*Warning, this post contains “spoilers” for the Dragonborn DLC
I hope you enjoyed this build, as this is my first one. I wanted to come up with something quite original and unique. To be honest, this post has been edited a couple times for various reasons and may still be updated as time goes on, however. These are the reasons for the adjustment of the post: additions to the build, better formatting, and better graphic images. After looking more into very popular builds, I realized to gain attention on the Character Build forums is 50% about the quality of the build itself and 50% and how the post looks. So without further adieu, I present to you, the Ash Knight.
Roleplay
You lived on the Far Eastern portion of High Rock, in a village made solely for mining where the heat of furnaces and coal burning left a constant drop of sweat on your forehead. A lake surrounds one portion of the town, and the snowy mountains of Skyrim surround the other. One day as you walk into the stables where you work, you realize a certain horse is missing, one prized by its owner as the strongest steed west of The Throat of the World. You set off looking for it. There are few places the horse could go, through the devastatingly cold water or over the mountains. You get ready for a trip over the mountain, it is a short and safe hike at most but you take your small sword just incase. You travel over one of the smaller mountains, and cross over into Skyrim. Minutes later three Imperials come, arrest you, and throw you into a wagon with other men, including Ulfric Stormcloak himself. The other fugitives talk to eachother, and tell you that you where arrested for crossing the border of High Rock and Skyrim. They take you to a town by the name of Helgen, 
you are expecting to just pass through it but they stop, and you see a chopping block. You know your fate, death. You feel helpless and angered. They put you on the chopping block when you hear the flapping of wings, larger than any bird you know of. A dragon sits itself on a tower just as the axe is about to go into your neck and it blows fire from its mouth, hotter than the forges of your home town. You escape.
You immediately set out to join the College of Winterhold. The anger you had feeling so weak in the face of death pushed you to seek out power and strength. You remember the heat of your town and the dragon’s breath at your almost-death-bed and decide you must learn the art of fire magic. You are Breton/Dark Elf, you possess the magical ability inside you, it is just a matter of unlocking it. Learning that you are Dragon Born only fuels your evil spirit and seek for power.
***
Race: Dark Elf or Breton
Major Skills: One-Handed, Destruction (Fire), Alteration, Smithing
Minor Skills: Conjuration, Enchanting, Heavy Armor
Stats: Magicka 3/Health 3/Stamina 2
Standing Stone: Warrior Stone -> The Lord Stone (I suggest the Warrior Stone to start with because we will naturally be using our magic more than our weapon, so the Warrior Stone will keep our one-handed skill level about the same as our magic skills.)
Shouts: Fire Breath (When upgraded by Parthunaax and Hermaeus Mora it is quite powerful), Slow Time, Elemental Fury, Whirlwind Sprint
***
Gear
Bonemold Pauldron: You will be wearing this heavy type in the form of gauntlets, boots, and the chest piece. The pauldron piece can be crafted, and I believe it looks much better than the original default. (I made a mistake in the image to the right, it should say Pauldron Bonemold instead of Improved)
Ahzidal's Mask: If you are okay with wearing a mask that doesn't look great, this piece of heavy armor can be a great asset to your powers. If you are a Dark Elf you become nearly immune to fire with resistance capped at 75% (this may be 85% two wikis say different things), providing the maximum protection from flames. This mask also adds 25% damage to fire, so if you have the two Augmented Flames perk you have 75% more damage for fire magic. If you don't want to wear the mask you can wear an Apprentice Hood.
Ruby Necklace: Ruby because it is red. Fire is red.
Ahzidal's Ring of Arcana: This is a wonderful little ring that grants the wearer two new spells, only one of which we will be using for this build.
Dragonbone Sword: Yes this is quite a difficult sword to acquire but it is very powerful and looks quite good with the build, better than any other. I know the only way to get this is to craft it or find it in the Soul Cairn, but we won't be visiting there with this build... Though it is seriously worth getting your smithing to 100 for it.
Screenshots provided by Vazgen. Thank you so much!
***
Magic
The main ways you are going to be dealing your damage as the Ash Knight is going to be through variations of magic; destruction, conjuration, and alteration will all be your aid in the tides of battle. Note that when I list spells you may use, I am listing only the most powerful version of that spell, for example: I will not be listing Stone Flesh, as the most powerful “version” of that spell is Ebony Flesh, though I suggest using Stone Flesh until you get to the next tier of that spell type.
Destruction: Fire spells are going to be used almost non-stop on the battlefield, but in many fashions. Used fire spells will include: Fireball, Fire Storm, Incinerate, Ignite, and Flame Cloak,
Conjuration: I marked conjuration as a minor skill because I believe conjuration magic is almost never a main form of attack. It is a “support” type skill, however it should be used often to get the ever-importantTwin Souls perk in the skill tree which will allow you to have two conjured atronachs at a time. The two conjuration spells used will be: Conjure Ash Spawn and Conjure Ash Guardian. Unfortunately, the Conjure Ash Guardian spell consumes 1 Heart Stone, and if you do not have a Heart Stone in your inventory, the Guardian will become hostile towards you. For this reason I suggest grabbing the Expel Daedra perk so you can banish a hostile atronach that wants to attack you.
Alteration: The alteration spells are going to be used to strengthen your armor, paralyze enemies with ash spells, and look bada** while you pull things towards you with your mind. I suggest using these spells: Ash Shell, Ash Rune, and Ebony Flesh. These next spells are fun or useful, but not at all necessary to the build:Detect Life, Telekinesis, and Transmute.
Enchanting: All enchantments used for this build can be found in the picture in the Gear section of the build.
Ash Spawn use a two-handed fire-enchanted weapons, or a one-handed flame-enchanted sword with fireball spell
***
Perk Usage
By Level 57 you should have all the perks you will need based on the build in this post.
One handed: Armsman 5/5, Bladesman 3/3, Fighting Stance, Savage Strike, Critical Charge
Destruction: Novice Destruction, Adept Destruction, Apprentice Destruction, Expert Destruction, Master Destruction, Augmented Flames 2/2, Rune Master
Alteration: Novice Alteration, Adept Alteration, Apprentice Alteration, Expert Alteration, Stability, Atronach, Magic Resistance 3/3
Conjuration: Novice Conjuration, Adept Conjuration, Apprentice Conjuration, Expert Conjuration, Summoner 2/2, Atromancy, Elemental Potency, (Unless the fact that Ash creatures are not effected by the Twin Souls perk is a bug, we won't need to grab it).
Enchanting: Enchanter 5/5, Fire Enchanter, Insightful Enchanter, Corpus Enchanter, Extra Effect
Heavy Armor: Juggernaut 5/5, Fists of Steel, Well Fitted, Tower of Strength
Smithing: Steel Smithing, Elven Smithing, Advanced Armors, Glass Smithing, Dragonbone Smithing (I go through the light armor side of the tree because we are only leveling it up for the Dragonbone and Steel Smithing the light armor side takes one less perk to get to the top).
***
Special Moves and Battle Tactics
Swift Infero
The Ash Knight covers himself in flames and increases his speed compared to the enemy as he rushes to them blade drawn.
Requirements: Fire Cloak, Slow Time Shout, Weapon
Molten Armor
The Ash Knight buys time for himself to regain his magical armor or replenish his health, magicka, or stamina.
Requirements: Ash Rune or Ash Shell, Ebony Flesh (Or lower level version of the spell)
Hell’s Arena
The Ash Knight surrounds his opponents in walls of fire and conjures a creature of ash to toss them around.
Requirements: Wall of Fire, Conjure Ash Guardian, Heart Stone (optional but recommended)
Battle Example: To showcase the true potential of the build, I will run through an example of a battle in the form of the end boss-fight in an ancient Nordic ruin. You start off the battle using an alteration spell like Ebony Flesh, to strengthen your armor. You immediately encase the main boss in ash so you can deal with the weaker leveled ones first. You cast Flame Cloak on yourself, slow time, and run into the mass of the undead swinger your fiery blade. When all the weak Draugr are dealt with, you cast Wall of Fire under the still ash-covered boss. When he breaks out, he is immediately damaged by the fire underneath him. You conjure an Ash Guardian to toss around and distract the boss while you cast flame spells at him until he dies.
***
Recommended Quests
-College of Winterhold (I recommend completing the questline before you get too far into the main one)
-Main Questline
-Tel Mithryn/Nelith Quests: Ash spawn spells
-Unearthed: Ahzidal’s Ring of Arcana and Ahzidal's Mask
-Dragonborn Questline: Someone claims to be stronger than you! You must defeat him and show the world your power, as well as gain people's love of you, making them more easy to manipulate if needed
*Warning, this post contains “spoilers” for the Dragonborn DLC
I hope you enjoyed this build, as this is my first one. I wanted to come up with something quite original and unique. To be honest, this post has been edited a couple times for various reasons and may still be updated as time goes on, however. These are the reasons for the adjustment of the post: additions to the build, better formatting, and better graphic images. After looking more into very popular builds, I realized to gain attention on the Character Build forums is 50% about the quality of the build itself and 50% and how the post looks. So without further adieu, I present to you, the Ash Knight.
Roleplay
You lived on the Far Eastern portion of High Rock, in a village made solely for mining where the heat of furnaces and coal burning left a constant drop of sweat on your forehead. A lake surrounds one portion of the town, and the snowy mountains of Skyrim surround the other. One day as you walk into the stables where you work, you realize a certain horse is missing, one prized by its owner as the strongest steed west of The Throat of the World. You set off looking for it. There are few places the horse could go, through the devastatingly cold water or over the mountains. You get ready for a trip over the mountain, it is a short and safe hike at most but you take your small sword just incase. You travel over one of the smaller mountains, and cross over into Skyrim. Minutes later three Imperials come, arrest you, and throw you into a wagon with other men, including Ulfric Stormcloak himself. The other fugitives talk to eachother, and tell you that you where arrested for crossing the border of High Rock and Skyrim. They take you to a town by the name of Helgen, you are expecting to just pass through it but they stop, and you see a chopping block. You know your fate, death. You feel helpless and angered. They put you on the chopping block when you hear the flapping of wings, larger than any bird you know of. A dragon sits itself on a tower just as the axe is about to go into your neck and it blows fire from its mouth, hotter than the forges of your home town. You escape.
You immediately set out to join the College of Winterhold. The anger you had feeling so weak in the face of death pushed you to seek out power and strength. You remember the heat of your town and the dragon’s breath at your almost-death-bed and decide you must learn the art of fire magic. You are Breton/Dark Elf, you possess the magical ability inside you, it is just a matter of unlocking it. Learning that you are Dragon Born only fuels your evil spirit and seek for power.
***
Race: Dark Elf or Breton
Major Skills: One-Handed, Destruction (Fire), Alteration, Smithing
Minor Skills: Conjuration, Enchanting, Heavy Armor
Stats: Magicka 3/Health 3/Stamina 2
Standing Stone: Warrior Stone -> The Lord Stone (I suggest the Warrior Stone to start with because we will naturally be using our magic more than our weapon, so the Warrior Stone will keep our one-handed skill level about the same as our magic skills.)
Shouts: Fire Breath (When upgraded by Parthunaax and Hermaeus Mora it is quite powerful), Slow Time, Elemental Fury, Whirlwind Sprint
***
Gear
Bonemold Pauldron: You will be wearing this heavy type in the form of gauntlets, boots, and the chest piece. The pauldron piece can be crafted, and I believe it looks much better than the original default. (I made a mistake in the image to the right, it should say Pauldron Bonemold instead of Improved)
Ahzidal's Mask: If you are okay with wearing a mask that doesn't look great, this piece of heavy armor can be a great asset to your powers. If you are a Dark Elf you become nearly immune to fire with resistance capped at 75% (this may be 85% two wikis say different things), providing the maximum protection from flames. This mask also adds 25% damage to fire, so if you have the two Augmented Flames perk you have 75% more damage for fire magic. If you don't want to wear the mask you can wear an Apprentice Hood.
Ruby Necklace: Ruby because it is red. Fire is red.
Ahzidal's Ring of Arcana: This is a wonderful little ring that grants the wearer two new spells, only one of which we will be using for this build.
Dragonbone Sword: Yes this is quite a difficult sword to acquire but it is very powerful and looks quite good with the build, better than any other. I know the only way to get this is to craft it or find it in the Soul Cairn, but we won't be visiting there with this build... Though it is seriously worth getting your smithing to 100 for it.
Screenshots provided by Vazgen. Thank you so much!
***
Magic
The main ways you are going to be dealing your damage as the Ash Knight is going to be through variations of magic; destruction, conjuration, and alteration will all be your aid in the tides of battle. Note that when I list spells you may use, I am listing only the most powerful version of that spell, for example: I will not be listing Stone Flesh, as the most powerful “version” of that spell is Ebony Flesh, though I suggest using Stone Flesh until you get to the next tier of that spell type.
Destruction: Fire spells are going to be used almost non-stop on the battlefield, but in many fashions. Used fire spells will include: Fireball, Fire Storm, Incinerate, Ignite, and Flame Cloak,
Conjuration: I marked conjuration as a minor skill because I believe conjuration magic is almost never a main form of attack. It is a “support” type skill, however it should be used often to get the ever-importantTwin Souls perk in the skill tree which will allow you to have two conjured atronachs at a time. The two conjuration spells used will be: Conjure Ash Spawn and Conjure Ash Guardian. Unfortunately, the Conjure Ash Guardian spell consumes 1 Heart Stone, and if you do not have a Heart Stone in your inventory, the Guardian will become hostile towards you. For this reason I suggest grabbing the Expel Daedra perk so you can banish a hostile atronach that wants to attack you.
Alteration: The alteration spells are going to be used to strengthen your armor, paralyze enemies with ash spells, and look bada** while you pull things towards you with your mind. I suggest using these spells: Ash Shell, Ash Rune, and Ebony Flesh. These next spells are fun or useful, but not at all necessary to the build:Detect Life, Telekinesis, and Transmute.
Enchanting: All enchantments used for this build can be found in the picture in the Gear section of the build.
Ash Spawn use a two-handed fire-enchanted weapons, or a one-handed flame-enchanted sword with fireball spell
***
Perk Usage
By Level 57 you should have all the perks you will need based on the build in this post.
One handed: Armsman 5/5, Bladesman 3/3, Fighting Stance, Savage Strike, Critical Charge
Destruction: Novice Destruction, Adept Destruction, Apprentice Destruction, Expert Destruction, Master Destruction, Augmented Flames 2/2, Rune Master
Alteration: Novice Alteration, Adept Alteration, Apprentice Alteration, Expert Alteration, Stability, Atronach, Magic Resistance 3/3
Conjuration: Novice Conjuration, Adept Conjuration, Apprentice Conjuration, Expert Conjuration, Summoner 2/2, Atromancy, Elemental Potency, (Unless the fact that Ash creatures are not effected by the Twin Souls perk is a bug, we won't need to grab it).
Enchanting: Enchanter 5/5, Fire Enchanter, Insightful Enchanter, Corpus Enchanter, Extra Effect
Heavy Armor: Juggernaut 5/5, Fists of Steel, Well Fitted, Tower of Strength
Smithing: Steel Smithing, Elven Smithing, Advanced Armors, Glass Smithing, Dragonbone Smithing (I go through the light armor side of the tree because we are only leveling it up for the Dragonbone and Steel Smithing the light armor side takes one less perk to get to the top).
***
Special Moves and Battle Tactics
Swift Infero
The Ash Knight covers himself in flames and increases his speed compared to the enemy as he rushes to them blade drawn.
Requirements: Fire Cloak, Slow Time Shout, Weapon
Molten Armor
The Ash Knight buys time for himself to regain his magical armor or replenish his health, magicka, or stamina.
Requirements: Ash Rune or Ash Shell, Ebony Flesh (Or lower level version of the spell)
Hell’s Arena
The Ash Knight surrounds his opponents in walls of fire and conjures a creature of ash to toss them around.
Requirements: Wall of Fire, Conjure Ash Guardian, Heart Stone (optional but recommended)
Battle Example: To showcase the true potential of the build, I will run through an example of a battle in the form of the end boss-fight in an ancient Nordic ruin. You start off the battle using an alteration spell like Ebony Flesh, to strengthen your armor. You immediately encase the main boss in ash so you can deal with the weaker leveled ones first. You cast Flame Cloak on yourself, slow time, and run into the mass of the undead swinger your fiery blade. When all the weak Draugr are dealt with, you cast Wall of Fire under the still ash-covered boss. When he breaks out, he is immediately damaged by the fire underneath him. You conjure an Ash Guardian to toss around and distract the boss while you cast flame spells at him until he dies.
***
Recommended Quests
-College of Winterhold (I recommend completing the questline before you get too far into the main one)
-Main Questline
-Tel Mithryn/Nelith Quests: Ash spawn spells
-Unearthed: Ahzidal’s Ring of Arcana and Ahzidal's Mask
-Dragonborn Questline: Someone claims to be stronger than you! You must defeat him and show the world your power, as well as gain people's love of you, making them more easy to manipulate if needed
