Welcome to another installment of a segment where we dive into oneElder Scrolls Online’smanySets, and explore what sort ofBuildsyou can make. Not only will we show you how to get the most from these Sets, but we’ll explain where to get them, what requirements there are to obtain them (if any), and everything else you could possibly want to know about them. In this article we take a look atBattalion Defender Set, which is used to heal allies or yourself.
An Introdution To Battalion Defender Set
This Set was added to the game withUpdate 20 Murkmire, which launched in October/November of 2018. Battalion Defender is a Rewards of the Worthy Set, and Rewards of the Worthy are obtained via mail after acquiring 20k Alliance Points either in Cyrodiil or Battlegrounds. The Style of this Set is tied to the Alliance that you are in, but you can trade or purchase the same pieces of different Styles from other players. Motifs can be found in chests in bothCyrodiiland theImperial City. Players will only find the Style of their faction, so players from other factions will need to purchase them from vendors or other players.
Since this is aRewards of the WorthySet, it will drop all weapon types, jewelry and armor pieces but only in Heavy Armor. Armor and Weapons pieces come with random Traits so you will need to farm them to get the ones you want, and jewelry comes with theHealthyTrait. Keep in mind that you’re able to useTransmutationto change Traits if you wish, however theSummersetexpansion is needed, along with 50 Transmute Crystals.
The Battalion Defender Set increases Health, Stamina and Healing Done. The 5 piece set bonus healsyourself, or a nearby group member with the lowest health, for 2000 Health when you Block. This number can be boosted all the way up to 2700 Health with both Minor and Major Mending active.
Healing Done, Healing Taken and Healing Received Information
Battalion Defender increasesHealing Done. This is one factor involved in calculating total healing, but there are others such asHealing ReceivedandHealing Taken. There isn’t a lot of information out there on how this all works, so I’ll note it here for convenience. The formula to figure out how much healing you will get is as follows: (Note thatHealing Done,Healing TakenandHealing Receivedall affect the healing ofPotionsas well)
Healing = Skill Value * Healing Done * Healing Taken * Healing Received
This formula allows us to calculate just how much healing aSkillcan do based on a number of factors. Since tooltips reflect the changes ofHealing Donealready, you’re able to take theTooltip * Healing Taken * Healing Receivedto get the actual number the Skill will do. You can use this formula to theory craft just exactly how much healing you can get from Skills this way. Let’s do an example:
Things That Grant Healing Done
Things That Grant Healing Taken
Things That Grant Healing Received
What You Need to Know About Battalion Defender
How this Set works is that whenever you Block an attack, an instant heal is initiated. The recipient of this heal is the party member (yourself included) with lowest amount of Health at that time, within 15 meters of you. It is important to note that this effect can occur every 1 second, making it extremely reliable and it will proc frequently in tanking scenarios. It cannot target members outside of your group.
This Set already comes with a Healing Done bonus, which increases the heal this Set provides, but it can be increased even further with things listed in the above section. You can easily reach over 4000 Health per heal by wearing Heavy Armor, maxing out Blessed and Quick Recovery, and keeping up Minor Mending and Minor Vitality. Ideally when using this Set you’d be an Orc or an Argonian for further increased Healing Received as well.
Notes for PvE Players
Battalion Defender is really a Set for Tank Builds, because they should be the only players Blocking with any frequency. Whether the Tank intends to use this Set to heal himself or other players in his/her group, it can be used effectively. Depending on your group, and setup, you should consider pairing this Set with 2 different types of Sets: Stamina-based Sets, or Healing Sets.
Stamina-based Sets will allow you to Block more and for longer periods of time, allowing you to keep your Shield up and proc the healing from this Set. I strongly suggest pairing one of these with this Set if you are an inexperienced Tank, or are running with an inexperienced group, because running out of Stamina is a sure fire way to get yourself killed. Look for Sets likeBattlefield AcrobatorTrappings of Invigorationto help keep your Stamina up.
Healing Sets focus on anything that increases Healing Done, Healing Received, and Healing Taken. They can also provide some other type of Healing, but for this Set it’s best to have some of the previously mentioned things.Jailer’s Tenacity,Duneripper’s Scales,Livewire, orLeeching Plateare all great choices, and can help turn you into an immortal beast of a tank. However, these Sets will not help you if you run out of Stamina and cannot Block, thus are not advised to novice players who are new to tanking.
My favorite Monster Helm Sets are two that make you even harder to kill, and that compliment Battalion Defender:VykosaandScourge Harvester. Vykosa grants more Healing Taken and putsMajor Maimon a taunted enemy that you bashed, reducing their damage done by 30% for 3 secs. Scourge Harvester adds Max Health and grants a 6% chance to generate a beam that steals Health while also granting Major Vitality for the beam’s duration.
Notes for PvP Players
For this Set to be effective in PvP the player will have to participate in large scale battles, which eliminates it right away as something you might use in Battlegrounds. You want to get struck every 1 second, which means you want to be facing at least 3-6 other players at all times, to make that happen. If you’re using this Set in Cyrodiil you are trying to get enemy players to attack you instead of your group or faction.
You will need to have great Stamina sustain in order to keep your Shield up at all times, so you want to take a second Set that helps facilitate this. I suggest something likeChampion of the Histfor not only Stamina, but also increased Ultimate, which can help you getShield Wallup more often. Or, consider taking something like Trappings of Invigoration for even more Stamina sustain.
EitherBlood Spawnor Scourge Harvester would be ideal choices here for increased Resistance and Ultimate gain or more healing to help keep you alive and make this Set more effective. You’re not going to kill a lot of players this way, but you’ll be extremely hard to take down, which is the goal.
Final Tips
The biggest problem with this Set is that it is hard to keep track who is going to receive the healing if your party is all over the place. This Set specifies an ally can be no further than 15 meters away from you to receive healing, but with all the moving around it is not a reliable heal, and your healer should not depend upon it. The upside is if you are in experienced party, that is fully ranged focused (except you), this Set can make a tank nearly immortal with the proper setup.
Be sure to putGlyphs of Shieldingon your Jewelry to reduce the cost it takes to Block incoming attacks. You cannot expect to Block very long without at least 2 of these, but 3 may be better depending on how often you intend to Block. TheSturdy Traiton your Armor helps out a lot as well, as does theShadow Wardchampion star. Make sure you use these to make Blocking sustainable.
Battalion Defender works best when your Tank is built around increasing Healing Done because it may not heal you in every scenario. Stacking Healing Done is therefore ideal, but Healing Taken and Healing Received are also good.Powered Weapon Traitincreases Healing Done and is definitely one of the best weapon traits for builds with this set. To increase healing even further useDivinesTrait on Armor andThe RitualMundus Stone. The Ritual Sign on its own increases Healing Done by 10%. With 7 Legendary Divines Traits that number jumps to15%. That would add, depending on the build, 200-400 additional Health restored per block. It does not sound like a lot but that heal-on-block effect occurs every second and it all adds up in the end.
Lastly, as mentioned above, Argonian and Orc are the best Races to select for this sort of Build because of their bonuses to healing. Argonian gets both Healing Done and Healing Received, making it the best choice, but Orc is also not bad. Races that provide some sort of Stamina or Stamina Recovery increase are also solid choices because you need Stamina to Block effectively.
Stay tuned as I’ll be covering the rest of theMurkmire Sets, and be sure to check out our otherESO Guides!
