Guild Wars 2

Fortus.6175:

I think we can all agreed that currently thieves are stealing (no pun intended) all the attention when it comes to damage dealer/roamer/squishy.

Their OP superb damage coupled with spammable blinds, teleports, dodges, stealth, backstabs is driving to extinction the few eles and mesmers that remain (today we lost 2 top mesmer players due to this, on top of the countless nameless elementalists which plead for fixes long time ago after getting the boot up their …..feet)

Backstabs, without any kind of interaction on the taker other than bending over and taking it regardless of skillfully blocking it, blinding or evading the attack.

Blinds, which reapply on literally every second and then there is the fact that every ranged skill on thieves (except autoattack) applies a blind through this field.

Teleports that cure conditions and break stuns, rendering any form of CC, soft or hard, useless. On top of not only having one, or 2, or 3, or 4 , or 5……. just as many as initiative permit, on top of 2 freebies on low CD.

---

You cant give one class all the best tools for survival regardless of stats, give it the best single target damage and then allow it to take anybody else’s role and call it a day.

Suggestions; blind fields, same treatment the earth storm ele got; once every 4 seconds.
Teleports, increase initiative cost, give it 1/2 or 3/4 seconds precast, 1/2 activation.
Damage and boon stealing; needs an ICD and the damage needs some shaving down, specially spamable skills, something not along the lines of 8%, but rather 15-25%.

Thoughts?

lol i disagree with this thread completely, I think thief is well balanced, I’m not saying this because i play thief, I do really well against thieves using other classes.

You sir. You’ve gone above and beyond.

While thieves usually have to deal with alot of exageration, lies and hyperbole when non-thief players talk about their abilities, you’ve distinguished yourself.

Fortus.6175:

Backstabs, without any kind of interaction on the taker other than bending over and taking it regardless of skillfully blocking it, blinding or evading the attack.

If you’re still puzzling over how to counter backstab, you’re just not trying. Stealth is UP in sPvP – it lasts 3 seconds (4 if you’ve got points in SA, which competitive thief builds dont). Here’s a simple counter – move away from where you last saw the thief – with 3 seconds, he’s going to have a hard time connecting that backstab. If you’d like more info, feel free to look it up.

Blinds, which reapply on literally every second

If you stand in a Black powders field (which would be a strange choice, seeing as you can melee the thief from outside the field)

and then there is the fact that every ranged skill on thieves (except autoattack) applies a blind through this field.

A…are you throwing P/P in with the “Thieves are OP” rant? You’re flirting with disqualification Sir. Unload is only a 20% chance anyway, and Trick shot (20%), cluster bomb and choking gas also don’t apply blind through the field, so it would be more accurate
to say “Spec’s you’ll never see in tPvP because they’re awfully suited for it have alot of ways to apply blind through BP’s field”. Let’s also note any setup that includes P/P is a joke in any PvP format- if you were unaware of this, you’re probably not qualified to comment on thief.

Teleports that cure conditions and break stuns, rendering any form of CC, soft or hard, useless.

Lets see here… IR cures 1 condition and doesn’t break stun… SS breaks stun but doesn’t cure conditions…Inf sig breaks stun with a targeted teleport….IA does neither….Shadow Return does break stuns and cure 3 conditions, so you should have used the singular form, “Teleport”

On top of not only having one, or 2, or 3, or 4 , or 5……. just as many as initiative permit, on top of 2 freebies on low CD.

5 Infiltrators returns would cost 15 total init (cause you know, you have to Inf strike first), and would leave you with 0 initiative for…you know….anything else at all. I don’t know if I’d call a class mechanic a “freebie” (it’s not as if thieves were 100% complete and a dev said “I know, lets give em the steal mechanic on top of all that!”), and you have to actually Slot infiltrators signet to use it.

Suggestions: Please roll a thief and make some video’s of you using the “incredibly overpowered everything” you listed above to absolutely obliterate your competition in any form of tPvP – if you can’t prove these allegations, they’re just ridiculous exaggerations, misunderstanding, and outright lies.

Burnfall.9573:

All problems would be gone if our Parents; Arena.net, didn’t play FAVORITISM

Ah yes, the favoritism of a major nerf nearly every patch… even though thieves were never considered OP in beta and received no buffs after that point before the nerfs started…
Clearly playing favorites. Funny thing is the devs hardly ever even play thieves in their presentations, and when they do, they die instantly.

The even introduced a cheap purchasable WvW item that completely disables stealth in an area, but yeah, definitely favoring thieves.

I would have to say that there IS a problem with thieves causing other classes to not have viable GC specs.

You can’t really run a glass cannon mesmer, ele, ranger, warrior, necro against a thief and expect to win. Of course, the tankier specs these classes have do just fine against thieves.

infantrydiv.1620:

I would have to say that there IS a problem with thieves causing other classes to not have viable GC specs.

You can’t really run a glass cannon mesmer, ele, ranger, warrior, necro against a thief and expect to win. Of course, the tankier specs these classes have do just fine against thieves.

exact! and teleport is one of the mainproblems why.

hooma.9642:

infantrydiv.1620:

I would have to say that there IS a problem with thieves causing other classes to not have viable GC specs.

You can’t really run a glass cannon mesmer, ele, ranger, warrior, necro against a thief and expect to win. Of course, the tankier specs these classes have do just fine against thieves.

exact! and teleport is one of the mainproblems why.

teleports (shadowsteps) are extremely easy to shut down if you know the terrain. Things which do not stop a rush or leap attack can stop a shadowstep.

The thieves are not the problem, its you.

Were thieves really so “OP”, how you all always said, why dont play then everyone a thief?
I see more Engis, Mesmer and Necros in spvp, then every other class.

How Arkantos already wrote, means L2P not only to know your own class, but also to know the other class.
But these is a thing that you can not learn, if you only run in a zerg and I see a lot of zergs in spvp.
Would you follow they players with the Spectator Mode, like me in the last few month, then could you see, that more the others are the problem and not the thieves.

Thieves belong already to the worst classes in this game, but it is doubtful that you ever play a thief to understand that.

Its correct that thieves can do alot of damage, but what do you expect about a class with 0 deffensive?
But this alone is no reason to call him OP.

What is with the other classes, like Guardians, Warriors or Eles, this classes can do the nearly around the same dmg (on one target), but have much more deffensive.
Especially eles can do so much dmg, that they can kill 5 people with only one attack, but I see noone who call them OP.
Or Engis, a class with so many hard counters that you need a group before you have a chance to kill only one of them.

(It gives only one thing, where I would accept its OP and this is stealth, but this is the issue of stealth and not of the thief.)

Black Teagan.9215:

The thieves are not the problem, its you.

Were thieves really so “OP”, how you all always said, why dont play then everyone a thief?
I see more Engis, Mesmer and Necros in spvp, then every other class.

How Arkantos already wrote, means L2P not only to know your own class, but also to know the other class.
But these is a thing that you can not learn, if you only run in a zerg and I see a lot of zergs in spvp.
Would you follow they players with the Spectator Mode, like me in the last few month, then could you see, that more the others are the problem and not the thieves.

Thieves belong already to the worst classes in this game, but it is doubtful that you ever play a thief to understand that.

Its correct that thieves can do alot of damage, but what do you expect about a class with 0 deffensive?
But this alone is no reason to call him OP.

What is with the other classes, like Guardians, Warriors or Eles, this classes can do the nearly around the same dmg (on one target), but have much more deffensive.
Especially eles can do so much dmg, that they can kill 5 people with only one attack, but I see noone who call them OP.
Or Engis, a class with so many hard counters that you need a group before you have a chance to kill only one of them.

see i play thief too and know how easy it is to safely overextend and kill that ele or anything whats spams skills in the groupfight from a more defensiv position than i have. after i downed, killed or forced him to retread i can return to my position or force more ppl out of the group fight to assist him. all trought teleports and stealth.

why i doubt u should talk about l2p? well lets reread the bold text.

Form.8741:

I don’t get how Mesmer is an underpowered class, unless they nerfed phants by about 80% in the last 4 months…it’s an extremely GOOD 1v1 class.

As you said, 1v1. Hence, underpowered.

Carighan.6758:

Form.8741:

I don’t get how Mesmer is an underpowered class, unless they nerfed phants by about 80% in the last 4 months…it’s an extremely GOOD 1v1 class.

As you said, 1v1. Hence, underpowered.

More mispowered, to coin a term. It’s extremely powerful in one area. It just so happens that it’s the wrong area for PvP.

hooma.9642:

see i play thief too and know how easy it is to safely overextend and kill that ele or anything whats spams skills in the groupfight from a more defensiv position than i have. after i downed, killed or forced him to retread i can return to my position or force more ppl out of the group fight to assist him. all trought teleports and stealth.

why i doubt u should talk about l2p? well lets reread the bold text.

There is no different, as if I say I kill every thief with every class.
It’s dependent from you and the others and this is what I mean with l2p(^look into my last posting.)
Only because this works dont mean it works always, especially not against people with the same or higher talent, than you.

I have no problems to kill thieves, except this one who play bettter than me, but these are rare.

P Fun Daddy.1208:

More mispowered, to coin a term. It’s extremely powerful in one area. It just so happens that it’s the wrong area for PvP.

True. Although, classes need strengths and weaknesses overall, and it stands to reason that some classes can and will be strong in 1v1 situations while others excel where they can capitalize on supporting and support.

The issue is more that we have one such specialization (1v1), which is always inferior to be used because it’s not a fight you want to create if there’s any way you can help it.

The problem with Thief is that it’s a little too good against other Glass cannons, hence pushing them out of the meta (Elementalist, Mesmer), whilst being only middling or outright inferior against tougher builds like Condi-bunkers or just Bunkers in general.

• Part, but not _all of the problem can be traced back to Critical Damage. Most GC builds run little to no toughness, so getting hit by a Thief hurts. A lot. You can easily start a fight at 50% HP as a GC against a Thief, and then you’ve got small windows of opportunity to turn the fight around. Against D/P, you have to interrupt/CC the re-Stealth. Against S/D, you have to hit a clutch CC, or wait for when they try to burst, then counter.

• Outside of these windows of vulnerability; there is little opportunity for other Glass Cannons to counter-engage. Stealth remains difficult to counterplay for some classes, laughably easy for others. The solution is to build tanky DPS so you live longer to see more windows. But that leads to the original problem – other glass cannons are out-competed.

The solution is not going to be easy, but it’s going to involve the following:

• Moving some of the utility Thieves get from Stealth into other areas. Condition cleanse, Crit chance, that sort of thing.
• Making Stealth a Boon; thus giving skills with Boon Hate additional utility against Stealth. Mesmers in particular would have their matchups improved markedly by this one change.
  • Most importantly removing Stealth as a Boon should not inflict Revealed. With counterplay must come counter-counterplay – the Thief should be able to re-stealth after hitting Boon Hate. Obviously things like hitting people while Stealthed should still inflict Revealed.

• As for things like Backstab, the whole Stealth Opener thing should be revised to be just that: an Opener. Damage should not be frontloaded into Backstab. Instead, large (I’m talking 5, 10, 15 stacks) of Vulnerability should be inflicted. Snares like Cripple or Immobilise optional. (maybe through Traits)
  • Thief weapon sets should then be rebalanced to put more damage into the other skills. Overall damage output over time should be increased. Thief shouldn’t be a one-shot wonder, but something that hits harder and harder the more you can’t get them off your back.
  • This has the effect of making Thief less effective against other Glass Cannons as the window of counter-engagement has now increased. This also makes Thief more effective against Tanky DPS builds (assuming damage output over time is also increased)

Too many weapon sets rely on only 2-3 out of the 5 possible attacks because too much has been loaded into 1 skill whilst others are left weak because buffing them would make the weapon set OP.

• Underutilised skills should be reworked to provide Thief with more sustain i.e. Life Steal is an underlooked mechanic on Thief, but as a Protection/Toughness ignoring source of damage, Life Steal on Thief can be looked at as a way for Thief to counter bunkers.
• The aim is to enable Thief to stay engaged with an enemy for longer while being less dependant on, but no less assisted by, clutch Blinds/Dodges

TL:DR: The aim should be to:

• Make Thieves less time-starved, or “one shot wonders”. Thieves should be dealing damage, but it should not be all frontloaded from Stealth.
• Make Thieves less dependant on Stealth overall to deal their damage. Thieves should deal their damage just like everyone else – Revealed. They just require the tools to be able to do so like everyone else instead of using Stealth as a crutch.
• Clutch Blinds and Evades should still be an outstanding feature of the class, but must promote a skill floor like being conditional on dodging actual attacks, or actually hitting, or dealing bonus damage to target after target misses attack due to Blind.
• Squishy GCs should have their window of counter-engagement against Thieves extended, whilst Tanky DPS or Bunkers have theirs decreased i.e. through Vulnerability stacking or Toughness ignoring damage i.e. Life Steal.

Bad mesmers die to D/P.

Hint: It’s not the D/P that mesmers have the most trouble with. It’s the SB. This really has very little to do with stealth, when it comes to D/P.

Decent to good mesmers will die to S/D.

The overall thief class isn’t the problem. The problem is the overall meta.

MonMalthias.4763:

The problem with Thief is that it’s a little too good against other Glass cannons, hence pushing them out of the meta (Elementalist, Mesmer), whilst being only middling or outright inferior against tougher builds like Condi-bunkers or just Bunkers in general.

• Part, but not _all of the problem can be traced back to Critical Damage. Most GC builds run little to no toughness, so getting hit by a Thief hurts. A lot. You can easily start a fight at 50% HP as a GC against a Thief, and then you’ve got small windows of opportunity to turn the fight around. Against D/P, you have to interrupt/CC the re-Stealth. Against S/D, you have to hit a clutch CC, or wait for when they try to burst, then counter.

• Outside of these windows of vulnerability; there is little opportunity for other Glass Cannons to counter-engage. Stealth remains difficult to counterplay for some classes, laughably easy for others. The solution is to build tanky DPS so you live longer to see more windows. But that leads to the original problem – other glass cannons are out-competed.

The solution is not going to be easy, but it’s going to involve the following:

• Moving some of the utility Thieves get from Stealth into other areas. Condition cleanse, Crit chance, that sort of thing.
• Making Stealth a Boon; thus giving skills with Boon Hate additional utility against Stealth. Mesmers in particular would have their matchups improved markedly by this one change.
  • Most importantly removing Stealth as a Boon should not inflict Revealed. With counterplay must come counter-counterplay – the Thief should be able to re-stealth after hitting Boon Hate. Obviously things like hitting people while Stealthed should still inflict Revealed.

• As for things like Backstab, the whole Stealth Opener thing should be revised to be just that: an Opener. Damage should not be frontloaded into Backstab. Instead, large (I’m talking 5, 10, 15 stacks) of Vulnerability should be inflicted. Snares like Cripple or Immobilise optional. (maybe through Traits)
  • Thief weapon sets should then be rebalanced to put more damage into the other skills. Overall damage output over time should be increased. Thief shouldn’t be a one-shot wonder, but something that hits harder and harder the more you can’t get them off your back.
  • This has the effect of making Thief less effective against other Glass Cannons as the window of counter-engagement has now increased. This also makes Thief more effective against Tanky DPS builds (assuming damage output over time is also increased)

Too many weapon sets rely on only 2-3 out of the 5 possible attacks because too much has been loaded into 1 skill whilst others are left weak because buffing them would make the weapon set OP.

• Underutilised skills should be reworked to provide Thief with more sustain i.e. Life Steal is an underlooked mechanic on Thief, but as a Protection/Toughness ignoring source of damage, Life Steal on Thief can be looked at as a way for Thief to counter bunkers.
• The aim is to enable Thief to stay engaged with an enemy for longer while being less dependant on, but no less assisted by, clutch Blinds/Dodges

TL:DR: The aim should be to:

• Make Thieves less time-starved, or “one shot wonders”. Thieves should be dealing damage, but it should not be all frontloaded from Stealth.
• Make Thieves less dependant on Stealth overall to deal their damage. Thieves should deal their damage just like everyone else – Revealed. They just require the tools to be able to do so like everyone else instead of using Stealth as a crutch.
• Clutch Blinds and Evades should still be an outstanding feature of the class, but must promote a skill floor like being conditional on dodging actual attacks, or actually hitting, or dealing bonus damage to target after target misses attack due to Blind.
• Squishy GCs should have their window of counter-engagement against Thieves extended, whilst Tanky DPS or Bunkers have theirs decreased i.e. through Vulnerability stacking or Toughness ignoring damage i.e. Life Steal.

This is one of the best suggestions for thief I’ve heard in a long time – well thought out and articulated. What’s even more shocking, you’re talking about thief on the forums but not exaggerating or crying for nerfs,and it’s clear your familiar with how the class works! I pinched myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.

What’s ultimately depressing is that these suggestions aren’t easy to implement – If we ever see them (and I doubt it), it’ll be 6+ months at minimum into the future.

Dardamaniac.1295:

Agree with the OP..
Take a look at this pic

thief did more dmg than Ranger..Rangers Longbow attack speed is 1sec and must be at max range for max dmg..

Thief did a leap, a gap closer and huge dmg..

It’s almost as if the whole GW2 game was balanced so that melee did more DPS than ranged !

Also, the thief did 2 and a half autoattack chains in that screen.

I come from a thief, recently switched to ele as thief didn’t have much synergy with my friends toons and was getting boring.

I played burst d/d spec and certain classes (elementalist, ranger, most thieves), were a guaranteed kill in sub 5 seconds. I would kill eles in my first combo. so sub 2 seconds.

Mesmers took a little more work, but not bad if you caught them unaware.

From an ele standpoint, when you’re wearing light armour, and lowest hitpoint tier, in WvW it stops you traiting for damage entirely as any no skill chump can C+D + steal you then heartseeker for 2-3k you a few times afterwards. So you end up with very little capability to deal damage and speccing alot of defence….or more commonly in pvp just not playing an ele and rolling a warrior, who laughs at every class he meets. Which explains the current issue with pvp matches being full of warriors and the dissapearance of elementalists and mesmers.

If you spec damage you’ll die within seconds to thieves/zerk warriors..if you spec defence you’ll die a bit slower, but won’t kill anyone. So why bother putting yourself through that annoyance.

Also…everyone targets the elementalist first for this reason. It’s like being teemo in LoL, you’re first target because everyone is aware you’ll either fall over or the fight you’ll put up won’t really put them in any significant danger. My friend loves it though, now people target me instead of him, whereas they used to target him and not my thief.

Aveneo.2068:

And personally I find the Thief class very unfun both playing one as well as playing against one as there is little to no counterplay involved.

This…. it’s an all around disaster of a class. It’s either gonna be overpowered or underpowered, but regardless of whatever it is, it’s not gonna be much fun for the parties involved in the fight.

MonMalthias.4763:

• Making Stealth a Boon; thus giving skills with Boon Hate additional utility against Stealth. Mesmers in particular would have their matchups improved markedly by this one change.
  • Most importantly removing Stealth as a Boon should not inflict Revealed. With counterplay must come counter-counterplay – the Thief should be able to re-stealth after hitting Boon Hate. Obviously things like hitting people while Stealthed should still inflict Revealed.

This would completely screw up engineers who have no boon hate to speak of. And if cover boons are utilized by the thief (easy to do) it becomes impossible for classes with boon hate which removes only 1 boon. Also because stealth makes you untargettable, any boon hate that requires a target cannot do kitten (arcane thievery for instance).

bwillb.2165:

Burnfall.9573:

All problems would be gone if our Parents; Arena.net, didn’t play FAVORITISM

Ah yes, the favoritism of a major nerf nearly every patch… even though thieves were never considered OP in beta and received no buffs after that point before the nerfs started…

Right…. thieves never got any buffs whatsoever amirite guise?

The even introduced a cheap purchasable WvW item that completely disables stealth in an area, but yeah, definitely favoring thieves.

The fact that they needed to introduce a stealth counter consumable is more than enough indication how ridiculous this class is.

The problem is, if you weaken the thief, suddenly classes like warriors, or med guardians will eat them alive.

There’s just too much disaparity between the 2 ends classes now , warriors being at one end, eles and rangers being at the other. The further you move down thieves, the better it gets for the top end.

Really you need to buff rangers and eles up instead of nerfing thieves.

phaeris.7604:

The problem is, if you weaken the thief, suddenly classes like warriors, or med guardians will eat them alive.

There’s just too much disaparity between the 2 ends classes now , warriors being at one end, eles and rangers being at the other. The further you move down thieves, the better it gets for the top end.

Really you need to buff rangers and eles up instead of nerfing thieves.

I am fairly sure there are several teams running rangers. Ele and Mesmer, not so much. Don’t think Mesmer should be left out of this, as they are one of the professions not worth taking over Thief.

True, although really just spirit rangers. It’s a bit of a no brain spec. Much like MM necro.

Takes any sort of actual skill from the game.

ManCaptain.3154:

bwillb.2165:

Burnfall.9573:

All problems would be gone if our Parents; Arena.net, didn’t play FAVORITISM

Ah yes, the favoritism of a major nerf nearly every patch… even though thieves were never considered OP in beta and received no buffs after that point before the nerfs started…

Right…. thieves never got any buffs whatsoever amirite guise?

Go search the thief forums a while back (~3 months?) there were 2 posts; one listing all the nerfs thief has seen since launch, and the other listing all buffs (of which I am the author) – feel free to compare the 2 and see how much more severe the nerfs were.

bwillb.2165:

bwillb.2165:

The even introduced a cheap purchasable WvW item that completely disables stealth in an area, but yeah, definitely favoring thieves.

The fact that they needed to introduce a stealth counter consumable is more than enough indication how ridiculous this class is.

We’re talking sPvP – WvW has nothing to do with sPvP in terms of stealth (capture point format makes stealth extremely weak)

every class but the thief has team support skills!
elements r support/ large aoe. u can just drop bombs in a packed zerg area and watch people just get blasted . elements also have the highest skill ceiling of any class so unless u r really good!
u need to be with your team giving them support !
and letting them use all your combo fields !
u r a valuable class and classes around should protect u and use your combo fields as much as they can !
and let u nuke people !

a thief can not do any of that
a thief has very few aoe skills we r mainly single target class and elements being squishy and being left open by there team r a prime target !

play your class people. better team play.
not mindless zerging … have your party of 5 and work together
with your team based classes !
support classes do not get enough credit

and there r way to many people that don’t even know what a combo field is lol

MonMalthias.4763:

…

TL:DR: The aim should be to:

• Make Thieves less time-starved, or “one shot wonders”. Thieves should be dealing damage, but it should not be all frontloaded from Stealth.
• Make Thieves less dependant on Stealth overall to deal their damage. Thieves should deal their damage just like everyone else – Revealed. They just require the tools to be able to do so like everyone else instead of using Stealth as a crutch.
• Clutch Blinds and Evades should still be an outstanding feature of the class, but must promote a skill floor like being conditional on dodging actual attacks, or actually hitting, or dealing bonus damage to target after target misses attack due to Blind.
• Squishy GCs should have their window of counter-engagement against Thieves extended, whilst Tanky DPS or Bunkers have theirs decreased i.e. through Vulnerability stacking or Toughness ignoring damage i.e. Life Steal.

Great post!

Stealth
Stealth certainly has its issues in GW2. In DAoC, for example, going back into stealth after attacking was a lot harder or even impossible. However, implementing your changes would make Shadow Arts totally useless. I personally would make going into stealth less attractive in general. Or just more difficult.

One idea which has been posted several times is changing the combo field of Blinding Powder into a dark field. I really like this suggestion. Blinding Powder could still blind on hit but the pulsing Blind could be removed. Leap stealthing would be prohibited. The original poster also suggested making dark fields stealth on projectile finishers. I disagree with that part of the suggestion. It would just move the perma-stealth issue from D/P to P/P. It would also be hard to control due to 20% projectile finishers and probably just cause unintentend reveals.

One shot wonders
I partly disagree here. There should be a way of playing the Thief in an Assassin style way. However, there got to be a bigger risk like in DAoC where you can’t get back into stealth after you used your backstab. As said earlier, I don’t think limiting stealth is the right solution here. However, Backstab and the other weapon#1 stealth skills could get a cooldown and only become available after this cooldown is done. As a result, Thieves won’t be able to burst that frequently. It also makes hiding in stealth less appealing because you can’t reapply your Backstab that frequently. Conclusively, Thieves might actually stay out of stealth longer to deal damage and use stealth more defensively.

caveman.5840:

every class but the thief has team support skills!

Got to disagree. Thieves do have support skills but most Thief players just don’t like them because they favour a different play style. Venoms are pretty nice for your group while they indeed might need some more tweaking. Smoke Screen and Shadow Refuge on the other hand are just plain great. They also provide great combo fields which you state Thieves do not have.

we have far fewer support skills than other classes
and i have not seen very many venom share thief’s running around .
the thief is not incapable of support but it is not support that benefits your team the same as the number of combo feilds an element can lay down … thief’s main support is to spam blast finishers so an element and a thief can work together well .
when i play thief i go thief hunting and keep thieves off my strong elements no wait no matter what class i am playing i like to protect the elements i love to have elements in my party for group fights in wvw .build a team to work with !

Xaylin.1860:

Stealth
Stealth certainly has its issues in GW2. In DAoC, for example, going back into stealth after attacking was a lot harder or even impossible. However, implementing your changes would make Shadow Arts totally useless. I personally would make going into stealth less attractive in general. Or just more difficult.

But stealth in this game has been entirely designed around short duration/reapplication. I Didn’t play DAoC, but of the games I have played with stealth in them (WAR, Wow, Rift to name a few), initial stealth was either permanent, or long lasting (30s+), making setting up a stealth attack a breeze – those games all had options for 1 in-combat stealth as well. Their stealth openers were also designed with this in mind, making them much more powerful.

One idea which has been posted several times is changing the combo field of Blinding Powder into a dark field. I really like this suggestion. Blinding Powder could still blind on hit but the pulsing Blind could be removed. Leap stealthing would be prohibited. The original poster also suggested making dark fields stealth on projectile finishers. I disagree with that part of the suggestion. It would just move the perma-stealth issue from D/P to P/P. It would also be hard to control due to 20% projectile finishers and probably just cause unintentend reveals.

Please stop saying “Perma-stealth” – it no longer exists in sPvP. The Dec 10th change rendered long-duration stealth impossible without the use of utilities, which Anet is fine with (and is fine from a balance standpoint) – thieves in sPvP can no longer stealth indefinitely.

One shot wonders
I partly disagree here. There should be a way of playing the Thief in an Assassin style way. However, there got to be a bigger risk like in DAoC where you can’t get back into stealth after you used your backstab. As said earlier, I don’t think limiting stealth is the right solution here. However, Backstab and the other weapon#1 stealth skills could get a cooldown and only become available after this cooldown is done. As a result, Thieves won’t be able to burst that frequently. It also makes hiding in stealth less appealing because you can’t reapply your Backstab that frequently. Conclusively, Thieves might actually stay out of stealth longer to deal damage and use stealth more defensively.

This is an awful, awful suggestion that keeps cropping up on the forums in various forms. Backstab is already balanced around the current stealth timers – if you want a CD imposed on backstab, be prepared for a big damage increase (which is completely counter-productive). On top of all that, I don’t see how Mon advocated less stealth – his suggestion leaves stealth where it is for the most past.

caveman.5840:

every class but the thief has team support skills!

Got to disagree. Thieves do have support skills but most Thief players just don’t like them because they favour a different play style. Venoms are pretty nice for your group while they indeed might need some more tweaking. Smoke Screen and Shadow Refuge on the other hand are just plain great. They also provide great combo fields which you state Thieves do not have.

Venoms are awful – to be of any use, they the entirety of your spec dedicated to them (60 points and 5 traits), and even then they’re Meh – they’re a utility line with a long CD with no stunbreaker in the line, and their use is all PBAOE and instant, making coordination significantly harder for the benefits you receive than other classes support options.

Shadow refuge has 1 real use – stomp prevention. Mind you, that’s a really good use.

evilapprentice.6379:

Please stop saying “Perma-stealth” – it no longer exists in sPvP. The Dec 10th change rendered long-duration stealth impossible without the use of utilities, which Anet is fine with (and is fine from a balance standpoint) – thieves in sPvP can no longer stealth indefinitely.

Point taken. The word perma-stealth probably is inaccurate. The maximum duration of chained stealth might have decreased but stealth is still overused. Thieves might drop out of stealth more often. However, they instantly get back into it. Considering the mobility of Thieves the window of Revealed is a lousy joke for bursting them down. While I don’t think that the duration of Revealed should be increased I still think that Thieves should rely on stealth a lot less.

evilapprentice.6379:

This is an awful, awful suggestion that keeps cropping up on the forums in various forms. Backstab is already balanced around the current stealth timers – if you want a CD imposed on backstab, be prepared for a big damage increase (which is completely counter-productive). On top of all that, I don’t see how Mon advocated less stealth – his suggestion leaves stealth where it is for the most past.

From my point of view, Backstab is not sufficiently balanced by stealth timers. While I don’t think denying Thieves to go back into stealth is the right thing to do, I feel that the frequency of applying Backstabs is too high. Thus, damage is too stealth dependend. Lowering the frequency by introducing a cooldown doesn’t necessarily mean that the damage of Backstab has to increase. If needed, out of stealth weapon skills could be adjusted or it could apply Vulnerability as mentioned above. It advocates the same idea like Mon mentioned, making Backstab an opener.

Mon did also advocate less stealth through taking damage away from skills like Backstab. His rework of making stealth a boon results in a totally different stealth. Not sure how you assume this would leave stealth where it is.

evilapprentice.6379:

Venoms are awful – to be of any use, they the entirety of your spec dedicated to them (60 points and 5 traits), and even then they’re Meh – they’re a utility line with a long CD with no stunbreaker in the line, and their use is all PBAOE and instant, making coordination significantly harder for the benefits you receive than other classes support options.

I said they needed tweaking. But they far from useless. I personally enjoy using them in PvE. It’s also not true that you have to get all traits at once, only Venom Aura is mandatory. If their range was increased and a stunbreak was introduced to them they might make for a nice supportive low stealth build in WvW or hotjoin PvP. tPvP not so much but that doesn’t mean they suck in general.

However, that’s not the point of my post. I just said that there are support focussed skills on Thieves. I didn’t argue about their usefulness. But feel free to bash me.

evilapprentice.6379:

Shadow refuge has 1 real use – stomp prevention. Mind you, that’s a really good use.

Well… everyone is entitled to their opinion I guess? I personally value it.

ManCaptain.3154:

MonMalthias.4763:

• Making Stealth a Boon; thus giving skills with Boon Hate additional utility against Stealth. Mesmers in particular would have their matchups improved markedly by this one change.
  • Most importantly removing Stealth as a Boon should not inflict Revealed. With counterplay must come counter-counterplay – the Thief should be able to re-stealth after hitting Boon Hate. Obviously things like hitting people while Stealthed should still inflict Revealed.

This would completely screw up engineers who have no boon hate to speak of. And if cover boons are utilized by the thief (easy to do) it becomes impossible for classes with boon hate which removes only 1 boon. Also because stealth makes you untargettable, any boon hate that requires a target cannot do kitten (arcane thievery for instance).

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Throw_Mine

srry i guess i need to be more specific i kinda thought it was ovious the fact that thieves r not totally with out any support skills at all .
and i though i would be fine trying to keep it short and just say
“every class but the thief has support skills”
but what i mean by this is that the thief is more of a solo roaming class
and the other classes r meant to focus on team play more

and that does not mean the thief can not participate in team play
and that does not mean other class can not solo roam . but the thief is designed for it !

Backstab should be a skill you use in at a specific time, i.e. a one shot high damage dealing ability. It NEEDS a cooldown, as it stands a thief can virtually chain this ability. Maybe even tie it too initiative, so that it’s only usable as an actual combat opener if your initiative is high enough. Make ability require skill and timing.

it does have a cool down reviled time ?
ranger has sickem to increase this time . but rangers pets meh :S
don’t run full zerk so u don’t get dropped in one hit
aoe cc imobilize fear
keep moving don’t leave your back open

Xaylin.1860:

evilapprentice.6379:

This is an awful, awful suggestion that keeps cropping up on the forums in various forms. Backstab is already balanced around the current stealth timers – if you want a CD imposed on backstab, be prepared for a big damage increase (which is completely counter-productive). On top of all that, I don’t see how Mon advocated less stealth – his suggestion leaves stealth where it is for the most past.

From my point of view, Backstab is not sufficiently balanced by stealth timers. While I don’t think denying Thieves to go back into stealth is the right thing to do, I feel that the frequency of applying Backstabs is too high. Thus, damage is too stealth dependend. Lowering the frequency by introducing a cooldown doesn’t necessarily mean that the damage of Backstab has to increase. If needed, out of stealth weapon skills could be adjusted or it could apply Vulnerability as mentioned above. It advocates the same idea like Mon mentioned, making Backstab an opener.

Mon did also advocate less stealth through taking damage away from skills like Backstab. His rework of making stealth a boon results in a totally different stealth. Not sure how you assume this would leave stealth where it is.

How does turning stealth into a boon in any way effect how often it can be used? It’s a mechanics change, not an availability change. He also mentioned not changing revealed timers (except for the case where his proposed stealth ‘boon’ was stripped), resulting in the exact same availability and restrictions to stealth.

His suggestion of taking damage away from backstab was balanced by a suggestion (albeit a vague one) to compensate with DPS boosters for the prolonged fight – I’m fine with backstab doing less up front damage if it enables damage later (like say via large stacks of vulnerability) – it’s about not kittening up overall damage. Lowering the frequency is a bad change, switching the frontloaded damage into escalating damage is a good one.

evilapprentice.6379:

Venoms are awful – to be of any use, they the entirety of your spec dedicated to them (60 points and 5 traits), and even then they’re Meh – they’re a utility line with a long CD with no stunbreaker in the line, and their use is all PBAOE and instant, making coordination significantly harder for the benefits you receive than other classes support options.

I said they needed tweaking. But they far from useless. I personally enjoy using them in PvE.

We are talking PvP

It’s also not true that you have to get all traits at once, only Venom Aura is mandatory. If their range was increased and a stunbreak was introduced to them they might make for a nice supportive low stealth build in WvW or hotjoin PvP. tPvP not so much but that doesn’t mean they suck in general.

If you take venomous aura, but dont take at minimum leeching venoms and quick venoms, your build is bad (again, in PvP). Once you’re at that level of investment, it only makes sense to also go 30 DA for Residual, and take venomous might.
It’s my opinion that venoms suck in general – it’s a fact that venoms suck in tPvP and sPvP, which is what this discussion is about.

evilapprentice.6379:

Shadow refuge has 1 real use – stomp prevention. Mind you, that’s a really good use.

Well… everyone is entitled to their opinion I guess? I personally value it.

I wasn’t disagreeing – Shadow refuge is basically a must in tPvP, because it’s ability to counter stability/invuln stomp is tremendous.

dont focus to much on stealth.. s/d and s/p are very strong too.

MonMalthias.4763 got it right. the problem for other gc is the low window of vulnerability on the thief for a short fight. but i think that is less a problem of stealth or blinding. its more a problem of initiative and no cooldowns.

d/p has the problem u cant interrupt the restealth on most classes, cause blinding powder shots a blinding projectile. unless a warrior who has zerkerstance up or a engi with shield or googles its nearly not interruptable or u need to be lucky that the projectile got blocked trought someone else. d/p shadow shot is on some gc enough to prevent big hits and on the same deliever high dmg.
s/d has the high evade problem + teleport, and the s/p got the invul. during pw, teleport and blindingfield for defense.

i think feline grace is 1 part of the problem and another bountiful theft. problem is the both are needed for longer fights. maybe other gc needs a more reliable way to ignore blinding like utility googles or zerkerstance and at least some viable source of vigor for a certain frame of time.

the overall goal should be to higher the amount of time of vulnerability to other gc and on the same part give thief more sustain for longer fights. i think the first part can only be achieved on other classes or we get rid of initiative.. all in all its a balancing problem! if the cost for skills without dimishing return is to low it favours spamming and if they are to high it hurts longer fights.

i think it would be overall healthier for the game if a dimishing return would exist for initiave.

evilapprentice.6379:

How does turning stealth into a boon in any way effect how often it can be used? It’s a mechanics change, not an availability change. He also mentioned not changing revealed timers (except for the case where his proposed stealth ‘boon’ was stripped), resulting in the exact same availability and restrictions to stealth.

I also mentioned not changing the revealed timers. I was solely talking about the stealth version of weapon skill #1. Not sure why you think I’d want revealed to be changed.

Making it a boon is quite a huge change since you can expect stealth being high on the priority list. You might underestimate boon stripping. Mesmers could Nullfield you. Or Mind Blast you with their GS. Or use Sword AA. Guardians could remove it by using AE burns. Necros could corrupt it with their Well. Engineers could run Elixirs and throw them at you. Throw Mines also works. And, of course, those sweet Sigils with boon stripping. Just got to spam area attacks.

evilapprentice.6379:

His suggestion of taking damage away from backstab was balanced by a suggestion (albeit a vague one) to compensate with DPS boosters for the prolonged fight – I’m fine with backstab doing less up front damage if it enables damage later (like say via large stacks of vulnerability) – it’s about not kittening up overall damage. Lowering the frequency is a bad change, switching the frontloaded damage into escalating damage is a good one.

As said earlier, reducing the frequency could come with compensating changes.

evilapprentice.6379:

If you take venomous aura, but dont take at minimum leeching venoms and quick venoms, your build is bad (again, in PvP). Once you’re at that level of investment, it only makes sense to also go 30 DA for Residual, and take venomous might.
It’s my opinion that venoms suck in general – it’s a fact that venoms suck in tPvP and sPvP, which is what this discussion is about.

While Quick Venoms is advisable you are in no way forced to take Residual. Yes, it could be fused with a different trait, but you don’t need it. I also don’t like Venomous Might. I personally prefer Mug and go 20/0/30/0/20. If you don’t like the extra Initiative and Vigor you are free to go 30/0/30/0/10.

Of course, this isn’t the best set up when getting into a 1vs1 situation while roaming in in hotjoin PvP. But we are talking about support. It is pretty nice when fighting side by side with an ally. And even solo you should not underestimate it when you bring Ambush and Thieves Guild. I like it. But I’m rather unconventional when it comes to builds anyway.

While mentioning Venom indeed was a bit off topic, please, let’s not argue about sPvP and tPvP. People rarely go for support heavy builds there because the builds have to be able to sustain on their own. Even on classes which are way more support focussed by class design. If you’re lucky you might find bunker builds with support capabilities.

Xaylin.1860:

evilapprentice.6379:

How does turning stealth into a boon in any way effect how often it can be used? It’s a mechanics change, not an availability change. He also mentioned not changing revealed timers (except for the case where his proposed stealth ‘boon’ was stripped), resulting in the exact same availability and restrictions to stealth.

I also mentioned not changing the revealed timers. I was solely talking about the stealth version of weapon skill #1. Not sure why you think I’d want revealed to be changed.

Revealed timers are there primarily there to limit stealth attack options – they affect SA traits as well, but every thief has stealth attack options, spending points in SA is not universal. Adding a CD to Backstab is the same as messing with the revealed timer, from a DPS standpoint.

Making it a boon is quite a huge change since you can expect stealth being high on the priority list. You might underestimate boon stripping. Mesmers could Nullfield you. Or Mind Blast you with their GS. Or use Sword AA. Guardians could remove it by using AE burns. Necros could corrupt it with their Well. Engineers could run Elixirs and throw them at you. Throw Mines also works. And, of course, those sweet Sigils with boon stripping. Just got to spam area attacks.

Still doesn’t mess with the stealth/revealed timers, which is the big deal.

evilapprentice.6379:

His suggestion of taking damage away from backstab was balanced by a suggestion (albeit a vague one) to compensate with DPS boosters for the prolonged fight – I’m fine with backstab doing less up front damage if it enables damage later (like say via large stacks of vulnerability) – it’s about not kittening up overall damage. Lowering the frequency is a bad change, switching the frontloaded damage into escalating damage is a good one.

As said earlier, reducing the frequency could come with compensating changes.

The compensating changes would have to be big damage boosts, which is the opposite direction of Mon’s suggestions. His version keeps the pace of stealth/stealth attacks the same, upping sustained DPS and dropping burst. Your suggestion would have to up burst, because you’re imposing a second artificial limit on BS (since we already have revealed), and isn’t necessary.

evilapprentice.6379:

evilapprentice.6379:

If you take venomous aura, but dont take at minimum leeching venoms and quick venoms, your build is bad (again, in PvP). Once you’re at that level of investment, it only makes sense to also go 30 DA for Residual, and take venomous might.
It’s my opinion that venoms suck in general – it’s a fact that venoms suck in tPvP and sPvP, which is what this discussion is about.

While Quick Venoms is advisable you are in no way forced to take Residual. Yes, it could be fused with a different trait, but you don’t need it. I also don’t like Venomous Might. I personally prefer Mug and go 20/0/30/0/20. If you don’t like the extra Initiative and Vigor you are free to go 30/0/30/0/10.

No one’s forced to do anything – if you’re going to spec venoms/support however, you’re going to have 3 traits at minimum (Aura, Quick Ven, Leeching), and as many venoms as you can cram onto your bar (likely Skelk, 2 utilities and BV) – at this point, not taking residual venoms is silly because you’re gimping your own support spec – 1 additional trigger per venom per target – assuming you share venoms with 2 players (since the goal is support, I Dont think that’s a wild assumption), you’re talking about 12 additional venom triggers – that’s a huge difference.

Of course, this isn’t the best set up when getting into a 1vs1 situation while roaming in in hotjoin PvP. But we are talking about support. It is pretty nice when fighting side by side with an ally. And even solo you should not underestimate it when you bring Ambush and Thieves Guild. I like it. But I’m rather unconventional when it comes to builds anyway.

Ambush and thieves guild is the “Solo” version of this, and you won’t be running it in tPvP. As far as hotjoin…who cares? It’s hotjoin, a specs effectiveness in hotjoin means basically nothing.

While mentioning Venom indeed was a bit off topic, please, let’s not argue about sPvP and tPvP. People rarely go for support heavy builds there because the builds have to be able to sustain on their own. Even on classes which are way more support focussed by class design. If you’re lucky you might find bunker builds with support capabilities.

Alrighty.

in my opinion good solution with less changes:

- feline grace: grants 100% faster endurance regeneration for 3 seconds -> the same like before. 15 endurance back, but avoid stacking with vigor
- opportunist: removed the icd or lower it to 2/3 seconds. -> to remove the burden a thief has on sustained dmg
- black powder: remove the projectile to allow counterplay against stealth combo. blinding projectile combo is still possible with other projectiles
- initial strike: higher the possible change from 7 to 15% -> helps for higher sustained dmg and opens up a choice between bountiful theft or sleight of hand
- fleet foot: double the icd from 10 to 20 seconds
- pain response: half of the duration of regeneration from 10 to 5 secs
-> with initial strike + (opportunist) + assasin reward and some % of crit chance thief has the possibility for more sustain trough continuous healing and evade like a ele/ranger mix

now that we helped thief with more sustained dmg trought opportunist we need to fix the “spam” of skills that shorten the vulner. window for other gc. without dimishing return the only solution is higher cost
- flanking strike -> from 3 to 4 or skillcoeff from 0.75 to 0.4
- heartseeker -> from 3 to 4
- infiltrators strike: requires a target in range or will miss and no teleport -> less “free” overextending and long reach becomes a choice
- infiltrators return -> from 2 to 3
- pistolwhip -> from 5 to 7 (remember multiattack so opportunist can trigger more than once) or remove/lessen the evadeframe 1,25-1,5 secs is to long. if first part of skill is blocked the second part should be happen. that way block-counterskills are actual usable against pw.
- shadowshot -> from 4 to 5 or remove blind and higher the skill coeff of projectile from 0.3 to 0.5
- unload and repeater -> from 5 to 7 (remember multiattack so opportunist can trigger more than once)
- death blossom: from 4 to 6 ( multiattack-> opportunist)

so with these changes the amount of skills in a short time frame is less then before. other gc have time and opport. for counterplay. trought opportunist and the higher regeneration of initiative the thief has more sustained dmg and sustain.

so all that thief then needs is some better condition remove outside of stealth. any suggestions?

edit:

buff small group team play!
everyone wants to be a solo roamer
and every one wants there class to be a better solo roamer class than the thief ???
buff skilled team play. traits/ skills that r beneficial to team play

for team support thief needs more sustain. see my suggestions.

as side from venoms thief already has teamsupport with bountiful theft and thrill of crime btw.

caveman.5840:

ya i know that joke .
thief does not need anymore team support it is a solo roaming class

right. aoe vigor, swiftness, might and fury and 2 enemy boons is crap i know.. /sarcasm

buff small group team play!
everyone wants to be a solo roamer
and every one wants there class to be a better solo roamer class than the thief ???
buff skilled team play or traits / skills that r beneficial to team play

ya i know that joke .
thief does not need anymore team support it is a solo roaming class

i am not saying that it is crap ! that is y i said they do not need any more team support…
u could go and buff team support for every class but the thief !

I have the sneaking (pun intended) suspicion that most people commenting on this thread ether WvW exclusively, or their spvp experience is limited to hotjoins or at the very least they have EXTREMELY limited soloque/teamque experience.

This thread is starting to become unreadable. Which is sad because I thought it was going to actually go somewhere. Welp. Chalk it up to forum-go’ers again. I really shouldn’t get my hopes up like this.

evilapprentice.6379:

Still doesn’t mess with the stealth/revealed timers, which is the big deal.

Again: I did not ask for changes to stealth or revealed timers. I literally said I did not want revealed to be changed. I just voiced my agreement for a suggestion regarding D/P. That’s totally unrelated to general stealth mechanics but an issue caused by a specific weapon set.

evilapprentice.6379:

The compensating changes would have to be big damage boosts, which is the opposite direction of Mon’s suggestions. His version keeps the pace of stealth/stealth attacks the same, upping sustained DPS and dropping burst. Your suggestion would have to up burst, because you’re imposing a second artificial limit on BS (since we already have revealed), and isn’t necessary.

I really don’t get how you can misread what I wrote in this way.

Yet again, I never said anything about changing revealed. The pace remains the same. While I didn’t name any compensations for the cooldown, I also never said that there should not be any. You just assumed I didn’t see the need for any.That doesn’t make it true.

The compensation in no way has to be done by increasing the Backstab damage. Again, that’s an assumpion you brought to the table. It’s quite easy to slightly increase the base damage of the other skills instead.

I dislike the idea of taking away all the burst a Thief can have and that is what would happen when his idea was established. Putting a cooldown on Backstab can make it a true opener while maintaining the ability to burst. Revealed would stay the same. The pace would stay the same. But going back into stealth will be less favourable. That’s it!

If you don’t like the idea, that’s fine. But please stop assuming stuff I just didn’t say.

evilapprentice.6379:

Ambush and thieves guild is the “Solo” version of this, and you won’t be running it in tPvP. As far as hotjoin…who cares? It’s hotjoin, a specs effectiveness in hotjoin means basically nothing.

If you don’t care for hotjoins, that’s fine. However, as I said earlier, discussing support builds for sPvP and tPvP has no purpose anyway. There are no true support builds in sPvP and tPvP for any class. Therefore, a Thief hardly has any disadvantage there.

that apples to pvp to
u can buff team play in a lot of ways! kinda a broad subject ( team play ) u can go a lot of ways with it but anyway .
u don’t really want to zerg in pvp but a group of 2 is not bad but if it encourages better more thought full team/game play all the better

Fortus.6175:

yet no need to be in stealth when the enemies are dead, so please

This!

pvp it self is based around 3 point capture . making every one run bunkers . more game modes to mix things up

all of the problems revolving around stealth would be very easily solved if they would just make hostile combo fields also reveal stealthed targets “while they are inside” so they dont lose their stealth and can teleport out of the field but they cant stand right on top of you while in stealth then simply re-engage 3 seconds later without ever needing to move away “stealthily”, it also gives a counter to things such as shadow refuge which quite literally have no form of effective counter you have to literally just sit there and watch them stealth for 10 seconds and even if you hit them you would never know if theyre even still in there.

this would just make it so placing down fields is a method to protect yourself while not really taking any of the power out of stealth as a whole.

Disable could remove stealth (all them).

style.6173:

Fortus.6175:

(today we lost 2 top mesmer players due to this, on top of the countless nameless elementalists which plead for fixes long time ago after getting the boot up their …..feet)

If a mesmer loses to a thief, then the mesmer is just plain bad. Mesmer is by far the best 1v1 class.

I think you missed the point of this point;

two of the most ‘famous’ pro players (highly regarded as civilized, open minded and reasonable man) quit their mesmer class in a rather ‘ragey’ way over their channels and rerolled to thieves due to the amount of unbalances and apparent favoritisim towards certain classes such as warriors and thieves. They are now rolling thieves themselves.

There were around 3 eles ‘pros’ that did the same a few months ago. Of course no one remembers anymore because in forum’s time thats ages, but it has happened, it is happening and it will keep happening if things continue this way.

HECK, even devs themselves admitted in a stream that thieves were driving away mesmers and elementalists from this meta.

The class is very “slippery” which gives them very high mitigation when played correctly. With high mobility, high damage, stealth and extraordinary ability to blind targets, causes the class to have better mitigation than a character specifically built to withstand damage.

The best form of mitigation is not to get hit at all. Combined with a very high damage output that doesn’t have any warning signs to counter play. It makes the class quite deadly.

Aza.2105:

…
doesn’t have any warning signs to counter play.
…

Warning Sign: Thief is in stealth. (and has a melee weapon set, dem back stabs)
Meaning: Possible burst of damage will happen, more likely if the thief is higher health than you.
Proposed Reaction: Run forward, sparsely dodge rolling to gain distance and stall till stealth runs out, possibly dodge a backstab as well.
People’s Reaction: Stand in place. Or, run around in circles (not creating distance). Or slowly walk backwards…

o.O i dont know… maybe it’s the way i play… but i can guess why the thief went into stealth… and this is just an example…