Honest Classes: Nightblade Edition

GrumpyDuckling · January 2020

In-Game Description: “Nightblades are adventurers and opportunists with a gift for getting in and out of trouble. Relying variously on stealth, blades, and speed, Nightblades thrive on conflict and misfortune, trusting to their luck and cunning to survive.”

Honest Description: “Nightblades are kinda, sorta, maybe the sneaking class in ESO, but you aren’t really encouraged to sneak. You get your speed penalized while sneaking (same as every other class), and most of your skills and passives don’t really encourage you to attack from sneak. Well, two of them kinda do… but, eh, you basically have to just play Nightblade like you would any other class. Feel free to be somewhat stealthy every once in a while, though, because one of your skills lets you turn invisible, which, by the way, is a class-defining skill that is totally 100% useless in most serious content (PVP excluded, because it actually works there and makes everyone hate you).

Also, you are into blood stuff because one-third of the class is dedicated to blood magic. Don’t worry, this doesn’t make you a vampire -- you just, for some reason, have way more options for blood-themed skills than vampires do, which, if you think about it, totally makes sense because…
Anyway, this bloody skill line gives you access to two powerful major damage buffs (brutality and sorcery), but don’t get too excited to enjoy them unless you meet the necessary conditions of having an enemy within melee range -- as if anyone wanted to play an archer and ranged mage anyway.

Let’s not forget that playing a Nightblade means that you get to be an assassin! There’s even an aptly-named skill line dedicated to such endeavors! This skill line gives you the greatest strengths associated with the traditional Elder Scrolls assassin archetype, including: an ultimate with the passive ability to restore resources, a skill that helps protect you from area attacks, and a skill that encourages you to do the totally normal and expected assassin-like thing of standing in front of a target and wailing on them with light and heavy attacks as a way to bulk up your defenses and make you tankier...
Oh, but don’t you worry because you still get to be a sneaky assassin and use the Blade of Woe to assassinate the weakest of overland enemies from stealth… just like every other class in the game who can perform the same exact assassin moves. Son-of-a…”

Nightblade Class: The Elder Scrolls Online
“Play the way you want.”

Shaloknir · January 2020

Lol 🤭

Czekoludek · January 2020

Kinda, sorta accurate. They massacred my Nb so hard over all this years

Kel · January 2020

Brought to you by the same people who believe a DRAGONknights class defining skill is throwing some kind of poop looking rock.

Know many examples of dragons throwing rocks? Are we really that surprised here?

Monte_Cristo · January 2020

Kel wrote: »

Brought to you by the same people who believe a DRAGONknights class defining skill is throwing some kind of poop looking rock.

Know many examples of dragons throwing rocks? Are we really that surprised here?

I actually look up to see if any dragons on Pokémon could learn rock throw. And even there, no rock throwing dragons.
On a similar thought, could we get a River Troll class? I wanna be able to throw mudcrabs at my enemies.

Noxavian · January 2020

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

In-Game Description: “Nightblades are adventurers and opportunists with a gift for getting in and out of trouble. Relying variously on stealth, blades, and speed, Nightblades thrive on conflict and misfortune, trusting to their luck and cunning to survive.”

Honest Description: “Nightblades are kinda, sorta, maybe the sneaking class in ESO, but you aren’t really encouraged to sneak. You get your speed penalized while sneaking (same as every other class), and most of your skills and passives don’t really encourage you to attack from sneak. Well, two of them kinda do… but, eh, you basically have to just play Nightblade like you would any other class. Feel free to be somewhat stealthy every once in a while, though, because one of your skills lets you turn invisible, which, by the way, is a class-defining skill that is totally 100% useless in most serious content (PVP excluded, because it actually works there and makes everyone hate you).

Also, you are into blood stuff because one-third of the class is dedicated to blood magic. Don’t worry, this doesn’t make you a vampire -- you just, for some reason, have way more options for blood-themed skills than vampires do, which, if you think about it, totally makes sense because…
Anyway, this bloody skill line gives you access to two powerful major damage buffs (brutality and sorcery), but don’t get too excited to enjoy them unless you meet the necessary conditions of having an enemy within melee range -- as if anyone wanted to play an archer and ranged mage anyway.

Let’s not forget that playing a Nightblade means that you get to be an assassin! There’s even an aptly-named skill line dedicated to such endeavors! This skill line gives you the greatest strengths associated with the traditional Elder Scrolls assassin archetype, including: an ultimate with the passive ability to restore resources, a skill that helps protect you from area attacks, and a skill that encourages you to do the totally normal and expected assassin-like thing of standing in front of a target and wailing on them with light and heavy attacks as a way to bulk up your defenses and make you tankier...
Oh, but don’t you worry because you still get to be a sneaky assassin and use the Blade of Woe to assassinate the weakest of overland enemies from stealth… just like every other class in the game who can perform the same exact assassin moves. Son-of-a…”

Nightblade Class: The Elder Scrolls Online
“Play the way you want.”

WAIT

I never thought of that and Ive been sitting here vouching for vampires to get more skills all this time.

Freaking Nightblades have more blood magic //than vampires//.

Better question we should all be asking is: Why does the assassin/shadow-y class have a blood magic skill line? Doesn't make much sense tbh. Shadow magic, sure, I'll give you that one because it can be stealthy.

But the more I think about it blood magic is kinda out of place??

snoozy · January 2020

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

“Nightblades are kinda, sorta, maybe the sneaking class in ESO, but you aren’t really encouraged to sneak. You get your speed penalized while sneaking (same as every other class), and most of your skills and passives don’t really encourage you to attack from sneak.

this is a non-issue. be a vampire - no speed penalty in sneak.
slot concealed weapon on top of this and use swift jewelry and steed mundus with divines armour, then you're already faster than base sprinting while just sneaking normally.
use 4 darloc brae, 5 night mother's embrace and 3 night terror and boom - you're practically invisible, super fast and can perma-sneak without worrying about stamina. thank me later

apart from this the honest description is pretty accurate

oxygen_thief · January 2020

i thought it would be a pvp whine thread. where is written that nightblade means assassin? is it official class description or just your fantasies? blade of woe means you are an assassin not a certain class

fiender66 · January 2020

It eludes me why most say that invisibility is useless in PVE. Well, it IS useless in endgame and even before that, against most bosses, but when you are soloing delves and dungeons, I found it super useful. My little bosmer NB (also a patented assassin) went through like a breeze, avoiding tons of embarrassing and/or boring/frustrating situations. In particular, she completed Murkmire w/o bothering all those pesky vegetables, not to say the Deshaan crocs. OFC this comes at a cost (no wonder...), that is a slower experience: now that she has come of age (really? lvl33) she wants lvl50 gear and engages way more often in fights. Needless to say, BG is great fun, and using surprise attack out of invisibility really works

Ei8htba11 · January 2020

snoozy wrote: »

this is a non-issue. be a vampire - no speed penalty in sneak.
slot concealed weapon on top of this and use swift jewelry and steed mundus with divines armour, then you're already faster than base sprinting while just sneaking normally.
use 4 darloc brae, 5 night mother's embrace and 3 night terror and boom - you're practically invisible, super fast and can perma-sneak without worrying about stamina. thank me later

apart from this the honest description is pretty accurate

But that option is available to EVERY class, making the choice of being a Nightblade for sneaking irrelevant

Noxavian · January 2020

oxygen_thief wrote: »

i thought it would be a pvp whine thread. where is written that nightblade means assassin? is it official class description or just your fantasies? blade of woe means you are an assassin not a certain class

Quite literally every single person I've ever spoken to about classes in ESO's first thought is Nightblade is the assassin class. Given the class description, literally any person would think that it is at the very least the stealth-y sneaky class aka **the assassin class**

Where is it written that Nightblade doesn't mean assassin? It looks like an assassin, acts like an assassin, sounds like an assassin. Guess what? It's probably an assassin.

I genuinely cannot imagine thinking "Nightblade" doesn't equal assassin or some sort of stealth fighter.

themaddaedra · January 2020

It's a very large issue with the center being all classes should perform all roles nonsense. This has been the way they want to build the classes and also how they have advertised the game over the years.

Many people kept suggesting rock-paper-scissor balance instead of this one but they just won't do it.

I hate this fact myself but this is the best assassin class you'll get as long as it has to be healer and tank as well at the same time.

oxygen_thief · January 2020

Noxavian wrote: »

I genuinely cannot imagine thinking "Nightblade" doesn't equal assassin or some sort of stealth fighter.

you can think whatever you want but theirs no word assassing or killer or something like that in class description.

Czekoludek · January 2020

oxygen_thief wrote: »

Noxavian wrote: »

I genuinely cannot imagine thinking "Nightblade" doesn't equal assassin or some sort of stealth fighter.

you can think whatever you want but theirs no word assassing or killer or something like that in class description.

They literally have skill line called "Assassination", skill called "Assassin's Blade" and a passive called "Master Assassin". But sure, they didn't sound like something related to assassins at all

evoniee · January 2020

i only slot four class skill as nb in pvp.

one for delayed spamable, give a gimmick heal and mitigation, which is replaceable by other class.
one for heal also replaceable by any other class.
one for sustain and semi heal like any other class.
one for mitigation utility, which any other class will slot and do better anyway.

pretty impressive?
yeah i dont even slot class spammable and damage ulti because how bad they re rn, falking sad honestly.
yeah i play no clak, im not even an assassin anymore, i change my nb career.

SidraWillowsky · January 2020

OHHHH do every class please!

Valykc · January 2020

Omg, I’m crying from laughter! This is one of the best things I have ever read on these forums 😂

NarutoUzumaki24 · January 2020

Very accurate. Please do the other classes as well.

Cavedog · January 2020

NB isn't a class, it's cloak with a handful of other balance breaking abilities.

azjuwelz · January 2020

I laughed.

And then I cried. (Miss the no cast time! And defile! And stun! Any stun!)

I know, it was previously overpowered, but now nightblades truly are shadows of their former selves.

I'd love to see the others!

Ei8htba11 · January 2020

Cavedog wrote: »

NB isn't a class, it's cloak with a handful of other balance breaking abilities.

Gilvoth · January 2020

we need a properly made assassin class that has:

invisibility
Very FAST sneak speeds
proper assassin skills

the current nightblade class simply does nmot properly fill the assassin role and assassin skills.

Gilvoth · January 2020

SidraWillowsky wrote: »

OHHHH do every class please!

the Honestly DO all need to be rebuilt and make new ones.
OR simply remove classes alltogether and let us choose from skills

Minor Skills
Major skills
healing skills
defensive skills

2 from each list so its balanced and not overpowered

Finedaible · January 2020

Nightblades are a shadow of their former selves.

NBs used to be fun to play, and quite unique too, but they became another generic class with weapon skill builds for the stamina variants because ZoS overbuffed generic skill lines and forgot about NB skills, while also copy-pasting Grim Focus onto Sorcs with minor changes and overloaded (no pun intended) passives just for having Bound Armaments slotted. This came shortly after Devs deemed Grim Focus was "too overloaded"; The very definition of Hypocritical game design choices.

Nightblade healers in particular were fun because your healing of other party members depended somewhat on your ability to damage the enemy. Was this overpowered compared to other classes? Maybe, but it was far more interesting niche than these generic skill-line builds we have now. Why even roll a nightblade at all now? They don't really have anything unique gogin for them now that other classes can't do.

sproattt · January 2020

Too many meta changes too soon changed the class forever. Dot buff put us down, they removed the dot but kept the tank meta which put us down again.

Cast times, removal of key features such as stun/defile on cap, removal of key identity features on Fear for NBS; too much too soon gutted it.

I still play it but on a 37k HP, HP regen/Stanm regen build, nowhere near Tanky as some black rose spamming most forming Templars out there.... Oh btw, BRP 30% then Mist form = unkillable players.

sproattt · January 2020

Mist Forming*

Drako_Ei · January 2020

Dont forget to add hardest rotation in the game but one of the weakest classes for dps, please just buy necromancer

Finedaible · January 2020

Gilvoth wrote: »

we need a properly made assassin class that has:

invisibility
Very FAST sneak speeds
proper assassin skills

the current nightblade class simply does nmot properly fill the assassin role and assassin skills.

What's ironic is that for stamblades - at least - Two-Hander skills and Fighter's Guild fear are arguably better than ANY of Nightblade Assassination skills... So yeah, fun times for Nightblades' rogue/assassin identity.... Only thing left is cloak which is garbage in its current state.

xenowarrior92eb17_ESO · January 2020

as a nb since early access...I feel depressed now.

Tommy_The_Gun · January 2020

GrumpyDuckling wrote: »

In-Game Description: “Nightblades are adventurers and opportunists with a gift for getting in and out of trouble. Relying variously on stealth, blades, and speed, Nightblades thrive on conflict and misfortune, trusting to their luck and cunning to survive.”

Honest Description: “Nightblades are kinda, sorta, maybe the sneaking class in ESO, but you aren’t really encouraged to sneak. You get your speed penalized while sneaking (same as every other class), and most of your skills and passives don’t really encourage you to attack from sneak. Well, two of them kinda do… but, eh, you basically have to just play Nightblade like you would any other class. Feel free to be somewhat stealthy every once in a while, though, because one of your skills lets you turn invisible, which, by the way, is a class-defining skill that is totally 100% useless in most serious content (PVP excluded, because it actually works there and makes everyone hate you).

Also, you are into blood stuff because one-third of the class is dedicated to blood magic. Don’t worry, this doesn’t make you a vampire -- you just, for some reason, have way more options for blood-themed skills than vampires do, which, if you think about it, totally makes sense because…
Anyway, this bloody skill line gives you access to two powerful major damage buffs (brutality and sorcery), but don’t get too excited to enjoy them unless you meet the necessary conditions of having an enemy within melee range -- as if anyone wanted to play an archer and ranged mage anyway.

Let’s not forget that playing a Nightblade means that you get to be an assassin! There’s even an aptly-named skill line dedicated to such endeavors! This skill line gives you the greatest strengths associated with the traditional Elder Scrolls assassin archetype, including: an ultimate with the passive ability to restore resources, a skill that helps protect you from area attacks, and a skill that encourages you to do the totally normal and expected assassin-like thing of standing in front of a target and wailing on them with light and heavy attacks as a way to bulk up your defenses and make you tankier...
Oh, but don’t you worry because you still get to be a sneaky assassin and use the Blade of Woe to assassinate the weakest of overland enemies from stealth… just like every other class in the game who can perform the same exact assassin moves. Son-of-a…”

Nightblade Class: The Elder Scrolls Online
“Play the way you want.”

As some one playing this game since launch, I can only say this:
its-true-all-of-it.jpg.76e8aca3bf80de7f8f91b63f4f844750.jpg

And this is kinda sad. It pretty much shows what classes used to be, and what they are now (if you did same thread on other classes it would be the same story).
Also recent "class identity" stuff is kinda mind boggling...

- Fear - NB class identity skill, is now available for every class (fighters guild skill). Previously, you could have access to it (if you really wanted), but with a great sacrifice - you had to be WW in WW form...
- Grim focus - another NB class identity skill is now also used also by sorcs. It is basically just a copy paste with slightly different skin & animation... And what is bizarre, is that it is supposed to be a sorc identity skill... lol...
- Teleport strike - yet another NB class identity skill, is now also available for all classes in dual wield skill line...

Also, you have invisibility potions, so even if you are not a NB, you can be invisable too...

Seeing how ZOS handled DK and Sorc class identity last patch (throwing rocks at people & copy-paste grim focus) I don't expect anything good... but time will tell...

Brennric · January 2020

fiender66 wrote: »

It eludes me why most say that invisibility is useless in PVE. Well, it IS useless in endgame and even before that, against most bosses, but when you are soloing delves and dungeons, I found it super useful. My little bosmer NB (also a patented assassin) went through like a breeze, avoiding tons of embarrassing and/or boring/frustrating situations. In particular, she completed Murkmire w/o bothering all those pesky vegetables, not to say the Deshaan crocs. OFC this comes at a cost (no wonder...), that is a slower experience: now that she has come of age (really? lvl33) she wants lvl50 gear and engages way more often in fights. Needless to say, BG is great fun, and using surprise attack out of invisibility really works

I guess the argument would be that's is useless when you get to be a little higher. It is way, way, way faster for me to blow up every enemy in front of me than it is to sneak past in every delve or dungeon I can solo. And to have an entire mechanic be basically useless at higher levels (where every single character will spend the vast majority of their gaming life) seems like a missed opportunity