Hi yall!

I'm here in search of guidance as to how to build a good Vampire Build. My race of choice is the Breton, if I didn't pick them I'd prolly make an Imperial.

Anywho, I'm not really all that good at building a Vampire.. like what kind've weapons should I use/magic/etc.? Basically I know they get bonuses to Illusion and Sneak thus those are obvious.

Never used Mysticism in TES4 or have used Illusion yet in Skyrim. Why is it essential? And how do you best utilize it?

Thanks to all who can help!!

I tried playing the vampire but didn't enjoy it at all. What is the allure to playing the vamp? Here doesn't seem to be any actual advantage unless you have your own back story you're supporting it with.
Anyway, cant help with your build.

Well, my Nords a Werewolf and really that's strictly just for RP purposes. I haven't used Beast Form since after me an Aela raided the Silver Hand camp to find Skjor dead.

Plus, I haven't been a Vamp yet in Skyrim and from what I see (my friends char.) it's tiresome, but fun. And the sun burning thing is done so much better in Skyrim then TES4. I just recently got rid of my Vampirism on my Nord in Oblivion because of it. I got sick of traveling at night ALL THE TIME. lol..

If you get the Necromage Perk, Atronach Perk, and the Atronach Stone, you'll have complete magic immunity, including immunity to poison, disease, and shouts, though that make make the game a tad too easy...

The most important advantages to being a vampire are the 25% bonus to illusion and sneak. Sneak is self explanatory, you are 25% harder to detect. However, illusion isn't as simple.

Illusion spells only work on enemies up to a certain level. For this reason, if you plan on using illusion for purposes other than muffle and invisibility, you will need every perk in the illusion tree to be effective. At high levels, very few illusion spells will work on most enemies without dual casting it.

This is where vampirism comes in. That limit in which illusion spells work is now increased to 25%, meaning you'll have a much easier time calming, fearing, and frezy-ing enemies. Illusion isn't required as a vampire, but it'd be a shame to miss out on that tasty bonus.

Being a vampire also registers you as an undead. This means that the Necromage perk in the restoration tree will affect you, which increases all of your active effects (Powers, Shouts, and enchantments) by 25%. The guy above me gave an example of how effective this can be. So clearly you'd want to invest some into restoration.

Because of the vampires' distinct advantage to sneaking, I'd stick with daggers as your primary weapon. The assassin's blade perk in the sneak tree multiplies sneak attacks with daggers by 15x, which is pretty devastating. As for range, you could use a bow from stealth or use destruction. OR for RP reasons you could go into the necromancy side of conjuration and watch battles from the sidelines as your minions tear apart frenzied opponents.

The armor choice is up to you. I'd recommend either robes or light armor as heavy armor makes sneaking a huge pain. If you're going to focus on magic instead of combat, use robes. If you focus more on fighting, wear armor for the extra protection. It's up to you, just use whatever you end up needing as you play.

And Breton is a perfectly viable choice for a vampire so that works out some people prefer Dunmer to help out with the weakness to fire, but in the end, none of the races really have an advantage when it comes to vampirism.

I hope this helped and good luck with your character

The ball is in my court!

I play breton vampire spellswords.

Here is my build at level 48 (master level)

http://skyrimcalculator.com/#99047

This is the end of the build : http://skyrimcalculator.com/#99050

(I am on PC so I have balanced destruction and multiple runes and extra spells and ect ect ect. YMMV if you are on a console)

As said above, you will want to pick up necromage.

Get light armor- the windwalker perk will keep your stamina regenning even in the daytime
Get the regen perks in restoration - they will keep your magica regenning even in the daytime

Since you are going illusion, you can skip the ENTIRE left side of the sneak tree since illusion spells (muffle and invisibility) are superior to those perks. You can save a whopping 5 perks in this way.

Don't forget the vamp 25% to illusion, you may want to branch that entire tree because of the buff you get to the effectiveness.Or you could just kill everything (as I do) and just use illusion for silent casting and muffle+invisibility.

Get the Atronach perk at the top of alteration, its effect is compounded by vampire necromage. That combined with the atronach stone will make you immune to magic.

Being a vampire meshes well with the major skills you mentioned. It will be a very fun build. Getting invisibility as a spell makes even being a level 4 vampire a trivial matter, since you can just disappear at will.

No one makes a sharper sword than a necro-vampire.

Weapon recommendations: dagger/sword bow + spells for range.

Pick up paralysis when you are up there on the alteration tree. ++ you do not need to put multiple perks in armor effectiveness since you will have ebonyskin for cheap (to help put you over the cap.) - oh, and ebony armor will be 25% more effective and 50% more duration thanks to necromage, just like all your self effect spells.

Once you are casting invisibility/calm/frenzy/paralysis/detectlife/detectdeath/runes/shockspells/armorskin/soultraps you may find yourself becoming a vampire spellsword.

If you are going to play a vampire character I would get this mod for sure:

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=5863

This mod made playing a vampire 100x better and it is how they should have been in the first place.

Here is a pic of my Breton Vampire :

http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/469735874915210487/FBBE05BB7BDA09ECCF516F4098CBC8726556BB72/

One handed
Heavy Armor (for ebony mail which is badass for a vampire)
illusion
Conjuration (go the necromancy route to get twin souls)
Destruction (only 1 point so the price of vampire drain cost half)
Sneak
Ritual stone (nothing cooler then raising a pile of dead bodies)


Hope this helps.

Agree with Kinjo about the vamp mod. I have the exact one for my game.

What about a vampire who's a vampire hunter? Basically Angel.

Here's what I've been thinking:

Alteration
Conjuration
Illusion
Light Armor
One Handed
Restoration
Sneak

That, or I choose Archery in place of Conjuration. But those are my major skills. I don't really see myself using Destruction that much (except for Runes) because I'll be mostly trying to kill via Sneak Crits. And use Dual-Wielding for CQC in case they get past my minions.

I feel this build is going to be very fun because I've never really used Illusion or Conjuration yet (outside of Bound weapons). And I've been using Sanguine Rose lately and having a BLAST!

Also going to be my 1st character that doesn't use Fast Travel. And my 1st char to be in the Brotherhood.