Guild Wars 2

Lately, stealth has been going from a minor annoyance to something that is totally throwing off the balance of the game. Everything in this game has numerous amounts of direct counters except for Stealth. Control skills are countered by Stability, Blind, and Block. Conditions are countered by skills like Berserker’s Stance, Empathetic Bond, 409, etc. The balance between these mechanics may not be perfect, but they exist. As far as stealth goes the only real “counter” out there is Sic ’Em on the Ranger.

What we need is more skills to have the ability to put Reveal on stealth classes like Thieve and Mesmer. It does not have to last for long, just long enough that vs stealth heavy builds you throw them off their game long enough to mount a counter attack. Not all of them should require a target because skills like Shadow Refuge and Mass Invisibility are often times used when the target is already stealthed. These long duration stealths allow for them to totally reset the fight while the other person flails around trying to get lucky. It drives me insane when I hear people say “you can still hit them in stealth you know!?” (Yes, we know) as if that means you can magically always know where they are. Any stealth user with half a brain is going to get the hell out of danger and not stick around and they generally have shadowsteps/teleports to do it. The ability to also stack stealth after being downed is also ridiculous and can lead to the player being downed but conditions or what have you and being able to revive.

What I would like all of you to do is propose skills on your main class that seem like good candidates to receive the ability to apply reveal. I’ll start with Warrior:

Fear Me!: The best candidate by far. It has a fairly long cool down and if you want to reduce that you have to find 10 points to put into tactics and would also have to swap out Bull’s Charge.

Stomp: Even with the buffs it’s still not an amazing skill. It would be another reason to justify it being on your bar and once again has a fairly long CD. Might even give people a reason to grab Physical Training (but probably not).

Also, if ANet even gives Warriors an elite shout I’d like to see “None Shall Pass!” from GW1 brought back. It knocked down moving foes and it would be nice for it to have reveal as well.

I’m tired of being unable to reliably do anything about stealth heavy classes that have the ability to simply stealth up again after messing up and having to wait around for 10+ seconds wondering if maybe I downed them and don’t know it.

Stealth has some counters, but due to the way it is currently implemented, those counters don’t work.

The main issue with stealth is that it’s a layer of defense on top of the other defensive mechanics a profession may have. Being invisible is strong, but if the person using it can also teleport to a different location, or trade places with a clone, or have acces to multiple blocks/immunities during the short time they’re revealed, then it essentially becomes a mechanic without downsides.

One thing that would be very cool is if certain ranger pets could ‘sniff out’ stealthed characters and attack them automatically. It’s too muc of a hard counter to implement though.

ThiBash.5634:

Stealth has some counters, but due to the way it is currently implemented, those counters don’t work.

The main issue with stealth is that it’s a layer of defense on top of the other defensive mechanics a profession may have. Being invisible is strong, but if the person using it can also teleport to a different location, or trade places with a clone, or have acces to multiple blocks/immunities during the short time they’re revealed, then it essentially becomes a mechanic without downsides.

One thing that would be very cool is if certain ranger pets could ‘sniff out’ stealthed characters and attack them automatically. It’s too muc of a hard counter to implement though.

I agree that a huge part of what makes stealth so strong is the ability to use other abilities while in it. I could see it being better balanced if you were only allowed to use certain skills while stealthed. That way it would be more of an initiator rather than something you use all the time. That still doesn’t help that they can heal during it however or the fact that they have no penalty to movement speed.

Assassins in GW1 had to land certain attacks before they would be able to use a more powerful one. Some of these were pretty spamable but if you interrupted the chain you would really screw them up. It’s a shame that concept didn’t extend to GW2.

True, stealth breaking at the end of the first ability used might change a lot of things up. But then we’re moving towards the “permanent OOC stealth” which other MMOs employed, and GW2’s very short (it is) but very strong (it is) stealth was supposed to rectify the deep underlying issues that other stealth implementation has.

There are more ways to counter stealth than you described. There are no “given” ways to counter stealth, you have to think for yourself on how to go about doing it. It requires you to think carefully and actively.

Vs thief:
If they’re d/d, dodge, block, blind, or OoR their CnD.
If they’re d/p, interrupt the heartseeker, crowd control them, hit where their powder is. There are less ways to counter stealth with d/p thieves, but it’s doable.
If they’re in stealth, predict where they will be. This is much easier if you play a thief. Think “hmm, what is the thief trying to achieve at the moment and how would he/she position him/her self to do this?” That way you can have a better chance of hitting/cc’ing them while they are in stealth.
Also to have a much better chance at avoiding damage, constantly turn your character around. They get double damage with Backstab if they hit your back. So try to get hit in the front if they hit you.

Vs Mesmer:
This is harder to counter but the stealths are shorter. They can make illusions while they are stealthed, so I would wear down the illusions until they are out of stealth. Once they are out of stealth, wear them down as quickly as possible. Rinse and repeat. Same stuff about predicting where they will be, but not as important with Mesmer.

alchemyst.2165:

Also to have a much better chance at avoiding damage, constantly turn your character around. They get double damage with Backstab if they hit your back. So try to get hit in the front if they hit you.

Yup, just remember to get hit in the front by that invisible player.

Better advice is when they stealth strafe at a 45 degree angle backwards. Backstab should actually be called ‘Side and backstab’ as the angle which you have to hit to get it is basically a 160 degree arc behind you. Don’t turn your character around as this infact makes it easier to hit you in the zone.

Dodging, Blocking, Or Blinding aren’t necessarily that effective because doing so doesn’t reveal them.

Interrupting the HS can only be done while they are standing in the Black Powder. As a Warrior that means I can ONLY do that while Zerker Stance is up because even leaping in there with a CC you will probably get blinded before it hits, if you interrupt them after they leap through the field they still gain stealth and a lot of control skills require a target. That means you have 2 seconds to CC them enough to where you kill them. That’s how I always beat D/P (unless they do something stupid) but that can be a really dubious thing to do in some situations. In team fights you won’t necessarily have the ability to focus on the Thief, and another enemy may have forced you to use Zerker Stance earlier.

There are a lot of bad Thieves just like there are a lot of bad Warriors, but a good Thief can be pretty much unkillable while a good Warrior can still be locked down and killed. A good Warrior will kill a bad Thief. A moderately good thief will have a fair chance to kill a good Warrior. A good Thief can take on a good Warrior and a few others and still manage to down people (granted if they rev right away they won’t get the stomp). That last example happened to me last night. This Sword/Dagger Thief took on 3 of us, all with good gear and builds and all good at the game, and managed to down both me and a Guardian (a minute or 2 apart mind you) while being able to disengage no matter how we chain CC’d. What’s worse is that we DID down him but because he got freebie stealth at 10% health he was able to shadow step, get downed, stacked stealth with the downed skill, and revive while we had no clear idea where he was. He was an absolute nightmare. Even if you beat him you couldn’t stomp him.

Stacking stealth with skills besides Shadow Refuge shouldn’t be a thing, or at least it shouldn’t exceed 6 seconds. With the ability to heal while your foe has to just blindly use attacks hoping to find you plus with the upcoming option to instead reduce incoming physical damage by 50% even if you DO catch them you won’t significantly damage them. That trait may end up being a nightmare. Cleaving a downed Thief is typically faster than stomping but now they can reduce that damage by 50% when they use the stealth which buys them even more time to get revived by allies or to use while reviving others.

Mesmer should not be able to deal damage while remaining out of combat. It is the definition of low risk high reward. The only solution I can think of is having the AI stop attacking while they are stealthed so you get time to clear them out.

Predicting sounds all well and good but let’s be honest that isn’t a counter. Some Thieves go for the backstab right after stealthing while other wait till the last second and other do it some time in-between.

Because I know they aren’t likely to make changes to stealth itself at least we can get some skills that give us a way to go “no resetting the engagement for you.”

lol, a warrior asking for nerfs for another profession.

Pot and kettle, and all that.

Fade.7658:

lol, a warrior asking for nerfs for another profession.

Pot and kettle, and all that.

True, but then again, you know it’s a problem if a warrior can’t even handle it.

Fade.7658:

lol, a warrior asking for nerfs for another profession.

Pot and kettle, and all that.

Weakest argument I’ve heard in a while. I MAIN Warrior, I do not ONLY play Warrior. My other class in Engi which actually has the best chance vs Thieves. I don’t even know why I dignified this with a response because you offered nothing of value.

This “War player so clearly has no right to discuss balance” crap is getting really old. You are trying to draw attention away from the discussion by making a personal attack.

I didn’t understand why this was posted until I realized it was Burr.

I have ZERO problems against thieves on any of my classes

ps. Once you figure out how to fight thieves the cheapest specs thar are cheesy are heavily specced into trickery. .

I think you just require more skill.

@Azukas/Zord: Nothing you say leads me to believe you’re doing anything but using an Over the Top defense. “I have absolutely no problems ever with the mechanic.” Then you don’t solo/small group roam in WvW, because that’s really the only situation that it becomes glaring, I’d think.

Carighan.6758:

True, stealth breaking at the end of the first ability used might change a lot of things up. But then we’re moving towards the “permanent OOC stealth” which other MMOs employed, and GW2’s very short (it is) but very strong (it is) stealth was supposed to rectify the deep underlying issues that other stealth implementation has.

It’s sometimes very short. I once had a bunch of conditions on a Thief and downed him inside Shadow Refuge. The next time I saw him, he was back up. I was pretty happy about that.

Generally though, it IS a pretty short-duration mechanic, but if anything I’d rather have long-duration OOC stealth with maybe 1-2 ways to get back in mid-combat than the ability to go into Stealth any time you please in combat. Utilities like Shadow Refuge and Blinding Power I think should take you back into stealth, but weapon abilities?

At one point against a Thief I finally dropped a Dark Pact on him before he used Black Powder and cheered inside because he was immob’d. I thought maybe that would work. Turns out, the Thief used Heartseeker anyway and went into stealth. Yes, odds of him still being in that location for a bit are high, but that doesn’t make it feel any better. I also remember a while back when I was just working on fighting the slew of Thieves that roam around, I tried to set it up so their Heartseeker would hit me, thinking that the attack would break the ability to stealth since it’s damage application. I was disappointed to find out they just get the damage from HS, then they drop into stealth anyway.

Heck, I’d be fine with just Cloak & Dagger existing, but the D/P BP + HS combo is the dumbest thing I’ve seen in an MMO, including the time I dueled my friend’s bear tank with my enhancemen shaman back in Burning Crusade when he had upwards of 80% chance to dodge.

Stealth can be strong given a short duration. It can give the user a potentially high damage burst if they have a short window to use it, or they can even have a larger window if they burn a minute-long cooldown. I don’t necessarily have a problem with all of those things. What I have a problem with is the ability to blind a target, then immediately go into stealth. At least, that’s the biggest problem. I also don’t think stealth duration should stack at all while in stealth, and I’d love to see any ability used while in stealth breaking stealth. If I time a dodge and see “Evade” because the Backstab missed, I should be rewarded with being Backstabbed a second later. “Great work judging your opponents timing! Here’s 7000 damage!”

I actually really like fighting S/P Thieves. It’s frustrating in a different way. In my opinion, a more healthy way. You just have to try a little bit with it.

Another idea I had while I was playing the other day is for the game to show any damage application numbers or “on-contact events” like Evade/Block on a Stealthed target. Give some feedback to the user so he can play against Stealth instead of guess against it.

Oh, and for the record, I don’t think the problem with PU Mesmer is the stealth mechanic. If anything I think Stealth works best with a Mesmer because they use it in short bursts for deception/trickery, then it’s on cooldown. If anything, the problem is a Mesmer popping out of Stealth with Block/Prot every time, but that isn’t Stealth’s fault.

Stealth is a problem but the absolute last thing that’s needed is to give anything more to the Warrior class at all. If you want more ways to counter stealth give them to classes that are currently underperforming in areas where stealth is a real problem.

Rangers, Mesmers, and Eles for example.

BurrTheKing.8571:

Fade.7658:

lol, a warrior asking for nerfs for another profession.

Pot and kettle, and all that.

Weakest argument I’ve heard in a while. I MAIN Warrior, I do not ONLY play Warrior. My other class in Engi which actually has the best chance vs Thieves. I don’t even know why I dignified this with a response because you offered nothing of value.

This “War player so clearly has no right to discuss balance” crap is getting really old. You are trying to draw attention away from the discussion by making a personal attack.

My post may have had nothing of value, but your didn’t either. Other people have no problems killing thieves with both warriors and other professions (which are widely recognized to be sub-par compared to warriors). I win some, I lose some, against most classes. I’m an average player at best.

If you can’t kill thieves as a warrior, instead of blaming thieves, try blaming yourself instead. Obviously, judging by a few posts, you are an ardent anti-thief poster who is either unable to learn how to beat thieves, or believes you shouldn’t have to.

Take your pick.

tldr: Just another whine from someone who can’t be bothered to make an effort to learn.

BurrTheKing.8571:

Lately, stealth has been going from a minor annoyance to something that is totally throwing off the balance of the game. Everything in this game has numerous amounts of direct counters except for Stealth. Control skills are countered by Stability, Blind, and Block. Conditions are countered by skills like Berserker’s Stance, Empathetic Bond, 409, etc. The balance between these mechanics may not be perfect, but they exist. As far as stealth goes the only real “counter” out there is Sic ’Em on the Ranger.

What we need is more skills to have the ability to put Reveal on stealth classes like Thieve and Mesmer. It does not have to last for long, just long enough that vs stealth heavy builds you throw them off their game long enough to mount a counter attack. Not all of them should require a target because skills like Shadow Refuge and Mass Invisibility are often times used when the target is already stealthed. These long duration stealths allow for them to totally reset the fight while the other person flails around trying to get lucky. It drives me insane when I hear people say “you can still hit them in stealth you know!?” (Yes, we know) as if that means you can magically always know where they are. Any stealth user with half a brain is going to get the hell out of danger and not stick around and they generally have shadowsteps/teleports to do it. The ability to also stack stealth after being downed is also ridiculous and can lead to the player being downed but conditions or what have you and being able to revive.

What I would like all of you to do is propose skills on your main class that seem like good candidates to receive the ability to apply reveal. I’ll start with Warrior:

Fear Me!: The best candidate by far. It has a fairly long cool down and if you want to reduce that you have to find 10 points to put into tactics and would also have to swap out Bull’s Charge.

Stomp: Even with the buffs it’s still not an amazing skill. It would be another reason to justify it being on your bar and once again has a fairly long CD. Might even give people a reason to grab Physical Training (but probably not).

Also, if ANet even gives Warriors an elite shout I’d like to see “None Shall Pass!” from GW1 brought back. It knocked down moving foes and it would be nice for it to have reveal as well.

I’m tired of being unable to reliably do anything about stealth heavy classes that have the ability to simply stealth up again after messing up and having to wait around for 10+ seconds wondering if maybe I downed them and don’t know it.

More warrior buffs? Good luck.

Fade.7658:

tldr: Just another whine from someone who can’t be bothered to make an effort to learn.

Paired nicely with the bitter cheese from people who ardently defend the mechanic without considering the possibility that it’s neither fun nor rewarding for a large number of people to play against.

I would just like to point out that while stealth does not have a direct counter, the process of stealthing has many counters (aside from blinding powder/decoy/torch OH. I will focus on thieves though).

First of all, fear me an stomp are direct counters to shadow refuge already since thieves can’t leave the circle till the end. If you can bait out their dodges until they are forced to use shadow refuge, you have a good chance of knocking them out and revealing (killing at that point) them. The same can be said for engis flame thrower or shield push, mesmer GS, Ranger wolf F2 (once they fix the F2 command to be client-side), guard GS pull or shield push, necro staff #5, etc.

D/P counterplay to stealting requires aggressive play to clear the initial blind and then an interrupt of the HS using many of the methods listed above, plus additional ones like mesmer OH pistol or mantra of distraction, doom, point blank shot or concussion shot, and updraft or gust to name a few more.

Countering CnD requires blocking, dodging, or blinding (like any key attack).

Countering HiS requires interrupting the skill like you would any other heal.

Blinding powder is the only stealth skill in the thief kitten nal that cant be counterplayed, which is why it’s on a 40 second CD.

Let me catch up…

Ok, so let me start by saying that I play primarily small group/solo roaming in WvW and PvP. I’m sure those who zerg surf or roam with a largish group would not have any trouble with Thieves besides their ability to stealth away to never be seen again.

In small group/solo/duels it’s totally different, I never find it enjoyable to spend half of a fight waiting for my opponent to make a move. If you can truthfully claim that you can consistently interrupt Thief’s stealth skills to where they have minimum time spent flailing around I’ll be genuinely impressed. Several of you really love to jump to conclusions about my skill level. I can say with confidence that so long as I am not ambushed mid fight I generally either kill the Thief or it ends up in a stalemate.

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none. Why is it OK for control to be counted by stability but it’s not OK for stealth to be countered by reveal? Stop making personal attacks and pay more attention to my arguments.

BurrTheKing.8571:

Let me catch up…

Ok, so let me start by saying that I play primarily small group/solo roaming in WvW and PvP. I’m sure those who zerg surf or roam with a largish group would not have any trouble with Thieves besides their ability to stealth away to never be seen again.

In small group/solo/duels it’s totally different, I never find it enjoyable to spend half of a fight waiting for my opponent to make a move. If you can truthfully claim that you can consistently interrupt Thief’s stealth skills to where they have minimum time spent flailing around I’ll be genuinely impressed. Several of you really love to jump to conclusions about my skill level. I can say with confidence that so long as I am not ambushed mid fight I generally either kill the Thief or it ends up in a stalemate.

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none. Why is it OK for control to be counted by stability but it’s not OK for stealth to be countered by reveal? Stop making personal attacks and pay more attention to my arguments.

While I don’t think this was directed at me since the length indicates that it was probably written at the same time as mine, I would just also like to point out that while I’m on my warrior, Axe/Shield works pretty well for countering thieves due to the rapid clearing of blinds from the fast autoattack and the burst from eviscerate one you’ve baited out their dodges/stunned them. When on my thief, this is the weapon combo I most resist jumping in to fight against.

Maybe they should put Reveal debuff on certain skills for every class, probably the lesser used skills. One example I could think of which makes sense the most is Engineer’s Utility Goggles.

BurrTheKing.8571:

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none. .

What’s the counter for immunity skills?
Waiting?

What’s a condition spec’s counter to Berserker stance, (Current) AR, or Diamond skin?
Don’t play a condition spec? Bring a friend?

What’s the practical counter to Berserker’s Stance + Stability, especially for a class that can’t strip boons? Run away?

Stealth has a counter – It’s mostly rooted in knowing how to play the game. Certain setups are better or worse at it, but everyone has a chance if they have any idea what they’re doing and what spec of thief they’re facing. Yes, Stealth spam can be very annoying in WvW, but it’s not without counter. Stealth is much less powerful (most consider it UP) in PvP because of how easy it is to predict where a stealth player is, and how much it “costs” (In terms of winning the game) to sit in stealth and do nothing.

In short, learning to play the game will teach you how to counter stealth.

I think giving more options for players to place reveal on oponents is an interesting notion, however I think it would be the end of thieves without some serious re-working of the class.

evilapprentice.6379:

BurrTheKing.8571:

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none. .

What’s the counter for immunity skills?
Waiting?

What’s a condition spec’s counter to Berserker stance, (Current) AR, or Diamond skin?
Don’t play a condition spec? Bring a friend?

What’s the practical counter to Berserker’s Stance + Stability, especially for a class that can’t strip boons? Run away?

Stealth has a counter – It’s mostly rooted in knowing how to play the game. Certain setups are better or worse at it, but everyone has a chance if they have any idea what they’re doing and what spec of thief they’re facing. Yes, Stealth spam can be very annoying in WvW, but it’s not without counter. Stealth is much less powerful (most consider it UP) in PvP because of how easy it is to predict where a stealth player is, and how much it “costs” (In terms of winning the game) to sit in stealth and do nothing.

In short, learning to play the game will teach you how to counter stealth.

If you could only use stealth once every 60 seconds, I might agree with your initial comparisons. When you can go into stealth at least every 10 seconds, it just looks like you’re reaching really hard.

Those abilities are plays the opponent is making to give themselves a window, besides immunities like Diamond Skin (which you could argue shouldn’t be in the game, and I would agree with that argument). Berserker’s Stance may be a bit on the long side, but the Warrior is saying “I’m going to come at you hard now”, and you have to deal with that using clever dodging/mobility/defensive counters. You roll with the punches until it ends, then it’s “your turn”. I don’t really see anything wrong with that.

I would have a problem if Warriors could go immune to conditions for 3-4 seconds every 10 seconds though. That would be annoying, and I’m sure people like yourself would come to the forums and say “Well there are ways to counter it, you just have to learn the game”.

Stealth isn’t an immunity to anything, but it might as well be most of the time. And I’d be totally fine with Stealth if it was something that had a significant cooldown, or if it was a utility instead of a means for doing really strong burst damage.

And to the person saying the way to counter BP + HS is to use something to drop the blind then use something to counter the HS, you have approximately .5 seconds to do both. I hope you have some fast attacks at the ready, and good news: melee at range doesn’t clear blind like it used to. In my opinion, that combo is just way, way too convenient.

evilapprentice.6379:

BurrTheKing.8571:

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none. .

What’s the counter for immunity skills?
Waiting?

What’s a condition spec’s counter to Berserker stance, (Current) AR, or Diamond skin?
Don’t play a condition spec? Bring a friend?

What’s the practical counter to Berserker’s Stance + Stability, especially for a class that can’t strip boons? Run away?

Stealth has a counter – It’s mostly rooted in knowing how to play the game. Certain setups are better or worse at it, but everyone has a chance if they have any idea what they’re doing and what spec of thief they’re facing. Yes, Stealth spam can be very annoying in WvW, but it’s not without counter. Stealth is much less powerful (most consider it UP) in PvP because of how easy it is to predict where a stealth player is, and how much it “costs” (In terms of winning the game) to sit in stealth and do nothing.

In short, learning to play the game will teach you how to counter stealth.

I swear some of you seem to refuse to read full posts before responding. Did I not JUST say that I win the majority of all my 1v1/Small scale fights (Our group of has taken out over double our number in the past)? The L2P argument doesn’t apply and if you read completely you would know that. I’m sure you’ll refuse to believe me because you would rather focus on personal attack but at the end of the day you can’t prove I am a bad player anymore than that I am a good one.

You gave a total non-answer when you say “Stealth has a counter – It’s mostly rooted in knowing how to play the game.” You gave no actual counter besides “L2P” which is about the least helpful thing you could say.

As for Berserker’s Stance, since you seem determined to shift the focus from stealth back to personal attacks based on what class I play (although you did throw in a few similar skills though AR is getting nerfed), it’s very different from stealth. The most important difference is that you can SEE the duration the skill will be active for. There’s no guessing, the guy will be glowing and there will be a very distinct icon under his name. It also only affects a single type of damage. If you force the Warrior to use both Zerk and Stability at the same time, you should be happy. You just forced them to use two long CD skills and as soon as they’re used up you’re free to go to work. Another fact about Zerker Stance, it initially only lasted 6 seconds and nobody used it because it didn’t last long enough to mount a significant offensive. It was only at 8 (how many people really trait into it when it means giving up Dogged March) that people started using it.

The most important point to all of this is that you always know what the other person is doing. There is no guessing, you see every attack. If they run, you know they are running away, not hiding nearby healing up while your skills are still on CD. If you built yourself right you should have some way to survive for 8-10 seconds on any class.

EDIT: As for Diamond Skin, I’m not really sure if it should exist in its current form or not. Just like AR it can last much, much longer than Zerker does since users of it tend to be good at staying at the correct health threshold. Of course because Engi is my secondary I do how badly condis can hit them unless they invest most of their build towards countering it. We’ll see how it all plays out on the 15th.

On a side note, I’ve noticed that at least in Sorrow’s Furnace’s recent matchups I am encountering a lot less clkittenred as of late. I’ve fought against more people who say “gf” and other shows of good sportsmanship after a fight than those that say “War noob git gud” 7 times until they get suppressed. So if we could channel some of that civility and focus less on me and more on what I made this thread for that be great.

EDIT 2: @Maugetarr.6823 I actually have started going back to old school glass cannon Axe/Shield + GS and if you time your skills right you’re correct that many Thieves can’t react fast enough before taking a ton of damage and an Evis and practically one-shot if they’re glassy enough. I almost feel bad for talking smack about it though it is basically a higher-risk Thief build since most of your damage comes from 2 really obvious attacks. The nostalgia for the start of the game is pretty fun as well, that being said a Thief can practically insta-gib you if you run what I do but at least the fight is short either way.

Cogbyrn.7283:

evilapprentice.6379:

BurrTheKing.8571:

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none. .

What’s the counter for immunity skills?
Waiting?

What’s a condition spec’s counter to Berserker stance, (Current) AR, or Diamond skin?
Don’t play a condition spec? Bring a friend?

What’s the practical counter to Berserker’s Stance + Stability, especially for a class that can’t strip boons? Run away?

Stealth has a counter – It’s mostly rooted in knowing how to play the game. Certain setups are better or worse at it, but everyone has a chance if they have any idea what they’re doing and what spec of thief they’re facing. Yes, Stealth spam can be very annoying in WvW, but it’s not without counter. Stealth is much less powerful (most consider it UP) in PvP because of how easy it is to predict where a stealth player is, and how much it “costs” (In terms of winning the game) to sit in stealth and do nothing.

In short, learning to play the game will teach you how to counter stealth.

If you could only use stealth once every 60 seconds, I might agree with your initial comparisons. When you can go into stealth at least every 10 seconds, it just looks like you’re reaching really hard.

If stealth was as strong as any of the immunities I listed above, you’d have a point. It isn’t though, so you don’t.

Those abilities are plays the opponent is making to give themselves a window, besides immunities like Diamond Skin (which you could argue shouldn’t be in the game, and I would agree with that argument). Berserker’s Stance may be a bit on the long side, but the Warrior is saying “I’m going to come at you hard now”, and you have to deal with that using clever dodging/mobility/defensive counters. You roll with the punches until it ends, then it’s “your turn”. I don’t really see anything wrong with that.

I don’t see why you don’t have a problem with that. There are plenty of classes who’s Offense, Defense, or Both are almost entirely reliant on conditions. Against a number of specs, Berserker’s stance might as well read “You win the fight against condition reliant classes, unless there is a tremendous gap in skill”. -66% condition duration (like what they’re changing AR to IIRC) is what you’re describing above – complete immunity is more or less an “I win button” against any class who’s build relies on conditions.

I would have a problem if Warriors could go immune to conditions for 3-4 seconds every 10 seconds though. That would be annoying, and I’m sure people like yourself would come to the forums and say “Well there are ways to counter it, you just have to learn the game”.

Stealth isn’t an immunity to anything, but it might as well be most of the time.

How so?

And I’d be totally fine with Stealth if it was something that had a significant cooldown, or if it was a utility instead of a means for doing really strong burst damage.

And to the person saying the way to counter BP + HS is to use something to drop the blind then use something to counter the HS, you have approximately .5 seconds to do both. I hope you have some fast attacks at the ready, and good news: melee at range doesn’t clear blind like it used to. In my opinion, that combo is just way, way too convenient.

Stealth has counters. What stealth lacks is opportunity cost, and even then it lacks opportunity cost only in WvW.

In Pvp, you’re prevented from just sitting in stealth for extended periods of time due to the Capture Point format. The cost of just sitting in stealth to reset fights, or waiting a long time to get perfect positioning/timing is too high to use it for these purposes in the vast majority of scenario’s. Capture point also takes care of another issue people have with thieves (though it wasn’t mentioned here) in that their superior mobility allows for easy escapes – combined with stealth, players complain that thieves escape and reset fights too easily.

I wholeheartedly agree that there should be some mechanism in WvW that prevents thieves from sitting in stealth for extended periods of time to reap the benefits of SA and superior positioning. It should have a similar opportunity cost as it does in PvP to keep it balanced. That still doesn’t make leave stealth without a counter however – you’re arguing the wrong point.

Evil, you keep saying stealth has counters without actually saying what they are. That doesn’t really help your argument any. To me a counter is something that cancels out stealth. Just being able to hit them in stealth isn’t a counter. Sure I know that they’ll probably be going for the backstab but I don’t know anyone who can go “Aha!” and figure out exactly where the Thief is (unless SR is down of course).

Stealth on Engi is a good example of stealth that feels fair. It generally lasts just long enough to where you can set up an attack and nothing else. It requires you to time things well and give you an advantage but your opponent will have an idea of what’s coming next. ANet isn’t going to redesign all of stealth to work like this most likely so having 1 or 2 currently underused skills per class that have relatively high CD’s apply a few seconds (3-4 at most) of reveal seems a good compromise. The only real smart use of such skills would be when SR comes down or when they are about to stealth while at low HP.

BurrTheKing.8571:

evilapprentice.6379:

BurrTheKing.8571:

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none. .

snip

I swear some of you seem to refuse to read full posts before responding. Did I not JUST say that I win the majority of all my 1v1/Small scale fights (Our group of has taken out over double our number in the past)? The L2P argument doesn’t apply and if you read completely you would know that. I’m sure you’ll refuse to believe me because you would rather focus on personal attack but at the end of the day you can’t prove I am a bad player anymore than that I am a good one.

Win or lose, if you feel stealth is without counter, you need more practice with the thief class in general. Also, I feel you’re being a bit over-sensitive – “l2P Nub” is a personal attack, I was simply letting you know that I feel your assessment is incorrect, and that better knowledge of thief in general would probably help you.

You gave a total non-answer when you say “Stealth has a counter – It’s mostly rooted in knowing how to play the game.” You gave no actual counter besides “L2P” which is about the least helpful thing you could say.

I’ve typed out the list of counters a dozen times at least – if you’re interested in seeing them, feel free to peruse my post history. Despite pointing out the counters time and time again, people still come to the boards and claim it is without counter – at this point I’m no longer wasting my time giving each and every player who doesn’t understand thief mechanics a point by point explanation of how to counter stealth.

As for Berserker’s Stance, since you seem determined to shift the focus from stealth back to personal attacks based on what class I play (although you did throw in a few similar skills though AR is getting nerfed), it’s very different from stealth. The most important difference is that you can SEE the duration the skill will be active for. There’s no guessing, the guy will be glowing and there will be a very distinct icon under his name. It also only affects a single type of damage. If you force the Warrior to use both Zerk and Stability at the same time, you should be happy. You just forced them to use two long CD skills and as soon as they’re used up you’re free to go to work. Another fact about Zerker Stance, it initially only lasted 6 seconds and nobody used it because it didn’t last long enough to mount a significant offensive. It was only at 8 (how many people really trait into it when it means giving up Dogged March) that people started using it.

The most important point to all of this is that you always know what the other person is doing. There is no guessing, you see every attack. If they run, you know they are running away, not hiding nearby healing up while your skills are still on CD. If you built yourself right you should have some way to survive for 8-10 seconds on any class.

snip…

You’re taking this awful personally – I simply brought up Berserkers stance because it’s one of the few skills in the game that can actually leave another player almost completely without counter – Against a condition based spec, Berserker’s stance might as well read “Lawl, you’re kittened” – if you want to make it a complete counter, add Stability against a class that can’t strip boons. Mind you that’s a semi-specific case, but it still equates to almost complete immunity for X seconds.

What It sounds like to me is that you just hate stealth as a mechanic. Your complaints mostly stem from how annoying it is to fight stealth, rather than how uncounterable it is. I’m sorry that you find stealth annoying, but your displeasure does not constitute a need for changes. I hate fighting PU mesmers – they’re annoying, but I’m not ready to come to the boards and claim their mechanics need changing just because I dont like to fight them.

I do not hate stealth as a mechanic. I don’t like to play it but I like that it exists in games. How it has been done in this game is totally different than any other game. It’s traditionally used to set up a chain of damage that heavily damages a foe and if it gets interrupted depending on the game you’re going to have to slug it out or retreat and try again much later. It doesn’t work that way in this game and having no cool downs on attack skills complicates things even more.

It is not the fact that stealth exists but that it can be used so frequently. Warrior burst skills and Necromancer Death Shroud can also be used frequently and I’m sure some despise that but those are highly obvious and telegraphed abilities that a player can react to. The reaction to stealth is generally to wait until they make a move. You can throw out something if you have an idea where they are but missing means you just wasted a skill.

I’ve seen your posts for a while and I think my reaction is pretty justified because I generally find your posts very combative. I know I can do the same thing but I try really kitten hard not to be the instigator. I know most of my targets aren’t going to be popular but I try to avoid “nerf dis” in a direct manor and instead look for ways to improve the weaker parts of a class to fix. I never said that I expected Stealth’s mechanics be fixed in the OP. I was asking for weak skills to gain additional functionality to fill a gap in the game.

On that note I really like the above suggestion to make Goggles cast reveal because right now..the goggles, they do nothing!

T1 warrior complaining about stealth is nothing more than a learn to play issue.

I’m sorry and i’m not trying to be rude…yet one can’t take you serious with this post

As for thiefs,
the Solution for your “anti-stealth” Problem is not to create more Options against stealth; the solution is to bring up more Options to Play without stealth!

The real main problem is to stay alive …. long enough….
Currently, the thief is pushed to Play with stealth, look at his traits …. not a single GOOD one that supports real engage fights without stealth.
The only Thing is to dodge and traits that supports dodging as secondary mechanic to stay alive, at the end not very efficient if you Play without stealth.
But the next problem goes with the upcoming balance patch April, there are 2 GM traits that supports permastealth again…. anet pushes again and 1 GM trait goes with acrobatic; that traitline should Support thiefs for playing wihout stealth …. by my mind!
I think many thiefs would Play without stealth if ANET would do/implent some of the given ideas of soooo many Players that supports stealthless gameplay as a secondary Option.

A warrior complaining about the only profession that can solo a warrior. QQ more.

Warriors need a buff like ArenaNet needs another Scarlet Briar.

There is a need for some anti-stealth, but no way should it go to warriors.

Additionally, any anti-stealth should be associated with a skill shot with a small area of effect.

The day I support warriors getting anti-stealth is the day ANet gives Mesmers a skill that disables Signets.

@evilapprentice: No one wants to go back through your post history searching for threads where you tell people to dodge after counting to 2 or to swing their auto-attack while spinning in a wild circle. Or maybe to count to 2, then do a 180 so you take the Backstab up front.

I also don’t know how you can, on one hand, tell people to learn to play against Stealth, while in the other hand claim that Berserker’s Stance is a death sentence. Can you really not survive for 8 seconds as a Condi spec unless you have condis applied? The moment BS ends, it’s an uphill battle for the Warrior. The very second. Unless you blow your Cripple/Chill/Immob while they are immune. I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt, though.

I say Stealth might as well be an immunity because during that time, I’m just sort of spamming around or dropping AoEs with random guessing (that gets exponentially more guessy the longer the Stealth lasts). An immunity means that I cannot focus said target directly because it will accomplish nothing. I argue that Stealth is basically an immunity because in most cases, you cannot focus said target and accomplish almost nothing.

And honestly, I’d be fine with it. Mesmers have multiple ways to stealth, but they’re blowing long(er) cooldowns to do it. You have to watch yourself and be careful of your positioning for when they come out of stealth. It’s a utility. For an Engineer, they have to combo multiple abilities to drop into Stealth, then they’re only in Stealth for a few seconds. It’s one of their Utilities. I’m fine with the current implementation of Stealth to work as a Utility, because you use it as distraction/diversion/escape.

For a Thief, you can use it regularly and it’s the source of a large burst of damage.

Do you see the difference? Stealth as it currently is designed appears to be a tool that should provide spurts of improved avoidance. It isn’t designed to have fun counter-play, as the game isn’t designed to give you feedback on stealthed characters, it just happens to out of necessity when something like an auto-chain lands, or a mark triggers. You don’t know if you hit or were dodged, you aren’t rewarded with anything other than you kind of know where the person is, sort of, and you maybe did some amount of damage to them.

There are counters to Diamond Skin. Physical Damage. Does that make it a good mechanic, because there happens to be a counter? Does that make it fun?

Also, I don’t think Thieves “need” it in order to survive. I think they might “need” it in order to try to Backstab as many targets as possible in a fight in their Zerker gear, but if so, let’s just define that properly. I’ve seen good Thieves fight really well with S/P in WvW, as the mobility is wild and it has strong evasion. But ugh, it probably takes effort, right?

There’s no reason why Stealth can’t have opportunity cost if they’re going to make it a mechanic that can just freely be entered at almost a whim. Especially if they’re also going to give it burst damage. Plus, are any small changes that might impact WvW going to have any implications in sPvP where it is being argued that it isn’t useful? Or are you just to give me the “ANet balances based on sPvP” line? Even if they do, that doesn’t mean we can’t share our opinions on it in their discussion forums.

It has nothing to do with “being the only class someone can’t 1v1”. It’s just lazy design given the rest of the context of how it can be entered and what can be done from it.

@coghbyrn you actually are told when you dodged or blocked a stealth attack, you also are told if they dodged your attack, if you hit a pu Mesmer or thief that phase aegis you are told also.

If you didn’t get the pop up then your attack wasn’t going to land. Just wanted to throw that out there not disagreeing or agreeing with your post.

Instead of pointing fingers at thieves, i encourage warriors to first point fingers at themselves.

Warriors are guilty as thieves, in bringing unfair and non-diverse challenge to the game.

As the saying goes,

" You blame your opponents for playing unfair, yet you use unfair strategy against him " ?

1. Completely remake Black Powder. Being able to go into stealth through a skill with no cooldown without interacting with any other player (enemy or ally), does not promote skillful play in any way.

2. Blind on Stealth is incredibly powerful. There are a myriad of ways to immobilize and otherwise CC thieves in stealth, or knock them out of a Shadow Refuge. However, they are all rendered useless by this trait if you happen to be anywhere near the thief in question. Especially stupid combined with aforementioned Black Powder blinding you as well.

oZii.2864:

@coghbyrn you actually are told when you dodged or blocked a stealth attack, you also are told if they dodged your attack, if you hit a pu Mesmer or thief that phase aegis you are told also.

If you didn’t get the pop up then your attack wasn’t going to land. Just wanted to throw that out there not disagreeing or agreeing with your post.

I knew you are told when you dodge an incoming attack, but I’ve never, ever seen anything pop up from an outgoing attack, ever. That could be a product of Thieves never dodging out-going attacks that would pop that message up (I don’t think Marks show Evade messages, but I could be wrong. I do know I’ve used Reaper’s Mark in SR, didn’t see the Thief pop out, and assumed they dodged with no message shown), but for me that only ever really includes Dagger #1. I’ve blind-fired LB through the air on several occasions, but I know that it would show the Evade message if you don’t have a target.

All I know is I’ve never seen any information about any attack, but I’m willing to play around with it.

Arkantos.7460:

truth

And I would do that lickety-split if anet would just lift my hour flood control and inability to make posts. ;D

In all seriousness though, I would. Starting out as a thief, I saw all of the crying that came from fighting stealth users and did my best to find decent builds that did not use stealth. There were very few since the plethora of bad traits and skills cornered thieves build-wise.

Post after post of good ideas and concepts fell on deaf ears. So eventually I decided to go along with their plan of pushing stealth builds and suggested some “on revealed” traits.

Now I am here wondering why those went through and not my many other ideas.

(hello??? RIFLES?! VENOM PASSIVES?! MANTRA-LIKE TRAPS?! SOMETHING MORE IMPACTING THAN 5% EXTRA DAMAGE TRAITS?!?! CUTTING THE OVERPOWERED TRAITS FOR CRAPPY UTILITIES AND REPLACING THEM WITH MORE USEFUL STUFF?! PLEASE?!?!)

Anyone can kill a bad thief. In PvP thieves aren’t that OP. In WvW however, some thief builds are insanely OP, especially in the hands of a good player. I’ve seen some solo groups of 5 (and not uplevels either) on many occasions. Keep believing that thieves are fine and that you are winning cause of your great skillz if it makes you feel better (speaking to thief defenders in general). The truth is that stealth and initiative are incredibly broken.

BurrTheKing.8571:

What none of you have addressed is the fact that I provided clear evidence that every mechanic in this game has some form of counter but except for one skill stealth has none.

Just because the tooltip doesn’t say “reveal” doesn’t mean it doesn’t work against stealth targets. Countering stealth players takes thinking, not button smashing and “waiting”. If you’re honestly waiting around doing nothing but waiting for the target to reappear you’re only playing into their game and are destined to lose every time.

Every profession has means to deal with stealth on a mostly balanced level because they don’t have to swap to some half kitten skill like “sic em” to apply reveal, they can use their experience and intuitive thinking to go toe to toe. If you start adding reveal to utility skills its going to only backfire, because now they’re wasting a utility slot on something they may never use. The notion I’ve seen is put reveal on skills that aren’t used that much, meaning they are kitten already and will be even more situational kitten after.

Really wish Anet hired a remotely good thief group for the balance team to help them address the real issues with thief. These Q.Q posts are about as chaotic as the situation in Ukraine on a balance level.

Meh. This kinda conversation again. The “Bull in the China Shop” here, is the simple fact that Thieves are rather … heavily pushed into Stealth setups. Frankly, if ANet’s guys would’ve moved equivalent condi-clear and self-sustain into Acrobatics, you’d probably see a lot more zero-stealth Thieves running around. Hell, I run with P/P and S/P most of the time; believe me, you rapidly realize how much easier it is to survive as a SA Thief.

Now, the troublesome side is that: as the game’s mechanics are now, it’d be almost impossible to move Thief stealth down the chain to operate in a less “constant” fashion, due to the weighting of SA > Acrobatics. Especially since the nerfing of Vigor messes with the idea of going high evasion. (Because, you know … in an “active” combat game … there’s such a thing as “dodging too much.” )

OTOH: Stealth access on other classes, as previously stated in this thread, is arguably
“balanced,” as much as invisibility can be. Less easy to stack duration, and longer C/Ds across the board.

I do feel that I should point out that Stealth is, in fact, an immunity.

A stealthed player is completely immune to the following skills:

Elementalist:
Flame Strike
Arc Lightning*
Lightning Strike
Blinding Flash
Impale
Steam
Air Bubble
Rock Anchor
Arcane Blast
Signet of Earth
Signet of Fire
Signet of Water
Discharge Lightning
Grasping Earth
Flame Wave* (from Firey Greatsword)

Engineer:
Analyze
Magnet

Guardian:
Chains of Light
Bane Signet
Signet of Wrath

Mesmer:
Diversion (Shatter)
Spatial Surge*
Confusing Images*
Illusion of Drowning
Arcane Thievery
Mantra of Distraction/Power Lock
Mantra of Pain/Power Spike
Signet of Domination
Polymorph Moa/Tuna
Mind Blast

Necromancer:
Doom
Rending Claws
Ghastly Claws*
Blood Curse/Rending Curse/Putrid Curse
Feast of Corruption
Life Siphon*
Dark Pact
Spinal Shivers
Sinking Tomb
Summon Blood Fiend
Signet of Vampirism
Blood is Power
Corrupt Boon
Plague Signet
Signet of Spite
Life Leech
Fear
Feeding Frenzy
Death Curse

Ranger:
Hunter’s Call
“Sic ’Em”

Thief:
Steal
Infiltrator’s Strike
Infiltrator’s Signet

Warrior:
“On My Mark”

*: If the cast activated before the target entered stealth, it will continue to hit anyway. If the target enters stealth before the skill is activated, they are immune.

The above list is skills that cannot affect a stealthed target. Period. I did not include possible Ranger pet skills. I also did not include illusion generating skills, as it is theoretically possible for those to affect a stealthed target, such as would be the case with a Sword clone having cleave. Likewise, skills that require a target, but do have an AoE effect were left out.

Me thinks the bigger question is would everyone be willing to waste a utility slot for a non stun break, possibly(and to keep it on the lower end) 20 second CD, and maybe a cast time, for a 5-8 second reveal. I think they tired that with ranger ( don’t know the exact skill but i know its not what i described above) but the only time i saw the skill being used was when it was implemented. i don’t think many people would waste a slot for that.. Thats just me thinking it would be they only way they could add a quick stealth break to the game.

I do feel that I should point out that Stealth is, in fact, an immunity.

A stealthed player is completely immune to the following skills:

Elementalist:
Flame Strike
Arc Lightning*
Lightning Strike
Blinding Flash
Impale
Steam
Air Bubble
Rock Anchor
Arcane Blast
Signet of Earth
Signet of Fire
Signet of Water
Discharge Lightning
Grasping Earth
Flame Wave* (from Firey Greatsword)

Engineer:
Analyze
Magnet

Guardian:
Chains of Light
Bane Signet
Signet of Wrath

Mesmer:
Diversion (Shatter)
Spatial Surge*
Confusing Images*
Illusion of Drowning
Arcane Thievery
Mantra of Distraction/Power Lock
Mantra of Pain/Power Spike
Signet of Domination
Polymorph Moa/Tuna
Mind Blast

Necromancer:
Doom
Rending Claws
Ghastly Claws*
Blood Curse/Rending Curse/Putrid Curse
Feast of Corruption
Life Siphon*
Dark Pact
Spinal Shivers
Sinking Tomb
Summon Blood Fiend
Signet of Vampirism
Blood is Power
Corrupt Boon
Plague Signet
Signet of Spite
Life Leech
Fear
Feeding Frenzy
Death Curse

Ranger:
Hunter’s Call
“Sic ’Em”

Thief:
Steal
Infiltrator’s Strike
Infiltrator’s Signet

Warrior:
“On My Mark”

*: If the cast activated before the target entered stealth, it will continue to hit anyway. If the target enters stealth before the skill is activated, they are immune.

The above list is skills that cannot affect a stealthed target. Period. I did not include possible Ranger pet skills. I also did not include illusion generating skills, as it is theoretically possible for those to affect a stealthed target, such as would be the case with a Sword clone having cleave. Likewise, skills that require a target, but do have an AoE effect were left out.

Stealth =/= immunity. Some classes aren’t as reliant on targeting as others, but many of the target skills you listed can still hit them, and a lot have cc effects. Also, preventing stealth in the first place helps.

I think “specialized” builds have more trouble in general, since they’re only capable of doing one thing. I think utilities should be fairly defensive. You have your weapon skills which are for offense pretty much, now you need to balance it out. Having good amounts of stunbreakers and shouts, heals, etc, helps a lot in the long run against many things, including stealth.

So if you want to counter stealth, you have to have fairly balanced utilities, (fairly balanced build in general) think about what they’re trying to do, and probably play a stealth class for a good amount of time. That way you learn how they work.

alchemyst.2165:

Stealth =/= immunity. Some classes aren’t as reliant on targeting as others, but many of the target skills you listed can still hit them, and a lot have cc effects.

Wrongo! When I say “completely immune” I mean “THEY CANNOT BE AFFECTED AT ALL IN ANY WAY, SHAPE, OR FORM” None of those skills I listed can hit stealthed foes, because there is no ground-targeting, splash, melee swing, or projectile. It is 100% impossible for any of those skills to have any effect whatsoever on a stealthed target.

Stealth is an immunity to those 55 skills (and their chains).

His list is also too short for Warriors. There’s also:

-Bull’s Charge

-Everything on Rifle except Rifle Butt

-Several Bow Skills

-Rush

There’s probably a couple more but there’s a lot of “can hit, but probably won’t” like Shield Bash. Warrior is probably the most un-MMO class in the game considering it isn’t overly reliant on having a target.

BurrTheKing.8571:

His list is also too short for Warriors. There’s also:

-Bull’s Charge

-Everything on Rifle except Rifle Butt

-Several Bow Skills

-Rush

There’s probably a couple more but there’s a lot of “can hit, but probably won’t” like Shield Bash. Warrior is probably the most un-MMO class in the game considering it isn’t overly reliant on having a target.

Bull’s Charge, all bow and rifle skills, and Rush can all hit a stealthed character. It’s either a fluke (you were aiming at something past the stealthed dude) or rediculously unlikely (you were firing with no target and hoping), but it is possible.

I just want one change to stealth: stop dropping my focus on the target.

I’ll wait for them to come out before I can make single target attacks. I’m cool with that. But having to fight the worst auto-targeting I’ve ever seen in over a decade of MMO playing to get them re-targeted again is infuriating.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

BurrTheKing.8571:

His list is also too short for Warriors. There’s also:

-Bull’s Charge

-Everything on Rifle except Rifle Butt

-Several Bow Skills

-Rush

There’s probably a couple more but there’s a lot of “can hit, but probably won’t” like Shield Bash. Warrior is probably the most un-MMO class in the game considering it isn’t overly reliant on having a target.

Bull’s Charge, all bow and rifle skills, and Rush can all hit a stealthed character. It’s either a fluke (you were aiming at something past the stealthed dude) or unlikely (you were firing with no target and hoping), but it is possible.

If you have no target before you use the skill you will go the full range of the skill. Yes, if someone is at the end they will get knocked down, but like that happens on any sort of consistent basis. It’s practical immunity even if it’s not full immunity.

As for Rifle, I have NEVER hit a stealthed target with an attack that wasn’t activated before stealth. A non-targeted attack shoots off at a semi-random angle rather than exactly where your character is facing. Again, physically possible but still practical immunity.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

When I say “completely immune” I mean “THEY CANNOT BE AFFECTED AT ALL IN ANY WAY, SHAPE, OR FORM” None of those skills I listed can hit stealthed foes…

The rare exception is for those skills that have cast times and are cast just before the target stealths. Though I don’t think I’d consider that to be a mechanic that can be effectively used as a counter.

To ANet’s credit, balancing stealth for a class for which stealth and survivability are so closely tied is tricky. I think they’ve already made huge concessions by implementing and increasing the duration of the Revealed debuff, but I do feel that a little more can be done to make it a more fair mechanic without harming thieves’ survivability. For instance, allowing attacks that are evaded to also cause Revealed.

For the most part, I am not unhappy with stealth. The only times in which the mechanic breaks down are when stealth (Shadow Refuge) and the downed state are used as a crutch to enable groups of thieves to get away with playing poorly. The usual “just spam attacks and CC” really only goes so far, unless said thieves get run over by a zerg in the process. That, combined with quick res speeds especially with multiple ressers, makes the group insanely difficult to kill regardless of relative party skill.