ESO Aetherian Archive Trial Guide for Tanks
Welcome to The Tank Club’s Aetherian Archive Trial Guide for Tanks.
Aetherian Archive is a 12-person trial in The Elder Scrolls Online, originally introduced in Craglorn (2014) and later updated in One Tamriel (2016) with a Veteran mode and Hardmode. This trial consists of four bosses and is one of the lowest-damage trials in the game, making it an excellent place for tanks to practice buff management, debuffs, and sustaining through fights.
While the first three bosses are relatively easy, the final boss, The Celestial Mage, introduces a sustain challenge, particularly with axe adds that must be controlled throughout the fight.
This guide will walk you through boss mechanics, tanking strategies, and hardmode tips to help you efficiently tank this trial.
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Aetherian Archive Tanking Overview
- Low-damage trial: Can often be completed with a single tank
- Great for practice: Ideal for learning buff & debuff management
- Final boss challenge: Managing axe adds and sustaining through long fights is key
- Hardmode difference: Adds Storm Atronachs and splashing AoEs that must be blocked
Aetherian Archive Boss Strategies for Tanks
Boss 1: Lightning Storm Atronach: This boss will use a lightning storm attack that can deal a lot of damage. To avoid this attack, stand on one of the golden pads that will appear on the ground. All other mechanics can be simply ignored by a Tank, keep boss turned away from group and focus fully on debuffing and buffing.
Boss 2: Foundation Stone Atronach: One of the few bosses in ESO where the group typically stand stacked on the Tank. When the boss slams the group, everyone stacks, when the boss curls up it throws rock at people and they need to be blocked. Adds will spawn in, taunt the melee adds but you don’t really need to do anything other than buff and debuff for the whole fight.
Boss 4: Varlariel the Wispmother: This boss drops AoEs on the ground, you need to not stand still because the more you are hit by them the more damage to receive and this might kill you during the explosion mechanic. Turn boss away from the main group stack and once again focus on buffing and debuffing
Last Boss: The Celestial Mage: The final boss is the only boss that poses any real challenge and this is most difficult on your sustain.
- Your job is to keep taunt of the axes that spawn into the room by the boss and this can be done easily by taunting the boss, taunting each axe when it first appears, and then only maintain taunt on the boss will keep the axes on you.
- You have to ensure you don’t get knocked down by the axe heavy attack, when you’re stunned the axes will retarget to someone else. When dealing with multiple axes it can be hard on sustain, using Immovable Potions and heavy attack while you have immovability active is a great way to deal with this.
- Darkness AoE will cover a lot of the floor, don’t stand in it.
- Watch out for the AoEs, if an add spawns and you’re stood in it, you’ll get knocked back whether you block or not and lose taunt of the axes.
- Stand by the boss with the axes NOT on the rock, this is an ancient method which actually makes the trial harder and you can’t put and buffs or debuffs on the boss, and it’s better for sustain.
Hardmode: This trial only has one hardmode and it’s the last boss. The only real difference is once you instigate combat Storm Atronachs start spawning. You need to stack these on the boss so they can die in cleave damage. The other thing is splashing AoEs now happen all over the arena and they need to be blocked.
Final Thoughts
Aetherian Archive is one of the easiest trials in ESO for tanks, making it a great place to practice mechanics, sustain, and group utility. While the first three bosses are fairly simple, The Celestial Mage requires careful resource management and awareness.
With the right positioning, proper taunt control, and awareness of AoEs, you’ll be able to tank this trial with ease.
