Guild Wars 2

Hi all!

So, I was scrolling through the thief forums and found a post where someone wanted to delete Shadow Arts from the game… We all know that SA is a highly defensive trait line that focuses on buffing stealth. In WvW this prove to be extremely powerful, while in sPvP and PvE it is close to useless. Then all of a sudden someone posted a good an sensible suggestion in that thread on how to fix SA! This fix wouldn’t just make it viable in sPvP (what?!), it would take away a lot of the cheesy use of SA and actually force all stealth builds that use it to play more offensive and be more active to gain the benefits from this line.

Thanks to evilapprentice for making this excellent suggestion.

Shadows Embrace
Changed from “Remove one condition when you enter stealth” to “Remove one condition when you gain Revealed”.

Shadows Rejuvenation
Changed to heal for a small amount (or removed totally while stealthed) to heal for a greater amount while revealed.

These two changes alone would fix a lot imo!

Thoughts?

If you were to change these traits, 90% of bad WvW thieves who are carried by these would flood the forums with tears.

BlackBeard.2873:

If you were to change these traits, 90% of bad WvW thieves who are carried by these would flood the forums with tears.

Exactly! But I think it is wrong that bad players can just reset and return until the better player eventually makes a mistake and end up dying. Shadow Arts are extremely powerful in WvW, over the top I would say. But in PvP it is never used for that reason. If these changes were to go through it would give the thief access to more condition removal and sustain – which could lead to SA being viable in tPvP.

Geiir.7603:

Shadows Embrace
Changed to “Remove one condition when you gain Revealed”.

No!, you will see more qq threads. leave the way it is.

Geiir.7603:

Shadows Rejuvenation
Changed to heal for a small amount (or removed totally while stealthed) to heal for a greater amount while revealed.

No!, you’re already dead before you can regenerate health and a waste of investment of defensive trait line and will ruin build diversity (which favor conquest). leave shadow arts alone.

Geiir.7603:

These two changes alone would fix a lot imo!

It doesn’t make sense, you will totally destroy an entire weapon set (which is D/D) in spvp/tpvp and the whole trait line itself.
i say madness!.

Geiir.7603:

Shadows Embrace
Changed from “Remove one condition when you enter stealth” to “Remove one condition when you gain Revealed”.

This would promote going in and out of stealth more often. Which seems to be the pet-peeve of most <term> players.

Geiir.7603:

Shadows Rejuvenation
Changed to heal for a small amount (or removed totally while stealthed) to heal for a greater amount while revealed.

I would prefer small amount in stealth and greater amount out of stealth, though I guess kind of biased opinion – I guess you could remove the healing while stealthed.
Overall it will marginally improve survivability, especially since the healing amount probably wont be anything too crazy.
The reason for that is, without evades/dodging (ignoring this, since then it goes into “effective health” and “effective other kitten”), health is treated as a buffer (till death), armor is treated as something that mitigates damage, and health regen (obviously) regens the health buffer. If the buffer is too small then the regen won’t have enough time to make a significant difference as the health buffer is depleted way too quickly which is also dependent on how paper thin the armor is. Considering thieves have the lowest (along with the guardian and some other prof?) base health pool and mediocre armor, increasing health regeneration will have a less of an impact than increase the base health pool for starters (then probably regen).

All that is to say, it will have very small impact. A nerf for people that use it right now in stealth and a buff for people outside of stealth.

Unfortunately ANet dug themselves a pretty deep hole when they made the thief (and RNG/reward system but that’s the BLC TP topic on the other forum) the way it is… now it’s just fun to watch them and people attempt to climb out of it.

You do know that this would destroy any chance for thieves against condi.

Yes some thieves reset over and over and over again but one has to wonder what build are people using to fight thieves.

SA on a PD dire thief seems rediculous but the problem is actually dire/condi. SA DP is easily predictable and if you are losing to that this late in the game it’s because you got out played

T raw.4658:

You do know that this would destroy any chance for thieves against condi.

Yes some thieves reset over and over and over again but one has to wonder what build are people using to fight thieves.

SA on a PD dire thief seems rediculous but the problem is actually dire/condi. SA DP is easily predictable and if you are losing to that this late in the game it’s because you got out played

This is a lie , any condi spike build is easy to avoid except for engis passive burning. A P/D thief without SA would also be easy kill.

Just because you can’t play without SA, doesn’t mean we all have that player skill issue.

Just for everyone’s reference, where OP/this thread originated from:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Shadow-arts-needs-to-be-removed
Originally started by glock as a QQ thread.

glock.6590:

T raw.4658:

You do know that this would destroy any chance for thieves against condi.

Yes some thieves reset over and over and over again but one has to wonder what build are people using to fight thieves.

SA on a PD dire thief seems rediculous but the problem is actually dire/condi. SA DP is easily predictable and if you are losing to that this late in the game it’s because you got out played

I play a lot of different builds on my thief. Some use SA some do not.

I will tell you if I’m facing a condi build I have to run SA. This is especially true against the hybrid builds as well.

I would be all for competent condi removal in the other lines though.

This is a lie , any condi spike build is easy to avoid except for engis passive burning. A P/D thief without SA would also be easy kill.

Just because you can’t play without SA, doesn’t mean we all have that player skill issue.

I play with SA and without SA using various weaponsets.

That being said vs condi I use SA

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/Skill-Bar-Thief-Expectations

Bad suggestion, my answer is no. Just give thieves more survivability out of stealth and you’ll see less of SA being used.

SA is mainly used in wvw and when you consider how strong and rampant condi builds are its fine.

Even with SA many other class still have better sustain.

RyuDragnier.9476:

Bad suggestion, my answer is no. Just give thieves more survivability out of stealth and you’ll see less of SA being used.

I like the idea of rewarding players for using stealth as a setup instead of as an escape. I’d be all for this.

Reading evil’s suggestion, you mentioned it wrong, which is why I gave a massive NO to your version of it. Here’s what he said, quoted and all.

evilapprentice.6379:

Shadow arts does not need to be removed.

What it does need is to have it’s shift focused from “Sit in stealth for benefits” to “Engage in combat for benefits”.

At the moment, many of the most used SA traits give alot of incentive to sit in stealth for their benefits, regardless whether or not the current situation calls for sitting in stealth. That needs to change, and can be done easily.

Shadow’s Embrace – changed to “Remove 1 condition when you enter stealth. Remove 1 condition when you gain revealed.” Now an SA thief will mitigate conditions by staying in combat and weaving in and out of stealth, not by jumping into stealth and just sitting there.

Patience – I’ll be honest, I don’t have a great suggestion for this one, but it also need to change, partly because it incentivizes sitting in stealth, and partially because it’s buttkitten useless and nobody runs it. Perhaps something along the lines of “All CD’s tick 20% faster while revealed”, or something of the like.

Shadow Rejuvenation – changed to “Heal X when you enter stealth. Heal Y health per second while revealed”. Again, now a thief is healing by weaving in and out of stealth and fighting his opponent instead of by just sitting in stealth doing nothing. X and Y will obviously need to be playtested, since being healed while revealed is more powerful than healing while in stealth.

Resilience of shadow – changed to “Stealth effects you apply reduce incoming damage (30%). When you (and only you, not others) are revealed, reduce incoming damage by 15%.”

There you go – you now how an SA tree that’s useful in PvP and not annoying in WvW.

Meaning he wants it changed so the traits activate upon entering stealth and upon leaving it through revealed, which is a far better version than what you put TC.

glock.6590:

T raw.4658:

You do know that this would destroy any chance for thieves against condi.

Yes some thieves reset over and over and over again but one has to wonder what build are people using to fight thieves.

SA on a PD dire thief seems rediculous but the problem is actually dire/condi. SA DP is easily predictable and if you are losing to that this late in the game it’s because you got out played

This is a lie , any condi spike build is easy to avoid except for engis passive burning. A P/D thief without SA would also be easy kill.

Just because you can’t play without SA, doesn’t mean we all have that player skill issue.

So you’re basically saying that you’re so good and everyone else is bad because they use SA. Sounds a bit ego-centric to me.

And if you think that you’re fine without at least 2 in SA vs conditions you’re delusional, it can be incredibly hard to face conditions without SA. I’ve tried many builds without SA in WvW and it gets very frustrating when I have 6 conditions ticking down on me and no way to get rid of them. Or when I’m low hp and I’m about to kill the person, but then they apply a condition and I’m royally screwed over because I have 0 condition removal.

RyuDragnier.9476:

Reading evil’s suggestion, you mentioned it wrong, which is why I gave a massive NO to your version of it. Here’s what he said, quoted and all.

evilapprentice.6379:

Shadow arts does not need to be removed.

What it does need is to have it’s shift focused from “Sit in stealth for benefits” to “Engage in combat for benefits”.

At the moment, many of the most used SA traits give alot of incentive to sit in stealth for their benefits, regardless whether or not the current situation calls for sitting in stealth. That needs to change, and can be done easily.

Shadow’s Embrace – changed to “Remove 1 condition when you enter stealth. Remove 1 condition when you gain revealed.” Now an SA thief will mitigate conditions by staying in combat and weaving in and out of stealth, not by jumping into stealth and just sitting there.

Patience – I’ll be honest, I don’t have a great suggestion for this one, but it also need to change, partly because it incentivizes sitting in stealth, and partially because it’s buttkitten useless and nobody runs it. Perhaps something along the lines of “All CD’s tick 20% faster while revealed”, or something of the like.

Shadow Rejuvenation – changed to “Heal X when you enter stealth. Heal Y health per second while revealed”. Again, now a thief is healing by weaving in and out of stealth and fighting his opponent instead of by just sitting in stealth doing nothing. X and Y will obviously need to be playtested, since being healed while revealed is more powerful than healing while in stealth.

Resilience of shadow – changed to “Stealth effects you apply reduce incoming damage (30%). When you (and only you, not others) are revealed, reduce incoming damage by 15%.”

There you go – you now how an SA tree that’s useful in PvP and not annoying in WvW.

Meaning he wants it changed so the traits activate upon entering stealth and upon leaving it through revealed, which is a far better version than what you put TC.

That last sentence is the important one. My specifics aren’t important (even if I do think they’re good suggestions), the thrust of the argument is SA traits should ditch “Sit in stealth for benefits” in favor of “on stealth and on revealed” triggers. It’ll just make thieves better.

Stop waisting your time trying to change SA other then obvious Last Refuge, conquest is holding SA no kitten on revealed traits will fix that if conquest is the only mode.

Courtyard is…>.>….

Would prefer to just move some of the condi removal elsewhere, honestly/give the class additional condition removal.

With such low base health and such limited clearing, it pigeon-holes too many thief builds into SA-Shadowstep for cleanses. I really think that needs to change.

But in all honesty, I think the issue is more about condition spamming. If there was simply less of it/it wasn’t as strong, less people would run SA on the basis that the cleanse wouldn’t be necessary and subsequently the rest of the tree wouldn’t be, either.

DeceiverX.8361:

Would prefer to just move some of the condi removal elsewhere, honestly/give the class additional condition removal.

With such low base health and such limited clearing, it pigeon-holes too many thief builds into SA-Shadowstep for cleanses. I really think that needs to change.

But in all honesty, I think the issue is more about condition spamming. If there was simply less of it/it wasn’t as strong, less people would run SA on the basis that the cleanse wouldn’t be necessary and subsequently the rest of the tree wouldn’t be, either.

I have to agree with the fact that thief just needs more condition removal out of stealth. The fact that people are so reliant on stealth for defense is the problem, Arena Net needs to buff their outside-of-stealth survival without making it op combined with Shadow Arts. My simple suggestion is to buff acro condi removal, make signet of agility cure 2-3 conditions.

alchemyst.2165:

thief just needs more condition removal out of stealth.

You can always use S/d and use sword skill 2 more often and spam more 3.

My simple suggestion is to buff acro condi removal

No!,you can always change trait whenever you want and get Pain response (which is labeled as Master trait only).

make signet of agility cure 2-3 conditions.

No!, it will make thief imbalance.

Didn’t even take 2 months for the thief nerf threads to come back

I’d rather just see better condition removal on the heal skills. I understand they’re already strong relative to a lot of other classes’, but consider ways to improve condition cleansing a little bit without impacting major builds. We don’t need sustained removal unless we spec for it, but burst cleansing with our low health pool seems almost necessary. Torment and immobilize are massively-impairing conditions, and DoT’s have major effects on the low health pool thieves have with no means of condition cleansing elsewhere in their kit as a viable way to remove them. You pretty much either need to run huge regen effects and Withdraw to possibly counter the DoT’s, or use HiS. But this always still leaves thieves with torment. The ONLY ways to remove torment as a thief is through Shadowstep, Sword 2/Signet of Agility if it’s the only condition you have, and through the use of Shadow’s Embrace. Being the most effective condition against thieves, and being buffed to crazy levels in this next incoming patch (perma-25 torment mesmers), simply put there need to be better ways of negating some particularly-impactful conditions without having to build explicitly around it.

My only gripe is that P/D then just becomes even stronger, but the only alteratives I can think of would be to give all signets a 2-condition cleanse when traited through Signet Use, and similar effects for other utilities like traps and venoms.

idk about condi cleanse on traps :S

it would be nice if if they added condi removal in acrobatics. pain response does not do much in terms of condi cleanse

it is to random to be a reliable condi removal trait.

the healing boon is reliable
but it almost never removes condi when u need it to . because of how it activates

Yes signet of agility remove 1 random condition (ally`s in range aswell) and if i am not mistaken it prioritize removing Cripple as far as my knowledge is concern, a Crippled thief is a dead thief in small and large scale fights (no pun intended, just education) course please you can always enlighten me if i am wrong. you know agility, duh.

Oh please, no need to fix acrobatic for thy its not broken. Embrace the Shadow if you want to be more condition removal dependent.

thieves doesn’t need more condition removal, even in spvp where celestial rule the meta you don’t see all these thieves speccing for shadow art. Thieves weakness always should of been conditions just like engineer. Shadow art is just a crutch for bad players that anet threw in to make the lesser skilled thief player to feel like they are good at the game.

Lifestealer.4910:

thieves doesn’t need more condition removal, even in spvp where celestial rule the meta you don’t see all these thieves speccing for shadow art. Thieves weakness always should of been conditions just like engineer. Shadow art is just a crutch for bad players that anet threw in to make the lesser skilled thief player to feel like they are good at the game.

There is more to consider than spvp, wvw is totally different. SA in lots of cases is almost mandatory in wvw roaming. Also if a thief runs full SA in spvp he is being punished already by doing crappy dmg and gimping his team.

I don’t know how you going to achieve “perma-25 stack torment”, but if the thief gets hit by shatter then he should be punished. Shadows embrace is an adept trait that soft counters GM Maim (which shatter usually apply confusion and torment only), and thieves who’re running acrobatics, shortbow or sword/x has accessible evade/kiting against periodic shattering. So there are more sustain condition builds that a thief should be worrying about than the odd condition shatter, and that includes P/D thieves.