- Assassination >> Lotus Fan
The skill appears to be buffed meaningfully PvE wise.
PvP wise just in a live server it is possible to have an idea about this changement but surely it seems a good improvement.- Assassination >> Pressure Points
I'll wait for EU characters to be copied since I can't properly check values compared to live server (craftable sets and legendary crafting improvements not available on Templates).- Shadow >> Shadow Cloak and morphs
The changement is something we can deal with but the ability to remove DoT effects is quite vital for a class that lacks a direct heal, damage shield and a proper defensive tool/skill. I prefer the live server Dark Cloak all the time both for magicka and stamina NB.
To compensate for this, the duration could be improved by 1-2 seconds, so also the suppression of damage over time effects.
Both morphs are finally now interesting, since they both have the same effect with an offensive option and a defensive one, good job.
The real problem, PvP wise, is instead the changement of Magelight that negates completely a core mechanic of this class making it unpersonalized.
Many players selected this class because of a specific and iconic archetype (both in MMORPGs and TES games) that is completely eliminated by a skill (Magelight), that was already good without this new extra function.
Losing the interest into an archetype means no fun and it has obvious consequences: some players will switch class, while the players most loyal and passionate of NB will adapt or quit.
Because of Magelight, not just Cloak is affected - negated but also the passive Master Assassin (NB), the ability to stun using Concealed Weapon/Surprise Attack, the passive Stealthy (Bosmer and Khajiit), the Vampire ultimate Clouding Swarm.
As you can see the consequent effects of Magelight are a cascade that involves not just a skill but several ones and an entire mechanic.
But for players changing class or quitting, this changement could have a simple consequence PvP wise: more players ganking using long ranged skills. As you can imagine this effect can lead to the exact opposite of reducing that kind of gameplay and so we will have more discussions and flames in game and forum.
The checks that Magelight does, probably spammed by the majority of players, I presume should be not few.
Performance wise I hope it won't be an issue on live servers.
The last thing I can say about is: Magelight should work at most for sneak and not for invisibility, there is already Flare and many other counters to Cloak.
Maybe, for players not aware of it, you can add a tooltip that explains to use counters like AoE damage skills, Revealing Flare and morphs, Piercing Mark, detection potions, etc.
If you really want to add something able to negate invisibility at all, you should keep the approach you had for Damage Shields with Shield Breaker: create a set with a specific bonus against invisibility.
A set is infact a trade off: I want to bypass damage shields, ok I use a set that is limited and less powerfull than other ones but it has a specific ability - use.
Magelight is instead not a trade off, since it's already a core skill used in many magicka builds in PvP and in every magicka build in PvE.
The fact it grants Empower (as it was already some patches ago) and that is no more a toggled skill are already a great buff. Last but not least, the chance to get Empower using this skill will further encourage the ganking gameplay from ranged.
There are many coherent and complete feedbacks in this topic and other ones about this matter, so I don't have to add much more.- Shadow >> Path of Darkness and morphs
This is an huge buff, I'd say even too much since it wasn't necessary.- Shadow >> Manifestation of Terror
This morph is a bit more interesting but fear reduced to 1 target and the fact that enemies can see these traps make again Mass Hysteria the clear winner.
But for soloing in PvE (vs mobs not immune to fear), Manifestation of Terror is still the weak morph of Aspect of Terror and there isn't a real choice.
Making traps not visible to enemies could make this more appealing in PvP, but the chance to fear just 1 target is still an huge negativity; at least 2 targets could be an idea or maybe more target on spot and 1 with the ranged trap (or vice versa).- Siphoning >> Funnel Health
This changement is in line with other changements on the healing side in general and for other classes; for healer magicka NB is surely an huge nerf.
Damage and/or healing provided could be increased because of this reason.
I'd say to make Swallow Soul the offensive one with more damage dealt + less healing and Funnel Health the defensive one with an additional target healed (character + 1 group member as it is in PTS) and more healing but less damage done. Doing so a magicka dd would go for the first, while an healer for the second one.- Siphoning >> Debilitate
The unlimited ammount of targets makes this morph really interesting, even if it could become too strong.
Both PvE and PvP wise is really solid.
One of the two morphs of Cripple could become a stamina one dealing poison/disease damage: this would provide stamina NB a class DoT that is missing at the moment.- Siphoning >> Siphoning Attacks
The changement is quite a big issue for NB tanks especially.
In this topic there are many feedbacks by players more competent than me for tanking, so better if you check those.
For stamina and magicka NB (dd and healer) is a big changement as well.
Before resources were too much, now the skill is not really good.
Probably something in the middle would balance it, like increasing the chances on non-basic attacks or the stamina/magicka restored.- Siphoning >> Catalyst
NB is able to generate really a lot of ultimate, it was unexpected this buff.
Probably this passive would be better if providing less Ultimate but granting another effect or granting directly something else.
A reduction on the cooldown for potions or a damage shield upon use a potion or an increased healing from potions could be something good to balance the lack of a direct healing skill.
Otherwise it can become a bonus to healing received, then with Swallow Soul changing into something different as morph (like I suggested before to make it the offensive morph of Strife).- Nightblade >> general - other
Stamina morphs Killer's Blade and Power Extraction should change their damage type into poison, disease or physical.
Assassin's Will of at least one morph (Relentless Focus would be better) should deal poison, disease or physical damage.
All NB ultimates dealing damage use magic damage so, considering Champion System, magicka Nb is better than stamina NB: instead of making a morph dealing poison, disease or physical damage you should overlook this for every class and also for Fighters Guild's skills.
A solution could be two new stars just for Ultimates: Mighty and Elemental Expert just increase basic attacks and skills, Melee Weapon Expert becomes Weapon Expert adding also bow within the weapons, Bow Expert is replaced by a new star that increase just the damage and healing of Ultimates.
Expert Defender then can reduce the damage of light/heavy attacks and Ultimates.
As shown by the nerfing of Dragon Knights and the introduction of a set of gear like Shield Breaker, I think it's safe to assume that common sense in regard to balance is not something we will find at ZOS.Has anyone tested how magelight works against clouding swarm yet?
I tested it carefully with @Xeniph (thanks mate) and Magelight breaks Clouding Swarm.
According to the description, invisibility should be granted if broken but your are simple removed from invisibility.
The damages is dealt regularly (less if you are a NB and Bosmer/Khajiit obviously) but this Ultimate loses its function.
If you cast Magelight before, Clouding Swarm can still be used but you don't enter invisibility at all.
I'll report it separetely as a bug since here it's not pertinent but surely Magelight should be deeply reviewed because it negates the core NB mechanic (stun from Surprise Attack/Concealed weapon obviously doesn't work), 1 NB passive, 1 Racial passive (Stealthy) and 1 Ultimate.
There is no skill doing something similar to other mechanics.
Flare is fine what it does but Magelight shouldn't have the chance to negate invisibility, maybe just reveal sneaking targets.
An option is to reduce the time when you can't use invisibility to 2-3 seconds but it's a changement that wouldn't work because Magelight costs really few and you can keep using it.
What suggested by Xeniph, to consider this effect like a CC, so giving immunity, can be another solid option.
The changements to Cloak are fine, we can deal with them.
Magelight as it is now instead ruins completely a class in PvP and its mechanic.
But for this it grants too much in a single skill and for too few magicka used.
The big problem of many whiners is that they consider gankers just NBs but there are builds with other classes even more effective to gank.
The issue we had was the spammability of Cloak of magicka NB not the mechanic itself.
A cost based on % max magicka (so stamina NB are not screwed) and an increased cost upon use would have been a lot better.
Cloak was able and is able on live server to be countered by many skills, if a player doesn't use them, he/she should avoid to complain.
Instead Magelight completely negate a mechanic, it's not a simple counter.
Flare makes sense instead because is designed for that and only that but Magelight no because it's used for a Major buff and a buff to magicka or for a Major buff and a defense against sneaking targets.
It's a skill already used by many for these reasons only, it can't provide something such huge as extra.
Compensate NB with something else defensive wise? No, it would be another class.
What is required to be changed is this new function of Magelight.
I'll write later a feedback on the other changements we got as NB.
Lava_Croft wrote: »As shown by the nerfing of Dragon Knights and the introduction of a set of gear like Shield Breaker, I think it's safe to assume that common sense in regard to balance is not something we will find at ZOS.Has anyone tested how magelight works against clouding swarm yet?
I tested it carefully with @Xeniph (thanks mate) and Magelight breaks Clouding Swarm.
According to the description, invisibility should be granted if broken but your are simple removed from invisibility.
The damages is dealt regularly (less if you are a NB and Bosmer/Khajiit obviously) but this Ultimate loses its function.
If you cast Magelight before, Clouding Swarm can still be used but you don't enter invisibility at all.
I'll report it separetely as a bug since here it's not pertinent but surely Magelight should be deeply reviewed because it negates the core NB mechanic (stun from Surprise Attack/Concealed weapon obviously doesn't work), 1 NB passive, 1 Racial passive (Stealthy) and 1 Ultimate.
There is no skill doing something similar to other mechanics.
Flare is fine what it does but Magelight shouldn't have the chance to negate invisibility, maybe just reveal sneaking targets.
An option is to reduce the time when you can't use invisibility to 2-3 seconds but it's a changement that wouldn't work because Magelight costs really few and you can keep using it.
What suggested by Xeniph, to consider this effect like a CC, so giving immunity, can be another solid option.
The changements to Cloak are fine, we can deal with them.
Magelight as it is now instead ruins completely a class in PvP and its mechanic.
But for this it grants too much in a single skill and for too few magicka used.
The big problem of many whiners is that they consider gankers just NBs but there are builds with other classes even more effective to gank.
The issue we had was the spammability of Cloak of magicka NB not the mechanic itself.
A cost based on % max magicka (so stamina NB are not screwed) and an increased cost upon use would have been a lot better.
Cloak was able and is able on live server to be countered by many skills, if a player doesn't use them, he/she should avoid to complain.
Instead Magelight completely negate a mechanic, it's not a simple counter.
Flare makes sense instead because is designed for that and only that but Magelight no because it's used for a Major buff and a buff to magicka or for a Major buff and a defense against sneaking targets.
It's a skill already used by many for these reasons only, it can't provide something such huge as extra.
Compensate NB with something else defensive wise? No, it would be another class.
What is required to be changed is this new function of Magelight.
I'll write later a feedback on the other changements we got as NB.
The real question is, would you vote Trump or Wrobel?
Clearly these things were made because of the near constant complaints about NB's in PvP... I'll be curious to see how this pans out once it goes Live. Because it seems to me that some of the biggest complaints about NB's have been addressed with these changes and NB's are just complaining because they won't be able to remain as OP anymore. Although, it does appear that any builds based upon Magicka will walk away just fine, I think a lot of these changes will hurt Stamina builds the most.
sabresandiego_ESO wrote: »The changes to magelight are fantastic. Stealth and invisibility are far too overpowered in pvp, and extremely cheesy playstyle that requires little to no skill. Spamming cloak is far too strong of an escape, and combat reset. The patch looks great so far.
Good players will adapt, there is MUCH more to the nightblade class than cloak and stealth. There is an opportunity cost to running magelight, and even with magelight cloak/stealth are useful. Finally there is a counter to cheese gameplay.
Bravo to zenimax. Swim in tears to the whiners who cannot adapt to a game who's balance mechanics will always be evolving.
dwemer_paleologist wrote: »my nightblade is now perminantly shelved, untill probably forever.
now using my dragonight. and if they keep on destroying stealth then ill be gone and done with eso.
and just like perfect world mmo and all the others mmo's ive played, once im gone there aint no callin me back.
and i willing to bet you 75% of eso players right now are the same way.
sabresandiego_ESO wrote: »The changes to magelight are fantastic. Stealth and invisibility are far too overpowered in pvp, and extremely cheesy playstyle that requires little to no skill. Spamming cloak is far too strong of an escape, and combat reset. The patch looks great so far.
Good players will adapt, there is MUCH more to the nightblade class than cloak and stealth. There is an opportunity cost to running magelight, and even with magelight cloak/stealth are useful. Finally there is a counter to cheese gameplay.
Bravo to zenimax. Swim in tears to the whiners who cannot adapt to a game who's balance mechanics will always be evolving.
sabresandiego_ESO wrote: »dwemer_paleologist wrote: »my nightblade is now perminantly shelved, untill probably forever.
now using my dragonight. and if they keep on destroying stealth then ill be gone and done with eso.
and just like perfect world mmo and all the others mmo's ive played, once im gone there aint no callin me back.
and i willing to bet you 75% of eso players right now are the same way.
If they destroy stealth? Why do you rely on a mechanic that requires absolutely no skill. If you cant get free kills on unsuspecting opponents who get immediately stunned and killed with no chance to fight back, youll quit?
How about improving your skill so that you can actually fight a real battle where your opponent can fight back, without relying on some sort of stealth cheese one shot.
sabresandiego_ESO wrote: »dwemer_paleologist wrote: »my nightblade is now perminantly shelved, untill probably forever.
now using my dragonight. and if they keep on destroying stealth then ill be gone and done with eso.
and just like perfect world mmo and all the others mmo's ive played, once im gone there aint no callin me back.
and i willing to bet you 75% of eso players right now are the same way.
If they destroy stealth? Why do you rely on a mechanic that requires absolutely no skill. If you cant get free kills on unsuspecting opponents who get immediately stunned and killed with no chance to fight back, youll quit?
How about improving your skill so that you can actually fight a real battle where your opponent can fight back, without relying on some sort of stealth cheese one shot.
How do you know why he joined ESO in the first place? Maybe it was a stealthy rogue type class that drew him in. He would have every right to be annoyed that the playstyle he liked is effected by these changes. If >50% of players are gonna run this new magelight that playstyle isn't really viable anymore. Your gonna see alot more stamblades switch to snipers and magblades picking up a destro staff.
Strider_Roshin wrote: »I actually don't mind the minor protection that's applied to dark cloak, but the duration is too short for it to be properly utilized by stamina Nightblades. I think if it were to be increased to 8 seconds at rank 4, it would be decent. At it's current state I'll be taking 8% less damage from 1 attack on average. Two attacks if I'm lucky.
Pretty much agree here. The changes to cloak are "ok", they hurt, but it's not playstle breaking.
Very sad about the nerf to Funnel Health
Will miss the utility I could offer to group play with some extra healing while DPSing
(guess this must have been a huge issue I was not aware of at all, if it got nerfed)
Very sad about the nerf to Funnel Health
Will miss the utility I could offer to group play with some extra healing while DPSing
(guess this must have been a huge issue I was not aware of at all, if it got nerfed)
AddictionX wrote: »I am very happy with magelight being the way it is... the swarms got their counter finally, no more invisibility while the zerg pops x10 swarms with steel tornado unable to damage these players for the duration of the ultimate... its not a tanking ultimate...its a dps ultimate... Imagine if my corrosive armor ticked for 4k each second while capping incoming attacks at 3 percent.
No more resetting the battle x10 times(till you get lucky) and purging all of my dots with an Escape skill... thats supposed to help you escape... Even your own NBs are kinda happy all of you that made the NB class look bad will be forced to adapt...
The reason its cheap cause it shouldnt be limited for magicka builds only... thats probably the intention of it staying that way.
Pretty much agree here. The changes to cloak are "ok", they hurt, but it's not playstle breaking.
I dunno, it may alter my play style a bit along with a few others in PvP. If I can't get a purge from a groupmate during a siege, I'll be forced away from the front lines (or my siege weapon) for a longer period of time while I "spam" the cloak until the DOT(s) expire(s). The simple answer is to slot Purge, but unless I am a MagBlade, I can only get one or two casts of it before my magicka is gone. There is no stamina-based purge in the game that I am aware of.
So as I said, it will alter the play styles of some people. Might break it, might not. I know I'm going to get quite a bit more angsty with my group's healers in PvP if they aren't helping me cleanse siege DoTs when I'm hit with them. To me, the cloak "nerf" is a pain in the neck. I'll live, but I won't like/enjoy having to burn half my magicka or all but hug the healers of my group to purge negative status effects.
AddictionX wrote: »I am very happy with magelight being the way it is... the swarms got their counter finally, no more invisibility while the zerg pops x10 swarms with steel tornado unable to damage these players for the duration of the ultimate... its not a tanking ultimate...its a dps ultimate... Imagine if my corrosive armor ticked for 4k each second while capping incoming attacks at 3 percent.
No more resetting the battle x10 times(till you get lucky) and purging all of my dots with an Escape skill... thats supposed to help you escape... Even your own NBs are kinda happy all of you that made the NB class look bad will be forced to adapt...
The reason its cheap cause it shouldnt be limited for magicka builds only... thats probably the intention of it staying that way.