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Elder Scrolls Online Dragonknight DPS Guide for PvE
ESO Dragonknight DPS Guide
Dragonknights in Elder Scrolls Online can breathe fire and lash their enemies with a lava whip. Many players got disappointed when they heard that this class role-plays primarily as a tank. Nothing is lost, though! All the ESO Classes have multiple playstyles and roles available to them. You don't have to run around with one hand weapon and shield, taking hits for your team, to be an efficient Dragonknight player!
If you want to unleash the full damage potential of Dragonknight to scorch your enemies, you're in the right place. We're going to take a look at the best Dragonknight DPS builds that can help you destroy your opponents as quickly as possible. Magicka build will heavily rely on the fiery dragon magic that this class has access to. Stamina setup utilizes more raw power and physical strength to cut through enemies with your weapon. No matter which one you'll choose, you're going to end up with a powerful DPS build. PvE content in ESO can sometimes be quite challenging - bringing a really high damage output is definitely a good way of dealing with it.
table of contents
Dragonknight skill trees
The three Dragonknight skill lines are Ardent Flame, Draconic Power and Earthen Heart. While you'll want to level some passives from all three of them, the Ardent Flame tree will remain the most important for both the Magicka and Stamina build. All the setups that we're going to discuss active skills from the Ardent Flame tree.
Stamina Dragonknight DPS Build
Stamina Dragonknights can deal massive amounts of damage while also having great sustain and decent survivability. As a Stamina DPS, your two-weapon setup will be either dual wield + bow or two-hander + bow. Attribute-wise, you should put every point into Stamina. You can be a bit squishy, but it's best to just learn your combat limits as a frontline damage dealer instead of putting your attribute points in Health. Optimizng the damage output will be really important for dungeons and trials.
Dual Wield Skill Bar
Venomous Claw – it's a morph of Searing Strike – a Dragonknight class skill that belongs to the Ardent Flame tree. It's a Damage over time skill that actually has stronger tics, the longer it remains on a target (up to 8 seconds).
Noxious Breath – a morph of Fiery Breath – another Ardent Flame skill. It's an AoE cone-shaped skill that deals initial poison damage and then more over time. It also debuffs the targets with Major Fracture, making them more vulnerable to physical attacks and skills. It makes this ability a great opener.
Rapid Strikes or Bloodthirst – both of these options are morphs of Flurry in the Dual Wield skill line. They are solid single target DPS abilities. They empower your five consecutive attacks, especially the final one (it's crucial to land it). Rapid Strike provides slightly higher damage output, while Bloodthirst brings additional sustain. In general, Bloodthirst is the safer option, but if you don't have to stay alive, you can elect to go with Rapid Strikes for higher DPS.
Rending Slashes or Blood Craze – the situation here is similar to the previous skill slot. Both of these abilities are morphs of Twin Slashes in the Dual Wield tree. Rending Slashes bring a little more damage, while Blood Craze provides some healing. Once again, the defensive option is safer, but if you're confident in your ability to survive in battle, you can go for more severe damage.
For the final non-ultimate slot, you have two options. It's pretty much a personal preference thing. One of these abilities will end up in your dual wield bar. The other will most likely be in your bow bar, so you'll have access to both of them anyway.
Flames of Oblivion – the first option is a morph of Inferno in the Ardent Flame skill tree. It's a convenient spell that can scale off of either your Magicka or Stamina – whichever is the higher one. It creates an aura that shoots up to two fireballs at different targets every 5 seconds. It also increases your critical chance with weapons and spells. In our opinion, this is the slightly better choice for your main skill bar.
Soul Splitting Trap – the second possibility is a morph of the Soul Trap skill in the Soul Magic tree. It's another ability that scales off of your highest offensive attribute. It's used as another source of damage over time.
Flawless Dawnbreaker – in this skill bar we're going to use the morph of Dawnbreaker - the Fighters Guild ultimate ability. It's a cone-shaped AoE damage skill that hits enemies in front of you. It has an initial burst, delayed damage over time effect and it increases your weapon damage for 20 seconds. It has a relatively low cost for an ultimate skill, but you still shouldn't use that too often.
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Bow Skill Bar
Arrow Barrage or Endless Hail – it's a morph of Bow skill line ability called Volley. It's an AoE skill that deals damage to enemies in a specific area over 8 seconds. You have to keep multiple enemies in that place for the full duration to get the most value out of it. Arrow Barrage has a bigger radius and more DPS, while Endless Hail has a longer duration and higher deals overall more damage for its Stamina cost.
Poison Injection – it's a morph of Poison Arrow from the Bow skill line. It's a damage over time skill that starts hitting harder when the target's HP gets lower. It has 10 seconds duration. There's no need to overlap it, but you want to keep it on your priority target the whole time. It's kind of a soft execution mechanic which is useful for finishing off the enemies.
Resolving Vigor or Echoing Vigor – these skills are two available morphs of the Vigor ability in the Assault tree. They are both healing abilities. Resolving Vigor is a self-heal that's faster and more powerful than the other option. Echoing Vigor is slower and less potent, but it also works on nearby allies. Most players will go for the first one since it's not a support build. Recasting this ability when it's still running makes it reset, so make sure that it ends before you use it again, so you don't waste resources.
Barbed Trap – a morph of Trap Beast ability in the Fighter Guild skill line. Place in on the ground and then lure enemies into it. It immobilizes them for two seconds and deals damage over time. Moreover, upon activation, it buffs the user with Minor Force – a 10% boost to critical damage. You should always try to keep this buff on 100% of the time.
In this slot, we're taking the remaining one of the Flames of Oblivion/Soul Splitting Trap pair.
Standard of Might – the ultimate skill that we go with in the ranged skill bar is belongs to the Ardent Flame line – it's a morph of the Dragonknight Standard. This skill deals AoE damage over time and increases the amount of damage that you deal (from all sources) by 15%. It also reduces the amount of damage that you take by 15%. All you have to do is stand in its range, so remember to place it strategically. The duration of this ability is 16 seconds.
Two-Hander Skill Bar
It is an alternative for the Dual Wield. Their DPS possibilities are quite similar, but Dual Wield is arguably a bit more popular. The Two-Hander setup is a bit better for killing multiple targets at once, while Dual Wield can provide slightly more single-target DPS. Choose whichever one you like more.
Venomous Claw – morph of Searing Strike in the Ardent Flame line. We already described in the Dual Wield setup.
Carve or Brawler– they are morphs of the Cleave skill in the Two-Handed tree. It's another cone-shaped AoE damage ability. Carve hits your enemies with an initial portion of damage and then make them bleed, losing even more Health over 10 seconds. Brawler doesn't inflict bleeding but instead provides you with a shield, that gets increased value for every enemy hit with the ability. As usual, the defensive option is a bit safer but provides less DPS. In case of this ability, the damage loss is quite substantial, so we recommend using Carve unless you have some major trouble with surviving.
Noxious Breath – it's base ability is Fiery Breath in the Ardent Flame tree. We described it in the Dual Wield section. Here it has even more value, because of the higher amount of built-in AoE.
Reverse Slice – it's a morph of Reverse Slash in the Two-Handed skill line. It's an AoE damage skill that deals significantly increased damage to enemies below 50% HP. It has a high execute quality while also being a very potent way of killing multiple targets.
Once again it's a choice between Flames of Oblivion from Ardent Flame tree and Soul Splitting Trap from the Soul Magic skill line. We talked about it in the Dual Wield section.
Flawless Dawnbreaker – this setup also uses the morphed Fighters Guild ultimate. The difference is that with the Two-Hander build you'll get access to significantly more AoE damage.
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Optional skills
Deadly Cloak – its base ability is Blade Cloak in the Dual Wield skill line. It provides Major Evasion, which reduces the amount of AoE damage that you take. It also deals continuous damage to surrounding enemies. Of course, it's only an option for the Dual Wield bar.
Eruption – a morph of Ash Cloud which belongs to the Earthen Heart tree. It creates a field that significantly slows and damages enemies who are inside of it. You can make room for it in the Bow skill bar. The slow synergizes well with Arrow Barrage and Endless Hail. Eruption scales off of Magicka, but its base values are high enough to make it work in a Stamina-focused setup.
Razor Caltrops – its base skill is Caltrops in the Assault line. It works somewhat similarly to Eruption, but it's Stamina based. It has lower damage and slightly weaker slow. But in turn, it costs less, has a larger radius of effect and applies Major Fracture, making its targets take more physical damage. It can be used in the Bow skill bar.
Molten Armaments – it's a morph of Molten Weapons in the Earthen Heart tree. It's a 30-second buff that provides you and your allies with Major Sorcery that increases their Spell Damage by 20%. You also get 50% increased damage with your heavy attacks. If you want to run a heavy attack build, you can definitely try to find a slot for this ability. If no one else in your group provides Major Sorcery, it will be an excellent damage increase for all your casters.
Corrosive Armor – you can use this morph of Magma Armor – the Earthen Heart ultimate ability instead of Flawless Dawnbreaker. It will reduce your DPS, but as compensation, you get an excellent survivability tool. It's a good idea to use this ultimate when you're still learning the build to avoid some unnecessary deaths. Overall, it's a tanking ability, but slotting it in your build once in a while can be pretty useful.
Passives
Ardent Flame: Combustion for more damage over time, Searing Heat for increased damage on specific abilities and World in Ruin for a bit of additional damage and decreased Stamina cost of your Ardent Flame skills. Optionally, you can take Warmth for extra slows, but it's not that important.
Draconic Power: Iron Skin, Burning Heart and Scaled Armor for damage mitigation and extra healing received. Elder Dragon increases the range of your instant melee attacks.
Earthen Heart: Eternal Mountain increases the duration of Earthen Heart skills, which is useful if you choose to go with Eruption or Molten Armaments. Battle Roar restores Magicka, Stamina and Health when you're using an ultimate ability. Mountain Blessing provides extra damage and ultimate resource. Helping Hands can make your Stamina management easier.
Bow: Long Shots, Accuracy and Hawk-Eye increase the damage output with your bow. Ranger reduces Stamina cost of your abilities, and Hasty Retreat provides extra mobility.
Dual Wield (only for the Dual Wield variant): Slaughter is a great passive finisher that increases your damage to enemies below 25% HP. Dual Wield Expert increases your damage with dual weapons. Controlled Fury reduces Stamina cost of Dual Wield skills. Ruffian increases your damage to enemies under crowd control status effects. Twin Blade and Blunt provides some bonuses based on the weapon type that you're using.
Two-Handed (only for the Two-Hander variant): Forceful makes your light and heavy attacks deal additional AoE damage. Heavy Weapons provide extra bonus based on the weapon that you're using. You can reduce the Stamina cost of your Two-Hander skills with Balanced Blade. For extra Stamina regeneration after killing an enemy, take Battle Roar. Optionally, if you're using heavy attacks, you can also unlock Follow Up.
Heavy Armor (not necessary if you're not using any heavy gear): Resolve and Juggernaut increase your survivability. Constitution provides some health regeneration as well as extra Magicka and Stamina when you get hit.
Medium Armor: Dexterity brings additional critical chance. Wind Walker helps with Stamina management. Agility is an excellent boost to weapon damage. Athletics lets you run faster and dodge more often. You can also go with Improved Sneak if you think that it will be useful, but it's better for PvP builds.
Fighters Guild: Intimidating Presence helps you intimidate NPCs, but more importantly, it reduces Stamina cost of Fighters Guild skills. Slayer provides extra weapon damage. You can generate more ultimate for killing Daedra, Undead and Werewolves thanks to Banish the Wicked. You can deal more damage to those enemies with Skilled Tracker.
Undaunted: Undaunted Command restores some of your resources when you activate an ally's synergy. Undaunted Mettle provides more max Health, max Stamina and max Magicka for each weight category of armor that you're wearing.
Alchemy: 30% additional duration of potion effects from Medicinal Use is really valuable.
Furthermore, you want to max out all the racial passives, no matter which race you decided to play.
Optionally, you can also become a Werewolf and develop that skill line, but this would be a significantly different build.
We described quite a few options for the final skill bars, which makes breaking down a skill rotation a bit difficult. These are some general directions and tips. The rule of thumb is: start with your bow, apply the DoTs that you have in this bar and then weapon swap to your melee bar. Continue with your damage skill, also prioritizing the damage over time abilities.
If you're using the Two-Handed setup, remember to start hitting the boss with Reverse Slice when it goes down to 30-25% HP. The execution bonus makes this ability the most efficient DPS option around that threshold. No matter which variant you're running – always weave in light attacks between your abilities. Learning to do this right is a crucial skill for any DPS player in ESO.
Stamina Dragonknight Race
Speaking of the race choice, some of the options will complement this build a bit more than the others. Of course, you can play whichever race you want and still be successful, but if you're more interested in min-maxing for the Dragonknight Stamina build, you might want to make the optimal choice. Imperial, Orc and Redguard are the recommended ones because their racial passives are the most useful for this build. Other options worth considering include Dark Elf, Khajiit and Wood Elf.
Champion Points
This is an example of 810 points setup:
The Mage (blue)
The Ritual: Mighty - 56, Thaumaturge - 61, Precise Strikes - 56, Piercing - 60
The Atronarch: Master at Arms - 37
The thief (green)
The Shadow: Shadow Ward - 48, Tumbling - 48
The Lover: Tenacity - 49, Mooncalf - 100
The Tower: Warlord - 23, Sprinter - 2
The warrior
The Lady: Hardy - 49, Elemental Defender 49, Thick Skinned - 48
The Steed: Ironclad - 81, Spell Shield - 43
Equipment
In general, the idea is pretty simple. You want to get as much damage as possible. That means prioritizing Stamina and Weapon Damage on your gear. The only thing that's a bit less straightforward is the Divine trait. Mundus Stones effects are extremely powerful for DPS characters in PvE (this build uses The Shadow boon for extra critical damage), so you want to empower them with this enchantment. To optimize DPS, you want to use poisons (Damage Health Poison IX) on your melee weapons (this makes glyph choice insignificant here) and Weapon Damage Enchant on your bow. Melee weapons can be enchanted too, but in ESO applying a poison overrides the weapon enchantment temporarily. You can use sword or mace, but axe and dagger are recommended weapon types - the differences aren't massive though.
If you want to optimize DPS and that's what this build is about, you're going to want a full medium armor set eventually. All your armor pieces should have the Divines trait and Stamina enchantment. Optimal jewelry has the Bloodthirsty trait and Weapon Damage enchantment.
Your endgame gear should look like this: five medium armor pieces of Perfect Arms of Relequen, four of five pieces of Perfected Tooth of Lokestiiz in the jewelry, remaining armor pieces or even weapon. You can also consider the two-piece Velidreth set for head and shoulder armor pieces. You can also consider using Absorb Stamina glyphs. You can also consider some other sets, for example Night Mother's Gaze or Poisonous Serpent can really amplify your DPS. If you're struggling with getting some of the dungeon, overland or trial sets, you can always go with the craftable Hunding's Rage.
Dual Wield Gear
Chest, belt, shoes, pants and gloves – medium armor Perfect Arms of Relequen set
Head, shoulder, necklace and two rings – Perfected Tooth of Lokestiiz
Weapon 1: Nirnhoned Maelstrom's Axe and Sharpened Maelstrom's Dagger with two-piece Cruel Flurry set.
Weapon 2: Infused Caustic Arrow bow
Two-hander gear
Chest, belt, shoes, pants and gloves – medium armor Perfect Arms of Relequen set
Head and shoulder – two-piece Velidreth set, also medium armor
Necklace and two rings – Perfected Tooth of Lokestiiz
Weapon 1 – Sharpened two-handed axe that also belongs to the Perfected Tooth of Lokestiiz set, to get the four-piece bonus
Weapon 2 - Infused Caustic Arrow bow
Before you can get gear from trials and Maelstrom Arena, you should use sets like Hunding's Rage, Leviathan and Briarheart, with the same traits and enchantments as we described for the endgame gear.
There are a few essential consumables for this builds. We already touched on Damage Health Poison IX that is necessary for your melee weapons to keep the damage numbers as high as possible. You will also want food that can provide the most important stats. Aratheum Takeaway Broth is overall the best option to go for. The cheaper and slightly weaker version is called Dubious Camoran Throne. The third possibility is Braised Rabbit with Spring Vegetables, but it doesn't provide Stamina recovery, which is quite important. As we already mentioned, you're going to be using the Shadow Mundus Stone boon. Overall, it's a great PvE DPS build.
Magicka Dragonknight DPS Build
The Magicka DPS build can do a lot of damage, both single target and AoE. It also provides plenty of sustain and shielding. The main downside of that build is the fact that you have to be close to your enemies to unleash the full damage potential. This fact, combined with almost exclusively light armor itemization, makes positioning extremely important. A squishy character that has to basically go into melee range to DPS as efficiently as possible will always be at risk of dying when piloted by an inexperienced player.
All the attributes points in this build go into Magicka. In terms of weapon choice and skill bars, we're going to use a setup with two destruction staves, with both bars built around this type of weapon. You're going to be able to deal a lot of damage with this PvE build. The tooltips don't include a burning status effect that you can inflict with your spells.
First Skill Bar
Molten Whip – it's a morph of the Lava Whip skill in the Ardent Flame tree. It is a spammable single target damage ability. It also unlocks a passive called Seething Fury. After you use Molten Whip, you gain a single stack, and you can further charge this passive with other Ardent Flame abilities. When it's fully stacked at three, the next Molten Whip will deal 33% extra damage. The passive disappears when you don't have Molten Whip on your skill bar. It is why some people run it on both bars.
Burning Embers – its base ability is Searing Strike from the Ardent Flame skill line. It is a single target attack with a bit of initial damage and much more damage over time. When it ends, it heals the caster for 75% of the damage done. In this case, the end means running out of the eight seconds duration, death of the target, or reapplying the effect to the same enemy. That means that you can recast Burning Embers to get a quicker, but less potent heal.
Degeneration – it's a morph of Entropy from the Mages Guild skill line. This spell is another source of single target DoT. You don't want to overlap this one since it doesn't do anything except resetting duration. Besides damage, it also provides you with Major Sorcery – a buff that increases your Spell Damage by 20%. Furthermore, you can restore 100 Magicka with each light or heavy attack onto the target.
Engulfing Flames – morphed from Fiery Breath, which is another Ardent Flame ability. It's a cone-shaped AoE skill that deals initial damage, DoT and makes the targets take 10% more fire damage for 12 seconds. It's a great spell to use early in your rotation. When fighting bosses, you want to keep it on them at all times.
Harness Magicka – it's a morph of the Annulment spell in the Light Armor tree. It's a powerful shield that caps at 50% of your Health bar (with right gear and buffs you might actually get there). It lasts for 6 seconds. When it's active, and you get hit by a spell, it will restore some of your Magicka.
Shooting Star – the ultimate ability on this bar is a morph of Meteor from Mages Guild skill line. You're not going to use it that often, but it's an excellent source of AoE damage, with both an initial burst and a DoT portion. Moreover, it restores some ultimate for each enemy that it hits.
Second Skill Bar
As we mentioned earlier, you can optionally use the second Molten Whip here, to keep the Seething Fury stacks at all times. It's not necessary for Magicka Dragonknight DPS, but it's a pretty efficient in terms of damage and Magicka usage.
Scalding Rune – as an alternative to the second whip, you can run this spell. It's a morph of Fire Rune in the Mages Guild tree. It's a strong AoE damage ability that takes 2 seconds to arm and then hits enemies in the area for 30 seconds.
Flames of Oblivion – it's a morph of Inferno in Ardent Flame skill line. It's an aura that shoots up to two fireballs on separate enemies every 5 seconds. It also provides spell and weapon critical chance. You don't want to overlap it, but keeping it up all the time is good.
Unstable Wall of Elements – its base skill is Wall of Elements in the Destruction Staff tree. It is an AoE damage over time spell with a powerful explosion when it ends after the 8 seconds duration. The skill differs a bit, depending on the kind of stuff that you're using. We're going to run a fire staff so that it can do additional damage to burning enemies. You can also recast it for an instant explosion.
Barbed Trap – morphed from the Trap Beast skill in the Fighters Guild line. It immobilizes the target for 2 seconds (doesn't work on bosses though), deals damage over 18 seconds and provides the user with Minor Force – a 10% critical damage increase. While it doesn't fit thematically with this fire mage build, it's handy and brings a substantial DPS boost
.
Eruption – this is another AoE damage over time skill. It has a high Magicka cost, but it also slows the enemies. It makes it easier to hit more of your AoE. It has 18 seconds duration. Eruption is a morph of Ash Cloud in Ardent Flame tree.
Standard of Might – once again, the primary ultimate ability is the morph of Ardent Flame's Dragonknight Standard. It is one more AoE damage over time source, but it also reduces the enemy healing. More importantly, as long as you stand inside the area of effect, your damage output will be increased by 15%, and the damage that you take will be reduced, also by 15%. Your allies can also activate the Shackle synergy for even more crowd control and damage.
Optional Skills
Some other abilities that you can also run in this build are Soul Splitting Trap and Inner Light. Especially the latter is an attractive option because it can significantly improve your damage output.
Passives
Ardent Flame: Combustion brings additional burning damage and some Magicka regeneration. You can slow enemies with Ardent Flame abilities thanks to Warmth. Searing Heat empowers some of your skills in this line. Finally, World in Ruin provides +6% damage to your AoE fire spells.
Draconic Power: Iron Skin (block value) and Scaled Armor (spell resistance) provide some additional defensive stats. We're not using any Draconic Power active abilities, so we can't benefit from other passives.
Earthen Heart: Battle Roar restores all three resources while you use ultimate skills. Eternal Mountain increases the duration of Earthen Heart abilities (in this build it's only Eruption, but it's still worth it). Helping Hands restore some of your Stamina – we're not using that many Stamina abilities in this build, but it's always useful for dodging and blocking. You can provide your group with +10% weapon damage and restore some ultimate thanks to Mountain's Blessing.
Destruction Staff: Tri Focus increases the damage that you deal with fully charged fire staff heavy attacks - not necessary unless you will be heavy attacking a lot. You can ignore 10% of your target's spell resist with your destro staff skills thanks to Penetrating Magic. Elemental Force lets you inflict burning more consistently. You can use Ancient Knowledge to increase your single target damage by 8%. It works exceptionally well with the double Molten Whip setup. Finally, Destruction Expert restores 3600 Magicka when you kill an enemy with a destro staff skill (including light and heavy attacks). Overall, this skill line provides great passives for our build.
Light Armor: Concentration (spell penetration) and Prodigy (spell crit) increase your damage output. You can get Spell Warding for additional magic resistance (even though it's a squishy DPS build, Dragonknights are inherently tanky against spells). Evocation helps with Magicka recovery. You can get some extra mobility and reduced snare duration from Grace.
Medium Armor: we're going to be using a single medium armor piece, but the passives here are not that great. You can definitely go for Athletics and Wind Walker for extra mobility and resource management.
Heavy Armor: we also include a one piece of heavy armor, which gives us access to a few decent passives. Resolve provides some resistances. Constitution regenerates Health as well as small amounts of Magicka and Stamina. You can also get an extra 2% max HP from Juggernaut.
Undaunted: Undaunted Command restores resources when you activate allied synergies, and Undaunted Mettle provides +2% max all resources for each type of armor worn. In this build, we use all three categories (light, medium and heavy) so we get an extra 6%.
Fighters Guild: Banish the Wicked provides ultimate for killing Daedra, Undead and Werewolves. You can also use Intimidating Presence, but it makes almost no difference. It's really low on the priority list for this build.
Mages Guild: Mage Adept reduces the cost of your non-ultimate Mages Guild skills by 15% (we only use Degeneration here, but it's still useful). Everlasting Magic increases the duration of these spells by 20%. You can get extra max Magicka and recovery from Magicka Controller. The Might of the Guild is also quite useful since you want to be weaving light attacks between abilities anyway. It's not going to increase your DPS massively though.
Alchemy: of course, Medicinal Use is excellent for the extra duration of potions.
Besides, you, of course, want to have all your racial passives unlocked.
Magicka Dragonknight Race
Of course, you can play this build with any Elder Scrolls Online race. Some of them will be more optimal for this specific setup, though. If you want to make the most out of this build, we recommend choosing Breton (best resource sustain) or Khajiit (best damage). The other good options include Altmer and Dark Elf.
champion points
This is a good example of how you could spend 810 points
the mage (blue)
The Ritual: Thaumaturge - 56
The Atronarch: Master at Arms - 56, Staff Expert - 19
The Apprentice: Elemental Expert - 56, Elfborn - 56, Spell Erosion - 27
the thief (green)'
The Shadow: Tumbling - 56, Shadow Ward - 56
The Lover: Arcanist - 100
The Tower: Warlord - 56, Sprinter - 2
The warrior (red)
The Lady: Hardy - 49, Elemental Defender - 49, Thick Skinned - 48
The Steed: Ironclad- 81, Spell Shield - 43
Equipment
For all your armor pieces, you should prioritize the Divine trait and Magicka enchantment. For jewelry, it's the Bloodthirsty or Arcane trait and Spell Damage enchantment. For weapons, you're always running two destruction fire staves, make sure not to use two identical ones.
The first equipment variant that we'll show is really powerful, but also easy to acquire. You won't have to complete any trials in order to get these sets. You might have to clear some dungeons and vet dungeons though. That being said, these items are relatively easy to get and they will increase your DPS by a large margin.
Pre-trial gear
Chest, belt, shoe pants, and gloves – you can either go with Silks of the Sun (overland set) or Robes of Destruction Mastery (drops in Dragonstar Arena). It provides five light armor pieces, which is essential for some of the passives.
Head and shoulder – two monster sets to consider here. Grothdarr provides a bit more AoE damage, while Zaan is more focused on a single target. You can go with either of them, make sure that you wear one medium and one heavy piece.
Necklace and two rings – Burning Spellweave. This City of Ash dungeon set provides a ton of additional damage for a fire-using spell caster like Magicka Dragonknight.
Weapon 1 – Burning Spellweave Inferno Staff. Staves count as two pieces of a set, which allows us to get full Burning Spellweave on the first weapon bar. This way, you can make sure that you'll only proc the powerful five-piece bonus when you're on your main damage skill bar.
Weapon 2 – optimally you'd want the Maelstrom's Inferno Staff since the Crushing Wall effect is a nice DPS increase. It empowers your light and heavy attacks against the enemies inside your Wall of Elements. You can, of course, supplement it with any strong fire staff.
If you're looking for a later game-focused gear, you can replace some of these items with Trial sets.
Burning Spellweave can be replaced with Perfected False God's Devotion or Perfected Mantle of Siroria. They're both solid, but the difference in power level compared to the dungeon set is not that huge. You can also use the overland Mother's Sorrow set if you feel like you need some more spell critical chance.
Trial gear
It is an example of a full gear that includes trial drops.
Chest, pants, necklace and two rings – Perfected False God's Devotion
Belt, shoes and gloves – Mother's Sorrow
Head and shoulder – once again, Grothdarr or Zaan
Weapon 1 – Mother's Sorrow Inferno Staff
Weapon 2 – Maelstrom's Inferno Staff
Another great option is simply using all the pre-trial gear that we described, but replacing Burning Spellweave with Perfect Mantle of Siroria.
In terms of consumables, we're going to use standard spell caster food. The best option is the Clockwork Citrus Fillet. If you want a slightly cheaper, but similar alternative, you should go for Witchmother's Potent Brew. You can always choose flat max resource foods, but we don't recommend them since the additional Magicka regeneration is really valuable. We recommend using The Shadow Mundus Stone for extra spell critical damage, but there's nothing wrong with picking The Apprentice for the flat spell power.
Dragonknight as a DPS class
Currently, Dragonknight can be an extremely strong damage dealing class. No matter if you're playing Stamina or Magicka build, you get a lot of options to adjust your setup more for single target or AoE damage.
Both builds require getting quite close to the targets if you want optimal DPS. Stamina setup obviously uses melee weapons in one of the bars. Magicka build has some short-range spells and special effects that only deal damage to enemies that are close to the caster. You will deal a lot of damage, but the playstyle differs a lot from more traditional Magicka-focused Sorcerer builds.
Just keep in mind that a significant portion of the Dragonknight's damage will always be dealt over time. You will get access to some direct burst, but poison (Stamina) and burning (Magicka) are going to be extraordinarily significant, and you have to play around them.
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Elder Scrolls Online
Elder Scrolls Online is currently one of the most popular MMORPGs. The game has been developed by ZeniMax Online and published by Bethesda. The remaining Elder Scrolls Online classes are: Sorcerer, Nightblade, Templar, Warden and Necromancer. Players can also develop many non-class specific skill lines and crafting professions.
The game is really beginner-friendly, it's a great choice for a first MMORPG. If you're planning on creating your first ESO character, check out our Leveling Guide. If you already have an account, you might want an additional boost. Take a lookat Gold offers at MMOAuctions and you might find something useful. Moreover, you can follow us on a social media channel like Facebook and Twitter! Make sure to leave a comment and share this guide with your friends!
The game is continuously being updated with lots of new content getting released with every patch, update and DLC. Players have access to various interesting activities and achievements. The most difficult PvE challenges include veteran dungeons and trials. In terms of PvP, there are Battlegrounds and the open world Alliance Battles in the PvP Zone - Cyrodiil and the Imperial City.
FAQ
Which classes work well together with Dragonknight DPS?
Dragonknight can be a powerful damage dealer that can do a lot, especially with some support. A strong tank like Warden, or another Dragonknight would be great. A Templar healer is always a good addition to any group. If your party needs more damage, you can always add a Magicka or Stamina Sorcerer or a Necromancer. All characters that provide useful buffs are valuable additions.
what is the best race for dragonknight in eso?
Best race choice for Stamina Dragonknight is Imperial or Orc. For Magicka build you should go with Breton or Khajiit. If you're playing tank Dragonknight we would recommend Nord or Imperial.
What is a dragonknight in ESO
Dragonknight is one of the six playable classes. They are powerful warriors that are proficient in martial arts and dragon magic. Dragonknight can be played as a tank, Stamina DPS and Magicka DPS.
