Guild Wars 2

The condition Chilled does the following:

• Movement speed decreased by 66%.
• Skill cooldown increased by 66%; stacks duration.

The thing is:

Thieves have semi-immunity to this skill because they do not have cooldown on their skills.

If this is not a bug or if this is intended, can you please make elementalist semi-immune to blindness, bleeding, and fire? Or semi-immune to all conditions?

Thanks.

Talk about ignoring the elementalist. Way to go way to go!

The only thing in this post that makes any sense is that the Thief doesn’t get a 66% cooldown increase on weapon skills.

The answer, though, is to cause chill to give thief a 66% reduction in the speed they regain initiative. That’s the closest thing to fair you’re going to get.

Giving Elementalists an arbitrary immunity to any condition because thieves have one built into their very mechanic is not balanced in any way.

Kal Spiro.9745:

The only thing in this post that makes any sense is that the Thief doesn’t get a 66% cooldown increase on weapon skills.

The answer, though, is to cause chill to give thief a 66% reduction in the speed they regain initiative. That’s the closest thing to fair you’re going to get.

Giving Elementalists an arbitrary immunity to any condition because thieves have one built into their very mechanic is not balanced in any way.

Thank you for actually giving a suggestion. I was about to propose the same about the slower Initiative recovery!

I’m impressed that this is a complaint about the initiative system, and not the more blatantly broken thief issues. Go OP for originality. Also, +1 for chilled dinging the initiative regeneration. (What about the various ways thieves have of gaining X initiative? That gets cut by 66% too? DO IT. Thief tears are sweet, sweet nectar.)

Nitross.6987:

Kal Spiro.9745:

The only thing in this post that makes any sense is that the Thief doesn’t get a 66% cooldown increase on weapon skills.

The answer, though, is to cause chill to give thief a 66% reduction in the speed they regain initiative. That’s the closest thing to fair you’re going to get.

Giving Elementalists an arbitrary immunity to any condition because thieves have one built into their very mechanic is not balanced in any way.

Thank you for actually giving a suggestion. I was about to propose the same about the slower Initiative recovery!

How about removing initiative and giving the thief a cooldown on their skills just like everyone else?

it is already enough that they have to waddle after you while being chilled…. how more do you need -_-

Hitman.5829:

How about removing initiative and giving the thief a cooldown on their skills just like everyone else?

completely changing class mechanics won’t happen; if they changed it to CDs thieves would be too binary and boring/slow to play

Hitman.5829:

Nitross.6987:

Kal Spiro.9745:

The only thing in this post that makes any sense is that the Thief doesn’t get a 66% cooldown increase on weapon skills.

The answer, though, is to cause chill to give thief a 66% reduction in the speed they regain initiative. That’s the closest thing to fair you’re going to get.

Giving Elementalists an arbitrary immunity to any condition because thieves have one built into their very mechanic is not balanced in any way.

Thank you for actually giving a suggestion. I was about to propose the same about the slower Initiative recovery!

How about removing initiative and giving the thief a cooldown on their skills just like everyone else?

I’m sorry if I have offended you Hitman; your first “solution” to the problem seemed a bit humorous so I only tried to respond in kind while acknowledging Kal Spiro’s answer. Obviously, my choice of words was not right.

Text is a wonderful medium but, it lacks the context tone and body language gives to a spoken conversation so, I may have misunderstood your intention.

As not to make the same mistake twice, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt: do you truly believe there is not way – like the -66% initiative regen proposed for Chilled – to balance the Thief’s core mechanic to the point that it should be scrapped completely? And, if so, what would you replace it with?

The thief is broken, from a balance perspective – between initiative and stealth, there’s no way to truly balance them against the other classes, who all have to deal with actually losing when things go bad, and managing their cooldowns.

I know you weren’t talking to me, Nitross, but realistically, no, there’s no way to balance them without scrapping the initiative system.

Also note, their core mechanic isn’t initiative, nor stealth – it’s steal. I know thief players argue this, because they love the perma-stealth/inst-gib builds, but nonetheless, it’s true.

stale.9785:

The thief is broken, from a balance perspective – between initiative and stealth, there’s no way to truly balance them against the other classes, who all have to deal with actually losing when things go bad, and managing their cooldowns.

I have played a thief to level 80, decked it with ascended trinkets and exotic armor and weapons, watched videos and tried pre-made builds and yet, I never achieved the level of proficiency that some thiefs who stealth ganked me in WvW have.

Point is, like any class, skill is a big factor. If there is one “problem” with the Thief class, it’s that skilled players make it ridiculously good while unskilled ones get trampled. Other classes are usually more forgiving for casual gamers and – from what I can gather in the forums – don’t get as much of an edge as Thief in the hands of a skilled player.

stale.9785:

I know you weren’t talking to me, Nitross, but realistically, no, there’s no way to balance them without scrapping the initiative system.

I don’t mind if anyone joins in the conversation as long as they bring something to it; that’s what discussion forums are for!

Considering what I said above to the effect that player skill seems to have a greater impact, we can see how initiative is so hard to balance; Thieves essentially have a shared cooldown for all of their attacks and have ways to reduce that cooldown with traits and skills that allow Initiative gain. The more aware you are of how much you’re using and regaining, the deadlier you are.

This is all cool on paper and gives the Thief an edge in the striker/burst department but, it does leave all the other classes behind in terms of flexibility since the only way they can manipulate their cooldowns is with -20% traits.

Here’s a suggestion: instead of finding ways to nerf or replace such a unique ability, Anet could use the addition of new traits and skills they announced to give the other classes abilities that reset cooldowns on their attack skills under certain conditions? For instance: a Warrior’s Berzerker Stance could reset weapon skill cooldowns on a kill or reduce them by a set amount. If that’s not enough, I’m certain other ways could be found to give a similar edge in the right hands.

As for Stealth, other classes like mesmer or ranger could get better access with longer duration and more skill variety so it’s not just a Thief thing. Add some counters that could reveal or pinpoint stealthed players and it would certainly make things more interesting.

If you still think there’s no way to balance Initiative aside from removing it, I’d be happy to hear of your suggestions to give the class a new ability to keep it’s role as the “striker” of the game without it being overwhelming in the right hands.

stale.9785:

Also note, their core mechanic isn’t initiative, nor stealth – it’s steal. I know thief players argue this, because they love the perma-stealth/inst-gib builds, but nonetheless, it’s true.

I’m sorry but, the official site presents Initiative as the main ability for thieves, just like they do Adrenaline for Warriors and Atunements for Elementalists.

But, for the sake of the argument, if you remove Initiative and Steal becomes the main ability of Thief, how would you change it to make it as powerful or versatile as the other class abilities, while keeping in mind their combat style is supposed to be all about moving fast and striking hard?

TLDR: I think that Thief gets stronger than other classes when the player is skilled enough to micro-manage their Initiative. Give ways to other classes to micro-manage their cooldowns to compensate instead of nerfing/removing Initiative and punishing players who, unlike me, got good with the Thief.