part of the problem might be that those that engage in duels are often those that expect to win against the average (and way above average) player. if you want to get into it nevetheless, imho i'd start with:

1) make sure you fulfill all the pve requirements, i.e. you have access to all the gear you could possibly want, have everythign leveld and have suffienctly many CP. this sounds boring and unnecessary if you want to win by skill but remember that those that duel are also very orgnazied and min/maxing. starting at a disadvantage is a problem.

2) copy a "duel build" you feel you can trust. eventually you will HAVE to find your own style, but a starting poitn never hurst.

3) know that you can often only be successful if you adapt for the encounter. to win with "the skills you always use" is agin a disadvatge against an enemy that swaps skills/items/CP just to beat you.


Going from there, try to figure out why you lost. Usually it means you had to be defensive too much and thus were trading resoruces badly. but maybe you just got bursted unexpectedly? in that case it might be worth it to reconsider your item/skill choices and to learn what skills to watch out for.

Once you get to a point where you always lose because resource X is empty, try to fix that. jeweöry glyphs and chmapion points give you a great opportunity to fine-tune. if you die because your stamina is empty, don't be shy to invest into "stamina-stuff". Some need stamina regen, some need break free cost reduction, whoever uses block will find block cost reduction (on jewels and as CP) incredibly helpful

MNB is hard to duel with and better suited for open world pvp IMO. In open world 1v1 you can use the terrain to LoS check and various other ways.

Dennegor has a nice duel video on youtube you should check out. Keep in my they are very good/experienced.

Halke wrote: »

Spam funnel health and fear. Know the other classes (you see wings, cry, back away, cloak and count). NBs are CC kings, take advantage of that. For starters, try a cloak-heavy attack-concealed weapon opener. If they are still up, fear them and conceal again. Healing ward will keep you alive and you can use rapids as a gap closer rather than teleport strike. Just remember, nirn is going to make your hits look tiny, nothing you can do there except run your own nirn gear/weap (which you should do if you can afford it).

Magicka NB does not have the burst potential of a STAM NB. Magicka NB is overhyped right now IMHO.

I run my MAGICKA NB as a resto off-healer utility build rather than burst or DPS. It's a lot of fun to play, but not the heaviest hitter. The good news is if something goes wrong you have more magicka to cloak and escape. Being marked sucks.

I must have misunderstood... RAPID STRIKES as a gap closer? It doesn't work. I know everybody loves DW, but as a magicka NB, aside from the xtra dmg, it's a waste for me as it's all stamina.

Funnel, Teleport, then cloak and go for CONCEALED.. From there I hit SOUL TETHER at the end of the stun. Funnel hit's reasonably hard and is fast spam even at range.

I'm finding FEAR just not working more than 50% of the time (blocked?), and broken almost instantly. It's a bit of a resource hog too. When it works it's great otherwise. Ideally I'd like to proxy det into the teleport, concealed rotation.

If my ultimate is up, and I get the drop I win most 1v1 encounters.

Is magicka detonation necessary for current magicka NB meta?

QuebraRegra wrote: »

Halke wrote: »

Spam funnel health and fear. Know the other classes (you see wings, cry, back away, cloak and count). NBs are CC kings, take advantage of that. For starters, try a cloak-heavy attack-concealed weapon opener. If they are still up, fear them and conceal again. Healing ward will keep you alive and you can use rapids as a gap closer rather than teleport strike. Just remember, nirn is going to make your hits look tiny, nothing you can do there except run your own nirn gear/weap (which you should do if you can afford it).

Magicka NB does not have the burst potential of a STAM NB. Magicka NB is overhyped right now IMHO.

I run my MAGICKA NB as a resto off-healer utility build rather than burst or DPS. It's a lot of fun to play, but not the heaviest hitter. The good news is if something goes wrong you have more magicka to cloak and escape. Being marked sucks.

I must have misunderstood... RAPID STRIKES as a gap closer? It doesn't work. I know everybody loves DW, but as a magicka NB, aside from the xtra dmg, it's a waste for me as it's all stamina.

Funnel, Teleport, then cloak and go for CONCEALED.. From there I hit SOUL TETHER at the end of the stun. Funnel hit's reasonably hard and is fast spam even at range.

I'm finding FEAR just not working more than 50% of the time (blocked?), and broken almost instantly. It's a bit of a resource hog too. When it works it's great otherwise. Ideally I'd like to proxy det into the teleport, concealed rotation.

If my ultimate is up, and I get the drop I win most 1v1 encounters.

Rapid maneuvers, not rapid strikes. I run a magicka NB too, and honestly I love my burst. Everyone is different, and my fear always works, just remember fear is a cc, so if they are immune it doesn't work. All cc's get broken, that is sort of the point of them, to drain the other person's stam and give you a split second to beat on them. Also, dueling isn't about getting the drop on someone, both people know what is coming.

First off, don't get discouraged at loosing a lot, especially if you are new to duelling or don't have the perfect setup. I think at the first couple of months my winrate was around 10-20%, so practice is certainly a big game changer. On the other hand you can also speed up your learning curve by getting specified feedback through forum threads like this, or joining a dueling guild (Arena for EU).

Regarding the Magicka NB as such I think Magicka Detonation is absolutely key, yes open world PvP does work without it but if you are up against experienced players, you're probably going to lack quite some burst. Meaning I'd advise you to either go stamina until you get it or grind to AvA skill rank 7.