Please give NB a viable defensive PvP alternative to cloak. Or give us our burst back.

Nyladreas · January 2020

Right now NB in PVP:

Stamina: ULTRA Squishy Assassin / Useless Tank
Magicka: MEGA Squishy Rogue-Mage/Useless Tank/Subpar but near unkillable healer
Magblade at least has the benefit of using their main stat pool with their main defensives but still makes me wanna barf.

There is no middle ground. There is nothing that lets you actually play your nightblade effectively in current meta. And if there actually is, we have to sacrifice so many things that make the class fun, barely anyone really wants to run it as it kind of loses point. ZOS, you took all our burst tools, everything is delayed/cast timed/impossible to stack, give us something to compensate.

We need some more alternatives to going defensive, and I DO NOT MEAN STUFF LIKE BLATANT FLAVOURLESS DAMAGE REDUCTION. Actually give us something along the lines all the other classes have. It's been so long and Nightblade still can't fully stand up to the meta. The only way to do it in most cases is to go SOLO and just 1v1 unaware targets. I have 0 desire to even log into the game anymore, because of how frustrating the NB (especially magblade) experience is.

Can you PLEASE look at nightblades and DO something. People give you 100s of suggestions and ideas, and 100s of posts of constructive criticism and you're constantly ignoring every bit of it.

NOT TO MENTION THAT CLOAK IS SUCH AN ANNOYING ABILITY TO BOTH USE OR PLAY AGAINST, BECAUSE IT RARELY SEEMS TO WORK WHENEVER YOU NEED IT THE MOST
^ In addition to that - everyone and their mother runs anti-cloaking measures like Pots, Aoes, Anti-Stealth, you name it. So even if you can actually kill someone you just die with nearly 0 ways to defend yourself, especially when your shadow image horribly and brutally fails you.

If we keep our current meta, we need to change something. Right now! I would rather be able to have some form of self-sustain, built-in defense and actually truly fight my opponent AND STILL be able to reliably kill him without having to rely on 3 different set procs, also than having to rely on stealth 99% of the time, even fearing to step out of it for a second cause everything just shreds you in blink of an eye. Plus, your self-heals are next to useless in an ongoing fight as a nightblade, they do virtually NOTHING apart from Rally - without which you're pretty much screwed to hell and it's not even a class skill to begin with. Having to dis-engage constantly from a fight has never EVER been so frustrating even in the history of THIS game.

If you'd rather give us back our burst, don't forget to actually give relentless Minor Force/Berserk back. As it stands we're a class that's extremely limited by skill bar slots, aka we don't have enough, to even be on par with others. Help us out at least this way.

sproattt · January 2020

Yeah cast times are the worst issue that affect Nightblade the most. Happy to have all my skills nerfed if they can actually land on the target, games a laggy disaster and impossible to land your delayed abilities.

P.S Saw block and bash has been rekt again by ZoS. Now we won't be able to properly block meteor or leap on time now; hi ZoS.

Fix the ***.

Strider__Roshin · January 2020

Nightblades are just such a gutted class. Compare them to wardens and you'll see that they're weaker offensively, defensively, and when it comes to utility. Nightblades are a terrible class, and if that's your main I would suggest rerolling or play a different game.

Iskiab · January 2020

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Nightblades are just such a gutted class. Compare them to wardens and you'll see that they're weaker offensively, defensively, and when it comes to utility. Nightblades are a terrible class, and if that's your main I would suggest rerolling or play a different game.

Yea, just reroll. That’s what I did. You’re either going to repeatedly get upset or just roll another class that interests you.

Strider__Roshin · January 2020

Iskiab wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Nightblades are just such a gutted class. Compare them to wardens and you'll see that they're weaker offensively, defensively, and when it comes to utility. Nightblades are a terrible class, and if that's your main I would suggest rerolling or play a different game.

Yea, just reroll. That’s what I did. You’re either going to repeatedly get upset or just roll another class that interests you.

I chose the latter, but I still keep up with the game to see if they ever make it worth returning to.

Nyladreas · January 2020

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Iskiab wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Nightblades are just such a gutted class. Compare them to wardens and you'll see that they're weaker offensively, defensively, and when it comes to utility. Nightblades are a terrible class, and if that's your main I would suggest rerolling or play a different game.

Yea, just reroll. That’s what I did. You’re either going to repeatedly get upset or just roll another class that interests you.

I chose the latter, but I still keep up with the game to see if they ever make it worth returning to.

Exactly, that's me, i don't wanna reroll, i don't wanna change, i *** on the meta and *** on the FoTM, I have a character i have been playing for years and i just want that one functional, enjoyable, satisfying, <insert possitive adjective>, if it doesnt work at all anymore then I might as well just stop playing tha game entirely, because that said character makes 80% of the game for me, as silly as it may sound.

Somewhere deep in my mind i keep thinking: Hey, maybe there is this one build, this one single untouchable, amazing and unknown secret build that works... A build that would haunt my opponents even in their dreams. But so far.... nope

Strider__Roshin · January 2020

Nyladreas wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Iskiab wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Nightblades are just such a gutted class. Compare them to wardens and you'll see that they're weaker offensively, defensively, and when it comes to utility. Nightblades are a terrible class, and if that's your main I would suggest rerolling or play a different game.

Yea, just reroll. That’s what I did. You’re either going to repeatedly get upset or just roll another class that interests you.

I chose the latter, but I still keep up with the game to see if they ever make it worth returning to.

Exactly, that's me, i don't wanna reroll, i don't wanna change, i *** on the meta and *** on the FoTM, I have a character i have been playing for years and i just want that one functional, enjoyable, satisfying, <insert possitive adjective>, if it doesnt work at all anymore then I might as well just stop playing tha game entirely, because that said character makes 80% of the game for me, as silly as it may sound.

Somewhere deep in my mind i keep thinking: Hey, maybe there is this one build, this one single untouchable, amazing and unknown secret build that works... A build that would haunt my opponents even in their dreams. But so far.... nope

There are builds that will make you powerful, but you'd be even more powerful if you were using a Warden.

olsborg · January 2020

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

There are builds that will make you powerful, but you'd be even more powerful if you were using a Warden.

Every build you make on a nb, will be more powerful on any other class. NB atm lacks everything except sustain.

Nyladreas · January 2020

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Nyladreas wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Iskiab wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Nightblades are just such a gutted class. Compare them to wardens and you'll see that they're weaker offensively, defensively, and when it comes to utility. Nightblades are a terrible class, and if that's your main I would suggest rerolling or play a different game.

Yea, just reroll. That’s what I did. You’re either going to repeatedly get upset or just roll another class that interests you.

I chose the latter, but I still keep up with the game to see if they ever make it worth returning to.

Exactly, that's me, i don't wanna reroll, i don't wanna change, i *** on the meta and *** on the FoTM, I have a character i have been playing for years and i just want that one functional, enjoyable, satisfying, <insert possitive adjective>, if it doesnt work at all anymore then I might as well just stop playing tha game entirely, because that said character makes 80% of the game for me, as silly as it may sound.

Somewhere deep in my mind i keep thinking: Hey, maybe there is this one build, this one single untouchable, amazing and unknown secret build that works... A build that would haunt my opponents even in their dreams. But so far.... nope

There are builds that will make you powerful, but you'd be even more powerful if you were using a Warden.

Hence there is no point playing a NB, so exactly my point again

Because this:

olsborg wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

There are builds that will make you powerful, but you'd be even more powerful if you were using a Warden.

Every build you make on a nb, will be more powerful on any other class. NB atm lacks everything except sustain.

Yep.

And ofc we can't ever have perfect balance, but it doesnt mean Class A gets 100% power, while Class B gets 70%. It should actually feel like 100% vs 95% if anything.

EtTuBrutus · January 2020

Good cloak or shade. Its a play style thing. If you are bad at being a night blade, move to a different class. They're really not taking that much more damage than other classes besides necro.

Nyladreas · January 2020

EtTuBrutus wrote: »

Good cloak or shade. Its a play style thing. If you are bad at being a night blade, move to a different class. They're really not taking that much more damage than other classes besides necro.

The point of the thread wasn't this. The point of this entire topic is that NB cannot equally stand up to any currently available class in terms of power-balance. We always have to sacrifice A for B, while other classes walk out of this on much much MUCH lighter terms

Iskiab · January 2020

olsborg wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

There are builds that will make you powerful, but you'd be even more powerful if you were using a Warden.

Every build you make on a nb, will be more powerful on any other class. NB atm lacks everything except sustain.

Actually sustain sucks too. Defensive abilities cost more then offensive abilities in general, and all the kiting tools are expensive too.

When I built my magblade I usually ran 800 or so more mag regen in my builds as a sort of magblade tax. 2k min mag regen on a magblade and I run 1400 as a magplar and 1300 as a MagWarden.

Sustain is bad, passive mitigation is good, self healing is the worst, speed is bad, damage/burst is bad. That sums up Magblade.

So many opinions on the forums are out of date.

Kadoozy · January 2020

olsborg wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

There are builds that will make you powerful, but you'd be even more powerful if you were using a Warden.

Every build you make on a nb, will be more powerful on any other class. NB atm lacks everything except sustain.

I mean, throw Caluurion on a magblade and no class can match up with it. It sucks that you gotta cheese on a nb to make it work, but damn if one shotting 90% of the player base doesn't feel amazing.

brandonv516 · January 2020

Kadoozy wrote: »

olsborg wrote: »

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

There are builds that will make you powerful, but you'd be even more powerful if you were using a Warden.

Every build you make on a nb, will be more powerful on any other class. NB atm lacks everything except sustain.

I mean, throw Caluurion on a magblade and no class can match up with it. It sucks that you gotta cheese on a nb to make it work, but damn if one shotting 90% of the player base doesn't feel amazing.

This. It's literally the only reason I'm still doing so well.

Flame Clench procs Caluurions which I can follow with Spectral Bow. Both are nearly guaranteed to hit at a closer range because of the knockback.

The downside is I don't really have an effective ultimate to add to the mix. Meteor will get blocked, the knockback from Flame Clench makes Soul Tether and Soul Harvest redundant, and Soul Assault is silly and too expensive.

MincVinyl · January 2020

How come nobody has complained that nb has pretty much been reduced to a *** proc build playstyle. Wouldn't it be nice to bring back some older styles of nb like sap builds or melee magblade. All there exists now is a really dull class that gets 90% of its damage from light attacks and spectral bow, which is easily timed and countered.

I would consider going back to magblade if instead of running a one trick pony proc setup I could set up a more skill based or active build.

Edziu · January 2020

Strider__Roshin wrote: »

Nightblades are just such a gutted class. Compare them to wardens and you'll see that they're weaker offensively, defensively, and when it comes to utility. Nightblades are a terrible class, and if that's your main I would suggest rerolling or play a different game.

it is just sad as I remember when NB was in great spot, between magica and stamina variety, for everything he was fine and ofc lazy ignorant players was calling for nerfs because other classes was undewhelming...instead calling for balance to other classes how defenders of this nb was arguing which was right

and now we see how some ither classes are in better which would be at all after all in this passed time....these some classes needed to get their balance, buffs but with thanks to those "to lazy to learn to play" it was at cost of nb from great spot of balance in build varietes

the worst community in every other online game ever
pure toxic community is not that very bad as this community here which is founded on nerf calls mostly whatever it will be

iCaliban · January 2020

Buff dark cloak. Push players away from the gank playstyle.

NyassaV · January 2020

iCaliban wrote: »

Buff dark cloak. Push players away from the gank playstyle.

Just cuz you use cloak doesn't mean you're a ganker lol. Though more often then that that can be found as the case

kaithuzar · January 2020

iCaliban wrote: »

Buff dark cloak. Push players away from the gank playstyle.

Spoken like a true sorc XD

MaskedHuman · January 2020

I think nightblades both mag and stam are not even close to being squishy, they have built in minor maim, minor protection, and major evasion. I think the problem with nightblades both mag and stam is that they've become a no damage tanks. both when I fought them and played them I felt the same way. I much prefer the old nightblades, stamblade was squishy but has super high damage with incap stun and perma minor berserk, same with magblade, they were very squishy but they played like an actual assassins class.
My suggestions would be to remove minor maim from shade, rework blur and give back incap stun, and minor berserk, and give back major fracture to suprise attack

Nyladreas · January 2020

MaskedHuman wrote: »

I think nightblades both mag and stam are not even close to being squishy, they have built in minor maim, minor protection, and major evasion. I think the problem with nightblades both mag and stam is that they've become a no damage tanks. both when I fought them and played them I felt the same way. I much prefer the old nightblades, stamblade was squishy but has super high damage with incap stun and perma minor berserk, same with magblade, they were very squishy but they played like an actual assassins class.
My suggestions would be to remove minor maim from shade, rework blur and give back incap stun, and minor berserk, and give back major fracture to suprise attack

That's the thing though. To use our defensive toolkit means we lose our damage. When you want high damage to kill these tanks in our current meta and keep enough sustain you gotta go for a build that is so squishy a flying grain of dust kills you.

MaskedHuman · January 2020

Nyladreas wrote: »

MaskedHuman wrote: »

I think nightblades both mag and stam are not even close to being squishy, they have built in minor maim, minor protection, and major evasion. I think the problem with nightblades both mag and stam is that they've become a no damage tanks. both when I fought them and played them I felt the same way. I much prefer the old nightblades, stamblade was squishy but has super high damage with incap stun and perma minor berserk, same with magblade, they were very squishy but they played like an actual assassins class.
My suggestions would be to remove minor maim from shade, rework blur and give back incap stun, and minor berserk, and give back major fracture to suprise attack

That's the thing though. To use our defensive toolkit means we lose our damage. When you want high damage to kill these tanks in our current meta and keep enough sustain you gotta go for a build that is so squishy a flying grain of dust kills you.

I do the same thing on my magdk, high damage high sustain and ignore building tankiness because we have no place to build for tankiness. still I think they should buff nightblades damage by a lot and nerf their damage mitigation. the tank meta doesn't help at all so im looking at this in a class power prespective and what it needs and what it misses. and I think it needs less damage mitigation, and a lot more damage.

Kadoin · January 2020

No problems on my mag NB except that:

1. Damage is kind of impossible to balance with defense
2. Seems required to run light armor
3. Mag pool almost always near empty unless perfect play; it literally is completely balanced with the thought of someone doing a rotation in PvE

4. Sets have too huge effect on how well you perform (probably more than any other class), and some sets have defensive power that is too much when combined with the damage reduction and avoidance NB has IMO but let me keep my mouth shut because I know that talking more will result in nerfs

I've said it before, but if you are pushed into a small subset of sets to make a class playable, something is not balanced and the design is bad.

Oh and remove soul siphon cast time. That skill already has delay because its AoE heal, then its lower on priority than damage, then it has cast time. Translation: worthless unless blockcasted, unless you slot that skill for slot effect

I would even use barrier over it.

Decimus · January 2020

While I don't think NB is terrible atm...

Considering wardens are getting 10% critical damage for practically free in this update (you know, because they definitely needed more damage /s), I wonder if it'd be too much asked for Relentless to grant Minor Force (or Minor Berserk again).

Just getting one more skill slot on NB (by not having to run RAT or Camo Hunter for max damage) would help a lot I think.

They could also make cloak a lot more reliable/fun to play with if det pots didn't have such a ridiculous duration (15,7 seconds), which makes fighting groups using them a rather painful experience where you don't really have any offensive window or ability to engage out of stealth. For comparison, other actual abilities designed to counter cloak each last around 3-5 seconds (Camo Hunter, Radiant Magelight) and have significantly less range (6m with Camo, 12m with Radiant... 20m with det pots). And you can't even tell someone is using det pots (because there's no visual indicator)... until it's too late.

I believe det pots to still be the main reason NBs get zerged down & why so many dislike playing the class.

Nyladreas · January 2020

Decimus wrote: »

While I don't think NB is terrible atm...

Considering wardens are getting 10% critical damage for practically free in this update (you know, because they definitely needed more damage /s), I wonder if it'd be too much asked for Relentless to grant Minor Force (or Minor Berserk again).

Just getting one more skill slot on NB (by not having to run RAT or Camo Hunter for max damage) would help a lot I think.

They could also make cloak a lot more reliable/fun to play with if det pots didn't have such a ridiculous duration (15,7 seconds), which makes fighting groups using them a rather painful experience where you don't really have any offensive window or ability to engage out of stealth. For comparison, other actual abilities designed to counter cloak each last around 3-5 seconds (Camo Hunter, Radiant Magelight) and have significantly less range (6m with Camo, 12m with Radiant... 20m with det pots). And you can't even tell someone is using det pots... until it's too late.

I believe det pots to still be the main reason NBs get zerged down & why so many dislike playing the class.

Totally agree here. We need some of our inbuilt passive damage back, but honestly we also need our reliable burst to actually be able to land it. As it works now it's insanely frustrating.

And hey, saw you in IC last night, was fun for awhile until our entire EP zerg rushed in out of nowhere and did exactly what you said. Detect pots and just roflcopter AoE on steroids. I honestly felt bad and logged out a couple minutes later seeing how stupid and distasteful pvp has become for us.

Faulgor · January 2020

Decimus wrote: »

While I don't think NB is terrible atm...

Considering wardens are getting 10% critical damage for practically free in this update (you know, because they definitely needed more damage /s), I wonder if it'd be too much asked for Relentless to grant Minor Force (or Minor Berserk again).

If Grim/Relentless wasn't already the most overloaded skill in the game, maybe.

I'll never understand why they had to add tanking and healing to that skill ...

Decimus · January 2020

Faulgor wrote: »

Decimus wrote: »

While I don't think NB is terrible atm...

Considering wardens are getting 10% critical damage for practically free in this update (you know, because they definitely needed more damage /s), I wonder if it'd be too much asked for Relentless to grant Minor Force (or Minor Berserk again).

If Grim/Relentless wasn't already the most overloaded skill in the game, maybe.

I'll never understand why they had to add tanking and healing to that skill ...

I would gladly trade the mitigation & healing for more damage... the healing part is extremely unreliable though and might as well not be there at all. A dodgeable skill with travel time that you need to build up to even use, and you've gotta be within 7m when/if it lands to get the heal? Who thought that'd be a good idea...

I think there's better skills on NB toolkit to slap extra mitigation on (Blur comes to mind).

iCaliban · January 2020

kaithuzar wrote: »

iCaliban wrote: »

Buff dark cloak. Push players away from the gank playstyle.

Spoken like a true sorc XD

This is the problem with these forums. Someone posts something actually in support of the general premise of the post and fools insult them.

Cloak is useless in group play which is most pvp. Buffing the morph that allows nb to actually help their teammates rather be parasitic cowards hiding in stealth would be good.

Ps: I have 2 nightblades.

Strider__Roshin · January 2020

iCaliban wrote: »

kaithuzar wrote: »

iCaliban wrote: »

Buff dark cloak. Push players away from the gank playstyle.

Spoken like a true sorc XD

This is the problem with these forums. Someone posts something actually in support of the general premise of the post and fools insult them.

Cloak is useless in group play which is most pvp. Buffing the morph that allows nb to actually help their teammates rather be parasitic cowards hiding in stealth would be good.

Ps: I have 2 nightblades.

I hear you bud, and I agree. The Dark Cloak morph should give adequate survivability for a brawler play style. And just for clarification when I say brawler I mean non-stealth NOT tanks or heavy armor specs; those latter play styles don't need any help obviously.

Solariken · January 2020

iCaliban wrote: »

kaithuzar wrote: »

iCaliban wrote: »

Buff dark cloak. Push players away from the gank playstyle.

Spoken like a true sorc XD

This is the problem with these forums. Someone posts something actually in support of the general premise of the post and fools insult them.

Cloak is useless in group play which is most pvp. Buffing the morph that allows nb to actually help their teammates rather be parasitic cowards hiding in stealth would be good.

Ps: I have 2 nightblades.

Haha why do so many people phrase it this way? It's THE guerilla class, literally how it was designed and intended to play. They would be stronger in group play if their single target power was more deadly than other classes, which it's not by a long shot.

Iskiab · January 2020

I think one option would be to make the dark cloak hot stack indefinitely. So you could stack it x amount of times and reduce the duration or retune the ability.

Might be sorta OP, IDK, I’d have to be carefully done so it’s not stupid.

If cloak is the reason magblade is undertuned, something with dark cloak makes sense.