Insco851 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

Squish magblades would really like to keep maim on fear.

Also removing the major expedition from cripple would be going in the wrong direction for magblades. Cripple expedition is essentially an alternate gap closer for melee blades, while also having defensive uses to escape... I mean it’s a NB after all.

It's the most likely skill to loss Major Expedition on NB though. Path was made NB's "utility" and that utility is Major Expedition, which by ZOS logic means the Major Expedition on Cripple and Blur are meaningless fluff, despite their practical implications and are most likely to be cut in the overhaul.

Just seems like an overall nerf to magblade. Doesn’t affect the over performing Stam brother at all.

Roll woodelf, bow vigor dodge roll.... dudes in the next county over.

Magblade.... cripple to path to close the gap for your melee ults... joy.... and when you need to get away, you run in a straight fkn line LOL.

Bet

idk wrote: »

twing1_ wrote: »

idk wrote: »

First, who has said? Zos specifically said if it is not coming from them do not take it as fact.

Second, you are not saying you have "heard" what the full changes to skills are. Ideas in a vacuum will always be lacking.

ZOS has stated either here on the forums:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/466792/update-22-combat-direction#latest

Or at the elsweyr preview event:


https://www.eso-library.com/core/index.php?chapter-elsweyr-en/

About halfway down the site:

Class changes

The Nightblade is being balanced with regard to "Grim Focus". So the bonus minor frenzy (8% more damage) is completely removed. This means that this bonus can only be obtained from Wardens (Selfbuff with the wings), by Healers (Combat Prayer) or by the skill “Camouflaged Hunter” (Fighters Guild).


Beyond the info in these links, I have no further information. Everything else (the specific skill changes presented in this post) are only my personal suggestions. They are not predictions and neither are they expectations. They are simply suggestions as to how they can fix some of their stated problem areas.

As for the link to the forum announcement of changes I did not find anything about changes to NB skills specifically and the other link just mentions the one skill, though you are suggesting changes other skills.

So what I am saying is if I were Zos I would be ignoring threads like this and wait for feedback on the actual changes were are making.

They have spent considerable time working on this and not just in the context of a single class, but everything across the board. You were merely lookin at one narrow slice so your suggestions lack the context they are looking at.

Edit: I am not saying do not offer your ideas to the forums. I am saying they are in a vacuum and are of extremely limited knowledge of what the class, all classes, will look like on the PTS.

Insco851 wrote: »

twing1_ wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

Squish magblades would really like to keep maim on fear.

Also removing the major expedition from cripple would be going in the wrong direction for magblades. Cripple expedition is essentially an alternate gap closer for melee blades, while also having defensive uses to escape... I mean it’s a NB after all.

It's the most likely skill to loss Major Expedition on NB though. Path was made NB's "utility" and that utility is Major Expedition, which by ZOS logic means the Major Expedition on Cripple and Blur are meaningless fluff, despite their practical implications and are most likely to be cut in the overhaul.

Just seems like an overall nerf to magblade. Doesn’t affect the over performing Stam brother at all.

Roll woodelf, bow vigor dodge roll.... dudes in the next county over.

Magblade.... cripple to path to close the gap for your melee ults... joy.... and when you need to get away, you run in a straight fkn line LOL.

Bet

Lotus fan exists as a gap closer too. Doesn't exactly act as a get away though.

Point remains, incredibly unneeded nerf to an underperforming subclass. Take it off doubles take.

twing1_ wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

twing1_ wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

Squish magblades would really like to keep maim on fear.

Also removing the major expedition from cripple would be going in the wrong direction for magblades. Cripple expedition is essentially an alternate gap closer for melee blades, while also having defensive uses to escape... I mean it’s a NB after all.

It's the most likely skill to loss Major Expedition on NB though. Path was made NB's "utility" and that utility is Major Expedition, which by ZOS logic means the Major Expedition on Cripple and Blur are meaningless fluff, despite their practical implications and are most likely to be cut in the overhaul.

Just seems like an overall nerf to magblade. Doesn’t affect the over performing Stam brother at all.

Roll woodelf, bow vigor dodge roll.... dudes in the next county over.

Magblade.... cripple to path to close the gap for your melee ults... joy.... and when you need to get away, you run in a straight fkn line LOL.

Bet

Lotus fan exists as a gap closer too. Doesn't exactly act as a get away though.

Point remains, incredibly unneeded nerf to an underperforming subclass. Take it off doubles take.

Right now 3 skills grant major expedition, and they want to narrow it down to one. Those three are:

Path of darkness
Cripple
Double take

twing1_ wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

twing1_ wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

Silver_Strider wrote: »

Insco851 wrote: »

Squish magblades would really like to keep maim on fear.

Also removing the major expedition from cripple would be going in the wrong direction for magblades. Cripple expedition is essentially an alternate gap closer for melee blades, while also having defensive uses to escape... I mean it’s a NB after all.

It's the most likely skill to loss Major Expedition on NB though. Path was made NB's "utility" and that utility is Major Expedition, which by ZOS logic means the Major Expedition on Cripple and Blur are meaningless fluff, despite their practical implications and are most likely to be cut in the overhaul.

Just seems like an overall nerf to magblade. Doesn’t affect the over performing Stam brother at all.

Roll woodelf, bow vigor dodge roll.... dudes in the next county over.

Magblade.... cripple to path to close the gap for your melee ults... joy.... and when you need to get away, you run in a straight fkn line LOL.

Bet

Lotus fan exists as a gap closer too. Doesn't exactly act as a get away though.

Point remains, incredibly unneeded nerf to an underperforming subclass. Take it off doubles take.

Right now 3 skills grant major expedition, and they want to narrow it down to one. Those three are:

Path of darkness
Cripple
Double take

I've opted to remove expedition entirely from double take, and give cripple minor expedition.

I left path of darkness with major expedition, because that is literally the only function of the base level skill. It's morphs add the secondary effects of either dealing small amounts of damage or healing.

If I left major expedition on cripple, I would have had to remove major expedition from path of darkness, rendering the base level skill useless.

twing1_ wrote: »

TL;DR

These are my suggested changes in attempts at balancing the nb class in accordance to the new U22 Combat Direction:

1. Veiled Strike and Blur should swap places in their respective skill trees. This would put Veiled Strike and it's morphs (surprise attack/concealed weapon) in the assassination skill tree, and Blur and its morphs (mirage/double take) in the shadow skill tree.

2. Mark Target should lose major fracture/breach, and instead apply minor vulnerability to the marked target.

3. Concealed weapon should apply major breach on the enemy.

4. Manifestation of terror should "instill enemies in fear, holding them in place" (like the new necromancer cc) and also allow multiple allies to trigger a DoT synergy.

5. Incapacitating strike should no longer stun, but at 120 ultimate should deal increased damage.

6. Dark cloak should heal 8% max health every second, not 32% health over 3 seconds.

7. Double take should grant snare removal and immunity for a short duration instead of providing major expedition.

8. Path of Darkness should be reworked into "Aura of Darkness". This would change the skill into a self-centered buff rather than a ground based AoE. It would supply a damage shield and Minor Evasion (not major) for the duration. Damage morph would damage nearby enemies when the shield takes damage, healing morph would heal self and allies when the shield takes damage.

9. Mass Hysteria should grant Minor Intellect for 10 seconds after the fear ends instead of applying minor maim on the enemies affected.

It's clear from the "Update 22 Combat Direction" thread that stamina night blades are going to be looked at and rebalanced, as they should. Stamina NB, relative to most other classes and even to Magicka NB, have been dominant for quite some time in PvP. A large part of that is due to their combination of easy survivability (rally, vigor, free major resolve/ward) and burst-heavy skills like incapacitating strike, surprise attack, and relentless focus. Many have probably already heard that the latter is losing its minor berserk component, and the new combat direction makes it sound an awful lot like these other nb offensive skills will be taken a look at as well. So, if it's not too late, I'd like to throw out a few suggestions in efforts of balancing the class.

In these suggestions, I hope to bring the NB class (specifically stamina NB) more in line with alternative options, while at the same time maintaining their class identity as a high damage potential, all or nothing assassin type. I will also be using the notes in the Update 22 Combat Direction post as guidelines.

Problem Areas, according to U22 Combat Direction
1. Some skills are loaded with functionality, others are not. Both the damage and functionality of a particular skill must be more or less in line with with the damage and functionality of other skills. In the case of NB, this probably means skills are going to be getting nerfed because their toolkit is full of loaded skills. The supposed upcoming changes to grim focus is evidence of this.
2. Redundancy in class toolkit. If one ability already performs a function, that function should not be performed by other abilities in the same class. For NB, surprise attack granting major fracture and mark target also granting major fracture was brought up. For reference, NB has three instances of major expedition (double take, path of darkness, cripple), two instances of major fracture (surprise attack, mark target), and two instances of minor maim (summon shade, mass hysteria). I will address these in my changes.

Problems Areas in my Opinion
1. Stamina NB has too much survivability. Given the high damage capacity of the nightblade class, stamina NB's access to the burst heal from rally, the healing ticks of vigor, and the free 100% uptime on major ward/resolve (in the form of dark veil synergizing with their class spammable, surprise attack) is too much easy survivability.
2. Offensive power is not distributed equally between the offensive abilities of the NB class. Grim focus was a prime example of this, providing both the single most powerful burst ability and also the strong passive of 8% damage done (minor berserk). ZOS has supposedly already adjusted this ability, but redistribution in other areas is still necessary.

My Suggestions

1. Veiled Strike and Blur should swap places in their respective skill trees. This would put Veiled Strike and it's morphs (surprise attack/concealed weapon) in the assassination skill tree, and Blur and its morphs (mirage/double take) in the shadow skill tree

Reasoning:

This is priority number one. The shadow passive, shadow barrier, grants 6 seconds of major resolve and ward upon use of a shadow ability. As it currently stands, surprise attack is an offensively loaded ability (strong burst spammable, also grants major fracture) and, as a shadow ability, it also grants the user major ward and resolve. It doesn't make sense for an ability that is so offensively stacked to also be the class source of major ward/resolve. In the case of stamina nb (which uses it as a spammable), this guarantees 100% uptime of major ward/resolve, free of cost. Switching it over to the assassination tree would make it a lot harder for stamina nb to achieve this by requiring them to cast a magicka ability every 6 seconds. It makes even less sense that this offensive ability is found on the tank skill tree, while the defensive ability, Blur, is found on the damage dealer skill tree. The switch needs to happen.

2. Mark Target should lose major fracture/breach, and instead apply minor vulnerability to the marked target.

Reasoning:

The removal of fracture is necessary on either mark target or surprise attack. Given my defensive nerf to surprise attack, I opted to remove fracture from Mark. Putting minor vulnerability in its place allows the ability to keep its current function without the redundancy.

3. Concealed weapon should apply major breach on the enemy.

Reasoning:

With the removal of major breach on mark target comes an opportunity to put major breach on concealed weapon to better match its stamina counterpart, surprise attack. Magicka NB are falling behind their stamina counterparts, and a large part of that is the magicka spammable being inferior to the stamina one. This change would remedy that. It would also fall nicely in line with abilities of other classes (like warden beetles) in which the magicka morph grants breach and the stamina morph grants fracture.

4. Manifestation of terror should "instill enemies in fear, holding them in place" (like the new necromancer cc) and also allow multiple allies to trigger a DoT synergy.

Reasoning:

Mass hysteria does everything manifestation of terror does, but is also easier to use. Introducing the inconvenience of an arm time to the fear traps should be balanced by providing increased utility relative to the instant cast of mass hysteria. Giving it both a hard cc and a group synergy gives the class access to two things it is currently lacking, and greatly improves the viability of NB PvE tanks.

5. Incapacitating strike should no longer stun, but at 120 ultimate should deal increased damage.

Reasoning:

Incapacitating strike is stacked. It not only provides great burst (through direct damage and also increased damage for a period of time), but it also provides major defile and on top of that also a crowd control. Something has to go. Given that nb already have access to a very strong cc in mass hysteria, I felt the best option was to remove the stun. In compensation, it will maintain its secondary effect criteria: if cast above 120 ultimate, the damage is increased. This should help balance soul harvest against incapacitating strike too, as magicka nb often run incap over the magicka version specifically for the crowd control.

6. Dark cloak should heal 8% max health every second for 3 seconds (24% total), not 32% max health over 3 seconds.

Reasoning:

This is admittedly more of an annoyance to me than anything else, but right now putting points into the passive skill dark veil is actually nerfing dark cloak. Dark veil increases the duration of shadow abilities by 15%. In the case of dark cloak, this means it takes 15% longer to heal 32% of your max health when you put points into it, making it quite counter productive. Letting dark cloak heal a % of health per tick allows it to be scaled positively with dark veil. I've nerfed the value of the heal to bring it back down closer to the value of the heals on other classes (green dragon blood heals for 33% of missing health, it doesn't make sense that dark cloak should heal for more than that given its relative ease of use).

7. Double take should grant snare removal and immunity for a short duration instead of providing major expedition.

Reasoning:

Major expedition is already accessible through cripple and its morphs, so it is redundant on double take. The addition of snare removal and immunity in its place gives magicka nb access to it, bringing them closer on par to their stamina counterparts who have access to snare removal and immunity through shuffle.

8. Path of Darkness should be reworked into "Aura of Darkness". This would change the skill into a self-centered buff rather than a ground based AoE. It would supply a damage shield and Minor Expedition (not major) for the duration. Damage morph would damage nearby enemies when the shield takes damage, healing morph would heal self and allies when the shield takes damage. This is what the reworked skill would look like:

Aura of Darkness
-Grants a damage shield that absorbs [x] damage over 6 seconds. Grants minor expedition for the duration.

Twisted Aura
-Grants a damage shield that absorbs [x] damage over 6 seconds. Grants minor expedition for the duration.
-When the shield takes damage, deal [y] magic damage to nearby enemies. This can occur once every second.

Refreshing Aura
-Grants a damage shield that absorbs [x] damage over 6 seconds. Grants minor expedition for the duration.
-When the shield takes damage, heal yourself and nearby allies for [y]. This can occur once every second.

Reasoning:

This skill needs a rework. The base skill provides a mobility bonus to the user and allies, but only while standing in a very narrow AoE. Buffing mobility while at the same time restricting that buff to a very small area is counterproductive. Allowing the ability to be self-centered allows the boon to mobility to be used to its fullest potential. Since Major Expedition is already being granted by cripple, it would be redundant on this ability. Therefore this is nerfed down to minor expedition, but a damage shield is also added in compensation. Magicka NB survivability needs a boost, and this would help them greatly in this regard.

9. Mass Hysteria should grant Minor Intellect for 10 seconds after the fear ends instead of applying minor maim on the enemies affected.

Reasoning:

Minor maim is already applied by summon shade and it's morphs, so it would be redundant on this ability. Having the skill provide minor intellect for the caster instead provides a small bonus to magicka regeneration to help recover the cost of the ability.

Conclusion
By emphasizing the NB's offensive capabilities (though not too extremely) and taking away some of its survivability, I feel this changes would bring it better in line with most of the other classes. These changes would also better balance mag nb against the dominating stam nb, without drastically altering either variant. Obviously, these changes are very unofficial, but I hope they are given serious consideration.

Iron_Blurr wrote: »

twing1_ wrote: »

TL;DR

These are my suggested changes in attempts at balancing the nb class in accordance to the new U22 Combat Direction:

1. Veiled Strike and Blur should swap places in their respective skill trees. This would put Veiled Strike and it's morphs (surprise attack/concealed weapon) in the assassination skill tree, and Blur and its morphs (mirage/double take) in the shadow skill tree.

2. Mark Target should lose major fracture/breach, and instead apply minor vulnerability to the marked target.

3. Concealed weapon should apply major breach on the enemy.

4. Manifestation of terror should "instill enemies in fear, holding them in place" (like the new necromancer cc) and also allow multiple allies to trigger a DoT synergy.

5. Incapacitating strike should no longer stun, but at 120 ultimate should deal increased damage.

6. Dark cloak should heal 8% max health every second, not 32% health over 3 seconds.

7. Double take should grant snare removal and immunity for a short duration instead of providing major expedition.

8. Path of Darkness should be reworked into "Aura of Darkness". This would change the skill into a self-centered buff rather than a ground based AoE. It would supply a damage shield and Minor Evasion (not major) for the duration. Damage morph would damage nearby enemies when the shield takes damage, healing morph would heal self and allies when the shield takes damage.

9. Mass Hysteria should grant Minor Intellect for 10 seconds after the fear ends instead of applying minor maim on the enemies affected.

It's clear from the "Update 22 Combat Direction" thread that stamina night blades are going to be looked at and rebalanced, as they should. Stamina NB, relative to most other classes and even to Magicka NB, have been dominant for quite some time in PvP. A large part of that is due to their combination of easy survivability (rally, vigor, free major resolve/ward) and burst-heavy skills like incapacitating strike, surprise attack, and relentless focus. Many have probably already heard that the latter is losing its minor berserk component, and the new combat direction makes it sound an awful lot like these other nb offensive skills will be taken a look at as well. So, if it's not too late, I'd like to throw out a few suggestions in efforts of balancing the class.

In these suggestions, I hope to bring the NB class (specifically stamina NB) more in line with alternative options, while at the same time maintaining their class identity as a high damage potential, all or nothing assassin type. I will also be using the notes in the Update 22 Combat Direction post as guidelines.

Problem Areas, according to U22 Combat Direction
1. Some skills are loaded with functionality, others are not. Both the damage and functionality of a particular skill must be more or less in line with with the damage and functionality of other skills. In the case of NB, this probably means skills are going to be getting nerfed because their toolkit is full of loaded skills. The supposed upcoming changes to grim focus is evidence of this.
2. Redundancy in class toolkit. If one ability already performs a function, that function should not be performed by other abilities in the same class. For NB, surprise attack granting major fracture and mark target also granting major fracture was brought up. For reference, NB has three instances of major expedition (double take, path of darkness, cripple), two instances of major fracture (surprise attack, mark target), and two instances of minor maim (summon shade, mass hysteria). I will address these in my changes.

Problems Areas in my Opinion
1. Stamina NB has too much survivability. Given the high damage capacity of the nightblade class, stamina NB's access to the burst heal from rally, the healing ticks of vigor, and the free 100% uptime on major ward/resolve (in the form of dark veil synergizing with their class spammable, surprise attack) is too much easy survivability.
2. Offensive power is not distributed equally between the offensive abilities of the NB class. Grim focus was a prime example of this, providing both the single most powerful burst ability and also the strong passive of 8% damage done (minor berserk). ZOS has supposedly already adjusted this ability, but redistribution in other areas is still necessary.

My Suggestions

1. Veiled Strike and Blur should swap places in their respective skill trees. This would put Veiled Strike and it's morphs (surprise attack/concealed weapon) in the assassination skill tree, and Blur and its morphs (mirage/double take) in the shadow skill tree

Reasoning:

This is priority number one. The shadow passive, shadow barrier, grants 6 seconds of major resolve and ward upon use of a shadow ability. As it currently stands, surprise attack is an offensively loaded ability (strong burst spammable, also grants major fracture) and, as a shadow ability, it also grants the user major ward and resolve. It doesn't make sense for an ability that is so offensively stacked to also be the class source of major ward/resolve. In the case of stamina nb (which uses it as a spammable), this guarantees 100% uptime of major ward/resolve, free of cost. Switching it over to the assassination tree would make it a lot harder for stamina nb to achieve this by requiring them to cast a magicka ability every 6 seconds. It makes even less sense that this offensive ability is found on the tank skill tree, while the defensive ability, Blur, is found on the damage dealer skill tree. The switch needs to happen.

2. Mark Target should lose major fracture/breach, and instead apply minor vulnerability to the marked target.

Reasoning:

The removal of fracture is necessary on either mark target or surprise attack. Given my defensive nerf to surprise attack, I opted to remove fracture from Mark. Putting minor vulnerability in its place allows the ability to keep its current function without the redundancy.

3. Concealed weapon should apply major breach on the enemy.

Reasoning:

With the removal of major breach on mark target comes an opportunity to put major breach on concealed weapon to better match its stamina counterpart, surprise attack. Magicka NB are falling behind their stamina counterparts, and a large part of that is the magicka spammable being inferior to the stamina one. This change would remedy that. It would also fall nicely in line with abilities of other classes (like warden beetles) in which the magicka morph grants breach and the stamina morph grants fracture.

4. Manifestation of terror should "instill enemies in fear, holding them in place" (like the new necromancer cc) and also allow multiple allies to trigger a DoT synergy.

Reasoning:

Mass hysteria does everything manifestation of terror does, but is also easier to use. Introducing the inconvenience of an arm time to the fear traps should be balanced by providing increased utility relative to the instant cast of mass hysteria. Giving it both a hard cc and a group synergy gives the class access to two things it is currently lacking, and greatly improves the viability of NB PvE tanks.

5. Incapacitating strike should no longer stun, but at 120 ultimate should deal increased damage.

Reasoning:

Incapacitating strike is stacked. It not only provides great burst (through direct damage and also increased damage for a period of time), but it also provides major defile and on top of that also a crowd control. Something has to go. Given that nb already have access to a very strong cc in mass hysteria, I felt the best option was to remove the stun. In compensation, it will maintain its secondary effect criteria: if cast above 120 ultimate, the damage is increased. This should help balance soul harvest against incapacitating strike too, as magicka nb often run incap over the magicka version specifically for the crowd control.

6. Dark cloak should heal 8% max health every second for 3 seconds (24% total), not 32% max health over 3 seconds.

Reasoning:

This is admittedly more of an annoyance to me than anything else, but right now putting points into the passive skill dark veil is actually nerfing dark cloak. Dark veil increases the duration of shadow abilities by 15%. In the case of dark cloak, this means it takes 15% longer to heal 32% of your max health when you put points into it, making it quite counter productive. Letting dark cloak heal a % of health per tick allows it to be scaled positively with dark veil. I've nerfed the value of the heal to bring it back down closer to the value of the heals on other classes (green dragon blood heals for 33% of missing health, it doesn't make sense that dark cloak should heal for more than that given its relative ease of use).

7. Double take should grant snare removal and immunity for a short duration instead of providing major expedition.

Reasoning:

Major expedition is already accessible through cripple and its morphs, so it is redundant on double take. The addition of snare removal and immunity in its place gives magicka nb access to it, bringing them closer on par to their stamina counterparts who have access to snare removal and immunity through shuffle.

8. Path of Darkness should be reworked into "Aura of Darkness". This would change the skill into a self-centered buff rather than a ground based AoE. It would supply a damage shield and Minor Expedition (not major) for the duration. Damage morph would damage nearby enemies when the shield takes damage, healing morph would heal self and allies when the shield takes damage. This is what the reworked skill would look like:

Aura of Darkness
-Grants a damage shield that absorbs [x] damage over 6 seconds. Grants minor expedition for the duration.

Twisted Aura
-Grants a damage shield that absorbs [x] damage over 6 seconds. Grants minor expedition for the duration.
-When the shield takes damage, deal [y] magic damage to nearby enemies. This can occur once every second.

Refreshing Aura
-Grants a damage shield that absorbs [x] damage over 6 seconds. Grants minor expedition for the duration.
-When the shield takes damage, heal yourself and nearby allies for [y]. This can occur once every second.

Reasoning:

This skill needs a rework. The base skill provides a mobility bonus to the user and allies, but only while standing in a very narrow AoE. Buffing mobility while at the same time restricting that buff to a very small area is counterproductive. Allowing the ability to be self-centered allows the boon to mobility to be used to its fullest potential. Since Major Expedition is already being granted by cripple, it would be redundant on this ability. Therefore this is nerfed down to minor expedition, but a damage shield is also added in compensation. Magicka NB survivability needs a boost, and this would help them greatly in this regard.

9. Mass Hysteria should grant Minor Intellect for 10 seconds after the fear ends instead of applying minor maim on the enemies affected.

Reasoning:

Minor maim is already applied by summon shade and it's morphs, so it would be redundant on this ability. Having the skill provide minor intellect for the caster instead provides a small bonus to magicka regeneration to help recover the cost of the ability.

Conclusion
By emphasizing the NB's offensive capabilities (though not too extremely) and taking away some of its survivability, I feel this changes would bring it better in line with most of the other classes. These changes would also better balance mag nb against the dominating stam nb, without drastically altering either variant. Obviously, these changes are very unofficial, but I hope they are given serious consideration.

I agree with most of your changes but i dont like the nerf to dark cloak. Nightblade tanks have a weaker heal than most other tanks. I agree that it should tick consistently but dont want a nerf to the healing. You brought up green dragon blood as a comparison but didnt consider the fact that gdb is a burst heal that gives minor vitality. A dk can cast igneous for major mending and then spam a few gdb for more healing than a nightblade could dream of. Im a nightblade tank main and i can tell you for sure having your heal be a hot instead of a burst heal is way harder to manage since you have to anticipate damage rather than react to it.

kaithuzar wrote: »

@twing1_

I quoted your statements rather than hitting reply.

"1. Stamina NB has too much survivability. Given the high damage capacity of the nightblade class, stamina NB's access to the burst heal from rally, the healing ticks of vigor, and the free 100% uptime on major ward/resolve (in the form of dark veil synergizing with their class spammable, surprise attack) is too much easy survivability"

My response:
No mention of dodge roll? The mitigation provided by dodge roll (often through skill, or spam-ability), combined with the mitigation from cloak (also through the aforementioned), is in my opinion the biggest defensive combination for fight against. Nice vigor/rally ticks are just icing on the cake.


"2. Offensive power is not distributed equally between the offensive abilities of the NB classOffensive power is not distributed equally between the offensive abilities of the NB class"

My response:
While true, the issue is that Grim Focus/Merciless resolve has become an almost useless skill due to the ease of blocking/evading/absorbing/reflecting the attack. So, if you're excluding that specific skill I think there is OK balance amongst the rest of the skills, yet imbalanced in comparison to how effective they are when compared to other classes.


"1. Veiled Strike and Blur should swap places in their respective skill trees."

My response:
I agree, however, I don't think it'll make that much of a difference due to cloak keeping the up-time for ward & resolve passives. Maybe, because stamina users occasionally run with small magicka pools, it will increase balance slightly, but I think most stamina users will just run shackle or amberplasm same as magicka users.


Everything else, I either agree with or am indifferent towards.

Iskiab wrote: »

twing1_ wrote: »

Iskiab wrote: »

Iron_Blurr wrote: »

Iskiab wrote: »

Meh, mass hysteria providing minor maim > shade. Mass hysteria is one of the best NB utility abilities, shade is just used for the port.

I think dark shade should keep minor maim though. Consider the fact that a nightblade tank (pve) should be stacking adds together not fearing them so they scatter..

True, but I would counter that minor maim isn’t doing much anyways on a tank with how damage is calculated. It’s 15% after mitigation if I’m not mistaken. So if you’re hit by an ability that does 30k damage and are at 80% mitigation from blocking it’ll reduce the hit from 6k to 5100?

It’s a lot more important in pvp for light armour magblades who have difficulty raising their resistances and people run pen.

If both roles use minor maim from different sources I don’t really see this as an either or issue. They should just leave both abilities giving minor maim.

They should, but they won't. ZOS has made it clear they want only one source of a particular effect per class.

Also, dont mag Nb typically run shadow image in PvP anyway for the teleport? I know it's broken right now, but after they fix it (hopefully soon) the lack of minor maim on mass hysteria should be a non issue.

I don’t as a pvp healer. When I need to escape I typically have 2–3 players on me and am loaded up with dots. There’s a travel time on the port and have ended my port dead. I’ve had a lot more success with mass hysteria, dodge rolling, and going into cloak to suppress the dots. I expect to have major defile on me as well so running hots doesn’t help and refreshing path is too small to help with healing.

Besides, mass hysteria is aoe and the shade is 1 target.

Iskiab wrote: »

We’ll see what they decide to do. A lot of assumptions are being made about ZoS’s intent and whatnot. Will they even read this thread?

It’s a little presumptuous to think any suggestions will be put in game.

kaithuzar wrote: »

twing1_ wrote: »

kaithuzar wrote: »

@twing1_

I quoted your statements rather than hitting reply.

"1. Stamina NB has too much survivability. Given the high damage capacity of the nightblade class, stamina NB's access to the burst heal from rally, the healing ticks of vigor, and the free 100% uptime on major ward/resolve (in the form of dark veil synergizing with their class spammable, surprise attack) is too much easy survivability"

My response:
No mention of dodge roll? The mitigation provided by dodge roll (often through skill, or spam-ability), combined with the mitigation from cloak (also through the aforementioned), is in my opinion the biggest defensive combination for fight against. Nice vigor/rally ticks are just icing on the cake.


"2. Offensive power is not distributed equally between the offensive abilities of the NB classOffensive power is not distributed equally between the offensive abilities of the NB class"

My response:
While true, the issue is that Grim Focus/Merciless resolve has become an almost useless skill due to the ease of blocking/evading/absorbing/reflecting the attack. So, if you're excluding that specific skill I think there is OK balance amongst the rest of the skills, yet imbalanced in comparison to how effective they are when compared to other classes.


"1. Veiled Strike and Blur should swap places in their respective skill trees."

My response:
I agree, however, I don't think it'll make that much of a difference due to cloak keeping the up-time for ward & resolve passives. Maybe, because stamina users occasionally run with small magicka pools, it will increase balance slightly, but I think most stamina users will just run shackle or amberplasm same as magicka users.


Everything else, I either agree with or am indifferent towards.

I left dodge roll out because that's technically available to all classes, and all builds. I emphasized the free ward/resolve and rally/vigor because these are things only stamina nb take advantage of, and not magicka nb (because magicka nb don't use concealed weapon and don't use 2h and vigor). While I do agree that these are just icing on the cake so to speak, I was really just trying to emphasize the that stamina nb in particular have a greater access to survivability than mag nb.

Some other examples of stacked abilities in the nb toolkit:
-surprise attack (strong burst, major fracture, major ward/resolve)
-incapacitating strike (strong burst, stun, defile, 20% damage increase. I get that it's an ultimate, but it's cost is so low it can be used in almost every encounter)

These are the only two that stand out to me (after grim focus loses its berserk) that need nerfs. The rest are fairly in line, and my changes to other skills are only to reduce redundancy in the class toolkit.

And yes, 100% uptime on major ward/resolve would still be attainable on a stamblade after these changes, but it would be harder to both sustain and maintain (as it would require a constant internal timer of needing to cloak/teleport/fear every 6 seconds, and doing so would put a massive strain on their magicka pools)

I know you’ve only been a registered forum user since this February, and that you primarily play on PS4, but you should try reading the forums more.

There are many people who play melee magblade, myself included, & we’ve posted multiple times in multiple nightblade threads that we ARE using concealed strike with a 2h sword for access to forward momentum.

IF & I should say “regardless if” ZOS gives nightblade access to snare removal/immunity, light & heavy attacks should scale off of the higher stat; weapon OR spell damage.

Iskiab wrote: »

We’ll see what they decide to do. A lot of assumptions are being made about ZoS’s intent and whatnot. Will they even read this thread?

It’s a little presumptuous to think any suggestions will be put in game.