The Elder Scrolls Online » Discussions


ESO Build: The Malconvoker - OUTDATED

  • Member
    September 28, 2015

    Anyone who is familiar with my Skyrim builds should know that my favorite skill in the Elder Scrolls series is Conjuration. I love summoning things and I love playing the party leader role. Well enter ESO and the Sorcerer brings a new twist to summoning with the Daedric Summoning tree. What this class lacks in a variety of summons, it makes up for with tons of utility. Update after update this idea just kept getting stronger and stronger. And I think here in the Imperial City update it has reached a sense of viability it did not have previously. The bonus to Daedric Prey and the PvP damage mitigation have given pet builds a new life. So here is a dedicated pet build:

    The Malconvoker

    “The standard concept of the perpetual war between good and evil is cliched to some: a black-and-white vision of reality, suitable only for religious sermonizing. A few who understand the complexity of the battles that rage throughout Mundus have taken up a dangerous path, entering into powerful pacts with the foulest abominations of Oblivion to turn evil against evil. These daring summoners are Malconvokers, and they bargain with their lives.”

    Race: Breton

    Stats: 1/0/0

    Stone: Mage

     I am getting sick and tired of seeing such little imagination in ESO. Across every forum, every popular build I read is nothing but a copy of the last with a minor tweak here or there. Well that is all about to change. Across these very same forums, the pet DPS build and Sorcerer Healer are both shunned in favor of the more meta DPS and Healer builds. Well the Malconvoker is here to turn the meta on its head.

    The Malconvoker is neither a dedicated healer or damage build, but instead it is a dedicated pet build. And because it fully embraces its pets it can rival those the best damage dealers and healers there are. 

    When I finally stopped thinking in terms of damage, healer or tank I finally saw how much variety this game has to offer. The Malconvoker is the ultimate party leader utilizing damage, healing and support skills in complete harmony to maximize one another. The Malconvoker thrives either in solo or group play and in both PvE and PvP. With a Restoration Staff on both bars and a full set of Light Armor he is more than capable of keeping his group and himself alive overcoming the Sorcerer healing gimps with natural power. He also uses his staff to augment the damage and defenses of his allies bringing them to astounding levels. These buffs and debuffs can turn a ragtag bunch of Daedra into a well oiled machine and even the most mediocre group of players into an unstoppable army.

    Equipment

    The equipment here is fairly simple, the Malconvoker runs a full set of Light Armor and a Restoration Staff on both bars. The double Restoration Staves may seem a bit odd at first, but as you will see, active skill space is a bit cramped so this is necessary to be able to use your healing spells efficiently.

    Now to get into specifics. First the Malconvoker rocks 3 pieces of Healing Mage jewelry. This is a really powerful set for a support character because it gives a passive debuff without using any extra resources and this character is primed to keep the debuff up throughout any battle as you will see when we talk about the skills. Next is 5 pieces of the crafted Seducer set. I really like this set because it is easily obtainable for new players, it has very strong passives (mainly the cost reduction) and since it is crafted it is customizable which is always a plus. Finally, the last three pieces are kind of used to fill up any gaps you have. For instance if you feel you need more defense maybe use the Death Wind’s set. Since I personally felt comfortable with my stat set up and playstyle, I opted for 3 pieces of Magnus’s Gift to pack on a little more “umph”. This set up combined with the sustain of the Breton race and Sorcerer class means your magicka pool will be gigantic, then when we add in all of the cost reduction and recovery, you guarantee that it stays huge until you are making your final push and expending all of your resources. This is how a Sorcerer healer can close the gap between itself and the “almighty” Templar healers. The Malconvoker sacrifices many of the Templar healing passives for just raw healing and spell power.

    Active Abilities

    Crystal Shard/Crystal Fragments: In my honest opinion, this ability should be on just about every Sorcerer’s bar. It is entirely too good to pass up for a consistent single target damage move. This morph gives it a 35% chance to have no cast time, be 20% more powerful and cost 50% less magicka. The cost reduction is further accentuated by our passives and gear so it is practically free. This ability will also take advantage of the Malconvoker spam casting Healing Springs. To make the most of this combination, it is best to hold off on using Crystal Fragments until you can get the instant cast which is signaled by a bunch of floating rocks around your hand.

    Lightning Splash/Lightning Flood: To conclude the Malconvoker’s little DPS combination he takes the Lightning Flood morph of Lightning Splash. At its core, all this morph does is increase the radius of Lightning Splash. This is important for a few reasons. The obvious one is that this is not a dedicated DPS character, so the extra second duration adds little to the Malconvoker’s overall purpose. The other thing is that regardless of if you are playing in a group or solo, your allies and pets are seldom attacking the same enemies, save for bosses. By increasing the radius there is a higher probability that you are adding damage to all the enemies your allies and pets are currently fighting. The final reason is ultimate generation. From my observations, damaging more enemies will generate more ultimate than you generate in the extra second with the Liquid Lightning morph. And generating ultimate is a very important part of the Malconvoker’s game plan.

    Daedric Curse/Daedric Prey: When fighting bosses or particularly difficult enemies, this takes the place of Lightning Flood. In general play, using this ability is too difficult to manage. But in a single target battle it really shines because it adds fantastic burst damage and more damage over the time in the sense that it adds damage to your pets.

    Grand Healing/Healing Springs: Since Sorcerers lack a dedicated healing spell, Healing Springs is the Malconvoker’s bread and butter heal. Healing Springs is the ideal morph here because after all of the magicka cost reductions and added magicka recovery, you will barely see your magicka bar move down after this is cast because there is rarely a time when you do not have three allies around you so you maximize its built in recovery. At the very least you will ALWAYS have two. So thanks to Healing Springs’ recovery and magicka recovery passives, your magicka pool will remain virtually intact unless you cast it 100 times in a row, give or take. That brings me to the next point about this spell, you have to spam cast it to see its true power. Because it has such low cost, spamming Healing Springs is the Malconvoker’s answer to burst healing and it works. There are some other benefits to this approach too though. The first, I already mentioned, is that is gives you free reign on when you can get an instant cast out of Crystal Fragments with no downside. The other reason is once again, ultimate generation. This ability generates ridiculous amounts of ultimate per second because it heals so many people and it can quickly be cast.

    Summon Familiar/Summon Clannfear:

    The first of our pet in the A-Team is the Clannfear. This is the morph of choice because it essentially acts as a tank outside of group play. It has a respectable amount of health, able to take boss attacks that would normally kill you and then just shake it off because the Malconvoker can easily replenish its health. My favorite thing about the Clannfear morph is the second dimension it adds. Whenever it is unsummoned or killed it heals you for a very generous amount of health. In some situations, particularly when your health potions are on cooldown, it is much faster to unsummon him to get the health recovery, and the magicka back thanks to Rebate, rather than spam Healing Springs on yourself. Then you can regroup and resummon and get right back into the thick of things.

    Summon Twilight/Summon Restoring Twilight:

    The next member is the Twilight. The Twilight is a little squishy naturally, but it balances itself by doing very good damage, so it acts as a pseudo DPS role for the team. The Restoring Twilight is a great morph because it just adds on to your already great magicka recovery. Not to mention the other morph doesn’t see much use in practice. With all buffs considered, these two and the Malconvoker alone make a pretty damn scary team. When adding all the damages together, you can reach levels that rival a dedicated DPS, with all the defense buffs your Clannfear can rival any dedicated tank, and of course you are the healer; together your are one well-oiled machine. And for the icing on the cake…

    Summon Storm Atronach/Greater Storm Atronach: And finally the reason for all the emphasis on ultimate generation. Thanks to the Power Stone passive and the massive damage/heals over time, it is possible for the Malconvoker to always have his Storm Atronach active, which is what you want. He draws loads of attention and puts out loads of damage with the Greater Storm Atronach morph. It is literally a one man wrecking crew. When combined with the rest of the team and the Malconvoker’s support skills, you are nigh unstoppable. On a not so side note, it adds more support for group play because any of your allies can activate the Major Berserk synergy for a big damage boost.

    Conjure Ward/Empowered Ward: Damage shields in this game are almost a necessity, especially for the squishier characters like the Malconvoker. Conjure Ward acts a second line of defense for the Malconvoker should enemies get past his little army, giving him enough time to retreat and rebuild. But its main purpose is to protect your pets and make them easier to heal. That is why Empowered Ward is the morph of choice because it is a fire and forget spell that adds sustainability to the Malconvoker as well as his team of pets.

    Circle of Protection/Circle of Preservation: This spot was pretty flexible for a while, but I finally decided that Circle of Preservation was the best fit. It is the perfect way to drop all of your extra stamina. The Minor Protection buff is the main reason this build uses this ability and the Major Fortitude is just an added bonus and has more utility than the Turn Undead morph. The only pitfall to this ability is that it is cast where you stand so you have to run into the fray of things to apply or you can use it when the fight draws too close.

    Blessing of Protection/Combat Prayer: Combat Prayer rounds out the support skills giving a buff to both armor and damage. Between the Healing Mage set bonus, wards, Circle of Preservation, and this the Malconvoker can reach very respectable levels of damage mitigation for his whole group, yes even the pets are affected by this spell. But Combat Prayer can also give his entire squad the edge offensively, via Minor Berserk bonus to compliment the Atronach’s synergy, making for a very well rounded support set up.

    Summon Twilight/Summon Restoring Twilight & Summon Familiar/Summon Clannfear: These two skills make their return on the second bar because if they weren’t, they would be unsummoned on the weapon switch. This is also the reason the Malconvoker utilizes dual Restoration Staves; there just isn’t enough room on a single bar.

    Negate Magic/Absorption Field: This is one of the things that sets supporting/healing/defensive Sorcerers apart from every other class. Although this isn’t the priority ultimate, it is a failsafe that can get you out of trouble at any time and completely change the course of the battle because it increases movement speed, all resource regeneration and stuns NPC enemies or silences opposing players.

    Passive Abilies

    I am not going to go too in depth with the passives since you should have more than enough skill points to take all of them, but I will outline the priority ones.

    Rebate: This is one of passives that adds to the Malconvoker’s consistency. If you ever lose a pet you will get a little bit of magicka back to resummon it. On the other hand if you ever run out magicka and you really need it you can pop one of your pets, typically the Clannfear because it is cheaper to recast and you get a health boost, and bam you have magicka to use again. Of course this is considering you do not have the opportunity to heavy attack, i.e. you are running away and need the magicka to heal.

    Power Stone: This is one of my favorite Sorcerer passives and it is part of the reason the Malconvoker can do what it is does. It will reduce Ultimate cost by up to 15% making the Storm Atronach nearly always a live cast.

    Daedric Protection: Thanks to update 7, just having a Daedric Summoning ability on your bar, you will have a constant boost to health and stamina recovery which adds some sustain to the Malconvoker that he doesn’t get anywhere else.

    Expert Summoner: I cannot believe this is actually a passive. It literally makes the Malconvoker, or any pet build for that matter, a serious threat. It gives your Clannfear a speed boost which helps as it closes the gap between you and enemies that want to attack you. Then it gives your Twilight another damage boost. Lastly it increases the range of your Atronach’s attacks which in my honest opinion only solidifies the choice for the Greater Atronach morph.

    Unholy Knowledge & Evocation: These two passives are from the Dark Magic and Light Armor skill lines respectively, but they both do the same thing. They add to the Malconvoker’s already obscene amount of cost reduction.

    Energized & Disintegrate: Although both of these passives do different things, they essentially have the same goal: increase damage and thus decrease battle time. The faster you can kill the things the easier it is manage your group and keep your group alive.

    Expert Mage: If you haven’t noticed yet, the Malconvoker’s primary bar is made up of 5 Sorcerer abilities. This wonderful passive will increase your spell power for every Sorcerer ability on your bar. Just so you know, an increase in spell power means an increase in both damage and healing.

    Cycle of Life: Along with the Tenacity Champion passive, this will increase the amount of magicka you restore on heavy attacks. When coupled with Rebate, the Malconvoker can have magicka on command at any time.

    Skilled Tracker: The last passive I want to talk about isn’t a necessity, but if I didn’t mention it some people may completely skip over it. This passives applies all Fighter’s Guild effects to werewolves along with vampires and undead. This means that Ring of Preservation will now grant boosted damage mitigation against werewolves, undead and daedra. This gives you very well rounded coverage in both PvE and PvP meaning you can really take advantage of the bonus mitigation.

    Champion Points

    Mage: Just about all of your points will go into the Apprentice tree with priority towards Blessed which will increase your healing output. Then you can work on Elfborn which will increase all of your healing critical numbers. The ultimate goal is to unlock Arcane Well to add another dimension of support granting added magicka recovery to all allies on top of what the Twilight gives.

    Thief: The number one passive here is going to be Magician from the Tower. The Magician passive further reduces cost reduction of magicka based spells. Following up is an even split with Arcanist and Tenacity in the Lover tree. Arcanist will just boost your own magicka recovery and as I said Tenacity will increase the amount magicka restored from heavy attacks.

    Warrior: Everything goes into the Lady tree for Light Armor Focus to boost physical defenses except for enough points into Quick Healing to unlock the Field Physician passive out of the Lord tree. I really like Field Physician because as a healer with primarily passive damage, the Malconvoker is the go to resurrector (though your group won’t do much dying once you get used to playing this build).

    Gameplay

    The playstyle of Malconvoker is virtually the same when in groups or soloing because in a sense you are always playing in a group. With all pets summoned, start off applying Empowered Ward and Combat Prayer. Then drop Healing Springs in the vicinity of the enemies, if you are close enough you will draw their attention too. This first Healing Springs sets up the rest of the fight because right off the bat you have healing regeneration and the Healing Mage buff will take effect to automatically reduce your enemies’ damage. Afterwards battle flows very organically. Place Lightning Flood down and then spam Healing Springs. Unless you specifically need to allocate your heals, which only happens when your allies take massive damage, just keep spamming Healing Spring. Other healers cannot do this because in order to contribute damage they have to stop healing and they do just do not have the sustain to, but the Malconvoker contributes damage passively through his pets and Lightning Flood, and the occasional Crystal Shard. When you earn an instant cast for Crystal Shards, use it then go right back to what you were doing. This will generate insane amounts of ultimate.

    As the battle progresses, switch to your second bar whenever a ward goes down or every ten seconds if you can. Whichever comes first. Reapply your wards and Combat Prayer then return back to healing. To better outline the priorities, keep Storm Atronach active, keep all buffs up, keep Lightning Flood active, and if the opportunity arises use the instant cast of Crystal Shard. Other than that, it is just a continuous stream of Healing Springs with a light attack weave to contribute to ultimate or a heavy attack weave to gain magicka. When fighting bosses the only change to this set up is keeping Daedric Prey active instead of Lightning Flood. If all hell breaks lose, or even if you lose control of all your buffs and abilities and things begin to go down hill, unsummon your pets, drop Negate Magic and retreat. Take your time to regroup, reapply all your buffs and go back in.

    Closing Notes

    Thank you all for reading another of my ridiculously long builds. I hope you enjoyed it and don't hesitate to ask any questions if anything wasn't clear.

    On another note, I would like to apologize for how many times I said this and other content was coming,  I greatly underestimated the time commitment this game requires and because of that I will not be able to churn out builds like I would for Skyrim. But rest assured I will be contributing as much as I can. With that out of the way, the stage has been set for a new era in the ESO group. I hope the rest of you can find the time and inspiration to post your own builds so we can really get this thing rolling!

  • September 28, 2015
    Brilliant build oneness and very well presented. I admit I put off my build because I didn't know how to present it. I think you may have solved that issue for me. I'm so stealing this format and there's nothing you can do to stop me!
  • Member
    September 28, 2015

    Thank you very much Mr. Curse. I had the same problem, I really had no idea how I wanted to present this because I wanted to be different than the previous builds posted so far and I wasn't too fond of the way it is formatted else where. So I decided to kinda mesh the Skryim CB format with what ESO requires. Its not perfect by any means but its a start and it was enough to get me through my first build. So I encourage your stealing and want you to improve it lol. Hopefully we can build on it and find our own standard like Skyrim CB has ;)

  • Member
    October 1, 2015
    Great stuff Oneness, sorry for not seeing this earlier! This looks like a lot of fun and it sounds like it remains effective throughout all parts of the game. Something else awesome about having a pet focus in pvp is that they actually offer you additional protection in the form of contributing toward the target cap of enemy spells like Impulse. Hopefully you're right about the new era in the ESO group, it would be awesome to get some more quality builds like this before we're all distracted by Fallout 4!
  • Member
    October 1, 2015
    I'm glad you liked it! I know for certain that I have more builds coming, but I have no clue how long they will take for me to finish and write. I've been thinking about trying to get this build and/or my guild posted on the ESO website for the Battlemaster's Corner or Guild Spotlight that way we might draw some fresh faces here. In any case, I really hope Fallout doesn't bury this group when it comes out lol. Btw are you still giving out those guides? :D
  • Member
    October 1, 2015

    Yeah, was at work so I was on my phone before. I'll send you a message now!

  • Member
    October 1, 2015
    Sweet! And sorry, I didn't mean to sound pushy lol. I hope I can learn some stuff from this guide and it will help with my guilds tutoring idea
  • October 6, 2015

    Great work! I may just adapt my sorcerer character to use for this build

  • Member
    October 6, 2015

    Thanks Veloth! If you do please let me know how it goes. I love to hear about others playing one of my builds so I can see the differences and learn how to improve the next time around lol

  • Member
    October 6, 2015

    Pretty cool! I'm still not advanced enough in ESO mechanics to be able to fully understand everything here (a Resto staff on both bars? What bars?) but I like that which I do understand. I wish I could give you more than that but MMO speak is like another language and the only thing really standing in my way of enjoying ESO.

    However it is great to see ESO getting more attention and more builds, even better to see the site drag itself away from the dark ages of Skyrim. It's also nice to see a mould-breaking build too and pets are always fun