Yes exactly as Wing says. Stam nb have incredible burst if geared and played correctly. Magicka nb have excellent mobility and utility.

And proximity is a bit of a gimmick and very situational. I find it tough to justify putting it on my heal, escape and evasion 2nd bar.

Magicka nb is frustrating because so many times you feel like you can finish off your opponent but it just slips away. Even when I made room for impale on my 1st bar it was always a struggle. You have to be willing to let some kills go when the risk starts outweighing the reward.

Stamina tends to be more burst-focused, at least for nightblades. A magicka nightblade plays more like a warlock.

For single target you'll want to get one or two damage over time spells up on an enemy. Crippling grasp is a good opener, since it immobilizes the target and slows them down on top of dealing damage over time. After that you can use destructive reach (or destructive clench), preferrably with a fire staff, to add another damage over time effect to the target and knock them backwards away from you.

Once you've got the damage over time going, you'll want to do a strife -> light attack -> strife -> light attack weave. Strife will cancel the animation of your light attack, allowing you to alternate between the two spells more quickly than normal.


For multi-target damage, you'll want to lay down twisting path or refreshing path from the shadow tree (deals damage over time in a large area, boosts your movement speed, and either does more damage or heals you based on the morph). You can also stack up wall of elements on it with a destruction staff to double up the damage over time in that area. Fire rune from the mage's guild line can also add some good burst damage and more damage over time to the area.

Once those ground effects are down, you run into the mob, use sap essence to boost your spell power, and then spam impulse/elemental ring/pulsar. Use sap essence again to heal yourself if you take too much damage.