The Nightshade class is a class that which, once matured, is a very strong class; much of which can be attributed to our Realm Ability selection. Up until that time however, there are many obstacles in the way of the growth of the individual, as groups (PvE and RvR) are very hard to come by to nightshades of all levels. However, if someone enjoys the challenge of a cerebral class that can solo in RvR and can stick it out to the higher RR, this class is very rewarding.
Concerns:
Low Realm Rank performance: New nightshades who start out have a very hard time competing until they mature into the higher realm ranks. In this age of the game where the bell curve of realm ranks is shifting ever higher this is a hard obstacle to overcome for new players. This points to a possibility that the base nightshade class and abilities at RR1 is slightly underpowered and the realm ability choices available to us bring us back inline.
Bladeshades: Nightshades who choose blades as their weapon of choice have an extremely hard time competing. This is stemmed directly from the low strength and con in the two available race choices and the impact on the low weaponskill this relates to. In addition to the specific styles in the Blades weapon style line that are inaccessible, or ineffectual for the Bladeshade.
Critical Strike/Hidden Attacks: Over the course of time the damages of the hidden attacks in our critical strike line have seen a steady decrease in the average damage done. This is very problematic as it leads to a lack of dependency on this class defining skill, forcing players into a light tank role that we don’t perform well at all in. There are also some outstanding bugs specific to this area that help to hamstring our performance here as well.
Groupability: Nightshades have little to no group friendly skills in both the PvE and RvR areas. Outside of forts in RvR, it is typically better to have a determination tank in a group that is less vulnerable to crowd control and doing damage the entire fight than to have an assassin that needs time-to-target as well as how precise their hidden attacks must be to succeed, after which they are a weak light tank.
Specline Issues:
Stealth: Danger Sense is useless in RvR, and only moderately useful in PvE. Distraction has no RvR use.
Blades: Two block chains in this style line hurt the accessibility of styles for nightshades who choose blades, especially when the reactionary stun style in this line is off a block. However the anytime chain here is a decent replacement for Garrote in some instances.
Pierce: The preferred specline by far. However the main issue here is the performance of Sidewinder. The style does not grow with the spec, and usually is outperformed by all the other styles in the chain. Wyvern’s Bite also duplicates a bleed from Dragonspider in the same chain.
Critical Strike: Rib Separation and Ripper do not do as much damage as Leaper in this chain. Ripper doesn’t have the right performance/payoff for specing to 50 in this line. There are 3 bleeds in the same chain, Hamstring, Leaper and Ripper all have bleeds in the Hamstring evade chain. The average damages of our Hidden Attacks have seen a decrease as time and game changes have progressed.
Celtic Duel: Really no nightshade issues in this line except for the fact that most nightshades do not spec high in this line, and only put leftover points here. Some nightshades have expressed a desire for a reason to spec here.
Envenom: No issues, some requests for more poisons (different, not more powerful).
New Issues:
Block/Parry fix: I am currently watching the impact of this change in regards to assassin performance in groups after their initial hidden attack has passed, in addition to our effectiveness against tanks in groups for those assassins who play a support defender role in groups. It is reducing our effectiveness against heavy tanks as it stands now, however this is not insurmountable.
Augment Acuity fix: Poorly received by the Nightshade community. There are very few times that total power amount comes into play. An increase to the damage of our shout was expected to possibly help the low RR underperformance – this did not materialize.
See Hidden fix: The change to See Hidden has brought it into balance, and while some disgruntled nightshades are out to “gut” True Sight, I believe these two abilities are now balanced.
Other Issues:
Regarding the assassin boosts of last year: The nightshade is the only one who's balancing factor can be reduced by resists. SM Pet Intercept: Watching the impact of this change on assassins. Poison Interface: Can’t tell what is and isn’t poisoned at a glance. Application message spam in the chat/system window. Same poisons overwriting. Perma Chasing controlled pets after stealthing
Viper is too expensive
Mastery of Stealth is a very low return for investment costs
Bladedance is another very low return for investment RA.
Item Problems:
Epic Armor: The Nightshade Epic suit is currently over max Dexterity on the suit alone. Easmarch Stinger: The proc is currently bugged (acknowledged)
Llava Registered User
Posts: 281
(6/16/03 9:37 am) Reply
Re: Nightshade Report v1.62 - Final
Thanks for mentioning Bladedance. I'd love to buy this ability but there's no way I'm going to spend more than it costs to get Mastery of Concentration or Ignore Pain for it. Cost and time should be severly reduced.
I trust Mythic now knows *why* Ripper doesn't do the damage it should?
Gorgon1 Registered User
Posts: 69
(6/16/03 9:48 am) Reply
Infiltraitor TL reports?
I do not want to take over your post Cougar Pak, but where can I find the TL reports for the Infiltraitors?
Re: Nightshade Report v1.62 - Final
What about the new-ish bug that prevents an enemy from dropping you as a target when you stealth? It's starting to get annoying to make a kill, escape, stealth, and THEN get stunned or DoTed a second or two later...
Or is that something being taken care of independent of the individual class reports?
Cortes LeNoir, 50 Infiltrator, Iseult
Keldain, 39 Nightshade, Palomides
And a bunch of BG assassins in all three realms :)
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