Dark cloak - what are you doing? any why?

Weisstag · July 2022

Okay so what is the deal with dark cloak getting absolutely nuked? Who do you think is going to be using it after it's been made completely utterly useless? What is wrong with the dark cloak on live? Has anyone EVER complained about dark cloak being too strong or something? Please, I need answers... why am I not allowed to play a nightblade that doesn't hide all the time? Out of all the changes introduced in this evil patch, nuking dark cloak is the least justified nerf. There is 0 arguments for this change. Oh my.... this tilts me so hard lol... don't lock NBs into being one trick ponies

Mr_Stach · July 2022

I think it's weird. It's like they want it to be more "Green Dragon Bloody" but a lot worse.

Iron_Blurr · July 2022

Imagine being a NB tank and getting around 3k heals per second that quickly degrade to about 1k hps.
It will take 10 seconds to heal back up to full.
All the while you are still getting attacked by a trial boss.
That translates to you being at less than full health for longer. So the first heavy attack may drop you from 45k hp to 22k hp. Then you heal a tiny bit and get back up to ~30k HP and you take another big hit which brings you down to under 10k if you even survive.
Meanwhile DK tank can just hit igneous for major mending and instantly get a huge burst of health back with coagulating or even green dragon blood.

Oh and they have magma shell 97% damage mitigation for 200 ulti
Meanwhile NB tank gets bolstering darkness... 10% damage mitigation for 200 ulti.

I cancelled my subscription over this change.

Iron_Blurr · July 2022

Mr_Stach wrote: »

I think it's weird. Like it's they want it to be more "Green Dragon Bloody" but a lot worse.

GDB is inferior to coagulating blood on a DK tank anyways. I believe The tank club has a video on it on YouTube.
Even if it was as strong as gdb, DK still gets major mending and a shield. That shield instantly gives them more effective max health and major mending so they can burst heal back to full or nearly full health.

Mr_Stach · July 2022

Iron_Blurr wrote: »

Mr_Stach wrote: »

I think it's weird. Like it's they want it to be more "Green Dragon Bloody" but a lot worse.

GDB is inferior to coagulating blood on a DK tank anyways. I believe The tank club has a video on it on YouTube.
Even if it was as strong as gdb, DK still gets major mending and a shield. That shield instantly gives them more effective max health and major mending so they can burst heal back to full or nearly full health.

That's true, I was just comparing the actual change to the heal being based on missing health vs being a HoT.

Coag is like a weird execute healing thing going on too so the comparison is weird. Where with gdb the flat 33% plus buffs. Which is more directly comparable to Dark Cloak which is heal plus buff.

But whatevs. Dark Cloak is very meh no matter which morph you compare it to.

Iron_Blurr · July 2022

Dark cloak is now even weaker than vampire drain. That's how pathetic it is now.

Dragonredux · July 2022

Iron_Blurr wrote: »

Dark cloak is now even weaker than vampire drain. That's how pathetic it is now.

That's the real tragedy. Forget Green Dragon Blood, when it's almost worse than Vamp Drain saved the fact that Dark Cloak doesn't have a cast time. We have a real problem.

Foxtrot39 · July 2022

guess I can dump my role as NB tank with no good burst heal outside soul syphon ultimate time to swap to healer

emilyhyoyeon · July 2022

I felt compelled to make a sorc tank a month ago, before that my nightblade was my only tank. I think I'm psychic

Imnotsurewho · July 2022

It's not even just for PvE tanks that this Dark Cloak change is bad. I play a brawler stamblade in PvP and the live Dark Cloak HoT is essential to surviving getting Xv1'd. At it's previous percentages on PTS week 1 I was getting at very low health about 8k initial tick (non-crit) with minor and major mending, and then it would drop off dramatically thereafter.

That felt ok, but lowering the percentage to the 11-14% will be a quick way to get it off my skill bar.

I enjoy playing NB in a way that's a bit different. I love the off-meta builds and that's 100% what Dark Cloak is for. Beginner NB's don't know how much fun they can have with this skill because they're all too busy running Shadowy Cloak. Fine, their choice. Ganking has its merits. But the brawler part is just so fun, and I feel this reduction in the percentage will be killing some of the build diversity imo.

But I know some people might think I just want brawlerblade to be overtuned so I can crush with it and that my motivations are selfish, but those people couldn't be more wrong. I want NB, and all classes, to feel balanced in order for good competition to take place.

Brrrofski · July 2022

I'm not sure why either.

In PVE, NB tanks aren't a go to for the heal. People aren't flocking to it because of dark cloak. So it's not like it's a change to make other classes closer.

In PvP, it's an ok heal. Just ok. It only last 5 seconds, and heals for like 10k total, if you invest some healings amplifications to it. But NBs aren't getting crazy healing with it. And for 90% of builds, invis is a better option.

It will heal for barely anything in PvP after battle spirit. Hosts are meant to top you up, keeping them running at all times to keep your health up. What good is waiting to cast this until 30% health? At that point you need a burst heal. The DK heal is burst, so makes way more sense. This doesn't though.

Nobody is complaining about how strong it is anywhere. Because it wasn't too strong anywhere. It was decent, that's all.

Really is a baffling change tbh. And not a good one

Weisstag · July 2022

Imnotsurewho wrote: »

It's not even just for PvE tanks that this Dark Cloak change is bad. I play a brawler stamblade in PvP and the live Dark Cloak HoT is essential to surviving getting Xv1'd. At it's previous percentages on PTS week 1 I was getting at very low health about 8k initial tick (non-crit) with minor and major mending, and then it would drop off dramatically thereafter.

That felt ok, but lowering the percentage to the 11-14% will be a quick way to get it off my skill bar.

I enjoy playing NB in a way that's a bit different. I love the off-meta builds and that's 100% what Dark Cloak is for. Beginner NB's don't know how much fun they can have with this skill because they're all too busy running Shadowy Cloak. Fine, their choice. Ganking has its merits. But the brawler part is just so fun, and I feel this reduction in the percentage will be killing some of the build diversity imo.

But I know some people might think I just want brawlerblade to be overtuned so I can crush with it and that my motivations are selfish, but those people couldn't be more wrong. I want NB, and all classes, to feel balanced in order for good competition to take place.

That's exactly where in comming from, I just didn't want to make this thread based around PvP since this change affects pve tanks quite a lot too.
I play only PvP and dark cloak aoe nb is my go to build, so taking away the ability to pre buff with dark cloak before engaging enemy is death sentence. I'll use healing path instead, no other way around it.

Also there is no point to cast dark cloak to heal at low hp even with the 20% modifier. If in low I'm casting healthy offering into vigor and previously dark cloak, now I'll have to dance on refreshing path instead of casting dark cloak.

Imnotsurewho · July 2022

Ok, I speak ZOS's language here. I have data.

In a no-CP environment (on PTS I just dumped my CP as that's the best I could do), I have basically the same setup (PTS I had Mirage in place of Killer's Blade so in theory tankier) and I went to a Cyrodiil resource and grabbed all the guards and let them hit on me for a bit. Here's how it went:

Live

PTS week 3

Anecdotally, I survived the live resource and died on the PTS one.

I'd say Dark Cloak on PTS is missing that bit that tops you up and even prevents your health from getting into execute range for other players to pile on as they see you're the vulnerable target going down. I would've died even quicker if there were players here using executes as I was in execute range far more often on the PTS than live.

ZOS if you want clips of both, just reach out and I can send them to you.

p4l4mu7 · July 2022

Imnotsurewho wrote: »

Ok, I speak ZOS's language here. I have data.

In a no-CP environment (on PTS I just dumped my CP as that's the best I could do), I have basically the same setup (PTS I had Mirage in place of Killer's Blade so in theory tankier) and I went to a Cyrodiil resource and grabbed all the guards and let them hit on me for a bit. Here's how it went:

Live

PTS week 3

Anecdotally, I survived the live resource and died on the PTS one.

I'd say Dark Cloak on PTS is missing that bit that tops you up and even prevents your health from getting into execute range for other players to pile on as they see you're the vulnerable target going down. I would've died even quicker if there were players here using executes as I was in execute range far more often on the PTS than live.

ZOS if you want clips of both, just reach out and I can send them to you.

This...
We have all these people taking their time testing everything, providing Zos amazing data and then we get mocked by Zos, they claim we are afraid of change, we will get used to it etc. If only they listened these people trying to help them this game would have been in much better state.

Dagobertfuk · August 2022

Im talking from pvp perspective, with halfed heal

Dark Cloak how it is on actual PTS will be a Skill nobody will use ever again. A nerf for no *** reason. Like it was stronger than other Heals. Vigor was way stronger. And since vigor gets major resolve its even less worth it, to even think about using it as a Nightblade.

My Nightblade in Cyrodiil on live servers with 40k HP gets 2,6k hps with dark cloak. After the first Dark Cloak Nerf in pts week one or two, i had to be 50% Player HP to get the heal value from live servers. Right now on pts after the second nerf, i have to be at 10% player HP to get almost old value of 2520 hps. I did the math with the pts maximum of 14%. Even Vampire Drain, a skill nobody with more than 2 braincells is using in PvP to heal up, heals more than actual PTS Dark Cloak.

Any reason why anyone should use PTS Dark Cloak instead of another healing ability other than for style? I can't think of any. Mainly because every other healing ability heals me more by a frightening margin, no matter how much HP I have, except at 10% where Dark Cloak get it old healing value.
Image when i dont have 40k HP. Hard to imagine but it gets even worse rofl.

But a skill that only really works, when i am already with both legs in the grave, in execute range and eating 400% extra dmg from enemy execute's, is a total abilityslot waste.

When zos worked on dark cloak their minds were elsewhere.

edward_frigidhands · August 2022

They have not provided reasoning or thought process behind this change or the updates to the ability that have followed on PTS.

Dagobertfuk · August 2022

Dark Cloak nerf makes it totally useless in PvP. With all that crosshealing going on and hybridscaling everyone is anyway running around with high weapon/spellpower. Those stats even make U35 Vigor stronger than U34 Dark Cloak.

Altrough Vigor will heal for a lot more and grant more uptime on Major Resolve than Dark Cloak with the NB passive Shadowbarrier does with full heavy armor setup.

Full heavy armor NB Major Resolve 16s vs vigor's 20s per cast and more healing than pre PTS Dark Cloak.

GG ZOS. Promising to the Community that they just do minor Tweaks on Abilities from high isle on, but continue changing things in a scale like never before, without any sense and complains from the community.

Impossible to gain trust for such a company.