Introduction
Bombing in The Elder Scrolls Online can be considered a very controversial yet fun style of PvP gameplay. While I quite enjoy the playstyle for its potential to turn the tide of war by eliminating multiple high value targets at once. I very much understand others negative opinion on bomb builds for their multiple different reasons. With that being said, this build guide is going to be the hardest hitting bomb blade for The Elder Scrolls Online, update 36 ready.
2 Hand Magicka Nightblade
The reason we chose the Nightblade for this guide is because of its accessibility to all players, it’s ability to do massive burst damage, mobility, and stealth built into the class. The hybridization changes make this build unique in how we stack our damage with over spell damage instead of weapon. Feel free to use the quick links below to jump to different parts of the guide or follow in its entirety from beginning to end. This guide should have all the information needed to be able to get some of the hardest hitting bombs in ESO.
- Introduction
- 2 Hand Magicka Nightblade
- Overview
- Gear
- Skills
- Rotation
- Balancing Resources
- Champion Points
- Additional Information
- Video
Overview
Race: Khajiit (for more crit damage) or Dunmer/Dark Elf (for more weapon damage)
Food: Ghastly Eye Bowl (the max magicka will increase damage and the recovery helps with buffing and escaping)
Mundus Stone: The Shadow (increase critical damage and healing by 11% full divines is 17%)
Vampire Stage: Vampire Stage 3 or 2 for the most additional damage
Consumables: Essence of Detection, Essence of Immovability, Tri-Stat Potions
Attributes: 64 Magicka, 0 Health, 0 Stamina
Gear
The gear used in this build is important and it is recommended to follow the “Best Option” as much as possible. This is a very unique gank/bomb build in that we wear a set obtained from a trial but gives the most spell damage in the game. With 9000 spell damage leaving stealth this build hits HARD. The burst of this is massive and if everything works correctly you can expect to hit the strongest vicious death bombs in ESO.
Gear Information:
- All armor in ‘Divines’ trait for max damage potential
- We wear 7 medium armor pieces for max damage potential
- Weapons in ‘Nirnhoned’ trait to to buff damage
- Jewelry in ‘Infuse’ trait with spell damage glyphs
- 2 Hand Axe with shock damage glyph
- All magicka armor glyphs
- The higher the quality gear the more damage you can deal
| Best Option | 2nd Option | 3rd Option | |
| Monster Set x2 | Balorgh | ||
| Damage Set x5 | Perfected Coral Riptide | Coral Riptide | |
| Damage Set x5 | Vicious Death |
Skills
Front Bar
Front Bar: Arterial Burst, Concealed Weapon, Impale, Silver Bolts, Camouflaged Hunter, Onslaught
Back Bar
Back Bar: Rally, Shuffle, Shadowy Disguise, Simmering Frenzy, Race Against Time, Soul Tether
Rotation
Buff Rotation: The buff rotation is more complex than typical bomb builds because we have to manage 2 resources, stamina and health. Starting on our back bar. Begin by reducing our health with simmering frenzy. Once while your health is going down spam Shuffle to lower stamina to 40%. Once health is at 50% cast Rally for damage buff. Race Against Time after that for our 2nd damage buff. By the time you are ready for the gank/bomb your health should be less than 50% and your stamina should be less than 33%.
Damage Rotation: After we decided to commit to the bomb start by casting Shadowy Disguise for guaranteed critical chance on the first strike. This gives us only a 3 second window to cast the rest of the skills and open the gank/bomb so better be quick after casting. Swap to front bar. After casting shadowy disguise immediately cast ultimate Onslaught. Finish with light attack and Arterial Burst combo till dead.
(rotations fully explained in build video)
Balancing Resources
Balancing resources; such as our magicka, stamina, and health; is one of the most important parts of this build guide. Because we are running sets that buff our damage based off missing resources, it is very important to learn how to manage them. Remember that your stamina needs to be less than 33% and your health needs to be less than 50%. To manage this effectively we use the following 3 skills Simmering Frenzy, Shuffle, and Rally. Simmering Frenzy is the only skill in this set up that can reduce our health. Rally should not be used until 50% health and only cast once to avoid over healing, causing us to lose our damage buffs. We also don’t want to cast Rally until our stamina is around 40%. To achieve this we cast Shuffle a few times while we wait for Simmering then Rally once at the end.
Champion Points
Because everyone who is viewing this guide is at a different Champion Point level I will only be putting up the champion points I chose at the level I was at the time of making this guide, which is 930. Remember that Champion Point soft cap is around 1800 but you can easily achieve high value bombs with low cp.
- 50 Backstabber (slot)
- 50 Fighting Finesse (slot)
- 50 Master-at-Arms (slot)
- 50 Biting Aura (slot)
- 20 Piercing
- 20 Precision
- 20 Eldritch Insight
- 40 Battle Mastery
- 50 Boundless Vitality (slot)
- 50 Expert Evasion (slot)
- 50 Bastion (slot)
- 50 Survival Instincts (slot)
- 20 Hero’s Vigor
- 25 Tempered Soul
- 30 Piercing Gaze
- 30 Tumbling
- 10 Mystic Tenacity
- 50 Steed’s Blessing (slot)
- 50 Sustaining Shadow (slot)
- 40 Fleet Phantom
- 50 Breakfall
- 30 Out of Sight
- 73 Wanderer
Additional Information
- The goal is to gank 1 person to set off a chain of kills
- You WILL die. A lot. Simmering Frenzy takes our health down to near zero
- Swapping Arterial Burst with Blood for Blood will give more damage but is a gamble on critical hits
- Focusing lower health targets for easier bombs
- This is the hardest hitting bomb build of Update 35 Lost Depths