Nightblade Class Identity Failures

Sporvan · September 2019

There are several skills in the Nightblade trees which just aren't good enough when compared to generic skills and would never really be picked unless you're trying something hipster. This contradicts the current ESO Balance team's long post.

Clearly Inferior Skills:

1. Twisting Path -> Wall of Elements - Wall of Elements benefits from the entire Destruction Staff passive skill tree and provides the important Off Balance debuff. No contest here. Keep the movement speed bonus on Path, but also give it a synergy.

2. Mass Hysteria -> Turn Evil - All the passive buffs and numerous other buffs completely outweigh Mass Hysteria. This class defining ability has been relegated to the bargain bin. This needs maim back with an increased duration to compete.

3. Cripple -> Entropy and Soul Trap - Both these generic skills trump anything Cripple has to offer. Entropy provides much better passives. This needs much more of a passive effect, perhaps reduced weapon / spell damage.

Situationally Inferior Skills:

1. Mark Target -> Elemental Drain - For Mag builds Magicka Steal is completely superior to some useless "on death" triggers which barely work in boss fights. This needs an additional effect that doesn't trigger "on death".

2. Death Stroke -> Berserker Strike - This two-hander skill is completely superior to Death Stroke. Get rid of the clunky ultimate threshold mechanic.

3. Power Extraction -> Whirlwind - If you're running Dual Wield there is no way you'd run this class ability over it. They had it right a few patches ago and then nerfed it again.

AuraoftheAzureSea · September 2019

Agreed on all counts. The only thing I'd say really is that some of these aren't "either or" options and could potentially be stacked - twisting path, cripple, entropy, wall of elements, etc. Although since we're limited to 10 skills, it often does become a choice of which would you rather slot. The better examples in your list are things like mark target and mass hysteria because there is no need to have two skills that perform the same action in those cases.

I would really love a synergy on twisting path, but moreso for refreshing paths since I care way more about that skill on my healer than on my dps. Granted, I care more about my healer and my tank in general because I don't even use my magblade or stamblade anymore since it's so painful so... I guess that should tell you something, lol.

Royalthought · September 2019

Damage on refreshing path
Major expedition on cripple
Major fracture on surprise attack
Major defile on incap
Minor main on mass hysteria.

Yea I know. Great ideas that would improve the class. No idea where I get this stuff from. Lol

Extra credit: drop the heal and put major brut/sorc on grim focus.

deepseamk20b14_ESO · September 2019

Royalthought wrote: »

Damage on refreshing path
Major expedition on cripple
Major fracture on surprise attack
Major defile on incap
Minor main on mass hysteria.

Yea I know. Great ideas that would improve the class. No idea where I get this stuff from. Lol

Extra credit: drop the heal and put major brut/sorc on grim focus.

It’s almost like those were things in some alternate reality!

I’d love major fracture back to surprise attack.

Maim back on mass hysteria would possibly make me slot it again, it’s just subpar to turn evil, and honestly I use neither now.

Major defile on incap would be nice but to balance it only apply major defile if at 120 ult, get rid of this ridiculous silence no one ever asked for.

Heal on relentless has been nice for PvE aspects but I don’t care for it in PvP at all. Major brutality on it would be great. The fact we have to hit something to currently get the buff (class skills I mean) is stupid especially considering most other classes can self apply the buff on a whim.

In an effort to “balance” ZoS is not just hurting NB but a lot of classes. I’m not one to jump on the bandwagon and say the classes are useless as my NB, DK, and sorc will do fine regardless, but they are sure making everything feel super vanilla. In an effort to balance they have focused to much on class equality than fairness and soon we will all have the same exact skills but with different names.

Sureshawt · September 2019

LOL....I would add more to the list. Believe it or not I'm down to just two class specific skills on my StamNB Bow/2h....guess which ones and you get a cookie!

Hint: One of them is just a passive on the bar so the active one has a better chance to actually work and provide a return for the resources spent rather then just fail completely.

Blackleopardex · September 2019

Some ideas to improve magblade:

Shadow Image(change):
Shadow Image (morph): The teleport for this morph is now 22 meters, down from 28, since this morph is meant to operate on our gap closer or creator standard. This also prevents confusion in areas where the tooltip range would increase for the teleport, but fail to actually increase.

First of all the shades rage is limited enough as it is, if anything the range should have been slightly increased.

Secondly, using the argument that you wanna have to "gap closer or creator standard" is just ridicules. If you wanna go by gab-closer standard, make it a "gab-closer" lets us place it at 22 range...

Mass Hysteria:
This morphs either needs to increase further in number of targets, if not it needs maim back, or something along those lines to even compete with Turn Evil.

Manifestation of Terror:
This morph should be completely reworked into range cast ability that fears one target.(This, with a increased number of people feared on Mass Hysteria, You have a choice: fear on range 1 target or fear only melee many targets.

Twisting/Refreshing path
As mentioned further up in this thread by @AuraoftheAzureSea both these morphs could use a synergy of some kind specially with the new standardized low damage.

Concealed Weapon
This morphs need either a slight damage increase or some sort of minor debuff applied to the target(or maybe a buff to the caster?). As it stands now the sneak/cloak speed-buff is nice(please leave it alone) but the sacrifice if beeing in melee with light armor and a 22m shadow image is self destructive... It should also be more rewarding to go melee in PVE.

Dark Cloak
Good for tanking, can be left alone as long as the minor protection buff is fixed(does not apply it atm).

Funnel Health
The damage should be slightly increased with a slight decrease to the healing %. Not to the damage of swallow but closer then it is today.

Swallow soul
This morph should get changed so the healing tics every instead of every other second, and the healing adjusted accordingly.

Sap essence
The additional heal this ability does based on targets hits should be slightly increased.

Merciless Resolve
The heal from this ability should scale of max spell damage, we could use a heal not based on damage done or max health. This would also justify the short range of the heal as well as the fact that we need to stack it up and loose damage mitigation when casting it.

MartiniDaniels · September 2019

Nightblade is just ruined over-nerfed class in PVE right now. Ton of effort for worst dps. This is just how things are.

Mayrael · September 2019

Blackleopardex wrote: »

Some ideas to improve magblade:

Shadow Image(change):
Shadow Image (morph): The teleport for this morph is now 22 meters, down from 28, since this morph is meant to operate on our gap closer or creator standard. This also prevents confusion in areas where the tooltip range would increase for the teleport, but fail to actually increase.

First of all the shades rage is limited enough as it is, if anything the range should have been slightly increased.

Secondly, using the argument that you wanna have to "gap closer or creator standard" is just ridicules. If you wanna go by gab-closer standard, make it a "gab-closer" lets us place it at 22 range...

Mass Hysteria:
This morphs either needs to increase further in number of targets, if not it needs maim back, or something along those lines to even compete with Turn Evil.

Manifestation of Terror:
This morph should be completely reworked into range cast ability that fears one target.(This, with a increased number of people feared on Mass Hysteria, You have a choice: fear on range 1 target or fear only melee many targets.

Twisting/Refreshing path
As mentioned further up in this thread by @AuraoftheAzureSea both these morphs could use a synergy of some kind specially with the new standardized low damage.

Concealed Weapon
This morphs need either a slight damage increase or some sort of minor debuff applied to the target(or maybe a buff to the caster?). As it stands now the sneak/cloak speed-buff is nice(please leave it alone) but the sacrifice if beeing in melee with light armor and a 22m shadow image is self destructive... It should also be more rewarding to go melee in PVE.

Dark Cloak
Good for tanking, can be left alone as long as the minor protection buff is fixed(does not apply it atm).

Funnel Health
The damage should be slightly increased with a slight decrease to the healing %. Not to the damage of swallow but closer then it is today.

Swallow soul
This morph should get changed so the healing tics every instead of every other second, and the healing adjusted accordingly.

Sap essence
The additional heal this ability does based on targets hits should be slightly increased.

Merciless Resolve
The heal from this ability should scale of max spell damage, we could use a heal not based on damage done or max health. This would also justify the short range of the heal as well as the fact that we need to stack it up and loose damage mitigation when casting it.

I know there is just a few of us but yeah, magblades need help more than anyone.

GeorgeBlack · September 2019

Standard
Chains
Dragon Blood
Reflective Scales
Inhale
Stone Fist
Molten Weapons
Ash Cloud

See what I did there?

This topic has nothing to do with identity

susmitds · September 2019

Blackleopardex wrote: »

Some ideas to improve magblade:

Shadow Image(change):
Shadow Image (morph): The teleport for this morph is now 22 meters, down from 28, since this morph is meant to operate on our gap closer or creator standard. This also prevents confusion in areas where the tooltip range would increase for the teleport, but fail to actually increase.

First of all the shades rage is limited enough as it is, if anything the range should have been slightly increased.

Secondly, using the argument that you wanna have to "gap closer or creator standard" is just ridicules. If you wanna go by gab-closer standard, make it a "gab-closer" lets us place it at 22 range...

Mass Hysteria:
This morphs either needs to increase further in number of targets, if not it needs maim back, or something along those lines to even compete with Turn Evil.

Manifestation of Terror:
This morph should be completely reworked into range cast ability that fears one target.(This, with a increased number of people feared on Mass Hysteria, You have a choice: fear on range 1 target or fear only melee many targets.

Twisting/Refreshing path
As mentioned further up in this thread by @AuraoftheAzureSea both these morphs could use a synergy of some kind specially with the new standardized low damage.

Concealed Weapon
This morphs need either a slight damage increase or some sort of minor debuff applied to the target(or maybe a buff to the caster?). As it stands now the sneak/cloak speed-buff is nice(please leave it alone) but the sacrifice if beeing in melee with light armor and a 22m shadow image is self destructive... It should also be more rewarding to go melee in PVE.

Dark Cloak
Good for tanking, can be left alone as long as the minor protection buff is fixed(does not apply it atm).

Funnel Health
The damage should be slightly increased with a slight decrease to the healing %. Not to the damage of swallow but closer then it is today.

Swallow soul
This morph should get changed so the healing tics every instead of every other second, and the healing adjusted accordingly.

Sap essence
The additional heal this ability does based on targets hits should be slightly increased.

Merciless Resolve
The heal from this ability should scale of max spell damage, we could use a heal not based on damage done or max health. This would also justify the short range of the heal as well as the fact that we need to stack it up and loose damage mitigation when casting it.

No need to change Manifestation of Terror, it is fine.

StrandedMonkey · September 2019

Hi everyone this is the obligatory "why is dizzying swing nerfed" post that is necessary for anything ESO related on the PTS sub section of the forums.

Thank you for reading.

Ragnaroek93 · September 2019

Class identity patch btw...

Power Slam tooltip is unstacked btw.

kind_hero · September 2019

I would like to drop wall of elements for twisting path... it would make my nb stand out from the other classes. How about increase the damage of the path with the number of enemies that stand in it, this making it better for groups of mobs?

Also totally agree with the points made... I hope for a rework of the merciless proc, make it fun or worthwhile. I don't need the heal from that.

Just as a cosmetic change, I would like the shadow image to be a shadow copy of my char, not a template.

FrancisCrawford · September 2019

Surprise Attack should have the same sneak speed buff as Concealed Weapon. The Concealed Weapon sneak buff is an iconic part of sneak builds that are inherently medium-armor.

FrancisCrawford · September 2019

Several nightblade skills only work in solo PvE. In particular:

The Magickasteal in Debilitate is senseless in a group, given how expensive the skill is, but could make some sense solo so as to save a bar slot.
Reaper's Mark is actually pretty good if you can control who dies when.

Pijng · September 2019

FrancisCrawford wrote: »

Surprise Attack should have the same sneak speed buff as Concealed Weapon. The Concealed Weapon sneak buff is an iconic part of sneak builds that are inherently medium-armor.

Then what's the point in CW except its being a magic damage ability?
Adding bonus ms while sneak to SA == basically removing unique bonus from concealed.

xAk_MoRRoWiNdx · September 2019

buh...buh...NITBALDE IS ZOSES FAVORET CLAS!!1!1

ccfeeling · September 2019

NB was too powerful before .

That's why ZOS keep to nerf NB every patch , TBH , they nerfed too much .

I have 5 NB , but I rare to play them unless my guild need a healer .

ZOS won't care , nm .

Irfind · September 2019

Um dont kill me

i would love to have a cripple stam version *cloak´s away*

Mayrael · September 2019

Yeah and what we get here? Everyone asking for buffs to STAMBLADES, which are overnerfed a bit to I admit but nobody cares about MAGBLADES which are almost extinct.

Royalthought · September 2019

Mayrael wrote: »

Yeah and what we get here? Everyone asking for buffs to STAMBLADES, which are overnerfed a bit to I admit but nobody cares about MAGBLADES which are almost extinct.

Actually the class as a whole was gutted.

Stamblade's just end up using weapon skill builds and benefitting from stamina perks.

Stamblade's used to have major fracture on S.A. and a stun on incap. They've lost defile, fracture, stun, etc. The idea that the stamina variant of nightblades has more in their class is actually outdated. The only real difference is magblade's rely moreso on range more than melee so concealed isn't the focus. Strife is and that was nerfed too.

Pijng wrote: »

FrancisCrawford wrote: »

Surprise Attack should have the same sneak speed buff as Concealed Weapon. The Concealed Weapon sneak buff is an iconic part of sneak builds that are inherently medium-armor.

Then what's the point in CW except its being a magic damage ability?
Adding bonus ms while sneak to SA == basically removing unique bonus from concealed.

Deep fissure - Sub assault
Relentless focus - merciless resolve
Puncturing sweeps - biting jabs

I guess the real point is build diversity. I would've loved to see both concealed and surprise get major fracture/breech with the 25% speed tbh. But as it is ive only ever used concealed for speed and SA as a spammable. Perhaps if concealed had more going for it melee magblade would apeeal to more players... maybe.

Szende · September 2019

im just still laughing on the german name of Surprise Attack.

Awesome! I know im childrish...

Xvorg · September 2019

I'll never get why Sap essence costs that much. Maybe costing 3k it woyld make the skill more useful for mageblade

Blaqmagik · September 2019

I agree, tbh I've even gone as far as to use executioner on my stamblade because it is better than the class execute by a large margin. Seems kind of odd that a weapon line execute does more damage than a class execute, when that class is the "assassin" archetype..

Pijng · September 2019

Royalthought wrote: »

Mayrael wrote: »

Yeah and what we get here? Everyone asking for buffs to STAMBLADES, which are overnerfed a bit to I admit but nobody cares about MAGBLADES which are almost extinct.

Actually the class as a whole was gutted.

Stamblade's just end up using weapon skill builds and benefitting from stamina perks.

Stamblade's used to have major fracture on S.A. and a stun on incap. They've lost defile, fracture, stun, etc. The idea that the stamina variant of nightblades has more in their class is actually outdated. The only real difference is magblade's rely moreso on range more than melee so concealed isn't the focus. Strife is and that was nerfed too.

Pijng wrote: »

FrancisCrawford wrote: »

Surprise Attack should have the same sneak speed buff as Concealed Weapon. The Concealed Weapon sneak buff is an iconic part of sneak builds that are inherently medium-armor.

Then what's the point in CW except its being a magic damage ability?
Adding bonus ms while sneak to SA == basically removing unique bonus from concealed.

Deep fissure - Sub assault
Relentless focus - merciless resolve
Puncturing sweeps - biting jabs

I guess the real point is build diversity. I would've loved to see both concealed and surprise get major fracture/breech with the 25% speed tbh. But as it is ive only ever used concealed for speed and SA as a spammable. Perhaps if concealed had more going for it melee magblade would apeeal to more players... maybe.

Deep fissure – Magic damage and reduce to spell resists
Sub Assault – Poison damage and reduce to phys resist

Relentless – mitigation, disease dmg, heal
Merciless – mitigation, magic dmg but dealing more base dmg than alternative morph, heal

Puncturing sweeps – phys damage, reduce enemy's ms, gives you major savagery
Biting jabs – magic damage, reduce enemy's ms, heals you on % of dmg dealt

Morphs are very similar but each has it's own unique bonus except different type of damage.
But what FrancisCrawford suggest is going to be like this:

Surprise Attack – phys damage, off balance from sneak, reduce phys resists, bonus ms while in sneak
Concealed Weapon – magic damage, off balance from sneak, bonus ms while in sneak

Now here comes the question – what'll be so special about CW? Just because it's magic damage and it'll be unprofitable to run SA as a mag archetype? Oh and CW will have less bonuses in total than SA

But yeah, I do agree that CW right now is a very niche moprh. I used to run it with my 2h melee magblade in PVP back in a days. Now I use it for movespeed bonus as a bomblade only. 2h and dw are unprofitable for magblades in pvp atm. Maybe it's popular rn for bow/bow builds, I don't really care about them.
And what about pve: if you can go as a range dd -> go as a range one!

Sahidom · September 2019

When sets became the "fix it" method and balance came by nerfing class skills as the "fix it" method. Nightblades, and other classes, won't really have any class identity until their "fix it" method changes.

We'll get some bones that we can say are unique but this is another "fix it" without fully defining and supporting our class. It's a pragmatic perspective, and sorry, my faith in their capability to stop old habits is low.

Epicasballs · September 2019

I turned my magblade into a material farmer a few patches ago. I was like "there's no way they can nerf a farmblade."

Then...

They changed rapids so I had to invest more into stamina recovery this patch. They even came for my farmblade.

Pijng · September 2019

Epicasballs wrote: »

I turned my magblade into a material farmer a few patches ago. I was like "there's no way they can nerf a farmblade."

Then...

They changed rapids so I had to invest more into stamina recovery this patch. They even came for my farmblade.

You can always respec to idleblade

LiquidPony · September 2019

From a PvE perspective, it's really amazing how they turned a class that was arguably the most unique, interesting, and powerful DD in the game (for both magicka and stamina) into a ... tank I guess?

Complete failure all around. NB overperforming? Destroy it with fire! Same solution ZOS has to everything.

Xvorg · September 2019

LiquidPony wrote: »

From a PvE perspective, it's really amazing how they turned a class that was arguably the most unique, interesting, and powerful DD in the game (for both magicka and stamina) into a ... tank I guess?

Complete failure all around. NB overperforming? Destroy it with fire! Same solution ZOS has to everything.

Well, the same guys that made the flame based tank a healer

SidraWillowsky · September 2019

Mayrael wrote: »

Yeah and what we get here? Everyone asking for buffs to STAMBLADES, which are overnerfed a bit to I admit but nobody cares about MAGBLADES which are almost extinct.

They're equally dead at this point, at least from a PvE perspective. In fact, unless I'm wearing Lokke, my dummy-humping sessions indicate that magblade is actually out-DPSing stamblade, and even with Lokke, the difference is nothing to write home about.

LiquidPony wrote: »

From a PvE perspective, it's really amazing how they turned a class that was arguably the most unique, interesting, and powerful DD in the game (for both magicka and stamina) into a ... tank I guess?

Complete failure all around. NB overperforming? Destroy it with fire! Same solution ZOS has to everything.

Yep... the class used to be set up well enough where both mag and stam versions were viable and felt completely different from each other, which I can't say is the case for some other classes. Now it's in shambles.