mag blade skills rework pls

Noctus

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/459252/comparison-conceiled-weapon-vs-suprise-attack/p1
note concealed weapon in stamina version gets debuff and also a 2.3 multiplier on back attacks

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/459061/funnel-health-rework#latest

if those skills get changed magblade will allready have a far better position

Iskiab

I’d rather have crippling be non-reflectable so at least the class can consistently keep expedition up.

I’ve been leveling a stamblade up, the difference is huge. Stamblade is a million times better, magblades are in a worse place then I thought.

Solariken

Iskiab wrote: »

I’d rather have crippling be non-reflectable so at least the class can consistently keep expedition up.

I’ve been leveling a stamblade up, the difference is huge. Stamblade is a million times better, magblades are in a worse place then I thought.

Agreed that Crippling should not be reflectable nor absorbable by Warden slab shield.

CavalryPK

There are 2 problems with magblade:
1. mobility
2. slow ars burst

casparian

I could say a lot about what I would like to see changed with magblade, but to my mind there is one big thing that would make a world of difference for the class: mobility.

Mobility is important not just because I wanna go fast (that's true on every class), but because magblade's class-defining defense is avoidance. We don't have the tools that other classes do (healing buffs, projectile defense, blocking buffs, huge shields). What we have is the ability to avoid damage entirely for brief windows. The weakness here is that if an enemy can shut down our mobility -- prevent us from creating distance between us and our shade, and use AOEs to negate cloak's defensive potential -- then those avoidance tools don't work.

In other words, our avoidance tools (Shade and Cloak) aren't replacements for mobility. On the contrary, they presuppose mobility in order to work well. Shade only works as an avoidance tool if you already have the mobility to create distance between yourself and your shade. Cloak only works as an avoidance tool if you're not perpetually stuck 5m away from someone running Frost Blockade. Since the reality of Cyrodiil these days is that snaring skills are incredibly prevalent and not realistically avoidable, Shade + Cloak is a far less effective defense tool than it used to be.

Incidentally, this is one reason stamblades can be so hard to kill: they are able to couple the Nightblade's strong in-class avoidance tools with out-of-class mobility tools (dodge roll and/or Forward Momentum). Magblades can't capitalize on those out-of-class tools, and so their in-class defenses don't work well.

It's this situation -- our in-class defenses only work in the context of an out-of-class resource (mobility) -- that has to change if magblade is to be viable outside of the niche specs it has been pushed into over the last few patches (Caluurion's ganker and heavy armor HOTblade).

My preferred solution would be to add 2-4 seconds of snare immunity to Refreshing Path. This would also be appreciated in PVP, as magblade healers would be able to free their team from any snares, something other healers can't do as reliably. But I'm open to other ideas.

Sincerely,
Someone who wants to be able to main magblade in PVP again

Brrrofski

My main gripe is how predictable the burst is. You're at about 4 light attacks in - ok cool, let me get ready to avoid the bow proc.

Maulkin

I think making cripple unreflectable would be buffing it way too much. Ranged, strong DoT, root, snare, speed buff.... that ability already does way too much. Allows you to control fights like nothing else against anyone without Shuffle, FM or Reflect. I mean we have people complaining about not being able to disengage with their magblades due to slows and roots yet at the same breath they want to be able to apply roots and slows to everyone else liberally. Doesn't seem to be with the best interests of balance in mind.

Now in terms of movement speed magblade has more ways of getting major expedition than any other class. Double Take, Path and Cripple, that's 3 from class skills alone and 4 if you count psijic skills. Major expedition is not the problem here. Getting some root/snare immunity to build some distance to your shade is the problem.

While giving Cloak some snare immunity would be highly desirable, this would also be buffing a single skill way too much. Invis, miss of single target abilities, DoT suppression, guaranteed crit and not too mention free Major Resolve and Major Ward from the passives ... that's already a helluva lot of strong things crammed in one ability.

For me either Blur or Path are the abilities worth buffing with a few secs of snare immunity, in line with what @casparian said. Also snare immunity and speed in one ability is really potent. You drop a shade you use one more ability, you're off at 100mph and you can teleport back to your shade whenever.

As for the dmg part, the only thing that really annoys me is the delay on the Bow Proc. Same as with the delay on the Frag proc for MagSorcs. It's beyond stupid and makes your burst too easy to block or dodge. By all means put a visual indicator when the Proc is there, like there is on MagSorc but the delay is very detrimental against anyone moderately competent. Other than that I find dmg and pressure very good tbh. I have to use Force Pulse instead of Swallow Soul so that I can dmg DKs behind their wings though, but that's it.

Datthaw

Im like a broken record now....

Refreshing paths needs snare removal, this wouldn't buff stamnb and magnb could spam it a couple times and with the maj exp buff it should allow decent movement being just a removal instead of immunity.

Knootewoot

I rather have cloak have snare removal and cloak should need 5 pieces of light armor to be able to cast it.

brandonv516

Maulkin wrote: »

I think making cripple unreflectable would be buffing it way too much. Ranged, strong DoT, root, snare, speed buff.... that ability already does way too much. Allows you to control fights like nothing else against anyone without Shuffle, FM or Reflect. I mean we have people complaining about not being able to disengage with their magblades due to slows and roots yet at the same breath they want to be able to apply roots and slows to everyone else liberally. Doesn't seem to be with the best interests of balance in mind.

Now in terms of movement speed magblade has more ways of getting major expedition than any other class. Double Take, Path and Cripple, that's 3 from class skills alone and 4 if you count psijic skills. Major expedition is not the problem here. Getting some root/snare immunity to build some distance to your shade is the problem.

While giving Cloak some snare immunity would be highly desirable, this would also be buffing a single skill way too much. Invis, miss of single target abilities, DoT suppression, guaranteed crit and not too mention free Major Resolve and Major Ward from the passives ... that's already a helluva lot of strong things crammed in one ability.

For me either Blur or Path are the abilities worth buffing with a few secs of snare immunity, in line with what @casparian said. Also snare immunity and speed in one ability is really potent. You drop a shade you use one more ability, you're off at 100mph and you can teleport back to your shade whenever.

As for the dmg part, the only thing that really annoys me is the delay on the Bow Proc. Same as with the delay on the Frag proc for MagSorcs. It's beyond stupid and makes your burst too easy to block or dodge. By all means put a visual indicator when the Proc is there, like there is on MagSorc but the delay is very detrimental against anyone moderately competent. Other than that I find dmg and pressure very good tbh. I have to use Force Pulse instead of Swallow Soul so that I can dmg DKs behind their wings though, but that's it.

Cripple passes through Wings and it snares the DK. Then the DK casts Wings and removes the snare. The DoT remains, which is fair.

If that's not true balance I don't know what is. If you fail to see it, you are helpless.

ChefZero

Impale - decrease range to 15 m and make it not reflectable and perhaps a slight buff to execute scaling

Maulkin

brandonv516 wrote: »

Maulkin wrote: »

I think making cripple unreflectable would be buffing it way too much. Ranged, strong DoT, root, snare, speed buff.... that ability already does way too much. Allows you to control fights like nothing else against anyone without Shuffle, FM or Reflect. I mean we have people complaining about not being able to disengage with their magblades due to slows and roots yet at the same breath they want to be able to apply roots and slows to everyone else liberally. Doesn't seem to be with the best interests of balance in mind.

Now in terms of movement speed magblade has more ways of getting major expedition than any other class. Double Take, Path and Cripple, that's 3 from class skills alone and 4 if you count psijic skills. Major expedition is not the problem here. Getting some root/snare immunity to build some distance to your shade is the problem.

While giving Cloak some snare immunity would be highly desirable, this would also be buffing a single skill way too much. Invis, miss of single target abilities, DoT suppression, guaranteed crit and not too mention free Major Resolve and Major Ward from the passives ... that's already a helluva lot of strong things crammed in one ability.

For me either Blur or Path are the abilities worth buffing with a few secs of snare immunity, in line with what @casparian said. Also snare immunity and speed in one ability is really potent. You drop a shade you use one more ability, you're off at 100mph and you can teleport back to your shade whenever.

As for the dmg part, the only thing that really annoys me is the delay on the Bow Proc. Same as with the delay on the Frag proc for MagSorcs. It's beyond stupid and makes your burst too easy to block or dodge. By all means put a visual indicator when the Proc is there, like there is on MagSorc but the delay is very detrimental against anyone moderately competent. Other than that I find dmg and pressure very good tbh. I have to use Force Pulse instead of Swallow Soul so that I can dmg DKs behind their wings though, but that's it.

Cripple passes through Wings and it snares the DK. Then the DK casts Wings and removes the snare. The DoT remains, which is fair.

If that's not true balance I don't know what is. If you fail to see it, you are helpless.

Scales is not the only reflect skill in the game. Spell Wall and Defensive Stance's value would be greatly diminished if anyone spamming Cripple could keep you rooted and snared.

Feel free to keep asking for buffs to the strongest skills and QQing when you don't get them. It's always the others' fault for not knowing what balance is, I guess.

Koolio

ChefZero wrote: »

Impale - decrease range to 15 m and make it not reflectable and perhaps a slight buff to execute scaling

Even still the delay on impale is terrible. It’s almost like you activate the skill (1GCD) then when it hits there’s a GCD. It works great in PVE with the timing of it since they stay in the execution range with minimal movement.

I have tried so hard to use this in PvP but it is removed off my bar within 1 hour of trying every time. It’s slow clunky dodgeable cloakable blockable reflectable.

Lotus fan on Console DOES NOT WORK. 4-5 of 10 casts either fail completely or target the wrong person. Or it’s dodged. I might still try and use it but the reduction of the snare from 75% to 40% makes it not worth it I’ll just cast another cripple for that.

Then there becomes a bar space issue with Melee. You pretty much need Concealed Fear Merciless Shade and Cloak(either morph) Soul Harvest.

That’s 50% of your bar space without damage buffs like InnerLight or Sap/Entropy no Shield yet. Even trying to build them beefy like a Templar result in a term I call flaccid. You Don’t really have to damage to burst with terrible AOE with no snare removal and no burst heal. It just feels awful.

I would say my buggest issue is the Range on Concealed Weapon ( Dw light attacks are 7m while Concealed and Soul Harvest are 5m)

This leads to an issue of “target out of range” because your snared and can’t get close enough but your light attacks still hit.

Fear also moves targets away from you and while snared could mean you CC then but can’t touch them anymore because of “out of range”. Try to lotus fan and it’ll fail they break CC and all that timing is gone.

Dw should let you get the 15% damage while CC without it being tied directly to DW abilities. Just like the staff got change to not require a Destro move.

So IMO

Make fear Not move people away from you

Fix Lotus Fan possibly remove AOE snared for a small HOT but keep single target snare

Increase range on concealed and Soul harvest Slightly

Make swallow soul heal for a flat amount maybe % of health

These are some of the solutions that I believe would improve the feel of the class without really bugging anything too far.

brandonv516

Maulkin wrote: »

brandonv516 wrote: »

Maulkin wrote: »

I think making cripple unreflectable would be buffing it way too much. Ranged, strong DoT, root, snare, speed buff.... that ability already does way too much. Allows you to control fights like nothing else against anyone without Shuffle, FM or Reflect. I mean we have people complaining about not being able to disengage with their magblades due to slows and roots yet at the same breath they want to be able to apply roots and slows to everyone else liberally. Doesn't seem to be with the best interests of balance in mind.

Now in terms of movement speed magblade has more ways of getting major expedition than any other class. Double Take, Path and Cripple, that's 3 from class skills alone and 4 if you count psijic skills. Major expedition is not the problem here. Getting some root/snare immunity to build some distance to your shade is the problem.

While giving Cloak some snare immunity would be highly desirable, this would also be buffing a single skill way too much. Invis, miss of single target abilities, DoT suppression, guaranteed crit and not too mention free Major Resolve and Major Ward from the passives ... that's already a helluva lot of strong things crammed in one ability.

For me either Blur or Path are the abilities worth buffing with a few secs of snare immunity, in line with what @casparian said. Also snare immunity and speed in one ability is really potent. You drop a shade you use one more ability, you're off at 100mph and you can teleport back to your shade whenever.

As for the dmg part, the only thing that really annoys me is the delay on the Bow Proc. Same as with the delay on the Frag proc for MagSorcs. It's beyond stupid and makes your burst too easy to block or dodge. By all means put a visual indicator when the Proc is there, like there is on MagSorc but the delay is very detrimental against anyone moderately competent. Other than that I find dmg and pressure very good tbh. I have to use Force Pulse instead of Swallow Soul so that I can dmg DKs behind their wings though, but that's it.

Cripple passes through Wings and it snares the DK. Then the DK casts Wings and removes the snare. The DoT remains, which is fair.

If that's not true balance I don't know what is. If you fail to see it, you are helpless.

Scales is not the only reflect skill in the game. Spell Wall and Defensive Stance's value would be greatly diminished if anyone spamming Cripple could keep you rooted and snared.

Feel free to keep asking for buffs to the strongest skills and QQing when you don't get them. It's always the others' fault for not knowing what balance is, I guess.

Oh more overpowered skills. Forgot about those. You are a hopeless idiot.

ScruffyWhiskers

Koolio wrote: »

I would say my buggest issue is the Range on Concealed Weapon ( Dw light attacks are 7m while Concealed and Soul Harvest are 5m)

This leads to an issue of “target out of range” because your snared and can’t get close enough but your light attacks still hit.

Make fear Not move people away from you

Fix Lotus Fan possibly remove AOE snared for a small HOT but keep single target snare

Increase range on concealed and Soul harvest Slightly

+1 to all of these. Concealed is really tricky even when your ping is decent like 130 ms. After you start getting into 180's it's really unreliable.

I have tried playing without a gap closer. It's really hard. But everything you say about lotus fan is true. It is still sub par although the irony is its probably better than ambush now since empower sucks.

Impale is super clunky but I back bar it . But because what you see on their health bar isn't always right you get wasted uses all the time. Plus lets say you get a stam blade down to execute range and then try impaling them during the dodge roll crazyness that ensues. Good luck with that.

I still think Concealed Weapon should go through dodge roll like it did when it was bugged. That would really put some fear into stam blades.

DivineFirstYOLO

Give cloak 8 seconds snare immunity and remove the invisibility, problem solved, both stam and mag nb balanced

Maulkin

brandonv516 wrote: »

Maulkin wrote: »

brandonv516 wrote: »

Maulkin wrote: »

I think making cripple unreflectable would be buffing it way too much. Ranged, strong DoT, root, snare, speed buff.... that ability already does way too much. Allows you to control fights like nothing else against anyone without Shuffle, FM or Reflect. I mean we have people complaining about not being able to disengage with their magblades due to slows and roots yet at the same breath they want to be able to apply roots and slows to everyone else liberally. Doesn't seem to be with the best interests of balance in mind.

Now in terms of movement speed magblade has more ways of getting major expedition than any other class. Double Take, Path and Cripple, that's 3 from class skills alone and 4 if you count psijic skills. Major expedition is not the problem here. Getting some root/snare immunity to build some distance to your shade is the problem.

While giving Cloak some snare immunity would be highly desirable, this would also be buffing a single skill way too much. Invis, miss of single target abilities, DoT suppression, guaranteed crit and not too mention free Major Resolve and Major Ward from the passives ... that's already a helluva lot of strong things crammed in one ability.

For me either Blur or Path are the abilities worth buffing with a few secs of snare immunity, in line with what @casparian said. Also snare immunity and speed in one ability is really potent. You drop a shade you use one more ability, you're off at 100mph and you can teleport back to your shade whenever.

As for the dmg part, the only thing that really annoys me is the delay on the Bow Proc. Same as with the delay on the Frag proc for MagSorcs. It's beyond stupid and makes your burst too easy to block or dodge. By all means put a visual indicator when the Proc is there, like there is on MagSorc but the delay is very detrimental against anyone moderately competent. Other than that I find dmg and pressure very good tbh. I have to use Force Pulse instead of Swallow Soul so that I can dmg DKs behind their wings though, but that's it.

Cripple passes through Wings and it snares the DK. Then the DK casts Wings and removes the snare. The DoT remains, which is fair.

If that's not true balance I don't know what is. If you fail to see it, you are helpless.

Scales is not the only reflect skill in the game. Spell Wall and Defensive Stance's value would be greatly diminished if anyone spamming Cripple could keep you rooted and snared.

Feel free to keep asking for buffs to the strongest skills and QQing when you don't get them. It's always the others' fault for not knowing what balance is, I guess.

Oh more overpowered skills. Forgot about those. You are a hopeless idiot.

Stay stupid kid

Jeezye

I'd be happy enough if swallow soul was a reliable spammable again. At the very least it should behave like crushing shock, ignoring reflects aborbs. I'd also like to see less strong but stacking hots, so you benefit from multiple hits on the opponent.

Talking about impale, since you throw a blade with "lethal precision" that only works under 25% hp (which is the lowest execute range in the game) this damage should also be reliable and "lethal". That is, unable to be dodged, reflected or absorbed.

note that both changes leave pve unaffected.

Iskiab

I don’t think crippling being unreflectable would make magblade overpowered, magblade really is that far behind right now.

About major expedition, magblade has the most sources and weakest implementations. When I used to pvp as a magblade I dropped crippling and refreshing/twisting path, they don’t work in pvp. The only real source is double take. Reason is simple, reflections are everywhere. It’s the most OP mechanic in the game right now.

Datthaw

Iskiab wrote: »

I don’t think crippling being unreflectable would make magblade overpowered, magblade really is that far behind right now.

About major expedition, magblade has the most sources and weakest implementations. When I used to pvp as a magblade I dropped crippling and refreshing/twisting path, they don’t work in pvp. The only real source is double take. Reason is simple, reflections are everywhere. It’s the most OP mechanic in the game right now.

Yeah I dont use cripple for maj exp In cyro. I do like path still, it sucks more now with no damage but it's a small *** hot that makes me go fast.

Iskiab

I use it as a healer, but for major expedition it’s about second of speed before you run past the effect. Double take is much better.

kaithuzar

@ZOS_Gilliam @ZOS_BrianWheeler @KenaPKK

I don’t think I’m the best magblade in game but I feel like I’m one of the few having success in Cyrodiil, one of the few here since beta & one of the only that has solely played magblade this entire 4+ years.
I don’t think I’m having the same problems others talk about, but maybe some.

I’m not a vamp, I use forward momentum, I build tanky & for decent sustain & damage.
When I see a problem, I try to change my build to perfect it (knowing it will never be perfect but little by little I slowly get there).

The problems I/others have are:
1) if I go full damage build (no proc sets), & use concealed strike, I’m going to be hitting a light armor s&b tank for 30 minutes & not come close to killing them, but it will seem like they will ulti-dump 2 shot me.

2) I don’t have any way to counter bleeds
Bleeds should be used on tanks, they should not be used against the “squishiest class”. It doesn’t make sense if you have a “highly mobile” ninja-like nightblade & you are going to very precisely cut a specific artery so they continue to bleed while they are doing acrobatics & you’re standing still..

3) I don’t have any way to counter cost increase poisons/cp resource drain tree

4) if you have the sustain to spam shields I won’t be killing you because animations are slow/impossible to cancel because assassin’s will has bugged out/travel time/reset/auto restarts causing the animation to “auto happen” after it fires; if it fires. Nightblade is SUPPOSED to be the BURST class, there is a very small window after CC’ing someone & if they can break free faster than your animation then you are dead.

5) mag dmg is too easily mitigatable, whether spell resist is too easy to obtain or reflect or absorb, dodge/dodge roll, block etc.. Blocking mitigates too much of our burst for skills to be slow!

6) ONE negate can end me.

7) we use to be the fastest in Cyrodiil at launch, we’ve been 3rd or 4th over the past 2-3 years; why?

8) we have decently terrible self heals



Things I feel should be changed:
1)Slow assassin’s will travel time should be reverted. “Slow” doesn’t fit the games fast paced combat system.

2)skills such as assassin’s will, ambush, shade, etc... need to work reliably; when I hit the button it better happen. Assassin’s will most notably bugs out, I have no idea if it’s lag that contributes or what but the skill almost never works properly.

3) increase the range on shade, at some point this was ninja nerfed, it could have been years ago, but I remember being able to reliably teleport possibly twice as far.

4)teleport strike & morphs should “always” teleport you if they are in range for the skill to highlight, but change the stun to only if it’s within x distance or the opposite, greater than x distance; similar to the s&b charge.

5)cloak should purge 1 dot & potentially have a slight cost increase

6)concealed should hit through dodge roll, again (broken record but true)

-Kai

kypranb14_ESO

Noctus wrote: »

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/459252/comparison-conceiled-weapon-vs-suprise-attack/p1
note concealed weapon in stamina version gets debuff and also a 2.3 multiplier on back attacks

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/459061/funnel-health-rework#latest

if those skills get changed magblade will allready have a far better position

This doesn't work in PVP, they removed bonus stealth damage in PVP ages ago. Nightblades still benefit from the 10% extra weapon and spell damage when stealthed or invisible though.

ScruffyWhiskers

Datthaw wrote: »

Im like a broken record now....

Refreshing paths needs snare removal, this wouldn't buff stamnb and magnb could spam it a couple times and with the maj exp buff it should allow decent movement being just a removal instead of immunity.

Last night I saw a ball group making a land bridge of refreshing path to get around. I remember thinking that I'm sure glad it doesn't remove snares. Yet.

Datthaw

ScruffyWhiskers wrote: »

Datthaw wrote: »

Im like a broken record now....

Refreshing paths needs snare removal, this wouldn't buff stamnb and magnb could spam it a couple times and with the maj exp buff it should allow decent movement being just a removal instead of immunity.

Last night I saw a ball group making a land bridge of refreshing path to get around. I remember thinking that I'm sure glad it doesn't remove snares. Yet.

Hmmm good point. I guess magnb bombers are still a ball group staple? Idk I always avoid that lag fest

Haashhtaag

Iskiab wrote: »

I’d rather have crippling be non-reflectable so at least the class can consistently keep expedition up.

I’ve been leveling a stamblade up, the difference is huge. Stamblade is a million times better, magblades are in a worse place then I thought.

If any skill should be non reflective it should be swallow soul/funnel health. You’re extracting from a target.