ETA or Glimpse of Upcoming Nightblade PVE Changes?

GrumpyDuckling

In this ESO Live video from May, specifically from 31:43 to 32:30, there is brief discussion from the Lead Combat Designer and the Creative Director of ESO that mentions potential changes to Nightblade PVE play. Specifically, one quote mentions, "getting a more sorta stealthy feel to the [Nightblade] PVE rotation is, umm a longer term goal."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSjITuUedNA&index=16&list=PL544E3ECCF3FB4203

The potential for enhanced stealth-related game play has me excited, and I'm hoping we could get a little insight or glimpse of the direction this may go. Thank you.
@Wrobel
@ZOS_RichLambert

GrumpyDuckling

Also, I'm curious if there has ever been any thought given to increased sneak speed being a passive in a Nightblade tree. It seems like it would be a logical fit.

Tigeracer

There is already a sneak speed buff for nightblades. The concealed weapon morph of veiled strike is already in our kit.

GrumpyDuckling

Tigeracer wrote: »

There is already a sneak speed buff for nightblades. The concealed weapon morph of veiled strike is already in our kit.

Great for Magicka builds, but it's tough for stamina builds to give up Surprise Attack.

NyassaV

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Tigeracer wrote: »

There is already a sneak speed buff for nightblades. The concealed weapon morph of veiled strike is already in our kit.

Great for Magicka builds, but it's tough for stamina builds to give up Surprise Attack.

Stamina has enough mobility as it is

Vapirko

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Also, I'm curious if there has ever been any thought given to increased sneak speed being a passive in a Nightblade tree. It seems like it would be a logical fit.

Go vampire for sneak speed. It's a worthy trade off.

GrumpyDuckling

Vapirko wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Also, I'm curious if there has ever been any thought given to increased sneak speed being a passive in a Nightblade tree. It seems like it would be a logical fit.

Go vampire for sneak speed. It's a worthy trade off.

Yeah I have vampire for my thief/assassin build (specifically for sneak speed), but he's a Khajiit with black fur that turns entirely white because of the stupid vampire appearance.

GrumpyDuckling

Now that HOTR is out, maybe we could get some insight on this?

FakeFox

I just hope "stealthy feel" doesn't mean actually stealth, since this is kind of useless.^^

max_only

#RevertSiphoningAttacks

That is all.

crobarXIII

I just hope they keep nb tanks in mind when doing these changes. I would really like abilities that scale with health

Yamenstein

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Vapirko wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Also, I'm curious if there has ever been any thought given to increased sneak speed being a passive in a Nightblade tree. It seems like it would be a logical fit.

Go vampire for sneak speed. It's a worthy trade off.

Yeah I have vampire for my thief/assassin build (specifically for sneak speed), but he's a Khajiit with black fur that turns entirely white because of the stupid vampire appearance.

Doesn't mean it's not available just cause you don't like the appearance.

I'm happy that people are put off by the vampire appearance, it's one of the trade off's for being one - and having access to some pretty sweet passives, and abilities.

Vaoh

@GrumpyDuckling Great catch! I remember that ESO Live and still recall them saying something about Nightblade DPS being changed overtime to feel more stealthy.

Who knows what that means, but it does sound interesting. I wish they'd give us some teasers for it.

GrumpyDuckling

Yamenstein wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Vapirko wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Also, I'm curious if there has ever been any thought given to increased sneak speed being a passive in a Nightblade tree. It seems like it would be a logical fit.

Go vampire for sneak speed. It's a worthy trade off.

Yeah I have vampire for my thief/assassin build (specifically for sneak speed), but he's a Khajiit with black fur that turns entirely white because of the stupid vampire appearance.

Doesn't mean it's not available just cause you don't like the appearance.

I'm happy that people are put off by the vampire appearance, it's one of the trade off's for being one - and having access to some pretty sweet passives, and abilities.

I don't particularly care on my other characters, but on my Khajiit and Argonian characters the vampire appearance changes almost the entire appearance choices that I made in character creation. What's the point of letting me customize my character's appearance when it gets overwritten?

More to the point though, I play as a thief/assassin Nightblade Khajiit, and access to a helpful sneak bonus in thief/assassin game play is locked behind:

- Stage 4 vampire with necessary appearance change
- 5 piece sets that force you to take up half the build

No, the sneak speed bonus is not essential, but I think there should be another way to get it without changing appearance or taking up half of your build.

GrumpyDuckling

Vaoh wrote: »

@GrumpyDuckling Great catch! I remember that ESO Live and still recall them saying something about Nightblade DPS being changed overtime to feel more stealthy.

Who knows what that means, but it does sound interesting. I wish they'd give us some teasers for it.

Agreed! I'd be ecstatic to be able to play in dungeons in a more stealthy way. Wrobel nailed it when he said that Nightblades basically stand around stabbing the boss in dungeons just like everyone else.

I rarely take my Nightblade into dungeons because since we're standing around anyway, it's easier to do so as a sorc.

subtlezeroub17_ESO

I really wish mirror image was a heavy hitter dps ability for magicka NB or had additional utility. I think the concept of summoning a shadow of yourself to fight for you is bad ass. Too bad its pretty useless outside of bomb pvp builds...or necro builds.

max_only

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

@GrumpyDuckling Great catch! I remember that ESO Live and still recall them saying something about Nightblade DPS being changed overtime to feel more stealthy.

Who knows what that means, but it does sound interesting. I wish they'd give us some teasers for it.

Agreed! I'd be ecstatic to be able to play in dungeons in a more stealthy way. Wrobel nailed it when he said that Nightblades basically stand around stabbing the boss in dungeons just like everyone else.

I rarely take my Nightblade into dungeons because since we're standing around anyway, it's easier to do so as a sorc.

No. That's only one way to play a nightblade. My magNB is a tank. I'm not just "standing around". If that's what Wrobel thinks of the nightblade class then we are doomed.

GrumpyDuckling

max_only wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

@GrumpyDuckling Great catch! I remember that ESO Live and still recall them saying something about Nightblade DPS being changed overtime to feel more stealthy.

Who knows what that means, but it does sound interesting. I wish they'd give us some teasers for it.

Agreed! I'd be ecstatic to be able to play in dungeons in a more stealthy way. Wrobel nailed it when he said that Nightblades basically stand around stabbing the boss in dungeons just like everyone else.

I rarely take my Nightblade into dungeons because since we're standing around anyway, it's easier to do so as a sorc.

No. That's only one way to play a nightblade. My magNB is a tank. I'm not just "standing around". If that's what Wrobel thinks of the nightblade class then we are doomed.

Of course you can tank if you'd like. But why discount people who want more of a stealth-feel to a stealth-based class?

deepseamk20b14_ESO

I'd be interested in how "stealthy" game play would actually help. Fun wise maybe, but in the end when you're fighting a gaggle of mobs or are on a boss you're not doing anything remotely stealthy. You're standing there attacking with a rotation that has nothing to do with stealth. Maybe stealthy play is fun early on and solo but once you hit end game and are doing trials and dungeons that require a group I see zero point. I wish they expound a bit more on what they are talking about.

I'd be happy if they just made relentless focus a 4 hit proc again. Heck, I wouldn't mind if it got the sorc treatment and there was a certain % to proc it upon any skill. No channeling though because while a sorc can have their shields eat up damage during the cast NB has no such luxury. Though I wouldn't be opposed to it channeling either as we could at least do it from stealth perhaps. There is your more stealthy gameplay lol.

max_only

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

max_only wrote: »

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

@GrumpyDuckling Great catch! I remember that ESO Live and still recall them saying something about Nightblade DPS being changed overtime to feel more stealthy.

Who knows what that means, but it does sound interesting. I wish they'd give us some teasers for it.

Agreed! I'd be ecstatic to be able to play in dungeons in a more stealthy way. Wrobel nailed it when he said that Nightblades basically stand around stabbing the boss in dungeons just like everyone else.

I rarely take my Nightblade into dungeons because since we're standing around anyway, it's easier to do so as a sorc.

No. That's only one way to play a nightblade. My magNB is a tank. I'm not just "standing around". If that's what Wrobel thinks of the nightblade class then we are doomed.

Of course you can tank if you'd like. But why discount people who want more of a stealth-feel to a stealth-based class?

I don't trust their direction anymore. They get hitched to an idea and burn the world down around them to force one idea through.

Oh I want to play my nightblade strategically, with all the careful planning and trickery of something like Thief. I want noisemakers to cast in a direction that turns npcs toward it so I can get a backstab bonus. I want to use Dark cloak to drop aggro as a part of regular rotation instead of "only useful for stealing and murdering". I want to debuff, poison and bleed the boss to help my teammates. There are so many "stealthy" things I would like to do BUT I've lost faith that they can do that and make it relevant to pve. This is a game where every class "can" do every role. I don't want to be relegated to "only useful for ganks" like we were in Homestead and be laughed out of all pve.

Furthermore, they haven't designed their game to require strategy. They've designed it to require dps checks only. I don't want them to forget about the other roles a nightblade "can" do by crapping all over our skills like they did with Siphoning Attacks (it was the lynchpin in nightblade tanking) and all the nerfs to cloak (used to cleanse) and all the nerfs to damage from stealth, and all the nerfs that were a result of whiny pvpers.

Highlights from this thread:

max_only wrote: »

The Templar lobby is getting a lot of attention.

I'm not saying they "shouldn't gripe". People can express opinions in constructive manners.

But I see that nightblades are once again ignored and not even mentioned in Zos responses.

Siphoning attacks is what makes a saptank <-- a diverse playstyle which is what you claim you want.

We don't pile on health to troll people with shields. We don't have earth shattering dps like Sorcerers. We aren't endgame tanks (we're barely get the benefit of the doubt in pledges).

Nightblades are just looking for a break.

Fine, take away ganking. I get why that's annoying. Just don't take away our resource restore on top of all the global resource changes. Let us be the true survival/strategic class. We are already playing at a disadvantage why punish us further?

Tommy_The_Gun wrote: »

max_only wrote: »

Find and replace "nightblade" with "masochist"

Thanks. :>

Why would anybody play NB at this point ? ?
Nightbalde is average at everything while other classes are best at something...

Dragonknght - Tank
Templar - Healer
Sorcerer - DPS
Nightblade... hmm... - Doing Thieves guild / dark bortherhood quests ? ?

Originally NB was intended to have high singe target (focus) dmg... but we all know that ZOS hates NB at this point.

max_only wrote: »

Tryxus wrote: »

Truthfully, I don't feel like a Nightblade anymore on any of them. ZOS has sucked the soul out of the class and left us as inferior husks of existing, more effective classes

I wonder if I can assume that people who love playing nightblade are into the survival playstyle? The kind where you have to set up traps and strategize; to outthink in places where you can't out damage; to outlast due to careful planning more than oh snap buttons. Or nightblade players are fans of Thief (game)? The kind of smash and grab/ assassinate and escape/ guerilla warfare playstyle? I feel like "leeroy jenkins" type of play you see with the other 3 classes is the antithesis of patient, stealthy nightblades.

If Zos wants to boast that they have diverse playstyles in their mmo, they must keep siphoning attacks as is.

efster wrote: »

I really have to wonder who at zos looked at the array of NB class skills and decided "these guys need more self healing, that'll make them happy"

They can't even type the words "nightblade tank" into the patch notes, so we are "heavy armor, tank focused nightblades". It's a total joke.

And by the way, a handful of NBs do tank endgame. But class skills -- with the notable exceptions of SA, mirage, refreshing path, and, in some situations (vSO backroom, vAA axes), Bolstering Darkness -- are more or less useless at that level, and of course DK tanks are way more group friendly. But with SA, I can tank all but HM Rakkhat and a double negate on the vmol twin bosses without needing a templar to feed me shards, which is kind of group friendly since it means the healers can use their resources elsewhere. But now that's going out the window because apparently no one on zos's team can conceive of tanking on something other than a DK.

But hey, I can keep major ward/resolve up for 2 extra seconds now, oh boy, just what i always wanted.

"Play as you like" is a lie.

GrumpyDuckling

How about a glimpse, ZOS?

kaithuzar

The sorc treatment would actually be if assassins will hit once with its huge arrow & placed a dot that proc'd for the same damage 4-10 seconds later

GrumpyDuckling

Any plans to implement Nightblade changes this year?

ccfeeling

Siphoning Strikes
Resource huge nerf . Most important nerf since NB came out .

Grim Focus:
You can now fire multiple Assassin’s Will or Assassin’s Scourge bow procs from a single cast of this ability and its morphs.
Increased the amount of Light or Heavy Attacks needed to obtain an Assassin’s Will or Assassin’s Scourge bow proc to 5 attacks from 4.
From busy to more busy .

Agnoy
Changed to healing perspective skill , we have to pay 6751 health to access 8 sec minor mending .
When you take a look about Accelerated Growth and Igneous Shield , sad to say , we don't need this cheap skill .
I've tested it on my NB healing tank few months , Healthy Offering + swallow + refreshing path + healing base cp , bad , really bad result and risky against strong bosses . DK just press 2 keys , full hp .
NB healer? Can you find them in end game trial?

Assassination
Soul Harvest (Death Stroke morph): Fixed an issue where you could not dodge this morph.
PVP voice right? Yes ... NB again .

I could add more if I focus on PVP oriented nerf but not this time .

Don't expect anything from ZOS .

aeowulf

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

Any plans to implement Nightblade changes this year?

They stated it's a longer term goal, not short term...

I found the class polls quite interesting, it showed which classes are shoe horned into what roles quite well. At one end of the scale, it showed Wardens seemed comparatively balanced aross all roles, and NB were the worst, being only really played in a DPS role