Anyone willing to train a newbie nightblade for PvP? (PC EU)

HaldaAinur

Simply, put, I'm not very good and would highly appreciate a more experienced player teaching me the basics of being a nightblade in PvP.

Build: Stamina. 219 cp
Set: mostly marksman's, with jack of flanking.

First bar, dual wield; Rending slashes IV, Flying Blade, Piercing Mark IV, Ambush II, Shadowy Disguise IV, Incapacitating Strike IV
Second bar, bow: Poison injection IV, Draining shot IV, Focused aim I, Retreating maneuver III , shadowy disguise IV, aggressive horn IV.

Currently have no problem as DD/DPS on PvE, never been good at PvP, so figured it's time to learn a few new tricks.

HaldaAinur

No but really I need help

Arthalion1

I don't play on PC, but I will give you a few tips.

With regard to your abilities, you are missing the two bread and butter abilities used by almost all nightblades in pvp. Get surprise attack and mass hysteria on your bars straight away. Mass hysteria can and should be used once every 4 seconds in a fight.

On your bow bar, draining shot doesn't tend to work well in pvp. I've tested it and it just doesn't fire, so I would swap that out for the jump back version if you're looking to gain range, or better still replace it with vigor.

You also need either shuffle or double take on your bar. You're missing 20% dodge chance, which is key.

I would suggest you scrap rending slashes for surprise attack and piercing mark for mass hysteria. That'll give you a strong melee bar. You want to light attack before each surprise attack for high speed dps.

Om your bow bar, draining shot switches for vigor. You need that heal. Especially if you're not going 2h, so have no rally (I prefer 2h as rally is just op). Retreating manouevor switches either for double take while is a speed boost and 20% dodge or shuffle which is 20% and removes snares.

Gear wise, there are a hell of a lot of choices depending on whether you want to be a ganker or prefer sustain. I'm not going to get into gear as there are so many choices for a stam blade. To get you started, I'd suggest you go copy one of Sypher'S builds. Google him.

Hope that helps a bit!

HaldaAinur

Neat- I've tried shuffle, in my case it didn't really do much for me though. And yeah, definitely going to add a burst heal in there. I'll probably keep piercing mark, as for me personally, it works well for sustainability (plus I was screamed at for not using it, ages ago...so now I'm confused, lel).

I've bumped into a few helpful players in game, and am currently just using generic builds and building off of them according to how they suit my playstyle as a nightblade, which has varying results.

My main problem is insta dying, so for the most part I agree with what you said. Definitely need to work in a burst heal, or maybe add in a few armor pieces that add extra health. Currently I go for armor with extra stamina or stam regen, thoughts?

Arthalion1

Piercing mark is a good ability. I do like it and will slot it if I'm fighting an annoying nb, but it doesn't quite make the cut for my main bar.

It sounds like you want to play more of a sustain style, so I'd recommend getting your health to about 21K. Slotting surprise attack and mass hysteria will instantly give you 6% more HP due to the passives, so that'll help.

You need to remember to play defensively, rather than all out attack. I run drinks which give stamina/magicka Regen, which really boosts sustain and means you have lots of magicka Regen for cloak and mass hysteria.

When you cloak, the passive will increase your resistances for a short time and dots won't tick on you in cloak, so you need to cloak a lot in combat. If you keep using mass hysteria your target will use a lot of stamina breaking free too.

The vice cannon set adds quite a nice heal if you're looking for a little boost, as you don't have rally. Cloak healing is quite important. Try and get some tri pots for Regen, as you haven't got much healing right now.

I have two set ups. I love my bow, so I play an unusual pure bow build sometimes. My build for that is 5 marksman, 4 morag tong, 1 kena and 1 bloodspawn. Abilities are poison injection, magnum shot, lethal arrow, mass hysteria, cloak and flawless dawn breaker with a 2h buff bar of relentless focus, vigor, magelight (for the empower passive for my first stealth lethal arrow which crits for about 12k), shuffle (this or double take you need that dodge chance 1 in 5 hits will miss you...), rally and consuming darkness, stack heals and fire your bow in safety of your 60% reduced damage ring.

My melee build is similar bow bar, except I switch magnum for vigor and hysteria for shuffle. The 2h bar is killers blade, ambush, surprise attack, mass hysteria, rally and incapacitating strikes.

Gear on melee set up is 1 kena 1 blood spawn 5 piece either vice cannon, hundings rage or vipers sting with ideally 3 agility and maelstrom weapons. Assuming you don't have maelstrom, you could go 4 morag tong, if you use one of the jewellery sets.

I play mainly solo and regularly win 2v1 and 3v1 fights with these builds, occasionally more if I can pick off 1 or two with my bow first.

HaldaAinur

Yup, defensive is definitely better, still can't take down targets though. Unfortunately though, I am a stam blade, and didnt put much into health points. Keep it as is or?

Arthalion1

Get yourself to 21K health in pvp. Either change your enchantments or stick some points into health, it doesn't matter which. Unfortunately you're going to be a bit squishy until you've got some heals. Rally is a great burst heal and gives major brutality. I'd recommend changing to 2h if you're not too in love with dw.

HaldaAinur

Hm.....but what about magicka for cloak? I'm thnking switching health to 20, magicka at 15 as its what I use least.

I could put points into resto- started off as a NB healer - and see if that helps.

Arthalion1

Hybrids don't really work. Take all of your points out of magicka and move them into health or stamina. The magicka/stamina drinks will sort you out for cloak etc. I use Rosy Disposition Tonic.

I would say push for vigor, rather than trying to go resto hybrid. You should be able to get vigor pretty quickly in pvp these days.

HaldaAinur

Alright, just a thought. I'll probably go split the points from mag for each. What's a good amount of points to leave in magicka or should I just move it all?

Arthalion1

I don't have any points in magicka. You will see when you put on that Regen drink that you don't need it.

If you really like dw, you could always give up your bow for a 2h buff bar, similar to the one I mentioned above?

HaldaAinur

I might stick with DW for a while longer, and see how it goes. If I change I'm thinking of switching to one hand and shield, for the extra resistance.

As for armor I'm going to mix my current set up with the vice-canon set you mentioned above for the extra healing.

Arthalion1

Good stuff. You'll not it procs on dots from stealth, so all you have to do is cloak then poison injection from cloak and the dot will stick.

HaldaAinur

Is the vicecanon set available in medium armor? If not what is a good alternative?

Arthalion1

Hi, yes, it is only available in medium. You get it from merchants in the Imperial City sewers. It will be for sale in guild stores too.

Arthalion1

Here is the link to the stats:

http://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Vicecannon+of+Venom+Set

HaldaAinur

Ah, not sure if I can do it then, don't have IC. Any alternatives?

Arthalion1

Viper's Sting set is good. That might be a bit hard to get if you don't have gold though. I'd get someone to craft you the Hundings Rage set. It's a pretty bread and butter stamina dps set.