Magicka V Stamina NB builds

Hilgara · April 2014

I have a kajiit nightblade which is at lvl 47. He’s duel wield and I decided not to use a bow. I tried a bow in the beta weekends and wasn’t impressed by its damage. Instead I have decided to concentrate on a purely melee build.

Kajiit get a crit bonus to weapon crit and so I wanted to use medium armour for the stamina regeneration so I can keep up a steady weapon damage rotation but I also wanted to get the massive burst damage from the skill attacks from stealth using Ambush ->Shadowy Disguise-> Surprise attack. As a result I have a two bar rotation that pounces in and hits hard using my magicka pool. If the target is still alive (most normal mobs aren’t) then I switch to my second bar which uses mostly weapon abilities with bleeds and a little syphon to keep my health up and slowly drains my stamina pool. This allows the magicka pool to refill then I can rinse and repeat for boss mobs that take time to wear down.

I have about twice as much stamina as magicka since I spend most of my time killing level 50 normal mobs and my magicka bar rotation is almost always enough to kill them without having to switch to the stamina bar and I don’t need to keep up a steady flow of magicka powered abilities. It’s a short burts of high damage and if that isn’t enough it’s a switch over for the long haul.

I just wondered what some of you thought about this approach. I’m by no means an ESO expert. I only had a couple of hours in the beta on the odd weekend. I have seen a lot of NB builds that seem to concentrate almost everything on magicka and skill abilities but that would mean having to use a lot of light armour to keep the magicka pool from draining too quickly and thereby miss some of the great passives from medium armour that seem to suit the class much better e.g. agility and sneak bonuses.

zamiel · April 2014

1. Bows are currently the highest dps weapons. I don't know what kind of damage you find impressive, but it doesn't get any better than bows.
2. There are several ways to build any toon. If you want to double dip as your lifechoice you should spread attributes a bit around, but main focus should be on health. Then cap sta/mag with food and item enchantments. You won't be as strong as a single stat focus build obviously but you'll have more resources.
3. All in all however I found sta nightblades relatively worthless for leveling. Sure, you do great single target damage, but those single target spells eat a ton of mag and you run out fast. Your clear speed in quests is terrible and you have to take care with pulls not to get swamped and die.
4. Nightblades are still the most flexible class however, you can make it work for everything - (mostly) self sustaining tanks, dps healers, pure casters, whatever actually but most of these are more mag reliant than sta. I personally find bow/dw nbs a waste as with sta I'm afraid you lock yourself into the 'weapon damage and nothing else' nicé.
5. About armor - medium armor does nothing to a mag build, you don't need stamina reg, you don't need melee attack speed, or crit. You don't lose too much on light armor (actually, in the long run it's way superior). Pick 5 light armor, 2 heavy and you are already near regular medium armor levels (at 50 it was 1150 I think against 1280 in full med). But you can have way higher mag resist with light armor which is extremely beneficial (and medium armor severly lacks in this aspect). With 2 heavy pieces you also have access to the godly Unstoppable heavy armor skill. This thing will put your armor well into the overcharge territory (your magicka resist should be in it already with passives), gives you immunity to knockdown, stun and all those nasty stuff which usually get you killed.

Chelo · April 2014

@zamiel dont know what are you talking about, Im a Khajit NB, 5 Medium, 2 Heavy, every single point in Stamina using a 2H Sword and a Bow. I can kill everything, 2H is full aoe, I morph all my skills in that bar for aoe dmg, even my ultimate is for aoe dmg and my main dmg skill of 2H is aoe and also recharge my ulti.

My bow bar is for single target dmg, I mostly use the bow to kill bosses.

2H and Bow are the best of both worlds, AoE and Single target dmg, both use Stamina and synergy with my class/race/armor/weapon passives...

For example: just read the last pasive of 2H (killing an enemy give you +25% Stamina regen for 6s) or Refresing Shadow from the Shadow Skill Tree (+30% Stamina regen for 6s after using a Shadow Skill), So if Im running out of Stamina, I use Shadowy Disguise (critial + the Stamina regen) and kill 1 mob.

I think that people are just having troubles in this game trying to figure out a viable build for their characters because this isnt a typical MMO. We just have 5 active skills + 1 Ultimate, but morphs and tons of passives that can change the way we synergy our active skills and gameplay. Its not like the common MMOs where you have like 50 active skills and just 10 passives.

Also here we can swamp between weapons in the middle of the battle, people need to learn how to use that advantage in a smart way. And people need to stop thinking that the classes here have the typical gameplay of the common MMOs, for example a 2H NB is way more better for leveling (dont know about pvp) than a DW NB classic rogue style gameplay because the passives (armor/class/weapon) synergy better for spaming weapon skills and controlling/damaging big groups of mobs...

Of course you can find a way to make a viable DW NB but it wont be the classic Rogue if you are going to use class skills, you need magika and you must be thinking about having some light armor, It wont be the typical medium armor/stamina Rogue if your main source of dmg are your class skills. And if you do this and go DW NB, class skills, light armor, magika, you must be thinking about using a destro staff as your second weapon for range dmg and some aoe...

zamiel · April 2014

2H can't keep up with a mag build in clearing dungeons. Cleave is rather mediocre and to kill mobs with it needs godly amounts of stamina - to even trigger stamina regen. If you have to kill a single mob to trigger sta regen to even start to kill the group you will be behind clear time again compared to mag NBs. Compare total damage of cleave with elemental blockade and refreshing path (the latter heals you as well). Or, if you dislike DoTs, then compare it to Power Extraction.

And with that we reach our next point - sustainability. You kill the first group, right, I get it, but what about the next? How do you get back your ~1000 stamina or so you dumped into cleave? The hp they took off you? And also, please let's be serious - combat sta regen (just like mag to a certain extent) is way too low to matter. Even if you have 50-60 sta regen that 'huge' bonus means you only get 30 stamina more every 2s. Which is trivial compared to the 300ish cost of a cleave.

And a mag build can still get back mag - actually way better than a sta build. Destruction expert gives me back roughly the same mag as an elemental blockade costs. For every enemy killed. Add to this the cost reductions available to spells and you can sustain your blue bar indefinitely. And as long as you have blue bar, you have red one as well due to Refreshing path/Swallow soul actually healing for meaningful amounts and the ability to kite.

I'm not debating that 2H is better than DW, it can be. I'm also not debating that 2H can clear stuff. I'm saying that it's inferior compared to a mag build.

omalley92eb17_ESO · April 2014

I use a Bow and a 2 hander with all points in Stamina. 5 medium, 2 heavy.

Bow - Venom Arrow, Lethal Arrow(Snipe), Shadowy Disguise, Swallow Soul(Strife), Reaper's Mark(Mark Target), Soul Assault

2 Hander - Critical Charge, Immovable, Rally, Wrecking Blow, Mass Hysteria, Soul Tether.

The dps is crazy. Can usually one shot someone with Reapers Mark and Snipe from stealth.

And with the two hander, Mass Hysteria is awesome from stringing up Critical Charges without taking any enemy damage and keeping mobs off you while you focus down one or two.

Chelo · April 2014

@zamiel LOL I dont have exactly this build but is the same concept...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNNHk-MaBYs

I teleport (morph to aoe), use my Ultimate Soul Tether, and spam Carve (Cleave morph) to recharge my ultimate again while killing the mobs... Actualy with the more mobs in a group, I recharge my ultimate faster, sometimes I fight so many mobs at once that with just 2-3 Carves I can use my Ultimate a second time for the same group. And I said I have every single point in stamina.

This isnt an experimental build, I knew this gameplay work during beta and I also knew that the pyromancer DK have the best gameplay for aoe dmg (Force main character right now), I did my research before early access...

Right now this is one of the best builds you can use in a NB for leveling purpose...

If you dont trust me, you are welcome to watch me clearing a Dungeon =D

Bunk · April 2014

What the hell is a "mag build"

Beeftips · April 2014

I use a hybrid bow/duel wield/shadow/assassinate/siphon build for pve and pvp. I utilize both mana and stamina. If i run out of one, i switch to the other.

merfpmerfinton · April 2014

Chelo wrote: »

@zamiel dont know what are you talking about, Im a Khajit NB, 5 Medium, 2 Heavy, every single point in Stamina using a 2H Sword and a Bow. I can kill everything, 2H is full aoe,

Hey Chelo do you happen to know if momentum and drain power stack? I'm going the 2h route for aoe as well, but it's gonna be a while before I can check myself.

Hilgara · April 2014

Bunk wrote: »

What the hell is a "mag build"

A build based on magicka as opposed to stamina

Chelo · April 2014

merfpmerfinton wrote: »

Chelo wrote: »

@zamiel dont know what are you talking about, Im a Khajit NB, 5 Medium, 2 Heavy, every single point in Stamina using a 2H Sword and a Bow. I can kill everything, 2H is full aoe,

Hey Chelo do you happen to know if momentum and drain power stack? I'm going the 2h route for aoe as well, but it's gonna be a while before I can check myself.

Sorry I dont know that but I dont see why cant it be like that...

tino.antoninieb17_ESO · April 2014

I play redguard mostly driven by stamina. I am vet 2 and i can speak only from my experience. I haven't tried magic build and honestly i dont intend to. Stamina regen is not problem. I have in general 1800 stamina, 1550 health and 1300 magic before any food or drinks and my stamina regen is 91 + some passives which are not included in that number - like adrenalin rush , haste morph , ww morph ,,, . Leveling is possible one way or another unless u make terrible mistakes while building your char. I cant say whether stamina or magic build is better coz i havent tried magic build. For sure i can say that i am pleased with mostly stamina driven damage and survivability. Most of my damage enhancers are magica driven ( haste, power extraction, veiled strike, reapers mark. So my point is that i use a lot of magic spells just not for directly inflicting damage.
Regarding weapons - i use 2h,dw and Bow . Dw i use for restoring resources, aoe. 2h i use for short bursts and boss fights which are not movement heavy. Bow i use for heavy movement boss fights. Dw is constant and i change 2h and bow depending on encounter. Its not easy to answer which is better specially coz that can be answered only when u come to end content and i am not there yet.

Note : when i rap up Craiglorn i will tell u my opinion ...