Guild Wars 2

I want to do dungeons and WvW. I like the Thief look and style. I also like the Ele diversity. I die so much more as an Ele than as a Thief. However, it looks like Thiefs aren’t wanted as much in dungeons. Is Ele the way to go over Thief?

Main your ele.

Thief are pretty good in dungeon if you don’t mind using Sw/P and switching to dagger for boss fight. You got pretty good access to blind which is perhaps the best defensive condition. And stealth is very handy for trash skipping.

But…

Smoke fields are counter productive in group play by stealthing your mate everytime your blasting it while you’d better have a fire field to blast. In team fight in dungeon, you definitely need power not stealth and Ele are the best at that.

Plus…

Ele provide heals through various form, multiple usefull boons (fury/might… etc.) and high dps conjure weapon (with pretty good utilities).

Overall, Pu group will welcome Ele and despise thieves except for rare dungeons like Caudecus manor. So, if you really wanna do some dungeon, Ele should be your way.

Stahp too much bad. The only way a thief can hit 9k BS is literally on people wearing yellow gear with full zerk stats. The highest backstab Ill get on a level 80 is 6k. Also, D/D eles if played to a certain level should have no problems with Thieves. Thieves aren’t the problem. Too many scrubs is.

Also you should main Ele. Thief is so boring in PvE.

In WVW, can you handle losing to other interweb strangers? Do you like them stomping on your corpse?
If the answers are “no”, pick Thief.

Best case scenario: you are 1337, you pwn everyone with skillz, and you tell everyone on the forum to L2P.

Worst case scenario: you run away on low hp.

Elitist.8701:

Stahp too much bad. The only way a thief can hit 9k BS is literally on people wearing yellow gear with full zerk stats. The highest backstab Ill get on a level 80 is 6k. Also, D/D eles if played to a certain level should have no problems with Thieves. Thieves aren’t the problem. Too many scrubs is.

Also you should main Ele. Thief is so boring in PvE.

Not supporting the guys argument or anything, but I’ve been once for a 12k backstab on full ascended zerk with half soldier trinkets half zerk.

For dungeons: ele is meta, thief not.
Wvw teams: ele is meta thief not
Solo roaming: ele and thief are meta

thieves cant be even compared to elementalists now… take ele

I would say it depends on one crucial question…

How do you feel about dying? Do you hate it? Is it OK more or less?

If you absolutely abhor dying, then Thief is definitely the profession for you. Between their constant evades, blinds, and stealth the only thing they really have to fear is AoE damage and often even that can be negated with careful dodges.

Elementalists have their heals and Earth attunements, but in the end they are squishy and will die. The chances of a hit landing on a Thief (other than AoE) is almost 1 in 100 due to their class mechanics.

So, if you just cannot stand dying. Go Thief!!

Thanks.

I still have to see any good/great player with profession able to kill a decent thief in WWW reliably.

An ele instead can be killed anytime and when it comes to small groups, a targeted ele will die faster than any other profession.

Its decent in 1vs1 that never happens in www, bit not even so good.
Its great instead for zergs with a staff.

So I hopped on my thief for karma train nite, and got destroyed by an ele, and I thought wow, hey!, we got something here!

..so I whispered him, and we was standard spec’d D/D zerker ele.

Turns out I was just rusty, I only play my thief on karma train nights, but soon enough I was back in form, killing people 5 and 6 at a time.

Ele’s have long cooldowns, on complicated combos….

…as a thief, you can just cloak and dagger people to death. When you’re landing 5k crits, it’s not hard, half the people you fight won’t even be able to attack you without a target.

…perfect your timing, and nothing can stop you.

I’ve played both professions (experience on everything in WvW but S/P for Thief, and only D/D for Elementalist in WvW) for almost two years now as a solo/small group WvW player and would say Elementalist is the harder class to learn and perfect, but Thief is the harder class to play without any error. Thief is clearly “better” for 1vX fights with the generic WvW 30 SA builds in mind, but it’s more of a toss-up in group play where D/D Elementalist can feel immortal. Thief is great for groups too but doesn’t have nearly as large of a cushion in group fights where burst from two players (or just random cleave from the fight) can easily take a Thief down.

In my experience, Thief takes more effort in group fights to use effectively — Elementalist is harder to solo (sometimes even 1v1 or dueling depending on the build) and win when outnumbered.

When comparing the two classes in a duel against each other, D/D Elementalist should win the majority if not all of the fights versus non-S/D Thieves and have a slight advantage against S/D Thieves.

As for dungeons, Elementalist is more flexible and useful to groups (especially experienced ones) in large because of Ice Bow, might/fury stacking, and Fiery Greatsword. Thief is still fine to great in dungeons though if you’re experienced.

This is all simply opinion from my own experiences of course.

trollish propaganda is funny, but i’m not a comedian.. so, i’ll state it plainly
elem is twice the work for half the pay, they are mediocre support and occasionally need to get scraped off the floor

The amount of thief non sense in this thread is amazing. I regularly seek out people in wvw that can put up a fight, and challenges exist in all the various classes. Thieves are not gods, but if you end up fighting one you better know your own class well.

Anyone saying how easy it is for a thief to kill someone, this is a l2p issue. If you’re dying fast within 5-10 seconds, then you are an up level or you have absolutely no idea how to deal with a thief. I know this because all I do is roam on my thief. If you have issues against them please PM me any questions.

That being said, I wish I was as good on and Elementalist as I was my thief. The number one class I have issues with handling is ele.

I am focusing on Ele, mainly because of the stigma that Thiefs seems to have in Dungeons. I realize that Thiefs can do incredibly high DPS and help with trash, but seems every group wants and Ele and some groups don’t want thiefs at all.

Pick thief for WvW! See how many roles you can play!

Ezeriel.9574:

So I hopped on my thief for karma train nite, and got destroyed by an ele, and I thought wow, hey!, we got something here!

..so I whispered him, and we was standard spec’d D/D zerker ele.

Turns out I was just rusty, I only play my thief on karma train nights, but soon enough I was back in form, killing people 5 and 6 at a time.

Ele’s have long cooldowns, on complicated combos….

…as a thief, you can just cloak and dagger people to death. When you’re landing 5k crits, it’s not hard, half the people you fight won’t even be able to attack you without a target.

…perfect your timing, and nothing can stop you.

Wow. I find it awesome and quite refreshing to see someone who actually plays a Thief post with such honesty and without fear of word getting out or the “nerfbat” coming into play.

Most Thief players seem to somehow equate their constant wins with superior skill on their part and not on the class mechanics themselves.

Well done.

Thanks.

^I suggest making a thief and trying it out before saying that. See how well you do Possibly even post a video of anyone you manage to down?

panicbutton.1053:

^I suggest making a thief and trying it out before saying that. See how well you do Possibly even post a video of anyone you manage to down?

Thanks, but no thanks.

I tried a Thief but the mechanics of the class just ruins any fun for me playing it. When I go into combat, part of the thrill is not knowing just how it will turn out.

Will I kill the other player?

Will they kill me?

Will we in those wonderful but oh-so-rare moments manage to drop one another at the same time and have to fight it out with downed skills?

Knowing that I control every aspect of the battle and that my win (or easy retreat) is almost assured just is not fun for me. I know there are people that do enjoy the confidence that comes with that style of combat and for those people Arenanet made the Thief.

It’s just not for me is all.

Thanks.

What good is not dying when you loose the camp anyway? Go for elementalist schmots, the only place where thief has a part is in Wvw roaming, everywhere else the elementalist has a stronger part to play.

Michaeas Magister.1589:

panicbutton.1053:

^I suggest making a thief and trying it out before saying that. See how well you do Possibly even post a video of anyone you manage to down?

Thanks, but no thanks.

I tried a Thief but the mechanics of the class just ruins any fun for me playing it. When I go into combat, part of the thrill is not knowing just how it will turn out.

Will I kill the other player?

Will they kill me?

Will we in those wonderful but oh-so-rare moments manage to drop one another at the same time and have to fight it out with downed skills?

Knowing that I control every aspect of the battle and that my win (or easy retreat) is almost assured just is not fun for me. I know there are people that do enjoy the confidence that comes with that style of combat and for those people Arenanet made the Thief.

It’s just not for me is all.

Thanks.

Right, but that’s not the point I was trying to make, correct? I’m addressing that the poster before you has no idea what they’re talking about unless he’s referring to murdering low level players. If you agree with the earlier poster then i assume it would be easy for you to jump into the class and down some people in wvw, correct? So i challenge you to do so.

Fighting people of equal skill level is not easy as a thief~

that’s what I was trying to say