The Official "Get RID of Nightblade Cast Times!" Thread

Moose_Scout

Hi fellow Cyrodill warriors,

Any long-time PVPer knows this is true: Nightblades are in a rough place.

If you want to read, go ahead. If you want to skip the reading, here is the main proposal: Get RID of ultimate cast times on NBs. Give Nightblades an identity→ Nightblades should be the... combo class!

Nightblades are no longer the damage class (everything else) or the escape class (I mean, even a sorc is better at surviving with dash and shields), please let nightblades be the incredibly-hard-to-play-but-possible COMBO class!!

I have been a nightblade main since 2015 and have kept silent through the nerf and buff cycles. However, recently the class has become useless to the point of insanity.

Last week, I switched to a stamina-necro and have killed more people spamming dizzying swing on purple gear than I have completely utilizing a perfected stamblade which took a long time to farm good gear (full yellow: master's bow, spriggan's jewelry etc.).

However, I am not here to try and nerf other classes--that is exactly what happened to nightblades--I am just here to ask for one simple fix: take away cast times on ultimates.

Anyone who plays has seen the nightblade slowly erode. In case you haven’t been paying attention, here are some of the main changes:

We had some damage nerfs (which were probably justified, no tank should be able to be completely ganked) but then many class abilities became nerfed as well: relentless focus lost a damage buff and is now a defensive skill (this change really sucks now that light attacks won't be utilized as much in pvp, i.e. no spectral bow), surprise attack lost its fracture (but sub-assault gets fracture and blastbones gets defile, huh?).

Meanwhile, weapon/armor skills that helped nightblades get nerfed too: Rally no longer heals over time (other classes have this in their tool-kits, nightblades don’t unless they get rid of cloak), poison arrow’s damage is cut in half, shuffle isn’t worth running.

Now, I am pretty sure a good nightblade player could look at these and figure out a way around them:
Instead of running a damage and a utility set, we have to go full damage.
Instead of putting some points into health, it all has to go into stamina/magica
Instead of eating survival food, we can get magica regen to try and cloak more.

However, there are two things that we cannot overcome:
AOEs and other things breaking cloak
Ultimate cast times

1) Cloak is pretty broken. I mean, even a spear from a templar takes you out of cloak (A spear does AOE damage? How does that make sense?) Since nightblades have had to go full squish just to try and hurt a few select opponents (we avoid all necros, wardens, templars), we have to cloak more than ever. Unfortunately, cloak is really unreliable right now. I can’t come up with an explanation other than it just isn’t working.

2) Since fixing cloak might be a struggle, I am not going to put many eggs in that basket. Here is the instant fix for the class: Simply remove cast times for ultimates.

Incap/Soul Harvest: I mean….come on. Get rid of the cast time. Just why? The damage is not that great. It is dodgeable. People know it’s coming. The cast time makes this completely useless. In that half-second pause, people are dodging, necros and templars have already regained 5k health, blastbones has hit, sub-assault has launched while we are just standing there…

Nightblades are not tanky enough to just stand there and wait. We NEED to be kiting, rolling, light-attacking, re-applying poison inject. We are the Combo-class, not the hard-hitting-tank class. The devs must not play nightblade because a ½ second is all it takes for us to die. ½ second is also all it should take for us to apply some serious pressure.

Playing nightblade is a heart-pounding experience, it sounds like a thousand-typewriters in my office when I am on my nightblade. The cast time goes against this play-style. We are not looking for a “win” button, just something to combo with. I mean, even the slow-moving DK doesn’t have a cast-time on leap. ‘CMON! Nerf the damage if you must. Get rid of the cast time.

Soul-shred: This should be a classic “oh-crap I am about to die" skill. Right now it is a "I might get hit in the future so I will cast this now(?) skill." That makes no sense; get rid of the cast-time. I mean, does Bone-Goliath have a cast time? No. Does Undo have a cast time? No. SO... what role does this skill play? None? Cool, get rid of the cast time.

Bigger picture than just nightblade:

I am in my thirties and have a good job so I can afford buying a DLC and the necromancer, but this recent pay-to-win scheme makes me sad and makes me finally want to speak-up for some balance.

In PVP, you have two choices: Stamcro or Stamden. After that, Templar and some sorc/dk builds will work but not be as strong. It just sends a strange message that the two DLC classes are so much easier to play and be proficient at.

Fixing Nightblades now would be a symbolic gesture that ZOS is taking a strong skill-to-win, play-how-you-want stand, over the bane-of-mmo, pay-to-win philosophy.
Save ESO. Save the Nightblade: Get rid of Ultimate Cast times!

JayKwellen

I'm also curious about the ideological inconsistency from the developers. Why were some skills (incap, dawnbreaker) given cast times, but others (crescent) weren't?

Did they just forget about the other ultimates, or did they purposely exclude them?

Unfortunately, they've made it quite clear that don't care about the cast times as they've ignored every complaint about them. They've also consistently demonstrated their inability (be it via either purposeful action or plain ignorance of its ongoing issues) to balance the NB class appropriately, so I'm afraid this will fall on deaf ears.

It's really unfortunate, but given their actions and lack of communication, what else are we supposed to believe?

Moose_Scout

JayKwellen wrote: »

I'm also curious about the ideological inconsistency from the developers. Why were some skills (incap, dawnbreaker) given cast times, but others (crescent) weren't?

Did they just forget about the other ultimates, or did they purposely exclude them?

Unfortunately, they've made it quite clear that don't care about the cast times as they've ignored every complaint about them. They've also consistently demonstrated their inability (be it via either purposeful action or plain ignorance of its ongoing issues) to balance the NB class appropriately, so I'm afraid this will fall on deaf ears.

It's really unfortunate, but given their actions and lack of communication, what else are we supposed to believe?

Exactly! While I am purposefully advocating for nightblade, I think you are right that it is just a window into a bigger idealogical issue with the devs in which other skills should be looked at as well.

We just want to have good, clean fights where the better player, not the better class, wins.

The devs seem to want us to...I don't know... constantly switch up toons? Buy new toons? Spend $ on crown riding books?
Their motivations seem strange and unfortunately, many 25 ranked pvp players in my guilds are moving on to different games as a result.

I don't think ZOS understands that pvp players just enjoy fighting each other with their friends and guildmates... we don't enjoy the rollercoaster of different metas overwhelming pvp. When we spend 3 years building characters, it is completely depressing to have those characters not be able to join the fight.

No one is asking for instant-win buttons--we just want the ability to get into the fight without it being a joke.

deleted221106-002999

The fact the skills often fail to fire in pvp (and sometimes in pve) should suggest to devs that removing cast times in general would be proper; at least nb in particular would be equivalent to everyone else fighting the bugs in order to fight each other (or environment) if cast times were instant.

Cast times in general are abhorent to all players - just look at how the resto staff siphon spirit skill and blood fountain are being used now that cast times have been removed. And those are just ordinary skills, not ultimates. Equally, when cast times were suggested for sorc shields there was such a massive outcry that the proposed changes were reverted. Again: players loathe cast times in any aspect of the game.

Even if ultimates 'must' have cast times they should be correspondingly much more powerful leaving only a pair of smoking boots on the ground at target location when done with a crater that does substantial environmental damage for 1 minute afterwards.

Moose_Scout

Souterain wrote: »

The fact the skills often fail to fire in pvp (and sometimes in pve) should suggest to devs that removing cast times in general would be proper; at least nb in particular would be equivalent to everyone else fighting the bugs in order to fight each other (or environment) if cast times were instant.

Cast times in general are abhorent to all players - just look at how the resto staff siphon spirit skill and blood fountain are being used now that cast times have been removed. And those are just ordinary skills, not ultimates. Equally, when cast times were suggested for sorc shields there was such a massive outcry that the proposed changes were reverted. Again: players loathe cast times in any aspect of the game.

Even if ultimates 'must' have cast times they should be correspondingly much more powerful leaving only a pair of smoking boots on the ground at target location when done with a crater that does substantial environmental damage for 1 minute afterwards.

Fair points. We love pvp for the skill-based fast action. If we wanted to wait for cast times, we would play pokemon.
It hurts NB and Sorcs in particular because we don't have the survivability to wait.

Jaimeh

PvE stamblade here: yes, please remove the cast time from Incap!

Tommy_The_Gun

Cost times are one thing and imho they should be removed , or at least reduced bu 90%. The other thing is entire NB toolkit and the fact that almost all of NB skills are weaker than weapon / armour / guild / world skills.

ZOS is extremely inconsistent, as according to their own standards, they THEMSELVES established, class skills should be superior to other skill lines. And those other skill lines (mentioned above) are meant to serve as a supplement, so if your class lacks certain ability, you slot those instead.

In case of NB, applying this, simply does not work as you already are using weapon / armour / guild / world skills instead of your own class skills.

New vampire changes are moving this trend further, as you will be better of with using Vamp invisibility + Dark Cloak instead of for example Shadowy Disguise (that is soo bugged that 90% of times, it does not work at all lol).

eKsDee

Get rid of all cast times that don't belong on skills (ie skills that aren't or aren't like Dizzy Swing). The game should be getting more responsive, not less.

Sanctum74

Remove cast times and give fracture back to surprise attack and Nb would be competitive again

Moose_Scout

Sanctum74 wrote: »

Remove cast times and give fracture back to surprise attack and Nb would be competitive again

Agreed. Nightblades will still struggle with the current tank meta but at least they won't be a joke.

Ragnaroek93

JayKwellen wrote: »

I'm also curious about the ideological inconsistency from the developers. Why were some skills (incap, dawnbreaker) given cast times, but others (crescent) weren't?

Did they just forget about the other ultimates, or did they purposely exclude them?

Unfortunately, they've made it quite clear that don't care about the cast times as they've ignored every complaint about them. They've also consistently demonstrated their inability (be it via either purposeful action or plain ignorance of its ongoing issues) to balance the NB class appropriately, so I'm afraid this will fall on deaf ears.

It's really unfortunate, but given their actions and lack of communication, what else are we supposed to believe?

I don't think that they forgot about Crescent. Probably just dev bias to be honest.

Nerftheforums

I'd rather see ALL cast times gone. It was a *** change, every single decent player on pc EU is against it, you name them. From Malcolm to hexys, from Kenta to Renne, even *** Fasold, who quit some time ago. There isn't one person who defends that change, besides forum warriors and "reported for speed hacking" pugs.

milllaurie

Well, OP I am really surprised by the convenience.

Since maintenance is going on now I thought I would create the exact same thread, but I saw yours at the very top

Now I can only add some points why I agree with you:

• When playing a rolling-monkey stamblade animation cancelling your incap is part of your survival.
• Incap has a very distinct and sharp sound. It goes out before the ulti does (cast time - duh) and most of the people can dodge it because it is SO VERY WELL TELEGRAPHED. On a nightblade. The stealthy class. One more skill I can dodge only by hearing - lethal arrow. But it is not hmmm... A CLASS DEFINING ESSENTIAL NIGHTBLADE TOOLKIT ULTIMATE.
• I usually don't play a stealth nb, I choose the brawler type. Not only can they see and focus me, but they can hear my ulti coming and dodge the (pretty much the only option on a brawlblade to kill anyone with some kind of experience) whole combo Incap>Spectral bow with only ONE ROLL.
• My main is a nightblade and it is the least played character just because of the stupid cast time on incap.

Seriously, nightblade has lost it's identity and now it is either: "Rolling monkey who might get lucky enough to kill something", "poor sorc with cloak", a bomber, or a tank. That is it, no exaggeration. You should be able to monitor how many people is playing this nerfed class, it should be about 3-4 times less nbs in cyro. Even gankers do not enjoy it anymore.

/rant over.

csparks1

Yes please fix my nightblade

And if you think your stamblade got nerfed - try playing a Magblade.... it's horrible.

landsbergis

Totally agree with the OP. Nightblade is in a very bad spot - you have to go full dmg on your sets and cp, while sacrificing survivability. Cloak is being broken by the most silent of farts these days and the class toolkit has lost it's identity.

While stamblade is still somewhat playable due to the increased amount of stamina dmg sets, magblade is where this class struggles imo. You have to rely on proc sets like zaan or caluurions legacy to add pepper to your 'burst'. And while paired with spinners or NMA you still struggle because these procs can easily be avoided.

Self healing on a magblade is a nasty joke if you don't run brp resto and dark cloak. While you get somewhat decent heals with that - you cannot avoid dmg by going invisible, meaning that you have to spend more recources maintaining your defensive rotation and healing.

It used to be that magblade was quite hard to learn but was extremely rewarding and fun when you did. Cast times on soul shred and death stroke are a huge part of that because you have lost an essencial part of the quick in-and-out of combat playstyle. Every move now is predictable and telegraphed visualy and with sfx.

Since the introduction of ultimate cast times the combat got significantly slower and I don't think that this is the way to balance the game or reduce skill gap. The recent block and bash changes also add to that.

I know I'm all over the place here so I'll stop now xD

TLDR: cast times suck and need to go away.

Moose_Scout

csparks1 wrote: »

Yes please fix my nightblade

And if you think your stamblade got nerfed - try playing a Magblade.... it's horrible.

I couldn't even get into that...I have a mageblade too and am so sad to try and be forced to use proc sets like caluurions just to try...something. Magblade was in too sad of a place to even explain.

A ZOS employee must have been magblade bombed once and thought... "I WILL SHOW YOU ALL!!!"

Moose_Scout

landsbergis wrote: »

Totally agree with the OP. Nightblade is in a very bad spot - you have to go full dmg on your sets and cp, while sacrificing survivability. Cloak is being broken by the most silent of farts these days and the class toolkit has lost it's identity.

While stamblade is still somewhat playable due to the increased amount of stamina dmg sets, magblade is where this class struggles imo. You have to rely on proc sets like zaan or caluurions legacy to add pepper to your 'burst'. And while paired with spinners or NMA you still struggle because these procs can easily be avoided.

Self healing on a magblade is a nasty joke if you don't run brp resto and dark cloak. While you get somewhat decent heals with that - you cannot avoid dmg by going invisible, meaning that you have to spend more recources maintaining your defensive rotation and healing.

It used to be that magblade was quite hard to learn but was extremely rewarding and fun when you did. Cast times on soul shred and death stroke are a huge part of that because you have lost an essencial part of the quick in-and-out of combat playstyle. Every move now is predictable and telegraphed visualy and with sfx.

Since the introduction of ultimate cast times the combat got significantly slower and I don't think that this is the way to balance the game or reduce skill gap. The recent block and bash changes also add to that.

I know I'm all over the place here so I'll stop now xD

TLDR: cast times suck and need to go away.

Exactly. I always thought of nightblades as difficult yet rewarding. Now it is difficult ...and yeah you might get a random killing blow with a haphazard lethal arrow. But winning a 1v1 with another experienced player is a thing of the past.

What makes me sad about playing nightblade is that I used to brawl. Now, I am so useless and scared that I usually just gank or spam ranged abilities... which perpetuates a cycle of people hating nightblade even more...which leads to more nerfs.

If we were in a good place where we could deal some damage and survive just a tad (just have our main skills function) ...we wouldn't be JUST lethal arrow spammers or noob gankers.

Solariken

I'd be fine with the cast times if we could at least have CC immunity during the cast. Soooo many times I've tried to hit my ult and have it cancelled by some random Streak or Arctic Blast etc.

Moose_Scout

Solariken wrote: »

I'd be fine with the cast times if we could at least have CC immunity during the cast. Soooo many times I've tried to hit my ult and have it cancelled by some random Streak or Arctic Blast etc.

While that would help, it wouldn't be strong enough---the issue is not landing them because everyone can see what is happening.