Nightblade tanks, are they a thing or dead?

Joxer61

Ok, so a NB tank sounds fun to me but boy you sure don't see many around. DK's for days, and more and more Wardens of late, but NB, meh. Now, I have read that they were a thing once, "Sap tanks" I believe? But something got nerfed and no more? Or, is it just that they are really that good for dps and no one bothers trying to tank on them? I found some builds, Alcasts and Woelers, outdated for the most part it seems although Alcast posted one for Summerset, so maybe there will be a resurrection?
Or, are they out there and if so, any good? Not looking at end game stuff so just dungeons and the like, trials and such. And yea, I'm a newbie (gone 3+yrs) so its all a bit overwhelming but I'm keen to get stuck in. Cheers!

Asardes

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Joxer61

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Thought I read somewhere that permablock was 1> not a good way to tank, aka lazy and 2> was getting changed come SS? I xould be way off and those could be the random rants of a few but just curious. From the sounds of it not the best choice for tank but then I don't want to be yet "another" DK tank. Have been levelling a Warden and is quite strong and fun, but decided to branch out and look at NB...but then again not waste my time.

usmcjdking

I've done a fair bit of NB tanking and while it isn't the worst at tanking, it is certainly the most uninspired.

Joxer61

usmcjdking wrote: »

I've done a fair bit of NB tanking and while it isn't the worst at tanking, it is certainly the most uninspired.

Awww really?? I was sorta hoping it was along the lines of a Deathknight in WOW where you did attacks and took health to stay up (one of many mechanics) and not so much a buffbot style of play?

Asardes

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Thought I read somewhere that permablock was 1> not a good way to tank, aka lazy and 2> was getting changed come SS? I xould be way off and those could be the random rants of a few but just curious. From the sounds of it not the best choice for tank but then I don't want to be yet "another" DK tank. Have been levelling a Warden and is quite strong and fun, but decided to branch out and look at NB...but then again not waste my time.

Yes, perma-block is not a good way to tank in any content, but some trials do require a fair amount of blocking, often for long periods or you die in one hit, and no important change is coming this patch. NB is not that bad for tanking actually, but it has nothing special either. For example it has no CC. I have actually tanked veteran DLC dungeons on one and I can't say it's especially effective in that role. So if you stick to dungeons and maybe easier veteran trials you should be fine.

Marginis

Nightblade tanks have hung in their for a long time, despite not being the meta for quite some time. It's become more of a niche build, but due to all the changes coming with Summerset (namely the Psijic skill line and the tanking morph on cloak), it is getting probably the biggest buff for tanking of the current classes.

Sap tanks were a type of tank that was viable some time ago, but at least since Morrowind it has become significantly less viable, mostly due to sustain changes. Sap tanks were built off of recovering their resources very quickly, and so they didn't need the same amount of pure defense as a mitigation tank, which is the type that is still viable today, and is just based off of straight up eating damage. Sap tanks aren't really coming back, because sustain is still just so hard (even moreso with the Summerset heavy attack changes), but Nightblades are getting some sustain tools, and so can fit more into the mitigation tank meta.

Joxer61

Asardes wrote: »

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Thought I read somewhere that permablock was 1> not a good way to tank, aka lazy and 2> was getting changed come SS? I xould be way off and those could be the random rants of a few but just curious. From the sounds of it not the best choice for tank but then I don't want to be yet "another" DK tank. Have been levelling a Warden and is quite strong and fun, but decided to branch out and look at NB...but then again not waste my time.

Yes, perma-block is not a good way to tank in any content, but some trials do require a fair amount of blocking, often for long periods or you die in one hit, and no important change is coming this patch. NB is not that bad for tanking actually, but it has nothing special either. For example it has no CC. I have actually tanked veteran DLC dungeons on one and I can't say it's especially effective in that role. So if you stick to dungeons and maybe easier veteran trials you should be fine.

Isn't the "Summom Shade" skill an aoe of sorts? I saw it on a build so kinda figured that it was decent?
Ah, but not a CC like Gripping Shards or Claws......I get it.

Asardes

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Thought I read somewhere that permablock was 1> not a good way to tank, aka lazy and 2> was getting changed come SS? I xould be way off and those could be the random rants of a few but just curious. From the sounds of it not the best choice for tank but then I don't want to be yet "another" DK tank. Have been levelling a Warden and is quite strong and fun, but decided to branch out and look at NB...but then again not waste my time.

Yes, perma-block is not a good way to tank in any content, but some trials do require a fair amount of blocking, often for long periods or you die in one hit, and no important change is coming this patch. NB is not that bad for tanking actually, but it has nothing special either. For example it has no CC. I have actually tanked veteran DLC dungeons on one and I can't say it's especially effective in that role. So if you stick to dungeons and maybe easier veteran trials you should be fine.

Isn't the "Summom Shade" skill an aoe of sorts? I saw it on a build so kinda figured that it was decent?
Ah, but not a CC like Gripping Shards or Claws......I get it.

It is quite nice to have that, but you can get the same effect from Thorvulkun monster set. As I said, you can tank on NB, but it has nothing special that can't be done by other classes, or even gear sets, and better.

Joxer61

And yea, don't want to spend the effort only to que up for a dungeon or whatever and be laughed out the door for being a NB. Lately these games don't allow for you to show player skill, you get kicked just for not being "meta", which is a shame.
(GW2 notoriously bad for that)

Asardes

Joxer61 wrote: »

And yea, don't want to spend the effort only to que up for a dungeon or whatever and be laughed out the door for being a NB. Lately these games don't allow for you to show player skill, you get kicked just for not being "meta", which is a shame.
(GW2 notoriously bad for that)

As I said, dungeons are totally fine, you can tank them with pretty much everything. As long as you properly do the tank things, nobody would care much. In fact most trial tank "META" builds will be overkill for dungeons. Non-DLC ones can even be tanked by a DD with a taunt on the bar. I've tanked Falkreath Hold HM on a sorcerer shield tank, I've tanked Bloodroot Forge non-HM with a Stamina NB tank w/o healer; with healer I would have beaten the HM for sure. Yet I would consider none of those builds worth bringing in Maw of Lorkhaj or even the Craglorn trials.

Joxer61

@Asardes , thank you for that Nighblade link! Very helpful. Caltrops??? To make up for lack of CC? ANd let me ask, I have "heard" that this game isn't like WOW whereas its not about the gar but yet it seems that a lot of builds and roles are very dependant on certain gear sets? Does that not make it about the gear? What happened to it being about the classes and such. That much change in 4 years? Bummer, because that makes it seem like a grindfest to get the optimal sets.

Ankael07

Asardes wrote: »

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Thought I read somewhere that permablock was 1> not a good way to tank, aka lazy and 2> was getting changed come SS? I xould be way off and those could be the random rants of a few but just curious. From the sounds of it not the best choice for tank but then I don't want to be yet "another" DK tank. Have been levelling a Warden and is quite strong and fun, but decided to branch out and look at NB...but then again not waste my time.

Yes, perma-block is not a good way to tank in any content, but some trials do require a fair amount of blocking, often for long periods or you die in one hit, and no important change is coming this patch. NB is not that bad for tanking actually, but it has nothing special either. For example it has no CC. I have actually tanked veteran DLC dungeons on one and I can't say it's especially effective in that role. So if you stick to dungeons and maybe easier veteran trials you should be fine.

Isn't the "Summom Shade" skill an aoe of sorts? I saw it on a build so kinda figured that it was decent?
Ah, but not a CC like Gripping Shards or Claws......I get it.

It is quite nice to have that, but you can get the same effect from Thorvulkun monster set. As I said, you can tank on NB, but it has nothing special that can't be done by other classes, or even gear sets, and better.

Doesnt that mean that NB tanks can use any other monster set of their choosing?

Asardes

Well I don't claim those linked are "optimal" sets. There were just sets I happened to have in storage. For example I used Tava's for a long time on the DK and used shuffle to get the dodge chance. That skill was changed at some point so I you now need 5 pieces of medium to use the skill, so that set became useless on the DK since it's 5 heavy. NB has Mirage skill that can be used regardless so he's basically the only one who can use that set now. Imperium was just sitting around in bank with no real use but the shield is quite nice to have somewhat compensating for the lack of Igneous Shield. Swarm Mother compensates for the lack of chains. So more than half of my gear and some of my skills for that build basically try to emulate various other skills that other classes have as part of their tool kit.

Joxer61

Asardes wrote: »

So more than half of my gear and some of my skills for that build basically try to emulate various other skills that other classes have as part of their tool kit.

But isn't that pretty much what other tanks (classes) do, only they gear more for say buffs and such? I kinda get where you are going though...

Asardes

Ankael07 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Thought I read somewhere that permablock was 1> not a good way to tank, aka lazy and 2> was getting changed come SS? I xould be way off and those could be the random rants of a few but just curious. From the sounds of it not the best choice for tank but then I don't want to be yet "another" DK tank. Have been levelling a Warden and is quite strong and fun, but decided to branch out and look at NB...but then again not waste my time.

Yes, perma-block is not a good way to tank in any content, but some trials do require a fair amount of blocking, often for long periods or you die in one hit, and no important change is coming this patch. NB is not that bad for tanking actually, but it has nothing special either. For example it has no CC. I have actually tanked veteran DLC dungeons on one and I can't say it's especially effective in that role. So if you stick to dungeons and maybe easier veteran trials you should be fine.

Isn't the "Summom Shade" skill an aoe of sorts? I saw it on a build so kinda figured that it was decent?
Ah, but not a CC like Gripping Shards or Claws......I get it.

It is quite nice to have that, but you can get the same effect from Thorvulkun monster set. As I said, you can tank on NB, but it has nothing special that can't be done by other classes, or even gear sets, and better.

Doesnt that mean that NB tanks can use any other monster set of their choosing?

Well AoE maim is not useful in all situations. In most cases you only need to apply Minor Maim on the boss and that you can do with Heroic Slash that's available to every class. Also it's deabatable if Thorvulkun or shades are better than Lord Warden since the latter also protects players from mechanics not linked to any mobs. So there's no absolute "best setup" for anything, just different setups for different situations.

Asardes

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

So more than half of my gear and some of my skills for that build basically try to emulate various other skills that other classes have as part of their tool kit.

But isn't that pretty much what other tanks (classes) do, only they gear more for say buffs and such? I kinda get where you are going though...

Well to conclude I would say NB, Sorcerer and Templar are the classes where you go to tank when you have become good at tanking on DK and Warden and need an extra challenge. If you breeze trough veteran DLC HM dungeons on your DK you can pick NB tank. If you are just learning to tank, or learning the game, I wouldn't recommend it. Resource management isn't there (that was the sap tank main selling point, basically infinite resources), and for the most part group utility isn't there either so you will have to jump trough a lot of hoops in terms of gear setup, know fights well to know when to open up and do some really unusual combos to be maybe ~70% as effective as a DK or Warden tank. For example if you try to do Bloodforge Root as NB tank, and you have very little experience at tanking that dungeon you'll get rekt so hard ther's no way you finish it.

Joxer61

Asardes wrote: »

Joxer61 wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

So more than half of my gear and some of my skills for that build basically try to emulate various other skills that other classes have as part of their tool kit.

But isn't that pretty much what other tanks (classes) do, only they gear more for say buffs and such? I kinda get where you are going though...

Well to conclude I would say NB, Sorcerer and Templar are the classes where you go to tank when you have become good at tanking on DK and Warden and need an extra challenge. If you breeze trough veteran DLC HM dungeons on your DK you can pick NB tank. If you are just learning to tank, or learning the game, I wouldn't recommend it. Resource management isn't there (that was the sap tank main selling point, basically infinite resources), and for the most part group utility isn't there either so you will have to jump trough a lot of hoops in terms of gear setup, know fights well to know when to open up and do some really unusual combos to be maybe ~70% as effective as a DK or Warden tank. For example if you try to do Bloodforge Root as NB tank, and you have very little experience at tanking that dungeon you'll get rekt so hard ther's no way you finish it.

Good advice....back to my Warden I go.....frost tank is fun!

Lynx7386

Nightblade tanking works great for most vet dungeons and normal trials. It starts to struggle pretty badly in vet trials.

jypcy

Yeah I think Asardes summer it up pretty well. If you start out learning fights as a NB tank you might find yourself needing to change up gear/skills/cp/approach depending on the encounter, whereas a DK could pretty much run the exact same setup and use more or less the same overall tactic (mechanics notwithstanding) from nfg1 to vhof without worry. I believe that the upcoming summerset changes will allow NB tanks to be more stable across content, although I wouldn’t be surprised if they still are better off adapting in the case of some of the extremes whereas DKs really wouldn’t need to.

There’s another user on forums (forget the name but hoping he shows up) who I believe has said he’s done all craglorn plus vmol and I think maybe even vhof on his nb tank in the current state of the game. And I’ve done the vet dlc hm dungeons as well as vas hm on mine, so between us that should be NB tanks completing all of the challenging content in the game. Just to show that it can be done, although I would recommend learning the fights on DK or warden rather than jumping right into them on a NB.

And also warden is probably my favorite tank so don’t want to in any way dissuade you from playing that class

Marginis

Not to say it's particularly effective, but even in vet trials, if you have very high technical skill, you can make some some really dynamic builds with Nightblades, as Nightblades have a lot more utility than other classes in many cases. It's completely unnecessary, and not as good as the typical tanks in trials, but it can be a really fun challenge to make a tank build based around teleporting and dashing around instead of just absorbing damage. I tried and it was really good, it just requires a lot of attention because there isn't really a rotation so to speak.

Nevasca

NBs tanks provide awesome off-healing in dungeons. People go with NB Tank + 3 DPS to steamroll through. They also maintain a good uptime on Sentinel of Rkugamz which helps stamina sustain for DDs, while also allowing them to pretty much perma-block. If you want builds (dungeon oriented) look for the Bloodletter build by Gilliamtherogue.

I've heard of people using NB Tank on stuff like vMOL, and I honestly think they can actually do it but will require a lot more skill to pull through. Main problem is your guild actually allowing you to participate in progression runs with NB Tank.

Strider__Roshin

I have always tanked on my DK, but I'll give NB tanking an honest try next update.

GreenhaloX

Neither a thing nor dead. They are like the red-headed stepchild you just want to slap around.

Tasear

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Maybe there's other ways to tank then perm blocking?

ccfeeling

All class tank should be able to do his jobs in any content, even VMOL, VAS, VHRC.

What I see there are just DK and Warden tank exist in end game content.

Isnt the game broken?

One more thing, NB is a pvp focused class, most of the abilities are related burst, damages and steath . Due to the NB outperform in Cyrodiil, NB skills keep to being changed and nerfed , so I think NB cannot be end game tank, no other classes accept.

Tasear

ccfeeling wrote: »

All class tank should be able to do his jobs in any content, even VMOL, VAS, VHRC.

What I see there are just DK and Warden tank exist in end game content.

Isnt the game broken?

One more thing, NB is a pvp focused class, most of the abilities are related burst, damages and steath . Due to the NB outperform in Cyrodiil, NB skills keep to being changed and nerfed , so I think NB cannot be end game tank, no other classes accept.

They exist, but it's a question why people aren't picking them as much.

Joxer61

ccfeeling wrote: »

All class tank should be able to do his jobs in any content, even VMOL, VAS, VHRC.

What I see there are just DK and Warden tank exist in end game content.

Isnt the game broken?

One more thing, NB is a pvp focused class, most of the abilities are related burst, damages and steath . Due to the NB outperform in Cyrodiil, NB skills keep to being changed and nerfed , so I think NB cannot be end game tank, no other classes accept.

That's fine, as end game/leaderboards isn't something I will be going for for quite some time. But yea, a tad broken in regards to tanks if 2 are the "meta", but then again what MMO isn't broken.

Sparr0w

NB tanks are basically unkillable next patch, only issue is their group support, thats why DK and Warden pull ahead.

Asardes

Tasear wrote: »

Asardes wrote: »

The only buff NB will receive soon is one morph of Cloak that will become somewhat of a burst heal; also Silver Leash will be similar to Unrelenting Grip, though the stamina cost is rather high. The new skill from Psijic, Deep Thoughts, may be of some use, but not won't help you in situations where you have to perma-block. Other than that, nothing really changes. So still DK and Warden are by far the best tanks, with every other class way behind in terms of resource sustain and group utility. You can tank dungeons and maybe off-tank some of the easier trials on a NB, but I won't try main tanking trials on one.

Maybe there's other ways to tank then perm blocking?

I hate when people cherry pick trough my answers, and get some concepts out of context. I wasn't implying anywhere you have to perma-block in each and every situation, but there are some where you have to hold block for extended periods since any attack that's not blocked will kill you. There's basically no other way to mitigate 100K+ base damage than blocking on top of high resistance and high HP and some bosses hit the tank repeatedly with such attacks.

Classes such as Dragonknight (Helping Hands, Battle Roar passives), and Warden (Bull Netch, Nature's Gift passive) can sustain blocking for extended periods without sacrificing any of their utility, but instead provide utility. For example Helping Hands also gives Minor Brutality to the group, while Nature's Gift is activated by healing allies (ex. place Budding Seeds and/or Leeching Vines). Nightblades give virtually no group utility as tanks, and would indeed have to sacrifice more than they would otherwise, by using selfish setups in order to sustain.

aeowulf

They do exist post Morrowind, I know one. Pre morrowind I used to know many and played one myself. They were a lot of fun and I think half the issue is those that learnt their unique playstyle are not happy it's gone, or more to the point, the fun was removed. We all play games to have fun right? It was ESO's 'death knight' kind of build, utilising sap essence to keep agro and provide significant self and group healing. It was good, stronger in trash but weaker single target when compared to DK, so I don't understand why it was removed, or why ZoS waited a year to start thinking about putting back class-roles that disappeared with the changes. (This is probably my only issue with ESO, and the reluctance to admit/fix bad changes <cough repentence cough>)

Post Morrowind put them into a place where they lost their uniqueness and found themselves competing on an even level. Their sustain could not easily provide perma-blocking in the few places it was required and due to lack of group utility found themselves being overlooked for DK's and Wardens who could adapt more easily. Being exceptionally difficult to play (comparatively) meant they were not. New players can not really use them to learn tough content. More experiencd players can, they already have a base of friends.

Sumerset changes will be interesting. From a class perspective, NB tanks get dark cloak (mega healing) but loose out with an increased cost to strife, less healing on refreshing path and a 50% caster only mitigation reduction on bolstering darkness. I can't really agree with that last one, not when DK's get a 3% of max health damage cap on incoming damage ulti. But all ulti's pale in comparison to war horn so it's almost irrelevant (War Horn is getting boring now...) There is also the issue of shades not providing 100% uptime on maim, which is needed. However NB will get good use out of non-class changes, but as a tank they will still provide minimal group utility. We shall see... I'd love to see groups with non DK/warden tanks, and non templar/warden healers. It's getting boring there too.

I think the person you were looking for above was @actosh, he's tanking still on NB.