Note: this is mostly for myself for formatting, cant have the css acting all weird nwo can we...
For this year’s Crossworlds Event I decided to try my luck at combining elements from two of the gaming industry's absolute biggest titles into one character. By breaking down The Demon Hunter class from the Warcraft universe and reassembling it as best I could in (vanilla) Skyrim, I brought to life a character which, for me at least, defines the very essence of the nostalgic and heretical monster hunter that we know and love.
So without any further adue allow me to introduce a truly wicked build that should give all Warcraft and Elder Scrolls fans goosebumps right down their spine!
Pros: Extremely high damage (some might even say tons), badass looking, potent magical resistances, fun and engaging playstyle, stat based build for consistency, necromage empowered enchantments, dual-wielding mage (whut? YES!).
Cons: Two grinding skills, takes a while to get properly geared, eats through soul gems, hard to manage magicka, squishy early game.
The Unhallowed
"The enemy came into our world, their only desire to extinguish all life. They slaughtered our loved ones. They razed our homes, our cities, and our sacred places. You tried to stop them... and you failed. And so you came to me, nothing remaining of you but rage and determination, and you learned that the things that once tormented you could give you power. Now you see that there is no sacrifice too great if it brings an end to the creatures of Oblivion."
- Indoril Stormrage, first of The Unhallowed
The awakening of unhallowed justice
Vengeance in itself is a paradox: it burns bright as hate, It drives mad as love, it clouds the mind as fear. Vengeance is as clear as it is murky. As cold as it is hot. As good as it is evil... Vengeance is Unhallowed, and thus The Unhallowed were born from vengeance!
When the gates of Oblivion unleashed horde after horde of demonic creatures into our world, little could stand in their way. Many innocents were killed; amongst them your loved ones.
Left broken and alone to fend for yourself in a world of chaos, you let the wounds on your soul fester and solidify. In the darkness of your own existence you lit a flame of hope, a flame of hatred; and when the time came you smiled with scorn onto your petty past - as you let me corrupt you with the very powers of evil that ruined your former life.
Rise now disciple of The Unhallowed. You wished for the power to execute your judgement... and I have bestowed that power upon you. Embrace what you have become, and march on your holy crusade toward unholy damnation!
- Verse from “The Awakening” by anonymous author
Crossworld’ing
At a glance the universes of Warcraft and The Elder Scrolls might seem somewhat incompatible; Warcraft is all about over the top artwork and big epic boss fights. In contrast the universe of Bethesda's creation has always leaned much more towards Dungeons and Dragons, focusing more on the story and less on the scene so to speak.
So the first challenge in the making of this build was figuring out how to “port” a Warcraft class into Skyrim. Let's start this process off by having a little brainstorm - what do we need to achieve in Skyrim. Well, The Demon Hunter from the Warcraft universe is defined as a dual-warglaive-wielding (what a word) badass who is half elf and half demon, ritually blinded to gain spectral vision and more or less as corrupt as the creatures they hunt (note: Illidan).
Let’s try and translate the above to fit the mechanics of Skyrim: first off no glaives, so what do we do? Easy! Any true monster hunter in Skyrim should make use of Silver weapons due to their damage bonus when fighting undead, and since dual wielding is a trademark of The Warcraft Demon Hunter we only really have one choice for weaponry, and that's a pair of one-handed silver swords. Check 1/4!
Next we have the half elf and half demon part and I’m sure some of you will already have guessed where this is going? Yes, The Unhallowed is a Vampire Altmer and yes we will be making use of the beloved Necromage Perk from Restoration to boost the power of the Unhallowed above and beyond. Check 2/4!
Lastly we have the lines about spectral vision and corruption. A big part of the demon hunter is the fact that they fight evil using evil, so to duplicate that corrupted warrior feel I decided to make use of what I like to call “felfire magic”. Basically felfire is a minor exploit that uses Aspect of Terror from Illusion to buff the damage of our fire spells by a flat +10, allowing for some seriously painful Flame Cloaks amongst other things. As for the spectral vision… well too bad there are no blindfolds openly available in Vanilla Skyrim so the “detect dead” spell from Illusion will have to surfice. Check 3/4 aaaaand check 4/4!
Gameplay - Offence
The Unhallowed is all about creating as much chaos in combat as possible, about fueling melee attacks with felflame and life leeching enchantments; a five-star hybrid sorcerer driven by a burning hatred to wield the power of the undead against them. With this dual-wielding exorcist you won’t find any shortcomings in terms of pure combat abilities. Whereas other mages keep their blood cool and bombard their enemies at a distance, The Unhallowed charges head first into throngs of the damned, leaving nothing in her wake but scorched corpses and destruction.
Our offense comes first and foremost from our twin silver swords: one enchanted for utility with vampiric spells of life and stamina drain - the other for pure damage, with fire enchantments and fiery-soul trap. The Unhallowed not only destroys the rotting flesh of her foes, but also captures their very souls in gems that she uses to feed her ever growing power. As a side note I might add that this is the first build I ever played where Soul Siphon turned out to be one hell of a useful perk and a huge money-saver in the long run.
Fire focused Destruction magic also plays a major part in this build. With the flat +10 fire damage that aspect of terror grants us in combination with augmented flames, the potency of flame cloak and novice level fire-spells becomes a force to be reckoned with. Needless to say these damage buffs also apply to our felflame enchantments, so you can probably imagine just how hard The Unhallowed hits… especially when hitting undead or other enemies with a weakness to fire.
One Handed: Despite being the defining element of this build, one-handed might seem poorly underperked. But rest assured, all we really want from this tree is to boost our attackspeed as much as we can. Yes, our damage is dealt in melee but 80% of it is purely magical. As such we don’t need to invest much in one-handed for the skill to be extremely beneficial for a minimum expenditure of perks.
Perks: Armsman 3/5, Dual Flurry 2/2.
Destruction: Destruction is this builds main source of damage, but unlike other mages we won't ever have to worry about amassing a huge magicka pool to actually use the skill in combat. Basically destruction is utilized as somewhat of a passive skill: boosting our damage to the point where it is absolutely essential, but we will only be making use of two or three spells.
Perks: Novice - Adept, Augmented flames 2/2, Intense flames.
Enchanting: The skill that makes The Unhallowed the absolute melee beast that she is. On its own the enchanting skill is quite underwhelming, but when we combine it with the buffs from destruction and super fast attacks from dual wielding it becomes something else entirely. Furthermore enchanting lets us stay alive and even allows us to cast super powerful spells for less than 50% of their magicka cost. However it comes at a heavy price in perk points.
Perks: Enchanter, Insightful enchanter, corpus enchanter, extra effect, soul squeezer, soul siphon, fire enchanter.
Gameplay - Defence
Despite wearing absolutely no armor The Unhallowed is more than able to soak up her fair share of punishment. With three quarters of our attribute-points going into health we won't even need to slow ourselves down by hiding inside a cage of metal and leather. Furthermore powerful enchantments of even more health will be added to our robes, jewelry, gloves and boots as well as health regeneration effects… and I haven't even mentioned alteration, alchemy, drain life enchantments or restoration yet. In other words The Unhallowed is damned near unkillable, and it is from this stat-based tankyness that the builds true power originates - this is no glass cannon.
However, we won’t have much magicka to spare for pells, or rather we wouldn't if it wasn't for our Altmer blood. Drain magicka enchantments become obsolete when paired with The Highborn ability and thanks to our +50 starting magicka, we will only have to put very few points into magicka. Yet again enchanting comes to our aid here also, +66 magicka and +66 health on our jewelry will render The Unhallowed an everlasting spring of resources… resources we spend to dish out pain and hurt at every turn.
As for regeneration, the restoration skill has us covered on health and magicka due to healing spells and the Recovery perks. Even so a Necromage empowered flesh-spell won't hurt every now and then, not to mention that Alteration is yet another skill that functions much as a passive ability, granting much needed restiances and even a fair amount of magic absorption in the late game.
Restoration: Necromage combined with Vampirism is what takes this build from simply mediocre to absolutely amazing. Despite this, The Restoration skill in general will be used only rarely. This makes it a pain to level, but we’ll work around that by using trainers at The College of Winterhold. A few perks for survivability is really all we need here.
Perks: Novice- apprentice, regeneration, necromage, recovery 2/2, avoid death
Alteration: The second most perked skill. Alteration is in truth our guardian angel, it’s the skill that make enemy mages cry, it’s the skill that makes The Unhallowed almost unkillable in the late game and it’s the skill that ties a knot around the rest of our defense. Alteration is even worse to level than Restoration, but thankfully there is a little trick around that (read “Tips and Tricks” section at the bottom).
Perks: Novice - expert, Magic resist 3/3, mage armor 3/3, atronach
Illusion: Probably the least used skill of the build, yet it is still essential as all the rest. Illusion is used for roleplay purposes, Detect dead is after all our only substitute for The Warcraft world’s spectral vision and Aspect of Terror grants us much of our power, both in terms of enchantments but also fire spells.
Perks: Novice, hypnotic gaze, aspect of terror
Alchemy: Alchemy, oh dear alchemy. When was the last time I played a build without this skill? Many years I think. What makes it so nice to have on any build in my mind, is that alchemy works together with all other skills in the game in one way or another. With only 2 perks invested for our fully fleshed level 45 character it seems almost pointless, but alchemy is anything but that.
Perks: Alchemist 2/5 and that's it
Perkspread Overview
More on its way, yay!
Note: this is mostly for myself for formatting, cant have the css acting all weird nwo can we...
For this year’s Crossworlds Event I decided to try my luck at combining elements from two of the gaming industry's absolute biggest titles into one character. By breaking down The Demon Hunter class from the Warcraft universe and reassembling it as best I could in (vanilla) Skyrim, I brought to life a character which, for me at least, defines the very essence of the nostalgic and heretical monster hunter that we know and love.
So without any further adue allow me to introduce a truly wicked build that should give all Warcraft and Elder Scrolls fans goosebumps right down their spine!
Pros: Extremely high damage (some might even say tons), badass looking, potent magical resistances, fun and engaging playstyle, stat based build for consistency, necromage empowered enchantments, dual-wielding mage (whut? YES!).
Cons: Two grinding skills, takes a while to get properly geared, eats through soul gems, hard to manage magicka, squishy early game.
The Unhallowed
"The enemy came into our world, their only desire to extinguish all life. They slaughtered our loved ones. They razed our homes, our cities, and our sacred places. You tried to stop them... and you failed. And so you came to me, nothing remaining of you but rage and determination, and you learned that the things that once tormented you could give you power. Now you see that there is no sacrifice too great if it brings an end to the creatures of Oblivion."
- Indoril Stormrage, first of The Unhallowed
The awakening of unhallowed justice
Vengeance in itself is a paradox: it burns bright as hate, It drives mad as love, it clouds the mind as fear. Vengeance is as clear as it is murky. As cold as it is hot. As good as it is evil... Vengeance is Unhallowed, and thus The Unhallowed were born from vengeance!
When the gates of Oblivion unleashed horde after horde of demonic creatures into our world, little could stand in their way. Many innocents were killed; amongst them your loved ones.
Left broken and alone to fend for yourself in a world of chaos, you let the wounds on your soul fester and solidify. In the darkness of your own existence you lit a flame of hope, a flame of hatred; and when the time came you smiled with scorn onto your petty past - as you let me corrupt you with the very powers of evil that ruined your former life.
Rise now disciple of The Unhallowed. You wished for the power to execute your judgement... and I have bestowed that power upon you. Embrace what you have become, and march on your holy crusade toward unholy damnation!
- Verse from “The Awakening” by anonymous author
Crossworld’ing
At a glance the universes of Warcraft and The Elder Scrolls might seem somewhat incompatible; Warcraft is all about over the top artwork and big epic boss fights. In contrast the universe of Bethesda's creation has always leaned much more towards Dungeons and Dragons, focusing more on the story and less on the scene so to speak.
So the first challenge in the making of this build was figuring out how to “port” a Warcraft class into Skyrim. Let's start this process off by having a little brainstorm - what do we need to achieve in Skyrim. Well, The Demon Hunter from the Warcraft universe is defined as a dual-warglaive-wielding (what a word) badass who is half elf and half demon, ritually blinded to gain spectral vision and more or less as corrupt as the creatures they hunt (note: Illidan).
Let’s try and translate the above to fit the mechanics of Skyrim: first off no glaives, so what do we do? Easy! Any true monster hunter in Skyrim should make use of Silver weapons due to their damage bonus when fighting undead, and since dual wielding is a trademark of The Warcraft Demon Hunter we only really have one choice for weaponry, and that's a pair of one-handed silver swords. Check 1/4!
Next we have the half elf and half demon part and I’m sure some of you will already have guessed where this is going? Yes, The Unhallowed is a Vampire Altmer and yes we will be making use of the beloved Necromage Perk from Restoration to boost the power of the Unhallowed above and beyond. Check 2/4!
Lastly we have the lines about spectral vision and corruption. A big part of the demon hunter is the fact that they fight evil using evil, so to duplicate that corrupted warrior feel I decided to make use of what I like to call “felfire magic”. Basically felfire is a minor exploit that uses Aspect of Terror from Illusion to buff the damage of our fire spells by a flat +10, allowing for some seriously painful Flame Cloaks amongst other things. As for the spectral vision… well too bad there are no blindfolds openly available in Vanilla Skyrim so the “detect dead” spell from Illusion will have to surfice. Check 3/4 aaaaand check 4/4!
Gameplay - Offence
The Unhallowed is all about creating as much chaos in combat as possible, about fueling melee attacks with felflame and life leeching enchantments; a five-star hybrid sorcerer driven by a burning hatred to wield the power of the undead against them. With this dual-wielding exorcist you won’t find any shortcomings in terms of pure combat abilities. Whereas other mages keep their blood cool and bombard their enemies at a distance, The Unhallowed charges head first into throngs of the damned, leaving nothing in her wake but scorched corpses and destruction.
Our offense comes first and foremost from our twin silver swords: one enchanted for utility with vampiric spells of life and stamina drain - the other for pure damage, with fire enchantments and fiery-soul trap. The Unhallowed not only destroys the rotting flesh of her foes, but also captures their very souls in gems that she uses to feed her ever growing power. As a side note I might add that this is the first build I ever played where Soul Siphon turned out to be one hell of a useful perk and a huge money-saver in the long run.
Fire focused Destruction magic also plays a major part in this build. With the flat +10 fire damage that aspect of terror grants us in combination with augmented flames, the potency of flame cloak and novice level fire-spells becomes a force to be reckoned with. Needless to say these damage buffs also apply to our felflame enchantments, so you can probably imagine just how hard The Unhallowed hits… especially when hitting undead or other enemies with a weakness to fire.
One Handed: Despite being the defining element of this build, one-handed might seem poorly underperked. But rest assured, all we really want from this tree is to boost our attackspeed as much as we can. Yes, our damage is dealt in melee but 80% of it is purely magical. As such we don’t need to invest much in one-handed for the skill to be extremely beneficial for a minimum expenditure of perks.
Perks: Armsman 3/5, Dual Flurry 2/2.
Destruction: Destruction is this builds main source of damage, but unlike other mages we won't ever have to worry about amassing a huge magicka pool to actually use the skill in combat. Basically destruction is utilized as somewhat of a passive skill: boosting our damage to the point where it is absolutely essential, but we will only be making use of two or three spells.
Perks: Novice - Adept, Augmented flames 2/2, Intense flames.
Enchanting: The skill that makes The Unhallowed the absolute melee beast that she is. On its own the enchanting skill is quite underwhelming, but when we combine it with the buffs from destruction and super fast attacks from dual wielding it becomes something else entirely. Furthermore enchanting lets us stay alive and even allows us to cast super powerful spells for less than 50% of their magicka cost. However it comes at a heavy price in perk points.
Perks: Enchanter, Insightful enchanter, corpus enchanter, extra effect, soul squeezer, soul siphon, fire enchanter.
Gameplay - Defence
Despite wearing absolutely no armor The Unhallowed is more than able to soak up her fair share of punishment. With three quarters of our attribute-points going into health we won't even need to slow ourselves down by hiding inside a cage of metal and leather. Furthermore powerful enchantments of even more health will be added to our robes, jewelry, gloves and boots as well as health regeneration effects… and I haven't even mentioned alteration, alchemy, drain life enchantments or restoration yet. In other words The Unhallowed is damned near unkillable, and it is from this stat-based tankyness that the builds true power originates - this is no glass cannon.
However, we won’t have much magicka to spare for pells, or rather we wouldn't if it wasn't for our Altmer blood. Drain magicka enchantments become obsolete when paired with The Highborn ability and thanks to our +50 starting magicka, we will only have to put very few points into magicka. Yet again enchanting comes to our aid here also, +66 magicka and +66 health on our jewelry will render The Unhallowed an everlasting spring of resources… resources we spend to dish out pain and hurt at every turn.
As for regeneration, the restoration skill has us covered on health and magicka due to healing spells and the Recovery perks. Even so a Necromage empowered flesh-spell won't hurt every now and then, not to mention that Alteration is yet another skill that functions much as a passive ability, granting much needed restiances and even a fair amount of magic absorption in the late game.
Restoration: Necromage combined with Vampirism is what takes this build from simply mediocre to absolutely amazing. Despite this, The Restoration skill in general will be used only rarely. This makes it a pain to level, but we’ll work around that by using trainers at The College of Winterhold. A few perks for survivability is really all we need here.
Perks: Novice- apprentice, regeneration, necromage, recovery 2/2, avoid death
Alteration: The second most perked skill. Alteration is in truth our guardian angel, it’s the skill that make enemy mages cry, it’s the skill that makes The Unhallowed almost unkillable in the late game and it’s the skill that ties a knot around the rest of our defense. Alteration is even worse to level than Restoration, but thankfully there is a little trick around that (read “Tips and Tricks” section at the bottom).
Perks: Novice - expert, Magic resist 3/3, mage armor 3/3, atronach
Illusion: Probably the least used skill of the build, yet it is still essential as all the rest. Illusion is used for roleplay purposes, Detect dead is after all our only substitute for The Warcraft world’s spectral vision and Aspect of Terror grants us much of our power, both in terms of enchantments but also fire spells.
Perks: Novice, hypnotic gaze, aspect of terror
Alchemy: Alchemy, oh dear alchemy. When was the last time I played a build without this skill? Many years I think. What makes it so nice to have on any build in my mind, is that alchemy works together with all other skills in the game in one way or another. With only 2 perks invested for our fully fleshed level 45 character it seems almost pointless, but alchemy is anything but that.
Perks: Alchemist 2/5 and that's it
Perkspread Overview
More on its way, yay!
