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Event Build: The Vile

Tags: #Character Build Barbarian  #Character Build Alchemist  #Character Build Villain  #Race:Orsimer  #Rank:Event Mythic  #Event:Deities  #Raidriar 
  • Member
    July 25, 2015

    Something I've never really looked into before was a 'pure warrior' build. I had always thought such a thing was impossible, since there aren't that many angles that you can take with a build whose sole focus is to hit things till they're dead.

    I hadn't intended to even enter this event too, but going through some of James' discussions I started to get some ideas, and decided that I'd give both things a go. What you see before you is a culmination of some kickass research from the T&T guys, along with some classic Orc barbarian skills and a touch of cannibalism to create what has been one of my most entertaining and yet simplistic builds to date...

    The Vile... A creature, like its patron and her other servants, the beggars and the wretched, is so easily forgotten...

    The few who remember it say it crawled forth from the Scuttling Void long ago, a monster unlike any the land has ever seen. A being of decay and revulsion, that even Namira could not stomach its presence in her realm...

    Its anger is immeasurable, its hunger as vast as the sea. The sweet flesh of men only drives it further, makes it want more...

    To call it a monster is a compliment. To call it a demon is kind. No, it is more an abominable force of nature, devouring everything in its path. And that path leads to Skyrim...

     

    The Build

    Race: Orc

    Stone: Lady

    Shouts: Elemental Fury, Marked for Death

    Stats: 0:1:0

    Major Skills: One Handed, Block, Alchemy

    Minor Skills: Sneak, Archery, Smithing

    Weapons: Orcish War Axes, Orcish Bow, Targe of the Blooded

    Apparel: Fur Armour, Stormcloak Officer Gauntlets, Predator's Grace, Necklace of Revival, Ring of Namira

    Powers: Seeker of Might, Secret of Protection, Sinderion's Serendipity, Ancient Knowledge, Force Without Effort

    Recommended Quests: The Taste of Death, Take up Arms, Laid to Rest, The Wolf Queen Awakened, Main Quest, Alftand, Dragonborn, Dark Brotherhood, Unfathomable Depths, Return to your Roots, Unearthed

    The Vile is essentially my take on the barbarian archetype but with some awesome twists and augments. With savage weaponry and a bare chest, the Vile rushes opponents fearlessly knowing that his patron is protecting him, then feasts on the corpses of his slain foes in honour of Namira. With some cunning, stealth and ranged tactics, he can take down even the toughest of enemies with ease, enhanced by clever brews and deadly poisons.

    You'll have noticed I put points only into health. That's because the Vile has no need of magic, and makes use of the Infinite Stamina glitch to augment his combat. By drinking a Philtre of the Healer, followed by a Draught of the Healer, followed by another Philtre and then equipping the Ring of Namira, he can achieve an unlimited Stamina pool. That means unlimited sprinting, power attacks, zooming, bashing, rolling and shield charging! This allows for unprecedented skill in combat, and means that all attribute points can be devoted to Health, creating quite a hardy warrior who has no need for armour perks. More health means more regeneration, and with the Lady Stone, Blessing of Namira and Necklace of Revival the Vile can maintain a constant 125% Fortify Health Regen whenever there are corpses available!

    Your main offence is two smithed Orcish War Axes, which are exceptionally powerful weapons in the right hands. With three ranks in Hack and Slash they do tremendous bleed damage (18 total per hit on Adept), which can stack quite easily with Elemental Fury and Dual Flurry 2/2. In addition, the axes swing with the same speed as swords, and with infinite Stamina you can keep up those power attacks endlessly, meaning that enemies will be dropping rather quickly! An Orcish Bow is the ranged weapon of choice, mainly for picking off some weaker enemies from stealth.

    Speaking of which, Sneak allows the Vile to create some great plays, and with Silent Roll and Critical Charge you can drop most foes without them even knowing. Predator's Grace make you pretty tough to detect, so you can often survey an area and formulate the best plan of attack before engaging.

    Block is your only means of defence, and can be a pretty deadly offence too. With a hand crafted Potion of Fortify Marksman and Power/Deadly Bash you can be doing something like 30x bash damage while still being defended, (and that's not even mentioning Marked for Death). Don't forget that the Targe can stack on the bleed too! Throw in a Lingering Damage Health poison and you can sit back while your opponent slowly bleeds out in front of you. Shield Charge makes for some great crowd control, and can really help thin herds and weaken tougher foes.

    Concoctions

    As usual, pretty much all of the ingredients can be grown in a greenhouse with Hearthfire. Hanging Moss is the only exception, which can be found in the Solitude Catacombs during the Wolf Queen Awakened. As there are only nine other ingredients, everything can be grown twice, increasing the efficiency of production. Numbers listed are with three pieces of Extreme Alchemy (Orcish Gauntlets, Necklace, Circlet). As the Ring of Namira takes up the last slot, you cannot wear anything over it, so this is pretty much the best you're going to hope for if you're looking for round numbers (66%). Fortunately, there are no generic Fortify Alchemy rings, so it is a pretty minor trade. The gauntlets can be found from level 30, and the necklace/circlet from level 32.

     

    Ferocity

    Fortify Marksman 100% + Fortify One Handed 100%
    Canis Root + Hanging Moss + Juniper Berries

     

    Endurance

    Fortify Block 100% + Resist Magic 25%
    Bleeding Crown + Tundra Cotton

     

    Vitality

    Regenerate Health 125%
    Juniper Berries + Namira's Rot

     

    Decay

    Lingering Damage Health 25pts + Paralysis 25s
    Canis Root + Imp Stool + Mora Tapinella

     

    Straight out of Helgen you'll want to grab the Lady Stone, as well as any Blue Mountain Flowers and Blue Butterfly Wings you can find along the way. These can be really helpful in levelling Alchemy early on, and starting a nice little profit that'll come in handy later.

    The Ring of Namira is your next target, and a quick carriage ride over to Markarth will allow you to start the quest. Smithing can be trained with Eorlund Graymane, and after completing Take Up Arms you can paralyse him and pickpocket the money back without it being a crime.As soon as you can amass a suitable total of gold (preferably over 8000) head straight over to Morthal and complete Laid to Rest. This will net you the opportunity to buy a plot of land. The remaining 3000 septims or so is enough to buy the materials required to build the main hall, the greenhouse and the planters to fill it.

    Once you reach level 20 the fun really begins. Alchemist vendors will now stock both Draughts and Philtres of the Healer, allowing you to harness the power of infinite Stamina quite early on! Remember, it's Philtre -> Draught -> Philtre. You can do a couple of power attacks to check whether it's working. Remember, you cannot put any points into Stamina, otherwise the glitch won't work. Don't forget to pick up the Targe of the Blooded from Alftand, and the Necklace of Revival at Radiant Raiment once you reach level 38.

    Abilities

    Strike

    Your standard opening ability, which deals nearly 12x damage to an opponent! A great way to open up combat, or pick off individual foes. Simply silent roll into a critical charge for it to work.

    Requires: Silent Roll, Critical Charge, Backstab

     

     

     

    Topple

    Easily one of your most entertaining abilities, infinite shield charging can be used in combat to keep enemies on the ground and vulnerable. It's also great fun in Slow Time!

    Requires: Shield Charge, Infinite Stamina

     

     

    Cripple

    A sadistic move befitting the champion of Namira. Stack constant bleeds on your enemy, then sit back and watch the carnage! A dual power attack is a nice way to administer the poisons, as you'll be hitting pretty fast.

    Requires: Hack and Slash 3/3, Decay, Concentrated Poison

     

     

    Feast

    Your main method of healing, which totals at 250% Fortify Healing Rate, a significant boost to health regen. Vitality lasts for 5 minutes, meaning you can often go through an entire dungeon with only two or three of them. You can even feed mid battle by clicking on the corpse, then equipping your weapons before the animation begins to cancel it and still get the bonus.

    Requires: Lady Stone, Necklace of Revival, Ring of Namira, Vitality

     

     

    Bloodlust

    A finisher move, which absolutely annihilates your enemies while providing good defence for yourself. Don't be afraid to just go nuts with power attacks, as you'll be hitting immensely fast and taking 75% less damage for 30 seconds.

    Requires: Berserker Rage, Secret of Protection, Dual Flurry 2/2, Elemental Fury, Ferocity

     

     

     

    Closing Notes and Credits

    It was good to get back into building. This really revitalised my interest in Skyrim, so firstly I'd like to say a massive thank you to the hosts of the Character Building group for organising this kickass event. I really hope you give this build a go, as its a helluva lot of fun if you're tired of incredibly complex playthroughs (and how can you say no to that face?).

    Another thanks goes to James for all of his research into game mechanics, which really makes this build shine. Check out his discussions on Marked for DeathBash Damage and Bleed Damage.

    All of those who managed to uncover and research Unlimited Stamina.

    DeviantArt, Thraen and Google for the various images. That final picture is actually very close to the final armour combo (minus the skull belt), so if you want some artistic reference then you know where to look.

    And thank you for reading!

  • July 25, 2015
    Awesome build as always man. I gave it a quick read and I am impressed so far. I'll write the more detailed assessment this build deserves when I am able.
  • Member
    July 25, 2015
    Wow. First off, great build!
    I love builds which focus DoT damage and you've really pulled it off well here.
    What difficulty were you playtesting this build on? By stacking all those DoT effects and with all those points in health, it must have been ridiculous!
    I'm a little confused as to how you used your weapons. You say tha the main offence is dual war axes, but you mention using the Garge of the blooded for bashing as well. Were you switching between the two a lot? Did you activate shield charge with the actual shield, or did you use the glitch to shield charge with a weapon?
    Also, that perk spread is a bit difficult to read - the colours blend in with the picture a bit.
    So, two event builds. One has unlimited concentration casting, the other has unlimited stamina. Next somebody's gonna have unlimited health (I don't know how, but it will happen) :P.
    Once again, great build!
  • Member
    July 25, 2015

    Thanks Kael!

    I played on Master. The lack of any armour perks makes all that health a must (650 with the Ring of Namira end game), and the character still took quite a lot of damage from deathlords and the like. That's where Block came in. Dual wielding was more used to rush enemies and finish the fight before it even started, whereas Block helped defend and survive against the tougher, more damage dealing foes.

    Yeah, I might brighten up the perkspread and make it easier to read.

    Haha, I'm sure some bright spark will crack it eventually! Thanks man!

  • Member
    July 25, 2015

    Great work! In stacking DPS from bleed damage and poisons your build is similar to Twisted's Scourge, but while Twisted used magic to complement the skills (namely Poison Rune), you walked the path of a warrior and used Targe of the Blooded and Marked for Death which, I imagine, made combat encounters fast and brutal  My only suggestions are to 1) replace Movarth's boots for Predator's Grace (it should not screw with unlimited stamina glitch) and 2) make the text on the perk spread brighter, it's quite hard to read.

  • Member
    July 25, 2015

    Love me some Orc barbarian +1

  • Member
    July 25, 2015

    Something I've never really looked into before was a 'pure warrior' build. I had always thought such a thing was impossible, since there aren't that many angles that you can take with a build whose sole focus is to hit things till they're dead.

    So you gave him Sneak. :p

  • Member
    July 25, 2015
    Thanks Vaz! Yeah, I did take some inspiration from Twisted's build on the DoT. Why Predator's Grace though? The build is already 100% muffled (Muffled Movement + Silence), and those boots only grant a 1% bonus to Stamina regen or something. And I'll update the perkspread soon, likely tomorrow when I've got time.
  • Member
    July 25, 2015
    Who doesn't Brewmaster? :D
  • Member
    July 25, 2015
    Ah, I couldn't go fully pure warrior. I know you dislike Sneak too Phil, so sorry about that! :D