Stamina Nightblade issues in PvP

Iskiab

I played a BG recently where there was a longtime player in our group who got mad at everyone else in the group for not having detect pots because there was a NB in another group.

Everyone was like, ‘Why would I need to?’. Yea, that’s the state of NB. Ignore them unless you see snipe, when the real engagement is over use some aoes and take them out, not a real threat.

Stebarnz

MusCanus wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

Imagine if cloak didn't give invis and gave major protection for 'X' (or something like that) the class could get balanced easily, I mean cloak is only used in pvp (unless an rp thieves guild addict).

Sure, if you ignore the fact that every player who choose NB as their first toon do so because they want to play rogue/assassin class, not some tank with "protection". You can do that with DK much better anyway.

Ye, like I said, I get the playstyle and the iconic cloak ability but that's why the NB is in a bad place and its purely the cloak mech.

Cant have both im afraid.

Doesn't have to be protection, some other mech like blind or a damage buff, 1 more defensive 1 morph offensive. Alternatively it has to have a fatigue or something as previously mentioned. Id love the mech to stay and the game to be balanced with awesome class identity but at this point I may aswell wish for lottery wins.

MusCanus

Stebarnz wrote: »

MusCanus wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

Imagine if cloak didn't give invis and gave major protection for 'X' (or something like that) the class could get balanced easily, I mean cloak is only used in pvp (unless an rp thieves guild addict).

Sure, if you ignore the fact that every player who choose NB as their first toon do so because they want to play rogue/assassin class, not some tank with "protection". You can do that with DK much better anyway.

Ye, like I said, I get the playstyle and the iconic cloak ability but that's why the NB is in a bad place and its purely the cloak mech.

Cant have both im afraid.

Doesn't have to be protection, some other mech like blind or a damage buff, 1 more defensive 1 morph offensive. Alternatively it has to have a fatigue or something as previously mentioned. Id love the mech to stay and the game to be balanced with awesome class identity but at this point I may aswell wish for lottery wins.

In every rpg ever (mmo or not) rogue/assassin was associated with stealth and it makes sense. If you can't be viable with your preferred playstyle and don't want to play another class, you just quit. That's a sure way to lose players.

There are so many hard (!) counters to cloak that I can't take seriously anyone who complains about it. It is the only defensive ability that can be completely shut down. As for the offensive side, you can't gank anyone who is not a complete potato from stealth since 2017. The only thing the cloak/stealth is good for atm is to remain invisible and to not engage in a fight you don't want. In actual combat it gives zero advantage.

hakan

Stebarnz wrote: »

SnikerPKK wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

SnikerPKK wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

What breaks this class is cloak mechs,

Don't give absolute invis then its easier to balance. Keep absolute invis and its either underwhelming or OP to the point of Cyro empty as everyone afraid to come out of stealth due to ganked, or everyone a NB.

The most trolls in this game play a NB, they broke it, not ZOS. (Granted ZOS doesn't know how to balance so the outcome was inevitable).

Fighting cloak is an L2P issue, as nobody should have an issue fighting Nightblades with detect potions.
Me as a player who uses them as a secondary potion option on everything I play I had never issues fighting cloak blades.

On top of that other classes have even more counters to cloak such as massive AoEs, Delayed abilities like POTL or Curse or Things like streak.

Agreed I play with and against it and know the strengths, flaws and counters.

However in the hands of a good player against Johnny average and if certain things were buffed back with cloak as it is then it would be devastating, so its a difficult balance is my point.

It comes from being able to come out of stealth and 1 shot then go back to shade and stealth away with no possibility of getting any damage back (Zergbad), you can say L2P all you want but unfortunately it would be used by these troll fools just to grief people hence its in the state its in.

When casuals complain in enough numbers they get listened to so blame the trolls. 90% of hate whispers I get for killing people in cyro are from nb players, this class attracts butt heads unfortunately.

Its not fair on the class and people who want to play that style as it is envisioned but its why we cant have nice things.

I get your points and agree with a lot but you need to take into account the wider game and casuals experience because ZOS do. (Not me btw, it makes me cry when this game is watered down but, whatcha gonna do.)

Dont think the ganking that was possible few years ago will ever be possible again, Zenimax made sure ganking got nerfed almost every patch up until now.

As for casuals, the game should not be balanced around the casual scene as thats how u end up with a unhealthy game ridden with crutches without much in-depth combat. Casuals will always cry about Y or X but at least when the game is well balanced for the more experienced players then every casuals issue could be solved with learning.
What are you gonna tell a newbie stamblade now when he struggles to kill a stamDK?
Exactly.

Like I said buddy, I agree with a lot you are saying and I don't like it when this game is made faceroll easy with things to help bad play but unfortunately for NB class it gets abused purely due to cloak.

Imagine if cloak didn't give invis and gave major protection for 'X' (or something like that) the class could get balanced easily, I mean cloak is only used in pvp (unless an rp thieves guild addict).

As far as the newbie NB struggling to kill a DK my advice would be to... cloak away wait for back up and jump in with execute when they are at 20% I know, but as long as this mechanic is in play its gonna be a problem, Its not the worst thing as ive had to ignore a few players as I just cant kill them.

Here is the thing though; Cloak gets countered by a lot of thing. Jabs, potl, streak etc. it can get completely negated which leaves nb with no defense except dodge. Just one knockback and its over for nb.

Plus pots and reveal skills.

Fatigue could be reasonable if it only revealed by pots and reveal skills. Getting hit by aoe should reveal you in that situation.

Every class has nb level burst they dont sacrifice anything.

The usual MMO logic doesnt apply here where everyone can heal, tank and dps in the same build like crazy.

Shadowasrial

I would be more than happy if they removed the major protection from cloak and added an offensive buff instead since I mostly use cloak to attack

Shadowasrial

But people asking for cloak to be be changed to remove the invisibility or remove the skill all together need to just learn how to negate it. It’s not hard and if your a stamblade you can only cloak so many times before you run out. I don’t think adding a fatigue is the answer as it’s already an expensive skill for stam version. Keep in mind cloak does no damage while many other classes have abilities that cause damage.

Nord_Raseri

I still don't see why they took minor berserk from you guys. Or major fracture from surprise attack

Kalante

Nightblade is just so lackluster compared to other classes that have reliable CC's along with tons of utility like major defile, minor beserker, major fracture on their MAIN damage skills. If I want major fracture on the nightblade I would need to completely butcher my skill bar and loose a viable slot such as leeching strikes, or a cc remover. Pick your poison either way you will have a terrible time regardless, and good luck trying to get more than one player off of you unless both are low cp or really bad players.

The burst window does not allow to kill even if a player makes a mistake against a nightblade because there are tons of delays and incap basically giving a free out of jail card CC immunity. Your only option is to cloak CC or relentless fear incap which it's just not reliable and it takes way too long, by the time you reach the incap phase your opponent already broke the fear CC and rolldodge the incap. Sometimes I just hold the incap and wait for them to stop roll dodging. It's a miracle if you get somebody with a such a convoluted rotation. The nigthblade is not a class you can sit still and facetank people your best defense was to get rid of people pressuring you. Now you can't do that, you just overwhelmed because there is no utility to aid your burst damage.

Its literally LOLz how bad the nightblade is. It's such a clunky unfun class to play at the moment. Meanwhile a dragon knight can stack dots from their main skills and get major fracture, dragon leap CC execute and GG, on top of that they get resources back.

Deathlord92

Brilliantly written I honestly don’t know what to comment that you haven’t already covered and I completely agree with all your points I really hope the devs see this.

MattVH

Great points and well written!

Vyvrhel

SnikerPKK wrote: »

Let's take a look at the Assassination Tree and compare it with the Two-Hander Weapon Tree, Zenimax said Class skills should always be better than Weapon skills right?

It feels like they do it on purpose. You know, once you make class skills obsolete and everybody uses weapon skills (accessible to anyone), you got rid of the class system which is in fact unbalanceable, and got something close to the skill system.

Something like that tried Funcom in their pretty nice combat system based on weapon skills they introduced in TSW. Yet even then were people complaining about OP skills.

This said, I started to die less often in IC on my stamblade, once I intentionally built around non-class skills and evaded class skill everywhere possible. No better testimony of the sad state of the nightblade class.

Curious_Death

A nice written NB's buff thread. Where are now class repsresentatives ?

TheFM

SnikerPKK wrote: »

Hello everybody,
this thread aims to list and explain all of Stamina Nightblade issues in PvP many which also affect Magicka Nightblade more or equally as much.
Due to the newly introduced "ability standardization" I will also compare skills/passives and explain the disadvantages of being a Nightblade compared to almost every other class in the game.
To hopefully make the combat devs see it and understand the issue with the class/meta more.
If you know of any more issues that have not been listed here then go on and comment them down below, we can discuss anything here.

Feel free to cry your souls out about how badly Nightblades have been massacred as this post serves as a safespace for all hurt cloakblades.
We dont judge here, just insult understand eachother.

A NOTE FOR ALL YOU FORUM WARRIORS: I AND MANY OTHERS WILL DISCREDIT/IGNORE EVERY COMMENT OF USERS WHO CLEARLY DID NOT READ THE ENTIRE POST.




Lack of damaging buffs/debuffs on skills
Compared to other stamina specs, stamina nightblades are in a huge disadvantage when it comes to having their damage amplified.
Stamina Wardens have Major Fracture built on top of their offGCD burst ability that is also AoE, Stamina Necromancers have Major Defile built on top of their burst ability that is also offGCD, given Major Defile is a pressure debuff but debuffing healing results in doing more damage in the longer run and preventing your enemy from recovering is very important especially this patch where healing is extremely overtuned.
Mark surely exists but for how empty the skill is it's not worth wasting your barspace for it if you could put a much more impactful skill there such as: Shadow Image, Shuffle, Leeching, Executioner or Camohunter basically provides about the same amount of damage but also gives you Major Savagery, 3% more weapon damage and doesn't have to be reapplied constantly. Also applying the skill leaves a huge mark on your opponent making you even more predictible with your next move.
The Major Berserk part from Reapers mark also does not work with how Nightblade plays as you will never be able to take advantage of the buff. Cause as soon as a Stamblade kills a player it needs to escape and reset which takes much longer than 5seconds.

When you compare Nightblade and Warden further you're going to notice an even bigger gap between how much damage the classes can put out.
For example Warden receives Minor Berserk on Bird of Prey and Minor Vulnerability on a Dot which is arguably one of the strongest damage debuffs in CP PvP because of how damage formulas work in this game.
Now before you say that Nightblades also have Minor Vulnerability on a skill, I have to stop you there because ambush in comparison to Growing Swarm is a super buggy, telegraphed, clunky and impactless skill that no build usually has barspace for. It slows down your gameplay and opens a huge burst window for your enemy to punish.
Here is an example of that:

Keep in mind that ranged classes can punish you even harder for using this skill, which can turn this skill into a deathtrap.
The worst thing about this skill is the charge up animation before you jump on your opponent.

About Death Strokes 20% damage buff, I will mention it later and explain how terrible it currently is.




Class being very turn based with no good stun available
In comparison to any other class who also tries to kill with Burst, Nightblades burst ability is very lackluster.

The biggest advantage of Wardens/Necromancers/Sorcerers burst is that their burst abilities are offGCD which means a player can put out much more damage within 1 GCD bringing him much closer to executing their target after a combo. These skills are also undodgeable.
Other classes who do not posses an offGCD ability have been previously brought in line with a stun on their Ultimates such as Leap or Incapacitating Strike which allowed for a further follow up before executing.
While Dragonknights still posses such an ability, it was ripped off from Nightblades kit making their burst easily avoidable and in majority of situations just not enough.

With the class' nature being bursty and having no pressure outside of it's burst abilities, it's important that the Nightblade lands some or all of it's burst skills, otherwise he/she wont be able to kill their target. Yet that is simply impossible when after each GCD your enemy has another GCD to react to the burst thrown at him.
To land your Death Stroke, Grim Focus and to execute you need at least 3 to 4 GCDs. After your ultimate has been thrown out to take advantage of the damaging buff your enemy has whole 3 to 4 seconds reaction window in which he can simply just start holding block negating all of your damage, rolling once or twice or activating any of his recovering skills.
This whole issue only gets much bigger considering Death Stroke is delayed by 400ms and Grim Focus by 270ms(due to it being a slower projectile).
3 seconds in a fight feels like minutes, months sometimes years.
No other burst class has to deal with it as they can simply line up their burst ability with their Ultimate resulting in sometimes gigantic damage output.

The delay on both your burst skills is also the reason why Mass Hysteria/Turn Evil(Both AoE Fear abilities) are so bad on Nightblades currently. Breaking Free takes 40-75ms which after you can instantly start holding block or start rolling making the follow up after a Fear impossible on a player who knows what he is doing.
Offbalance gained from Tactician is the only stun that Stamblades crutch on currently and with next patch changes to offbalance, the future looks even worse for Stamblades as their success currently relies on how strong Offbalance is. A mechanic that isn't even included in their kit.

Nightblade currently feels much like playing Pokemon with your enemy, you do one skill, he does one skill, you do one skill, he does one skill, you do one skill, he does one skill, etc.
All the issues mentioned above is also the reason why the 20% damage buff from Death Stroke is currently so impactless, as you either use it to execute your enemy after an offbalance heavy attack into Incap or don't use it at all. All of this is extremely unhealthy and is not how the class is supposed to be played.




Skill/Passives Comparisons and how impactless Nightblades kit is
Let's take a look at the Assassination Tree and compare it with the Two-Hander Weapon Tree, Zenimax said Class skills should always be better than Weapon skills right?

Incapacitating Strike vs Onslaught
Onslaught's tooltip is bigger by roughly 8%, the debuff effect applies on the initial hit and the skill allows you to not invest anything into penetration gaining absurd amounts of more damage over Incapacitating Strike.

Incapacitating Strikes damage debuff does not apply on the initial hit, the skill animation becomes seemingly slower at 120 Ultimate and the skill Silences which prevents you from fearing your enemy making the skills which provides no stun simply better. SILENCE IS A TERRIBLE STUN PLEASE REMOVE IT.
The Reave passive also only equals to roughly 10 to 30 regen in a 5 minute or longer fight.


Killer's Blade vs Executioner
Executioner has a higher base tooltip, higher damage build up, has a smoother animation and is much easier to execute with considering how strong healing which makes it so easy to escape the 25% HP mark.
Killer's Blade's healing is extremely pathetic and underwhelrming too, making this skill pointless to equip over Executioner.
And before you write that it can be equipped on a Dual-Wield frontbar build I want to ask you one thing: Who in their right mind plays Dual-Wield frontbar this patch? Off-Meta builds are completely irrelevant to me as they do not represent the strength of a class.


Executioner vs Battle Rush
Considering that Killer's Blade is a much worse execute ability than Executioner(The 2h Execute) putting this passive already in a disadvantage over Battle Rush.
Battle Rush procs off of any kill and 30% more recovery for 10 seconds is much more sustain Fthan some pathetic 2k stamina.


Now this trend continues on the Magicka side too for example when we compare Elemental Drain to Mark you can see how empty Mark is, while Elemental Drain also provides a huge sustain buff, Mark is simply empty. And, how will you even manage to take advantage of the Mark healing if your class doesn't have enough damage to kill anything over 30k HP which seems to be the vast majority of the playerbase nowadays.

Overall the Assasination Tree's passives are underwhelming, take for example Master Assassin which it's only redeeming value is having a atmospheric sounding name, the 10% weapon damage out of stealth is completely irrelevant with how little damage it provides to your combos.
And while other classes receive passives such as Advanced Species, Rapid Rot or Amplitude, Nightblade gets Pressuring Points... Which it's purpose is to...? Be completely meaningless to Nightblades?
Even Major Savagery on skills such as FOO from DK which gives more crit chance than this passive with the entirety of Assassination tree slotted.
This leaves us with only one decent passive in this Tree for both the Magicka and Stamina spec, which is hemorrhage which the Templars and now Wardens also own now
With the damage buff of this passive not even being any good due to the existance of Transmutation or Impreg which is widely considered the best defensive set currently with whole 30% critical damage mitgation. Nowadays you have builds running around who completely mitgate the entirety of your critical damage and this passive does not help.
At least change it to be critical healing too like the Wardens will have next patch....

Now when you look at the Damage buff/debuff issue above you can also safely say that Nightblade is the only class without a single impactful damage amplification method that wouldn't starve the user of barspace and potentially ruin the functionality of the build.




Offensive windows and delayed damage
Stamblade works much differently with it's offensive windows than any other class, while other classes have their offensive windows judged by how much damage they can take on face to face, Stamblades offensive window depends on how much pressure it has on the enemy.
No defile on Incapacitating Strike and the current tank meta where people can simply go above 27k HP and not care about a Stamblades burst makes it is close to none which makes the delays put on Incapacitating Strike and Grim Focus much worse. Stamblades need to hit their burst and establish dominance over their enemy quicker than ever before and need much more damage to do so as well. And that is in the current patch close to impossible. Holding up the pressure without Defile or a decent stun makes holding that pressure impossible as well. 1 roll, 1 good block or 1 vigor completely negates the entirety of a Nightblades kit.

It can go 2 ways: after a landed Incapacitating Strike or Onslaught that's when your offensive window ends as you fail to put out enough damage to put your enemy on defense OR your Offbalance Heavy Attack into Ult near oneshots your enemy. Is this any healthy ?


For now I will leave it at that and probably update it with more issues in the future. DISCUSS!

I stopped when you called sorcs burst unavoidable when it is the most avoidable burst in the game xD.

Nightblade is fine atm, just because you cant murder everything in one hit anymore does not make you underpowered.

Iskiab

Vyvrhel wrote: »

SnikerPKK wrote: »

Let's take a look at the Assassination Tree and compare it with the Two-Hander Weapon Tree, Zenimax said Class skills should always be better than Weapon skills right?

It feels like they do it on purpose. You know, once you make class skills obsolete and everybody uses weapon skills (accessible to anyone), you got rid of the class system which is in fact unbalanceable, and got something close to the skill system.

Something like that tried Funcom in their pretty nice combat system based on weapon skills they introduced in TSW. Yet even then were people complaining about OP skills.

This said, I started to die less often in IC on my stamblade, once I intentionally built around non-class skills and evaded class skill everywhere possible. No better testimony of the sad state of the nightblade class.

It’s the same on magblade. Get your class passives and use the least amount of class skills as possible.

The_Lex

I am in complete agreement with OP’s well written analysis. I only keep my NB around for chest farming in dungeons.

Stebarnz

Lots of people talking from a blinkered NB only view point.

NB wont get the damage back with cloak how it currently operates and that is how it should be.

People talking about countering, from an experienced player POV yes it can be countered but from a new player POV its a rip. In the hands of a good player Stam NB is very strong, magblade is in a worse place imho.

Yes the class needs some work and it has been gutted but they are not going to just change stuff back so come up with some alternatives thinking about the entire game not just stamNB POV.

INb4 - you must be a templar player.... I main a magblade and the only success I can currently get is caluurians, spec bow and soul harvest and execute, difficult to time with the slow ass projectile speed so I know the feels but I play every class mag and stam so I know the big picture.
Im just trying say the class needs work but to give high damage burst from total impunity will never happen and unfortunately we gotta blame the trolls that this class attracts.

Someone said you cant gank someone from stealth unless a potato since 2017, that's how it should be!

Kel

SnikerPKK wrote: »

NB just has no place in this game anymore, the class went from being the killer/rogue class to the annoying mosquito you slap once he lands on you.

This is the best short assessment of nightblades in thier current state I've yet to see on the forum.
Well said.

Solaire

Nerf Nightblades

ayu_fever

NB doesnt need any buffs.
cloak needs a few nerfs.
incap needs a few nerfs.

NB were on top for YEARS, and now it is time to let the rest of the classes have a few turns up top for a while.
NB were a thing for so long that millions of players made one (i did too), and they are FUN but they were broken. every patch nerfs NB more and more, which is healthy for the game because there needs to be variety in MMO.
so.... about those millions of shelved NBs? dont delete it. in a few years they will get a minor buff.

TequilaFire

Apparently the sorc Illuminati got him. smh

cyx54tc

MusCanus wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

MusCanus wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

Imagine if cloak didn't give invis and gave major protection for 'X' (or something like that) the class could get balanced easily, I mean cloak is only used in pvp (unless an rp thieves guild addict).

Sure, if you ignore the fact that every player who choose NB as their first toon do so because they want to play rogue/assassin class, not some tank with "protection". You can do that with DK much better anyway.

Ye, like I said, I get the playstyle and the iconic cloak ability but that's why the NB is in a bad place and its purely the cloak mech.

Cant have both im afraid.

Doesn't have to be protection, some other mech like blind or a damage buff, 1 more defensive 1 morph offensive. Alternatively it has to have a fatigue or something as previously mentioned. Id love the mech to stay and the game to be balanced with awesome class identity but at this point I may aswell wish for lottery wins.

In every rpg ever (mmo or not) rogue/assassin was associated with stealth and it makes sense. If you can't be viable with your preferred playstyle and don't want to play another class, you just quit. That's a sure way to lose players.

There are so many hard (!) counters to cloak that I can't take seriously anyone who complains about it. It is the only defensive ability that can be completely shut down. As for the offensive side, you can't gank anyone who is not a complete potato from stealth since 2017. The only thing the cloak/stealth is good for atm is to remain invisible and to not engage in a fight you don't want. In actual combat it gives zero advantage.

in all other rpgs rogue/assassin has the highest instant burst to take the enermy down. Funny thing about this game is that NB has the lowest burst even if the attack was launched from stealth. whats the point of being an assassin if the opponent can instantly heal up himself and you are forced to fight the guy head to head.

MusCanus

cyx54tc wrote: »

MusCanus wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

MusCanus wrote: »

Stebarnz wrote: »

Imagine if cloak didn't give invis and gave major protection for 'X' (or something like that) the class could get balanced easily, I mean cloak is only used in pvp (unless an rp thieves guild addict).

Sure, if you ignore the fact that every player who choose NB as their first toon do so because they want to play rogue/assassin class, not some tank with "protection". You can do that with DK much better anyway.

Ye, like I said, I get the playstyle and the iconic cloak ability but that's why the NB is in a bad place and its purely the cloak mech.

Cant have both im afraid.

Doesn't have to be protection, some other mech like blind or a damage buff, 1 more defensive 1 morph offensive. Alternatively it has to have a fatigue or something as previously mentioned. Id love the mech to stay and the game to be balanced with awesome class identity but at this point I may aswell wish for lottery wins.

In every rpg ever (mmo or not) rogue/assassin was associated with stealth and it makes sense. If you can't be viable with your preferred playstyle and don't want to play another class, you just quit. That's a sure way to lose players.

There are so many hard (!) counters to cloak that I can't take seriously anyone who complains about it. It is the only defensive ability that can be completely shut down. As for the offensive side, you can't gank anyone who is not a complete potato from stealth since 2017. The only thing the cloak/stealth is good for atm is to remain invisible and to not engage in a fight you don't want. In actual combat it gives zero advantage.

in all other rpgs rogue/assassin has the highest instant burst to take the enermy down. Funny thing about this game is that NB has the lowest burst even if the attack was launched from stealth. whats the point of being an assassin if the opponent can instantly heal up himself and you are forced to fight the guy head to head.

Yes, that's another point. All that combined makes NB what it is now.


[Removed Quote]

[Edited for removed content]

ZOS_Volpe

Greetings,

We've removed some comments that were discussing disciplinary action. As this thread continues be sure to stay constructive and keep the Forum Rules in mind to avoid derailing the thread.

Thank you for understanding.

Vyvrhel

Stebarnz wrote: »

Someone said you cant gank someone from stealth unless a potato since 2017, that's how it should be!

Just wrote rather long reply on that but it dissapeared, so I will make it shorter next time: in all due respect, if NB is not the invisible master of high burst damage (I can understand that for sure since this is something people hate in PvP) what is your idea about the class role, PvP and overall. What shall a NB excell at. What shall be the class speciality in combat.

Vyvrhel

cyx54tc wrote: »

in all other rpgs rogue/assassin has the highest instant burst to take the enermy down. Funny thing about this game is that NB has the lowest burst even if the attack was launched from stealth. whats the point of being an assassin if the opponent can instantly heal up himself and you are forced to fight the guy head to head.

This is not entirely true. A rogue type class has often a cc role, too, or you can lternatively spec it either into damage or into ccing. But asi I said before elsewhere, the devs must first have a very clear idea what is the role of the class in the game. So I recommend to start from it. What the recent nerfs suggest there was a decision that the NB allows for grief play and players are very angry so they kinda paralyzed the class until, as I hope, there is a plan what to do with it. So the real question is, is there any plan yet?
This is no flaming. I love the game for several reasons and I absolutely understand the problem. But the class is currently really not working. You are better off not using class skills at all atm.

Vyvrhel

This is the typical fantasy mmo cliche set of roles as I have experienced it:

Fighter: a heavily armored and resistant tanky type with possibility to spec into some damage. The role is to stand in the fight and keep fighting.

Mage: high damage ranged dps, ranged glass cannon.

Rogue (a NB in this game): sneaky scout, who can either do high single target melee damage or cc, a melee glass cannon.

Priest / paladin: high defense and healing with some damage.

Plus an optional ranger / hunter type, outdoor survivalist and archer.

So where is the NB place?

Solaire

Vyvrhel wrote: »

This is the typical fantasy mmo cliche set of roles as I have experienced it:

Fighter: a heavily armored and resistant tanky type with possibility to spec into some damage. The role is to stand in the fight and keep fighting.

Mage: high damage ranged dps, ranged glass cannon.

Rogue (a NB in this game): sneaky scout, who can either do high single target melee damage or cc, a melee glass cannon.

Priest / paladin: high defense and healing with some damage.

Plus an optional ranger / hunter type, outdoor survivalist and archer.

So where is the NB place?

There are no roles when it comes to PVP, everyone can Tank, Heal, and do a lot of DMG

Coppes

Disclaimer: Repost from another thread.

[Nightblades] are adventurers and opportunists (taking advantage of others misfortune) with a gift for getting in and out of trouble. Relying variously on stealth, blades and speed, they thrive on conflict and misfortune trusting to their luck and cunning to survive.

— Official Nightblade description from the game

I could of seen Nightblades as a DoT-Burst class. Dealing increased damage for the amounts of DoTs on a target. With a wide array of debuffs.

Solo Play - Sneaking in and out of stealth chipping away at the enemy until the opportune moment to strike.

Group Play - Tossing debuffs at the enemy from a range: maim, slower movement, removing buffs, etc. Maybe even setting traps and marking targets (with clear visibility to your teammates).

Being a debuffer and acting on those debuffs is actually more identifying than being known for going invisible.

And if we are known for that at least lower the cost on Shadowy Disguise or maybe increase the duration of stealth.

angelofdeath333

Stamblades need a snare, it would make it so much easier to land SA with a range of only 5m (like wtf?) if we could slow down our opponents for a couple of seconds. Magplars have it on Every skill they use, and even from a passive until next patch..just add a 4 second snare to mass hysteria like it used to be and things would be so much easier!

cyx54tc

Vyvrhel wrote: »

cyx54tc wrote: »

in all other rpgs rogue/assassin has the highest instant burst to take the enermy down. Funny thing about this game is that NB has the lowest burst even if the attack was launched from stealth. whats the point of being an assassin if the opponent can instantly heal up himself and you are forced to fight the guy head to head.

This is not entirely true. A rogue type class has often a cc role, too, or you can lternatively spec it either into damage or into ccing. But asi I said before elsewhere, the devs must first have a very clear idea what is the role of the class in the game. So I recommend to start from it. What the recent nerfs suggest there was a decision that the NB allows for grief play and players are very angry so they kinda paralyzed the class until, as I hope, there is a plan what to do with it. So the real question is, is there any plan yet?
This is no flaming. I love the game for several reasons and I absolutely understand the problem. But the class is currently really not working. You are better off not using class skills at all atm.

Thats for games where CC duration is actually meaningful. Assassins either have highest burst or longest CC chain stun. The idea is the same. either you can instant burst someone down or you can lock the target down completely if caught from stealth. For this game though...no instant burst. Everyone can break out of CC. The moment your opponent presses the heal button you pretty much need to fight him head on head like a man. Which...is what an assassin sux the most. (Unless you are playing assassins creed)