Useful Spells (That aren't on the Wiki)

[FrozenWolf150]

I searched for a similar topic on most useful custom spells, but the only results I found were either locked, or about spells that have enormous magnitudes and are therefore not practical. I thought there should be a thread for sharing, discussing, and refining the custom spells you've found most practical. These spells should follow the same basic guidelines as the ones on the wiki.

Here are a couple I've been using a lot.


Assassination:
(Not taking credit for this, as several players discovered it independently.)

Invisibility on Self for 2 sec
Weakness to Poison 100% for 3 sec on Target
Weakness to Magic 100% for 3 sec on Target

This is a cheap spell that can be cast repeatedly on an enemy to soften them up for a poisoned weapon. Once you've dropped their magic resistance into the negative hundreds, cut them with poison and run away / block. They'll die very quickly. It's very useful against bosses like Umaril or Jyggalag. The only enemies that might still give you trouble are those that can absorb or reflect spells, like liches or xivilai. For them, you might want to give the spell a longer duration so that you increase the likelihood of stacking Weakness to Magic. If you don't want to use Invisibility, then any spell that prevents enemies from fighting back will work, like Calm or Demoralize.


Telekinetic Supercharger:

Any damage effects for 2 sec
Any weakness effects for 2 sec
Telekinesis X pts for Y sec

This spell is for when you get 100% Spell Absorption, since you'll absorb your own Telekinesis spell. This will give you back the base cost of the spell, so at Mysticism higher than 33 you'll get a net increase in magicka. At Journeyman Mysticism, costs are reduced to 80%, so you'll get back 1.25 times the magicka. At Expert Mysticism, so you'll get back 2 times, and at Master Mysticism, you'll get back 5 times. Since the idea is to to chain cast this, you'll want to adjust the Telekinesis effect so that the returned magicka equals the total spell cost, so at Expert level, it should take up 50% or more. Now you can add your damage and weakness effects until you reach the aforementioned cost limit. To determine the strongest possible spell, the cost should not exceed half your total magicka, or you won't be able to cast it more than once.

This can also be combined with Fortify Magicka 100 pts for 2 sec to push your upper limit even higher. Here, add 50 to the total spell cost and adjust the Telekinesis effect accordingly, so that it's the same percentage of the new total. Just make sure you can still cast it at your level.


What useful custom spells have you discovered?

[legoless]

That wiki article is open to editing btw.

[FrozenWolf150]

That wiki article is open to editing btw.

I know, but I don't want to mess with it until I've refined these spells and discussed their merits and drawbacks.

[Flinchel]

Use mixed elementals. It's cheaper, faster, and less likely to fail due to resistances. The weaknesses, in combination with what I mentioned before, can bring death upon all everything ever.

[Golden Sinner]

My eight custom hotkey spells are:

1. "Sneaker"- Invisibility and Nighteye for 40 seconds.
This spell is used to explore danger areas. My magicka fully regenerates in the 40 seconds, so I can keep using it continuously or use it to hide until I have a full blue bar again.

2. "Stacker"- Paralyze on touch for 1 second, 100% Weakness to Shock and Magic both on touch for 9 seconds, Invisibility on self (IoS) for 6 seconds.
Cast this several times as needed, since the effect "stacks".

3. "Whacker"- 36 Points of Shock damage on touch for 10 seconds, IoS for 6 seconds.
A cannon bolt of thunder befalls the target you whacked.

4-"Sapper"- Absorb 20 points of magicka for 10 seconds, IoS for 12 seconds.
Why use your own magicka to slay something?

5. "Oh Lordy"-Summon Dremora Lord for 40 seconds, IoS for 46 seconds.
In fact, why should you do all the work yourself?

6. "Cracker"- Telekinesis to 100 feet for 1 second, Open Very Hard lock on target, 100% Chameleon on self for 6 seconds.
Opens any lock (except under water) and I use it to enter through doors unseen so as not to be ambushed. I can also call up the hotkey to scan targets without actually casting the spell. Place the crosshairs over a distant opponent and the telekinesis effect will tell me if they are a bandit or vampire, etc.

7. "1st Aid"- Fortify Endurance 100 points on self for 5 seconds, Restore 40 points of Health on self for 5 seconds, IoS for 6 seconds.
The endurance boost gives me 200 more health points instantly while the restore effect quickly heals that much damage.

8. "2 Minute Drill"- Detect Life in 100 feet, Water breathing, 100 point Feather and fortify Magicka with 6% Chameleon all on self for 120 seconds.
This is the walking around buffs I use. If I choose to wear armor, the 6% Chameleon effect will complement the adjusted 95% Chameleon of the "Cracker" spell.

I play at max difficulty. My character is always using the 2 minute drill. I add the sneaker when exploring. To attack, I cast several stackers and then one big whacker. If the target is a spell caster, I'll preface the attack with the Sapper spell. This won't work on Liches or opponents with reflect magicka. Then I use the Dremora Lord. The cracker spell is great for stealthy recons and the 1st aid spell gives you a boost while actually treating the damage too.

[Dark Spark]

A new character of mine would travel to Leyawiin to make use of the Serpent Stone power, then join/use the Arcane University to create a 1-second spell before selecting a new Heaven Stone (such as the Shadow Stone or Steed Stone). This way I preserve the ability to craft Paralysis into my spells when I no longer have the serpent's touch. The new, simple Paralyze spell is named "Face Slap".

[FrozenWolf150]

Use mixed elementals. It's cheaper, faster, and less likely to fail due to resistances. The weaknesses, in combination with what I mentioned before, can bring death upon all everything ever.

This is true, though there is one caveat I wanted to point out. The cheapest type of damage spell you can create will use all 3 elemental types, Fire, Frost, and Shock. For a time, I was also mixing Damage Health in with these, but then I did some testing and discovered that its high base cost will always make it more expensive than simply raising the elemental damage types to the same total. For example (and this goes for enchantments as well) I first created the following spell:

Fire Damage 10 pts
Frost Damage 10 pts
Shock Damage 10 pts
Damage Health 10 pts

Then I deleted the Damage Health and raised the other 3 until I reached the same cost. I was able to give the elemental damage types a value of 14 pts each, for 42 total.

Also, while it may be tempting to add Drain Health 100 pts for 1 sec to a damage stacking spell, it's not really worth it in my experience. On max difficulty, this only does 16.7 pts of damage on the first hit. It won't actually deliver its damage until you land the killing blow, and you're better off using the points for actual damage types.

2. "Stacker"- Paralyze on touch for 1 second, 100% Weakness to Shock and Magic both on touch for 9 seconds, Invisibility on self (IoS) for 6 seconds.
Cast this several times as needed, since the effect "stacks".

3. "Whacker"- 36 Points of Shock damage on touch for 10 seconds, IoS for 6 seconds.
A cannon bolt of thunder befalls the target you whacked.

Why not just combine the two? This way you won't have to keep switching back if the damage spell fails to kill them. Also, do you really need Paralyze if you're using IoS? Invisibility is much cheaper and stops enemies from attacking as long as you aren't right next to them when you turn invisible. Here's what I'd do (though this is just my preference of strategy):

Fortify Magicka 100 pts, 2 sec on self
IoS 2 sec
Shock Damage X pts, 1 sec on touch
Weakness to Shock 100%, 1 sec on touch
Weakness to Magic 100%, 1 sec on touch

Now adjust X so that the total cost of the spell is 50 or less, and you can chain-cast this indefinitely until your enemy dies. In order to achieve the fastest casting rate, wield a bow and block while casting. This is faster than if you block with a shield or any other weapon, allowing you to get the next hit in less than a second.

[Golden Sinner]

The weakness and the damage effect don't both work in the same spell. You have to cast weakness first, stack it up (on max difficulty) and then hit them with damage effect. Also without the paralysis, the target may walk or run away before you can zap them.

[FrozenWolf150]

The weakness and the damage effect don't both work in the same spell. You have to cast weakness first, stack it up (on max difficulty) and then hit them with damage effect. Also without the paralysis, the target may walk or run away before you can zap them.

Yes, the first hit will not be affected by the weakness effects. However, the idea is to chain cast it. The second and each subsequent hit will be affected. Therefore the damage for each casting will be 1x, 4x, 6x, 8x, 10x, etc.

I did some more testing and found that I got the best results when I combined your strategy and my strategy. First I blast a bunch of enemies with a zero-damage area-effect spell that weakens their resistances. (I prefer Drain Speed over Paralyze.) Then I hit them with a damage-stacking spell (or weapon) to finish them off. The advantage of this is that I can chain cast the damage spell if they don't die immediately.

[Yaije]

The main thing is working combos. If I recall... the game merely refreshed things if the same spell cast an effect? So you could make the exact same spell, give it a different name and abuse stacking effects like..... weakness to magic?

weakness to magic boosting a weakness to magic.... cycle the two until the weakness is enough to make a drain health 1 pt for 1 sec on target outright kill a god and well you don't need much else.

[FrozenWolf150]

The main thing is working combos. If I recall... the game merely refreshed things if the same spell cast an effect? So you could make the exact same spell, give it a different name and abuse stacking effects like..... weakness to magic?

weakness to magic boosting a weakness to magic.... cycle the two until the weakness is enough to make a drain health 1 pt for 1 sec on target outright kill a god and well you don't need much else.

It's not even necessary to do that. Weakness to Magic stacks with any and all previous Weakness to Magic effects, including from the same spell or weapon enchantment. So if you have Weakness to Magic in a spell, and keep casting it before previous one wears off, you'll stack up a lot of damage.

[ParanoidAndroid]

One of my most useful spells for dealing with multiple enemies is currently:
- Shock damage 5 pts for 10 secs on touch
- Frost damage 5 pts for 10 secs on touch
- Fire damage 5 pts for 10 secs on touch

This works pretty well against groups of enemies, simply run to them, cast spell, move on to the next target, cast spell, etc. Most creatures have a weakness and resistance to either one of those effects so it works well to combine multiple forms of elemental damage. It's also cheap because of the duration, although the long duration is also the most significant disadvantage of this spell.