Guild Wars 2

Why didn’t you say nothing about Lineage2 (NCSoft game). There’s also reveal by AoE damage or by dots like bleed etc (if you apply them before enemy enter stealth)

Stealth is as much of a mechanic as bursting or conditioning or bunking and so on. Complaining about enemies having better cards with stealth is like walking to a condi necro and has no condi cleanses on you.

Stealth is fine as it is. We just need more counter. Every class should at least has some counter to it.

Ever run sic’em on ranger? I can guarantee you it’s almost 80-90% death sentence for stealth heavy spec esp. thieves.

Trigr.6481:

bliss.4305:

Playing against classes with stealth access is only hard if you fail to have an understanding of how it can be countered. and it doesn’t show anything other than your lack of experience and skill in understanding how advanced gw2’s pvp system is.

Lets get a few things straight. Personally for me, I don’t have a problem winning more than the majority of my fights in a 1v1 scenario, against opponents with and without stealth. There are not many thieves and mesmers that I would even consider to be a threat in a 1v1 matchup in conquest. However having ease against classes that use stealth does not mean that the mechanic of stealth is not flawed. Your simply mistaking player skill with flawed game mechanics. They are two different issues entirely.

Countless

Right. So what you’re saying is: “I have no problem against stealthed players because I’ve learned to play against them… but we still should nerf stealth cause the system is flawed (although being TOTALLY balanced once learned to deal with it) around bad players.”

Gotcha… either you like to falsify yourself for amusement or you don’t know what you’re talking about.

I’ve actually played all MMOs noteworthy and played the stealth classes there. I can safely say all those classes have better ways to engage in combat with stealth out of the question. Take away stealth from Thief and what is left? A few dodges.

I’d love to have half of what other MMOs grant “stealth” classes out of their stealth mechanic if stealth mechanic was to be normalized around same concepts. But you can’t just claim a mechanic is flawed while completely ignoring all the other mechanics classes are built around — especially when other games have much different mechanics that compliment one another.

Should the question to be answered first no be:

Are the classes who use stealth are too strong at the moment (or more accurately coming HoT)?

And if so: Which class using stealth is too strong?

If the answer is all —> Nerf stealth.
If just a few: Nerf the class.
If none: This whole discussion is moot. Or you need to buff the classes utilizing stealth after nerfing stealth.

As a thief main I feel thief hardcounters inexperienced players. I cannot say when I fought the last time against an opponent who was unable to counterplay me stealthing. That does not mean the other player was always successful but that is also not the meaning of counterplay.

Counterplay means to give you a fighting chance.

Edit: As a counter example let me say the following:

I, as a thief, cannot fight against a Warrior who activated berserker, or his invulnerability, both of them last longer than three seconds. I simply cannot counter play that apart from running away or dodging.
Despite the fact that the thief is very weak against these mechanics I have seldom seen a thief (apart from very novice ones) ask for these two mechanics being nerfed because we recognize that the mechanic is MEANT to be strong against us.

And to counter the “But fighting stealth classes is sooo frustrating” argument: Fighting invulnerable classes or classes with huge health pool is frustrating to me too, but I do not ask them to be nerfed, it is just their class mechanics. And it creates a diverse and challenging pvp environment.

Different does not necessarily mean op and frustrating for someone does not necessarily mean for everyone.

Edit 2: spelling

@OP:
And all mentioned games suck^^

Such comparisons don’t make any sense, because u take a mechanic out of its gameplay environment and put it into the GW2 gameplay environment. What information is to gain from that? Nearly none, because the context has been completely changed. You can use such comparisons to gain inspiration, but they aren’t an argument for the good or bad design of GW2 stealth mechanic.

GW2 as a whole works differently than the mentioned MMOs, as far as I can tell. So any similarities or dissimilarities are purely incidental.

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Trigr.6481:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

Hm… Some people seem to be missing the point here…

Stealth is a problem not because of duration or accessibility… But because you can’t see what your opponent is doing at all which means you can’t do anything but make an educated guess on how to counter their next attack.

You’re a sight for sore eyes.

Is this an insult or a compliment? And if an insult can you elaborate?

Not sure what a few of my responders mean with their comments. Since they’re still 100% missing the point.

Compliment

This is what happens ever since launch.

-New player enters pvp. Gets rekt by thief.
cant be a l2p issue, class must be broken.
-Tries thief in pvp and gets kitten on.
cant be a l2p issue, class must be broken.
3 months later
-Thief easy to defeat, found counter.
-New player enters pvp. Gets rekt by thief…_

Lol this gave me a laugh. “Perma-stealth” nah, you can’t pull that off any more without having a full utility bar of stealth skills, which is useless, considering you’re not doing anything in stealth and you can’t cap points in stealth.

Revealed is also being tossed around like candy, and people still say there are no counters to it, when you literally press a button and a player is left there like a sitting duck. No skill to it, lol.

Stealth doesn’t help much in PvP, considering the fact that you can’t cap points and sitting in stealth isn’t doing anything.

The reason attacks missed/blocked do not reveal you is because 1. In a sense they do, you know where they are now (STEALTH =/= INVULNERABILITY, people don’t seem to realize this), and it can be pretty kitten hard to land a stealth skill like backstab, especially against a player who actually knows how to fight a person who uses stealth.

People still crying after 3 years, smh.

Edit: Channeled skills also still hit players in stealth, you people act like you have it bad but you have a ton of crap that helps you kill a stealth player, INCLUDING YOUR BRAIN.

was this just a way to show ur epeeen cause besides the useless information about other games stealth mechanics that have no bearing here because pvp revolves holding nodes

all i got form this was that
A. u can beat thieves with ease along with nearly every other spec in the game at this moment
B. you dont like stealth because they can stay in it for long periods of time (which btw does nothing for your team in pvp) and if a thief resets in stealth u clearly did too except uve held the point the entire time that hes wasted so called perma stealthing
C. mesmer and other classes can dmg from stealth and not break it which thief cant do except for condi which is useless on thief
D. Thief is the only class that actually gets punished from revealed since our inatiaive, health regen , condi removal, mobility, and our low health pool and armor as well as being forced to run bascially full dmg spec since our dmg is kitten if we run any form of a bunkerish playstyle .

Ps Risk vs reward is a joke for thief right now compared to the other nonsense builds running around

how about instead of crying about stealth on a class you and everyone else already hard counters u give atleast 1 reason in pvp why stealth is actually good if u can still beat them in 1v1s and kitten on them in teamfights with mindless aoe

Btw ill take immunity over stealth any day of the kittening week which almost every class has in some way or another except thief.

ps countless we both know i used to wreck u on thief back in the day so dont say u used to beat thieves when they were viable we both know thats not true

After reading the comments I feel I need to clarify the following based off misunderstanding most of you have after reading my initial post.

1- If some of you didn’t read my full post, I did say that the game would obviously need to be balanced out after implementing stealth detection based off distance, if it were to ever happen. I’m not about just mindlessly nerfing classes that include my own without some type of compensation.

2- Defending stealth with a game type is not a valid argument. New game modes will continue to come out in the future, one in two weeks. Game types are irrelevant when it comes to the overall mechanic of stealth. Using the conquest card isn’t sufficient at this point. Esp when the mechanic covers the entire game, not just the narrow minded view of conquest.

3- The only argument I feel is worth addressing is reveal. Reveal is indeed a great counter to stealth, and if that’s your argument then great, I’d be willing to agree with you for the most part. However I feel that the concept of stealth detection based off distance concept should be baseline to all classes, instead not using reveal card as a third class tier excuse for not adding such a mechanic to stealth. It makes too much sense not to add.

Countless

u still didnt explain ur argument why stealth is any bit if at all useful in pvp

if u were talking pve or wvw i could understand cause u dont need to worry about objectives and u can stealth for days with no penalty but in pvp LOL no just no….

this is the pvp forums after all give me 1 reason why stealth is useful in pvp i ask again

ps u must known i would have something to say about this sry for the hate but ur talking alot of kitten on something that doesnt really matter in pvp at all

Trigr.6481:

After reading the comments I feel I need to clarify the following based off misunderstanding most of you have after reading my initial post.

1- If some of you didn’t read my full post, I did say that the game would obviously need to be balanced out after implementing stealth detection based off distance, if it were to ever happen. I’m not about just mindlessly nerfing classes that include my own without some type of compensation.

2- Defending stealth with a game type is not a valid argument. New game modes will continue to come out in the future, one in two weeks. Game types are irrelevant when it comes to the overall mechanic of stealth. Using the conquest card isn’t sufficient at this point. Esp when the mechanic covers the entire game, not just the narrow minded view of conquest.

3- The only argument I feel is worth addressing is reveal. Reveal is indeed a great counter to stealth, and if that’s your argument then great, I’d be willing to agree with you for the most part. However I feel that the concept of stealth detection based off distance concept should be baseline to all classes, instead not using reveal card as a third class tier excuse for not adding such a mechanic to stealth. It makes too much sense not to add.

Countless

2.In any gametype EVEN TEAM DEATHMATCH you wont get any points for permastealthing, new mode- stronghold. you cant defend nor attack with stealth, you cant take supply nor use treb nor take mist esence, only 2 things stealth is GOOD on this map is same as any other maps. You can stealth skitts to make them not insta die from 2 pack of guards, you can stealth rez lord(didnt tried in bwe3 so dont know if still works). Unless there will be PvP mode that is about non fighting no objective controll you wont get any benefit from stealth.

In wow you get stealth detection cuz initial stealth on rogues is not 3 sec of thieves but perma stealth. Have you ever considered fact that stealthing thief has 3 SEC to get to your back? IMAGINE it! The fastest way to flank you is? And hit there with your hardest spells? Guess what/// You just killed thief. I rly like when ppl want to have
“no brain” counter to something. Condi inc? Zerker stance? Dmg inc ? Signet of stone ?Someone is about to burst me? AEGIS BLOCK LOLOLO Renewed FOCUS! Someone Stealths? i will run around like moron waiting for stealth detection to “hit” so i can kill him same way like he was visible… Is rly 3 SEC OF INVISIBLITY in fight THAT PROBLEM? I duel vs thieves as thief on daily basics and thats what you call stealth wars… Still, if you use brain you can kill invis thief without problem. Autoattack around spinning, never stay in place, make fast turns so your flank changes fast. Before you know thief will be forced to use shadowshot from invis (THAT YOU CAN HEAR and just make blind dodge.) Whats funnier, any ranged attack from thief will be visible to you, any shot, any restealth (even if they use stolen item all you need to watch for is if you get blind. and turn 180 and hit them) I guess someone that doesnt even try to learn other classes wont know.

If interested please drop by, pick apart or add ideas in this thread Stealth – Combat feedback making it more fun. As I’m looking to improve stealth gameplay & make it enjoyable for viewing.

official.7362:

u still didnt explain ur argument why stealth is any bit if at all useful in pvp

if u were talking pve or wvw i could understand cause u dont need to worry about objectives and u can stealth for days with no penalty but in pvp LOL no just no….

this is the pvp forums after all give me 1 reason why stealth is useful in pvp i ask again

Take specific classes out of the discussion for a moment, stealth is a completely one-sided mechanic in favor of the player in stealth and that’s the real issue here. Additionally some classes have relatively easy and frequent access to stealth which further compounds the issue.

Stealth is PvP is still very strong, despite your suggestion that ‘you can’t cap in stealth’ somehow makes not valuable. Look at the usage of stealth in even high level pvp:
- Used for openings in match and coordinated burst
- Used for exiting a fight to get a quick decap. Similarly can be used to mind game a player to stay close to a point so as not to get decap’ed allowing you to leave and +1 elsewhere.
- Reviving downed teammates.
- Stealthing lord in Foefire to protect his heal and shutdown damage from skills that require a target

The issue with stealth, and hence the frustration from players, is that stealth in the overwhelming majority of scenarios doesn’t provide an avenue for counter play. Also consider that not only can we not see a stealthed players actions/animations, the stealthed player cannot be targeted thus completely shutting down any skills that require a target for use. If you stealth up (again forget what class you are playing for the sake of discussion) what options do I have to respond and counter play at this moment? My response is pretty limited but falls into one of these cateogories:
- Do nothing, and be prepared to immediately react to your attack from stealth
- Spend defensive cooldowns in anticipation of an attack from stealth (eg. dodges, blocks, invuln, stealth etc)
- Spend offensive cooldowns to discourage your attack from stealth (eg. ground targeted aoe or aoe cleave).

The limited response options aren’t a bad thing be default if stealth was less readily available and/or couldn’t be used so frequently. For comparison, consider if a warrior could use endure pain or zerker stance much more frequently. Like stealth, neither zerker stance or endure pain are invulnerability, but I’m quite confident we’d see much more complaining about warriors because when a warrior uses those skills it very much limits the other player’s response options.

lol ppl are so confused on the simple fact that stealth is supposed to give you the opener wtf is so hard to understand about this the game was balanced around this and guess what our burst for stealth openers got nerfd to the ground over and over because bads like you die to thief gibbing you in stealth which is our whole kittening class mechanic….. enough with this stealth nonsense thief is the stealth class and its all directed at them. and frankly we are getting destroyed by literally every class so whats the kitten problem????

again wvw and pve i can see a problem but not in pvp

if ur only arguement is that we dont get to see them open thats because the game is build around that and all of the classes have enough survival to survive through a stealth opener and still merk the thief even if a team does stealth burst you all at once you have things in the game to counter that even if you do die u have alot of classes that can insta res players in downstate and guess what the other team wasted their entire burst and all have revealed now and all u had to do is use 1 chars utility to counter them back or u can just pop one of the 100 immunities given out in this game one way or another after breaking stun and they wasted their entire burst without even downing u

not even to mention the numerous otherways to counter stelath with just good awareness, watching ur aegis/block, aoe rings, channeling , cc, dodging, making it hard for them see your back by moving rapidly back and forth, being an asrua for kitten sakes lol (gl getitng a backstab on asuras in random motion) , auto attack chaining, (btw thats how u stop thieves from shadow refuge surviving)

ps no wonder countless doesnt care about stealth he doesnt even use it

The biggest issue in my opinion is the combination of stealth and the terrible targeting system. When you try to burst down let’s say a Thief in fight and he goes invisible and you have just one guy around, let’s say a mesmer with 3 clones. To get back your target on the Thief as he attacks it’s just SOOOOOO tedious for no reason. Being invisible is already strong enough as it is, getting back to your target as he is not invisible anymore would be good, or at least brining a lot more options to the table to counter stealth. Because if I’m correct with HoT we will have only a second way to break stealth … Woohoo so much possibilities …

And in my opinion way too many classes can stealth, the ranger for instance his stealth is so trollish, you always end up targeting his stupid bird and spend 4 hours targeting again the ranger because that kitten bird flies all over the place and his “hitbox” is ridiculous too big.

Why thieves feels stealth is almost useless while others feels stealth OP?
In almost all the PvP games, stealth(sneak) means GANK. But in GW2, there is no Ganking. Why? have you played LoL? if someone restores health to full in only 3 sec after they stop attack and avoid be attacked 5 sec, will this ganking still funny? NO! what GANK means is you find a good chance that your enemy is too weak to fight against you (in general is when your enemy is low health but still doing some ez fighting and you are in very good condition) then you start a fighting against that guy, Stealth (Sneaking) is ONLY A TOOL helps you do this easier and better.
On the other hand. Sneakers are always easy to be killed in PvP Games(MOBA) . So ganking is skillful to them. Quickly kill a GOOD target is a way proves sneakers worth. But in GW2? can thieves find this feeling? NO! not only because of the Health-Restore-Mechanic but also because of the DOWN-STATE! While you put a target down, you will need at least 10 sec to finish the target (especially Mesmer) and they have a HUGE-Chance to put you down if you are a thief! Yes! Down State is learned from Call Of Duty, but Call Of Duty Online has NO down state in PVP! Was that really a good idea keep down state in PVP?
I think these are the problems why everyone feels stealth is not good.

official.7362:

lol ppl are so confused on the simple fact that stealth is supposed to give you the opener wtf is so hard to understand about this the game was balanced around this and guess what our burst for stealth openers got nerfd to the ground over and over because bads like you die to thief gibbing you in stealth which is our whole kittening class mechanic…..

It’s fine for stealth to provide an opener, sure. It’s when you can continue to go into stealth and repeated get that free opener, hence there needs to be a happy medium between how often you can stealth up to open and the burst you can deliver.

enough with this stealth nonsense thief is the stealth class and its all directed at them. and frankly we are getting destroyed by literally every class so whats the kitten problem????

If you wanna have a decent discussion on the implementation of stealth you’re gonna have to set your class aside and look at the game play the player in stealth and without stealth. As you noted above you completely agree that stealthing up should get you a free burst. That’s fine. So what’s the counter play for your target? How do you still make that scenario of game play fun as the target?

if ur only arguement is that we dont get to see them open thats because the game is build around that and all of the classes have enough survival to survive through a stealth opener and still merk the thief even if a team does stealth burst you all at once you have things in the game to counter that even if you do die u have alot of classes that can insta res players in downstate and guess what the other team wasted their entire burst and all have revealed now and all u had to do is use 1 chars utility to counter them back or u can just pop one of the 100 immunities given out in this game one way or another after breaking stun and they wasted their entire burst without even downing u

not even to mention the numerous otherways to counter stelath with just good awareness, watching ur aegis/block, aoe rings, channeling , cc, dodging, making it hard for them see your back by moving rapidly back and forth, being an asrua for kitten sakes lol (gl getitng a backstab on asuras in random motion) , auto attack chaining, (btw thats how u stop thieves from shadow refuge surviving)

These all fall into one of the categories I mentioned aside from the asuran size which isn’t an issue anymore in ranked with standard character models. What I’m getting at is that doing nothing or straight out guess and burning cooldowns isn’t counter play. The player in stealth can see if the target is burning defensive cooldowns and just not burst – wasting those defensive cooldowns of the target. This is why stealth is a one-sided mechanic; only the player in stealth is actually playing for that moment.

ps no wonder countless doesnt care about stealth he doesnt even use it

Click his video link – he’s got Mass Invis for his elite.

I do not agree with what Countless is proposing: stealth detect by proximity, but I do agree that Anet needs to take a hard look at stealth and its implementation across the board. I do not believe that more revealed applications are the answer either. It’s going to be a tricky balance between:
- ease of access and cooldown/initiative cost to get stealth
- how frequently can the class gain stealth
- player only or group stealth
- what does stealth provide – burst? escape? other (condi clear, boon application, protect casting of key skills)

Let stealth be an opener but also provide visible feedback that players can work with. It’s fun playing the stealth build but not so much on the receiving end & even less watching.

Let me ask how fun is it to watch a stealth fight if you have no in depth idea of the profession & build in the fight?

Is there away to improve visible feedback but not take away to much from the positioning guessing game. Players still have no idea of what skill your using while stealthed.

Regarding reveal could a soft version be added that displays a shimmer but allows targeting & position location but keeps said player in stealth.

Trigr.6481:

After reading the comments I feel I need to clarify the following based off misunderstanding most of you have after reading my initial post.

1- If some of you didn’t read my full post, I did say that the game would obviously need to be balanced out after implementing stealth detection based off distance, if it were to ever happen. I’m not about just mindlessly nerfing classes that include my own without some type of compensation.

2- Defending stealth with a game type is not a valid argument. New game modes will continue to come out in the future, one in two weeks. Game types are irrelevant when it comes to the overall mechanic of stealth. Using the conquest card isn’t sufficient at this point. Esp when the mechanic covers the entire game, not just the narrow minded view of conquest.

3- The only argument I feel is worth addressing is reveal. Reveal is indeed a great counter to stealth, and if that’s your argument then great, I’d be willing to agree with you for the most part. However I feel that the concept of stealth detection based off distance concept should be baseline to all classes, instead not using reveal card as a third class tier excuse for not adding such a mechanic to stealth. It makes too much sense not to add.

Countless

I would argue that one drawback of reveal with distance is that it opens the game up more to abuse via modifying the client. If you have reveal based on distance, that means you have to pass some kind of positional information to an opponent’s client, and trust that their client properly renders the person as translucent. At the point information is being sent to the client, it becomes quite possible to modify the display to ignore translucency (or make a plug-in to highlight translucent characters). This would work its way into many people with the desire to cheat’s game, and could impact high-tier tourney play.

The current system passes no positional informational info the client (damage gets passed back if you hit, but that is just a check at the server side I believe), and thus avoids this.

I personally do think that revealed offers enough means for counterplay. I just wish they would be more willing to make it available to specs that need it. For instance, prior to the buff, I would have argued that null field should apply revealed, thus making the mesmer vs. thief matchup infinitely more interesting. As someone who played burst ele, I would have killed to get a trait that applied revealed on burning (with a 10s icd or something) or have arcane shield/wave apply revealed. That allows both players to enjoy the game more, as your fight against a thief is no longer “I’ll just stand here until he opens, hope I have an invuln, and hope he doesn’t dodge my quick counter-burst.” Maybe then, you dodge after 3s, when you think a burst is incoming, then pop your aoe reveal (with long CD) b/c you see that you evaded an attack.

Giving out more ways to apply revealed would even allow you to buff stealth-based classes damage or self-defense more, as now other classes have tools other than “lucky counter-burst” and “have tons of sustain to tank through it”

BlackBeard.2873:

That allows both players to enjoy the game more, as your fight against a thief is no longer “I’ll just stand here until he opens, hope I have an invuln, and hope he doesn’t dodge my quick counter-burst.”

Remember… Thieves have to deal with Thief bursts also. We know what it’s like to take Stealth openers. And we don’t have the sustainability that almost any other profession has. But we learn to deal with it.

I don’t even remember the last time I was instantly burst down by another Thief from full health… even when I’m full glass and unaware. He stuns me and hammers me with Backstab and Heartseeker. But I’ve learned to use a stun breaker instantly. I can usually find a way to recover to extend the fight.

I will tell you, though, the other day, I took an insta-burst from a Stealthed Mesmer. Four simultaneous hits with no tell whatsoever. 12.5k damage… my poor Thief had no chance. I don’t believe I’ve ever been killed so quickly by a lone Thief.

BlackBeard.2873:

Trigr.6481:

After reading the comments I feel I need to clarify the following based off misunderstanding most of you have after reading my initial post.

1- If some of you didn’t read my full post, I did say that the game would obviously need to be balanced out after implementing stealth detection based off distance, if it were to ever happen. I’m not about just mindlessly nerfing classes that include my own without some type of compensation.

2- Defending stealth with a game type is not a valid argument. New game modes will continue to come out in the future, one in two weeks. Game types are irrelevant when it comes to the overall mechanic of stealth. Using the conquest card isn’t sufficient at this point. Esp when the mechanic covers the entire game, not just the narrow minded view of conquest.

3- The only argument I feel is worth addressing is reveal. Reveal is indeed a great counter to stealth, and if that’s your argument then great, I’d be willing to agree with you for the most part. However I feel that the concept of stealth detection based off distance concept should be baseline to all classes, instead not using reveal card as a third class tier excuse for not adding such a mechanic to stealth. It makes too much sense not to add.

Countless

I would argue that one drawback of reveal with distance is that it opens the game up more to abuse via modifying the client. If you have reveal based on distance, that means you have to pass some kind of positional information to an opponent’s client, and trust that their client properly renders the person as translucent. At the point information is being sent to the client, it becomes quite possible to modify the display to ignore translucency (or make a plug-in to highlight translucent characters). This would work its way into many people with the desire to cheat’s game, and could impact high-tier tourney play.

The current system passes no positional informational info the client (damage gets passed back if you hit, but that is just a check at the server side I believe), and thus avoids this.

I personally do think that revealed offers enough means for counterplay. I just wish they would be more willing to make it available to specs that need it. For instance, prior to the buff, I would have argued that null field should apply revealed, thus making the mesmer vs. thief matchup infinitely more interesting. As someone who played burst ele, I would have killed to get a trait that applied revealed on burning (with a 10s icd or something) or have arcane shield/wave apply revealed. That allows both players to enjoy the game more, as your fight against a thief is no longer “I’ll just stand here until he opens, hope I have an invuln, and hope he doesn’t dodge my quick counter-burst.” Maybe then, you dodge after 3s, when you think a burst is incoming, then pop your aoe reveal (with long CD) b/c you see that you evaded an attack.

Giving out more ways to apply revealed would even allow you to buff stealth-based classes damage or self-defense more, as now other classes have tools other than “lucky counter-burst” and “have tons of sustain to tank through it”

Lucky counter burst on a,class that has instant 1200 range stuns…..

Landing a counter burst requires the IQ level of being brain dead.

T raw.4658:

Lucky counter burst on a,class that has instant 1200 range stuns…..

Landing a counter burst requires the IQ level of being brain dead.

I was speaking from the perspective of a burst ele (s/f fresh air) vs any stealth class, not just thief. There are more classes than just thief and mesmer, but those are the only ones that can truly play the burst role effectively. The fight is incredibly 1-sided b/c you don’t have the instant stuns, and your defenses are all on long CD’s, making it quite easy to simply exhaust them then destroy you.

BlackBeard.2873:

T raw.4658:

Lucky counter burst on a,class that has instant 1200 range stuns…..

Landing a counter burst requires the IQ level of being brain dead.

I was speaking from the perspective of a burst ele (s/f fresh air) vs any stealth class, not just thief. There are more classes than just thief and mesmer, but those are the only ones that can truly play the burst role effectively. The fight is incredibly 1-sided b/c you don’t have the instant stuns, and your defenses are all on long CD’s, making it quite easy to simply exhaust them then destroy you.

You are talking about an ele

Seriously stop.

At this junction in time you need to find a new game if you can’t handle a thief 1v1. Fresh Air ele has more than enough invulns/blocks/evades to counter the meta thief. In fact that thief can’t kill you in 1 burst but you can kill him in 1 w/ ease.

T raw.4658:

BlackBeard.2873:

T raw.4658:

Lucky counter burst on a,class that has instant 1200 range stuns…..

Landing a counter burst requires the IQ level of being brain dead.

I was speaking from the perspective of a burst ele (s/f fresh air) vs any stealth class, not just thief. There are more classes than just thief and mesmer, but those are the only ones that can truly play the burst role effectively. The fight is incredibly 1-sided b/c you don’t have the instant stuns, and your defenses are all on long CD’s, making it quite easy to simply exhaust them then destroy you.

You are talking about an ele

Seriously stop.

At this junction in time you need to find a new game if you can’t handle a thief 1v1. Fresh Air ele has more than enough invulns/blocks/evades to counter the meta thief. In fact that thief can’t kill you in 1 burst but you can kill him in 1 w/ ease.

Huh, you seem to need some help vs. fresh air ele, which I don’t even play anymore, but here it is:

Their defenses are on a 50 (or 40s traited), 75, and 60s CD…that is all. Here is how you win: burst then dodge…they will invuln and if they try to counter-burst they just missed, if not you have room to double-dodge if needed. Keep your space and restealth. Rinse and repeat. After the 3rd time, they die guaranteed, as they have no more defense, while you can play that game all day.

The reason nobody plays fresh air ele is b/c it straight up loses to mesmer and thieves in 1v1’s, in terms of team support utilty, and in map mobility. If you can’t 1v1 a fresh air ele, then pebcak.

Kageseigi.2150:

BlackBeard.2873:

That allows both players to enjoy the game more, as your fight against a thief is no longer “I’ll just stand here until he opens, hope I have an invuln, and hope he doesn’t dodge my quick counter-burst.”

Remember… Thieves have to deal with Thief bursts also. We know what it’s like to take Stealth openers. And we don’t have the sustainability that almost any other profession has. But we learn to deal with it.

I don’t even remember the last time I was instantly burst down by another Thief from full health… even when I’m full glass and unaware. He stuns me and hammers me with Backstab and Heartseeker. But I’ve learned to use a stun breaker instantly. I can usually find a way to recover to extend the fight.

I will tell you, though, the other day, I took an insta-burst from a Stealthed Mesmer. Four simultaneous hits with no tell whatsoever. 12.5k damage… my poor Thief had no chance. I don’t believe I’ve ever been killed so quickly by a lone Thief.

So much this…. i never had issues fighting thieves and their openers no matter what class because i know how they work and there miriad ways to counter their openers/stealth gain etc. If thief opens on me, i can always use stunbreak, stun them or blind them to deny follow up dmg. Try to do it vs mesmers with their miriad of stuns, access to invul and aoe blinds that prevent ANY kind of counter, instant stealth, openers that actually instagib you unlike 6k backstabs.

But hey, even if mes fill same role somehow they are allowed to be viable in combat (actually one of the best dueling classes atm) but thieves should stay at level of ranger pet and unable to do crap w/o teammates. Biased design is biased.

Proboably a reason this games pvp never took off as a competitive game is to do ei5h stealth. You are right there is no counter play. I think any aoe that hits a stealthed player should of revealed them. Either way its too late now. The games mechanics are pretty well set and i cant see this game becoming a serious competitive game

Lordrosicky.5813:

Proboably a reason this games pvp never took off as a competitive game is to do ei5h stealth. You are right there is no counter play. I think any aoe that hits a stealthed player should of revealed them. Either way its too late now. The games mechanics are pretty well set and i cant see this game becoming a serious competitive game

Oh sure let’s implement it. But if we do then thieves should have same mechanics as other stealth based classes in other games where aoe reveals them. Namely ability to use stealth based attacks w/o stealth, have multiple defensives that don’t rely on stealth namely blocks, immunities etc. And no i am not talking about some crappy 1 sec block. Nah those classes have basically zerker stance that cleans all condis and endure pain on relative short CD. Also have multiple hard CCs like those classes as well. Oh and those classes also have highest single target dmg in game so i think thieves should have it as well if aoe cleared stealth. I am totally fine with it. Will you be tho kek?

BlackBeard.2873:

T raw.4658:

Lucky counter burst on a,class that has instant 1200 range stuns…..

Landing a counter burst requires the IQ level of being brain dead.

I was speaking from the perspective of a burst ele (s/f fresh air) vs any stealth class, not just thief. There are more classes than just thief and mesmer, but those are the only ones that can truly play the burst role effectively. The fight is incredibly 1-sided b/c you don’t have the instant stuns, and your defenses are all on long CD’s, making it quite easy to simply exhaust them then destroy you.

Funny that you came up with fresh air…
Isn´t exactly THAT build the best example for a burst which is instant and without counter without randomly dodging after your way of thinking? Its fast enough to abuse aftercasts on S/D and D/P being out of stealth. Yes, stealth gives the advantage that you can´t damage him with fresh air, but that isn´t your only source of damage, right? After all it about watching signs and getting to know WHEN a fresh-air ele gonna spike. Its very similar to D/P thieves. That you can´t see him doesn´t mean you can´t know what he will do, would do or possibly wont do. So many thieves steal when I want to stealth through blackpowder. So what can I do? Blackpowder, dodge right, dodge left and blinding powder into black powder for a good duration of stealth. It ends up baiting the enemy steal. Its so much about mindgame that make the game interesting imo.
Have you played a thief actually? Sry that I ask, but thats the biggets problem in all of that kind of threads.

What is hilarious is that medi-guards are/were considered the main counters to thieves while not being a stealth-burst class…

Another question… if a mesmer uses mirror blade or a thief goes in with shadowshot from stealth, do you even dodge that one? While evading the blind on shadowshot is difficult, the damage can be evaded easily. Stealth doesn´t make anything impossible, but more interesting. If people try to spike me from stealth its always a great time, considering it can go horribly wrong. For example mesmer/thief from team A try to burst a player from team B at the beginning. That player knows that (who doesn´t know about stealth engages?), predicts/bait it and now the mesmer/thief are open for counterburst, letting the rest of the team in a dangerous situation. Mostly they will escape that counterburst thorugh invuln/port, etc, losing important cd´s, which the enemies still have ready. If the counterburst was hard enough to proc vamp-runes they maybe have to disenagege or take time to regenerate.

And stop blaming thieves to be guilty for the “burst-meta” at the start of every bigger balance/change-patch. It happens because people want to try out highest numbers, highest bursts, etc, before going back to old ones. Thieves are kinda the ideal class for such situations because you just want to have exactly one in your party. Maybe that makes him almost the most balanced one off all? And other classes have to be tuned down?

Cynz.9437:

Lordrosicky.5813:

Proboably a reason this games pvp never took off as a competitive game is to do ei5h stealth. You are right there is no counter play. I think any aoe that hits a stealthed player should of revealed them. Either way its too late now. The games mechanics are pretty well set and i cant see this game becoming a serious competitive game

Oh sure let’s implement it. But if we do then thieves should have same mechanics as other stealth based classes in other games where aoe reveals them. Namely ability to use stealth based attacks w/o stealth, have multiple defensives that don’t rely on stealth namely blocks, immunities etc. Also have multiple hard CCs like those classes as well. I am fine with it. Will you tho?

i always laugh at people who just only view everything as a thief or whatever. Like they should design a fun game with fun mechanics which are also fun to fight against. Not that i care. Havent played this game hardly for a year!

BlackBeard.2873:

T raw.4658:

BlackBeard.2873:

T raw.4658:

Lucky counter burst on a,class that has instant 1200 range stuns…..

Landing a counter burst requires the IQ level of being brain dead.

I was speaking from the perspective of a burst ele (s/f fresh air) vs any stealth class, not just thief. There are more classes than just thief and mesmer, but those are the only ones that can truly play the burst role effectively. The fight is incredibly 1-sided b/c you don’t have the instant stuns, and your defenses are all on long CD’s, making it quite easy to simply exhaust them then destroy you.

You are talking about an ele

Seriously stop.

At this junction in time you need to find a new game if you can’t handle a thief 1v1. Fresh Air ele has more than enough invulns/blocks/evades to counter the meta thief. In fact that thief can’t kill you in 1 burst but you can kill him in 1 w/ ease.

Huh, you seem to need some help vs. fresh air ele, which I don’t even play anymore, but here it is:

Their defenses are on a 50 (or 40s traited), 75, and 60s CD…that is all. Here is how you win: burst then dodge…they will invuln and if they try to counter-burst they just missed, if not you have room to double-dodge if needed. Keep your space and restealth. Rinse and repeat. After the 3rd time, they die guaranteed, as they have no more defense, while you can play that game all day.

The reason nobody plays fresh air ele is b/c it straight up loses to mesmer and thieves in 1v1’s, in terms of team support utilty, and in map mobility. If you can’t 1v1 a fresh air ele, then pebcak.

Then don’t bring it up.

Your issues aren’t because of imbalances within the game but your inability to play at a decent level of skill.