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The Magic Anomaly enemy in Skyrim is one of the few enemies that levels linearly with the player. I have finally encountered my first 10 during the College of Winterhold quest line.

I am a level 43 Stealth Archer with a dash of conjuration and the Magic Anomaly enemies are the most difficult enemies I've faced. Not the most deadly by far, but easily the hardest to kill.

At 43 I can only describe their health as close to a Frost/Blood Dragon, but much, much, much harder to hit. It takes a very, very long time to take one down and I'm looking for strategies centered around efficiency and time saving. Bows are out of the question, and my one/two handed are under 40.

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  • Perhaps it's easier to beat this quest when you're a lower level. At level 24 I was able to kill 10 anomalies within about 5 tries by just summoning a dremora and then bashing them with my one-handed weapon. Took about 3 minutes. I stayed near the entrance to the bridge of the school the whole time. The hard part was keeping my stupid companion/husband alive, which is why I kept restarting the quest, actually. – user73041 Mar 29 '14 at 9:40

15 Answers 15

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The problem with the anomalies is that they're fast, move randomly, and they're resistant to many types of damage.

As a sneaky character, I'd probably recommend working the Thieves' Guild quest line up to the end, and using Shadowcloak of Nocturnal or Shadow Warrior (100 Sneak perk) to "cheat" the backstab system. Just crouch right in front of them, and as soon as you turn invisible, mash your attack key. If you get the timing just right, you'll get credit for a backstab, even though you were fully "detected" before crouching. If you've got the dagger backstab damage perk, you can do insane amounts of damage in a single blow.

A few other general thoughts/strategies:

  • If you're willing to do the Dark Brotherhood quest line, you can bring Shadowmere to the fight, who is crazy as a tank, moves fast, and can output major damage in a short period of time.
  • I seem to remember them being fairly resistant to magic damage, but I did summon my Flame Atronach anyhow, who at least helped a little bit. Her attacks tend to home in, and she can fire from a distance, which can give you an advantage against the fast moving anomalies.
  • The Slow Time shout might also come in handy as well.
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I am level 46 with level 100 Archery and it was still hard to take them down. My suggestion is use the shout storm call. Storm Call kills them all in less than a sec. Just make sure you don't have a follower, otherwise they will get hit by the lightning and leave your service.

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I did the pop in and out strategy at the inn, keeping the avatar alive but not dealing much damage. After doing this for about 5-10 minutes, a dragon showed up to the party and soon thereafter the anomalies were no more.

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Strangely enough they take fall damage. I'm an illusion/restoration master of mind but I was able to lure a bunch up onto the bridge and knock them off to kill them easily.

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Go and stand by a door and keep killing them. When your health runs low go inside and get your health back. Keep doing this until they are all dead.

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Remember that you can tank them by using Conjuration to summon creatures as well, and then do target practice on the Anomalies from a safe distance. I took care of the last batch I ran into by conjuring an Ash Guardian (you get the spell in the course of the Dragonborn DLC), which is pretty tough and fights with fireballs. All the Anomalies swarmed it but by the time they took it down, most of them were down too and the rest were badly injured. Another that would probably work would be a Wrathman (big mean mother from the Soul Cairn, where you find the spell book to conjure it, Dawnguard DLC) or even an Ash Guardian (also from Dragonborn, but a bit trickier to summon, unless you don't mind it attacking you as well). Of the more usual conjured creatures, I suspect a Frost Atronach would hold up the best.

They're not very bright, and tend to go after the first thing they find, so with a bit of care you should be able to keep them tangled up with your summoned creatures until they run out of health.

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Use your runes man. The fire rune has killed them all fairly quickly, in less than 5 minutes. I'm currently level 33.

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Only thing I've found to use that's really effective is call storm shout, it dominates them. Just remember to have clear skies and healing with you

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My solution was to stick with Arniel because:

  1. They're more drawn to him so I just used simple shock
  2. It's hilarious watching a Lvl30 Conjurer punch the cr*p out of a leveled magical beast!
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There's a easier way: just stand on one of those pillars at entrance, summon a flame atronach, and just sit there and repeat. This worked for me at level 15.

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I'm a little late to respond, but here's what I did. I'm a lvl 26 Wood Elf, and I mainly use one-handed weapons, though I use a few spells every now and again.

At the beginning of the battle, before I even got off the bridge between the College and the town, I used my Dragon Aspect Shout. I also used Oakflesh and Conjure Familiar and used the Sanguine Rose to summon a Dremora.

Trying to make sure I was spaced away from my follower, my Dremora, and the other "helpers" from the College, I just whacked at the anomalies until my stamina ran out, then drank some potions to bring it back up.

I tried to keep an eye on my familiar and Dremora and summoned new ones as necessary.

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This is not so bad once the proper tactics are employed. This is for a level 27 wood elf on Legendary. Stand on the front porch of the inn in the corner to the right of the door as you come out of the inn. Equip a sword in one hand, fast heal in the other (if you have it). When an enemy comes at you, swat away. Watch your health. Fast heal as necessary. If you get too low on health or magicka, step inside the inn and recharge. Summoning a fire atronach is helpful (if you have it). It takes a bit of time, bit is definitely managable!

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Use Frost bite on them and after hit them with your sword. It worked for me:-)

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I have a very easy solution get the all 3 words to the slow time shout and use that and a fairly good damage dagger + DB (DragonBorn) gauntlets or if you don't like the DB quest line use shadow warrior and as soon as you crouch attack 2-3 times. I am 114 khajiit sneak archer little bit of magic still haven't fought miraak yet but I am using a blades sword (left) windshear (right) so it was really hard for me probably on par with the higher dragons I've fought especially since I'm missed almost all my attacks :D

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Just go on the broken part of the bridge. Let them follow you and just use a member as a shield (just run to the college they will automatically follow you) and find a way to push the acandies of the broken part (unrelenting force)

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