Magblades - Do you use Impale?

NagualV

Curious to know what fellow magblades/everyone else thinks/does. Feel free to include why/why not/when.

TheCaptainJosh

NO

Being that this is the pvp forum, I will say no. Impale can be dodged and is borderline useless against stam builds (roll dodge+hots=not worth). In the current meta magblade is shoehorned into three builds:

1. high HP regen vamp with zaan and vateshran staff- impale is worthless here, as your procs kill for you and the skill itself will hit like a wet noodle
2. light armor proc cannon- if built correctly, you don't need impale because your opponent will already be dead (flame blossom+caluurion+balorgh+soul harvest will delete players unless they are built tanky; there is a surprising amount of <25k hp builds in bgs and open world)
3. bomber- your goal is to kill groups of people in three attacks max. using a single target execute is a bad idea on this spec

I have seen impale used on gankers and brawler builds with success, but I believe that these are exceptions

WhyEvenTry

SOMETIMES/SITUATIONALLY

I only use it when I’m bored and want to handicap myself even more by wasting a slot on that terrible ability.

If you’re ganking like 99% of magblades then I guess you can slot it if you want to, just incase your procs don’t kill them.

1vx: No, don’t use it it’s terrible. Execute at 25% hp as a projectile means it is easily dodged since when you get someone that low odds are they start rolling and healing to get out of execute range.

Bgs: Still bad. It can be ok for stealing the odd kill here or there, but again people will be rolling and healing at that hp% so it will rarely land. If you really want an execute use ele ring. It’s aoe, brp destro is strong, and the execute works decently well.

Gilvoth

SOMETIMES/SITUATIONALLY

this is only my guess: but, i think it doesn't do well because the server does not register that an enemy is below 25% Heath at the very moment i need it to land or i try to cast it.
your in lagg, and so is your enemy, so it simply does not proc when you need it to.
in addition to that, when i did see it go off, it did Not do 300% more damage, the damage was more like 10% Damage.
but again, that is just my guess. because it always seems to be perfect time for it to execute the 300% more damage to enemies below 25% Heath, yet even tho i can clearly see he is below that 25% it doesn't seem to go off. so i have gave up.

fred4

YES

I slot Impale instead of Merciless Resolve. Most players probably do the opposite. I run Caluurion and Zaan. Yeah, Impale is weak in that type of build, but so is everything and, contrary to popular opinion, procs don't do the entire work for you. I also play a stamblade. Time to kill on a stat-based stamblade ganker is as good or better than on a Caluurion plus Zaan magblade. Either way you have to work for a kill against decent opponents.

It's swings and roundabouts. Merciless is better burst, but if that shielding sorc, who is in execute range, is streaking away from you (not BoL for the sake of the argument), then spamming Impale IMO works better as you may eventually get them. There is synergy with Caluurion in those situations, e.g. when that procs during Impale spam.

Aside from that I play in IC a lot and Impale is useful when you solo a boss.

tsaescishoeshiner

NO

I found the timing for Impale too slow to hold it until I see the enemy is low on health, and the fact that it's a dodgeable projectile made it unreliable as part of a burst combo for me. Using it requires predicting when your opponent will pop under 25% health, since it doesn't scale gradually with their low health like Executioner does, which I think starts out-damaging a spammable at 30-something percent health.

So this means you have rely on actually landing an ult or Assassin's Will, which I find makes it not worth the skill slot. Using Swallow Soul or Concealed Blade wound up hitting more killing blows for me than Impale, but I run War Maiden's + New Moon Acolyte + Wild Hunt (no invis), so I don't need to depend on the bonus execute damage like a tankier nightblade would. On my bar, I currently use Ele Drain where Impale would be.

I think it's interesting that some builds find it helpful or even necessary, while others can't seem to find any use for it.

exeeter702

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

I found the timing for Impale too slow to hold it until I see the enemy is low on health, and the fact that it's a dodgeable projectile made it unreliable as part of a burst combo for me. Using it requires predicting when your opponent will pop under 25% health, since it doesn't scale gradually with their low health like Executioner does, which I think starts out-damaging a spammable at 30-something percent health.

So this means you have rely on actually landing an ult or Assassin's Will, which I find makes it not worth the skill slot. Using Swallow Soul or Concealed Blade wound up hitting more killing blows for me than Impale, but I run War Maiden's + New Moon Acolyte + Wild Hunt (no invis), so I don't need to depend on the bonus execute damage like a tankier nightblade would. On my bar, I currently use Ele Drain where Impale would be.

I think it's interesting that some builds find it helpful or even necessary, while others can't seem to find any use for it.

War maiden + new moon and not using shadowy disguise. What kind of potatoes are you fighting and where can I find them.

Hamboot

NO

Of ALL the skills that exist in ESO impale is by FAR the most unreliable, it's every easily doged only works at 25% and is way too slow, is there any execute worst than impale? maybe it works in pve but certainly not in PvP, I think impale should work like jesus beam at 50% hp reduce the range but pls god just make it work at 50% it's way too unreliable in PvP

Hamboot

NO

I mean even stamblade use executioner that's jus how bad killer blade is.

Gorilla

YES

I use it in the current meta because with all the various procs and low health resistances, I sometimes need something to ensure healers etc die. I agree with all the criticisms above...sometimes, however, it's just necessary.

JayKwellen

NO

Nope.

Aside from Impale being a slow, audible, easy to dodge projectile that only works <25% health (the exact moment everyone starts to dodge and heal which means your slow, audible, easy to dodge projectile will get dodged and they'll be above 25% health by the next GCD), where would I put it?

Magblades have so many barebones abilities that there's simply no space for it on the bar once I slot in all the "required" stuff. Anything that gets sacrificed for Impale is going to be something that will be sorely missed. It's just not worth it to me, especially when you can already use your spectral bow as a pseudo-execute.

EmEm_Oh

SOMETIMES/SITUATIONALLY

Gilvoth wrote: »

this is only my guess: but, i think it doesn't do well because the server does not register that an enemy is below 25% Heath at the very moment i need it to land or i try to cast it.
your in lagg, and so is your enemy, so it simply does not proc when you need it to.
in addition to that, when i did see it go off, it did Not do 300% more damage, the damage was more like 10% Damage.
but again, that is just my guess. because it always seems to be perfect time for it to execute the 300% more damage to enemies below 25% Heath, yet even tho i can clearly see he is below that 25% it doesn't seem to go off. so i have gave up.

Yeah, the info on the Impale is misleading. Probably like 300% when you get somebody down to like...1% health. Otherwise, it's very situational, and I hardly use it.

Zabulus

As à magblade....
I rerolled stam blade, and I'm not using impale.
Hope it helps ^^

WabanakiWarrior

SOMETIMES/SITUATIONALLY

Only time I would slot it would be on a gank build. It's mostly useless in a stand up fight. Devastating when used in a ganky burst combo though. I used to love one shot ganking on that broken build from a couple patches ago (ele weapon ->light attack -> soul harvest -> impale), the few that escaped usually attempted to dodge roll away at 10% health just to get impaled in the face from range

exeeter702

One thing I want to stress though is there has historically been this misconception that impale has a trajectory duration that results in it being reactable mid flight.

This is actually not true. Most of the time, it being dodged is due to the target roll dodging as an immediate response to a burst combo or gank attempt, naturally. Impale is an instant cast ability that resolves instantly if the criteria is met for its use (target is in range, targetable, and user has the resource to afford the cast). The client side animation of the ability is not indicative of how the server treats the skill In terms of recipients on the recieving end. This is why many think that if you "block cancel" it, the damage is dealt quicker because the combat text appears sooner on your screen, than if you let the ability animate, for which the combat text will appear slightly later when the impale would connect to the target naturally. Again this is only a client side illusion and has no bearing on the recipient's end.

The moment impale is casted on a target, the server handles the rest, ie is target in range, was a crit rolled, mitigation calculation, were they in a block state or dodge state etc etc.

That last one, dodge, is the main culprit here is far more problematic than most realize. Heres why..

The issue with NB is that, as most people know, most of their kill potential is telegraphed and lined up. The reason other classes work so much better is that they have mechanisms to help them deliver damage within less GCDs via delayed damage delivery or channel and cast times that conclude at the start of the next GCD for which an isntant cast ability is thrown out, allowing damage from separate skills to "meet in the middle" so to speak.

NBs dont exactly have this luxury inherent to their kit. So when they attempt to line up their damage, the only thing they have is a stun and 1 gcd per damage source (his is why magblade is so desperately reliant on proc sets to even work as a damage dealer in pvp). As most who pvp already know, there are extremely few situations in this game where you actively decide to "take the stun" and chose not to break free. One such situation is that you were stunned collaterally and not in any immediate focused threat and dont want to waste the stamina, or you just blew a strong defensive ult and know that you can take the hit and need the stamina for something more worthwhile in the following moments. But most of the time, if you dont break free you are dead. And if you let a nb get their entire combo on you in a stun, you are especially dead. Point being is that 99.9 percent of the time when you get feared or stunned by a nb, you are breaking free and rolling or blocking.

If we look at magblade, the spec that would likely use impale if any one. After a stun, you need 3 GCDs to get bow proc ult and impale out. The reason this sucks so much is that as mentioned above about dodging, the state of dodge covers a single GCD in duration. So nb stuns, break free ensues and the follow up is dodged, and likely by that point, impale will be ineffective due to the 25 percent threshold being missed.

Impale simply has no place on a class that otherwise really only has, at best, 2 GCDs AFTER a stun to get any meaningful damage out, between an already telegraphed ult and the telegraphed 5 attack requirement on assassins will that shouts "get ready, my damage is coming soon!" But otherwise offers additional utility at the very least, there is zero room for a 25 percent execute.

With ALL that being said, I want to suggest some thought on the skill for a moment and where it actually does fit in assuming a particular design choice for the class were to return.

Assuming for a moment, that a ranged siphoning focused magblade would once again function. I'm talking about the attrition style of slow burn while healing through damage and kiting, fully engaging in the siphoning passives and not playing a stealth based gank or high burst damage build. This form of magblade was once upon a time an actual thing and it was not a snowflake approach to playing magblade "off meta" it was very much design, inherently built to fufill this playstyle as much to its identity as a stealth based gank build is. In that situation, impale does serve the purpose of affording them the pressure to seal the seal on a kill, not so much as an execute per say, but as a "if the magblade successfully, wears the target down from range via cripple, swallow soul and will procs, at 25 percent their spammable changes to impale to keep the target from recovering with ease. It's for this reason, the ability is at 25 percent, its a home stretch type of ability. You dont want it at 50 percent, because you are still going to need to sustain from swallow soul to fill that GCD space. Getting the target to 25 percent might force them on their heel and you are alleviated while still being able to play from range.

Of course this archetype no longer works in any way shape or form in ESO as it exists today. And thus impale is absolutely worthless.

NagualV

YES

exeeter702 wrote: »

Assuming for a moment, that a ranged siphoning focused magblade would once again function.

Of course this archetype no longer works in any way shape or form in ESO as it exists today. And thus impale is absolutely worthless.

First off thanks to everyone for all the posts, really valuable information. I've played this game since it was released in 2014, but I havent gotten into pvp seriously until recently. Magblade is the class I enjoy the most( I started pvp as a stamblade in 2015)

What i quoted above resonates with me, because that's the style of magblade I enjoy playing. There was a magblade named Kenapkk(I think he even became a class forum person at one point) who played the style you described, and that's the style I've been trying to play. It seems based on the comments of the more experienced people here that it's not viable, and that is prob why I have struggled and been frustrated.

Good comments, I laughed at the "roll a stamblade one lol"

WhyEvenTry

SOMETIMES/SITUATIONALLY

It’s absolutely viable.
Will you have to work harder to achieve the same results as other classes? Yes.
Does it need buffs? Yes.

Just don’t use impale. It’s trash

Hamboot

NO

It is an absolutely useless skill imo, compared to all other execute skills out there

Hotdog_23

SOMETIMES/SITUATIONALLY

2nd best kill stealer in BG next to Sorcerer Mages' Wrath skill.

Stay safe and enjoy the journey 😊

PS. ZOS stop the micromanagement of the green tree 🥺

Jaimeh

YES

Yes, with full knoweledge it's worse than executioner for my stamNB, but I really don't like the latter's animation, and with my ping, it usually fails to land, so I'll use killer's blade instead.
EDIT: sorry, just realized that was specifically for magNB, for which I have no comment, because I don't play mine in Cyro

Mayrael

NO

Nope, if I can get my target to 25% then I don't need execute to finish him, if I can't, then Impale is useless, waste of a slot.