Magicka Necromancer PvP Build
Magicka Necromancer PvP builds can be some of the best around. While they take some practise to master and careful build composition, Magicka Necromancers can dominate the PvP landscape with incredible burst damage potential, excellent sustained damage, amazing group utility and survivability that can make them near impossible to bring down!
Gear Sets
Buffer of the Swift: This is one of my favourite sets, giving a nice extra boost to resistances along with a flat 10% damage mitigation against all players, which is a much bigger boost than you would think! You can get this from Cyrodiil gear vendors.
Way of Fire: A surprisingly potent set that deals a lot of damage whenever you deal damage with a weapon, up to once every two seconds. Damage over time effects count, so you can really get a lot of mileage out of this! This set can be found in Craglorn.
Perfected Destructive Impact: A very powerful weapon that comes from Dragonstar Arena, allowing you to line up a huge boost to your damage with a burst damage combo while also activating Way of Fire, all with one skill!
Magma Incarnate: We use a once-piece of this set to boost both Magicka and Stamina recovery. You can get this from The Dread Cellar.
Sea Serpent's Coil: This is a great single item that you can get from mythic item leads. It gives you a nice big damage mitigation boost when you are at full health, and converts that into a ridiculous amount of damage output when you take a hit.
Skills
Crushing Weapon: This is your main spammable, and despite costing stamina, it is incredibly powerful, allowing you to line up a burst of damage along with Major Breach.
Blighted Blastbones: Your main burst damage ability that will also apply Major Defile to enemies hit, reducing their healing power. Line this up with Destructive Clench and Crushing Weapon.
Destructive Clench: If you choose to use an ice staff, this will provide an immobilization, whereas shock creates an area blast on the target, and fire knocks them back. Shock is best for damage, fire is best for having a crowd control option, ice allows you to block better. Use your best judgement, and use this skill often to activate the Master's Staff effect.
Degeneration: Your source of Major Sorcery which should be kept up at all times to ensure you are dealing as much damage as possible.
Elusive Mist: If you are in trouble or need to get closer to your opponent, this is your go-to ability, providing a much-needed mobility option.
Glacial Colossus: Use this as a powerful burst of damage to a single target or in an area. If you prefer, you can use Dawnbreaker of Smiting instead.
Spirit Guardian: Heals you over its duration, activates the Undead Confederate passive for better recoveries, and grants 10% damage mitigation. Combined with Buffer of the Swift, that makes us very tanky.
Resistant Flesh: Further resistances in addition to a potent burst heal. Don't worry about the Minor Defile - the Curative Curse passive boosts healing by the same amount when you have a negative effect on you, balancing this out.
Summoner's Armor: Your source of Major Resolve, boosting your resistances. Also makes your Spirit Guardian and Blight Blastbones more resource-friendly.
Resolving Vigor: A nice source of healing that also provides Minor Resolve. If you prefer, you can switch to Rapid Regeneration for a Magicka-costing option.
Race Against Time: An excellent mobility tool that will allow you to reposition easily. However, if you get enough of that from Elusive Mist, you may switch this to something else.
Life Giver: An excellent life saver when you need to recovery quickly from a tricky situation. If you run an ice staff instead, go with Temporal Guard.
Champion Points
Master at Arms: Direct damage is one of the most common types in PvP, and is often where the ability to burst down your opponents lies, making this a valuable buff.
Biting Aura: This class in particular really benefits from a buff to area damage, making this a smart choice for increasing your burst damage potential, so make sure you always have it slotted.
Ironclad: Since direct damage is so common, it is important to also defend against it. That is where Ironclad comes in, boosting your mitigation against this damage type.
Resilience: No matter what the meta is running, critical damage will always be a big part of what many players build around in PvP. It is important to defend against that, and Resilience will help you there in combination with Impenetrable armour pieces.
Boundless Vitality: Every bit of health makes a difference, especially in some of the tougher content that The Elder Scrolls Online has to offer. This will help you bump yours up a little more, increasing your survivability.
Slippery: In PvP, pinning your opponent down with CC before you burst them down is important. This will prevent that from happening to you so easily, making it an important addition.
Rejuvenation: Recoveries are important for every role. For healers, it is essential for keeping your group alive, for tanks, it is the source of most of your buffs and debuffs, for DPS, you can't deal damage with no fuel, and in PvP, no resources means death.
Celerity: Extra movement speed is an amazing boost in all content. In PvE, it helps massively with avoiding nasty mechanics, and in PvP, it allows you to run circles around your opponents.
Mundus Stone
The best Mundus Stone to use on this build is the Lover for significantly better Penetration. The Lover gives the best overall boost to damage output on average against players, especially since players in PvP tend to run a lot of resistance. However, if you need more recovery, consider the Atronach instead.
Food Buff
The Clockwork Citrus Filet offers an incredibly useful spread of Max Health, Max Magicka, Health Recovery and Magicka Recovery, making it perfect for Magicka-focused PvP builds. If you can't afford its hefty cost, go with the Witchmother's Potent Brew instead, offering similar stats but no Health Recovery.
Race
My preferred race to run for this build is a Breton for their superior sustain. However, if you feel that you are managing your resources well enough, then you can switch to a High Elf (Altmer) for more overall damage, or Dark Elf (Dunmer) for almost the same damage as the High Elf with a little extra stamina for survivability as well.
Potion
PvP builds generally work best when running Immovability potions, which grants a lengthy immunity to snares, immobilizations and stuns. It's good to carry some potions to reveal invisibility as well to counter Nightblades.
Mortality
If you can carefully manage the sustain to account for it, adding Vampirism to this build can be very useful for access to the Undeath passive and Mist Form, offering greater survivability and mobility. Necromancers struggle with resource management though, so only use this if you don't run into sustain issues.
Notes
Magicka Necromancers were not a popular class due to not having access to a source of Major Breach or a reliable CC option. With this build, you won't have that problem. Your main spammable will be Crushing Weapon, which provides Major Breach, and you have access to CC with Destructive Clench when using a flame or ice staff.
Your approach to combat should be to set up with Blastbones, hit Crushing Weapon and then light-attack weave into Destructive Clench. Crushing Weapon will debuff your opponent's resistances and Destructive Clench will activate the Master's staff for a big spell damage buff while also activating Way of Fire. All of this will happen a split second before Blighted Blastbones connects with the target, dealing tremendous damage against a debuffed opponent. It is a savage burst combo that gets the job done.