So--after waiting almost seven years, someone finally did it, they made the mod I have prayed for.
I have always wanted to make a Morag Tong build; the concept armor they did for Morrowind was f***ing amazing. And then, in all the games, the armor was trash. But now I have my gear and I raise the Ebony Blade in the Webspinner's name.
So - the build will be called The Vounouran. We've learned in ESO, maybe somewhere else, that when a Tong agent retires, due to old age (or because of the 'curse of fame' from a big job), he or she retires to the Isle of Vounoura. Naryu Virian's papa Mjahlar is one example.
The backstory will involve this legendary retired Tong assassin being recalled to Skyrim because of...something, to do...something. I'll work on that. No shortage of lore options--avenge the oppressed dunmer in Windhelm, weaken/strengthen the Empire, destroy the Brotherhood, use the Brotherhood to destroy the Empire...it's a lot. My guy will venerate Mephala, but I'm not sure if it will be her that calls him to Skyrim, or someone/something else.
A key roleplay mechanic will be public kills instead of sneak kills. (I am pretty sure that I will "convert the DB over to the Tong philosophy" via roleplay, rather than destroy it--its really the only organized thing in the game that will give me kill contracts.) Tong agents killed in public and turned themselves in with their honorable writs. This guy won't have writs, but he has Tong honor and just rejects the idea of skulking around like a common street rat. As such I'll dispense with the dagger and stick to the dai-katana for a more dignified brand of murder.
In terms of gameplay, my idea here is that he is old, so it will be built around the limitation of low stamina. Physical combat will have to account for that, when he doesn't use illusion to avoid combat. Archery, but primarily to deliver poison damage. Twohander, but primarily to deliver absorb health damage with Ebony Blade. The Ebony Blade, augmented with Marked for Death and weakness to magic poisons, is a perfect fit for a guy who fights with skill, experience and mysticism but not with raw power. (Credit to Oneness and his Emissary of Darkness build)
Race Dunmer. Probably--doesn't have to be, the Tong had members of all races in Morrowind. But dunmer are the master race so there's that.
Stone (Andromeda) Shadow or Serpent. Possibly both if i use the Aetherial Crown. (Vanilla) - I guess I'd just do Lord.
Skills Major Alchemy, Illusion, Light Armor; Minor: Sneak, Archery, 2h. I will likely do the build in Ordinator. Question to community, do you think nonstandard skills would be better? I debated other skills but honestly I feel like these are the skills of a veteran Tamrielic assassin. I already have the quirk of 2h instead of 1h/dagger; going further out of the mold just doesn't make a lot of roleplay sense.
Gear This sick armor, the unenchanted Chitin Bow from this mod and the Chitin arrows from this mod, and the Ebony Blade. I did some testing with this loadout and I got no testing done because I kept stopping to admire how great this dude looked. Other item is (maybe) Aetherial Crown; ring and necklace TBD.
Spells There are a lot of cool Apocalypse illusion spells, but I think I will stick to vanilla calm/fear/frenzy and showcase Ordinator's illusion tree. (Again, if I use Ordinator). It adds a ton of new dimensions to those standard spells.
Special Abilities Yes
Wait what are the special abilities I'm not telling
You don't have any special abilities yet, do you Shut up, n'wah
I have a lot of stuff swirling in my head about quests, roleplay, etc but I'll stop there. So I'd love any suggestions or feedback, on anything and everything. Praise be to the Spinner -
Replies
I am a huge fan of these lore inspired builds you do. I also love how you've already come up with a way for the gameplay to reflect the character's attributes and backstory elements. When you've worked out your abilities and overall combat strategy I should be able to offer more assistance.
Danke schon! I have been blessed (I guess?) with time off of work but a cancelled trip out West, so I've got a week of staycation to sloth around and work on this. Should be fun.
I am super excited for this build.
I'm playing it right now; I think the perk spread I've got planned (17 Ordinator perks in Illusion!) will be epic. Going to post a few lore questions separately..
OK so the build and gameplay and roleplay is all coming together nicely...
The roleplay and lore is quite involved; I will probably post it separately from the build. The roleplay was mine, and others can use it but certainly don't have to. My first couple of builds were really long, I want to try to tighten this one up.
My draft perk spread is below, I'm level 30 now with Alchemy maxed and heavy investment in Illusion. (Edit: oops - here it is:)
The playstyle is a lot of illusion and sneak when hidden, and Ebony Blade + MfD + Weakness poisons when discovered. I guess I am sort of doing a tour of Ordinator skill trees with my builds, and here my goal is to showcase all of the amazing add-ons Ordinator provides for fear, calm and fury. You can remove defense from people you calm; paralyze and de-armor people you fear; buff people you frenzy; later, you get the ability to kill people in some really nasty ways. Illusion graduates from a strong crowd control ability to a truly terrifying skill.
And wow, using weakness to magic poisons with the Ebony Blade is bananas. If I pop a 'weakness to poison' poison on someone with my bow, then Ebony Blade with 'weakness to magic' poison, I can tank even with my paper armor as I am absorbing like 80 health per subsequent hit. And the Bottomless Cup perk keeps poisons on your weapons for 10 hits at 100 Alchemy. Even with just the weakness to magic poison its more than 50 health absorb.
The evolution here has been the opposite of my Black Dragon build--more open combat early on, and later more in stealth once my sneak + illusion got stronger.
Archery is quite minor, basically it's for delivering poison to dragons and occasionally other tough guys. I've got a few illusion-based special abilities, and a few two-handed specials.
Questions:
Sorry it’s taken me so long to reply to this. I think you’re off to a great start with this build. My suggestion would be to scrap archery entirely and take those block perks you mentioned.
With the a full power ebony blade, and the ability to weaken enemy magic defenses you’re pretty much unstoppable in close combat, which is perfect for an honorable assassin who doesn’t sneaka round much. Even dragons will have a hard time keeping up with the rate at which you can restore your health.
Since you’re going with alchemy consider using a potion of Fortify health regen. It will go exceptionally well with the blades health stealing power.
As for neutralizing a dragons Magicka and keeping it that way, you’re going to want to use the shout drain vitality (the glitched version learned with every word of marked for death works best). Drain vitality sets any affected targets regen to 0 so regeneration of any kind is impossible. My knight cleric uses a sword enchanted with drain Magicka and damage Magicka along side that shout, and I can shut down any dragons breathe attacks in as few as 2 - 4 strikes.
Throw voice would compliment this builds sneakiness very well. Throw voice + frenzy (rune) is a very powerful opening tactic.
Excellent suggestions. Hadn't thought about extra health regen--I wanted a potion that actually boosted health absorption but that doesn't exist, your idea is next best thing. Throw voice is a great shout with frenzy; that+MfD+Aura Whisper were the staples I was using.
I don't think I can get that glitched version of Drain Vitality--whether it's the unofficial patch or something else in my load order I haven't seen that show up in years. Anyway dragons were much less of a problem than solo dwarven automatons - those were my nightmare since neither poisons nor the Ebony Blade do anything to them. The only thing I could do with automatons was alternate calm spell, attack, calm spell, attack. I might add Stormfang or something into the build just to deal with those guys.
I got this up to level 30ish but I want to revisit with a fresh playthrough, with block as a more major skill and ditching archery (I'll still use it unperked). I'll also trim light armor down to three essential AR-boosting perks, and finally I'll skip the Andromeda mod and use the vanilla Lord stone. The mitigation you can get with timed blocks in Ordinator is amazing, both physical and magical. But I am personally not great with twitch reflexes so the extra defense from the Lord stone will help me a lot...
marked for death+calm would force the centurion to sit there while its armor drops into the negatives. Unless of course the unofficial patch fixes that too
I’m curious to know if you’re still working on this build or if the idea is up for grabs.
Have at it! I have gotten a lot busier at work and wont be building characters any time soon. Definitely focus on illusion or the “hotwire” lockpicking perks from ordinator for those dwemer robots! I look forward to seeing what you do with it, take or leave anything you’d like.
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