Nightblade, help me out here...

AtmaDarkwolf

Damage seems VERY low(Have to spam the SH!T out of skills to kill ANYTHING, very annoying) AoE is... neat (Sap essence and tornado) but again, damage is abysmal. I've tried many different skill/stat setups (Really want to utilize siphoning and dual weapon trees) even single target (which is fine vs 1 mob, but more than one seems I have to spend more time 'regaining' resources via heavy attacks, which sadly, do even WORSE dmg than the others)

I'm vr 3, have had this issue (and spent countless coin respecing and trying others 'builds') since 50/vr1 and am no further ahead(am actually 'behind' what I was before with a siphoning attacks, blood craze, degeneration, swallow soul, and sap essence setup, and I felt THAT was 'weak' after watching people @ my level - or lower - cut though packs of mobs and carry on like it was nothing.)

I am done with spending coin on respecs until I have a better idea of what im doing wrong. I've tried magicka heavy build, stam heavy build, split (hybird) between them all, but even when following others guides (which I admit, are outdated by at least a year) I cannot even remotely see the results they have...

Should I just give up on NB completely (Rather not) or what?

(Current setup is siphoning attacks + mage rune + blue + tornado + sap essence and typical ambush + killers + swallow on 2nd bar)

Dekkameron

It looks like you cant quite decide whether you want to be stam or magicka. A caster NB like it looks like you have meddled with before is a completely different fish compared to being a close range concealed weapon spammer.

I personally run very weapon heavy NB builds.. For example a stam Bosmer NB of mine that does fairly well is as follows.

First bar: [Twohanded] Rally, Critical Rush, Wrecking Blow, Killers Blade, Mass Hysteria
Second bar: [Bow] Piercing mark, Venom arrow, Bombard (this often gets swapped out for other things), Focused aim, Dark Cloak

AtmaDarkwolf

Im sure that's great, but I 'want' to play a DW build, and I 'want' tornado and sap on my bar(also want to make use of siphoning attacks because it does ok when paired with the other 2)

If there's no other option than to get pidgin holed into a 2h+bow build, I'll just quit now, I'm not interested in playing it(nor staves, tried all and just did -not- like how it played, personal preference)

Thing is I see A LOT of dw builds that are outdated, adn I'm wondering, have they just simply died out, or can DW NB utilizing aoe tactics survive/do well in VR content? I don't want to keep pushing forward if its going to always feel like this (IE : not fun)

I like how sap works, its 'fun' (At least until i hit vr levels lol) and I like the concept (IE vampiric draining without being a vampire, minor heals to group, etc) and tornado is also fun, but it just seems like I hit a wall where everything needs 30 casts of them to go down(Before vr levels I felt I was about equal to others I grouped with, I didn't feel like I was killing slower or faster than anyone, and actually felt like I was contributing... now I feel, when in a group, that I'm the welfare subject they are 'carrying' though a dungeon.)

I am considering just going back to the old build I had, dropping tornado and going with degeneration again(for the 20% sorc buff)

aco5712

you dont need to be forced to play any particular way however, you do need to decide whether to go stamina or magicka. Unfortunetly, with the way the game is, hybrid builds wont work, unless your vr14 and even then you will be hurting yourself in content other then questing.

Stamina -> http://esohead.com/calculator/skills#1.mcsz9s8w2CC8IPSR8GUFk8GFlU8IPUP8IPwA8GFx48Iryv8GFlr8w2Bl8IrtE8GHRb8t7rNsgZ6Nsg18C7Jbzqa6Nzqq6Nzqb6Nzqu6bzqG8D7xbzdM6Nzdm6bbMz8F7JNzrO6Abux6Abut8zz7zztyfm8zf7zzNbo8zu7zzHfYE6zHfZd8zG7zzHQ3F8zI7zzJIoX6zJIkL8zN7zzJZcY8zA7zzKpUN8zL7zzK4EX

just threw this together. I tried to use only DW and class skills coz i dont know much about what you have unlocked and what not. 1st bar is AoE. 2nd bar is single target.

Magicka -> http://esohead.com/calculator/skills#1.mcsz9s8IPSc8IPbV8If0b8GFlU8IPUP8IPwA8GFtV8IryQ8GFlM8IrtE8IPQL8GHRb8C7GNzqa6bzqq6Nzqb6Nzqu8D7GNzdM6Nzdm6Nzds8F7JAzrJ6NzrO6Abuy6Nbux6Abut8zz7zztyfm8zf7zzNbo8zu7zzHfYE6zHfZd8zG7zzHQ3F8zI7zzJIoX6zJIkL8zN7zzJZcY8zA7zzKpUN8zL7zzK4EX

same deal with this

Im happy to help you more if you want to inbox me or something. I just made these up quickly and i dont pve that much but i do aoe grind and thats what you described as seeing, aoe grinders. These build should be sufficient enough to grind like that and more.

gearing is another thing thats going to impact the effectiveness of your build so after you decide which spec, you need to gear for that spec.

note: with the stamina version of the build, you lack self healing coz sap wont give you enough healing. If you really want to have a heal, spend some time in pvp to get rank 5 for vigor or use 2h as your off bar for rally heals. If neither, maybe put cloak on both bars.

note note: if you use sap you get spell power and weapon power buff so you dont need to use the mages guild ability.

Dekkameron

AtmaDarkwolf wrote: »

Im sure that's great, but I 'want' to play a DW build, and I 'want' tornado and sap on my bar(also want to make use of siphoning attacks because it does ok when paired with the other 2)

I merely posted my own preferences and knowledge of NB. Alas i don't really have much experience (apart from caster magicka NB) I apologise if my post was next to useless for you as i might be a little tipsy

AtmaDarkwolf

Tried the 2nd, and spent all coin to buff and im just obviously not 'good' at game because i go out and now its worse than it has ever been... I cannot keep my health(EVEN with constant 'heals' and twilight set) up, nor does my magicka last the fight, even with weaving heavies in.(this is fighting a pair of thunder bugs, 3 separate fights, came VERY close to dying in each fight. a pair of the weakest junk mobs I could find...)

I am not completely drained of cash and honestly, any desire to play anymore. Giving game a rest until I feel up to playing again(and will just play 'noob' levels on a diff toon, nightblade obviously isn't made for me, at least using the skills I 'like')

I appreciate the help, thanks.

aco5712

Go for a DK/Templar if you want to be super tanky

AtmaDarkwolf

Dekkameron wrote: »

Nah I appreciate the attempted help, I'm not having issues having fun PRE 50, its after (vr levels) with 2 characters now(one deleted to preserve name lol) that the fun just quickly 'dies' and takes all my coin (and patience) with it.

I don't think VR levels are too 'hard' I just think there's something wrong with NB(Seriously so) because people of my level (or even 1, 2 below) just blow though stuff I'm fighting and just keep going, without hardly losing any health(and getting 100% by the time they reach the next group ahead of me) - then watching as they wipe out a group of 3-5 mobs (Also finishing the one I'm working on) before I can get mine to 1/2 health. ALl this time I'm 'hurting' and both green/blue bars are empty(or the one I use if I'm main stam or mag)

Being that I've respected 15-20 times on each toon, played though on khajiit and imperial, had ABSOLUTELY NO issues pre 50(like NONE< i doubt i even died once, Like i said above, don't feel as if I was 'behind the pack' pre 50) then 50/VR1 hit and inside 3 levels(vr 3 both times its where it 'hits') Its like either my dps+survivability mysteriously drops to 1/5th what it was, or everyone else(Not nb, i am not certain i've even seen many NB at my level/around me after 50) is having no apparent issues (or much less so than I)

I'll just try another character, prob go with a DK or Templar and try the 3rd faction from 1-50, give the toon I got a rest(rather than rage-delete to reuse name lol... at least he makes a good crafter)

Anyways, frustrations aside, from a nublet to ESO, I appreciate the attempted help.

Mitchblue

You need to keep at it. A DW build, it's not going to be tanky unless you take away his damage. Utilize shadow cloak, and it's morphs, to prevent getting hit. You can be very viable with a NB build. But not every class or weapon choice is for everyone.. I have NB Magicka build with a Destro staff, I like it but I've been using Resto on my second bar and I'm not very good with it..

Yakidafi

@AtmaDarkwolf

Put all character points into stamina., can have health enchants on armor. If you have problem with surviving use Whitstrake armor 5 pieces and 4 ashen grip, both are crafted all medium armor and 3 jewelery pieces magicka furnace. You said you have no money so might be hard but this should not cost much more then 5-8k. If you cN survive go with hunding rage instead of Whitstrake. The armor sets are crafted for your info.

Bar 1: dw
Steele tornado, surprise attack, killer blade , healing skill from undaunted , siphoning attacks, Ultimate soul harvest
Bar 2: bow
Poison arrow, acid spray, sap essence, magnum shot, siphoning attacks, ultimate veil of blades.

Use sap only for dmg buff, acid for dot on multiple enemies poison on single target, morph poison arrow into the one that does more dmg when low health. Magnum shot great against bosses that hit too hard and too often, so you can kite around them forever, only work on melee bosses but they are also the ones dealing most dmg. Eat buff food for health and stamina.

The ultimates you can use soul harvest all the time since it is cheap and veil of blades when you need protection like in a boss fight.

Since it is an mmo gear come first if you want to perform well skill bar 2nd and personal skills last in my opinion. Of course you need to know your class but to play well.

I use dw on my stamblade for raids and such, when I pvp I use 2h. If I would go through vr content again with a stamblade I would go 2h bcs of the shield and heal everything becomes so much easier. Now your only heal is the undaunted aoe which is not so good in single better in group but better then nothing. Also killers blade will heal you, use it when they are low health under 25%. I used funnel health as heal when I did vr content first time, though not so good for stamina. Since you have siphoning attacks you should be able to roll dodge alot and therefore not need heal as much so funnel health could work better then undaunted one. Keep in mind that with imperial city update this type of game play will not be as effective as now. Will have to find a better setup then.

Some things to think about when it Come to skills for pve singleplay : self heal, aoe dmg, dot and protection against heavy hitting bosses.

AtmaDarkwolf

So i pretty much went back to my old build (big shock eh?) except i don't have anything (except passives) in my dual weapon spec.

I went with:

Bar1: (duel Wield) siphoning attacks, structured entropy, cripple(grasp when unlocked), swallow soul, sap essence.
Bar2: (Also Duel Wield) hysteria (Mass when unlocked) impale, piercing mark, concealed attack, ambush/dark cloak(swap as needed)

-Went this route because I like most of the morphs for each skill so it will save me a TON of money respecing (since I 'like' this setup, and also enjoy the 'stamina' versions of most of the morphs, so if I want to swap around a quick morph change will do)

I also went 100% health, with magicka on enchants (25k health, 22k magicka with this setup + enchants) 2 peice heavy, 5 piece light, 5peice twilight 5 piece magicka furnace + 2 piece torgue pact (daggers) for extra spell dmg

Right now since all my clothing traits are speced into med armors, It will be some time before I can upgrade my own armor, but if I ever go back to stamina at least im set there.

I tried bow, and I was 'meh' toward it(it kills quick, and nice synergy with many skills, but it just did not feel right) and I tried 2h but it was 25 when I first started trying it and only got to 33 after 4 days in Cyroriil, so I just gave up (Takes WAAAAAY too long to level) and besides, i didn't really enjoy it (slow speed, brawler was boring and other attacks were bleh, with dual at least I can get 2 peice set on)

I used most of the advice above (and a few random googles and reading) to try out a few other builds (2 respecs since last post lol) and I still found my 'original' play style as the most enjoyable. I also feel that this build is 'cheap' to swap over and try other things (Don't need to reset stats, only need to swap morphs, and this setup actually uses slightly 'less' points so I can keep my crafting levels at needed levels)

I just hope this setup allows me to do some 'decent' stuff in pvp/cyroriil.

Once again thanks again for the advice, you all helped me reach a more 'refined' build I had started with, but some ideas you offered lead me to research other options.(IE mark use, hysteria, etc)

Thank you again.

Resipsa131

Dunmer Vamp Magicka NB V14 also here are the stats;
All attributes in Magicka 63
All Kuta (gold) enchantments into health
My CP is spent to get spell critical and spell damage, spell resistance and that sort of thing
Right now running 5 piece Magnus, 4 piece Torug Pact, various jewelry
I run the Apprentice Stone (or whichever one is the spell damage) I have over 2000 Spell Damage
I run DW on my main DPS Bar Dark Cloak, Concealed Weapon, Sap Essence, Mirage (I get major expedition from Crippling Grasp on the other bar), Reapers Mark, Concealing Swarm my Off bar is a resto staff Crippling Grasp, Healing Ward, Impale(for the execute on bosses and for the passives to critical strikes) Dampen Magicka(Can sub out if no flame damage) merciless resolve Flawless Dawnbreaker but I subout as needed.

I always seem to back out of melee off my Serious DPS and into staff because I'm pulling to much agro or getting hit with too much spike damage.

Can someone fix my bars?


Quote: I also went 100% health, with magicka on enchants (25k health, 22k magicka with this setup + enchants) 2 peice heavy, 5 piece light, 5peice twilight 5 piece magicka furnace + 2 piece torgue pact (daggers) for extra spell dmg

How the fug are you getting these stats pre-food?

RavenSworn

Hi there!

Dont mind the forum name, my game id is @RavenSworn and feel free to msg me ingame and ask for any help whatsoever. Im on NA server, PC of course and will definitely help out if you need some explanation on Nightblades. I may not be the best NB around but i do pride myself on knowing what's best for PvE and whats really suitable for PvP. ok now on to the actual help XD. please note however, while the overall picture is for both PvE and PvP, i mostly play PvE since i am a pve carebear.

Stat points
Now stat points are crucial in understanding your game styles. Are you an up close and personal kind of warrior? or perhaps a melee, magicka based spellsword? Perhaps you like to hit things from afar with an arrow? or perhaps you just want to cast spells?

Most importantly, what resource are you using as your primary resource? Are you using dual wield skills to do damage and using siphon skills to 'augment' your attacks? or vice versa? Have you taken a look at the other skill lines such as Shadow and Assassination? My advice to you is to decide on your main damage resource, which means either you use stamina or magicka to deal damage. This is crucial since dual wield skill lines uses stamina while most of the class skill lines uses magicka. This means that your primary resource should be the one that has the biggest number, while your secondary resource should be the lowest. ( or perhaps putting any remaining points into it)

To give you an example: I use a 0:1:7 ratio of magicka : health : stamina. This is because i use stamina as my main damage resource while my magicka is simply to augment my attacks or as a utility resource. I have used a 1:2:5 ratio for my Nightblade Reaver build and it works too because the higher stat is stamina, which my reaver build is build upon. A different set of ratio will also work in terms of magicka builds, such as 7:1:0 (solid magicka dps) or 4:3:1 (for a more tanky magicka based dps) but use this *theme* to help you out with the stat points.

Gear
The armor you wear affects your resources. The weapons you use affect your damage output. It's as simple as that. Light armor gives you magicka bonuses, Medium gives you stamina bonuses and Heavy gives you defense bonuses. Now, can you be a Heavy armor, staff wielding, tanky mage shouting "You SHALL NOT PASS" kind of character? Sure you can but you wont be as effective or as viable as a 5 medium 2 heavy dual sword wielding warrior or a 7 light staff wielding nightmage. You also wont last long in a sustain fight, in melee range, without proper builds or proper rotations and character mobility.

So, if you are a stamina based dps, Medium armor is your friend. It gives you a whole lot of crit, stamina recovery bonuses and also allows you to have better dodges and ultimately better physical mobility all around. If you are a magicka based dps, then Light armor is your go-to gear. My tip however is not to go all out 7 light or 7 medium but rather mix and match it according to your build and stat points.

For eg: Since i use 0:1:7 ratio for stats, my gear is primed for medium armor. But i included 2 heavy armor because i wanted a bit of survivability on my end. I needed some damage mitigation in terms of Armor number. I used Hunding's Rage and Night Silence for extra stamina bonuses though as starter armor sets, Ashen's Grip and Night's Silence are wonderful as well.

Build
Ah, here comes the meat of it all, the skills used and the rotation needed for the whole thing to be successful. PROTIP: use all class skill lines! Here is what i did with my Reaver, a DW / 2H stamina based melee warrior.

Surprise Attack
Killer's Blade
Steel Tornado
Ambush
Double Take
Veil of Blades

Rally
Brawler
Sap Essence
Evil Hunter
Relentless Focus
Soul Tether

I understand however that you want to use both bars to be DW so i took that into account and created somewhat of a pure melee berserker monster.

Ambush
Surprise Attack
Rapid Strikes
Steel Tornado
Killer's Blade
Flawless Dawnbreaker / Soul Harvest

*Camouflaged Hunter*
*Shadowy Disguise*
Blade Cloak / Double Take
Relentless Focus
Reaper's Mark
Flawless Dawnbreaker / Soul Harvest

*this two abilities can be changed to something else like Crippling Grasp (Cripple) for single target root, movement speed if you don't wish to use Ambush or Vigor for heals or even perhaps Immovable from the armor skill line to prevent you from being rooted or stun. It's really two utility slots, depending on situations such as zerging in pvp or 1vX. The choice is yours

This is basically a damage bar and a buff bar. Before the fight, you buff yourself and mark the target. switch weps and dish out the pain. Rinse and repeat.

I have thought of a melee magicka based warrior but its somewhat tricky to pull off since regaining resources for magicka is harder when you use melee weapons but its possible to do it.

Teleport Strike (I prefer Lotus Fan but the damage simply isn't good enough. you can try it for the snares but to each his own)
Mass Hysteria
Sap Essence
Crippling Grasp
Siphoning Strikes
Soul Tether

Funnel Health / Swallow Soul
Inner Light
Structured Entropy
Impale
Reaper's Mark
Soul Harvest

This is not to look down on your knowledge of the game or just to make you look like a newbie but there are many times where even a V14 that i was talking to ingame that did not even know of rotation or proper builds because they were just grinding mobs with a friend while following blindly. Nightblades are one of the harder classes to master (though i find Dragonknights hard to understand but that's just me) so hang on to the class.

Do note too that pre veteran levels are very very easy. A lot of the vet content was also nerfed but this does not mean that the content is not hard. All you need is a better grasp of the class core mechanic and you are good to go on any level. All the best and keep on killing!

-RavenSworn
Lone Wolf Help
Corvus Fratenalis

Baronh2o

This isn't exactly what you want, but it's close.

deltiasgaming.com/2015/04/10/umbra-nightblade-leveling-build/

KleanZlate

AtmaDarkwolf wrote: »

Damage seems VERY low(Have to spam the SH!T out of skills to kill ANYTHING, very annoying) AoE is... neat (Sap essence and tornado) but again, damage is abysmal. I've tried many different skill/stat setups (Really want to utilize siphoning and dual weapon trees) even single target (which is fine vs 1 mob, but more than one seems I have to spend more time 'regaining' resources via heavy attacks, which sadly, do even WORSE dmg than the others)

I'm vr 3, have had this issue (and spent countless coin respecing and trying others 'builds') since 50/vr1 and am no further ahead(am actually 'behind' what I was before with a siphoning attacks, blood craze, degeneration, swallow soul, and sap essence setup, and I felt THAT was 'weak' after watching people @ my level - or lower - cut though packs of mobs and carry on like it was nothing.)

I am done with spending coin on respecs until I have a better idea of what im doing wrong. I've tried magicka heavy build, stam heavy build, split (hybird) between them all, but even when following others guides (which I admit, are outdated by at least a year) I cannot even remotely see the results they have...

Should I just give up on NB completely (Rather not) or what?

(Current setup is siphoning attacks + mage rune + blue + tornado + sap essence and typical ambush + killers + swallow on 2nd bar)

I know exactly how you're feeling! I've had this feeling with my nightblade many times. I'm not a theory crafter but advise is don't get too caught on a single set of abilities. Sometimes sap and tornado work like a charm and other times they don't . You have to adapt to different situations. That's actually part of the fun.

My main is a VR14 Dunmer Nightblade. He's always been troublesome lol. One minute I think he's invincible, then he hits like a wet noodle the next. I tried him on PTS and was pleasantly surprised how his survivability had increased. If you have PTS set up I'd take for a spin there to see how things have changed.

AtmaDarkwolf

questions: whats the mod that shows the battle things (IE: when to execute, etc)

Also, those health/magicka values are with seared slaughterfish(blue vr1 food) sorry for not clarifying.

KleanZlate

The mod is called Foundry Tactical Combat (FTC)

HungryHobo

Rally from the 2hander tree is what you want. Pair that with a cloak for 2.9 seconds and you can get 2-3 good casts in before the enemies re-initiate their attacks.

It is how I leveled. Once I got rally I never stopped running from mob to mob. Whirling blades 3-4 times, everything is dead (With 5 hundings set + 3 ashen grip)... Siphon Life helps to be on the bar and whatever of its morphs increases healing helps too. The blur buff also helps mitigate ~20% damage too, making those periodic heals worth more essentially.

2hander unfortunately is kinda a must in regards to survivability for stam oriented NB's. Unless you go bombard and not let any mobs even touch you...... but then you'd be using 2hander/bow XD

2hander+DW is my two cents.

Blackjak-33

You could give tanking a shot. I'm a magicka based nightblade tank that relies heavily on the siphoning aspect of the class. I usually duel wield at times while solo questing in order to kill faster. I'll post my stats/skills if interested.

Artifact

Like others have said you need to pick stamina or magika. Either way as a DW dos sap essence isn't a great aoe. I use it in my Nb healer because it heals while doing small damage. As a dps you actualy want something hard hitting. Perhaps just focus on single target skills with only 1 aoe and investing in assassination is a great idea.

AtmaDarkwolf

sap essence isn't used as an dps move, its used to buff your OTHER damage by 20% (and offset siphoning attacks debuff)

Swallow soul is the 'dps' move of the set since sap + entropy gives u a 40% dmg increase (or 20ish % if siphoning attacks is active)

Reeko

Since when does Sap and Entropy stack?

Violynne

AtmaDarkwolf wrote: »

Should I just give up on NB completely (Rather not) or what?

Having just finished my NB to VR10, I will admit playing one was a chore. With little AoE damage, no health buffs, and having to be close to the target to deal repeated damage, it does become tedious.

I see so many NBs playing but fail to take advantage of the stealth crit hit. Most just run up and attack, which is foolish, especially when there are 3 enemies in a group at higher levels.

Night's Silence armor is a must for NB. The stamina boost aside, the ignore sneak movement makes all the difference as an NB.

How I played:
-Entered sneak
-Threw on cloak before enemy detection
-Moved to their side or behind them and attacked for guaranteed crit hit.

This took over 50% health on the first enemy, with Rapid Strikes finishing them off. Then, I entered Shadow again, and nailed the second to stun them for 4 seconds, finishing them off. Repeat until all are dead.

With no magicka attributes, I had just enough to do all three enemies.

For bosses, I did the same. If the boss knelt, I pummeled with Rapid Strikes 3x. Then moved back and waited until the enemy launched their attack. Once done, I Shadowed again and stunned them for another 4 seconds, repeating this until they died.

Some bosses, like Harvesters, Watchers, and Wispmothers, are just tough and require a different approach, usually staying behind them as best you can. Not much in the NB arsenal takes them down easily.

Definitely a chore to play one, so it's now up to you to decide if you want to stick with it.

I enjoyed the challenge, even if times I cursed the game.

But I'm not playing it anymore. Craglorn will wait until I rank up my sorcerer. There's no way I'm taking my NB into Craglorn with such a disadvantage compared to DKs and Sorcs.

Swindy

AtmaDarkwolf wrote: »

Should I just give up on NB completely (Rather not) or what?

Nooooooooooooooo!!! It's great to see others suffer as I have/do lol.

Jokes aside...
I'm VR14 Imperial NB stamina...& I so feel your pain.
Both are DW although like youself & others here I've tried everything through respec except Staffs.
I've literally smashed (XBox EU as I hated playing on Mac) controllers in frustration at the game mechanics (Graccas with Mora's interventions, Harvesters) at times (or my inability to alter my playing style) that make stamina NB a very tricky class to play/master.
I am always solo (Pve addict) with exception of when others show in public areas.
I'll talk of trash here as mobs in Craglorn, Cyrodiil, public or group delves, that STATE they're VR10-13.

Both bars:
Evil Hunter primary with Aspect of Terror, Dark Cloak, or Prolonged Suffering on secondary
Reapers
Relentless Focus & refer Evil Hunter options for sec
Ambush
Rapid on pri, Tornado on sec
Dawnbreaker (or Soul Tether opponent dependent) on pri, WW on sec
5 Hundings, 4 Ashen, all armour stamina enchanted
4 daggers- 1 each of flame, shock, frost, & poison, which I interchange on the bars & hands dependent upon opposition
Amulet & rings all stamina with reduce stamina enchants
All 62 attributes in Stamnia
CP all Warlord, Spell Shield, Precision as I only have 79 CP so far.
I eat crown store food before major battles, & drink crown potions if required.
Without food I'm 8,458 mag, 17,601 hp, 23,936 st.

No trash with less than 1 gold has survived my initial stamina pool in tornado...always spam evil, reapers, & relentless first & repeat if the primary focus of my reapers dies early.
Ambush in to stun the strongest looking opponent, having reapers the weakest looking, repeat ambush stuns on the strongest as required if he has gold bar/s, and run around them in circles 10 metres away of possible lol.
Bosses & gold small mobs get the same approach but with rapid instead taking one out at a time with aspect/cloak/prolonged as required.

Using the heavy attack-start animation-tap ambush from stealth or cloak combination attack is a cracker as a 1-1 opener (followed with another heavy of course). I run out of magicka after two cloaks however and prefer to have magicka reserved for reapers as I've no other heals (without soul tether).
I try to never use ultimate's, keeping them up my sleeve for emergencies, or the end bosses.
Only became WW at VR12 & still haven't morphed even the pounce.

Yes I do still die on occasion, harvesters for example screw me often with their stuns unless I WW.
I truly suck solo in any of the group delves outside of Craglorn too, and some there also.
It takes time to analyse different foes to find the best weapon enchants to help kill them, but with this setup death is quite rare now, and I get to fight the way I like with DW up close and personal.
Roll on Dark Brotherhood add on.

I know it's a glass cannon, soul/fire/ice cages/rain need roll dodging, and if I get an assault wrong I'm just squishy mush with a soul gem, but ESO demands choices & compromises, and as no one else has posted similar to this I just thought I'd give you an alternative perspective...for what it's worth.

AtmaDarkwolf

Reeko wrote: »

Since when does Sap and Entropy stack?

See this comment made me go and research what you meant. I did not know that the like effects would not stack
Truly a more helpful reply may have been more... helpful :P

RavenSworn

Sap and entropy doesnt stack on one of the Buffs. But it will buff your health by 5% while healing and also heals via sap. You are also buffed by the weapon damage. I dont see why both of these shpuldnt be used together when the pros clearly outweigh the one unstacked buff.

willymchilybily

@AtmaDarkwolf

You aren't doing as much damage as you see other classes do, this sounds more like your set up of gear, skill points and attribute points than your skill combinations. Though it can also be play style. Nightblade skills and play reward using stealth, de-buffs, self buffs and crowd control. Also depends on your race slightly. Assuming you are stamina NB id suggest:

* Wear at least 5 pieces of medium armour
*Get passives as many as you can. particularly the medium armor and DW passives for first.
*Use a mace and sword or mace and dagger, for penetration from DW passives and some crit or some extra damage .
* Use set pieces, if you can get hundings rage use it. at the moment im using it with 2 heavy armour pieces of dreuger set and a neck for 2 and 3 piece bonuses to weapon damage. i made the hundings and the dreuguer set i paid <1200g for all three pieces. ( I chose 2 pieces of heavy armor for the increased duration on the shadow barrier passive and for more tankiness)
*Get all the shadow and assassin passives.

refreshing shadows is a must for stamina users make sure your jewelry compliments it, no point using all reduced cost if you have 30% increase in stam regen! mix that with say a WW redgaurd you have around 45% increase in regen before CP. I like and use shadow barrier, using my dark cloak and surprise attack regularly as i do on single targets i become very tanky and coupled with fortitude it can help on bosses as most health regen relies on killing, which is a bit more difficult on the boss. and if he is CC immune it is a Real pain.

Siphoning is more geared to magicka, shadow to stamina, Assassins to damage. as a general rule of thumb on passives.

otherwise below is the same information many have said. the same generic way to play a stamina Nb (though both bars are DW)

You have had a lot of advice sorry if i repeat any of it. some of it was good some of it, not how i would roll. The following worked for me:

single target bar DW:

[1]Ambush - gap closer with stun is AMAZING as can go up cliffs and all sorts and has no min range
[2]Suprise attack - very high damage move. stuns enemies also of balance, One shot NPC enemy's from stealth with ease
[3]Dark Cloak - turn invisible to lose agro remove dots, prevent single target damage for few seconds, coupled with surprise attack
[4]killers blade- execute move, health regen
[5]Flex - suggest a buff like camo hunter (crit) , or grim focus(8% damage), but can swap out for mass hysteria if dealing with larger groups of enemies, though i prefer mass hysteria on my other bar. Maybe something like flurry,rending slashes flying blade to help level DW skill line too.
[ULT] Either morph of deathstroke, This give an additional buff to your next attack that does stack! its cheap and having more assassin abilities on bar gives more crit

how i use it:

you are not using healing on bar you have health potions if things get really bad but you use CC and the healing you get from killers blade execute should suffice.This can easily take 3 enemies. You stealth surprise attack one, he is dead. you can mass hysteria or cloak and suprise attack a second for a 4 second stun but also sets of balance and Debuffs!! so good. A heavy attack after this will do double damage due to off balance and get you resources. if alive killers blade finish for health. Ambush the other target and repeat: cloak, surprise attack, heavy attack, killers blade. i use the ult after ambush and before dark cloak, surprise attack combo so my surprise attack hits harder

Bar two support and AOE DW:

[1]mark target - use for healing - debuff target,
[2]Quick cloak -does exactly what double take would do 20% dodge plus 40%speed buff, can swap out for double take if you need to conserve stamina for DPS. but quick cloak also does some damage to anyone who hits you and double take doesnt
[3]sap essence - your damage buff, off heal, aoe, magicka dump
[4]steel tornado - spam skill
[5]Flex - you may decide you want your gap closer on this bar also, or flying dagger to pull when out of line of sight or mass hysteria if you don't have it on bar 1 for that oh **** moment that's what id use.
[ULT]soul tether - every Nb knows how nice this move is. healing stunning damaging death bomb of an AOE

how i use it:

I like to mark a target, a melee target with reasonable armor, this way he is debuffed and likely to die and give me a nice health boost mid aoe spam. i decide who i mark based on how many targets I'm facing and how strong (how quickly i will need the health boost) and how I'm going to engage (pull or gap close). After target is marked I tend to get quick cloak on change bar (use grim focus for stamina regen/damage buff depending on morph) ambush in (not on the marked target)switch bars back sap essence into steel tornado spam weaving light attacks on my marked target, and re applying sap if i have good magicka and need a little health tot up. if i get in trouble i switch bars cloak and single target the guy who i marked or execute the lowest health guy, and mass hysteria after i get the health boost to regain my control

i tend to keep the core skills i state and swap the [5] flex spot depending if I'm grinding and want a flying dagger to pull as many enemies as i can or need the extra crit with camo hunter, or focus for stamina regen and extra damage, its all situational depending who im with and what we are doing.

AtmaDarkwolf

My fav build setup was what I was actually using from the start.. it just does not cut it.

Swallow soul is a decent damage dealer, and I can manage (with good gear) SOME world bosses, but I STILL watch anyone else of diff classes just plow though content I need many, many repeat casts to kill.

Unfortunately in pvp it is just utter trash (Seems, at least when not facing zerg packs of 10+ people, most pvp is 'hold down right button, spam skills' so most siphoning skills do jack squat.(At least I was not able to land a single dot or siphon, I never saw my health go up, and generally was absolutely different to how pve worked, in pvp my Swallow/Entropy/sap/cripple/strikes setup did GREAT, just killed VERY slow(At least it felt that way) and I wanted more kick.

Judging from all the advice, this is simply not possible, everyone wants a nightblade to be the typical 'thief' build who does sneak attacks OR a lame 'mage' type who uses a staff. Neither playstyle is that fun imo.

The 2h/bow setup also feels very un-nightbladeish (The bow not so much, that feels ok and I Don't mind it although I PREFER duel weild) and I STILL felt 2h was 'weak' Maybe its just my level range, but with @ level gear with @ level blue or purple enchants, following multiple builds - and wasting a good 150+ K coin on respecs to try other sh!t out, I have realized that there just is -not- a way to escape the general 'cookie cutter' setups. You cannot 'play how u like' (IE if it worked 1-50 it prob will NOT work VR lvs)

Violynne

AtmaDarkwolf wrote: »

Judging from all the advice, this is simply not possible, everyone wants a nightblade to be the typical 'thief' build who does sneak attacks OR a lame 'mage' type who uses a staff. Neither playstyle is that fun imo.

Unfortunately, it's not really a matter of want, but need, given some passives work directly with such a play style. The guaranteed crit hit on stealth, for example, is just something that requires sneak to get.

I've not seen an NB play with sorc backup, though I'm sure they're out there. Most, like me, used bow for range, given how well scatter shot can be used for quick crowd control.

People swear by NB's DPS output, but the reality is while it may be quick to deliver, it requires twice the delivery time to do the same amount of damage output DKs and sorcs can do with one hit.

I also sat by and marveled how these classes just swooped in and cleared a hole. I was never a fan of mage play in other ES games, but this one changed that for me.

I can even enter crossbone boss areas, ranked level 2 (or however they're tiered), and take them out solo. Yesterday, I wanted to see how awesome I was and took on an area that had 3 level 2 bosses (Argonian pirates, I think) and took them all down solo.

I could never do that with my NB, which is why many remain incomplete in my game.

Hence why NB is a chore to play.

RavenSworn

Violynne wrote: »

AtmaDarkwolf wrote: »

Judging from all the advice, this is simply not possible, everyone wants a nightblade to be the typical 'thief' build who does sneak attacks OR a lame 'mage' type who uses a staff. Neither playstyle is that fun imo.

Unfortunately, it's not really a matter of want, but need, given some passives work directly with such a play style. The guaranteed crit hit on stealth, for example, is just something that requires sneak to get.

I've not seen an NB play with sorc backup, though I'm sure they're out there. Most, like me, used bow for range, given how well scatter shot can be used for quick crowd control.

People swear by NB's DPS output, but the reality is while it may be quick to deliver, it requires twice the delivery time to do the same amount of damage output DKs and sorcs can do with one hit.

I also sat by and marveled how these classes just swooped in and cleared a hole. I was never a fan of mage play in other ES games, but this one changed that for me.

I can even enter crossbone boss areas, ranked level 2 (or however they're tiered), and take them out solo. Yesterday, I wanted to see how awesome I was and took on an area that had 3 level 2 bosses (Argonian pirates, I think) and took them all down solo.

I could never do that with my NB, which is why many remain incomplete in my game.

Hence why NB is a chore to play.

Weird because as a nightblade myself, I solo everything, down from delves to world bosses to public dungeons.. Never had much of a problem other than the occasional oops moments when you are watching *** or something. And my build is somewhat hybrid, tankish melee stamina based dps.

I can take on groups of ten and survive in public dungeons. Perhaps its because I am a tank/dps but ive downed bosses using bows, dual wield, two handers, sword and shields...

Not tooting much but I had my difficulties before, way before when NightBlades were simply unplayable because stats were all over the place and all class skills were still under magicka rules. Its so much better and easier now to play as a nightblade, even if you are going balls out weapons ready melee warrior.

And yes, when I fight the bosses, I can count in one hand how many times I used cloak or its variants.

Bloodgharm

Yes, NBs tend to be pretty tough to play. This will become even worse in pvp since they will be extending TTK across the board. So where does that leave us NBs?

We still won't have any survivability inherent in our class skills. This means that 2h skills like rally will be even more of a necessity. Yes, we'll be getting our cloak fixed, but it still won't add to our sustainability. We can no longer rely on striking hard and fast and as we are forced into longer engagements, it will become a slaughter.

I predict an uproar from NBs after IC drops. We'll get a half-a$$ed buff to make up for it, but until we get to the root of the problem (survivability), it's going to be face-roll city on NBs.

Consequently, I'll be focusing on pve while I listen to all the QQs.