Could I get some advice on StamBlade?

Valykc

I’m returning after a 5 month break and have been leveling a Stamina Nightblade for PvP, using 5 medium, 2 Heavy, 2H and Bow. I’m trying to learn the playstyle of engaging when it is best and using stealth to get away. I know that sounds like I want to be a ganker but that’s not exactly what I mean, I want to use stealth defensively, to approach a fight at a new angle or to escape when overwhelmed. It just seems like everything pulls me out of stealth and I am too snared to actually gain any ground. I’ve tried using LoS and Mass Hysteria to my advantage but it just seems hard to stay alive when cloak fails.

-Should I be investing towards Magicka recovery/Max Magicka?

-How do more experienced players use Nightblade to stay alive?

-Do you have any tips you can give?

I know this is an L2P issue, just looking for advice to put me on the right path.

P.S. What gear would you suggest once I choose to level to 50? I have Bone Pirate, Hundings, Spriggans, Eternal Hunt, Alchemist... all sitting in the bank.

Smmokkee

Yeah you should have a small amount of magicka recovery. I sit around 1200 and never have any problems. Go bone pirate, 3 agility, master bow and aslyum 2h.

TimeDazzler

1) Don't worry about gear when you get level 50, get gear once you get CP160
2) Bone Pirate, Hundings, Spriggans are all good imo, eternal hunt is meh
3) 5 medium 2 heavy is a good choice, you can also consider 5/1/1
4) Don't invest in magicka/m.recov
5) LOS then cloak, always
6) If you're still dying consider shadow image once it's fixed
7) If you're still dying then consider tristat on your 2 heavy pieces which should be any of the 2 chest/head/legs (most likely chest+head, but if you're running a monster set and get a helmet of your preferred trait in medium just do legs heavy.
8) DW+2H > 2H+Bow IMO unless you have an asylum 2H

IlCanis_LupuslI

Valykc wrote: »

I’m returning after a 5 month break and have been leveling a Stamina Nightblade for PvP, using 5 medium, 2 Heavy, 2H and Bow. I’m trying to learn the playstyle of engaging when it is best and using stealth to get away. I know that sounds like I want to be a ganker but that’s not exactly what I mean, I want to use stealth defensively, to approach a fight at a new angle or to escape when overwhelmed. It just seems like everything pulls me out of stealth and I am too snared to actually gain any ground. I’ve tried using LoS and Mass Hysteria to my advantage but it just seems hard to stay alive when cloak fails.

-Should I be investing towards Magicka recovery/Max Magicka?

-How do more experienced players use Nightblade to stay alive?

-Do you have any tips you can give?

I know this is an L2P issue, just looking for advice to put me on the right path.

P.S. What gear would you suggest once I choose to level to 50? I have Bone Pirate, Hundings, Spriggans, Eternal Hunt, Alchemist... all sitting in the bank.

Caughheavyarmorisbetterthenmediumonstambladecaugh

Oh excuse me

deepseamk20b14_ESO

Everyone does stuff different but here is my take and I find I’m very successul. I solo 90% of the time.

First off play and expect cloak to fail. If you play almost as if cloak doesn’t exist you won’t come to depend on it.

Stamina recovery is best above 2k. Magicka recovery is best above 1k. Don’t sacrifice all your damage to achieve super high recovery though, there is such thing as too high.

Keep damage high as a good offense is a good defense in my opinion.

Don’t be afraid to invest a little into quick recovery CP. place CP wisely. Know the jump points.

When creating a build don’t just look at numbers on the character screen, think about what passives do what as they don’t always reflect on the character screen.

Learn the strengths and weaknesses of the other classes as they have changed since you last played.

LOS and roll dodge appropriately, generally a dodge, vigor, dodge and cloak will give you distance and get you back to full HP. Rally works best last 10 seconds, as you probably already know.

Spectral bow is amazing now.

Keep crit resist over 2k

7/7 medium isn’t a death sentence like so many like to say. The extra crit, recovery, and cost reduction is nice. It outweighs using the undaunted passive in my opinion.

If you can manage over 2 k crit, throw some well fitted on. I run 4 impen and 3 well fitted. With CP and other passives my dodge roll (initial) only costs 1800 stamina. My Stam recovery can get as high as 2.9k. Even with consecutive rolls and dodge fatigue I can roll dodge A LOT.

Fully buffed ( with pot and CA) i sit at 39.3k stamina, 11.2k magicka, 20.5k HP, 2.9k stamina recovery, 1.3k magicka recovery, 57% crit, 4,550 weapon damage (not cloaked or hidden), 2008 crit resist, I can debuff the enemies healing up to 62%. I get extra damage constantly from procing exploiter passive with tactician passive on top of all that.

Find what works for you and go with it.

Valykc

Thanks everyone, I’ll apply everything you all said. I do have Asylum 2H but no master bow yet so I’m using a gold infused bow back bar with weapon damage enchant. Thanks for the tips!

Smmokkee

Cries wrote: »

1) Don't worry about gear when you get level 50, get gear once you get CP160
2) Bone Pirate, Hundings, Spriggans are all good imo, eternal hunt is meh
3) 5 medium 2 heavy is a good choice, you can also consider 5/1/1
4) Don't invest in magicka/m.recov
5) LOS then cloak, always
6) If you're still dying consider shadow image once it's fixed
7) If you're still dying then consider tristat on your 2 heavy pieces which should be any of the 2 chest/head/legs (most likely chest+head, but if you're running a monster set and get a helmet of your preferred trait in medium just do legs heavy.
8) DW+2H > 2H+Bow IMO unless you have an asylum 2H

Dont invest in magicka recovery? Do you even nightblade bro..? Lol.


If you dont invest in magicka recovery you will have about 3 cloaks. If you know anything about cloak you know it is broken as *** and will probably be broken a couple times alone while you are trying to get into it. Also you say to use shadow image.. if you have no magicka recovery you are not going to be able to cloak and use shadow image more the once.

If hes dying its because he doesnt have enough magicka recovery to use the nightblades bugged defensive abilities. With dodge being as dumbed down as it is now nbs are more reliable on having strong magicka recovery. On my nb I have over 4k buffed wd, 2700-2800 Stamina Recovery, 1200-1300 magicka recovery almost 22k health and 32k stam. That is not considering my potions or vampire. With those its 3000+SR and 1500+MR.

Valykc

Smmokkee wrote: »

On my nb I have over 4k buffed wd, 2700-2800 Stamina Recovery, 1200-1300 magicka recovery almost 22k health and 32k stam. That is not considering my potions or vampire. With those its 3000+SR and 1500+MR.

Mind telling me your gear, race, food/drink, and glyphs you use for that high of a stat pool?

TimeDazzler

deepseamk20b14_ESO wrote: »

Fully buffed ( with pot and CA) i sit at 39.3k stamina, 11.2k magicka, 20.5k HP, 2.9k stamina recovery, 1.3k magicka recovery, 57% crit, 4,550 weapon damage (not cloaked or hidden), 2008 crit resist.

Valykc wrote: »

Smmokkee wrote: »

On my nb I have over 4k buffed wd, 2700-2800 Stamina Recovery, 1200-1300 magicka recovery almost 22k health and 32k stam. That is not considering my potions or vampire. With those its 3000+SR and 1500+MR.

Mind telling me your gear, race, food/drink, and glyphs you use for that high of a stat pool?

Note that these guys are all probably CP690 and are on CP campaigns, that's why their stats seem good, as you mentioned in your OP you are just reaching level 50 and will have nothing near those stats. That's why I also recommend you to play in a non-CP campaign.

In no-CP I have 38k max stam, 20.5k max hp, 4550 wd, 50% crit, 1650 stam recov. About what that guy said about investing in magicka recovery is completely wrong. Invest in stats that actually WORK. Investing in magicka recovery is not worth since cloak and shadow image are so buggy. Some of the top tier nightblades don't even run cloak anymore since they are max spec'd into stats that work such as stam recov, max stam, etc. Investing in those and not wasting points in magicka allows you to survive based off dodge rolls and continous vigors/rallys etc.

Kode

I think anyone who can give you solid stamina NB advice knows what you mean about using stealth defensively, rather than as a ganker.

As far as snares, yeah they are slowing you down too much to be able to get out of combat fast enough for stealth to be useful You wont be able to get far enough before someone breaks it on you. There are quite a few abilities that will help you out, Forward Momentum and Rally depending on what fits you... I wouldn't take FM over rally though unless you are running vigor or you are going to be losing too much of your healing strength.
Snares can be nasty, if you can't move you are probably going to die more than you should.

Also, try to get a good handle on what is the appropriate defense for each ability, and learn to read the telegraphs if you don't already know them. It wont help if someone is animation canceling, but it still helps on most of the important ones.

Personally, I like 7 medium over mixed sets for the Undaunted passives, but that is based on my playstyle. Check out the passives in medium armor, heavy armor (for your two pc), and the undaunted passive and make an informed decision.

LittlePinkDot

Ive been leveling a stamblade as well. For pvp I will use bow/2H, but for pve leveling im using dual wield. I use bloodthirst to get health back and I can use cloak and then use surprise attack to stun them, then go nuts on them with rending slashes / steel tornado. When the stun is clear I use cloak again and move behind them then surprise attack again ect.

Valykc

Cries wrote: »

deepseamk20b14_ESO wrote: »

Fully buffed ( with pot and CA) i sit at 39.3k stamina, 11.2k magicka, 20.5k HP, 2.9k stamina recovery, 1.3k magicka recovery, 57% crit, 4,550 weapon damage (not cloaked or hidden), 2008 crit resist.

Valykc wrote: »

Smmokkee wrote: »

On my nb I have over 4k buffed wd, 2700-2800 Stamina Recovery, 1200-1300 magicka recovery almost 22k health and 32k stam. That is not considering my potions or vampire. With those its 3000+SR and 1500+MR.

Mind telling me your gear, race, food/drink, and glyphs you use for that high of a stat pool?

Note that these guys are all probably CP690 and are on CP campaigns, that's why their stats seem good, as you mentioned in your OP you are just reaching level 50 and will have nothing near those stats. That's why I also recommend you to play in a non-CP campaign.

In no-CP I have 38k max stam, 20.5k max hp, 4550 wd, 50% crit, 1650 stam recov. About what that guy said about investing in magicka recovery is completely wrong. Invest in stats that actually WORK. Investing in magicka recovery is not worth since cloak and shadow image are so buggy. Some of the top tier nightblades don't even run cloak anymore since they are max spec'd into stats that work such as stam recov, max stam, etc. Investing in those and not wasting points in magicka allows you to survive based off dodge rolls and continous vigors/rallys etc.

Yeah I’m aware of you first statement, I leveled the StamBlade to 50 so now I’m 570 CP. thanks for the other advice too!

Valykc

christopher.duvalub17_ESO wrote: »

I think anyone who can give you solid stamina NB advice knows what you mean about using stealth defensively, rather than as a ganker.

As far as snares, yeah they are slowing you down too much to be able to get out of combat fast enough for stealth to be useful You wont be able to get far enough before someone breaks it on you. There are quite a few abilities that will help you out, Forward Momentum and Rally depending on what fits you... I wouldn't take FM over rally though unless you are running vigor or you are going to be losing too much of your healing strength.
Snares can be nasty, if you can't move you are probably going to die more than you should.

Also, try to get a good handle on what is the appropriate defense for each ability, and learn to read the telegraphs if you don't already know them. It wont help if someone is animation canceling, but it still helps on most of the important ones.

Personally, I like 7 medium over mixed sets for the Undaunted passives, but that is based on my playstyle. Check out the passives in medium armor, heavy armor (for your two pc), and the undaunted passive and make an informed decision.

Ok thanks I’ll give all that a try and see how I do

deepseamk20b14_ESO

Shadow image is broken, yes. Cloak isn’t that bad though if you’re paying attention and not simply letting someone AoE you. Cloak works for me more than it doesn’t. Im not gonna speak for the other guy, but like I said, get your magicka recovery up WITHOUT sacrificing to much of other stats, but don’t just completely forget about it like the other guy is saying. There is a happy medium that doesn’t set you back very much and honestly only makes a build stronger.

Smmokkee

Valykc wrote: »

Smmokkee wrote: »

On my nb I have over 4k buffed wd, 2700-2800 Stamina Recovery, 1200-1300 magicka recovery almost 22k health and 32k stam. That is not considering my potions or vampire. With those its 3000+SR and 1500+MR.

Mind telling me your gear, race, food/drink, and glyphs you use for that high of a stat pool?

Woodelf gold stamina recovery / magicka recovery drink. Tristat potions. Weapon damage glyph on weapon. Nirnhoned greatsword. Bp, 3 agility, 2 wd monster pieces, health enchants as needed, maybe a stamina recovery glyph on the jewelry dont remember if they were all WD or not. I'm not even min/maxed just thrown together real quickly. Still missing about 300wd from not having a master bow.

I could switch some things around and give up magicka recovery entirely but that playstyle is pretty horrible on a nb.

Ragnarock41

Smmokkee wrote: »

Yeah you should have a small amount of magicka recovery. I sit around 1200 and never have any problems. Go bone pirate, 3 agility, master bow and aslyum 2h.

1200? Small?

God the amount of free stats nbs have is just confusing to me.

deepseamk20b14_ESO

Here is my setup:

5 bone pirate, 1 domihuas, 5 senche (back bar is senche infused bow with damage enchant, no need for senche on front bar), 2h nirnhoned assylum weapon, dubious camoran throne, 3 well fitted, 4 impen, all Stam on armor, weapon damage on jewelry, 62% total healing debuff on the enemy from major defile and minor defile (poison, last 5.5 seconds) warrior stone or atronach if I’m feeling frisky. Tactician passive procs exploiter passive. Having so much into atro is great because master at arms and NB synergizes very well and I have 48 points into shattering blows make shields go down during the first part of this combo extremely easy which leads right into a stun before they can get shields back up and they die.

I approach each battle accordingly to a) the enemy class, b) is this a well known good player or a nub?, c) what are the enemy numbers and my cover and concealment options?.

My most BASIC combo is this (again it changes depending on who or what class I am fighting). the combo sounds difficult or long when written but I can do the main burst combo after the setup in about 2 seconds and with a stun and the amount of defile it’s extremely hard for an enemy to come back from. Again, this is the basic setup and combo to give you the general idea, situations always change and adapting to them is important.

I try to make sure surprise attack debuff is on them first as it last forever.

5 LA—> roll dodge—> cloak—>lethal arrow—>LA—>ani cancel—>assassins scourge ani cancel with weapon swap—> ambush—> incap—> reverse slash.

Sounds like a bit much right? Works every time. Again, there are different combos for every class you’ll have to figure out yourself. Stuff like cloak or reflects makes me change things up.

5LA procs spectral bow and maxes hawk eye passive for max damage on lethal arrow. The 5 LA doesn’t have to be consecutive as you have to adapt to what they are doing however it’s best to keep hawk eye up and get the 5 LA early for max up time on spectral bow proc. Roll for senche proc and you pecking at them with LA usually makes the enemy attack so you dodging them also sets them off balance. Cloak isn’t to crit lethal arrow just to help reposition. As lethal arrow hits, LA to re-proc damage enchant, (roll dodge to re proc senche only if you need to but it extends the combo by a half a second). Spectral bow is really easy to animation cancel now which is why I bar swap cancel it. Ambush to gap close and grant empower. DONT just incap. Most decent players will immediately roll dodge after you ambush, expecting incap. Sure you can fear BUT I Wait a fraction of a second or feign attack by putting up block (even the big shield icon makes people jumpy and goads them into roll dodging. Once standing up, a well timed incap to stun and 20% extra damage to your reverse slashes. All the while major defile is up still and if you’re Lucky minor defile poison also procs.

No, lethal arrow isn’t crap just because people use miats. Sometimes I’ll even be in stealth and cancel lethal arrow before it fires just to see if they react. If the dodge or block, they are using miats. If they aren’t, let it fly.

I will say the play style takes getting used to but it’s great for solo, small group, hit and run, 1vX. Not good for raid groups as it adds nothing to the raid. But you can easily adapt it to what it seems you are looking for.

rimmidimdim

I like shacklebreaker. You can use it with bone pirate and have tons of Regen. You can go medium or heavy. I personally don't use bone pirate I use spriggans. I used to use seventh legion instead of shacklebreaker but they are a little different play styles. Legion great with troll king. Cheers.

Brutusmax1mus

Of youre in medium, jewels of misrule is awesome. Gets you that magicka you'll miss from constitution gains. It's much more noticeable than you think in long fights.

Valykc

deepseamk20b14_ESO wrote: »

Here is my setup:

5 bone pirate, 1 domihuas, 5 senche (back bar is senche infused bow with damage enchant, no need for senche on front bar), 2h nirnhoned assylum weapon, dubious camoran throne, 3 well fitted, 4 impen, all Stam on armor, weapon damage on jewelry, 62% total healing debuff on the enemy from major defile and minor defile (poison, last 5.5 seconds) warrior stone or atronach if I’m feeling frisky. Tactician passive procs exploiter passive. Having so much into atro is great because master at arms and NB synergizes very well and I have 48 points into shattering blows make shields go down during the first part of this combo extremely easy which leads right into a stun before they can get shields back up and they die.

I approach each battle accordingly to a) the enemy class, b) is this a well known good player or a nub?, c) what are the enemy numbers and my cover and concealment options?.

My most BASIC combo is this (again it changes depending on who or what class I am fighting). the combo sounds difficult or long when written but I can do the main burst combo after the setup in about 2 seconds and with a stun and the amount of defile it’s extremely hard for an enemy to come back from. Again, this is the basic setup and combo to give you the general idea, situations always change and adapting to them is important.

I try to make sure surprise attack debuff is on them first as it last forever.

5 LA—> roll dodge—> cloak—>lethal arrow—>LA—>ani cancel—>assassins scourge ani cancel with weapon swap—> ambush—> incap—> reverse slash.

Sounds like a bit much right? Works every time. Again, there are different combos for every class you’ll have to figure out yourself. Stuff like cloak or reflects makes me change things up.

5LA procs spectral bow and maxes hawk eye passive for max damage on lethal arrow. The 5 LA doesn’t have to be consecutive as you have to adapt to what they are doing however it’s best to keep hawk eye up and get the 5 LA early for max up time on spectral bow proc. Roll for senche proc and you pecking at them with LA usually makes the enemy attack so you dodging them also sets them off balance. Cloak isn’t to crit lethal arrow just to help reposition. As lethal arrow hits, LA to re-proc damage enchant, (roll dodge to re proc senche only if you need to but it extends the combo by a half a second). Spectral bow is really easy to animation cancel now which is why I bar swap cancel it. Ambush to gap close and grant empower. DONT just incap. Most decent players will immediately roll dodge after you ambush, expecting incap. Sure you can fear BUT I Wait a fraction of a second or feign attack by putting up block (even the big shield icon makes people jumpy and goads them into roll dodging. Once standing up, a well timed incap to stun and 20% extra damage to your reverse slashes. All the while major defile is up still and if you’re Lucky minor defile poison also procs.

No, lethal arrow isn’t crap just because people use miats. Sometimes I’ll even be in stealth and cancel lethal arrow before it fires just to see if they react. If the dodge or block, they are using miats. If they aren’t, let it fly.

I will say the play style takes getting used to but it’s great for solo, small group, hit and run, 1vX. Not good for raid groups as it adds nothing to the raid. But you can easily adapt it to what it seems you are looking for.

This is the best handful of information I have ever gotten on the forums! Thanks so much!

Lexxypwns

My advice is stop looking at cloak as defense and instead look at it as a way to quickly reset a fight by forcing a big rally crit

Izaki

Cries wrote: »

deepseamk20b14_ESO wrote: »

Fully buffed ( with pot and CA) i sit at 39.3k stamina, 11.2k magicka, 20.5k HP, 2.9k stamina recovery, 1.3k magicka recovery, 57% crit, 4,550 weapon damage (not cloaked or hidden), 2008 crit resist.

Valykc wrote: »

Smmokkee wrote: »

On my nb I have over 4k buffed wd, 2700-2800 Stamina Recovery, 1200-1300 magicka recovery almost 22k health and 32k stam. That is not considering my potions or vampire. With those its 3000+SR and 1500+MR.

Mind telling me your gear, race, food/drink, and glyphs you use for that high of a stat pool?

Note that these guys are all probably CP690 and are on CP campaigns, that's why their stats seem good, as you mentioned in your OP you are just reaching level 50 and will have nothing near those stats. That's why I also recommend you to play in a non-CP campaign.

In no-CP I have 38k max stam, 20.5k max hp, 4550 wd, 50% crit, 1650 stam recov. About what that guy said about investing in magicka recovery is completely wrong. Invest in stats that actually WORK. Investing in magicka recovery is not worth since cloak and shadow image are so buggy. Some of the top tier nightblades don't even run cloak anymore since they are max spec'd into stats that work such as stam recov, max stam, etc. Investing in those and not wasting points in magicka allows you to survive based off dodge rolls and continous vigors/rallys etc.

Yeah. No. Without magicka recovery, in any REAL outnumbered situation you will be dead as soon as you run out of magicka. Magicka is your main CC, its your main healing tool (yes since Shadowy Disguise makes all your heals crit) and its your get out of jail free card. Usually, people who say that you don't need magicka recovery on a Stamblade, haven't survived and won an outnumbered situation that featured at least 1 very good player. You can 1vX low CP dudes and bad players all day without barely pressing Vigor, so of course you wouldn't need magicka recovery.

So point is: magicka recovery is very important. There are 2 ways of doing it. 1st way is rather simple, just stack up on some magicka recovery. 1,2k is more than enough in general. 2nd way is also rather simple, but it requires a slot on your bar: Siphoning Attacks. That will takes care of your magicka bar and you won't even have to think about it. But then again, you have to sacrifice a bar slot.

Izaki

So if its any help at all, at the moment I run the following setup which has been working out for me better than any Bone Pirate setup that I've tried.

So as far as gear goes, its more or less classic: Blood Spawn, Agility and Master Bow, been running these since like Orsinium or Thieves Guild now, never changed it and probably never will (obviously updated the Bow to a VR16 one instead of the VR14 lol). 5 Shacklebreaker, Asylum's Maul. Nirnhoned 2H with a Double damage health poison IX and Infused bow with a weapon damage enchant. Warrior Mundus. Weapon Crit, Health and Stam pots. Redguard.
Now, why Shacklebreaker over Bone Pirate? The magicka and magicka recovery of course! More specifically, with Bone Pirate, most people either run Dubious with Siphoning Attacks for the magicka sustain (something that I can't do since I don't want to drop any skills at all) or they run Bone Pirate with the Stam and Mag recovery drink. So Shacklebreaker since it gives you a little bit of magicka recovery and max magicka without hurting your damage too much. It also doesn't limit you to only using drinks which is a very good thing. All tri-glyphs. Lava Footsoup and Saltrice as the food. Stamina and Stamina recovery. That brings me to:
3.6k weapon damage (over 4.8k with Master's Bow and Weapon Damage enchant), 36.7k Stamina, 15k Magicka, 2.7k Stamina recovery, 900 Magicka recovery, 50% Crit Chance, 20.7k health.

Seems meh right? Yeah. But most open world builds that really work, will always seem meh in comparison to builds that are just made for pumping out the highest Weapon Damage, Max Stamina, Crit Chance and Stamina recovery. Obviously, its possible to push much more damage through this setup, I actually have 1 stamina recovery glyph, which I might drop since Shadow Image is completely bugged, so I'll just use Leeching Strikes there instead to get the sustain back. Or I'll just heavy attack more, after all, its not really a big deal. Although, it does make me wonder whether a Bone Pirate build that doesn't invest into magicka recovery at all but uses Siphoning Attacks would be better. The only reason why 900 magicka recovery works here is the fact that I've got a 15k max magicka pool, which takes a long time to eat up, but you still have to be very careful with it, since it doesn't fill up too fast. So far, this is the best all rounded setup I've been able to find, all the others either get lower in overall effective weapon power (a mixed stat that is accounting for your weapon damage, your max stamina, your crit rating, your crit damage and your penetration, the higher the number, the better) while not gaining anything anywhere else aside from extra 1k Max Health (for example Dubious food and Serpent Mundus with full Weapon Damage glyphs). So stats could definitely better, its still a work in progress.

Skills are pretty standard for a Stamblade with just 1 exception:
2H: Executionner, Surprise Attack, Relentless Focus, Mas Hysteria, Rally, Incap
Bow: Shadow Image, Poison Injection, Shuffle, Shadowy Disguise, Vigor, Flawless Dawnbreaker

I don't use a gap closer, cause I want to have Relentless on my front bar as well as the Asylum weapon. Because really, Executionner isn't that useful at all as a skill, most of the time, you'd be able to finish people off with a Surprise Attack too. What's real nice is the ultimate return. Pair that with Blood Spawn and you can use Incaps like crazy, which increases your burst potential more than stats will. Alternatively, you could use a Maelstrom weapon with Crit Rush instead of the Asylum weapon with Executionner. The DoT isn't too bad and it can still critically strike although it is a proc set, another benefit being the fact that with 1 gap closer you can potentially apply 3 DoTs on your target (the vMA 2H DoT and the Double DoT poison). Both are good in different situations.

Now playing without a gap closer on a Stamblade specifically is weird to be honest. But frankly, when you do a Heavy Attack > Relentless Focus proc > Light attack > Incap > light attack > Executionner combo, it just feels soooo good. Since Relentless is a pretty slow projectile, it will land at roughly the same time as your Incap (even if you're at point blank range) at which point you drop the empowered Executionner. Really satisfying to land this combo. Now you have to play pretty passively however, which is kind of tricky and is more suited to heavy armor builds (but heavy armor builds don't have snare removals unless you use Forward Momentum, which means you'd need to use Troll King and I don't like that set since it doesn't give any offensive bonus unlike Blood Spawn). But when you'd outnumbered you're most likely being focused, which means that there's always an opponent in melee range. And either way, you're in medium armor, which means that you're bloody fast when you start sprinting, so 99% of the time, not having a gap closer isn't that bad. Plus you actually have a ranged nuke skill, so if someone does try to run and you have this bad boy proc'd, they are most likely toast. But sometimes, I do wish that I had Crit Rush for that ridiculous 60% snare.

But the most important thing about Stamblade is finding your own playstyle. People say that its an easy class, yet the amount of horribly bad Stamblades says otherwise. So yeah, mess around with things and you'll find something you like.

PS: Almost forgot: NEVER underestimate block. Its the best defensive mechanic in the game and since you've got about 2.7k recovery, you can afford to block often. Just because you're in medium armor, doesn't mean dodge rolling is all you have to do to survive. Dodge rolling is good, but never forget to "tap-block" when you're starting to get a lot of pressure. You'll instantly become much tankier. Obviously, you're not a tank at all either, so don't just sit there and block until your stamina runs out or you get CC'd by Rune Prison or Fossilize or Fear. You block for a bit, turn around Vigor and roll dodge, Cloak and instantly use Rally or Shadow Image (pray that it works) then Cloak and then Rally. Cloak won't work for very long most of the time with all the AoEs, so you just to need to Cloak long enough to force a Rally crit. That's really all its useful for nowadays. Can't rely on it to actually be called a real defensive mechanic, since it breaks on light attacks.

deepseamk20b14_ESO

Valykc wrote: »

deepseamk20b14_ESO wrote: »

Here is my setup:

5 bone pirate, 1 domihuas, 5 senche (back bar is senche infused bow with damage enchant, no need for senche on front bar), 2h nirnhoned assylum weapon, dubious camoran throne, 3 well fitted, 4 impen, all Stam on armor, weapon damage on jewelry, 62% total healing debuff on the enemy from major defile and minor defile (poison, last 5.5 seconds) warrior stone or atronach if I’m feeling frisky. Tactician passive procs exploiter passive. Having so much into atro is great because master at arms and NB synergizes very well and I have 48 points into shattering blows make shields go down during the first part of this combo extremely easy which leads right into a stun before they can get shields back up and they die.

I approach each battle accordingly to a) the enemy class, b) is this a well known good player or a nub?, c) what are the enemy numbers and my cover and concealment options?.

My most BASIC combo is this (again it changes depending on who or what class I am fighting). the combo sounds difficult or long when written but I can do the main burst combo after the setup in about 2 seconds and with a stun and the amount of defile it’s extremely hard for an enemy to come back from. Again, this is the basic setup and combo to give you the general idea, situations always change and adapting to them is important.

I try to make sure surprise attack debuff is on them first as it last forever.

5 LA—> roll dodge—> cloak—>lethal arrow—>LA—>ani cancel—>assassins scourge ani cancel with weapon swap—> ambush—> incap—> reverse slash.

Sounds like a bit much right? Works every time. Again, there are different combos for every class you’ll have to figure out yourself. Stuff like cloak or reflects makes me change things up.

5LA procs spectral bow and maxes hawk eye passive for max damage on lethal arrow. The 5 LA doesn’t have to be consecutive as you have to adapt to what they are doing however it’s best to keep hawk eye up and get the 5 LA early for max up time on spectral bow proc. Roll for senche proc and you pecking at them with LA usually makes the enemy attack so you dodging them also sets them off balance. Cloak isn’t to crit lethal arrow just to help reposition. As lethal arrow hits, LA to re-proc damage enchant, (roll dodge to re proc senche only if you need to but it extends the combo by a half a second). Spectral bow is really easy to animation cancel now which is why I bar swap cancel it. Ambush to gap close and grant empower. DONT just incap. Most decent players will immediately roll dodge after you ambush, expecting incap. Sure you can fear BUT I Wait a fraction of a second or feign attack by putting up block (even the big shield icon makes people jumpy and goads them into roll dodging. Once standing up, a well timed incap to stun and 20% extra damage to your reverse slashes. All the while major defile is up still and if you’re Lucky minor defile poison also procs.

No, lethal arrow isn’t crap just because people use miats. Sometimes I’ll even be in stealth and cancel lethal arrow before it fires just to see if they react. If the dodge or block, they are using miats. If they aren’t, let it fly.

I will say the play style takes getting used to but it’s great for solo, small group, hit and run, 1vX. Not good for raid groups as it adds nothing to the raid. But you can easily adapt it to what it seems you are looking for.

This is the best handful of information I have ever gotten on the forums! Thanks so much!

Thanks. Message me if you want any help. Izaki has some good pointers too.

davey1107

There are some good tips here already. I’ll try to add where I have distinct advice. I mostly solo or 2 man pvp w my stamblade.

If you’re super new to pvp on a NB, you might try a bow build first to learn the ropes on stuff your talking about...cloak duration, when it’ll work and when it won’t. Being a range build will help you learn your tolerances before trying a more melee build, which is dangerous. Also, I like marksman + hawks eye as a pvp learning set, because it reduces cost so much that you can focus on things other than resources (mostly). It’s just easier on a more range-oriented build to learn things like how to identify how many hits a player can take before they die, how far away you need to be to avoid being overrun, etc.

Secondly, unlike other classes you almost need to forget most of what you learned playing a NB in pve. On this class, pvp is way different...perhaps mostly because your opponents ar all unpredictable. In a trial you just learn where to stand and when to attack. In pvp a nightblade has to learn new strategies.

A core strategy to learn is stealth. And not just using cloak...you want to be as hard to see as you can be at all times, even when attacking. Positioning and timing are crucial. Choose your position...know the terrain and consider how your attack will look to others. Can you position yourself next to a rock or tree to hide yourself from view? If you’re chased, do you know where you’ll go? When your attack is launched, are your enemy’s cameras pointed at you, or will you be out of their field of vision? Then if you do get into close quarters, use stealth to confuse the heck out of them. Move into their blind spot. Change directions right after you cloak. Be annoying, lol.

Another strategy is mitigating damage. Templars do this by healing through it, DKs just take it and shrug it off...nightblades are designed to mitigate it by *avoiding the hit all together.* A stamblade is very hard to play in pvp if you don’t dodge, roll and block. I think this is where the armor disagreements come in. Medium gives you stealth and dodge boosts that are VERY powerful. The best stamblades wear medium, giving up some resistance because the medium will help you mitigate twice as much damage...if you use dodge and stealth well. But if someone wants to play like a Templar...walking up to a foe and punching them and not really using roll...then sure, heavy would help. You can also mitigate damage with shuffle or mirage. A lot of builds skip these, but they can really help.

Use these together with a final strategy I’ll mention - be unpredictable. Watch how people play on pvp, they do things 95% the same way. They all attack from the same positions, Defend from the same positions and follow the same patterns. When your enemies are taking a resource, every single one of them has their camera pointed at the keep tower. If you attack from the other direction, usually it takes them a while to figure that out. Use their predictability against them, and make unpredictability a weapon to your advantage. Try bow sniping someone from inside a resource barn instead of the tower and see how confused it makes people...you’ll see what I mean.

Good luck. And remember...if you aren’t getting flame messages, you aren’t playing stamblade right, ha.

gabormezo

Trying to make a bow build working. Not a ganker style one, kinda assault build for BG. My problem is, I don't have reliable spamable. If my initial burst don't kill, and in BG it won't for sure, I don't have anything for pressure. On my sorc I can spam pulse for ex. What is the right tactics? Infused LA spam?

gabormezo

Lemme answer my own question. It turned out that it is imposdible for me to build a viable archer for BG. Decided to stay in melee. A piece of Bloodspawn, 5 Night Mother Embrace, 5 Spinner or what is the high phys pen set, all medium works for me. Nice burst, but the idea of this setup is that, me as a learning Stamblade player, have a window to prepare my burst and hide if that fails. NME 5th bonus is great for that. Later I might move towards the meta, but right now its fine, I don't die that often even in medium and can slaughter players in BGs, and that was the goal.

Unfadingsilence

Currently I'm playing around with a new set up, my current stats fully buffed are 33k max Stam 3k Stam recovery, 5.3k weapon damage and 63% crit damage. I'll be dropping 400 weapon damage once I get another set and I'll be going up 4000 max Stam for the drop in weapon damage tho

http://xboxdvr.com/gamer/UnfadingSilence/screenshot/7909098

My tool tip for incap is 20k atm as well

http://xboxdvr.com/gamer/UnfadingSilence/screenshot/7909117

gabormezo

Wth is this setup consist of?

Valykc

Who Necro’d?!?!

leepalmer95

Valykc wrote: »

Who Necro’d?!?!

Oh well.

How is your stam blading going anyway?