Sunshine Daydream's Guide to ESO

Begin ~ Build ~ Play ~ Craft ~ Customize ~ Zenimax

Style Key & Glossary

Our Newest Guide: The Antiquities System

Begin Your Journey in The Elder Scrolls Online

The most important knowledge for a new player is this: the only things about your character that cannot be changed is your Class and your Alliance (with Greymoor you can change your Alliance with an Alliance Change Token if you own Any Race, Any Alliance). Most options can be changed at the cost of in-game gold, however some changes (specifically race, name, appearance & alliance) must be purchased with crowns.

After choosing your alliance and class, customizing your character's appearance, and completing the basic tutorial what's your next step? Answering that question and guiding your first few hours in The Elder Scrolls Online is the focus of:

Sunshine Daydream's Guide to Starting Out in ESO

Establishing Your Basic Setup - accessing the Settings Menu to alter camera settings, keybindings and the social option color scheme -- plus how to perform basic social interactions
Essential Addons - a short list of the particular addons that make the most difference to quality of life in the game (how are these not part of the base game?)
Attributes & Skills - unlocking skill lines, how to reset assigned points, basic info on attributes & some skill lines, and more
Inventory & Gold Management - item scaling, repairs, quickslots, bank space, inventory space upgrades, inventory management techniques, developing an initial income stream
Getting Around

Basics & Your Mount
The Zones of Tamriel
Wayshrines & Transitus Shrines
Teleporting to Friends & Guildmates
Jumping to Houses
Boatswains, Navigators, & Silt-Striders

Questing - your Quest Journal, unalterable choices in quest dialogue, non-repeatable vs Daily Quests, the Main Story and other essential quests
Crafting - info on crafting certifcation and introductory thoughts about deconstruction & research

Build Choices & Skill Development

Status Effects, Debuffs & Buffs
Mundus Stones
Cultural (Racial) Options - these skill unlock at character level 5
Developing Your Class for Your Role
Weapon-based Skills & Morphs - unlocks after killing while the weapon is equipped
- Two-Handed Weapons for Stamina-based Characters
- Dual-Wield Weapons for Stamina-based Characters
- Bows for Stamina-based Characters
- Shield & One-Handed Weapon primarily for Tanks or others needing added Defense
- Destruction Staves for Magicka-based Characters
- Restoration Staves for Magicka-based Characters
Armor-based Skills - must wear 3 pieces of that armor weight to unlock these skill lines
- Light (cloth) Armor to benefit Spell Damage & Magicka-based abilities
- Medium (leather) Armor to benefit Weapon Damage & Stamina-based abilities
- Heavy (metal) Armor primarily for Tanks or others needing added Health/Defense
Universal Skills & Morphs Available to Everyone
- Soul Magic
- Fighters Guild - unlocked upon joining the Fighters Guild
- Mages Guild - unlocked upon joining the Mages Guild
- The Undaunted - unlocked upon joining the Undaunted
The Alliance War - unlocked by gaining Alliance Points
- Alliance War: Assault
- Alliance War: Support
Chaotic Pursuits: Life Outside the Law
- Ledgerdemain Skills - unlocked by commiting a crime
- Thieves Guild Skills - unlocked by joining the Thieves Guild
- Dark Brotherhood Skills - unlocked by joining the Dark Brotherhood
An Accursed or Blessed Life?
- Vampire Skills & Morphs - unlocked by being bitten & completing the quest
- Werewolf Skills & Morphs - unlocked by being bitten & completing the quest
The Psijic Order - unlocked by joining the Psijic Order (requires Summerset)

Recommended Outside Resources

NEW: Antiquities System: Basics Guide FAQ by ZOS
Character Build Planner (by ESO-Skillfactory)
Champion Point Calculator (by Deltia)
Other Miscellanea (BenevolentBowD)

Play the Essential Quests

With the exception of Daily Quests (whose quest-givers have blue markers) the quests in ESO are not repeatable. Since each character may complete each quest's story only once, if you plan to do a quest with a group then everyone in your party must have never previously completed and turned in the quest. If a character has started a quest but has not turned it in, then that quest can be abandoned within the Quest Journal so as to start it over with the group.

The Main Story is a series of solo quests accessed through the Harborage, but there are also regional story arcs presented within each zone. The Mages Guild & Fighters Guild also each have their own storylines that progress through contact with the guild halls in each sequential zone within your alliance. There are also many side quests which are tasks for an individual quest giver but are not part of the chain for that zone's storyline.

We also consider quests which progress the regional story arc, lead to a skill point, or are part of Cadwell's Silver/Gold series to be Essential Quests. These quests tend to have pre-requisites within the zone's story arc quest chain and thus often cannot be directly shared among a group through the Quest Journal. Each character should plan to take these quests directly from the quest giver as listed below.

Sunshine Daydream's Guide to Crafting

Introduction to Crafting

Craftable Traits

The Special Craftable Sets

Crafted for Tanking

Crafted for Healers

Crafted for Magicka DPS

Crafted Sets that Attempt to Balance Magicka & Stamina

Crafted for Stamina DPS

Jewelry Crafting

Blacksmithing

Clothing

Woodworking

Summary of Crafting Styles and How to Acquire Style Motifs & Style Materials

Basic Motifs found all-in-one as a full book
Rare Motifs typically found by the chapter, with 14 chapters in a full book

Enchanting

Provisioning

Skills for Anyone (even the Non-Provisioner)
Skill Progression for the Provisioner
Food Ingredients
Drink Ingredients
Leveling Provisioning
Daily Provisioning Writs

Recipes for Writs

Provisioning Your Characters
The Exotic Menu (rare & special treats)

Orzorga's Recipes
Other Recipes With Unique Benefits
Ambrosias (elixirs to boost experience, skills count it as a drink)

Alchemy

Skills for Anyone (even the Non-Alchemist)
Skill Progression for the Alchemist
All About Solvents
All About Reagents
Quickly Discover Every Reagent's Traits
- Summerset Addendum (for if you'd already learned all existing traits with our old primer)
Leveling Alchemy
Introducing Poisons
Alchemical Recipes
Applying What You've Learned: Further Experimentation

Housing & Furnishings

Furnishing Plans

Shopping for Furnishings

Other Ways to Acquire Furnishings

Customize The Interface with Add-Ons

Addons are installed within your "My Documents" folder. The exact structure resembles

C:\Users\(WindowsLogin)\My Documents\Elder Scrolls Online\live\AddOns\(NameOfAddOn)

We find the following addons extremely useful:

For Everyone

Votan's Keybinder - makes it so that you can adjust keybinding settings once for the account instead of needing to repeat again for each character. You can still modify things for just the one character by unchecking a checkbox on that binding in the Settings menu, so this addon offers both convenience & flexibility.
Fast Volume - quick & simple on-screen volume control
Harven's Improved Skill Window - adds experience numbers and identifies morphs more clearly
Leo's Altholic - track various completions, skills, research, inventory across your characters
The Elder Bar - unobtrusively track various informative tidbits at the top of your screen
Iakoni's Gear Changer - track and quickly swap gear layouts
Iakoni's Skill Changer - easily keep track of multiple skill bar set-ups and quickly swap between them
Combat Reticle - enhances visibility and utility of the on-screen reticle for targeting and interacting with items, NPCs, and other players in the game world. The primary goal is to make the reticle more visible during combat to improve targeting accuracy. This is accomplished by allowing the user to customize the reticle image, color, opacity, scale, rotation, and animation mode.
Srendarr - Aura, Buff & Debuff tracker
Action Duration Reminder - a great way to keep track of active/expired skills
LUI Extended - an excellent Aura, Buff & Debuff tracker and more
Harven's Potions Alert - This addon will automatically select a presetted quickslot when one of player attibutes drop below defined value. It will also show an alert window with selected quickslot item icon and reminder message to press the quickslot key. There are three quickslots that can be defined in the addon setting window together with threshold values (health, magicka and stamina).
FCO StarveStop - enable a warning message when your food/drink buff is about to expire (you set time remaining) and/or an icon on your screen when you have no food/drink buff
Collection Bars - Want to be able to keybind various collectibles? Want buttons available for various mounts or assistants or other collectibles with just a click? Then this is for you.
Code's Combat Alerts - Provides notifications and alerts for a selection of PvE mechanics.
Combat Metrics - Track your fights. You can use it to measure your DPS, you can analyse which skills make your DPS or who caused your incoming damage. You can also analyse the heals you received or cast. You can check which buffs and debuffs were running, how much magicka or stamina per second you used and regenerated. You can Analyse the Combat log, filter it to analyse specific issues.
Synced Account Settings - If you have more than one game account this addon is very helpful in coordinating your settings across accounts. Even with only one account it could be useful for things like getting all those chat color settings unified across characters! :)
Azurah - allows you to unlock and move various interface elements
Votan's Adaptive (Video-)Settings - helps maintain high frame rates for smooth combat while balancing beautiful graphics when out of combat

Map & Travel Enhancements

Votan's Minimap - reenables the game's original minimap with some performance enchancements (the minimap is sadly no longer available by standard settings without an addon)
Map Pins - shows locations for many things and easy to directly adjust with the map's standard filters
Votan's Group Pins - shows group members on your map and/or minimap in different colors and/or icons
Votan's Improved Locations - can make using wayshrines more intuitive with an organized list instead of an alphabetical list of zones, highlights zones you've recently been in or favorited
Faster Travel - travel quickly to guildmates and friends or favorited wayshrines
Port to Friend's House - map a keybind to open a list and travel to any number of houses on any account -- and not just their primary house! (must still have permission to visit, of course)

Inventory Management

Advanced Filters - makes managing your inventory and bank easier through the use of sub-categories
FCO ItemSaver - provides a lock function to keep from destroying/selling/deconstructing items you want to keep. Options include "lock," "mark selling in guild store," "mark selling," "mark deconstruction," "reserve for research," or mark with a custom gearset/marker. You can customize which actions are allowed/prevented.
Unknown Tracker - tracks the known/unknown state of motifs, recipes, furniture plans, style pages, & runeboxes (can even show markers across accounts!)
Dustman - the best way to keep unwanted items from clogging your inventory
Auto Category - if you like to customize your inventory display you'll love this addon once you have it set up!
Iakoni's Gear Changer - track and quickly swap gear layouts
Set Tracker - tracks item sets across characters & banks and even across accounts
GearSetsSort - allows you to sort gear in your inventory and bank by set, trait, quality, etc
Itemization Browser - Search for sets by armor weight, a particular set bonus, the location acquired, the update released, and by other methods
Simple Durability - makes it easy to tell when an item is worn out without becoming a nuisance
Loot Log - keep track of valuable items with notes in the chat window when you (or party members) pick one up
Craft Bag Extended - allows you to mail, trade, sell, etc straight from the craft bag without needing to remove the item from the craft bag separately

Guild Stores

Tamriel Trade Centre - helps you find deals when shopping and helps you set prices that make your items actually sell by guiding you to not price too high & without getting ripped off by selling too low
Awesome Guild Store - many players prefer the adjustments this makes to the guild store interface

Social

Zolan's Chat Notifications - associate a sound with when selected types of messages come in (whisper, party, particular guild(s), keyword)
Quick Message - write predefined messages and send them quickly by typing /qm#
FCO Chat Tab Brain - various options to control your chat window behavior
FCO Notes - enhanced and private notes on friends' lists and guild rosters

Antiquities

Display Leads - a better way to keep track of Leads -- and it shows when they expire! (table shows Lead's item, zone, quality/difficulty, if needed for Codex's lore, set if part of a set, and expiration)

Crafting

HarvestMap - places 3d pins in the world and/or adds icons to maps for all resource nodes that you have discovered
FurniturePreview - enables a crafting plan to show a preview of what the item will look like (not only when in inventory, also works on chat links and in guild stores as well)
Unknown Tracker - tracks the known/unknown state of motifs, recipes, furniture plans, style pages, and runeboxes (can even show markers across accounts!)
CraftStore - tops our list of most beneficial addons to developing crafters! The key features in my opinion are the research timer management features and the ease of crafting daily writs, but it does so much more including tracking styles and traits learned
TraitBuddy - very handy for checking which styles are near completion and which chapters are still missing. Also provides a grid of known/unknown traits and a tooltip inside item descriptions to let you know if your crafter(s) know a given trait on weapons/armor and several other useful features.
Writ Worthy - If you do master writs then you want this one! Helps find worthwhile master writs and locate the proper station at your home and/or automatically create master writs.
Confirm Master Writs - If you're a top-tier crafter then you want this one! Shows whether your current character is able to do a given Master Writ based upon motif/recipe knowledge, skill points, and mat requirements.
Crafting Writ Assistant - informative window shows current writ requirements (not necessary if using CraftStore as a similar option included there)
HearthHome Filter - adds a search box to Furniture plan lists at crafting stations
FCO Craft Filter - adds buttons to the crafting station's menu which will easily filter your items (only inventory, only bank, both) in the crafting stations' panels
AlchemyUknown - adjusts the interface at the alchemy tables to add the icon (not the trait name) for unknown traits on reagents
Votan's Rune Info - adds description info showing the type of glyph it can create on essence runes and the glyph's designated level on potency runes
Crafting Stations - shows crafting locations on your map even if they're undiscovered and does a pop-up tooltip window telling what set is created at each location along with its set bonuses
NonstopHarvest - continue to harvest a node despite opening your map, inventory, mail, etc.

Housing

Essential Housing Tools - editing tools, copy & paste, automatic backups, and more
DecoTrack - tracks furnishing inventory in banks, coffers, storage chests, homes, and personal inventory
Port to Friend's House - map a keybind to open a list and travel to any number of houses on any account -- and not just their primary house! (must still have permission to visit, of course)
Guild Hall List - scans guild rosters for member notes denoting a guild hall or a crafting workshop

Dark Arts

N'tak Loot'n'Steal - lots of enhancements to the interface that are useful for thieves!
Innocent Blade of Woe - this addon allows you to fight back if engaged by an "innocent" despite "Prevent Attacking Innocents" being turned on in the game's Settings (permitting self-defense while preventing starting combat)
NoAccidentalStealing - this addon makes it so you must be hidden (in stealth mode or invisible) in order to steal. If you've ever gotten a bounty by accidently stealing an object instead of talking with the person behind it, you will know the addon's advantage. However, if you use the Azurah addon (mentioned earlier) then this feature is included there.

Fishing

Rare Fish Tracker - keeps track of which rare fish you've caught and which are still needed for the Master Angler achievement
Votan's Fisherman - fishing becomes easier with a "lure in" notification and adds a colored pin to your map showing the type of water/bait once you have caught something in that particular fishing spot.