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Character Build: The Terramancer

Tags: #Character Build Archer  #Character Build Summoner  #Character Build Bound Weapons  #Race:Breton  #Rank:Mythic  #Nelaf  #Earth  #Geo  #Geomancy  #Nendir Olaffsen  #Stone  #Terramancer  #Terramancy 
  • Member
    January 7, 2014

    The Lore:

    Terramancy is a form of magic that manipulates the earth - not in the sense of natural magic that utilizes flora - but directly with the earth: rock, metal, and mineral. Terramancers are a unique type of spellcasters. Their power to cast spells is not drawn from the spirit as most spells are. Instead, the power is drawn directly from the earth.


    Another unique aspect of Terramancy is that the skill cannot be learned through any amount of study or obtained through the use of any magical devices. It is an inherent ability present in a rare few. The difference in power of Terramancers is the degree in which they have learned to harness the power. A much more advanced type of Terramancy is 'Geokinesis' - is the metaphysical ability to control, shape and manipulate earthen substances with your mind instead of hand gestures, the most common taught way in Tamrielic fashion to mages.


    To concentrate their power, most Terramancers use a Focus. A Focus is a magically enhanced item intended to enhance the desired manifestations of the Terramancer. There are diminishing returns on size, yet some Terramancers utilize massive Foci to gain the maximum effectiveness from their efforts. A famous and very powerful Nordic Terramancer of old is supposed to have worn a suit of granite plate armor into battle to serve as a Focus as well as protection. Legend holds that in order to merely carry this incredibly cumbersome suit of armor, he learned a powerful set of spells to increase his strength just to the point of being able to stagger into battle.

    ...Casually commanding and creating woodland life to decimate your enemies quickly becomes the norm...

    The Build:

    The concept of the build is to control the earth, and nature, and bend it to your will. Your Foci is your enchanted Chitin Armor, much like the Nordic Terramancer of old (see Lore section) , and allows you to enhance your own Terramancy. The secondary concept of this build is to be able to utilize archery by not sneaking. Sneaking is so oftenly seen among thief and assassin builds, but it's almost unheard of just to be able to stand there and fire at enemies without having to crouch behind stuff with a bunch of Illusion spells hot-keyed.


    We'll also be using Conjuration, swapping it up from Sneak. The Conjuration archer type is, in my opinion, the stupendous mix of not taking damage while dealing plenty of it. This build revolves around the Bound Bow skill (Conjuration 50), which you can buy from Farengar in Dragonsreach. This spell basically gives you unlimited arrows, along with damage modifiers from both the Archery and Conjuration skill trees (The higher the Conjuration level, the stronger the bow. And your archery perks all apply too). The Conjuration tree also conveniently gives you some of the best tanks in the game – Antronachs.


    With the spell Flame/Frost/Storm Thrall (Our main conjuration that will be with us 90% of the time is the Ash Guardian, to truly give us our feel of Terramancy), you can permanently summon (until it dies) an antronach, and coupled with Twin Souls (Conjuration 100), you can summon two at a time.  To get the spell, you must have level 90 Conjuration, and go to Phinis Gestor in the College of Winterhold. The strategy behind this build is engaging and simple, whilst still being amazing fun. This build uses an advanced skillset with an odd mix of Warrior and Mage skills to create an interesting and challenging playthrough whilst replicating Nature's defenses for your own.

    ...Our main conjuration we'll be using - The Ash Guardian...

    A powerful Terramancer is a frightening thing, capable of raising thousand foot volcanoes, or rending huge chasms in the earth, or shaking a town to the ground through massive earthquakes. Fortunately, Terramancers of such power are exceedingly rare. Today, there are extreme restrictions placed on Terramancers. There is not a culture on Tamriel without laws - or at least great stigma - that prevent Terramancers from deliberately modifying terrain at their whim.


    Evidence of Terramancy is present, to varying degrees, all over Tamriel. Battlegrounds between Terramancers over an Era ago are still very apparent. Sudden and vast changes to a landscape are a sure sign of a former Terramancers presence. Terramancers of the past have occasionally left landmarks as a sort of signature in their homelands. The face of Tamriel is wildly scarred with these crazy changes in terrain.

    ...All yours to command and conquer...

    So, naturally, to start off with, we'll need quite a bit of health, some good armor (that accurately portrays that we can summon nature to do our bidding) and a bow fit for a warrior. In the meantime we shall be replicating and examining how we can give nature a voice of it's own, to wreck havoc with those that challenge our Terramancer.


    On top of this we'll be utilizing not one, but two of the Guardian stones in order to further our defenses (Including one of the All-Maker stones from the Dragonborn DLC ...)

    ...The Earth Stone allows us to ignore 80% of all physical damage for 30 seconds, which actually has the exact same effect as Dragonhide, the best flesh spell the Alteration school has to offer. This way, we essentially obtain this spell over 50+ hours of gameplay quicker. Despite having the limitation of one use a day, the spell Dragonhide itself requires Master level status in Alteration, something which costs an awful lot of magicka, game-time, and septims (if you plan on training it, too)...


    So we'll be doing this all whilst seemingly having the ability to control Nature's forces. So, without further babble, let's take a look at this badass in all his glory...

    Race: Breton, Bosmer, or Altmer. Breton will give us our critical defenses for this build for our 'no sneak archery', on top of everything else, whilst the Bosmer's Command Animal will give us allegiance with mammoths, especially devastating when coupled with our master level Thralls. (Since we have the shout, it renders this choice rather useless since their power is only once a day). For my playthrough I chose Breton, although an Altmer would also be an excellent choice aswell because of the build's need for high magicka for Conjuration mastery, and their Highborn Magicka is an excellent early fix for such a need.

    Guardian Stone/s: Lord Stone, and Lady Stone. This already allows us to get a knock or two on the chin and get back up, whilst the Lady Stone will improve our regeneration.

    Major Skills: Archery, Conjuration, Alteration.

    Minor Skills: Enchanting, Heavy Armor.

    Weapon/s: Bound Bow, and Dwarven Black Bow of Fate.

    Armor:  Enchanted Heavy Chitin Armor with Aetherial Crown.

    * * *

    Shouts:

    Whirlwind Sprint - You move the soil beneath your feet to withstand your ground better, and, as a result, you can move with the speed of Nirn's Four Winds.


    Storm Call -  You call upon your cycromantic nature once again, and summon a brilliant storm around you in the skies to strike upon your enemies and fry them.


    Clear Skies - Mother Nature's breath herself cleanses the air, making all harsh weather clam once again to aid you in your journey.


    Cyclone - Summoning the Winds of Tamriel, you create a deadly cyclone, a typhoon, to destroy your challengers, as they get blown around the battlefield.


    Slow Time - Steadfast underfoot, you slow Nirn moving itself, slowing down time, giving you immense accuracy with your bow in skirmishes.


    Animal Allegiance - You command animals to crush or scatter likely contenders by quickly acquainting yourself with the forest dwellings with your geomantic abilities.


    Bend Will - Bending the very stones to your will, as your terramncy grows in strength and gains power, animals, people, and even dragons must do your bidding.

    Marked For Death - Willing upon the Void itself, summoning the Earth Mother's strength to weaken your foe, and free him of his mortal soul.

    Terramantic Tactics:


    As I mentioned, we'll be using Conjuration in conjunction with Alteration, to be able to conjure up Atronachs to do our bidding and wear down our opponents whilst we're on higher ground shooting down on our opponents from afar. Casting and specializing in Alteration allows us to be even more unstoppable, which will allow Nature to protect us, ramping up our own AR and defenses.


    Heavy Armor will do it's job should we encounter the rareity that we do get hit but we will not be taking any of the perks that we get from wearing a matching set, since we will be using the Aetherial Crown. Enchanting will enable us to combine and fuse our knowledge of charms and protections to bind our earth-like armor with even more defenses. One of which will be health regeneration, which will stack with our second chosen Guardian Stone, the Lady, which on it's own has a 25% regeneration rate, not to mention the 25% stamina regeneration rate too, which will help us with our zooming skills in battle, since we won't be sneaking. The Slow Time shout, one in numerous we will be utilizing, will also benefit us against the fastest of enemies.


    The Lord Stone gives us 50 AR, and 25% magic resistance, which stacks with the Breton's innate racial 25% magic resistance, plus, including the Magic Resistance 3/3 Alteration perk giving us 30% resistance too, leaves us with a nice 80% protection against those pesky mages that we will in no doubt encounter along our playthrough. That's just 5% off the full magic resistance cap, which we can make up in enchantments, plus that handy master level 'Atronach' Alteration perk, which allows us to absorb 30% of any spells that do hit us.

    Now that we've covered our backs sufficiently well, we'll need something to actually smack that enemy in the head and bring them to their senses. This'll help balance out the build, but not so much that it'll become a glass cannon. In our possession, after we've located the Kagrumez Resonance Gems to unlock the gates that precede our prized bow, we'll have the Dwarven Black Bow of Fate, which dictates a 50% chance of absorbing Health, Stamina and/or Magicka. In itself it's very similar to Chaos damage, but this bow, however, absorbs the attributes instead of simply damaging them like Chaos Damage.


    The Bound Bow is an exceptionally desirable weapon in the early stages of the game - unmodified through perks, it is still a formidable bow. The relevant Spell Tome is found in Fort Amol Prison under a lantern in a bucket, guarded by five mages in total. Casting the spell will require 183 magicka at 15 (base) Conjuration skill, <180 as of 17.


    This amount of magicka may be achieved as early as level 1 via any combination of Novice Hood (30 magicka), Atronach Standing Stone (50 magicka, found just to the east of Fort Amol) and Altmer Highborn racial bonus (50 magicka), as well as outright through periodic consumption of Elsweyr Fondue (100 magicka).

    The Bound Bow is also quite special for a number of reasons:-

    • It increases two skills. (Conjuration when summoning in front of enemies, and Archery when firing).
    • It's arrows also have damage rating of 24, equal to their Daedric counterparts.
    • It has a base damage of 18, which increases to 24 after the perk Mystic Binding is applied.
    • Poisons can still be applied to it, despite it's ghostly image.
    • With Soul Stealer and Oblivion Binding, the bow can effectively be triple-enchanted with Soul Trap, Banish, & Turn effects, and requires no recharging. This also allows the player to continue attacking directly, without needing to un-equip their weapon to equip these spells.

    Stat Placement: | Magicka 4 | Health 3 | Stamina 1

    The perk spread for the Terramancer is wide open and challenging, with odd sets of skills to use with each other to stregthen our defenses. Since four of our five skills will be defensive, we'll be tipping the scales by fully perking Archery. Actually, just about the only skill be won't be fully perking is Conjuration, since we won't be using Necromatic perks, apart from those that also include bolstering our thralls, like Twin Souls or Summoner.


    For the earliest levels, since we won't be getting our Alteration or Conjuration skills up early, the best defensive skill in our possession to start using and training is Heavy Armor, and our Archery skills for our defense; This makes our beginning game simple, but easy to level. Since leveling these two skills for our Terramancer will be passive (melee'ers and marksman enemies will be rushing us, steadily improving our Heavy Armor skill, whilst Levels 1-5+ (at least) will be dominantly levelled by our Archery skills in open combat.

    By Levels 5 - 10+ onwards you should have started to use and practice your earliest Flesh spells, like Iron Flesh, Stone Flesh, etc; which you can obtain for a small sum from Lucan Valerius, first time your enter Riverwood.

    Early midgame, from Levels 15 - 20+ you should start to stock up on your Conjuration spell books, and be able to cast the first few simplest Thralls etc. Casting them in the line of vision for enemies levels this quicker. An even quicker way to level it is to cast Soul Trap repeatedly on a dead body. (Credit: Brynjolf)

    Meanwhile throughout these skill levels you should be training Enchanting. Since this levels so slowly (apart from disenchanting artifacts, or recharging weapons are the quickest way to level it applicably.) you'll want to train it, since your coin purse should have enough left over from purchasing your Thrall spell books, you can begin at the earliest convenience to seek out the Enchanting trainers.

    You can start the Kagrumez Quest to get the Dwarven Black Bow of Fate at Level 25 (earliest required level) at the same time you should attain the Earth Stone, both in your clutches by midgame. Obtaining the Earth Stone is better before Level 25 since it has the same effect as Dragonhide, and essentially we can get this Master level Alteration spell effect quicker, so I'd advise making two trips to Solstheim, one as early as possible to get the Earth Stone (Just go to Windhelm and pay the sailor 200 gold) and another trip at Level 25 to do the Kagrumez Quest for the Black Bow of Fate, but do this as soon as you hit Level 25, since the Black Bow is better at taking down the higher level enemies, namely mages, than the Bound Bow, essentially for it's pre-binded enchantments.

    The Terramancer's Equipment:

    Aetherial Crown - Allows you to have two Guardian Stones active at once. Can be obtained by starting the quest 'Lost to the Ages' by reading the book 'Aetherium Wars'.

    'Stone-Fist Gauntlets' - Heavy Chitin Gauntlets enchanted with Fortify Archery + Fortify Heavy Armor

    'Earth-Laiden Stompers' - Heavy Chitin Boots enchanted with Fortify Stamina and Fortify Stamina Rate

    'Earth Mother's Chestpiece' - Heavy Chitin Armor enchanted with Fortify Alteration and Fortify Conjuration

    Ring of Recovery - Magicka Regeneration Rate +100%

    Alternate Ring - Any lesser ring with the same enchantment (Ring of Recharging etc.)

    Necklace of Revival (Endgame) - Healing Regeneration Rate +50%

    Alternate Necklace - Amulet of Talos.

    ___

    Roleplaying a Terramancer


    Most terramancy comes in the form of defensive structures, whether it be uprooting trees to block a barrage of fire arrows, or creating rock guardians chiseled out of a mountain face; now since we can't create chasms and form volcanoes in our quest for terramanctic mastery, we'll form a heavily dependent side of roleplaying amongst our available shouts, spells, and equipment.


    As to factions and acquaintances, we can use our Command Animal and Bend Will shout to allow forest creatures to form a formidable woodland army to defend us, including Mammoths, Earth Matron Spriggans, Giants... Dragons! literally anything that strikes your fancy. I recommend the Mages Guild, since if you complete it early, as difficult as it may be, it will give you a nice headstart on some good magicka fortification gear whilst you are collecting your endgame equipment.


    I wouldn't recommend any other faction apart from the Mages Guild, since as an outsider with a powerful, but rather unheard form of magical prowess you are largely independent, and wouldn't make sense to join the Companions or the Dark Brotherhood. If you insist that you want to complete the Civil War, I recommend Imperials, since two out of the three listed advised racial choices are elves, which the Stormcloaks look down on in disgust; my advice would be to just stay away from the War altogether.
    As for followers, good choices would be any of the College of Winterhold students, since they would compliment you battle tactics rather well. Hunters/Archers are a bad choice, since they are ranged, they might take down some of your opponents before you can have some fun with them with your shouts and thralls etc.; same with warriors and melee combatants.

    Special Moves:

    'The Final Tusk'

    Marked For Death Shout + Animal Allegiance Shout (Mammoth) + Amulet of Talos

    Using the Amulet of Talos to quicken the time between your two shouts, you can mark your target and will him to the Void itself.

    Using the Animal Allegiance shout, you can bend the mentality of a mammoth to do your bidding, as it charges it's way over to your hapless foe.

    Watch as it tusks your enemy as its sharp bone weapons inflict the destiny of death upon your challenger.

     

     

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    Credits:

    NoSnakes - For editing the main build picture.

    Ben C - For giving me quite a few good ideas through PM & ongoing support.

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    Thank You! 

     

     

     

     

  • Member
    January 7, 2014

    YES! Its here :D

  • Member
    January 7, 2014

    What's wrong with it? Most builds use CoolText.

  • Member
    December 9, 2016

    All images have been restored for this build. While I try my best to keep the formatting as close to the original as possible, there are some unavoidable differences as a result of differing platforms... for this I apologize.

    Also, please feel free to remove the 'Restored' banner at the end of the build--I put it there as a courtesy to let the reader know that the build has been worked on by somebody other than its original creator without his or her knowlege.