New to Nightblade

Delta1038 · March 2018

So I have a solid amount of experience in ESO but it has almost always been as a Templar magic healer build, I have done some as a Sorcerer DPS but did not care for the Sorcerer that much. Recently I decided to see how the Nightblade is and turns out I really like the class and want to try a serious playthrough with it. I was hoping maybe some veterans of the class and game in general could offer some suggestions and advice in terms of gear and skills.
I feel I should point out that I do not care for PvP at all so it does not matter for anything related to that and I do not expect to ever play trials or vet dungeons. This is more for a solo PvE run that focuses on messing with my enemy before finishing them off so I do not need to necessarily be built for max burst damage or something like that. I tend to enjoy rogue builds that weaken enemies making them vulnerable before finishing them off and I prefer range, bow or staff.
As I said, this is more for the fun of it for me and survivability solo or in normal dungeons, beyond that I care little for the upper echelon end game content as I am not in a guild and my friends are not big gamers and the few that are have never really touched ESO. So general or specific recommendations or advice would be appreciated, would ne happy to hear from players of many different perspectives as the wide range of information might help paint a clearer picture for me to consider. Thanks for your help.

Skander · March 2018

Slot incapacitating strike

Enjoy till it lasts

Turelus · March 2018

Alcast's builds and videos will give you a pretty good starting point for builds/gear to do group content as well as Maelstrom.

Personal tip is to get very good at light attack weaving, as the Nightblade needs this for both sustain and DPS due to skill effects procing or charging from light/heavy attack hits.

Delta1038 · March 2018

I have looked a little at Alcast and Deltia’s builds, the catch is I own literally none of that gear and I have no intention on doing the Maelstrom and high tier stuff like that so getting it is very unlikely. That being said I have heard about weaving, not really an expert on how to do it properly though and I will go check it again, perhaps it can give me good guidelines for attributes of gear to match as closely as I can.

Turelus · March 2018

Delta1038 wrote: »

I have looked a little at Alcazt and Deltia’s builds, the catch is I own literally none of that gear and I have no intention on doing the Maelstrom and high tier stuff like that. That being said I have heard about weaving, not really an expert on how to do it properly though.

You should be able to get some crafted entry level gear. Julianos for Magicka, Hundings for Stamina and mix it with a crafted sustain set.

The weaving whilst isn't needed to be perfect is a big part of them. The basics really are "Light attack, once you see the projectile launch/hit land push your skill button to cut the animation. Repeat with every skill."

For just normal gameplay that you're looking for it's not needed as much though. You should be fine just firing off skills for any overland content and weaving in heavy attacks during any normal group content to get resources back.

Sparr0w · March 2018

Advise looking at the (v)MA builds if you plan on playing solo a lot, main difference is that they're focused on survivability over max damage.

That said Leeching Strikes/Siphoning Attack with proper light attack weaving = >1k health per second, combine that with another heal you're good to go - plus you get an extra 106 stam/mag each attach also.

The Shadow Barrier passive gives Major Ward/Resolve for 6 seconds every skill you cast from the Shadow line. This means it's up 60% of the time on a Mag & 100% of the time on Stam, apart from execute phase (and that's without Heavy Armour as each piece increases this 25%).

shinikaze · March 2018

Delta1038 wrote: »

I have looked a little at Alcast and Deltia’s builds, the catch is I own literally none of that gear and I have no intention on doing the Maelstrom and high tier stuff like that so getting it is very unlikely. That being said I have heard about weaving, not really an expert on how to do it properly though and I will go check it again, perhaps it can give me good guidelines for attributes of gear to match as closely as I can.

hunding + marksman + domihaus shoulder is a good place to start your experience and quite easy/cheap to get.

Carl-lan · March 2018

Hey I run a stam NB solo since I started 2 years ago. Look at PVP builds or VMA builds, these will help you most, but I tweak them for what works for me.

For Stam I think you’ll find 2H and Bow the best for survivability because NB has no burst heal, so using Rally from 2H skill line cover this. Especially if you’re a casual kinda player like me. I also use brawler which gives u a dmg shield when attacking mobs.

I also use clever alchemist set on back bar which gives me a bit of health, and also means I can use the fifth piece bonus when I weapon swap so long as I pop a potion on my back bar.. gives me high weapon dmg. I swap between viper and defiler on my front bar. If using CA use standard stamina pots, they’re extremely cheap and easy to get, but immovable pots are great for VMA and make a difference. I have validreth monster set that I purchased from the golden. I use serpent Mundas for stam regen.

All divines armour. All max stam. 5 medium 1 heavy 1 light. Weapon dmg on jewlery and weapons.

Back bar - bow, clever alchemist, sharpened
Poison injection, endless hail, caltrops, rearming trap, vigour, ult - dawnbreaker

Front bar - defiler/viper Greatsword
Surprise attack, killers blade, brawler, relentless focus, rally, ult - incap strike.

This works fine for me. On target dummy I can do like 23-24k dps and I can do VMA in an hour and a bit. Can solo normal dungeons but usually run them with my brother and we do them in 15 mins usually.

Not gunna set the world on fire but it’s a good survivabily build that works well and is good all round. You could run DW instead of 2H but I personally found it difficult to regen health when getting slammed - although I haven’t tried leeching strikes much since they changed it to be more a heal ability instead of resources....

Anyway, like I said I’m not a hardcore player but I like NB and this setup is easy and works for me.

Sparr0w · March 2018

Carl-lan wrote: »

Hey I run a stam NB solo since I started 2 years ago. Look at PVP builds or VMA builds, these will help you most, but I tweak them for what works for me.

For Stam I think you’ll find 2H and Bow the best for survivability because NB has no burst heal, so using Rally from 2H skill line cover this. Especially if you’re a casual kinda player like me. I also use brawler which gives u a dmg shield when attacking mobs.

I also use clever alchemist set on back bar which gives me a bit of health, and also means I can use the fifth piece bonus when I weapon swap so long as I pop a potion on my back bar.. gives me high weapon dmg. I swap between viper and defiler on my front bar. If using CA use standard stamina pots, they’re extremely cheap and easy to get, but immovable pots are great for VMA and make a difference. I have validreth monster set that I purchased from the golden. I use serpent Mundas for stam regen.

All divines armour. All max stam. 5 medium 1 heavy 1 light. Weapon dmg on jewlery and weapons.

Back bar - bow, clever alchemist, sharpened
Poison injection, endless hail, caltrops, rearming trap, vigour, ult - dawnbreaker

Front bar - defiler/viper Greatsword
Surprise attack, killers blade, brawler, relentless focus, rally, ult - incap strike.

This works fine for me. On target dummy I can do like 23-24k dps and I can do VMA in an hour and a bit. Can solo normal dungeons but usually run them with my brother and we do them in 15 mins usually.

Not gunna set the world on fire but it’s a good survivabily build that works well and is good all round. You could run DW instead of 2H but I personally found it difficult to regen health when getting slammed - although I haven’t tried leeching strikes much since they changed it to be more a heal ability instead of resources....

Anyway, like I said I’m not a hardcore player but I like NB and this setup is easy and works for me.

Basically my build bar I use 5pc Hundings (front), 5pc Viper (back) with 2pc Kra'gh (or 1 Kra'gh 1 Pirate) & swap rearming trap for Siphoning Strikes as it's buggy af at the minute - solid solo build, should be able to solo any normal dungeon with this (Not the II or DLC ones until you're really comfortable, think some are impossible solo tho)

Grynnyl · March 2018

For what it's worth, if your starting fresh, you might try Bahraha's Curse. Before everyone knocks it, I would point out that you asked for survival, not top tier damage. I really enjoy this set for general delving and overland questing. The 5-piece helps offset 2 of the early difficulties for night blades, AoE and healing.

Definitely not BiS, but it can keep you alive if you stumble into a larger group than expected.

kadar · March 2018

Skander wrote: »

Slot incapacitating strike

Enjoy till it lasts

Omg stahp...

Lynx7386 · March 2018

Skander wrote: »

Slot incapacitating strike

Enjoy till it lasts

The salt is strong with this one.

Gilvoth · March 2018

warm welcome to you @Delta1038, is Great to have new nightblade players. (PVE side) as you mentioned
right now i suggest just making sure you try out and unlock Every Single skill to see how it feels to you and maxing them out because there are many of them people have like / dislike relationships with.
the more you are aware of in its class the more you will be more comfortable with makes stealthing much easier and more comfortable playstyle.

RavenSworn · March 2018

There's a good number of great sets for stamina nightblades, both crafted and from easy to get dungeons as well as overland.

Hundings (crafted)
Mechanical acuity (crafted)
Night Mothers gaze (crafted)
Briarheart (overland)
Automaton (Darkshade Caverns)

All of these sets work well with a bow/bow setup since you wanted ranged.

Julianos (crafted)
Mechanical acuity (crafted)
Mother's sorrow (overland)

This will get you by for magicka though I'm sure there are more options that I missed.

There are so many great advice given before me so I leave it to you to decide. I'm sure you'll be able to pull through since you aren't new to the game.

Do practice your rotations though as with both magnb and stamnb, it includes grim focus (with its appropriate morphs).