Guild Wars 2

Larynx.2453:

Wolfe.3097:

hardly talking about steal, assassins signet is the main thing. not too mention many pair it with devourers or basilisk to further ensure the backstab.

assassins signet is the main cd, can turn 5k into 7.5k (more actually cuz of hte traits hte build uses with might stacking)

Um, apparently Assassin’s Signet is all of my cooldowns, and is so important that I’m completely useless without it.

Gotcha.

I don’t even run with Basilisk or Devourer, so I’m guess I’m just perpetually useless.

im sorry, i guess i shouldve added vs a competent player, cuz lets be honest, i could make a vid of me using black powder and autoattack only and gibbing people all over the place cuz they refuse to move out of my circle.

steal is just one aspect of the build, its usually used in cunjunction with the others to get a long ranged near instant kill off which can be pretty hard to counter.

even without it, your gonna do 1/3 less damage without assassins signet. those epic 10k backstabs are really more like 6.6k in a completly glass cannon build (less actualy again cuz of the specs might stacking)

not too mention i said its the main Cd, not the only. im talking about a very specific backstab build here, not just any backstab build.

@ Wolfe

Come on, man… this hyperbole is making it difficult to have a reasonableconversation. I play a thief in pvp. I don’t want to see them nerfed to hell either, but there are some things that need to be realistically adjusted.

The squishy build BS is probably out of line. BS itself is not. That said, let’s not pretend that once the cheese build blows all of his cooldowns for the insta-gib that the thief is worthless. BS still hits hard (just not as hard) and the thief can still contribute (now vs a team who is down one person). Is he as good as he is with his CDs up? Absolutely not, but to say he is weak is, as I said above, hyperbole.

Moreover, I am tired of the thief has no defense. In a vacuum? Yes, the thief is weak. If he were to just stand there and let any other class pound on him, yes, he is weak. That said, thieves get one of the single best defensive skills in the game on a relatively low cooldown. When I am on my thief and I lose a fight, more often than not that just means I have to run away for a few seconds… when I am on my necro and I lose a fight, I am looking at a respawn timer.

QSpec.4298:

@ Wolfe

Come on, man… this hyperbole is making it difficult to have a reasonableconversation. I play a thief in pvp. I don’t want to see them nerfed to hell either, but there are some things that need to be realistically adjusted.

The squishy build BS is probably out of line. BS itself is not. That said, let’s not pretend that once the cheese build blows all of his cooldowns for the insta-gib that the thief is worthless. BS still hits hard (just not as hard) and the thief can still contribute (now vs a team who is down one person). Is he as good as he is with his CDs up? Absolutely not, but to say he is weak is, as I said above, hyperbole.

Moreover, I am tired of the thief has no defense. In a vacuum? Yes, the thief is weak. If he were to just stand there and let any other class pound on him, yes, he is weak. That said, thieves get one of the single best defensive skills in the game on a relatively low cooldown. When I am on my thief and I lose a fight, more often than not that just means I have to run away for a few seconds… when I am on my necro and I lose a fight, I am looking at a respawn timer.

Touché, sir, touché. I find a big problem between classes is the ignorance, a lot of classes don’t know the ins and outs of the other classes (myself included). This leads to absurd blanket statements about other classes, for instance, I notice lots of people think thieves are just 100% benefits. Thieves don’t have the smallest selection of weapons combinations in the game, thieves don’t have abysmal base health and armor, thieves never get hit by attacks because we’re always stealth or in some form of a dodge, every attack by a thief is a spammable 10k crit, etc etc… you see my point.

When it’s all said and done, I think that perhaps thieves should be toned down a small amount and all the other classes need to have their bugs fixed and be appropriately buffed to the perceived level of a thief. Or if not that, maybe make toughness scale better or something, I don’t know. It’s the same age old argument, at this point I’m just waiting to see if it’ll be the same age old solution of nerfing the rogue archetype into uselessness.

Cyric.7485:

Touché, sir, touché. I find a big problem between classes is the ignorance, a lot of classes don’t know the ins and outs of the other classes (myself included). This leads to absurd blanket statements about other classes, for instance, I notice lots of people think thieves are just 100% benefits. Thieves don’t have the smallest selection of weapons combinations in the game, thieves don’t have abysmal base health and armor, thieves never get hit by attacks because we’re always stealth or in some form of a dodge, every attack by a thief is a spammable 10k crit, etc etc… you see my point.

When it’s all said and done, I think that perhaps thieves should be toned down a small amount and all the other classes need to have their bugs fixed and be appropriately buffed to the perceived level of a thief. Or if not that, maybe make toughness scale better or something, I don’t know. It’s the same age old argument, at this point I’m just waiting to see if it’ll be the same age old solution of nerfing the rogue archetype into uselessness.

Now this is how to reasonably discuss things :P

I agree. When I first started playing thief I was pretty impressed with how facerolly it was not (some builds). People also forget that thieves are counterable. Guardians give me hell (I am curious to see how the retri nerfs will change that), and engies bunkering are rough too.

My own two cents, I would like to see thieves obnoxious builds toned down, but I would be cautious about any nerfs to standard abilities that are not super out of whack (like old HSS and PW). I think more than nerfing thief, some classes need buffs (I am thinking specifically of eles dps build and necros non-condition builds… possibly non-greatsword warriors, but not sure on that last one).

Once all of the classes are performing where they should be performing, then we can start looking out how classes are performing.

My complaint is that the cheese builds are making it hard to get there.

For the record, my thief build is close to this: http://www.gw2build.com/builds/clerk-stealth-killer-thief-5548.html

I personally think thieves are fine. They perform their function pretty well when built as glasscannons, they kill very fast, but if they lose the initiative in the fight for even a second then they melt.

I reckon if you see a thief coming and you still die in 2 seconds then one of two things
is happening:
1) You’re bad (sorry but yep ^^). If you know they’re coming it’s very easy to counter them.
2) You’re a glass cannon yourself, in which case of course you melt. If you caught them out in a similar way then you would mow them down just like they do to you.

There are many ways to counter the initial burst and no, not just ‘dodge!’. I’m not going to list each class and each option, people should just work it out for themselves.

I don’t play thief, but I do fear that if the nerfs that people seem to want do go ahead the class will become pointless in PvP.

As things stand right now for me thieves are already moving towards getting on the ‘free kill’ list, along with Warriors (biggest offenders, needs serious buffs imo), Rangers and even Guardians (can take ages but no way they can actually win in my experience), this is from an Engineer main btw. At least right now thieves occasionally get the kill on me if they get lucky with crits/me starting afk, if nerfs happen I just don’t think they’ll be competitive.

Kellhus.8071:

LOL @ posts saying go play a thief, learn what they did, and then counter it!

You know what they did? They turned invisible and have too many multipliers. The ONLY reliable option is be a class that can bunker, or run from them — neither of which really play along with the notion of “skill based pvp”.

Thief damage is broken, and most good players who love thief classes will openly admit this — it’s really the marginal players who think it’s their skill with a thief that is making some difference, and to them I glad say — pick any class, and run spvp. Feel free to message me. I’ll jump on my thief and show you how you have very few playstyle limiting options to counter me.

The above is really the problem — to counter a thief you have to build yourself as a bunker. There isn’t a single other glass cannon build that this hold true for.

QSpec.4298:

I think there may be some element of l2p. Stealth classes are always contentious. People do not like taking huge amounts of borederline unavoidable damage even if the fight is completely winnable. Coupled with things like the invisible stealth bug, this is going to lead to a lot of upset people.

That said, I am getting a tad annoyed with some of the thief’s responses. Learn to Dodge is especially annoying. So a class is supposed to be able to read minds in order to win an even fight? Why doesn’t every class just get an insta-down skill then? That way other classes can throw out the learn to dodge as well.

What if in a fight I had already used two dodges? Then it is acceptable for one class to completely dominate another without any chance for retaliation? That is super flawed thinking.

Thieves definitely have some PR to do so as to be seen as fair. Thieves should work on doing this instead of defending cheese builds that may not be tourney viable but are wrecking the pub scene.

PS I main a thief in sPvP.

^^ Two of the most well written and level-headed posts on the subject I’ve read to date. Jonathan Sharp and Co. should read those two clearly.

The average human reaction time is less than half a second, so if you’re taking longer than a second to react then you’re just slow. Shouldn’t change the game just to cater to slow people.

HellsMachine.4083:

The average human reaction time is less than half a second, so if you’re taking longer than a second to react than your just slow man. Shouldn’t change the game just to cater to slow people.

Is that a half second with or without lag or some other delay?

I play in AU and my average ping is 200-300 milliseconds, average human reaction time being about 200 milliseconds you still have 1.5 seconds.

HellsMachine.4083:

The average human reaction time is less than half a second, so if you’re taking longer than a second to react then you’re just slow. Shouldn’t change the game just to cater to slow people.

Luckily there is no ping or a render problem. It is fun to get 3 attacks from nowhere and the suddenly a thief appears. Cool thing. But yes, people should just expect that. No skill and such, right?

QSpec.4298:

@ Wolfe

Come on, man… this hyperbole is making it difficult to have a reasonableconversation. I play a thief in pvp. I don’t want to see them nerfed to hell either, but there are some things that need to be realistically adjusted.

The squishy build BS is probably out of line. BS itself is not. That said, let’s not pretend that once the cheese build blows all of his cooldowns for the insta-gib that the thief is worthless. BS still hits hard (just not as hard) and the thief can still contribute (now vs a team who is down one person). Is he as good as he is with his CDs up? Absolutely not, but to say he is weak is, as I said above, hyperbole.

Moreover, I am tired of the thief has no defense. In a vacuum? Yes, the thief is weak. If he were to just stand there and let any other class pound on him, yes, he is weak. That said, thieves get one of the single best defensive skills in the game on a relatively low cooldown. When I am on my thief and I lose a fight, more often than not that just means I have to run away for a few seconds… when I am on my necro and I lose a fight, I am looking at a respawn timer.

yes i know stealth is bugged, cant wait for the bugs to be fixed and effectively reduce stealth duration from 5-6 seconds to 3-4 when specced properly, and you go from 1 second of being visible to 3. should provide a interesting change.

but as far as teh hyperbole comment, yes the thief is weak, at this point he may have 2 dodges and a heal that may put him in stealth. he doesnt have the omg amazing mobility or survivability. hes tissue paper. yes he can still hit hard, but its brought from the stratosphere to merely high. hes weak, if anyone would attack/cc him hed fall over.

but again, when the stealth bugs are fixed, i dont see your supposed ability to survive being much if anything.

its a crappy build, that provides very little to the group in terms of letting yoru team win.

I understand the frustration with the stealth bug, it’s very annoying to not have your assailant appear while attacking you.

But bear in mind that despite this, the thief can be attacked and responded to (as in dodges, aoes, breaks, protection skills, reflects, hell even auto attacks still work).

I find that despite not seeing the body of the thief, I can still see the animation ‘swirls’ as they mash their faceroll skills

But yeah, should be fixed really.

Bels.7210:

I understand the frustration with the stealth bug, it’s very annoying to not have your assailant appear while attacking you.

But bear in mind that despite this, the thief can be attacked and responded to (as in dodges, aoes, breaks, protection skills, reflects, hell even auto attacks still work).

I find that despite not seeing the body of the thief, I can still see the animation ‘swirls’ as they mash their faceroll skills

But yeah, should be fixed really.

nah, that would require people to try, to step outside there comfort, thats simply asking too much!

Derps.7421:

No seriously learn to dodge take stun breakers and predict what they are going to do. That’s what separates the good from the bad. The good see a thief and predict that he will use steal cloak and dagger then back stab and then try and burst you. In knowing this they win the fight. The bad get blown up get upset and then whine on the forums. Sounds familiar huh

Firs off, thief, maybe learn to play your class better.

Secondly, thieves don’t use stuns, they use immobilize which is not affected by stun breakers. Also realize that even with condition removal on hand, the thief with the invis render bug can get more than half of tehir combo (cleaving more than 1/2 the health from players) off before the other player sees you there and can react accordingly, skewing the battle in favor of the thief from the get-go. A good player can change those odds, but the ‘good’ thieves run away and get allies and come back for a rematch in their favor.

@teviko

If the thief has to go and get allies in tPvP to kill you 1v1 (well 1v? upon his return) then you have countered their roaming player and your team now has the upper hand on the rest of the map. If it’s sPvP… who cares?

As for immobilise, well it’s better CC than stuns (sort of), the weakness with it is that the victim can still use skills (such as blinds, their own CC etc).

Bels.7210:

@teviko

If the thief has to go and get allies in tPvP to kill you 1v1 (well 1v? upon his return) then you have countered their roaming player and your team now has the upper hand on the rest of the map. If it’s sPvP… who cares?

As for immobilise, well it’s better CC than stuns (sort of), the weakness with it is that the victim can still use skills (such as blinds, their own CC etc).

maybe I am just getting better?? Or maybe I get the bad ones. But its been awhile since a thief has gotten me in 1v1. 1v2, however, they stealth, I lose los and their buddy moves in to pressure me and then they gank me. I can never escape either, so I’ve long since tried, as they have too many SS abilities to close in. In that event, I just switch to longsword and show them what true ‘burst’ means.

laughs at thieves still trying to figure out what ‘slice’ is

I enjoy it when glass cannon thieves bring a friend to try and gank my engineer. I just counter their opener and then melt them with a quick burst (they are hilariously easy to kill when they’re stealthed with ’nades ).

I may or may not then lose to their friend (depends what they’re running and whether the thief took a decent chunk off me before going down), but either way it’s a) funny to imagine the thief grumbling about how I can have burst in a bunker build ^^ and b) delays both of them giving my team the upper hand elsewhere.

Bels.7210:

@teviko

If the thief has to go and get allies in tPvP to kill you 1v1 (well 1v? upon his return) then you have countered their roaming player and your team now has the upper hand on the rest of the map. If it’s sPvP… who cares?.

1. Most of the pvp community playes in sPvP so I would say most pvp’ers care. Just because sPvP does not mean anything to you, doesn’t mean that it doesn’t mean anything at all.

2. Yes, if a thief has to go get help, you won the fight. But you can see the difference between a thief losing a fight and getting help (making it a less than ideal 5v5 / 8v8) and any other class in the game losing the fight (and the game being 4v5 / 7v8), right?

deriver.5381:

Harmadda.5971:

Even Imperial Agents in SWTOR can’t wipe you to zero health without you reacting to it.

Actually they could. Before the nerf to their ‘backstab’ move. I lost count on how many times I got knocked down and killed before I could react on my Mercenary.

But that was fixed?

I must have came in after that fix, but obviously they saw the problem and gave a solution so even if they could before, they can’t now.

I hope Anet does the same.

- H