Melee Magic Nightblade- the problem

Erondil

Magicka melee nightblade is ok if you have the right setup, very good instant damage (more than sorc for example) and decent survivability when played well with cloak, shadow image, healing ward and annulment. From my experience its better (higher instant burst, less counterable) than staff nb in open world but its the contrary in duels, where its one of the worst build to go with atm. If you feel youre lacking damage, go shadow mundus and manage to get 1.9k+ mag rec (drinks) unless youre using spell reduce cost glyphs. You wont have nearly the same instant uncounterable burst capacities than a stamblade, but still very decent/high compared to other magicka builds, and you have alot of tools for survivability.

arkansas_ESO

Honestly, I feel like the non-bomb magicka NB died this patch. I simply can't see a DW/resto magicka NB working with the nerf to proxy's damage, and staff NBs are so reliant on projectles that you might as well just pack it up when you see a DK (a good 20-40% of the people you run into in PVP), as they'll just reflect all of your abilities right back at you. If somebody has had good results with magicka NB 1vX in DB, by all means let me know what you're doing.

joshhh_nb

@arkansas_ESO like I said before, I'm changing my mind after playing for a week on my new build. Melee magic NB is still viable probably in a better shape than sorcs if they fix cloak to work reliably. It's really about timing your burst like what @erondil said and I found the perfect setup for it. 5 lich 5julianos/kagernac with 3 willpower and either apprentice stone/ shadow. The addition of spell damage enchants and higher penetration when db comes out on console is really gonna be nice.

On my dw bar I'm using concealed weapon,lotus fan, merciless resolve, sap and cloak.
Resto bar : healing ward, shadow image, cripple, double take and fear. I might try harness/ dampen magic for more survivability but kiting with cripple, shadow image and 20% dodge chance from double take is good enough.

I really like clouding swarm but i dropped it for tether instead and comboing that with merciless resolve proc and concealed weapons is mostly Gg and the heal+ stun is really nice.

kaithuzar

I know that sharpened is causing a ton of damage making it appear as if everyone is running around without armor with the exception of 5 heavy wearers which in turn makes them act like they are wearing 5 light; however...
I doubt this will change
In lieu of this, heavy armor has recently received a nice buff & in 5 heavy I'm able to get approx. 3k unbuffed 4k buffed sp dmg as a magic melee nb.
Assuming you made julianos or kag's heavy you might be able to get closer to 5k buffed.
Personally I'm still using the Willows Path heavy that I made, but you could really do anything, seducer is a good choice too.
The key to these builds IMO is having decent stam or stam recovery so you can break free, dodge roll, & block on occasion.
Shield stacking with magicka harness is really helpful now that it has physical resist as well & minimum of 4 impen is needed to secure yourself in a fight.

kaithuzar

Scratch that, I switched from willows path to 5 heavy kags 7 impen tri-stat food, + harness magicka & healing ward
I feel pretty OP overall. You can use the gold food to increase health + recovery but then your shields don't stack as high & you lose some dmg. It might be worth it if you are fighting someone wearing shield breaker & using blessing of resto with maelstrom resto staff instead of bubble.

Cody

Stamblades also tend to be in medium armor, which gives more resistance than light, so that does not help matters any.

joshhh_nb

To be honest resistances don't mean much anymore unless you really build for it because of how op penetration is. I'm feeling really happy on my mag NB this patch, hopefully they give it a small buff in the next one