PvE - Stamina DDs analysis (only existing classes)

Demion

Very good read OP, much thank you for this will read again and follow the updated testing that follows

DHale

LiquidPony wrote: »

DHale wrote: »

LiquidPony wrote: »

DHale wrote: »

I am sorry to be the negative poster but 99 perecent of people do not wear the very best gear in the game as you do or run with one of the most elite guilds as you do. So try posting an assessment with five hunding three agility. Or some similar combination. I really don't see how an elite players perspective is helpful to the player base. I did find the post to be extremely interesting and well written though.

@DHale how about you log onto the PTS and test it yourself?

OP is a raider in a top raid guild. You expect someone else to do a bunch of testing for gear they don't use and content they don't play?

Three days so far. So try again. That said I believe I would do (as everyone else would be) better in twice fanged snake and vicious ophidian.

@DHale so then where's your detailed write-up of the state of stamina DPS using sub-optimal gear?

There are a ton of players who are interested in the BiS meta every patch.

And what's stopping you from getting Vicious Ophidian or Twice-Fanged Serpent? That stuff drops in normal Trials. I ran 5 x Vicious Ophidian (acquired in normal Trials PUGs) long before I completed my first vet Trial and I farmed my TFS armor pieces with a 4-man group in normal Sanctum (you'll actually have better luck farming TFS on normal than on vet, since you're going to get much more VO/IA/Yokeda on vet).

I would never in million years spend one second testing something I don't support. I think the patch is no bueno. I am not going to say all is well in Shangrala. This game, any game should never be balanced around elite players with the best gear. As for what stops me I have zero desire to farm blue jewelry in normal trials. I have never needed moon dancer, aether, alkosh, VO or TFS. Glad he has it and glad you have it. I can do absolutely everything I want to do with the gear I have but that does not change the fact is most people do not have the best gear and they cannot do what op and apparently you are going to fare in th Morrowind patch.

Shad0wfire99

DHale wrote: »

I would never in million years spend one second testing something I don't support. I think the patch is no bueno. I am not going to say all is well in Shangrala. This game, any game should never be balanced around elite players with the best gear. As for what stops me I have zero desire to farm blue jewelry in normal trials. I have never needed moon dancer, aether, alkosh, VO or TFS. Glad he has it and glad you have it. I can do absolutely everything I want to do with the gear I have but that does not change the fact is most people do not have the best gear and they cannot do what op and apparently you are going to fare in th Morrowind patch.

If you don't even wanna run normal trials, then why would you have any concern whatsoever about any of the changes in this patch?

Flattedfifth

DHale wrote: »

LiquidPony wrote: »

DHale wrote: »

LiquidPony wrote: »

DHale wrote: »

I am sorry to be the negative poster but 99 perecent of people do not wear the very best gear in the game as you do or run with one of the most elite guilds as you do. So try posting an assessment with five hunding three agility. Or some similar combination. I really don't see how an elite players perspective is helpful to the player base. I did find the post to be extremely interesting and well written though.

@DHale how about you log onto the PTS and test it yourself?

OP is a raider in a top raid guild. You expect someone else to do a bunch of testing for gear they don't use and content they don't play?

Three days so far. So try again. That said I believe I would do (as everyone else would be) better in twice fanged snake and vicious ophidian.

@DHale so then where's your detailed write-up of the state of stamina DPS using sub-optimal gear?

There are a ton of players who are interested in the BiS meta every patch.

And what's stopping you from getting Vicious Ophidian or Twice-Fanged Serpent? That stuff drops in normal Trials. I ran 5 x Vicious Ophidian (acquired in normal Trials PUGs) long before I completed my first vet Trial and I farmed my TFS armor pieces with a 4-man group in normal Sanctum (you'll actually have better luck farming TFS on normal than on vet, since you're going to get much more VO/IA/Yokeda on vet).

I would never in million years spend one second testing something I don't support. I think the patch is no bueno. I am not going to say all is well in Shangrala. This game, any game should never be balanced around elite players with the best gear. As for what stops me I have zero desire to farm blue jewelry in normal trials. I have never needed moon dancer, aether, alkosh, VO or TFS. Glad he has it and glad you have it. I can do absolutely everything I want to do with the gear I have but that does not change the fact is most people do not have the best gear and they cannot do what op and apparently you are going to fare in th Morrowind patch.

THEN STOP SPENDING A MILLION YEARS COMPLAINING! You "think" the patch is bad but you refuse to test it? So, because you "feel" it'll be bad that's it? What are you Newt Gingrich?

Poop or get off the pot. You refuse to test (even tho you have 11 characters lmao) but won't stop moaaaaaning

Izaki

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

This is the type of stuff I love reading, and it helps tremendously.

Great post... thanks for taking the time to write it up!

NOW FIX US NIGHTBLADES PRETTY PLEASE!

fericirea

Asmael wrote: »

Mucho insights...

Thanks for contributing. It's very insightful.

Royaji

Thank you for the great post. Maybe it's not all lost for stam DDs.

Considering the changes to rotation, might it be that Master's daggers will become more viable? Rending slashes are on the bar for every class and since our DPS will rely on DOTs now will it be a major increase?

martinhpb16_ESO

DHale wrote: »

I would never in million years spend one second testing something I don't support. I think the patch is no bueno. I am not going to say all is well in Shangrala. This game, any game should never be balanced around elite players with the best gear. As for what stops me I have zero desire to farm blue jewelry in normal trials. I have never needed moon dancer, aether, alkosh, VO or TFS. Glad he has it and glad you have it. I can do absolutely everything I want to do with the gear I have but that does not change the fact is most people do not have the best gear and they cannot do what op and apparently you are going to fare in th Morrowind patch.

This makes no sense. If you are not going to run content and have never needed gear why are you complaining about people who do run trials and subsequently use the gear they get?

Its a misconception to think that you can only complete content if you have the best gear. best gear is accumulated.

I dunno just seems that you want to gripe against what you perceive is "elite".

You say you have no problem running the content you want to run, in the gear you want to run it in, so whats the problem?

Sorry I'm getting wrapped up in replying to you when what is important is the extremely informative OP.

technohic

Awesome post OP.

So hope they adjust NB in some ways now.

t3hdubzy

DHale wrote: »

LiquidPony wrote: »

DHale wrote: »

LiquidPony wrote: »

DHale wrote: »

I am sorry to be the negative poster but 99 perecent of people do not wear the very best gear in the game as you do or run with one of the most elite guilds as you do. So try posting an assessment with five hunding three agility. Or some similar combination. I really don't see how an elite players perspective is helpful to the player base. I did find the post to be extremely interesting and well written though.

@DHale how about you log onto the PTS and test it yourself?

OP is a raider in a top raid guild. You expect someone else to do a bunch of testing for gear they don't use and content they don't play?

Three days so far. So try again. That said I believe I would do (as everyone else would be) better in twice fanged snake and vicious ophidian.

@DHale so then where's your detailed write-up of the state of stamina DPS using sub-optimal gear?

There are a ton of players who are interested in the BiS meta every patch.

And what's stopping you from getting Vicious Ophidian or Twice-Fanged Serpent? That stuff drops in normal Trials. I ran 5 x Vicious Ophidian (acquired in normal Trials PUGs) long before I completed my first vet Trial and I farmed my TFS armor pieces with a 4-man group in normal Sanctum (you'll actually have better luck farming TFS on normal than on vet, since you're going to get much more VO/IA/Yokeda on vet).

I would never in million years spend one second testing something I don't support. I think the patch is no bueno. I am not going to say all is well in Shangrala. This game, any game should never be balanced around elite players with the best gear. As for what stops me I have zero desire to farm blue jewelry in normal trials. I have never needed moon dancer, aether, alkosh, VO or TFS. Glad he has it and glad you have it. I can do absolutely everything I want to do with the gear I have but that does not change the fact is most people do not have the best gear and they cannot do what op and apparently you are going to fare in th Morrowind patch.

I think its fair to say testing with top gear and top players would help show the bigger gaps than average players with average gear who dont understand mechanics.


I would say though that it would be interesting to see the 2 but hard to balance around both if they have different results

CatchMeTrolling

Wish I could read everything but nice work actually taking the time to do this with great detail.

Pallio

So BiS gear, complicated rotation, weaving in a lot of heavy attacts, squint your eyes, hold up your left pinky finger, while gargling ginger ale and our dps will be almost good.

Ivan04

Rich was here! /kowtow
NEED MORE DEVS

Sigtric

arkansas_ESO wrote: »

"By the time you cast the last ability, the first one is about to run out, rinse & repeat. It's simple, it's effective, it allows you to run 3 weapon damage glyphs and no sustain sets, but it gives the best results, so HA just became the new spammable for all stamina specs."

Isn't this boring? I mean why even have damage skills like Flurry or Force Pulse if the best way to play the game now is to hold down LMB in between reapplying your DOTs?

Hold down LMB in between reapplying is more boring than spamming Flurry?

Dragath

@Asmael
good work, thank you for the insight on the stamina side of things.
can you tell me how your mdks perform?
i feel like these changes are just too much for mdks, if they don't get every bit of support possible.

Izaki

Sigtric wrote: »

arkansas_ESO wrote: »

"By the time you cast the last ability, the first one is about to run out, rinse & repeat. It's simple, it's effective, it allows you to run 3 weapon damage glyphs and no sustain sets, but it gives the best results, so HA just became the new spammable for all stamina specs."

Isn't this boring? I mean why even have damage skills like Flurry or Force Pulse if the best way to play the game now is to hold down LMB in between reapplying your DOTs?

Hold down LMB in between reapplying is more boring than spamming Flurry?

Or spamming Force Pulse or spamming Whip or spamming Jabs... Or Surprise Attack... Or Snipe ( ) Or Dizzy Swing... The list goes on really.

The thing about heavy attacks, is that you have to time your skills properly so as to not waste any globals. Its actually quite a fair bit more interesting than spamming a spammable.

dpencil1

@Asmael Just a note regarding HA breaking the Exploiter passive. This is false. Combat Metrics registers the Exploiter effect as a black icon with "Blockade of Storms" In the debuff section. This effect is not removed if the mob is knocked down by a heavy attack. It is retained for its full duration regardless.

I don't know who started claiming that HAs messed up Exploiter, but I challenge anyone who thinks that to present hard evidence to refute my own.

Edit: Ok, after looking closely at what Asmael posted in response to this I do see the momentary drop of the buff after a heavy attack. Dunno how I missed it before when I tested it a couple months ago. Thx.

Grunim

Much of the stuff in the original write-up went over my head. It looked very cool and I could understand parts of it, but for so much of it I lack the personal experience to really understand. I just don't have the analytical skills I maybe had a few decades ago. I don't do any sort of trials whatsoever, I find even attempting competitive PvE to be far too stressful. For group PvE, I sometimes do pledges and I avoid pledges in DLC dungeons because they are just too hard. I just want to know if I keep the armor I already wear, which obviously isn't BiS and the traits tend to be things like Impenetrable rather than Divines, and don't get new armor and I just switch from using light attacks to more heavy attacks I should be able to complete the original vet dungeons still?

Why do I care about vet dungeons? Because folks who play in Cyrodiil, which I enjoy doing, like to level their undaunted skill lines and if you don't do veteran or DLC dungeons, this takes a very very long time.

So for folks who aren't really into end game PvE, will we be OK playing the same PvE content we currently play?

usmcjdking

I have been saying this for quite some time but there was a lot of DOOM & GLOOM in some guilds. The simple fact that heavy weaving for stamina is practically non-intrusive for DPS rotations will allow it to sustain DPS.

Tholian1

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

This is the type of stuff I love reading, and it helps tremendously.

Great post... thanks for taking the time to write it up!

The section about NB was interesting.

Acid_Glow

Thank you very much for this analysis looking forward for more input on the changes.

Ruinhorn

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

This is the type of stuff I love reading, and it helps tremendously.

Great post... thanks for taking the time to write it up!

Unfortunately, even such a fine information doesn't help when your only playable character is stamblade...

Faulgor

Asmael wrote: »

I'd even go as far as to say that this might be a bit too much of a buff, but I'm afraid of having a lizard squad hunting me down so "SHHHH".

SHHHH!

Too bad my Argonian is a stamblade.

Also, will this make the Kvatch Gladiator set in any way usable?

Vaoh

@Asmael Absolutely fantastic write up! TYSM.

As a side note, how has it generally been preferred on PTS to run Stamina vs Magicka setups when going for serious clears such as score runs? Will we continue to see 8/8 Magicka DPS (and sometimes the rare 7/8 Magicka DPS), or will we begin to truly see Stamina DPS enter trials and carry their weight due to Sustain being easier on them?

Also I main a Magicka Sorc, and have easily invested around 95% of my ESO time into it. I've already made the decision before Warden was announced that I would main a Magicka Warden once it launched. Since we can't talk about Warden yet, how have your Magicka Sorc group mates been handling sustain? Are they still strong at single target DPS?

aeowulf

Great post OP, nice to see RIchLambert acknowledged it too. I hope he is takin everything you posted into consideration, especially the nb section wrt trial % and sustain changes

Asmael

Damn I raid a bit, go to sleep and end up with a dev comment and 50 answers, da' hell

LiquidPony wrote: »

[..] On the topic of Nightblades ... what are your thoughts on the War Machine set for stamblades? Say, 5 x War Machine + 5 x TFS + Maelstrom weapons.

Same thought for a magblade with Master Architect.

Seems to me that a Nightblade running that set, dropping cheap ultis every 20 seconds to proc Major Slayer would be a massive buff to group DPS.

I'd probably do it with a monster instead of maelstrom daggers (keeping the maelstrom bow backbar) but the general idea is there. It's a pretty promising set and this is pretty much what people thought about. I'd still prefer NBs to be good by themselves instead of being buff-bots. Final point: just like the Alkosh set in MoL, we will try the set on the tanks.

Alternatively, stamplars also have the new Crescent sweep.

We had a little issue with template characters *cough* zos* *cought* so need to either farm it or get it on the next PTS cycle for further testing.

IzakiBrotherSs wrote: »

I think that a Stamina Sorcerer (as well as NB and Templar) can totally make use of the heavy attack AND the vMA weapons. That could have some very high potential.

I agree with everything you've said on the stamblade. Its such a shame...

Actually @Xantaria used both on a stam DK as well and both rotations are pretty close in terms of overall DPS, but the sustain is slightly worse. Not that much of an issue on the live servers. Perhaps someone will find a vMA daggers rotation performing better that is still sustainable, you never know with those things

Strider_Roshin wrote: »

Solid write-up. Food for thought: with the change from light attack weaving to heavy attack weaving, will this help bridge the gap between DW DPS, and 2H DPS considering the Follow-up passive of the 2H?

Already tested as well with different gear setups, and there are a few other combos to try once the templates are fixed (hopefully).

It does reduces the gap, but not enough yet to make 2h a competitive choice in terms of sustained DPS.

Food for thought 2: Stamina templar for lower ult cost + prism passive for 3 ult/6s + carve from 2h + the new sets (so with 2H). That's silly, but we will test that.

EldritchPenguin wrote: »

Hmm. So Stamina is superior this patch, but not in a way that absolutely eclipses Magicka.

Even being a Magicka player, I can live with that.

If stamina indeed surpasses magicka again in terms of single target, we will see what we saw before, which is still a minimum amount of mag DKs due to their sheer amount of utility and control and magicka sorcs due the restrictions on the number of melees for certain bosses. Also, trash fights are still a thing, and stamina is still behind in this regard.

Both could see play, can't ask for more than that.

DHale wrote: »

I am sorry to be the negative poster but 99 perecent of people do not wear the very best gear in the game as you do or run with one of the most elite guilds as you do. So try posting an assessment with five hunding three agility. Or some similar combination. I really don't see how an elite players perspective is helpful to the player base. I did find the post to be extremely interesting and well written though.

You'd be surprised to know that both parses posted in this thread have been done with Hundings (5 on the front bar, 3 backbar).

The difference between Agility and Alkosh/VO has also proven to be quite small, and before the change to sustain, the extra stamina from Agility also translated as extra sustain for those needing it.

Gear does make a significant difference in some cases - for magicka templars, a 5p Moondancer makes sustaining a breeze on the live servers (I don't think @Alcast played around with magplar that much, just annoy him for that ), but in the case of stamina, the difference between the absolute best gear and non-trial drop + crafted setups is a matter of a few %.

I dislike making a "this is the best gear ever and you should use this, this and that" kind of post, because there is no such thing as "absolute best", only "situational best" and "generally best". Two Fanged Snake is overall the best set IF you are solo, but turns out to be quite "meh" if someone is running armor debuffs with NMB / Sunderflame. Just like Axe / Dagger is a very strong choice against bosses but inferior to daggers x2 against trash fights, and not everyone wants to swap everyone, so people actually get to choose.

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

This is the type of stuff I love reading, and it helps tremendously.

Great post... thanks for taking the time to write it up!

*purrs softly*

Capt_Morgan wrote: »

Is this satire? Hvy Atk weaving DoTs is the direction they are taking this game... and that's it? This can't be serious can it?

arkansas_ESO wrote: »

"By the time you cast the last ability, the first one is about to run out, rinse & repeat. It's simple, it's effective, it allows you to run 3 weapon damage glyphs and no sustain sets, but it gives the best results, so HA just became the new spammable for all stamina specs."

Isn't this boring? I mean why even have damage skills like Flurry or Force Pulse if the best way to play the game now is to hold down LMB in between reapplying your DOTs?

I don't think Zos will let the game turn into ESO : Heavy attacks Unlimited, since it doesn't quite have the same level of interaction than before and doesn't quite feel good. It takes about 5mn of forum-warrior'ing to realize people wouldn't be a fan of this.

Shad0wfire99 wrote: »

@Asmael Not that you guys would ever run into such issues anyway, but have you noticed any kind of adjustments to enrage timers in any of the vet trials?

Time is a precious resource that we mostly choose to spend on the new trial, more than the old ones. I do not think there were any adjustments to any of the existing trials, so...

But if that reassures you, I sometimes run with groups that are not always experienced in said veteran trials, and the biggest issue I notice is usually to follow the mechanics properly and staying alive, more so than having the highest potential DPS. This little investment in survivability might be the biggest DPS gain one can hope for in most cases.

sodantokb16_ESO wrote: »

Interesting post. What I get from it is that bow, being not "optimal" before, is even worse because of its heavy attack. Cool.

There is something to know about heavy attacks fo both DW/2H and bows: it is that they don't behave the same way for all abilities, specifically bow.

While on my front bar, I never let go of my HA button until I swap, all you do is activate an ability as soon as your character starts weaving the HA, and both the HA and the ability will be released as soon as the HA is fully charged.

For Bow, doing the same with ground DoTs (such as Endless Hail) will instead wait for you to release the HA button, while instant cast abilities (like Poison Injection) will instantly fire said ability.

If the behavior of Bow HA could be changed to behave liek DW/2H on the front bar, it would make it much easier to weave HA with it.

Royaji wrote: »

Thank you for the great post. Maybe it's not all lost for stam DDs.

Considering the changes to rotation, might it be that Master's daggers will become more viable? Rending slashes are on the bar for every class and since our DPS will rely on DOTs now will it be a major increase?

To be further tested once proper PTS templates are available, not giving a final "yes" or "no". Soon™

Dragath wrote: »

@Asmael
good work, thank you for the insight on the stamina side of things.
can you tell me how your mdks perform?
i feel like these changes are just too much for mdks, if they don't get every bit of support possible.

They are currently bashing their heads against walls.

Vaoh wrote: »

@Asmael Absolutely fantastic write up! TYSM.

As a side note, how has it generally been preferred on PTS to run Stamina vs Magicka setups when going for serious clears such as score runs? Will we continue to see 8/8 Magicka DPS (and sometimes the rare 7/8 Magicka DPS), or will we begin to truly see Stamina DPS enter trials and carry their weight due to Sustain being easier on them?

Also I main a Magicka Sorc, and have easily invested around 95% of my ESO time into it. I've already made the decision before Warden was announced that I would main a Magicka Warden once it launched. Since we can't talk about Warden yet, how have your Magicka Sorc group mates been handling sustain? Are they still strong at single target DPS?

Since we are going for completion of the new trial only (better score comes later) and that the PTS is a unique opportunity to test whatever people want, if someone wants to test a stamina build, he simply goes for it. If these changes go live in their current state (which I doubt) I'd see stamina being picked for higher single target DPS and magicka for AoE. That and caltrops (finally) not being restricted to a single user, that could possibly mean a more balanced raid raid composition will be a thing.

For magicka sorc specifically, it retains pretty high st DPS compared to their magicka equivalent, but I don't think we're quite done testing everything yet.

---

Final point: this is the first PTS cycle, expect changes to happen, and don't take all I said as "this is exactly what you should do", because progress is done doing something other people didn't think about.

About the builds posted:

I am not the fastest stamina player of all times, I also make mistakes - lots of them, I don't know everything about stamina DK yet after maining it for over a year and bringing it to the most competitive level, I still have a lot to learn just like everyone else. I prefer to think of my builds as "templates" that one should adapt to his/her needs, offering a very strong basis - but still one you should change according to the situation. Is there something better out there? There probably is, but maybe it simply isn't known yet.

Test stuff & make science. Also share the skooma.

Alcast

Ok this is the NonNDAd pts forum, I must be careful with what I write here mios dios.
@Asmael crazy writeup and very detailed and prolly sums it up pretty much.

Have you also tried to set up a "Non HA" setup for each class and see the differences? or are you planning on doing that? Because it would be GREAT to see the difference currently between dps of Heavy Attack build and a normal Light Attack weave build

dpencil1 wrote: »

@Asmael Just a note regarding HA breaking the Exploiter passive. This is false. Combat Metrics registers the Exploiter effect as a black icon with "Blockade of Storms" In the debuff section. This effect is not removed if the mob is knocked down by a heavy attack. It is retained for its full duration regardless.

I don't know who started claiming that HAs messed up Exploiter, but I challenge anyone who thinks that to present hard evidence to refute my own.

Every time he heavy attacks you see Off Balance pops up. And this is the INGAME damage meter.



*triggeroni* @Asmael xD

DHale wrote: »

I am sorry to be the negative poster but 99 perecent of people do not wear the very best gear in the game as you do or run with one of the most elite guilds as you do. So try posting an assessment with five hunding three agility. Or some similar combination. I really don't see how an elite players perspective is helpful to the player base. I did find the post to be extremely interesting and well written though.

It does not matter which gear that you are using for a comparison between ALL classes? Sure if you do not use optimal gear your damage will be slightly lower, but it will go down on all classes in about the same way.

I am soon gonna do some Skeleton parses on my youtube channel with BiS gear + suboptimal gearsetup (if I dun forget that >.>)

ZOS_RichLambert wrote: »

This is the type of stuff I love reading, and it helps tremendously.

Great post... thanks for taking the time to write it up!

I also really hope ZOS is reconsidering this Heavy Attacks Online. I am sure they are already adjusting some stuff and we might see that with the next big update on PTS or the one after that.

For me personally, revert the changes to cost reduction on the Light and Medium armor + make the stamabilities again 20% cheaper (instead of only 15%) that would already help tremendously for both magicka and stamina. Because we know stamina had already a harder time sustaining than magicka in most PvE content (unless you were a HA build)


Also, it seems that Two Hander builds might become more viable, did a small test and it was only 2k dps behind the dualwield setup.

Asmael

dpencil1 wrote: »

@Asmael Just a note regarding HA breaking the Exploiter passive. This is false. Combat Metrics registers the Exploiter effect as a black icon with "Blockade of Storms" In the debuff section. This effect is not removed if the mob is knocked down by a heavy attack. It is retained for its full duration regardless.

I don't know who started claiming that HAs messed up Exploiter, but I challenge anyone who thinks that to present hard evidence to refute my own.

I wanted to make a separate reply to this comment, because it requires a detailed explanation

You'll find below 3 different parses taken from the live server:

Lightning staff LA spam + Blockade of storms - 99.6% uptime

Lightning staff HA spam + Blockade of storms - 84.8% uptime

Power Lash spam + Blockade of storms (similar to DW HA) - 54.3% uptime

A noticeable difference is that lightning staff heavy attacks consume it only on the final tick, hence the difference in uptime.

Offbalance is conditioned by:

• Permanent uptime of Blockade of storms
• Concussion proc RNG, as it needs to be up for Offbalance to be activated

If you use HA or Power lash, it will consume the proc then quickly refresh it, which means it will be down for maybe 0.1-0.2s every time you do it, but over the course of a fight, if multiple people are doing, and if Blockade of storms isn't up when a HA is done... RIP uptime on offbalance.

Hope it helps.

Cadbury

Alcast wrote: »

Also, it seems that Two Hander builds might become more viable, did a small test and it was only 2k dps behind the dualwield setup.

Don't play with my emotions

Teiglin14

Thank you for this awesome post! Just to add to this thread to reinforce what was said, I share most of the same sentiments, but can only give hard numbers for stamina nightblades. Nightblades are not brought to trials as it is. I am in a fairly competitive raid guild and have been leveling other characters - specifically magicka sorcerer dps's - to bring to these raids, because even though I have the most practice with nightblades, they are not viable, and oftentimes not allowed, in veteran trials.

I'm just an average player who enjoys all aspects of the mmo rpg gameplay, and these are the numbers I post. My current gear is good, not best in slot and not all legendary. I use a typical setup for stamblade PvE: Vicious Ophidian, Kra'gh, Night Mother's Gaze (which is no longer needed in large group content due to the lack of stamina builds participating in said content). I do not have Maelstrom weapons. I am your average, well-practiced, non-professional game player, ZOS. In the current game, I can dps test on a practice dummy for 22k dps without outside buffs, and slightly higher if I am using essence of weapon power potions. That usually translates to high twenty-thousands dps when running with a dungeon group that has buffs up and good teamwork. A full dps test on a practice dummy takes me about 2-3 minutes, and during that time, I usually run out of stamina 3 times. If I'm good about keeping my siphoning attacks up and pop a few of those weapon power potions (which also have stamina and critical bonuses), I will run low on stamina, but not run out.

For the same character on the PTS, I parse 14.68k dps. I redistributed the champion points I had in "Warlord" as best I could. I had to drink a stamina potion every 60 seconds, and even with that, I was completely out of stamina by the end of my second rotation. Most of that loss in dps was due to the fact that I couldn't hit the target with much because I had no stamina. I have not had the chance to bring along a friend to cast the new Orbs or pop them. Perhaps this will handle some of the sustain issues, but that makes it impossible to play a lot of PvE content (minibosses, Maelstrom Arena, etc) solo. Sustain was the single thing nightblades were good at. If the developers want a blanket nerf to sustain, fine, but then they should find some other way to make nightblades usefu instead, of nerfing our sustain even more by changing Siphoning Strikes. I switched the morph the Leeching, and it does very little for sustain. I don't know exactly how to properly balance this class, but there have been suggestions floating about on the forums about increasing the usefulness of nightblade passives and adjusting grim focus so that it does not have to be cast twice.

Edited to add: I weave in light attacks as well.

2 Daggers, sharpened and/or poisoned.

• Relentless Focus
• Surprise Attack
• Rending Slashes
• Deadly Cloak
• KIller's Blade
• Rend (sometimes Soul Harvest)

Bow, sharpened

• Leeching Strikes
• Poison Injection
• Endless Hail
• Razor Caltrops
• Rearming Trap
• Soul Harvest