Vermintide wrote: »

Bump for the bump god!

What's the state of magblade these days? We;ve been weak for a while, I left a few months ago when it felt like a couple of changes in the game as a whole pushed us to rock bottom (as long as I've been playing, at least). Have we got anything to be thankful for lately? Has the meta shifted somewhere that allows us an edge in?

My internet sucks these days so I won't be making the 60+gb download if we're still stuck where we were last October.

Not really, same old. There’ve been lots of balance swings lately, and PTS will be up in a couple weeks or so. Maybe there’ll be positive changes.

It’s still good in duels, for solo play okayish but a hard time with any tanky targets, poor in BGs, good in group play. It’s just the three areas magblade can do okay in the specs are totally different.

ThePedge wrote: »

Unfortunately burst is an issue. Basically need to stars to align and Fear -> Soul Siphon -> bow proc.

That has been the case as long as I can remember, way back into 2016 or so. Kill combo has always been the same. The trade off used to be we had the best resource management in the game. Sadly that has no longer been true for a very long while.

Iskiab wrote: »

Not really, same old. There’ve been lots of balance swings lately, and PTS will be up in a couple weeks or so. Maybe there’ll be positive changes.

It’s still good in duels, for solo play okayish but a hard time with any tanky targets, poor in BGs, good in group play. It’s just the three areas magblade can do okay in the specs are totally different.

Ugh. Not encouraging news then. I'll check back in maybe another month or two.

Before I left I was toying with bringing back a simple, very old school 5H/2L Seducer/Spinner type of build, seems like it would go well with some of the changes they made to mitigation etc recently. Think there would be any mileage in that?

IMO magblade is super fun to play on! Unlike other patches where Playing a nightblade was considered a carry, it is one of the hardest if not the hardest class to solo on. The survivability on it compared to other classes is laughable. With that being said, it’s one of the most rewarding classes to play on.

For a solo magblade, I’ve learned that heavy armour this patch is not a very viable option. Though it can kill some players, aka the very squishy pvers, you won’t be able to kill someone properly set up for pvp. The best option this patch is definitely light armour Mostly just for the spell pen passives.

After endless amounts of tests and theory crafting, I have found that high sustain is the best way to go this patch with pen and max stats taking a back seat in terms of higher importance. Some people play with tk but in all honesty, it’s not something you need. A lot of people tend to think that higher pen is better; (which is true in some cases) however, the majority of your time is spent kiting a Zerg or group around and pen doesn’t count towards healing. not to mention that we’re no longer in a resistance meta but a heal meta so pen is kind of meh. I kill people just fine with my soul harvest merciless burts.

Regarding monster sets, I usually run blood spawn (faster ult means faster resto ult for emergency heal) or shadowrend depending on the style I want to play. Occasionally, I’ll throw on engine guardian but I prefer the prior sets.

Healing and mitigation is very important this patch. I found hots to work better than burst heals. (Rapid regen, Dark cloak). It’s at the point where I can stay alive better with hots than shields. (One hot has a tool tip of 37k fully buffed) mitigation works waaay better than resistances especially with every stam toon running onslaught. The more mitigation, the better. (Maim, 10% merciless, protection, with sets being optional)

In terms of a 1v1, there’s very few builds or classes that I have lost against in a fair fight. In fact, I would go as far to say that a magblade, in the right hands of course, can easily outperform the majority of the “meta Builds” out there.

So long as merciless, fear, soul harvest and some sort of hard cc are on your front bar, I have found that Skills are all a matter of personal preference. Example: For solo open world play I play with vamp mist and phantasmal escape on back bar. For my play style, I have found that the major evasion is better than the minor force from race against time or the minor maim/kiteablitlty from shade. Unlike others, I have a very patient play style in which I will not try to burst until I have everything ready and If my burst doesn’t kill you in a 1 shot or followed by two swallow soul light attack spams, I will just go back to healing until I have everything ready again and will attempt to run you out of Stam. Just be sure you’re using shadowrend for access to minor maim.

Finally, it’s been nice not seeing that many nightblades running around everywhere. The majority of the people who “Mained it” before are now getting carried on other classes. it actually takes some brain to be able to effectively play this class either solo, or in a 1v1 scenario. There’s no copy and paste build that will make you into a god. At this point, if I see someone using a mag blade, I know they are A) either really good and have been playing magblade for a long time or b) really bad and are new to the game or are a zergling.

The following is a list of people who are, aside from me, still playing magblade and are able to solo:
- zDan (xbox), YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/user/iSelectify

- xJEJENUMx (ps4 NA/AD), YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/user/iSelectify

- isthereno1else

zDan is amazing. xJEJENUMx is probably the best magblade on AD. (There could be better players idk. Haven’t seen many around.) feel free to add your own.

If you're wearing light armor as a magblade in this patch you are doing it wrong. The magicka end of your class is busted right now. Extreme amounts of pressure and healing with very good burst and a ranged execute spammable. Figure out how to play it and enjoy it while it lasts before heavy armor passives get nerfed to the floor.

Koensol wrote: »

nublife01 wrote: »

Dude magblade is so freaking strong right now. Go equpi nma (heavy) spinners and bloodspawn with black rose back bar and just livelord everything and put out more pressure than any other class in the game outside of jav spam which is melee

nublife01 wrote: »

If you're wearing light armor as a magblade in this patch you are doing it wrong. The magicka end of your class is busted right now. Extreme amounts of pressure and healing with very good burst and a ranged execute spammable. Figure out how to play it and enjoy it while it lasts before heavy armor passives get nerfed to the floor.

Can I have what you're smoking?

[snip] I don't think he's figured out magblades have worse burst, healing and tankiness then stamblades. Any setups he says are OP for magblade can be done better as a stamblade unless it's a cloak spammer build.

[edited for baiting]

SpiderCultist wrote: »

hey, I'm back after a few months break

I've missed lots of patch notes and too lazy to read 35 pages here

so what are the news? any decent build or idea? I played yesterday with my mNB and felt really clunky, Swallow Soul hitting for 2k on magsorcs ,etc. I can't compete by any mean with them...

Magblades are hot garbage right now. I'm waiting to see what changes turn up on the PTS, and if the class doesn't get a [substantial] rework, I'm throwing in the towel. I can't speak re: Cyrodiil/CP PVP, but in BGs they are almost completely non-viable against other classes once you rise above the lower tiers & are playing even semi-competent players.

Pick magblade if your primary goal is to be the most effective at sneaking off in retreat from a fight you can't possibly hope to win — if you actually want kills, pick another class. Any other class.

Iskiab wrote: »

Koensol wrote: »

nublife01 wrote: »

Dude magblade is so freaking strong right now. Go equpi nma (heavy) spinners and bloodspawn with black rose back bar and just livelord everything and put out more pressure than any other class in the game outside of jav spam which is melee

nublife01 wrote: »

If you're wearing light armor as a magblade in this patch you are doing it wrong. The magicka end of your class is busted right now. Extreme amounts of pressure and healing with very good burst and a ranged execute spammable. Figure out how to play it and enjoy it while it lasts before heavy armor passives get nerfed to the floor.

Can I have what you're smoking?

[snip] I don't think he's figured out magblades have worse burst, healing and tankiness then stamblades. Any setups he says are OP for magblade can be done better as a stamblade unless it's a cloak spammer build.

I honestly had to chuckle at the part where he said "extreme amounts of pressure". If he's not trolling then he's either fighting potato's or getting carried by others. Magblade with NMA in heavy lmao. Lets take the class with the worst sustain and slap on 2 damage sets in heavy armor with a 5% cost increase on top, while relying on a very expensive (and garbage tier) healing ward to survive

[edited to remove quote]

Nightblade is and has been in such a terrible position for BG’s & small scale/solo play for 3 months or so now.

It really saddens me that the rogue/assassin archetype class is completely unable to burst down aka overwhelm a player with damage due to the amount of damage other classes passively have, enabling them to all build as tanks.

It feels as if nightblade has 1-3% more damage than other classes when we spec into 100% damage & die whenever we’re looked at, while everyone else gets 90% of the damage we have AND the ability to tank for days.

BG’s are heavily dominants by AOE damage but many users also have a ton of speed which makes things like our Veil ultimate seemingly useless due to the fact that it’s stationary. I would argue the warden tree ult is even better than Soul Siphon.
Sap has had many nerfs through the years I think the damage version of refreshing path is even better & that doesn’t even proc set bonuses like scathing anymore but can’t necro proc it’s own synergies with harmony builds LOLOLOL

Nightblade is sheer trash can right now & I can’t pray hard enough that they do something to help us.

See the PTS notes? Thoughts?

Main things:
- some set changes that might help a bit, hard to tell from notes
- Scathing mage might be good
- Dizzy will stun off balance targets, off balance will have a CD so will be up 1/3 of the time
- Single target abilities will be able to target people in stealth

Overall? Hard to say, I think things will be worse overall. Expect things to be harder 1v1, the last time dizzy stunned was when I quit magblade

fred4 wrote: »

Scathing looks like 100% uptime, as long as you are in combat. Unlike, say, Spell Strategist, this will buff healing, but then again Swallow Soul keys off damage done, so it's a wash there.

How do you figure? It's still a 20% chance to proc, no? My guess would be an uptime of ~83% tops, and that's probably very optimistic. Am I missing something?

It's definitely better for lower crit builds now though. Should make it more viable in BGs.

fred4 wrote: »

Langeston wrote: »

fred4 wrote: »

Scathing looks like 100% uptime, as long as you are in combat. Unlike, say, Spell Strategist, this will buff healing, but then again Swallow Soul keys off damage done, so it's a wash there.

How do you figure? It's still a 20% chance to proc, no? And now that the cooldown doesn't overlap it's literally impossible to be up 100%. My guess would be ~83% tops, and that's probably very optimistic. Am I missing something?

It's definitely better for lower crit builds now though. Should make it more viable in BGs.

Fair enough. I think I overlooked the proc chance, but also I'm a PvPer. 83% and 100% are near equivalent for me. I was thinking of either using Crushing Shock or Sweeps. I suppose a sorc, being single target, will be just as well served with Spell Strategist or another set, but a templar? This is basically New Moon Acolyte without the cost increase. Sweeps is direct damage now and presumably amounts to 4 proc chances.

Yea, scathing is good as a magtemplar. Still melee life will be a lot harder with dizzy stunning. The snare on ritual is gone too.

Both magplar and MagWarden got little nerfs. Invig drain will be useless which will hit magwarden. Snare on ritual gone which will hit magtemplar.

If there’s a winner this patch I’d say it’ll be stamWarden, maybe stamnecro depending on the Necro fixes. High burst stam classes will be really tough I think.

SRASinister wrote: »

What is everyone running for Bar setups especially on Destro/Restro? I have trouble fitting things on each of my bars without sacrificing something I need for survivability vs damage vs a cc. I also had trouble picking a mundus stone since people would recommend me apprentice, mage, thief, shadow or even the lover.

There isn’t one way to set it up. Most magblade specs are missing a key thing in their builds, most specs are about how to overcome this weakness.

Only thing that’s required: stun, cloak, merciless, and a siphoning ability. Usually people go swallow soul as the spammable to save bar space, but since the ability sucks I usually try to avoid it.

Changes to solo queues only in BGs will be awesome for Magblades.

There will still be many coordinated players (especially at a higher MMR) but without the premade balls I'll be dominating even more lol.

Iskiab wrote: »

brandonv516 wrote: »

Changes to solo queues only in BGs will be awesome for Magblades.

There will still be many coordinated players (especially at a higher MMR) but without the premade balls I'll be dominating even more lol.

Maybe PC-EU is different. On PC-NA there aren’t a lot of premades, and the ones you see aren’t dominant players. High MMR is mostly solo players who play together naturally without queueing together.

I'm Xbox NA. Plenty of ball group premades running around that I come up against.