Hyperioxes
Hyperioxes

One Bar Heavy Attack Dragonknight DPS Build - ESO Guide

DPS One Bar Magicka Heavy Attack Subclass Dragonknight Sorcerer Nightblade
Up to date for: Update 48 - 8th December 2025
Last changed: Update 48 - 8th December 2025

This build focuses on amplifying Heavy Attacks with the Sergeant's Mail item set, Rakkhat's Voidmantle Mythic and the Empower buff sourced from the Might of the Guild passive, procced by constantly using Ulfsild's Contingency.

Works in normal and veteran dungeons, trials, hard modes, Dragonstar Arena, and Blackrose Prison.

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Subclassing

Combination

Ardent Flame
Dragonknight
Storm Calling
Sorcerer
Assassination
Nightblade

Base Class

This build can be used by characters who have either Dragonknight, Sorcerer or Nightblade as their base class, but if you're a Dragonknight you can utilize the Dragonknight Class Mastery script on Banner Bearer which is stronger than Cavalier's Charge when facing multiple enemies.

Skill Setups

Base Setup

A base setup that will work for most situations and which should be your starting point when making situational setups

Ulfsilds Contingency Flames of Oblivion Merciless Resolve Engulfing Flames Banner Bearer Standard of Might
Concealed Weapon Molten Whip Soul Harvest
Front Bar Back Bar
Slot 1: Ulfsild's Contingency Slot 1: Concealed Weapon
Slot 2: Flames of Oblivion Slot 2: Molten Whip
Slot 3: Merciless Resolve
Slot 4: Engulfing Flames
Slot 5: Banner Bearer
Ultimate: Standard of Might Ultimate: Soul Harvest
  • Ulfsild's Contingency ( , , ) - your source of crucial Empower buff, which increases damage done by Heavy Attacks by 70%. Since Ulfsild's Contingency is a Mages Guild skill, it will trigger the Might of the Guild passive, which grants you Empower for 10 seconds. It also deals decent damage in an AoE and grants you Minor Force buff, increasing your Critical Damage by 10%. Ulfsild's Contingency is delayed until the next skill cast but whenever it's needed you can activate it early by bashing your enemy. If you cast this ability as you're finishing your Heavy Attack, the Empower you gain from it will start working just in time to boost the final tick of that Heavy Attack you just finished
  • Flames of Oblivion - an ability which deals a lot of damage per cast, passively grants you Major Savagery and Prophecy, and grants you a Molten Whip stack.
  • Merciless Resolve - an ability that will cause your Light and Heavy Attacks to generate stacks. You can spend 5 stacks to fire a powerful arrow that also heals you if you're in Melee range. It also grants you Major Savagery and Prophecy
  • Engulfing Flames - an AoE DoT which increases enemies' Flame damage taken by 6% and grants you a Molten Whip stack.
  • Banner Bearer ( , , ) - increases your Magical damage done by 6%, grants Weapon Damage based on your movement speed and grants Minor Berserk, increasing your damage done by 5%. You can change the script to if Minor Berserk is being provided by your supports. You can also use Class Mastery instead of Cavalier's Charge if your base class is Dragonknight. It grants Weapon Damage based on amount of enemies surrounding you and it reaches the Weapon Damage provided by Cavalier's Charge at 3 enemies. It also reduces your damage taken
  • Standard of Might - extremely powerful ultimate that deals damage over time, increases all of your damage done and decreases all of your damage taken
  • Concealed Weapon - an ability that will passively grant us 15% movement speed, which will grant us 90 Weapon and Spell Damage thanks to the script on Banner Bearer
  • Molten Whip - an ability we'll keep slotted on backbar for its passive effect. At 3 stacks it will provide you with 300 Weapon and Spell Damage and the stacks will be kept up with Engulfing Flames and Flames of Oblivion
  • Soul Harvest - slotting this Ultimate on backbar will cause you to gain 10 Ultimate when killing enemies
  • Whenever you need to slot situational skills, replace Banner Bearer
  • Venomous Claw - a replacement for Engulfing Flames for purely Single Target fights. Just like Engulfing Flames it will grant you Molten Whip stacks
  • Elemental Blockade - your source of Off Balance if supports aren't providing it. It requires enemies to be Concussed, so you'll have to use Shock enchant to proc it or rely on your teammates for that.
  • Critical Surge - a very strong self-heal. Use it when you need a self-heal because you're assigned to some duty which puts you far away from your group, or if your healers are bad. It also increases your Weapon and Spell Damage through the Expert Mage passive

This is just a list of priorities. Simply recast abilities when they run out and follow this list of priorities when there are multiple things to refresh.

If you're tracking the Off Balance debuff, you should cancel your Heavy Attack when there's around 1-2 seconds left on the Off Balance Immunity. This way the next Heavy Attack you start will finish its channel during Off Balance and you'll be able to fit 3 Heavy Attacks during a single Off Balance window

While the build works perfectly fine without it, reaching 125k DPS requires you to maintain Molten Whip stacks. It means that sometimes you'll have to recast Flames of Oblivion early so that your Molten Whip stacks don't expire. Whenever the timers on your Flames of Oblivion and Molten Whip are equal, the timer on Engulfing Flames/Venomous Claw is higher than these two and your Standard of Might isn't becoming ready in a few seconds, you have to recast Flames of Oblivion after there's 5 seconds left on it, which is when it shoots out the second to last projectile. This way you're wasting the last projectile which would shoot out at 0 seconds but you're avoiding losing the 300 Weapon and Spell Damage from Molten Whip

Priority List

Pre-buff

These abilities can be pre-cast before entering combat

Final Setups

A few examples of final setups you could end up with after applying the situational skills to the base setup

A setup you should use when your supports aren't providing the crucial Off Balance debuff

Ulfsilds Contingency Flames of Oblivion Merciless Resolve Engulfing Flames Elemental Blockade Standard of Might
Concealed Weapon Molten Whip Soul Harvest
Front Bar Back Bar
Slot 1: Ulfsild's Contingency Slot 1: Concealed Weapon
Slot 2: Flames of Oblivion Slot 2: Molten Whip
Slot 3: Merciless Resolve
Slot 4: Engulfing Flames
Slot 5: Elemental Blockade
Ultimate: Standard of Might Ultimate: Soul Harvest

What Changes

Changes compared to the Base Setup

Passives

There are no passives you need to skip with this build.

Class

Weapon

Armor

Guild

Alliance War

Racial

Craft

Class - Ardent Flame

CombustionCombustion - High Priority

WarmthWarmth - High Priority

Searing HeatSearing Heat - High Priority

World in RuinWorld in Ruin - High Priority

Gear

Base Setup

A base setup that will work for most situations and which should be your starting point when making situational setups

Switching gear for trash packs isn't worth it unless you're using gear-swap addons.

Default setup

Gear Slot Set Weight/Type Trait Enchantment
HeadHead Slimecraw Light Divines Magicka
ShouldersShoulders Rakkhat's Voidmantle Medium Divines Magicka
ChestChest Infallible Mage Light Divines Magicka
HandsHands Infallible Mage Light Divines Magicka
BeltBelt Infallible Mage Light Divines Magicka
LegsLegs Infallible Mage Light Divines Magicka
FeetBoots Infallible Mage Light Divines Magicka
NeckNecklace Sergeant's Mail Jewelry Bloodthirsty Increase Magical Harm
RingRing Sergeant's Mail Jewelry Bloodthirsty Increase Magical Harm
RingRing Sergeant's Mail Jewelry Bloodthirsty Increase Magical Harm
MainhandFrontbar Main Hand Sergeant's Mail Lightning Staff Precise Shock

When choosing different situational sets you can only replace Infallible Mage. Sergeant's Mail and Rakkhat's Voidmantle are too strong and too crucial for this build to ever be replaced. If you want to use a Medium Armor set, you have to make sure your group is providing enough penetration

Infallible Mage parses 114.7k DPS which is roughly 10k lower than the top setup which is Slivers of Null Arca, but Slivers of Null Arca is focused on Single Target damage and it's a Medium set so when using it, you have to make sure your supports are providing you with enough penetration. Because of that, Infallible Mage is the most practical set.

Gear that can be stronger than the setup from the table in specific situations or when specific circumstances are present

Gear that is easier to obtain and can be used while you work towards the best gear

Crafted:

All of these are tradable and can be bought from other players

Dungeons:

PvP:

All of these are tradable and can be bought from other players

Additional tips

  • Use Flame enchant instead of Shock if your supports are providing Off Balance

Final Setups

A few examples of final setups you could end up with after applying situational rules to the base setup

This is the crafted gear setup you can start with

Gear Slot Set Weight/Type Trait Enchantment
HeadHead Tharriker's Strike Light Divines Magicka
ShouldersShoulders Tharriker's Strike Light Divines Magicka
ChestChest Order's Wrath Medium Divines Magicka
HandsHands Order's Wrath Light Divines Magicka
BeltBelt Order's Wrath Light Divines Magicka
LegsLegs Order's Wrath Light Divines Magicka
FeetBoots Order's Wrath Light Divines Magicka
NeckNecklace Tharriker's Strike Jewelry Bloodthirsty Increase Magical Harm
RingRing Tharriker's Strike Jewelry Bloodthirsty Increase Magical Harm
RingRing Tharriker's Strike Jewelry Bloodthirsty Increase Magical Harm
MainhandFrontbar Main Hand Assassins's Guile Lightning Staff Precise Shock

The crafted setup parses 84.6k DPS, although a huge majority of this DPS loss stems from lack of Sergeant's Mail

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Champion Points

WarfareWarfare
Weapons Expert
20% Light and Heavy Attack Damage
Deadly Aim
6% Single Target Damage
Wrathful Strikes
205 Weapon and Spell Damage
Master-at-Arms
6% Direct Damage
Critical Damage Cap
Replace Master-at-Arms with Fighting Finesse if you aren't at the Critical Damage cap.
FitnessFitness
Boundless Vitality
1400 Max Health
Fortified
1731 Armor
Celerity
10% Movement Speed
Rejuvenation
90 Health, Stamina and Magicka Recovery
CraftCraft
Steed's Blessing
20% Movement Speed out of combat
Extremely useful utility
Quality of Life
Green Champion Points don't affect Combat, choose whatever Quality of Life you prefer

Race

The difference between best and worst race is about 5% of DPS and there is no content in the entire game that you'd be blocked from completing because of choosing a bad race.

High Elf
Best for 12-Man
High Elf
Why pick this
Provides Max Magicka and Weapon/Spell Damage. In Trials that's usually stronger than Khajiit's Critical Damage racial, because with 4 supports your team will (usually) provide enough Critical Damage buffs for you to reach the cap regardless
Spell Recharge Spell Recharge ≈104 lower resource per second, 5% less damage taken while channeling
Syrabane's Boon Syrabane's Boon 2000 Max Magicka
Elemental Talent Elemental Talent 258 Weapon & Spell Damage
Dark Elf
Best for 12-Man
Dark Elf
Why pick this
Provides Max Magicka and Weapon/Spell Damage. In Trials that's usually stronger than Khajiit's Critical Damage racial, because with 4 supports your team will (usually) provide enough Critical Damage buffs for you to reach the cap regardless
Dynamic Dynamic 1910 Max Stamina & Magicka
Resist Flame Resist Flame 4620 Flame Resistance
Ruination Ruination 258 Weapon & Spell Damage
Khajiit
Best for 4-Man
Khajiit
Why pick this
Khajiit's Critical Damage is more valuable than High Elf/Dark Elf's Weapon/Spell Damage in 4-man content, because it's unlikely your two supports (or in many cases a single support) will be able to provide enough Critical Damage buffs for you to reach the 125% Critical Damage cap
Feline Ambush Feline Ambush 12% Critical Damage
Lunar Blessings Lunar Blessings 915 Max Health, Stamina and Magicka
Robustness Robustness 90 Health, Stamina, Magicka Recovery

Other decent options

Orc
Orc
Brawny Brawny 1000 Max Stamina
Unflinching Rage Unflinching Rage 1000 Max Health, ≈531 Healing per Second
Swift Warrior Swift Warrior 258 Weapon & Spell Damage, -12% Sprint Cost, +10% Sprint Speed
Breton
Breton
Gift of Magnus Gift of Magnus 2000 Max Magicka
Spell Attunement Spell Attunement 2310 Spell Resistance (doubled when Burning, Concussed or Chilled), 130 Magicka Recovery
Magicka Mastery Magicka Mastery -7% Magicka Cost

Mundus

  • Default

    5.53% Critical Chance(9.04% with 7 )
    Use most of the time
  • Instanced

    2744 Penetration(4489 with 7 )
    Use in 4-man dungeons if your group is not providing enough penetration

Attributes

You should always put all 64 attribute points into Magicka.

Health
0
Stamina
0
Magicka
64
All points into Magicka

Food

  • Default

    Max Health +5,414 Max Magicka +4,938
    Use for most content.
    Cheaper alternative
    Difference Max Health +5,395 −19 Max Magicka +4,936 −2
  • Full Damage

    Max Magicka +6,048
    Use for practice dummy parsing.

Potions

  • Default

    Restore Magicka
    Use the Spell Power potions. They'll provide Major Sorcery and Major Prophecy which are crucial buffs.
    Craft with: Lady's Smock Namira's Rot Corn Flower

Parses

Null Arca
125k DPS
Infallible Aether
114.7k DPS
Noble Duelist
112.8k DPS
Crafted
84.6k DPS
Anthelmir's Construct
107.4k DPS
Null Arca
125kDPS
Patch
Update 48
Armor
6 Medium / 1 Light
Gear Setup
Null Arca
Skill Setup
Regular
Potion
Spell Power Potion
Food
Fresh Apples and Eidar Cheese
Mundus
Race
High Elf
Combat Metrics screenshot of the 125k parse
CMX Parse
CMX Setup
Recording
Infallible Aether
114.7kDPS
Patch
Update 48
Armor
6 Light / 1 Medium
Gear Setup
Infallible Aether
Skill Setup
Regular
Potion
Spell Power Potion
Food
Fresh Apples and Eidar Cheese
Mundus
Race
High Elf
CMX Parse
CMX Setup
Noble Duelist
112.8kDPS
Patch
Update 48
Armor
6 Light / 1 Medium
Gear Setup
Noble Duelist
Skill Setup
Regular
Potion
Spell Power Potion
Food
Fresh Apples and Eidar Cheese
Mundus
Race
High Elf
CMX Parse
CMX Setup
Crafted
84.6kDPS
Patch
Update 48
Armor
6 Light / 1 Medium
Gear Setup
Crafted
Skill Setup
Regular
Potion
Spell Power Potion
Food
Fresh Apples and Eidar Cheese
Mundus
Race
High Elf
CMX Parse
CMX Setup
Anthelmir's Construct
107.4kDPS
Patch
Update 48
Armor
2 Medium / 5 Light
Gear Setup
Anthelmir's Construct
Skill Setup
Regular
Potion
Spell Power Potion
Food
Fresh Apples and Eidar Cheese
Mundus
Race
High Elf
CMX Parse
CMX Setup

Gameplay

Aetherian Archive
Trial
Kyne's Aegis
Trial
Aetherian Archive
Trial Veteran
Kyne's Aegis
Trial Veteran
Aetherian Archive Veteran Log
Patch: Update 48
Kyne's Aegis Veteran Log
Patch: Update 48
Builds ESO DPS Builds DPS builds for Veteran Trials, Hard Modes, and 4-man arenas, verified through gameplay and clears. Pure class, subclass, one bar, heavy attack.


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