Newbie Nightblade in need of help

[Noitatunti]

Hi!

First I want to say that while I've been gaming for years, the only MMORPG I've played prior to ESO is WOW an it's been over ten years since I played that. I usually play only single player games, but decided to give ESO a try 'cause I love The Elder Scrolls.

I've been playing this for about 2 weeks now, and I'm really liking it by far and starting to get the hang of it. I'm at level 15.

But, I am a bit confused with builds and primary stat.

As I made my character and chose a class (Nightblade) I checked the Skill Advisor and saw that Nightblade Initiate was recommend for new players so I went with that. Now I have started to question that, as Umbral Assassin build seems much more interesting to me and would probably suit my playing style better.

So, if I change the build now, do I have to redistripute my skill points? It's no problem if I have to ofc.

Also, I'm a bit confused by the primary stat. For Nightblade Initiate it's magica and for Umbral Assassin it is stamina. What does this mean in practice? My understanding is that if your primary stat is magica, using skills takes magica to use and if it is stamina, using skills take stamina to use. Am I correct?

I tried googling and reading some articles and whatnot, but this is still a bit unclear to me.

Thanks in advantice to anyone who could help and sorry if my questions are stupid, haha. I'm just very new to this

-Noitatunti

[watchdog79]

Welcome to the wonderful universe of Elder Scrolls.

You may find these links to the website of Alcast, a respected community member, useful:

https://alcasthq.com/eso-top-3-beginner-tips-for-elder-scrolls-online/
https://alcasthq.com/eso-new-player-beginner-guide/

You may also find this link and the whole webbsite useful:

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Classes

Click on each class to see some build advice.

Generally, each class offers a kind of general "Initiate" build, a Stamina and a Magicka Damage Dealer build, a healer build, and a tank build. Generally, Stamina Damage Dealer builds tend to use Dual Wield (such as two daggers, an axe and a sword, etc.), Two-Handed and Bow, Magicka Damage Dealer builds tend to use Destruction Staff, tank builds tend to use One-Handed and Shield, or Ice Destruction Staff, healer builds tend to use Restoration Staff (often Flame).

Don't worry too much about builds before you hit character level 50 and Champion Point level 160, though. You won't be able to follow them completely for some time anyway, you will not have certain skills, skill morphs, passives and such unlocked anyway.

If you plan to go for Umbral Assassin, you will want to concentrate on Stamina. Get it as high as possible.

One important thing to take into consideration is, that you will need to get new gear very often while levelling up. Item sets will help you a lot, but while levelling up your first character, it may not be easy to get full sets at the same levels:

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Sets

On your first character, you will have to level up without Champion Points until level 50. After that, you will start learning those "CP" and any alts will start with the same amount of CP, since the CP level is account wide.

Learn more about the Champion system here, even though you won't touch it for some time:

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Champion

I would also recommend using some addons. Addons are allowed, unless they try to do something not allowed by ZOS.

A good site for addons is here:

https://www.esoui.com/downloads/index.php?cid=23

I cannot imagine playing without these two, but other players are sure to consider some others invaluable:

https://www.esoui.com/downloads/info1881-MapPins.html
https://www.esoui.com/downloads/info1399-VotansMinimap.html

I would definitely recommend using the free Minion application to manage your addons, since most of them will need constant updates:

https://www.minion.gg/

Last, but not least, there is the most important rule of Elder Scrolls Online:

Have fun.

Play the game as you like, and have fun. That is all that really matters. Find a good guild, perhaps a social, newbie friendly guild. Mind that you can be in 5 guilds at once, and guild membership is per account on a given platform (PC, PS4, Xbox) and server (NA or EU), not per character.