solo or large groups (see my Regen Tanking tip). Tagging an enemy with this returns health to their attackers and twice as much to you.

    Support Skills

    Spear Shards->Luminous Shards: Useful in situations where you're teamed up with a heavy Stamina user for the synergy, not so much for the damage or CC. This can proc the Burning Light passive however and has a big area.

    Eclipse->Unstable Core: The ultimate PvP support ability! Eclipse projects a bubble around an enemy, causing them to reflect all projectile spells back at themselves for 6 seconds. It works even when the projectile is already in flight. Ideal for taking down tower mages at resources and pesky Sorcerers and Destruction Staff users. Another great use of this ability is on Reflective Scales Dragonknights - casting an ability will cause it to continually bounce between you two until someone's reflect runs out - usually theirs. This means they're hit with a huge burst of damage and potentially crowd control effects. Keep in mind it does count as a CC ability and thus can be resisted.

    Magelight->Inner Light: The Spell Crit boost is invaluable in high-strain situations like Veteran dungeons and tough PvP battles, increasing your overall healing output. It also increases your detection radius, helping you find stealthy players in Cyrodiil.

    Blessing of Protection->Combat Prayer/Blessing of Restoration: An aimed area heal which also provides protection. Both morphs are good depending on when you plan to use it - in PvP the larger area is useful while in PvE you can use it to boost the DPS of squishier characters while improving their durability. Something to keep in mind is it doesn't stack with itself so if you're in an organized group make sure you don't have the same morph as someone else.

    Stamina Skills:

    Immovable->Unstoppable: A significant boost to your toughness as well as immunity to most crowd control. Very useful in bossfights with lots of AoE, adds or CC so that you can always be ready to heal your comrades.

    Silver Bolts->Silver Shards: A nice Stamina-based ranged ability that can be morphed for area damage. I almost exclusively used this while soloing over other Stamina skills.

    Circle of Protection->Turn Undead: An immensely underrated skill which can boost the toughness of you and the other nearby members of the party. The Turn Undead morph is amazing for dealing with groups of undead, werewolves Daedra such as at Dark Anchors, or it can easily turn battles with melee world bosses of these varieties into a cakewalk. It has a surprisingly low cost so don't be afraid to abuse this.

    Rapid Maneuver->Rapid Retreat: Great for organized PvP, you can increase your party's speed and make them immune to slows and snares as you move from place to place (along the walls of a keep for example). When maxed out it increases speed by 33%.

    Caltrops: While I don't actually have this skill at time of posting, the wide-area damage over time and snare would be great for extended fights in Cyrodiil or for dealing with large trash groups in dungeons.

    Ultimate - Rite of Passage->Practiced Incantation: Pretty much god mode. You're rooted in place for 6 seconds healing a massive amount of health every half second to everyone nearby while immune to CC. Plus, if you have the Light Weaver passive, you get a big resistance boost while it's active. Don't forget to lay down a Cleansing Ritual before use to increase the heal.

    Equipment

    I didn't have a specific apparel set for the Lightbringer role but rather used my Crusader or Dawnmage's gear sets, depending on whether I was doing PvE or PvP respectively. I used a Weighted staff to increase the speed of my Heavy attacks, since they restore 10% of your max magicka.

     

    As a brilliant Dawnmage, you use the power of the sun to bring fiery doom upon your foes. The Dawnmage role is ideal for PvP, bringing powerful ranged, area and damage over time abilities to the table. Wearing a mix of light and heavy armour to increase the effectiveness and frequency of spells, the Dawnmage is not as durable as the other roles but makes up for it with raw damage output. I only started working on this role at Veteran levels when I got in to PvP - you simply don't have the skill points to maintain two roles and crafting skill(s) at low levels. As with the Lightbringer role, I usually used a Stamina skill on my bar as well as my magic skills. This is the preferred role for PvP, and performs admirably in dungeons as well due to the high area damage.

    Class Abilities

    Piercing Javelin->Binding Javelin: An excellent substitute for the Destruction Staff's Destructive Touch ability. Binding Javelin adds a lengthy immobilize - I would typically only use this ability in solo PvE or 1v1 however due to the relatively low range and damage. It does have some nice utility for knocking people off of castles though...

    Sun Shield->Blazing Shield: A toughness boost that also adds a powerful punch when up close. Alternating this ability and Impulse can dish out a lot of damage and keep you alive - just remember to watch your Magicka!

    Sun Fire->Reflective Light: Nice ability to spam in to groups, laying down some decent damage and snare. The low projectile velocity can be both a bane and benefit in PvP - it can catch enemies when they think they're out of range, but gives observant foes time to reflect it. My go-to ranged ability, I alternate it with light attacks.

    Solar Flare->Dark Flare: Powerful ranged ability with a short cast time that also increases the damage of a follow up attack - particulary deadly when you're working with a team to combo it into a Snipe or Crystal Shards. Once morphed it reduces healing recieved. This can be difficult to use when foes are darting in and out of your range. (Reflective Light is usually a better option in this case)

    Rushed Ceremony->Breath of Life: Why aren't you using this again?

    Destruction Staff Abilities

    Wall of Elements->Elemental Barrier: Lay down an area of elemental damage which can stack with itself. I picked the morph to increase area, allowing me to fill dungeon corridors or cover a large section of castle walls and breaches.

    Force Shock->Crushing Shock: Personally I prefer Reflective Light but Crushing Shock does offer a stun when targeting casting enemies. This is a good option for boss fights as Evil Hunter can proc multiple times on this ability - once for each damage type.

    Impulse->Elemental Ring: Perfect for running through groups or taking guys on at close range along with Blazing Shield. Along with the 40+% chance to apply the Burning effect, Elemental Ring applies another damage over time. In a group, this ability can generate Ultimate very quickly.

    Ultimates

    Nova->Solar Prison: One of the better PvP ultimates - massive area, massive damage, brutal synergy. When in a bomb group and combined with Negate and/or Dragonknight Standard this is absolutely deadly. Frequent use of damage/heal over time abilities will charge this up pretty fast.

    Soul Strike->Soul Assault: A very high damage single target ability which you get from completing the main quest. Can be used to quickly melt a priority target or turn the tables in a solo gank.

    Equipment

    I used a Sharpened Inferno Staff with a Flaming (Later Disease) enchantment. Fire is usually the best damage type for PvP due to the relative abundance of vampire players, who will take significantly more damage from your abilities. Disease damage can reduce healing received, which is an obvious asset in PvP situations. I wore 5 pieces of Light Armour to get a good balance between the Light Armour passives and the protection of a heavy Cuirass and Greaves - the two pieces with the highest armour rating. As for sets, I used the modified Warlock jewelry mentioned earlier, 5 pieces of the Arena set for a boost to all stats and CC break cost reduction and 3 pieces of the Death's Wind set for a little more durability. Alternately, swap out the Death's Wind pieces to complete the Warlock set. or a set which increases your spell effectiveness such as Magnus' Gift. I used a mix of Health and Magicka enchantments to end up with around 2200 Health and Magicka, which was boosted further by Battle Spirit in Cyrodiil.

    Video

  • Member
    September 17, 2014

    Well done Ponty, its a great build and you've given me some ideas on how to modify my current setup  :)

  • Member
    September 18, 2014
    Oh my god it's finally here! Can't wait to give it a try! I see this build uses a lot of skill points, any suggestions on a leveling order. Or low level enchantd?..did I mention that I can't wait to try this out!
  • Member
    September 18, 2014
    Never mind on the enchants I see now
  • Member
    September 18, 2014

    Like I said I didn't really use the Destruction Staff/Light Armour setup until much later on. I'd start out with mainly Two-Handed and Dawn's Wrath skills, but make sure you've got some basic heals (I had Grand Healing, Breath of Life and Rapid Regeneration) before level 15 or so for your first dungeon(s)!

  • Member
    September 23, 2014
    Interesting build P0nty! I'm running a Templar with 2H and resto staff right now around level 40. Very similar build. Mine is more focused on being an offtank with many AoE skills on the first bar, and a main healer on the second bar. We'll have to compare notes :D
  • Dan
    Member
    April 26, 2015

    Your build link is broken. Apparently March 4th is when they broke if they were made before then.

  • Member
    April 26, 2015

    Thanks for the heads up Dan. There's been a number of changes to the game since I made this build so I should probably go back and re-do some parts anyway.

  • Dan
    Member
    April 26, 2015

    I would love that. Been going around testing out different things here and there, but with most TES games I can't stick to one till I've tried a lot of playstyles.

  • Member
    September 11, 2015

    Hey, Ponty. I really like this build. Since I plan to get ESO very soon, I was wondering if you thought that this build would serve as a good starting point for a noob?