Forward
Renaming the guide to just NB healing guide, other Nightblades posted a lot of tips and have made the build a lot stronger. I never hear garbage about how Nightblades can't heal well anymore, I think those people got stomped enough times to get the message that Nightblades can heal.
Why Nightblade?
Here are the Nightblade healer's strengths:
1. Cloak. Pretty simple, cloaking away while being focused will save you many times.
2. Burst healing. NB is the best single target burst healer in the game by a lot.
3. Sustain. Using health plus magicka as healing resources means that you rarely if ever run out of magicka unless you're cleansing a lot.
4. Versatility. Battlegrounds and a lot of the Cyrodiil campaigns do not use Champion points. That means that if you have a max level magblade you can switch to healing very easily. The only annoying thing is you'll need refreshing path as a NB healer.
Skills
PvP healing doesn't have a rotation, instead here's a write up of NB skills and their strengths and weaknesses:
Core/Required Abilities:
Healthy Offering – this is your primary heal, use it often. It is the largest single target heal in the game and is spamable, for those who have a Templar healer imagine if Breath of Life could be used without running out of magicka, and instead after using it 4-6 times in a row you had to go back to using combat prayer or healing springs to regen your health. The downside is it cannot heal yourself, so if you're focused you have to rely on your mitigation and cloak away.
Combat Prayer – Decent frontal heal, provides extra mitigation and a damage buff to those you use it on. Enough classes don't have minor berserk in their class toolkits to make this mandatory. It's also your 2nd or 3rd best self heal.
Shadowy Disguise or Dark Cloak – always on one of your hot bars, if you don't use either you're gimping yourself as a nightblade, all your other abilities have been balanced around these abilities. You have to choose which one you're going to use and build around it; if you choose shadowy disguise you'll be more of a full healer, if you choose dark cloak you're moreso a tank and you need to buff your health. I suggest choosing which one you use and building around it, as the rest of your gear selections will revolve around which one you choose.
Elemental Blockade – Really powerful ability, Ice has an added snare effect with the chance to proc minor maim for 15% less damage. Also pops nightblades out of stealth if you hit them on cast. Fire or lightning are also options but you won’t get the snare for defense.
Mass Hysteria – PBAOE fear, great ability. I use it as a peel for people who're being focused and to escape being focused myself. Templars with puncturing sweeps or Dks who stun lock you can be annoying to escape from, manifestation of terror > dodge roll > cloak > double take will save you running back from the respawn. Some people prefer the fear traps over mass hysteria, I think it's a mistake to choose the traps instead. You can use the fire trap from the mages guild and it'll be almost as good as the fear trap, missing out on the pbaoe fear with NB's limited cc toolkit is a mistake.
Cleanse – the expensive morph of purge. Good ability, high magicka cost but since NB's have great sustain from using two resources you can afford it. The other morph efficient purge morph is not worth a cast unless you're in cyrodiil, it's the secondary effect of cleanse you want where it heals the group for 15% of their health you want in BGs. Has the added effect of 10% extra magicka regen because of the support passives.
Double Take - aoes are everywhere, 25% aoe damage reduction? Yes please. Lasts a decent amount of time. Doesn't break stealth/disguise, best used when you're cloaked trying to escape. I used to always take concealed blade but double take is superior, playing around the build is even stronger than it was!
Other Good Abilities:
Impale - impale is probably the strongest ranged execute in the game. It’s worth using just to kill steal in death matches or help finish off pesky runners. Ability is reflectable.
Forward momentum - if pure healing is your thing forward momentum is handy. 2 hander plus resto required.
Impulse - ground aoe. A major issue for magblade dps abilities is they’re all reflectable. This ability is the best way to circumvent this limitation. It’s so so on it’s own, but great with a BRP staff.
Piercing Mark – really nice ability, gives you a bit of stealth detection (but not for long enough to be useful). Main purpose is to debuff magicka resistances (stamina already debuff physical resistances themselves) and if the target dies with the debuff up you heal for 50% of your health.
Harness Magicka - lots of healers don’t use it because of the short duration, but I don’t see why not. It’s a really strong shield and returns some magicka when you’re hit, way better than ward ally.
Healing Springs – you won't use it a lot unless your team is stacked or you need to heal yourself, but it is the best or second best self heal per cast.
Rapid Regen - I think this ability was stealth buffed. It’s strong enough to be good in pvp now and it helps offset the health drain on healthy Offering. I still think mutagen is too weak to be effective.
Borrowed Time (Time Stop) – I don't view healing as only healing health bars, your role is to support your group. I find the ability better in cyrodiil than battlegrounds, in battleground there are better choices.
Refreshing Path – Really strong heal, but only if people stand in the small area. I mainly use it because if I get cc'd it'll tick away, plus casting a shadow ability gives you major resolve and major ward. I hit this ability no matter what whenever I need the mitigation buff. If you use shadow image then I probably wouldn't use refreshing path, it's the bonus from using a shadow ability that's the main benefit.
Shadow Image – Not too bad... provides minor maim, but I prefer snaring with Ice elemental blockade, damage is meh. Port I don't like, there's an animation and travel time, that means while traveling you can still take damage. I've hit the ability when low health (maybe 25%) and when I ended my port I've been dead from dots and whatnot multiple times. If you're skilled in using it I'd continue, every time I read the description I imagine the possibilities and potential, it might just be me but I can't make it work. Results may vary depending on how many opponents you're up against, I typically have 2-3 people chasing me like a Benny Hill show every battleground so lots of dots on me.
Ward Ally – Shields are always good, just doesn't fit on my hotbar. There are better options. Last time I checked this in pvp the shield was under 3k. Also has a habit of not acting like a smart heal and always applying on the same person.
Structured Entropy – I haven't been using this but think I'm going to try to find a way to fit it on my hotbar. I use the cheap pots in battlegrounds (I'm thrifty from pvp vendor) or immovability pots and need a way to get major sorcery when I use immovability pots.
Crushing Shock – Useful in capture the relic battlegrounds to interrupt people trying to grab a relic.
Siphoning Attacks - I've started using this more on my back bar. Don't underestimate the strength of light attack spamming, I've started light attack spamming a lot in BGs to help peel reflections and this ability will help you regen some health and magicka while doing it.
Concealed Blade - I used to always run this on my back bar with shadowy disguise but have recently switched to double take instead. More stealth speed is awesome and they both stack, the only reason I don’t use it anymore is limited bar space. It’s still a great ability for the passives.
Abilities you should not use:
Funnel Health/Swallow Soul – absolute garbage. The heal these abilities provide is tied to how much damage you do, as a healer the answer is not a lot. People run heavy armour, block, and are never fully debuffed so the healing amount is terrible, plus it can be reflected. Last time I tried it in pvp it was ticking for ~500 health. People associated the ability with NB so much that the weakness of the ability makes people think the class is weak. This ability, either morph, is a dps magblade ability and not a healing ability. Stay away. Funnel health is literally the same healing amount or less than mutagen, with half the duration and no secondary cleanse effect... but you also need a target and will do maybe 2k damage? You'd be better off doing nothing for that second to regen some magicka. I’m going to test it again now that I’ve switched to 5 light.
Sap Essence – every time I try to use this ability I die. I had a hunch it was reflectable but it's not, it's just that when you're in range of multiple opponents and would use this ability you should be getting out of there, not trying to do damage for a small heal. Not worth a skill slot in pvp, great in pve. I imagine if you go dark cloak this skill would become a lot better. I’m going to test it again now that I’ve switched to 5 light.
Ultimates
Soul Siphon – Best healing ultimate in battlegrounds hands down. Good range, strong effect. It's essentially a full heal for your team. Only problem is the effect doesn't hit for a second or so after using the ability, so it's useless when someone's being focused. Best use for the ability is when your team is all low health and you have a couple dps on you. I'll cloak away and then switch to my front bar and hit the ultimate – bam - team's full health.
Temporal Guard – I use this ultimate on my back defense/escape bar. I never use it though, it's purely for the passives. Soul Siphon is so strong it's the only ultimate I use. Slotting this ultimate will reduce the damage you take by 8% plus give you a free damage shield while blocking. There's something to be said for double slotting soul siphon instead, bar switching can be interrupted and with all the cc flying around I'll sometimes hit this by mistake blowing my ultimate on the wrong ability.
Typical Skill Loadouts
I'll tell you what I use in battlegrounds, there are different setups that work. I've noticed most pvp videos/builds make sure they have all the buffs in each build, this is one of the weaknesses I see right now because I'm missing some key buffs. There are many ways to skin a cat so there are options. I’ve recently switched to the updated Buffer of the Swift set and love it. Transmutation is another strong pvp healing set, I like the higher healing values of bright throat better but it doesn’t fit well with the BRP staff. I use the fire BRP staff because I’m an idiot and accidentally decon’d my Ice staff. A lot of players run vampire in pvp so it’s not bad, but I’m leaning towards thinking ice is better.
W1 – Powered Transmutation Restoration Staff, (glyph doesn't matter too much I use SP)
W2 – (Trait doesn't matter too much I use sharpened) BRP Fire Staff, Oblivion Enchant
Head – Heavy Impenetrable Bogdan the Nightflame, tri stat glyph
Shoulders – Medium impenetrable Bogdan the Nightflame, tri stat glyph
Chest – Light Impenetrable Buffer of the Swift, tri stat glyph
Legs – Light impenetrable Buffer of the Swift, tri stat glyph
Belt – Light impenetrable Buffer of the Swift, tri stat glyph
Hands – Light impenetrable Buffer of the Swift, tri stat glyph
Feet - Light impenetrable Buffer of the Swift, tri stat glyph
Necklade – Transmutation, protective trait, SP rune
Ring 1 – Transmutation Protective trait, SP rune
Ring 2 - Transmutation Tri stat trait, magicka recovery rune
5 light, 1 medium, 1 Heavy
Drink: Witchmothers potent brew
Mundus: Steed
Ability Points: All magicka
Pots: Alliance vendor (magicka and spell power)
5 piece Transmutation on my front bar, 3 piece with BRP back bar
Resto staff: 1 – Healthy offering, 2 – Rapid Regen, 3 – Combat Prayer, 4 – Refreshing Path, 5 – Shadowy Disguise – U: Soul Siphon
BRP Flame Staff: 1 – Mass Hysteria, 2 – Elemental Blockade, 3 – Impale, 4 – Elemental Ring, 5 – Double Take – U: Soul Siphon
Pure healing points in BGs suck. I prefer to mix damage and healing, but primarily heal.
Race
Any Race will work but I think Breton and Argonian are the best. If you play a different race just shuffle around stats with glyphs.
Playstyle:
You're a full healer/tank, for those who're new to pvp healing all healers are tanks. Expect to be the primary target of skilled opponents, so without mitigation you won't be able to contribute much to your team. Use your front bar for healing others, switch to your back bar when you're being focused to escape or help apply pressure.
Ice staff is for two reasons; first when you block with an ice staff it consumes magicka instead of stamina, if you're out of stamina from constantly being cc'd blocking with an ice staff will give you time for your stamina to regen. You can also get a free damage shield every 10 seconds from having a psijic skill slotted. The other reason is elemental blockade, the ice variant is the best variant in pvp. Blockade of frost can also knock Nightblades out of stealth if you hit them on the initial cast. So basicly you heal and support the group with blockade and light/heavy attacks when you don't need to heal.
I’ve been trying out the flame staff recently, mainly because there are a lot of vampires in pvp. I miss the blockade snare for defense so am on the fence about which is best, but leaning towards ice.
Edited by Iskiab on April 1, 2019 6:04PM Looking for any guildies I used to play with:
Havoc Warhammer - Alair
LoC EQ2 - Mayi and Iskiab
PRX and Tabula Rasa - Rift - Iskiab
Or anyone else I used to play games with in guilds I’ve forgotten