Guild Wars 2

I just came up with a suggestion that would deal with thieves spamming skills. Don’t get me wrong, thieves aren’t overpowered but their ability to spam skills due to the lack of recharge is a very bad design flaw. So here’s my solution to force thieves into using all their skills and not spamming a few of them over and over.

Make it so that if a thief uses the same skill more than once in a 5second (maybe slightly longer) period it costs an additional initiative and then another for each one after that.
Make it stack up to 2 or 3 times and now we have thieves unable to spam non-auto attack skills.

tahdah fixed

tahdah s/d set now sucks again because there are no other weapon skills worth using tahdah thief is even worse in teamfights with the nerf on clusterbombs tahdah

ahuba.6430:

tahdah s/d set now sucks again because there are no other weapon skills worth using tahdah thief is even worse in teamfights with the nerf on clusterbombs tahdah

tahdah let’s sweep the problem under the carpet then?

You’re right, your solution is better if we take into account ANet’s mindset.

Guess it may be the only way to try balancing that class. The problem with the lack of cooldown/initiative costs is that, as now, there is basically no incentive to use something other than the “best” skill, simply cause you can do that, aside from few strategical choices.

I do not play a thief, though I have given them a try to see what they are all about (traits, weapons, builds, etc.). I do not think spamming was a design flaw so much as part of the whole idea to begin with … use whatever ability you have that is most optimal at that time, and if that includes spamming one ability then go on and spam it. I agree that it can most certainly be annoying/frustrating/rage-provoking to deal with. However, I think this was intentional and should not be hampered … it is just part and parcel of the profession.

Jax.5261:

ahuba.6430:

tahdah s/d set now sucks again because there are no other weapon skills worth using tahdah thief is even worse in teamfights with the nerf on clusterbombs tahdah

tahdah let’s sweep the problem under the carpet then?

You’re right, your solution is better if we take into account ANet’s mindset.

You made a thread about a suggestion to “fix” thieves, i disagreed about said suggestion and presented you with the reason why i did. whats wrong with my mindset? maybe the problem is your mindset, not mine. and how can you read “sweep it under the carpet” in what i said?

Thieves are fine. They don’t do the absolute best in tourneys and can be owned by any class in a duel. Every class can spam but it doesn’t deserve a nerf.

I don’t really see anything wrong with this? I admit I don’t play thief, but I don’t really see this as a horrible change, any thief who plays properly and sets himself up wouldn’t suffer to much I don’t think.

But as an alternate suggestion (possibly worse) What if a skill just couldn’t be used more than once or twice in a row before having to use another skill. (excluding auto attack ofcorse) and then building on it as part of the mechanic? Like making it so certain skills don’t have this restriction so you inherrently expand on the class mechanic and maybe even sets up a brighter future for thiefs? Also adds to the skill factor.

Now I see how that could force a thief to blow more initiative than they want to so some balancing would need to be done but even traits that reduce such a thing could be built uppon it.

But as thiefs are now they are far from OP so I don’t even think somthing drastic needs to really be hard pushed yet. Other classes take less skill and give such a higher reward for being survivability built.

The real way to fix thieves would actually be to make all their weapon skills worth using.

Puru.4217:

The real way to fix thieves would actually be to make all their weapon skills worth using.

The thing is that doesn’t work, if they need damage on a target they’re still going to continue to spam the skill which does the most damage, or whatever scenario you can think of, regardless of the level of play.

If we don’t do anything, nothing will change. The current system is bad and has to change, if thief skills do get a buff that’s fine but spamming skills is stupid and shouldn’t exist in this game.

ahuba.6430:

Jax.5261:

ahuba.6430:

tahdah s/d set now sucks again because there are no other weapon skills worth using tahdah thief is even worse in teamfights with the nerf on clusterbombs tahdah

tahdah let’s sweep the problem under the carpet then?

You’re right, your solution is better if we take into account ANet’s mindset.

You made a thread about a suggestion to “fix” thieves, i disagreed about said suggestion and presented you with the reason why i did. whats wrong with my mindset? maybe the problem is your mindset, not mine. and how can you read “sweep it under the carpet” in what i said?

That we just ignored the problem because we didn’t want to think about the solution.

But why do you find it a bad design? If they don’t play carefully with their initiative, they’re pretty much screwed. I don’t know what’s so bad about it. Maybe from the playing perspective, but you don’t play a thief, or do you?

Puru.4217:

The real way to fix thieves would actually be to make all their weapon skills worth using.

And you would still use the best one, cause there is no incentive using the “weaker” ones anyway. Unless they put a lot of different effects, but that would make them even too versatile, thus you would be nerfed in other aspects to counterbalance (see engineer and reduced dps in main weapons).
Beside that, other classes’ weapons haven’t necessarily got only strong attacks; we have to use those anyway cause they are still better than the autoattack, though.

Unintentionally nerfs P/P.

But really, thief weapon sets (other than d/p) need more synergy and fluidity with all the skills. They don’t…need this. -_-

I hate to play against the thief mit s/d. I do not care if it is overpowered. But I guess it is not a good idea to design a char people hat to fight against.

Immune to condis, hard to hit. Hitting like a truck. Stealing all buffs. Simply suck

I wouldn’t be upset if they implemented this. That said I think the more likely and better fix would be to simply make s/d’s third skill cost more initiative. Or lower base damage on a few of the more OP skills by a bit.

If you get hit by 1 heartseeker allright. But if you take 3 in a row you’re terrible and frankly I doubt you have much trouble with that Silven. You probably just hate the OP s/d spec because it takes little skill to play and is rather effective.

If you are refering to Heartseeker or any skill on a backstab build: no thief can simply spam a skill until he runs out of initiative and live to tell against a good player.

Only S/D can do this right now, because the build is largely focused on dodges through vigor and initiative gain.
One could argue Lacerating Strike costs too little initiative, but it’s still a gamble to spam. The problem right now is their ability to reset.

Risk/reward is very important for the initiative mechanic to be balanced.

Manuhell.2759:

Guess it may be the only way to try balancing that class. The problem with the lack of cooldown/initiative costs is that, as now, there is basically no incentive to use something other than the “best” skill, simply cause you can do that, aside from few strategical choices.

Thief was designed to be a quick in and out of combat class. We move in for the kill and disappear again. Any good thief will never really spam an ability, because there is really no “best” skill. I use all skills on my weapon set for different reasons, and I rarely do any spamming. We can’t spam any ability and actually kill someone, except for those bad players just standing there…

Try a thief and you’ll understand.

i would love cooldowns like every other class

then we would actually have useful skills and meaningful cc

Geiir.7603:

Manuhell.2759:

Guess it may be the only way to try balancing that class. The problem with the lack of cooldown/initiative costs is that, as now, there is basically no incentive to use something other than the “best” skill, simply cause you can do that, aside from few strategical choices.

Thief was designed to be a quick in and out of combat class. We move in for the kill and disappear again. Any good thief will never really spam an ability, because there is really no “best” skill. I use all skills on my weapon set for different reasons, and I rarely do any spamming. We can’t spam any ability and actually kill someone, except for those bad players just standing there…

Try a thief and you’ll understand.

An ability gets spammed when the opportunity cost for it and the other 3 skills on that bar are disproportionate. Hence P/D’s typical 5-1 play. Outside of imbalances in skills spamming is terrible for thieves because it means putting all your eggs in one basket and getting drained out of initiative. Good thieves don’t spam skills when our weapon set is balanced to give them choice otherwise thief has no option but to spam.

Initiative is a good mechanic, imo a really good one, but initiative doesn’t want slow skill balancing. It requires meaningful choices and for those choices to have a cost. Imo initiative is much better than a cooldown system and every profession would be more interesting if they had it. Only reason to not want it is because of how thief skill balance has been handled. We’d be better off with Cooldowns the way things have been going.

You can start by removing all the auto-face and homming skills thief has got…it’d be less faceroll and it’d be a change for the better

I have another idea!

Make all there abilities do good damage and worth using instead of just 2-3!

Daecollo.9578:

I have another idea!

Make all there abilities do good damage and worth using instead of just 2-3!

Make all their abilities crit for 3k+!

Great idea! Thieves need more burst!

This is like warriors whining that their sword doesn’t do enough damage simply because their mainhand axe does OP autos for 3k+ and they feel every weapon of theirs should do that damage while the other classes at best crit for 1.5-2.5k

Thieves are easy kills as long as you survive the initial pop.. whats the issue? If you want more depth, seek it in other classes.

Simplistic classes are needed imo because they lower the barrier to entry.

oh pls stop, i will spam whatever i wanna spam if i have initiative!
let’s talk about players who run in circles like circus animals and when i use gap closer(hs) they say: " dude you spam 222!" so what? you running like chicken!

but truth is thief only works good in good team, so leave us alone!

22222222222222 lol

if u see any other game you will see thieves with energy/iniziative but some skill have cooldown..

for balance “i think” 1 second cooldown for the high damage skills could be ok..

example Heartseeker 1 second cooldown, headshot 0 sec cooldown..

Daecollo.9578:

I have another idea!

Make all there abilities do good damage and worth using instead of just 2-3!

they’re all worth using and all thieves (not just good ones) would notice that if they were forced to use them due to either cd or cumulative initiative cost.
Maybe just pistol mainhand kinda sucks (unless you want to use a troll p/d stealth spam build)

Actually the reason thieves spam is because far to many of there abilities are situational and don’t do much damage. Headshot is an amazing ability? Why use it besides anything other then an interrupt?! it does absolutely no damage!

I need to kill something… 2 2 2 2!

Making all thieves abilities do decent damage will change that.

Daecollo.9578:

Actually the reason thieves spam is because far to many of there abilities are situational and don’t do much damage. Headshot is an amazing ability? Why use it besides anything other then an interrupt?! it does absolutely no damage!

I need to kill something… 2 2 2 2!

Making all thieves abilities do decent damage will change that.

But … that is the same for all classes. Functionality of certain abilities often have reduced dmg in exchange for something else. Do thieves have to be the special snowflake, that just gets all the goodies?

Poxxia.1547:

Daecollo.9578:

Actually the reason thieves spam is because far to many of there abilities are situational and don’t do much damage. Headshot is an amazing ability? Why use it besides anything other then an interrupt?! it does absolutely no damage!

I need to kill something… 2 2 2 2!

Making all thieves abilities do decent damage will change that.

But … that is the same for all classes. Functionality of certain abilities often have reduced dmg in exchange for something else. Do thieves have to be the special snowflake, that just gets all the goodies?

Tell that to my Axe Warrior! All my abilities do great damage and have a great effect like cripple/vulnerability!

Heck! look at Greatsword mesmer! again all abilities do great damage!

S/P Mesmer? Again, all abilities do great damage!

Thieves abilities that have effects do little to no damage, so the thief must spam his damaging ability to damage, even if he may want a cripple or something.

Dancing Dagger used to be an awesome ability, however its damage got reduced by 50%.

Guess what? They can do that exactly because they have cooldowns, so they can’t spam them.
They can’t make all abilities strong, versatile and spammable.

and bunch of ppl, who hate thieves automaticaly liked post, where somebody call for thief nerf
imho its totally bad idea

bad idea……….

Daecollo.9578:

Poxxia.1547:

Daecollo.9578:

Actually the reason thieves spam is because far to many of there abilities are situational and don’t do much damage. Headshot is an amazing ability? Why use it besides anything other then an interrupt?! it does absolutely no damage!

I need to kill something… 2 2 2 2!

Making all thieves abilities do decent damage will change that.

But … that is the same for all classes. Functionality of certain abilities often have reduced dmg in exchange for something else. Do thieves have to be the special snowflake, that just gets all the goodies?

Tell that to my Axe Warrior! All my abilities do great damage and have a great effect like cripple/vulnerability!

Heck! look at Greatsword mesmer! again all abilities do great damage!

S/P Mesmer? Again, all abilities do great damage!

Thieves abilities that have effects do little to no damage, so the thief must spam his damaging ability to damage, even if he may want a cripple or something.

Dancing Dagger used to be an awesome ability, however its damage got reduced by 50%.

Uhm … take a calculator like that on intothemist.com and see the normalized values of ALL the skills. Mesmers don’t have a high base-value on their skills. It comes from traits and gear. Warriors don’t either, really.
And as stated above (Manuhell), they all have cooldowns on their skills.

Poxxia.1547:

Daecollo.9578:

Poxxia.1547:

Daecollo.9578:

Actually the reason thieves spam is because far to many of there abilities are situational and don’t do much damage. Headshot is an amazing ability? Why use it besides anything other then an interrupt?! it does absolutely no damage!

I need to kill something… 2 2 2 2!

Making all thieves abilities do decent damage will change that.

But … that is the same for all classes. Functionality of certain abilities often have reduced dmg in exchange for something else. Do thieves have to be the special snowflake, that just gets all the goodies?

Tell that to my Axe Warrior! All my abilities do great damage and have a great effect like cripple/vulnerability!

Heck! look at Greatsword mesmer! again all abilities do great damage!

S/P Mesmer? Again, all abilities do great damage!

Thieves abilities that have effects do little to no damage, so the thief must spam his damaging ability to damage, even if he may want a cripple or something.

Dancing Dagger used to be an awesome ability, however its damage got reduced by 50%.

Uhm … take a calculator like that on intothemist.com and see the normalized values of ALL the skills. Mesmers don’t have a high base-value on their skills. It comes from traits and gear. Warriors don’t either, really.
And as stated above (Manuhell), they all have cooldowns on their skills.

All thief skills have the same cool-down, its called initiative.

Daecollo.9578:

Poxxia.1547:

Daecollo.9578:

Poxxia.1547:

Daecollo.9578:

Actually the reason thieves spam is because far to many of there abilities are situational and don’t do much damage. Headshot is an amazing ability? Why use it besides anything other then an interrupt?! it does absolutely no damage!

I need to kill something… 2 2 2 2!

Making all thieves abilities do decent damage will change that.

But … that is the same for all classes. Functionality of certain abilities often have reduced dmg in exchange for something else. Do thieves have to be the special snowflake, that just gets all the goodies?

Tell that to my Axe Warrior! All my abilities do great damage and have a great effect like cripple/vulnerability!

Heck! look at Greatsword mesmer! again all abilities do great damage!

S/P Mesmer? Again, all abilities do great damage!

Thieves abilities that have effects do little to no damage, so the thief must spam his damaging ability to damage, even if he may want a cripple or something.

Dancing Dagger used to be an awesome ability, however its damage got reduced by 50%.

Uhm … take a calculator like that on intothemist.com and see the normalized values of ALL the skills. Mesmers don’t have a high base-value on their skills. It comes from traits and gear. Warriors don’t either, really.
And as stated above (Manuhell), they all have cooldowns on their skills.

All thief skills have the same cool-down, its called initiative.

Well … 0 is not a number. Not having a cd promotes imho spamming … and I like to see thieves as being the most complex class, not some flimsy 1-trick pony. But hey .. everyone is entitled to their opinion
Oh … and: Having the “same cd” is kinda a part of the problem as I see it.

Lol, well this idea just went to the crap shoot.

want to spam HS? remove the gap closer and it’s became ok..

the problem of the HS it’s not the initiative, neither the damage, but his gap closer..

it’s totally ridicolous that thieves in one skill have gap closer, high damage, with 0 cooldown..

another ridicolous thing is that thieves complains because the others skills are not good as heartseeker lol

heartseeker, for be balance should be:

deal -50% damage that do now if hit by front.
deal +50% damage that do now if hit a target from behind.
without gap closer of course.

[little OT]

another ridicolous thing is see a thief keep spamming HS when i have retaliation, , shocking aura, fire aura, aegis, and so..they play just smashing 222222222222 without notice anything..and when u kill them, they quit game lol

many noob play thief, and without HS they are nothing., infact i kill them as a GLASS STAFF ELE..but when i fight a really good thief i have no chance to win, and i recognize them because they don’t spam nothing, but play very smart and use the right skill in the right moment..

it’s a pleasure fight a good thief..it is frustrating that there are few thanks to HS spamming..

[close ot]