Hi everyone!
After rocking the game with a ranged Primal Strike build I decided to try a Nightblade for something up close and personal. 5 dead characters later I realize that melee builds are hard.
Is there a trick to sustaining a Nightblade in the early lvl20+ game?
Thank you!
Dont play veteran, maybe?
Anything works early game (the first potential problem for low damage builds imo is Cronley in act 2)
Invest enough in the mastery bar and get Pneumatic Burst for healing and you should be good for a long time.
Nightblade is inherintly squishy, that’s just how it is. If ranged mobs are a problem getting up your Pierce resistance and your bleeding resistance helps alot.
Also “Dual Blades” gives you Phyiscal Resistance, which also helps. An important passive skill is “Shadow Dance”. At 12/12 you get a 20% chance to avoid 20% of projectiles and Melee Attacks. It gives you Defensive Ability, too.
For Devotions I’d probably go “Ghoul” first because the 3rd node provides you with 4% attack damage converted to health, which helps increasing your sustain.
Veil of Shadow and Night’s Chill are pretty much a must-have, too. Veil of Shadow for slowing down enemies in your proximity and reducing their offensive ability, Night’s Chill for Resist Reduction. With soft capped Night’s Chill mobs just start to melt in early game.
pneumatic burst (dont forget dual wield/cooldown modifier) andpot is all you need, if youre getting rekt with those then dont know what to say besides put more points in pburst 
ghoul is a good early devo grab too!
Early game AoE caster are more potent,but I don’t think Nighblade has problems with surviving.Pneumatic burst+healing potion is usually enough.If you want take bat constellation and use it on a component skill like fireblast.
Don’t worry, I suck at early nightblade play really bad as well. I can level every other mastery just fine, but I dread starting as NB.
I was like that for a long time, then I started a blademaster who I refused to level as forcewave. Ring of Steel and maxed lethal assault saw me flying through normal and deep into elite pretty much as a pure nightblade. I wonder how things’ll go from there, as I’m playing an MI-reliant build (Alkie Scythe for coldblitz).
still, NB leveling isn’t that bad, esp as a 2h user.