Help me building a pure vampire!

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J'darr

Member
Hello and sorry for my poor English.
I am going to play Skyrim again with all the DLCs. I'd like to build a vampire and play it on master difficulty. Now I have some ideas:
Race: Dunmer (for the fire resistence)
Stone: Lady Stone (for the health and stamina resistence)
Primary Skills: One Handed, Sneak, Illusion, Destruction (only frost and shock spells), Conjuration.
Secondary Skills: Restoration, Light Armour. (Speech or Alchemy?)
I have now some questions:
1) What spells and shouts are the most important?
2) There is no helmet in vampire set so how can I benefit from the Light armor perks?
3) What about stats allocation?
4) For the roleplaying (evil vampire) what factions should I join?
5) Other tips are welcomed.
Thanks for the help!
 

Raijin

A Mage that loves a Templar
I'm going to change some of the things you wrote down to which I considered best suitable match for the perfect Vampire build :)

In my opinion Vampires are better off being mages than just being a warrior.

Race: Breton for their Magic Resistance ability (FormID 000aa01f): Breton blood grants a 25% resistance to magic, constant
Dragonskin greater power (FormID 000aa022): Absorb 50% of the magicka from hostile spells for 60 seconds, once per day.
Stone: The Ritual Stone: Once a day, those under the sign of The Ritual can reanimate nearby corpses to fight for them. Raise all dead to fight for you once a day for 200 seconds.
Primary Skills: Destruction and Conjuration,
Secondary Skills: Restoration and Light Armour.

I have now some questions:
1) What spells and shouts are the most important?
Shouts:Fire Breath, Frost Breath, Ice Form, Storm Call, Unrelenting Force, Whirlwind Sprint, Call Dragon
2) There is no helmet in vampire set so how can I benefit from the Light armor perks? I'm not a fan of helmets (I'm a mage addict) but as long as you your perk points to the Light Armor Perk Tree you will be fine.
4) For the roleplaying (evil vampire) what factions should I join? Castle Volkihar (Dawnguard DLC) Thieves guild, Dark Brotherhood.
5) Be a mage is my pointage :)
 

J'darr

Member
I'd like to build a more mage assassin vampire, not pure mage.
The perks in light armor only work if there is a complete set of light armor.
Should I join also the college of mages?
 

Wildroses

Well-Known Member
If you want to join the College of Winterhold, go for it. I've always gotten the impression the College care much more about gaining knowledge rather than morality. I am completely sure the Conjuration Professor has done some pretty shady things in Morthal, and I found it rather revealing that Enthir advises you to do any experiments which require live test subjects off College grounds. If the College of Winterhold was full of people who wanted to ensure good triumphed and was more important than learning, they'd be sending out people to stop magic users testing on live subjects rather than staying in their College studying. But don't feel you have to join the College you don't want to. Maybe your evil vampire is nervous being so close to magic users might be dangerous or reveal what he is. Go with whatever you prefer.

If you are determined to wear vampire armour, I'd consider not putting perks into Light Armour so you won't have the 'no vampire helmet' problem. If you a determined to have Light Armour perks, consider not wearing vampire armour.

I think Alchemy would be more useful than Speech. Potions will be needed if you end up having to fight in the sunlight with no natural regeneration, and some resist fire potions would help with the 25% weakness to fire.
 

J'darr

Member
Thanks man, I think I'll join it for the invisibility spell.
I have found this build on the forum, what do you think about it? Should I change anything?
 

Nighthiker77

Well-Known Member
Invisibility is overrated if you have high sneak, but you'll need silent casting and you get an illusion bonus as a Vampire so you might as well use it.
 

Nighthiker77

Well-Known Member
The Nightingale hood will give you your light helmet, and I think it has an illusion enchantment. I would definitely do the Dark Brotherhood, and the thieves guild main quest to get the Nightingale gear and chillrend. Don't bother with the thieves guild side quests unless you just want to.

You could also wear the ancient shrouded cowl for looks, but it has an archery enchantment. The worn shrouded cowl could be enchanted I think, but it has a much lower armor rating
 

Nighthiker77

Well-Known Member
Spells are personal preference. I like Atromancy for Dremora Lords and storm Atronachs. Some people prefer necromancy for dead thrall. Either way you will want Bound Sword, conjure familiar, and flaming familiar to build up conjuration. You could use the lower reanimation spells too, but i don't like them nearly as much.

You definitely want muffle early, since it will increase your sneak and illusion. Frenzy is really the only higher spell I use.

You can get some easy leveling hunting with Fury and bound sword. Just Fury a dear, kill it with bound sword, and you get illusion, conjuration, and 1h experience. You could throw in sneaking and/or muffle. And you won't have to chase them. I'd keep all the pelts for smithing.

I have no advice on destruction. I like bound bow a lot better. It takes less perks and a lot less magica. You will only need 300 magica if you swap destruction for archery. Maybe 350 for necromancy instead of summoning

Don't get the matching set perk in light armor. Do the dark brotherhood right away. Take it all the way to the end, then start Dawnguard. You can start Dawnguard as soon as you are around level 10 to get vampire Lord form if you think you are ready. But definitely start the Dark Brotherhood as soon as you can.
 

Nighthiker77

Well-Known Member
I would drop speech completely, and shadow warrior, and move them to 3/5 light armor. And your casting cost for dead thrall without the master perk or cost reduction enchantments is going to be almost 700. That is one reason I prefer dremora lords so much. They only cost about 100 with the expert perk.

You probably also don't need respite or avoid death from restoration, and I would use those to get to 5/5 light armor. The base perks don't require 4 pieces of light armor so you won't need to worry about that.

If you don't want to do light armor, you will definitely need alteration. I personally don't like alteration, but you will have a very difficult time with no damage reduction.
 

Nighthiker77

Well-Known Member
Also, I prefer archery myself, but if you want to use destruction instead, there's 2 really good threads about it. Search for Psiberzerker's Build Clinic and Destruction 101.
 

Nighthiker77

Well-Known Member
I like light armor a lot more than alteration. That build will work fine. You won't need much armor most of the time, so it levels pretty slow, but once you are detected, everything changes and you really need some protection.
 

Nighthiker77

Well-Known Member
At level 60 with the non-Altmer, you will have 890 stat points. You will need at least 300 magica depending on how you play and how many enchanting slots you use for cost reduction.

With windwalker and light armor, you won't ever need more than 300 stamina, no matter how you play. If you use Windshear for stagger, you would be fine with 100 stamina.

If you play the Dark Brotherhood, I would use Windshear and the Blade of Woe, leave stamina at 100, and split the other 790 fairly even between health and magica. Then you can adjust as you go along based on your playstyle.

You could smith both of those weapons with just the steel perk, and the vampire armors are affected by the advanced perk, if you decide to add in some smithing at some point.
 

J'darr

Member
I don't know, I'm building a one handed, with a spell and a weapon.
How can I adjust that build to reduce the perks at 50?
Are dual-casting perks and apprentice-master perks important? Thanks!
 

AS88

Well-Known Member
Staff member
I don't know, I'm building a one handed, with a spell and a weapon.
How can I adjust that build to reduce the perks at 50?
Are dual-casting perks and apprentice-master perks important? Thanks!

http://skyrimcalculator.com/302723

Here's how I'd tweak that build to make it more efficient, in my opinion. It's Level 50 (perhaps I'd go to 51 for Impact, but it's definitely optional, just a nice distance maintainer)

As a 'pure vampire,' I would concentrate mostly on Illusion and Necromancy from a RP standpoint. That's also why I added in the persuasion perk in Speech, as vampires are notorious seducers and very persuasive. To that effect, Illusion should always be your first line of attack, and defence. Remember, you don't need to kill everyone, why kill them only to spill their precious blood? Use of Fear spells are recommended for the vampire feel.

Once you've thinned the crowd a little, and you're running out of Magicka from your frost spells, use of a sword and light armour are pretty much your last line of defence. Although, with a raised zombie in the mix you should seek to deflect attention to your meat shield rather than to yourself.

Vampires are immense fun to play, and there's lots of different slants to it. You can play as a Necromancer, or a specific strain of vampire, eg the Khulari.

http://theskyrimblog.ning.com/group/character-building/forum/topics/character-build-the-khulari

There are very few characters that are potentially more diverse and fun to play for an evil playthrough. You could even go for a tank-style build - just watch out for those fire mages ;)

I find that master perks are, by and large, a waste. Particularly for Illusion, which should be among your main focusses as a 'pure' vampire archetype. Take a look at this guide, which pretty much illustrates my point on master Illusion being a waste.

http://skyrimforum.com/threads/quick-reference-for-affected-enemy-level-for-illusion-spells.14541/

Let me know what you think :)
 

J'darr

Member
Thanks for the tips man.
I decided to remove conjuration from the build, because I realised that I won't need it too much, and because I can summon gargoyles as a vampire lord too. I also have Vampire's Servant power. Is conjuration so good?
I think speech perks are a waste, I have already have Vampire's Seduction power.
So this will be my build: http://skyrimcalculator.com/#302665
What do you think? Any advices on the stats allocation? Thanks!
 

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