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The Ultimate "Get Rid of Nightblade Cast Times" Thread

Moose_Scout
Moose_Scout
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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!
"What a Grand and Intoxicating Innocence"
  • Lole
    Lole
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    Just no...
    Gankblade is strong enough
    Buff it somehow else but just taking away Casttime of the ults will make gankblade broken again :)
  • Moose_Scout
    Moose_Scout
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    Lole wrote: »
    Just no...
    Gankblade is strong enough
    Buff it somehow else but just taking away Casttime of the ults will make gankblade broken again :)

    Gankblade is strong enough? What is this, 2017?

    Anyway, I am not talking about ganking...I am talking about actually being able to just play, brawl, fight, move!

    Post me several videos of you taking down a rank 22-25 stamcro or stamden with a stamblade 1v1 in this current patch.

    It is just RARE. It is not even close to an even battle. The .5 seconds it takes for a nb to ult, those tanky classes are back at full health.

    Lole, there are several ways to get the upper hand on a stamblade... stamblades have zero things in their disposal to take down any tank-meta classes.

    "What a Grand and Intoxicating Innocence"
  • Kadoin
    Kadoin
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    Lole wrote: »
    Just no...
    Gankblade is strong enough
    Buff it somehow else but just taking away Casttime of the ults will make gankblade broken again :)

    I don't think it had much to do with the strength of the ults that got cast time, as much as it did the ability to heavy attack twice with 2h sword and chain two skills behind the animation in the same instant with no animation ever playing.

    It's still possible on live to use this bug with regular spammable skills like jab and whip, but the ults they left alone cannot be chained like all the ults that got a cast time because they have a built-in delay of some sort (not even templar's sweep can be used that way, despite the noise on the forums about it).

    Though really, soul siphon cast time is just silly...it already is delayed because it's an AoE heal + longer animation. But hey, ZOS thinks it's balanced...
  • Moose_Scout
    Moose_Scout
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    The crazy thing is, I am not asking them to get rid of all the other crazy nerfs on nightblade...I am just asking for the 1/2 second delay to go away... that is IT.

    How is it so controversial?

    Hell, get rid of all cast times. I don't care. Let people play their class with skill and grace.
    "What a Grand and Intoxicating Innocence"
  • colossalvoids
    colossalvoids
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    At this point I'd expect them to add cast time to SA and make Strife travel time as long so i can make a coffee or two inbetween casts.
  • Moose_Scout
    Moose_Scout
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    At this point I'd expect them to add cast time to SA and make Strife travel time as long so i can make a coffee or two inbetween casts.

    It's too soon. It hurts too bad still :'(:D
    "What a Grand and Intoxicating Innocence"
  • Anyron
    Anyron
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    Any long-time PVPer knows this is true: Nightblades are in a rough place.
    True, but when you compare stamNb vs magden,MagDk, magcro stamblade is fine.
    MagNB compared to anything is trash. There you can see inconsistency between magicka and stamina = magicka is always worse (one rulebreaker is sorc where mag is better tham stam)
  • Anyron
    Anyron
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    The crazy thing is, I am not asking them to get rid of all the other crazy nerfs on nightblade...I am just asking for the 1/2 second delay to go away... that is IT.

    How is it so controversial?

    Hell, get rid of all cast times. I don't care. Let people play their class with skill and grace.

    You know i call it karma.
    When Soul Assault was only viable mag ultimate it was nerfed because it was too strong against rolling-stone-stam
    Stam ultimates were hit later because of same reason - too bursty against mag

    Now both stam and mag ultimates sucks.
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