The Mirage was one of my first forays into really pushing the limits of Necromage, but for a primarily melee character. What followed was a dual wielding Redguard vampire assassin who forgoes slow, methodical sneaking in favour of lightning fast attacks, utilising magic of the desert to aid in his unrelenting assault.
No Crafting: A big part of the Mirage is how easy it is to become effective and play the build how it is meant to be played without having to rely on crafting skills. Not only that, but this build can dominate on Legendary difficulty without crafting!
Speed Demon: The Mirage is very fast - the combination of Necromage, Elemental Fury and Dual Flurry lets you perform incredible combos in the blink of an eye, and pull off some very unconventional moves. This also provides a refreshing change from the typically slow, monotonous assassin playstyle, instead letting you focus on a graceful and stylish mix of stealth, dueling, and magic.
The sands of time come for us all…
There are whispers among the Redguard people of a… creature. A being, born of the deserts, yet untouched by time itself. An ancient guardian, who fights as gracefully as the wind and bends the sands to his will…
Some speculate this being doesn’t exist. There is no creature out there, haunting the sands, moving like lightning and gone in the blink of an eye. It is simply a tale, an illusion, a…
Mirage...
Race: Redguard Vampire
Stone: Lady
Shouts: Dragon Aspect, Elemental Fury, Marked for Death, Throw Voice, Whirlwind Sprint
Stats: 1:1:2
Major Skills: One Handed, Sneak, Alteration
Minor Skills: Conjuration, Restoration, Illusion
Weapons: Nordic Sword, Nordic Dagger
Apparel: Redguard Robes, Shrouded Hood, Shoes and Hand Wraps, Amulet of Talos
Recommended Quests: Destroy the Dark Brotherhood, Rings of Blood Magic, Dragonborn, Raven Rock Mine, From the Ashes
This build is all about creating illusions, manipulating your enemies and sometimes reality itself to give you the upper hand in battle. With only 250 AR at this build’s peak, you’ll never be going toe to toe with the big bads. Instead, you’ll appear to never fight them at all, and that’s where the beauty of this build comes to light; you strike so damn fast your enemies don’t have a clue what hit them. Sporting only six skills, five of which you’ll use actively, perk placement can be a lot more focused. Illusion is only required for Quiet Casting, which creates our first mirage of spells appearing out of thin air. This enhances not only our other spell schools, but also our shouts, which are now completely silent.
The Mirage is famed for his wind-like speed, and dual wielding a sword and dagger maximises your attack power. Throw in Necromage, Dual Flurry and Elemental Fury and you’re moving so fast enemies can’t even see you. Restoration gives you some extra attacks against the undead, turning those lumbering fools into probably the easiest enemies you’ll face! No longer will you have to worry about pesky deathlords disarming you, since you’ll be doing so much damage to them with Necromage enhanced sun spells that they won’t know what hit them.
Alteration and Conjuration make up your magic of the desert, with Ash summons being used exclusively. Since you’re casting them at massive range, an Ash Spawn can easily become a scout, drawing enemies from hiding. On the other hand, an Ash Guardian is best used at choke points, blocking exits or entrances for enemies. Alteration provides a whole host of useful effects, of which the Mirage uses all. No spell is useless! Finally, Sneak ties everything together, keeping the Mirage unseen and unknown. Shadows are your real armour here, providing more defence than any flesh spell can offer.
One Handed is thoroughly beefed up, since we need all the damage we can get when we hit for a quarter of what the weapon says. As you can probably tell, power attacks are pretty key here, and with Savage Strike and Dual Savagery your power attacks when standing still will do 75% more damage. Not to mention stagger enemies, giving you another second or two of free attacks. And with four times faster swing speed, that’s a lot of hits you can get in.
Alteration is taken up to expert for Ash Runes, Paralysis and Ebonyflesh. The former makes for a great trap, and paralysis can be used for 15 seconds of free attacks on enemies. Ebonyflesh can give some much needed defence, as without it you’ll go down in one hit from most enemies. Stealth is thoroughly beefed up so as to remain as sneaky as possible, with Shadow Warrior allowing escapes when seen. Restoration gives you extra firepower against undead, as well as Wards which you’ll need when fighting mages.
Conjuration is taken up to Expert for Ash Guardians and Ash Spawn, which are both hardy summons. Only Summoner is perked for longer casting range, as neither ash summon is affected by Twin Souls. The Ash Guardian doesn’t actually count towards your number of summons, so you can have both out at the same time. Finally, Illusion is perked just for Quiet Casting, so that you can remain undetected while using shouts or spells.
Straight off the bat you’ll want to get Necromage. I personally picked up the Atronach Stone, travelled to Raldbthar and just rubber banded my triggers while making lunch. It takes around one and a half hours to reach level 70, if you’re very particular about not levelling too much. I had Necromage by level 12, but you could just as easily get it sooner, since I was level 6 when I reached Riverwood. This should leave you with some spare perks.
Next you’ll want to become a vampire. Haemar’s Shame is the best place, as there’s a Vampire Fledgling not too far in. Make sure you have unequipped the Atronach Stone, as that interferes with contracting the disease. After you’ve become a vampire, perk Dual Flurry and get Elemental Fury ASAP. I also recommend grinding for Quiet Casting at this stage too. Courage is your best friend here, and gives equal experience to its base Magicka cost, the same as Muffle. It shouldn’t take you too long if you’ve picked up a follower to tank some damage in combat.
Abilities
Cyclone Strikes
The Mirage’s signature move, allowing you to enter a state of supreme speed to decimate your enemies. Moving like the wind itself, your strikes deal massive damage and stagger enemies constantly.
This is your go-to attack in combat, and can be used in almost any situation. It best synergises with Decoy, when your enemy is distracted by your summon. Circle around them and strike them in the back, staggering them and preventing them from retaliating. This also gives your summon a chance to get some damage in too, and you can potentially kill a foe in a couple of seconds as a result. Since you have Quiet Casting, you can also activate Elemental Fury while sneaking, allowing for some rapid backstabs before engaging. I recommend not using this in sneak mode after an initial attack, as your swing speed is significantly lessened.
Requires: Necromage, Dual Flurry 2/2, Elemental Fury
Phantom Charge
My preferred method of transport as the Mirage, which is actually faster than a werewolf in sprint mode. The Mirage is known for moving at blinding speeds, and this move solidifies the claim.
Critical Charge is a very interesting perk to say the least. When holding the attack button and sprinting, you leap and power attack your enemy, doing critical damage. However, when sprinting and only tapping the attack button, it allows you to perform a constant sprint while slashing at the same time. The speed at which you run in this state is actually determined by your swing speed. Synergy or what? By activating Cyclone Strikes then entering a Critical Charge sprint, you’ve got 22.5 seconds of moving very fast, for the same amount of stamina as sprinting. While I used it more as a method of transportation, this can easily be used to rush enemies in battle then fly straight past them, or as an escape when the odds are turning against you.
Requires: Cyclone Strikes, Critical Charge
Decoy
When in battle, the Mirage can call upon a creature of the desert to distract his foes, while he vanishes from sight and reappears elsewhere moments later. Little do his enemies realise he is right behind them, ready to strike.
Probably your most tactical move, which really depends upon your skill at playing the Mirage. Mastering this ability is key to your survival on Legendary. By entering sneak mode with Shadow Warrior perked, you’ll become invisible for a second of two. Use this opportunity to roll behind your foes, then immediately summon an Ash Spawn in the direction they are facing. Doing this breaks the invisibility, but it won’t matter because you are no longer in your enemies’ lines of sight, and an Ash Spawn is. This hardy summon provides a useful distraction, letting you regroup, escape or recommence the attack.
Requires: Shadow Warrior, Silent Roll, Quiet Casting, Ash Spawn
Ashen Tomb
When facing a particularly tough foe, the Mirage can trap them in a tomb of ash, crippling them while they lay immobilised and helpless. The Mirage can either leave his ensnared opponent, or wait until they are freed and slay them instantly due to the ash’s deadly magic.
Sometimes you will have to fight some difficult opponents, with no chance of escape. These foes are usually Forsworn, who can hit ridiculously hard and have insane detection skills, leaving you at your most vulnerable. At this stage, you’ll need to fight dirty (or dirtier than you have been fighting already). Shouting Marked for Death will have them losing their armour rating every second, making them far easier to kill after the 60 seconds are up. However, you’ll need to survive that heart-pounding minute if you’re ever to stand a chance at killing them. Casting Ash Shells on your enemies removes them as a threat, and when they re-emerge from their tombs, you can quickly silence them due to their massively weakened state. With Stability, they’ll be in the ash for 45 seconds, which is easily enough time for Marked for Death to take lethal effect.
Requires: Marked for Death, Ash Shell
Tactics
Early game I recommend sneaking everywhere, and picking your battles if you can. Atronachs can draw some attention and create distractions, allowing you to sneak past. Only engage if you’re sure of winning the fights. Using Elemental Fury then assassinating someone is a good idea, as with the Shrouded Gloves you’ll be doing three lots of double power backstabs in quick succession. Mages and archers should be targeted first, as they can destroy you at earlier levels (and later levels, too. Always take the ranged foes first). Staggers and power attacks are your best friends, anything to stop your enemies attacking you. Once you unlock Cyclone Strikes is when the fun really sets in - this will become your bread and butter move, and as a Necrovamp with the Amulet and Blessing of Talos, you can have it active almost all of the time.
Phantom Charge has a lot of use both in and out of combat - use it go get close to enemies, escape combat, or quickly reach a location. Decoy is another great method of escape and diverting enemy attention. Ash Spawn are great for this as they are strong in both close and long range, so can distract mulitple enemies, letting you flurry them in the back. Ashen Tomb is a great move for resetting a fight if you cannot escape, as during that 45 second period you can passively restore your stats as well as get a guaranteed kill on the frozen enemy after the spell is finished, as they'll be weakened by Marked for Death. If you have the magicka for it, Paralysis can be a better alternative to Ash Shell, as you can attack the downed enemy and also stack poison runes on them for extra DoT. However, against multiple opponents I'd recommend Ash Shell or Ash Rune.
Don't feel like you have to rely on all of your abilities either - the Mirage can very easily avoid combat with Stealth 5, Nightstalker's Footsteps and the Shrouded Hood. Both are boosted by Necromage, making you twice as hard to detect while sneaking. Necromage also boosts the effects of Dragon Aspect, which in turn boosts Elemental Fury, letting you swing incredibly fast for 5 minutes a day - very useful when fighting against a particularly tough opponent like a dragon, or when you're in a difficult dungeon. When facing undead you also have the option of sun spells; a dual cast Vampire's Bane enhanced by Necromage is no joke, and can do some serious damage.
Closing Notes and Credits:
Google, Deviantart and Thraen for the various images
Replies
Some of the images look a bit funny for this one, they're all quite long so they can take up a lot of the screen. I'll see about finding some better ones but I thought I'd better post this now as I've been tinkering with it for a while.
I can probably take screenshots for this guy.
It's definitely not urgent, but if you can that would be amazing, those screenshots of yours really help spice up the builds!
Another superb build I suspect will reach master rank quite quickly.
Thanks Daedric Priest!
This is an awesome build! Rooting a lightning fast dual wielding build as a creature of the desert just feels so right. Likewise your use of the ash spawn summons is pretty cool.
This has to be one of my favorite vanilla builds. Incredibly evocative and a lot of room for personalization.
Gonna have to try it again, maybe with mods.
quite interessting I have to say. have you tried experimenting with the ethereal form/ shadow warrior setup? I think it would fit well with this Build.
Wow what a unique and awesome idea! This build is great. I may try it out with a few mods and see how it goes. Wonderful job.
I think I found just the build I want to try out next.
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