The Refabricant Scourge - a Stamina Nightblade Two-Handed PvE DPS& vMA Build (HotR ready)

Masel

Welcome to my Stamblade 2h Guide for HotR!

If you know me, you also know that I'm a big fan of alternative Setups for Endgame content in ESO. Now that Stamina has fully arrived and many people go back to it, I experimented a lot woth a 2h Gear Setup on all Classes, and found the stamblade to be the class that it suits the best.

The reason is the very nice class spammable Surprise attack, that is very good for weaving with 2h light and heavy attack, the Assassin's will procs and the presence of leeching strikes. You could technically also use wrecking blow, but i found that you don't have that much time to make use of your spammable after all and it simply is weaker than surprise attack in utility.

Why a 2h in the first place?

Because a 2h Weapon is fun, something else and still does great damage. The Cleave damage is amazing, you have high survivability and great sustain.

Race: Redguard is hands down the best race. The sustain it gives is so nice, and all three Passives synergise perfectly with a melee stamina build. After that, Khajiit, Orc, Imperial and even dunmer can be good alternatives.

Stats:

Gear for Group Settings:

Armor:

All Divines

1x Velidreth/Molag Kena Shoulder or Hat in Medium/Heavy

5 War machine

4 Briarheart

Any 5+4+1 Combination works here.

Weapons:

Briarheart Greatsword, Infused, with Weapon Damage Glyph.

The Maelstrom's Bow, Infused/Nirnhoned, Thunderous Volley

Gear for Solo Settings:

Armor:

All Divines

1x Velidreth/Molag Kena Shoulder or Hat in Medium/Heavy

5 Vicious Ophidian

4 Briarheart

Any 5+4+1 Combination works here.

Weapons:

Briarheart Greatsword, Infused, with Weapon Damage Glyph.

The Maelstrom's Bow, Infused/Nirnhoned, Thunderous Volley

Why War machine?

War machine in combination with Incapacitating strike is a really really strong combination that gives you and wo allies 15% damage done for 10 seconds, 20% more damage taken from the target, 1k DPS from the hit etc. The uptime on slayer is usually between 40-50% as we cast incap every second rotation on the back bar when it's ready, which is very very nice.

Why Briarheart?

It is a selfish set, yes. It is better than hundings, but not by much. We spend about 30-35% of our rotation on our back bar. If we used Hunding's Rage instead, we'd lose the 299 WD for 35% of the time, so we'd have to deduct abotu a 100 Weapon damage, leading to 200. Briarheart is up between 45-55% in the longer run, so we get about 222 Weapon Damage from it. It also buffs your Incap a lot of the times, which is why i think it is the better option.


Substitutes?

Support sets are always good to have. We wear War machine, but you can also use Night Mother's Gaze instead of briarheart on the front bar only, it will still be up about 95% for sure. Sunderflame isn't an option here as we dont heavy attack enough to make it useful. But most raids have night mother's gaze already, so you might be free to boost your own damage.

Bar Setup (Group Setting):

Front bar:



Brawler, Surprise Attack, Rearming trap, Relentless Focus, Killer's Blade/Reverse Slice, Flawless Dawnbreaker

Back Bar:



Endless Hail, Razor Caltrops, Poison Injection, Leeching Strikes, Flex Spot, Incapacitating Strike

Bar Setup (Solo Setting):

Front Bar:



Brawler, Surprise Attack, Rearming trap, Relentless Focus, Rally, Flawless Dawnbreaker

Back bar:



Endless Hail, Razor Caltrops, Poison Injection, Leeching Strikes, Mirage, Ballista

Rotation+Video:

Coming Soon

Start with Leeching Strikes > Bar Swap > Relentless Focus > Trap > Potion > Bar swap > Hail > LA > Caltrops > LA > Injection > (LA > Leeching Strikes > LA> Incap every second Rotation) > Bar Swap > Brawler > LA > Surprise Attack > LA > Assassin's Will (when ready) > LA > Rearming Trap > LA > Surprise Attack > Bar Swap > repeat

After each second Spectral Bow, refresh the buff. It's not a fully static rotation, but it makes it more interesting to play in my opinion.

Full vMA run?

https://youtu.be/6CFBeLJpeUs

Parses?

This is a dummy parse done with just the above setup. I could obviously get more damage out if i used the lover+twice fanged snake, but what's the point of optimizing your dps with a setup you won't use anyway? I do dummy parses with the lowest possible number of selfbuffs to get good DPS that is amplifiable. This has fracture and minor berserk active obviously and 2k penetration form CP, but you still miss about 10.8k penetration to the cap, which is more than a 20% damage increase on top of those 35k dps, so you can expect a damage ceiling in the upper 40's with raidbuffs active.

Varlariel parse:

Had to res once and this was an afternoon pug run, so there's definetely more potential there!



We had NMG, Sunderflame and a Tank with Infused Crusher and Alkosh.

DRXHarbinger

2h was how I got my 1st Stamina Flawless run. I do still use it, but for VMA I don't bother with Dawnbreaker....

Onslought. Literally all you need to do with Warmachine is Crit Rush or Ambush, Sup Attack, Onslought...Buffed up and rinse and repeat, all trash rounds just involve leaping from one trash to another. Weakish deeps on a dummy or long fights compared to using DBS on front bar, but slot it on back bar and ani cancel / swap before it hits and it still counts as the 2h bar.

Reverse slice in most PVE terms is far better imo than Killers Blade, the splash damage becomes free OP one shots to most trash.

But this is a great set up still, just adding my 2 cents. Your builds are great and practical.

Masel

DRXHarbinger wrote: »

2h was how I got my 1st Stamina Flawless run. I do still use it, but for VMA I don't bother with Dawnbreaker....

Onslought. Literally all you need to do with Warmachine is Crit Rush or Ambush, Sup Attack, Onslought...Buffed up and rinse and repeat, all trash rounds just involve leaping from one trash to another. Weakish deeps on a dummy or long fights compared to using DBS on front bar, but slot it on back bar and ani cancel / swap before it hits and it still counts as the 2h bar.

Reverse slice in most PVE terms is far better imo than Killers Blade, the splash damage becomes free OP one shots to most trash.

But this is a great set up still, just adding my 2 cents. Your builds are great and practical.

Nice thought with onslaught! I thought about it myself a bit, but I tested more in trials and on a target dummy for now, that's why I haven't had as much experience with it.

I'll check that out. Question is: does it make the trash rounds fast enough to make up for longer bossfights? I mean you get ridiculously tanky with that...

DRXHarbinger

It's fine for boss rounds, I think when mastered I was doing 550k ish scores with it, 1st 7 rounds you fly though the trash. round 8 is a little slower due to annoying spawns / focusing on the annoying flame spinners.

But for boss rounds it's not a huge difference, but as they all have trash on them it has a much much higher uptime on Major Slayer to compensate for the loss of the FG / DB Passives, AND as a small bonus...killing trash with this maintains the 2H stamina recovery passive.

If you happen to have 2x Briarheart 2h Swords...have a fast switch out ready in between rounds with a Prismatic Glyph on it for the Daedra waves. Instaeasy.

Give it a whirl in VMA, You'll mow them down.

Koensol

Why not use power extraction and reverse slice? This will make you an AoE beast while at the same time having free major brutality without having to use pots on cd.

Trap, caltrops, endless hail, brawler, power extraction a couple of times and then reverse slice until everything is dead. Maybe even add in a dawnbreaker here and there. You will absolutely nuke trash and still have good single target dps. You can use power extraction once every 20 seconds in your rotation to keep up major brutality.

Masel

Koensol wrote: »

Why not use power extraction and reverse slice? This will make you an AoE beast while at the same time having free major brutality without having to use pots on cd.

Trap, caltrops, endless hail, brawler, power extraction a couple of times and then reverse slice until everything is dead. Maybe even add in a dawnbreaker here and there. You will absolutely nuke trash and still have good single target dps. You can use power extraction once every 20 seconds in your rotation to keep up major brutality.

AoE is already great, no point in sacrificing single target for even more. Weapon power potions are quite cheap to be honest...

Asardes

I actually use a 2H setup on my StamDK because the class lacks an execute and molten armaments buff synergizes pretty well with the forceful and follow up passives as well as the reverse slice skill. I also love the burst heal from rally, and the fact it provides brutality without the use of potions as well as the mitigation from brawler. Gear setup is 5 Briarheart (body), 5/4 VO (front bar 2H, jewels, shoulders) and Maelstrom bow backbar with a monster head (Slimercraw, Kena or Kra'gh). I can't really brag about scores since I only completed the arena about 10 times on this char but it does offer very good sustain, survival and burst damage.

Bar setup is:
Reverse Slice | Venom Claw | Brawler | Rally | Camouflaged Hunter | Flawless Dawnbreaker
Poison Injection | Endless Hail | Resolving Vigor | Spiked Armor | Molten Armaments | Corrosive Armor

I could probably drop Rally and Camo Hunter to use trap and noxious breath there instead if I switched to potions but I still can't remember most spawn points, I sometimes get CCd and eat AoEs so I really need that burst heal ready. I run Serpent for the time being because I burn so much stamina healing, dodging and breaking CC but Lover or Warrior would boost DPS.

So it's not ideal for pulling top scores, but surviving and running cheaply (dropped pots, low repair costs) when you aren't very experienced yet. I could only get about 460K thus far (I barely break 500K on mag sorc anyway) so probably more experienced players could do far more.

Koensol

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Why not use power extraction and reverse slice? This will make you an AoE beast while at the same time having free major brutality without having to use pots on cd.

Trap, caltrops, endless hail, brawler, power extraction a couple of times and then reverse slice until everything is dead. Maybe even add in a dawnbreaker here and there. You will absolutely nuke trash and still have good single target dps. You can use power extraction once every 20 seconds in your rotation to keep up major brutality.

AoE is already great, no point in sacrificing single target for even more. Weapon power potions are quite cheap to be honest...

You will not lose single target dps by adding reverse slice and power extraction to your build. What else would you use in your flex spot? You don''t really have any more dots to use. I would highly recommend using an AoE spammable in your setup, if you are playing dungeons/trials that is. I agree it is not needed for vMA and you would be better of using mirage. Reverse slice is also better than killer's blade imo. It starts scaling a lot earlier, and has added AoE that hits like a truck.

Also interesting that you put trap on front bar. Did you do it for the added weap dmg? I haven't tested it but isn't it better to put down trap asap when you start rotation om back bar to get the max benefit from the crit dmg?

Overall really nice build. I love using 2h in PvE as well and I play it on NB too. Definatelly will try out briarheart! What do you think of a briarheart+spriggans setup? I don't have raid gear yet.

Masel

Koensol wrote: »

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Why not use power extraction and reverse slice? This will make you an AoE beast while at the same time having free major brutality without having to use pots on cd.

Trap, caltrops, endless hail, brawler, power extraction a couple of times and then reverse slice until everything is dead. Maybe even add in a dawnbreaker here and there. You will absolutely nuke trash and still have good single target dps. You can use power extraction once every 20 seconds in your rotation to keep up major brutality.

AoE is already great, no point in sacrificing single target for even more. Weapon power potions are quite cheap to be honest...

You will not lose single target dps by adding reverse slice and power extraction to your build. What else would you use in your flex spot? You don''t really have any more dots to use. I would highly recommend using an AoE spammable in your setup, if you are playing dungeons/trials that is. I agree it is not needed for vMA and you would be better of using mirage. Reverse slice is also better than killer's blade imo. It starts scaling a lot earlier, and has added AoE that hits like a truck.

Also interesting that you put trap on front bar. Did you do it for the added weap dmg? I haven't tested it but isn't it better to put down trap asap when you start rotation om back bar to get the max benefit from the crit dmg?

Overall really nice build. I love using 2h in PvE as well and I play it on NB too. Definatelly will try out briarheart! What do you think of a briarheart+spriggans setup? I don't have raid gear yet.

If you dont want to run potions you'll also need the major critical buff, so you'd have to slot evil hunter...

And yes you sacrifice single target DPS. AoE ability on your back bar doesn't make sense, it'll onyl drain your stamina. in trash mobs heavy atatck weave brawler and put hail and caltrops down. Cant get more AoE than that. Power extraction is a waste, rather slot Rally then....

Masel

Couple more parses:

6m Dummy together with a stamplar friend with Sunderflame and PotL:

Kanar

I like 2handed for my stamDK too. Both for vMA and group PvE. The execute is really nice especially along with poison arrow. Onslaught with battle roar look like it would be great in vMA but I've had trouble making it work; I think it would require a lot of mesmerizing exact hit combos for many mobs so the finishing blow will always be onslaught. I've went back to flawless DB.

Koensol

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Why not use power extraction and reverse slice? This will make you an AoE beast while at the same time having free major brutality without having to use pots on cd.

Trap, caltrops, endless hail, brawler, power extraction a couple of times and then reverse slice until everything is dead. Maybe even add in a dawnbreaker here and there. You will absolutely nuke trash and still have good single target dps. You can use power extraction once every 20 seconds in your rotation to keep up major brutality.

AoE is already great, no point in sacrificing single target for even more. Weapon power potions are quite cheap to be honest...

You will not lose single target dps by adding reverse slice and power extraction to your build. What else would you use in your flex spot? You don''t really have any more dots to use. I would highly recommend using an AoE spammable in your setup, if you are playing dungeons/trials that is. I agree it is not needed for vMA and you would be better of using mirage. Reverse slice is also better than killer's blade imo. It starts scaling a lot earlier, and has added AoE that hits like a truck.

Also interesting that you put trap on front bar. Did you do it for the added weap dmg? I haven't tested it but isn't it better to put down trap asap when you start rotation om back bar to get the max benefit from the crit dmg?

Overall really nice build. I love using 2h in PvE as well and I play it on NB too. Definatelly will try out briarheart! What do you think of a briarheart+spriggans setup? I don't have raid gear yet.

If you dont want to run potions you'll also need the major critical buff, so you'd have to slot evil hunter...

And yes you sacrifice single target DPS. AoE ability on your back bar doesn't make sense, it'll onyl drain your stamina. in trash mobs heavy atatck weave brawler and put hail and caltrops down. Cant get more AoE than that. Power extraction is a waste, rather slot Rally then....

Isn't power extraction basically the replacement of steel tornado? DW builds run that all the time. I suppose heavy attack kind of makes up for it though, even when light attack weave power extraction nets me more AoE damage than heavy attack weaving brawler. Plus it gets you extra ult from siphoning passive.

But I'd be willing to drop it if I have a good skill to put there as alternative. Im interested what abilities do you run on your flex spot in trials/dungeons?

Masel

Koensol wrote: »

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Why not use power extraction and reverse slice? This will make you an AoE beast while at the same time having free major brutality without having to use pots on cd.

Trap, caltrops, endless hail, brawler, power extraction a couple of times and then reverse slice until everything is dead. Maybe even add in a dawnbreaker here and there. You will absolutely nuke trash and still have good single target dps. You can use power extraction once every 20 seconds in your rotation to keep up major brutality.

AoE is already great, no point in sacrificing single target for even more. Weapon power potions are quite cheap to be honest...

You will not lose single target dps by adding reverse slice and power extraction to your build. What else would you use in your flex spot? You don''t really have any more dots to use. I would highly recommend using an AoE spammable in your setup, if you are playing dungeons/trials that is. I agree it is not needed for vMA and you would be better of using mirage. Reverse slice is also better than killer's blade imo. It starts scaling a lot earlier, and has added AoE that hits like a truck.

Also interesting that you put trap on front bar. Did you do it for the added weap dmg? I haven't tested it but isn't it better to put down trap asap when you start rotation om back bar to get the max benefit from the crit dmg?

Overall really nice build. I love using 2h in PvE as well and I play it on NB too. Definatelly will try out briarheart! What do you think of a briarheart+spriggans setup? I don't have raid gear yet.

If you dont want to run potions you'll also need the major critical buff, so you'd have to slot evil hunter...

And yes you sacrifice single target DPS. AoE ability on your back bar doesn't make sense, it'll onyl drain your stamina. in trash mobs heavy atatck weave brawler and put hail and caltrops down. Cant get more AoE than that. Power extraction is a waste, rather slot Rally then....

Isn't power extraction basically the replacement of steel tornado? DW builds run that all the time. I suppose heavy attack kind of makes up for it though, even when light attack weave power extraction nets me more AoE damage than heavy attack weaving brawler. But I'd be willing to drop it if I have a good skill to put there as alternative. Im interested what abilities do you run on your flex spot in trials/dungeons?

Vigor/Mirage. Mirage is a great mitigation skill. But if you prefer power extraction and using that, then you can ofc do that, this is just meant as an example of how you can do it to max out single target damage

Koensol

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Masel92 wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

Why not use power extraction and reverse slice? This will make you an AoE beast while at the same time having free major brutality without having to use pots on cd.

Trap, caltrops, endless hail, brawler, power extraction a couple of times and then reverse slice until everything is dead. Maybe even add in a dawnbreaker here and there. You will absolutely nuke trash and still have good single target dps. You can use power extraction once every 20 seconds in your rotation to keep up major brutality.

AoE is already great, no point in sacrificing single target for even more. Weapon power potions are quite cheap to be honest...

You will not lose single target dps by adding reverse slice and power extraction to your build. What else would you use in your flex spot? You don''t really have any more dots to use. I would highly recommend using an AoE spammable in your setup, if you are playing dungeons/trials that is. I agree it is not needed for vMA and you would be better of using mirage. Reverse slice is also better than killer's blade imo. It starts scaling a lot earlier, and has added AoE that hits like a truck.

Also interesting that you put trap on front bar. Did you do it for the added weap dmg? I haven't tested it but isn't it better to put down trap asap when you start rotation om back bar to get the max benefit from the crit dmg?

Overall really nice build. I love using 2h in PvE as well and I play it on NB too. Definatelly will try out briarheart! What do you think of a briarheart+spriggans setup? I don't have raid gear yet.

If you dont want to run potions you'll also need the major critical buff, so you'd have to slot evil hunter...

And yes you sacrifice single target DPS. AoE ability on your back bar doesn't make sense, it'll onyl drain your stamina. in trash mobs heavy atatck weave brawler and put hail and caltrops down. Cant get more AoE than that. Power extraction is a waste, rather slot Rally then....

Isn't power extraction basically the replacement of steel tornado? DW builds run that all the time. I suppose heavy attack kind of makes up for it though, even when light attack weave power extraction nets me more AoE damage than heavy attack weaving brawler. But I'd be willing to drop it if I have a good skill to put there as alternative. Im interested what abilities do you run on your flex spot in trials/dungeons?

Vigor/Mirage. Mirage is a great mitigation skill. But if you prefer power extraction and using that, then you can ofc do that, this is just meant as an example of how you can do it to max out single target damage

Yea I understand, I'm just kind of using you to bounce off my ideas to get a broader perspective. Not many times you meet 2h NB's in pve

dickeybarret

@Masel92 you've done it again. Just as I was looking for a strange stam build to mess about with this patch here you are. Now to lvl a nb.

Qbiken

Didn´t see the charged trait anywhere....was dissapointed xD

But for real, nice build, will probably try this one out

Masel

Qbiken wrote: »

Didn´t see the charged trait anywhere....was dissapointed xD

But for real, nice build, will probably try this one out

It is so much fun! Updated it with a few more parses here... If everything goes right you can do very good damage.

Downside is that you might have Elitist idiots calling you out for using a 2h, But as soon as they see my parses, they usually shut up.

andro21

I was looking for a 2h sword and bow build for stamblade. Finding this was interesting, but i don't have any dlcs or morrowind. How can a base game player use this sort of build? What subs could be made?

Asardes

You could go for 5 Hunding or NMG + 5 Vicious Ophidian + 1 monster set that gives you weapon damage/critical.

fantomas

I've been levelling a 2h/bow stamblade in PVE and having fun with it. @Masel92 I'm wondering if any of the patches since Dec and further playing has caused you to make any changes to your build?

mr_wazzabi

@masel92 how do you sustain with 1k recovery and no vicious ophidian?

I have 2k recovery and still ran out of stam. Don't have VO so will farm for it.

mr_wazzabi

@masel92 any chance you'll update this build for Summerset?

SmellyUnlimited

I’m guessing sustain may be influenced by Battle Rush (2H passive - 30% increased stam regen after a kill).

VO is great, but I’ve found that even with it I need to work in some heavy attacks in on VMA to properly sustain (only tried with DW though).

With Nightblade burst, it’s possible to have a good uptime with Battle Rush, which turns that 1k regen into 1300. I think as long as you don’t sprint (which you shouldn’t outside of a few stages)since that outright stops your regen, it’s totally doable.

mr_wazzabi

SmellyUnlimited wrote: »

I’m guessing sustain may be influenced by Battle Rush (2H passive - 30% increased stam regen after a kill).

VO is great, but I’ve found that even with it I need to work in some heavy attacks in on VMA to properly sustain (only tried with DW though).

With Nightblade burst, it’s possible to have a good uptime with Battle Rush, which turns that 1k regen into 1300. I think as long as you don’t sprint (which you shouldn’t outside of a few stages)since that outright stops your regen, it’s totally doable.

I just use dubious camoran throne with vo. Blue food got me killed in there.