How about a bit of love for NB?

ConciseRex · May 2014

Everyday I have a check on this section of the forums because I love to see the builds people come up with and the different discussions about skill set ups etc. But all I see is "NB sucks""DK is OP""So done with NB" etc and I'm tired of it.

I have a VR2 NB who is already in East March as I am finding EP VR content fairly easy. I wear 5 Med and 2 Light with just the 1 bar set up for Dual Daggers (Hmm sounds like the sort of assassin everyone claims the NB can not do). I am a vampire yet only use the Drain skill most of the time (Bats if I'm in a public dungeon myself). I have 49 points in health (giving me about 2.2K health) my Bosmer skills give me good stamina and some extra disease resistance. My gear is all crafted my self with enchants found on my travels (Magika glyphs seem fairly common in VR).

Right so down to skills and style. I open with Shadow Cloak and Suprise Attack hitting with 2 light attacks and 1 heavy for knockdown and 2 more light attacks as enemy stands up again. Leeching strikes is returning all my resources with the 15% boost kicking more often than you would expect. I rinse and repeat until low health warning pops up (tactical combat add on very handy for this) then a Killers Blade will finish them (sometimes several for bosses) this returns Health and Passive (Not sure it works though) returns Magika allows me to move on with very low downtime. For groups of up to 3 I hit weakest target first then next then next with no different style than single target. High health + Leaching Strikes + Drain (For oh * moments) gives me great survivability against mobs. Incapacitating strikes is my ultimate and provides and extra 3s knockdown on bosses or mobs of 2-3.

My PvP set up is very similar. Being Magika based and having no Stamina ability on my bar allows for sustained sneaking allow stopping moving for 2-3 seconds fully return s all stamina due to Med Armour passives also allowing for plenty of stam for blocks/dodges and interrupts. Instead of cloak I open with Teleport strike for a 1.5s stun and powerful boost for a follow up Suprise attack with a few hits of Killers Blade to finish them. Again Incapacitating Strike provides a 3s knockdown on pesky high health DK and Templars.

For dungeons I concentrate on taking out healers in the first few seconds of each trash mob thanks to high single target DPS leaving AOE to the Sorc or whatever and then taking out any annoying archers avoiding the others attacks. For my ULT Veil of Blades will give everyone a boost to dmg reduction I'm sure they will not argue with and Slip Away for when the healer may be taking too much dmg.

So even if the skills are a bit buggy all the NB hate posts are very unjustified and they have just as good survivability etc as other classes.

Artis · May 2014

As good? because of the ult? Well, that you can not use any time you want, so you can't count on it.

Also, you said a very good thing - you pvp and pve set ups are similar. NBs don't have much of choice. And well... For example, I don't like that as melee I need to use Shadow Cloak+Veiled Strike all the time. It's must have combo+Veiled Strike only makes sense when used with Shadow Cloak. That consumes lots of magicka. So to use it many times I need to invest into magicka... But usually I would use them together with physical weapons+medium armor, which implies investing in stamina...

Idk, they need to do something with NB. They really need to. The class feels like the weakest in almost anything you can think of. All those things you described...
Other classes are more effective. And killing mobs one by one in a pack - is not a solution. It's the only thing you can do, because you don't have good AoE, unlike sorcs or dks.

Zubba · May 2014

I say lower the other classes damage by alot. Theres no reason being NB as all the other classes can dish out insane damage.

ElSlayer · May 2014

Artemis wrote: »

Also, you said a very good thing - you pvp and pve set ups are similar.

/disagree

For PvP I mostly use Bow with

Venom Arrow
Swallow Soul
Magnum Shot
Crippling Grasp
Silver Shards
Incapacitaiting Strike

For PvE I use One handed and Shield with

Ransack
Swallow Soul
Lotus Fan
Path of Shadows
Drain Essence
Soul Teether

Huh?

zamiel · May 2014

I don't think people are saying NBs are unplayable.

It's just every other class out there can do the same, just much faster and with less effort involved. Why clown around with daggers when you can melt the mob in 2 casts with a sorc? Why tear down enemies one by one when you can take the whole group and kill it in the same amount of time?

That said VR1 is fairly easy still. It's the low level area afterall, as you get further groups of mobs are becoming way more common. And that's where you will suffer.

ConciseRex · May 2014

I agree on the toning down of damage of other classes as boosting the NB will make team work a waste of time. As for suffering at higher VR ranks I can not agree or disagree till I get there but I do imagine it would be tougher for all classes and not just NB.