Replies: 31

Introduction

So now that I have completed the new arena a couple of times I feel qualified to write a small guide for nightblades on one way to do the arena. There are many ways, but this is how I do it. It is not meant to be a long guide where I go deep into mechanics or gear as there are plenty of threads discussing this, such as Asayre’s threads. I will most likely not keep updating this thread as the meta for arena progresses because I think it will head in a direction where full on dps is all that matters, like DSA did. I would also like to apologize in advance for my english as this is not my first language

Changelog:

[spoiler]05.11.2015 – Added new gear

07.11.2015 – Added more skills to situational skills

07.11.2015 – Changed video from last boss to all bosses[/spoiler]

Table of contents

– Genral information

• Race
• Attributes
• Champion points

– Gear

– Skills

– Tips and Tricks

General information

My Character with inner light, rest unbuffed:

RACE:

Personally I play as an Altmer for the 10% extra magicka and the 9% magicka recovery which I believe is better than Bretons 3% reduced cost as we use funnel health/swallow soul as our main filler ability. However Breton is still an excellent choice for magicka nightblades and you get the extra spell resistance which is nice. Another top tier race is Dunmer. However you can still use this build with all races, but you will lose a small advantage.

ATTRIBUTES:

Your main goal is to get at least 17,5k HP for maelstrom arena, I put all 65 attribute points into magicka and is above this limit.

CHAMPION POINTS:

Personally i have 468 Champion points and I’ve distributed them like this

The Apprentice 55 points
– Elfborn 49
– Elemental expert 1
– Spell erosion 5

The Atronarch 1 points
– Staff expert 1

The Ritual 100 points
– Thaumaturge 100

The Steed 35 points
– Block expertise 20
– Spell shield 15

The Lady 101 points
– Hardy 30
– Elemental defender 49
– Thick skinned 22

The Lord 20 points
- Quick recovery 20

The Tower 100 points
– Magician 100

The Lover 56 points
– Arcanist 56

The Shadow 0 points

This is with the old jumppoints in elfborn, afaik they changed in the new patch (fixed?).

Gear

My current setup is a bit a bit of a stand in while i wait for my destro staff:

This is a setup that I used in the arena for the character screencap and my first few clears until I got my twice born star setup made, works really well if you can’t afford the materials or don’t know anyone that can craft you TBS. It is a bit of a grind to acquire the set from White Gold Tower.

And I believe this will be best in slot for maelstrom purposes, Julianos is still a very viable choice, but you can read more about TBS vs. Julianos in Asarye’s Thread

Skills

Bar 1:

Funnel Health:This is your bread and butter, it does a ton fo damage and heals you enough to keep you alive throughout the arena. You can switch this for Swallow Soul as that will give you even more survivability, but I cba to change since I use this character a lot for healing.

Structured Entropy: A weak ass dot, but it applies major sorcery that allows us to use tripots in the arena. Also the 8% health increase is nice.

Inner light: A must have for magicka classes, 10% extra crit and 5% more magicka. nothing more to be said.

Reapers Mark: This is a hidden gem for PvE nightblades, especially in Maelstrom Arena, it heals you to full every time you kill a mob, increases dmg and reduced their armor.

Ice comet: A heavy hitting ultimate, but I think shooting star might be the choice because of the ulti gain.

Bar2 :

Healing Ward: The oh shit heals, give you a nice shield when you’re low. As you get more and more used to the arena this skill will be less used.

Impale: Every nightblades favorite skill, an insane execute and it gives magicka when you kill a mob with it.

Inner Light: Need it on both bars so you don’t need to retoggle.

Siphoning attack: This is a lovely skill in the arena, use it when you’re at around 40% magicka or when your out of stamina and you’ll get back to 100% ina couple of seconds. A very good skill that makes life easy for nightblades, also with this there is no reason to use the Engine Guardian set

Sap Essence: Tbh I don’t really use this skill much at all and can be used as a flex spot.

Soul Harvest: I have this ultimate for the passive and I use it before execut phase to improve my impale damage.

Situtaional skills:

Merciless Resolve: I switch out entropy for this and use spell power pots instead of tripots if I’m feeling risky :p This is a very nice dmg buff and the assassins will proc is very good for when you need to one-shot something.

Double Take: 20% dodge chance comes in handy quite often, but I don’t like “luck” factor of this skill. I’ve started replacing sap with this lately, and I just refresh it between mob waves. Also the movement speed buf is nice for when cripple is not active.

Prox Det: I don’t have this skill yet because im lazy, but i will switch this for sap essence as soon as i get it.

Prolonged Suffering: Finally a good use for this skill. You can basically take out a mob for 30 seconds making a lot of the arena much more managable. For my first clear i used this skill a lot in stage 5 for the casters and archers.

Manifestation of Terror/Mass Hysteria: Again making arena more managable but only for 4.5 seconds, i actually like the trap better than mass hysteria because after a while you will know where the “dangerous” mobs will spawn and you can prepare in advance.

Harness Magicka: This is an amazing skill for every class that does not have a class shield. Really helps with the casters in the arena, and it also works for the rotating blades in arena 2 since these for some reason deal magick dmg. Completely forgot about this until I saw xBlackroxe bar. :p

Veil of Blades: A good AoE ulti that slows and reduces damage. I use this when there are a lot of mobs, and it is very useful in stage 5 round 3 and in stage 6.

Soul Tether: I fell in love with this skill after using it in the arena. Low cost stuns all mobs and heals you for 8 seconds. I use this a lot in stage 9 to control all the archers, and for revenge to all those pesky nightblade mobs

Tips and tricks

• My first and most important tips is to not be afraid to use the sigils, after watching streams and looking at guild chat people are not using the sigils enough. There is no excuse to not use it other than score, and you probably won’t get a good score the first couple of times you complete it anyways and get used to the mechanics etc.
• Every one shot is avoidable, and all except for Taking aim is mechanics based.
• Major Breach is a lot more impactiful than you’d think. If you are not a niughtblade but still reading this i suggest using elemental drain.
• Use tripots
• Keep moving, it’s much easier to dodge an aoe attack if you’re already moving

Video OF ALL bosses:

I will upload every stage if there is interest for it.

• This topic was modified 1 month, 1 week ago by  Pinky.