Guild Wars 2

On my necro, baited some scrub thief who was literally only using Haste and then spamming heartseeker. Waited for him to come out of stealth and was going to death shroud (for retaliation) > DS fear > flesh golem knock down > well of darkness (with chill effect traited)> well of suffering > well of corruption > dagger #3 immobilize and #1 spam. Comes out of stealth from shadow refuge WITH HEARTSEEKER and literally didn’t even have time for my DS > Fear > Pet Knock down > Well Bomb combo before I ate almost 30k in HS damage as a 24k HP toon with ~1600 toughness.

Coming from a primary thief player, this is nauseating to me. I think thief is a great class when played skillfully. This was just some baddy pub scrub literally hitting Haste and then spamming the number 2 key on his keyboard and killing people with it. He was top score and the side of the screen was scrolling with him killing people using only heartseeker. This was NOT a skillful thief, based on his movement patterns and his inability to react it was just a bad player exploiting a ridiculous mechanic. He had no titles and the starter PvP gear. If he failed at spamming HS he would stealth heal + shadow refuge until his initiative was back up and then come out with more HS spam. Repeat.

Did you really design a game based around a player being able to defeat other players by hitting ONE BUTTON MULTIPLE TIMES? I wish I screen shotted it but I was too concerned with exiting the game and wiping its existence from my hard drive before it tainted my computer any longer. I’m all for buffs over nerfs and thief is my favorite class in every game that allows it, but this is like unbelievable. I’m by no means a bad player and very rarely have a problem with thieves on my necro and even less so on my thief. Thieves LOVE to defend their class by saying, “Good players don’t die to HS spam” to try and cover the ability’s overpowered mechanics. As a thief against a HS spamming thief it’s easy to CnD and make them waste their initiative HS’ing away from me. As a necro it’s even easier to well bomb/immobilize/fear/knockdown during HS spam. But when you’re actively waiting for a thief that you know is only going to hit Haste and spam HS, and you’re completely prepared to effectively nullify that attack, and instead immediately die, there’s really nothing you can do. I don’t care what you say should have been done differently, I KNOW what should have been done. I was physically UNABLE to do it.

Before you guys start diving into making your next whatever Holiday event maybe you should take a look at crap like this that’s completely ruining this game. It’s bad enough every class plays the same build basically anyway (have you seen a non-100b warrior?). Initiative was a good idea to try and keep the spirit of the thief alive but in a game like this it just doesn’t work. Heartseeker would be fine if it wasn’t spammable. STOP RUINING THINGS AND MAKE THEM BETTER. Take haste out of the game and you’ll solve so many problems: people won’t flock to FotM burst builds and players won’t keep getting killed by level 2 FotM rerolled burst builds! I don’t care what you do, because I’m done with this game. It’s more like an exit interview from a crappy job; I’m hoping that by being honest you’ll make things better for the people who stick it out.

Hanzo.9624:

On my necro, baited some scrub thief who was literally only using Haste and then spamming heartseeker. Waited for him to come out of stealth and was going to death shroud (for retaliation) > DS fear > flesh golem knock down > well of darkness (with chill effect traited)> well of suffering > well of corruption > dagger #3 immobilize and #1 spam. Comes out of stealth from shadow refuge WITH HEARTSEEKER and literally didn’t even have time for my DS > Fear > Pet Knock down > Well Bomb combo before I ate almost 30k in HS damage as a 24k HP toon with ~1600 toughness.

Coming from a primary thief player, this is nauseating to me. I think thief is a great class when played skillfully. This was just some baddy pub scrub literally hitting Haste and then spamming the number 2 key on his keyboard and killing people with it. He was top score and the side of the screen was scrolling with him killing people using only heartseeker. This was NOT a skillful thief, based on his movement patterns and his inability to react it was just a bad player exploiting a ridiculous mechanic. He had no titles and the starter PvP gear. If he failed at spamming HS he would stealth heal + shadow refuge until his initiative was back up and then come out with more HS spam. Repeat.

Did you really design a game based around a player being able to defeat other players by hitting ONE BUTTON MULTIPLE TIMES? I wish I screen shotted it but I was too concerned with exiting the game and wiping its existence from my hard drive before it tainted my computer any longer. I’m all for buffs over nerfs and thief is my favorite class in every game that allows it, but this is like unbelievable. I’m by no means a bad player and very rarely have a problem with thieves on my necro and even less so on my thief. Thieves LOVE to defend their class by saying, “Good players don’t die to HS spam” to try and cover the ability’s overpowered mechanics. As a thief against a HS spamming thief it’s easy to CnD and make them waste their initiative HS’ing away from me. As a necro it’s even easier to well bomb/immobilize/fear/knockdown during HS spam. But when you’re actively waiting for a thief that you know is only going to hit Haste and spam HS, and you’re completely prepared to effectively nullify that attack, and instead immediately die, there’s really nothing you can do. I don’t care what you say should have been done differently, I KNOW what should have been done. I was physically UNABLE to do it.

Before you guys start diving into making your next whatever Holiday event maybe you should take a look at crap like this that’s completely ruining this game. It’s bad enough every class plays the same build basically anyway (have you seen a non-100b warrior?). Initiative was a good idea to try and keep the spirit of the thief alive but in a game like this it just doesn’t work. Heartseeker would be fine if it wasn’t spammable. STOP RUINING THINGS AND MAKE THEM BETTER. Take haste out of the game and you’ll solve so many problems: people won’t flock to FotM burst builds and players won’t keep getting killed by level 2 FotM rerolled burst builds! I don’t care what you do, because I’m done with this game. It’s more like an exit interview from a crappy job; I’m hoping that by being honest you’ll make things better for the people who stick it out.

30k damage…???? lol

http://i.imgur.com/ZMgBM.jpg.…….yes it’s real and kicking

“30k damage…???? lol”

27.8k to be exact.

Make a thief. Go to HoM. Trait 25/30/0/0/10. Find a player. Hit assassin’s signet, haste, then spam HS until you can’t spam it any longer. If he lives, heal stealth + shadow refuge to escape then repeat. Or use roll for initiative, repeat HS spam until dead, and THEN retreat if he’s not dead. Seriously go do this. This isn’t some attempt at trolling or getting thieves nerfed, why would I do that? My main is a thief, I don’t want thieves to get nerfed. I want HASTE to get removed and want Heartseeker to get fixed because as it stands both are too strong alone and game breaking combined. Granted it takes a special kind of moron to build around spamming HS but the fact that that moron can outperform better players across the board means the dev’s need to look at it.

Thiefs have ruined pvp for me… and after rolling a thief i don’t rly enjoy owning with it either. Maybe the only place a thief is balanced is in a tournament 5v5 scenario even tho i doubt that. The initiative system is broken to the core and the stealth mechanic. Only place a thief does not shine is pve and he’s not to bad there either. In pvp it is to easy to kill ppl with it and escape. I don’t understand why it’s not fixed yet because ppl have been crying about thiefs since launch and they are still broken and op. Is anet balancing pvp only based on competitive 5v5 matches?

Agreed… unfortunately I don’t think Anet is going to fix these issues anytime soon. All burst/bunker builds need to be toned down to promote out-of-the-box builds… imo of course.

One of my 80s is a Thief. I tried playing her in sPvP without roflspam or instagib, but the sad truth is that Heartseeker just wins (in regular hotjoin games)…

Xolo.3580:

One of my 80s is a Thief. I tried playing her in sPvP without roflspam or instagib, but the sad truth is that Heartseeker just wins (in regular hotjoin games)…

You guys are stupid. Instead of crying about a silly spec why not actually learn to counter it? Notice how thieves basically have no stability? Why not cc them? There, their HS spam will now do 0 damage.

edit: That being said, the only thing that deserves a nerf is the range of heart seeker.

the problem IMO is that HS is a leap that tracks the target removing the opportunity to counter with positioning. the traditional skill curve of rogues has been defined by their ability to stay on a target through their own positioning. Steal already does this for them. After that the onus is supposed to be on them to accurately deliver dmg. Instead the game does it for them.

Additionally the inverse is true as well. They are too capable of escaping and resetting the fight. Once a rogue commits to a fight they should only have one way out and that should be through their opponent.

tl;dr – remove the leap from HS, and remove haste from the game (for more reasons than just HS spam).

How about dodging twice while he spams 2 like a noob, making him waste all his initiative AND his haste buff? Just saying.

(No, I don’t play a thief.)

Shar.3402:

How about dodging twice while he spams 2 like a noob, making him waste all his initiative AND his haste buff? Just saying.

(No, I don’t play a thief.)

I’m sure he would have, but… did you read the bit where he said:

“I don’t care what you say should have been done differently, I KNOW what should have been done. I was physically UNABLE to do it.” ?

I have also stopped pvping (and buying gems, if you’re reading this Arenanet. Take heed.) until the ridiculous burst and broken mechanics in this game have been addressed.

“You guys are stupid. Instead of crying about a silly spec why not actually learn to counter it? Notice how thieves basically have no stability? Why not cc them? There, their HS spam will now do 0 damage.”

You can’t counter things, even if you know how to counter things, if you aren’t given time to counter things. Not to mention as a Necro our “signature” CC is stronger when used by a thief who used Steal.

“For a necro, just put a staff 5 on the ground and stand in it. Then you can do your wellbomb combo.”

Any thief worth worrying about isn’t going to open on a necro standing in a blatantly visible mark.

“How about dodging twice while he spams 2 like a noob, making him waste all his initiative AND his haste buff? Just saying.”

Because 2 dodges =/= avoiding 5 attacks. As a thief, if I opened with HS + Haste and he dodged, I would stop spamming HS and then CnD > BS > Roll for Initiative > go back to HS (if spamming HS was my goal).

People always say “Just dodge it” when something is overpowered, meaning you need to meet certain prerequisites:

1. You have a full dodge meter.
2. You can see the attack coming.
3. There are zero other variables in place (like Basilisk Venom…)

That’s like saying to counter 100b warrior, “just dodge Bull’s Rush”. Except it’s more like you’re running, then all of a sudden out of nowhere you get knocked to the ground and instantly haste + 100B spammed to death before you recover from the knock down. Don’t forget Haste speeds up stomp time! You’re literally knocked down, burst down, and stomped before you have a chance to recover from the knock down. Even with a stun breaker the amount of damage accrued before you’re able to use it is significant enough to put you on the defensive which allows the warrior to continue attacking.

The common denominator here is HASTE. It’s a stupid mechanic and doesn’t belong in this game. It would make certain aspects of the game more tactically focused. Heartseeker DOESN’T NEED A GAP CLOSER THAT HOMES IN ON THE TARGET! These are basic design flaws that have been the topic of frustration since BWE1! That’s the disgusting part about this whole thing, that during the beta we were not only allowed but ENCOURAGED to give feedback and despite there being an overwhelming outpouring of protest from players on specific topics, NONE of the most important things were implemented!

Dodge twice. Since HS is queued and he’s hasted, the thief will waste all init and can’t do anything about it because he’s spamming HS.

Chill.

Congrats. Thief wasted all his init doing nothing.

Chill reduces leap distance by 66%. Playing a necro in pubs, i would follow thieves around all game just to chill them and watch them hopelessly spam HS.

This one game, I got 25 bleeds on me, ran around in a circle, and died. Nerf bleeds.

Considering i already got hit for 10k+ with 2 HS (starting above 50% health), considering it can also proc a crit air sigil along the way, 30k with heartseeker is not even a lot since 5 hasted HS would have dealt about 50k on a glass thief like me.

Anyway, please Anet, help your players get better at the game, do not let them mash 222222222222222 til it dies.

I hereby officially rename GW2 to GW2222222222222222222.

“Dodge twice. Since HS is queued and he’s hasted, the thief will waste all init and can’t do anything about it because he’s spamming HS.

Chill.

Congrats. Thief wasted all his init doing nothing.

Chill reduces leap distance by 66%. Playing a necro in pubs, i would follow thieves around all game just to chill them and watch them hopelessly spam HS.

This one game, I got 25 bleeds on me, ran around in a circle, and died. Nerf bleeds."

First off, you wouldn’t be able to dodge until you got hit with the second HS. The first would be invisible coming from stealth until it hit you and the second would then technically count as the first visible HS. Assuming you activate dodge twice after the first visible HS (now that you’ve been hit by 2), what if he DOESN’T spam HS? What if he decided to use only 2 HS? You can’t just assume that by some psychic phenomenon you’ll instinctively know not only when an invisible player is going to attack you but know exactly what attacks he’s going to use. If he DOESN’T waste all of his initiative on HS you’ve still wasted all of your dodge and then CAN’T dodge the CnD > BS combo (assuming 15 initiative, -6 from 2 HS, -6 from Cnd allows for a total of HS > HS > CnD > BS > HS with Assassin’s Signet potentially in use and ~1-2 secs of Haste remaining). Or to make it even noobier, after you waste all of your dodge, the thief uses Roll for Initiative, evading while escaping and gaining 6 initiative and then spams more HS with Haste still up. Don’t forget, even though Roll creates distance, HS is a gap closer!

What you’re basically saying is “Assume you know what’s going to happen and when, time your dodges perfectly with precognitive precision, hope that all he does is spam one attack because if he doesn’t, you now have no dodge left to survive off of.”

This is the logic that prevents appropriate fixes from being implemented.

I just don’t understand what exactly the “rogue” is, from what many people mentioned here. Also.. thieves are paper, you can counter them easily with any profession. Necro fear for example, to break their combo, or whatever invulnerability skill with any profesion.. anyway.. thieves are not op in any way.
But seriously what are rogues?

“I just don’t understand what exactly the “rogue” is, from what many people mentioned here.”

One person used the word Rogue in place of Thief. Your attribution to “many” means you exaggerate, so you saying “thieves are not op in any way” is invalid as you’ve proven to be an inappropriate source for information.

it’s not about whether or not a skilled player can counter a noob. it’s about the game doing too much of the work that should be required of the players themselves. and not just with thieves but across most classes.

and as for Necro’s and their fear: the instant Fear requires a target to actually work (meaning you’re eating dmg before the thief renders and you can use the skill), and the aoe fear mark has a 3/4 sec cast time which is far too long to be considered a reactive skill while dodging (dodge cancels cast) and avoiding hasted burst.

Hanzo.9624:

“You guys are stupid. Instead of crying about a silly spec why not actually learn to counter it? Notice how thieves basically have no stability? Why not cc them? There, their HS spam will now do 0 damage.”

You can’t counter things, even if you know how to counter things, if you aren’t given time to counter things. Not to mention as a Necro our “signature” CC is stronger when used by a thief who used Steal.

“For a necro, just put a staff 5 on the ground and stand in it. Then you can do your wellbomb combo.”

Any thief worth worrying about isn’t going to open on a necro standing in a blatantly visible mark.

“How about dodging twice while he spams 2 like a noob, making him waste all his initiative AND his haste buff? Just saying.”

Because 2 dodges =/= avoiding 5 attacks. As a thief, if I opened with HS + Haste and he dodged, I would stop spamming HS and then CnD > BS > Roll for Initiative > go back to HS (if spamming HS was my goal).

People always say “Just dodge it” when something is overpowered, meaning you need to meet certain prerequisites:

1. You have a full dodge meter.
2. You can see the attack coming.
3. There are zero other variables in place (like Basilisk Venom…)

That’s like saying to counter 100b warrior, “just dodge Bull’s Rush”. Except it’s more like you’re running, then all of a sudden out of nowhere you get knocked to the ground and instantly haste + 100B spammed to death before you recover from the knock down. Don’t forget Haste speeds up stomp time! You’re literally knocked down, burst down, and stomped before you have a chance to recover from the knock down. Even with a stun breaker the amount of damage accrued before you’re able to use it is significant enough to put you on the defensive which allows the warrior to continue attacking.

The common denominator here is HASTE. It’s a stupid mechanic and doesn’t belong in this game. It would make certain aspects of the game more tactically focused. Heartseeker DOESN’T NEED A GAP CLOSER THAT HOMES IN ON THE TARGET! These are basic design flaws that have been the topic of frustration since BWE1! That’s the disgusting part about this whole thing, that during the beta we were not only allowed but ENCOURAGED to give feedback and despite there being an overwhelming outpouring of protest from players on specific topics, NONE of the most important things were implemented!

…? haste heart seeker isn’t instant. You have loads of time to counter

Donedusted.9846:

I hereby officially rename GW2 to GW2222222222222222222.

XD

Anyway although I kinda share OP’s sentiment I gotta say that 5 heartseakers, haste or no haste, is not instant, nor is it relatively instant. It’s just fast, and despite being fast you have, as a necro anyway, the ability to counter asap with ds3 (granted: you need at least some life force).
I would also recommend standing in your own marks if you know there’s a thief around. In my experience they ignore the things more often than you might think (wouldn’t he especially ignore it if he was just some hs spamming scrub?). + Marks trigger instantly, which gives you awareness about adjacent stealthy thiefs (in contrast: I’m often dazzled by stealth attacks cuz they litterally come from nowhere, and then after you’ve been dealt 10k+ damage the thief’ll appear. kitten stealth.)
But yeah, quickness is a dumb mechanic.

OP, this is why there are less than 100 people online in spvp at times.

As a necro I do not have a problem with thieves killing me just fear with ds or staff. The problem is I can’t kill them when I can’t chase after them. They should make our ds 2 instant cast with 1200 range.

Daays.4317:

Dodge twice. Since HS is queued and he’s hasted, the thief will waste all init and can’t do anything about it because he’s spamming HS.

Chill.

Congrats. Thief wasted all his init doing nothing.

Chill reduces leap distance by 66%. Playing a necro in pubs, i would follow thieves around all game just to chill them and watch them hopelessly spam HS.

This one game, I got 25 bleeds on me, ran around in a circle, and died. Nerf bleeds.

I’m glad someone else got the point. Btw, if you’re full hp heartseeker does little damage, unless you’re a glass cannon necro…also a bad thing in hotjoin :|

Also, to those saying “bull rush warrior coming out of nowhere and 100b-frenzy”, if you’re running in pvp and you’re not panning your camera, you’re doing it wrong.

Hanzo.9624:

What you’re basically saying is “Assume you know what’s going to happen and when, time your dodges perfectly with precognitive precision, hope that all he does is spam one attack because if he doesn’t, you now have no dodge left to survive off of.”

This is the logic that prevents appropriate fixes from being implemented.

If you can’t read bad players, then you deserve to die.

GW2 skill-gap is in the defense. It’s about dodging and knowing when to use abilities.

Everyone has died to hasted HS spam. So you can either learn to adapt, counter, and read bad players or come cry on the forums.

One will give you results. The other won’t.

HS spam was only broken at launch. If you’re dying to it, you need to check your spec/gear setup. Especially if you’re playing a necro. A necro just laughs at HS spamming thieves because of chill/cripple spam.

Okay well you said you were physically unable to avoid the damage? Does that mean he also had basilisk venom and you have no stun break? Or he has Devour Venom? Please help me understand, be cause if the thief in question doesn’t have either of these venoms then HS spam is completely avoidable with two dodge rolls.

Donedusted.9846:

I hereby officially rename GW2 to GW2222222222222222222.

U just made my day.lol

I kind of think that ‘Haste’ needs a different debuff than the endurance drain. You can run a sigil of stamina and assuming you get the kill, the debuff means nothing. Different story if you don’t get it, obviously.

Dodge twice. Problem solved.

Tests of HS on 3200 armor guardian

100>50% took me 5-9 heartseekers
50>25% took me 2-4 heartseekers
25>0% took me 1-2 heartseekers.

At best possible case its 8 heartseekers(all crits)=24 innitiative minding that guardian didnt pop any heal/active defences, or aeagis.
At worst its 15 heartseekers(0 crits)=45 innitative on guardian stadning afk.

By the time i use 4 heartseekers(12 innitiative) i have enough innitiative for 2 more so its basicly 6 heartseekrs in a row at best(if i haste i will have enough only for 5 since i spend my resources faster)

Testing average heartseeker damage its next to imposible to deal 28k with 5 heartseekers from 100%.
It is possible if he mug>cnd>backstab you pop death shround but are under 25% then average heartseeker on glass cannon is 6-7k. If he did 5 hearseekers like that its entirely viable.

Well a 3200 armor guardian is going to be way higher armor than a necro with 1600 toughness. Thats like my warrior with 2k toughness.

So it would naturally take less heartseekers to finish him.

And for those of you that kitten out hundred blades…..

Hundred blades doesnt make you instantly jump on your target over and over to insure it never misses due to anything but dodge rolls. heartseeker you can literally jump on your target over and over and over and dodge rolls will not affect your dps as much as dodging a hundred blades once.

Whats more OP about heartseeker than its damage, is how easily it can connect. Just bounce on your opponent and it will automatically hit. How many warrior skills do that…eviscerate maybe but you travel half as fast…

Maybe greatsword rush that has horrible aiming or sword leap that does virtually no damage…possibly shield stun that has a delay on the actual hit when you actually rush to your target…

Bullscharge is the only one i know. Cant bullscharge 6 times in a row though.

Agree on everything, remove quickness and HS jump thing.

It is so funny, a thief tried to catch me while i was running with ride the lightning just spamming HS, he used it just to catch me xD

hharry.1967:

Agree on everything, remove quickness and HS jump thing.

It is so funny, a thief tried to catch me while i was running with ride the lightning just spamming HS, he used it just to catch me xD

I had a thief chase me circles around the map on my necro (using signet of locust) just spamming HS HS HS HS HS.. I just kept on running dropping marks at my feet, by the time I finally stopped and turned around he was at 10% hp and still pressing 2, laughed my kitten off for sure.

Fail

death shroud (for retaliation) > DS fear > flesh golem knock down > well of darkness (with chill effect traited)> well of suffering > well of corruption > dagger #3 immobilize and #1 spam.

Win

HeartseekerHeartseekerHeartseekerHeartseeker

I sense a disturbance in the balance…

Quickness is a rather absurd mechanic and should not function in PvP/WvW. You can’t take a game with burst damage that can kill people in 2-3 seconds without quickness and then cut that time in half. That’s insane.

As far as HS goes, other than the automatic tracking, I feel like it’s fine. They need to change it to work like elementalist burning speed where the thief jumps directly forward and does damage if his path crosses his target. That would make it require skill to use and create situations where it’s not a good choice.

Still, I would much rather face some horrible 222222 thief than a CnMugD → backstab for 20k damage in 1/2 second.

You saw the thief coming, you had LF, and you didn’t have time to use an instant cast ability when you have 20-25k health. Be serious. I play necro and if I died to heartseeker spam I sure wouldn’t post on the forums about it. I’d probably keep it very quiet.

In general, dealing damage is easy and avoiding damage takes at least some skill. Most fights are not decided based on who puts out damage more efficiently—even in a duel between glass cannons, fights are decided based on who dodges/avoids better. Even bunker guardians have to rotate through some skills.

No matter how much gets nerfed, this combat “meta” will never change. The number of AoE/auto-aim/gap-closing skills in the game is staggering, and dealing damage will always be easy. So, yes, Anet should nerf pubstomp skills that drive people away from PvP, but no, we should never expect there to eliminate all forms of F1-2-2-2-2 playing.

I’m sorry but to everyone saying just “dodge it” the OP’s replies back to you are the only sensible thing happening in this entire argument. Hanzo from his explanation of replies is clearly a skilled player and actually has countered thought through before starting a fight. And what really got me was the “rerolled level 2” killing skilled players. Completely true. I play a ranger mainly, which is the worst attempt of a ranger class I’ve ever seen in any MMO, when the hell can we get a buff? Seriously. But myself and a friend (elementalist at the time) made a backstab thief, this was about a month ago since I haven’t played since (before backstab was nerfed) just to see how easy it was to destroy people. It took, no! skill. I pressed steal, hit my #1 ability and if he wasn’t dead from just that alone, spammed HS til he was dead – and this was without using Quickening since its the worst idea I think for PvP. You cannot physically dodge or even dodge enough! to prevent builds like what the OP is saying and previously, back stab builds. Worst part is it takes the skill level of someone on frigen Mists of Pandaria compared to a serious competitive gamer and they will still come out on top, unless your running FOTM as well. Their stealthed, they shadowstep to you and get the initial strike. So I guess your guys tactics is roll all the time, never stop and stack endurance regens?

MarcusKilgannon.5048:

So I guess your guys tactics is roll all the time, never stop and stack endurance regens?

Or he could just do exactly what he said, only start doing it slightly faster than the three kittening seconds it takes to spam 5 hasted heartseekers. Reactions like a brick? He even SAW the thief coming. This whole thread is ridiculous.

Mammoth.1975:

MarcusKilgannon.5048:

So I guess your guys tactics is roll all the time, never stop and stack endurance regens?

Or he could just do exactly what he said, only start doing it slightly faster than the three kittening seconds it takes to spam 5 hasted heartseekers. Reactions like a brick? He even SAW the thief coming. This whole thread is ridiculous.

No he didn’t. Do you know how to read? He said he saw him, he used shadow refuge, putting him – back into stealth! then he re-attacked the OP. Now necro’s can see stealth at all times? I wish i had that ability.

MarcusKilgannon.5048:

No he didn’t. Do you know how to read? He said he saw him, he used shadow refuge, putting him – back into stealth! then he re-attacked the OP. Now necro’s can see stealth at all times? I wish i had that ability.

I know what he said. The point I was making is that he wasn’t caught off guard, he was sitting on his deathshroud key and still couldn’t press it within 3 seconds, then decided to make a thread about that fact.

Mammoth.1975:

MarcusKilgannon.5048:

So I guess your guys tactics is roll all the time, never stop and stack endurance regens?

Or he could just do exactly what he said, only start doing it slightly faster than the three kittening seconds it takes to spam 5 hasted heartseekers. Reactions like a brick? He even SAW the thief coming. This whole thread is ridiculous.

No, the OP’s point wasn’t that heartseeker is overpowered. He was merely pointing out that it is possible to play competently using only heartseeker. His argument is basically that the skill-floor difference between professions/builds is too much. I think there’s some truth to that, and it could be why PvP has failed to keep the new players trying it out.

In other words, the traditional “l2p” does not apply. He even said he knew what to do, and just failed to respond fast enough. Sure, spamming heartseeker isn’t going to cut it in tournaments, but this is a discussion of skill floor.

NevirSayDie.6235:

No, the OP’s point wasn’t that heartseeker is overpowered. He was merely pointing out that it is possible to play competently using only heartseeker. His argument is basically that the skill-floor difference between professions/builds is too much. I think there’s some truth to that, and it could be why PvP has failed to keep the new players trying it out.

In other words, the traditional “l2p” does not apply. He even said he knew what to do, and just failed to respond fast enough. Sure, spamming heartseeker isn’t going to cut it in tournaments, but this is a discussion of skill floor.

It’s not possible to play competently using only heartseeker. It’s possible to troll people who can’t react within 3 seconds. How low do we want to set the floor? Is 5 seconds enough time to start reacting? 10? Maybe I should be able to go make a cup of tea when I see a thief stealth right in front of me and then come back and kill him?

His argument is that offense in this game trumps defense if you do nothing.

That’s how it was designed. Kind of backwards from an FPS.

In an FPS, bad players don’t do well because they can’t aim.
In GW2, everyone is already strong offensively. It’s your defensive cooldowns and dodge usage that separates the good players from the bad.

It’s not possible to play competently using only heartseeker. It’s possible to troll people who can’t react within 3 seconds. How low do we want to set the floor? Is 5 seconds enough time to start reacting? 10? Maybe I should be able to go make a cup of tea when I see a thief stealth right in front of me and then come back and kill him?

So I guess you and the other 30 active PvP players set the bar for the entire PvP community then? Hm, I wonder if what the OP states is an actual issue or did 2 millions players drop off the face of Mists just because a pretty light caught their eye and they haven’t returned back yet.

MarcusKilgannon.5048:

So I guess you and the other 30 active PvP players set the bar for the entire PvP community then? Hm, I wonder if what the OP states is an actual issue or did 2 millions players drop off the face of Mists just because a pretty light caught their eye and they haven’t returned back yet.

I see new faces in tournaments all the time, both free and paid. Lots of them. In fact, I used to queue into a free tourney and see one or two people I knew on every map 90% of the time, now I barely recognise anyone. I guess we all just like losing to the tremendous OPness that is heartseeker spam.

I see new faces in tournaments all the time, both free and paid. Lots of them. In fact, I used to queue into a free tourney and see one or two people I knew on every map 90% of the time, now I barely recognise anyone. I guess we all just like losing to the tremendous OPness that is heartseeker spam.

So explain the threads about now even free tournament queues taking upwards of 20mins+ during prime time? Why is this such an issue for people but you somehow have priority to tournament games.

MarcusKilgannon.5048:

So explain the threads about now even free tournament queues taking upwards of 20mins+ during prime time? Why is this such an issue for people but you somehow have priority to tournament games.

I don’t know, I don’t play in primetime much, but frees pop fast anytime I queue. It takes me longer to get a match on dota2. I guess the forums are more accurate though, they always are

Hanzo.9624:

HEARTSEEKER … STOP RUINING THINGS AND MAKE THEM BETTER.

Play me the world’s smallest violin.

Your tears slake my thirst.

Also, BS.

Hanzo.9624:

On my necro, baited some scrub thief who was literally only using Haste and then spamming heartseeker. Waited for him to come out of stealth and was going to death shroud (for retaliation) > DS fear > flesh golem knock down > well of darkness (with chill effect traited)> well of suffering > well of corruption > dagger #3 immobilize and #1 spam. Comes out of stealth from shadow refuge WITH HEARTSEEKER and literally didn’t even have time for my DS > Fear > Pet Knock down > Well Bomb combo before I ate almost 30k in HS damage as a 24k HP toon with ~1600 toughness.

Coming from a primary thief player, this is nauseating to me. I think thief is a great class when played skillfully. This was just some baddy pub scrub literally hitting Haste and then spamming the number 2 key on his keyboard and killing people with it. He was top score and the side of the screen was scrolling with him killing people using only heartseeker. This was NOT a skillful thief, based on his movement patterns and his inability to react it was just a bad player exploiting a ridiculous mechanic. He had no titles and the starter PvP gear. If he failed at spamming HS he would stealth heal + shadow refuge until his initiative was back up and then come out with more HS spam. Repeat.

Did you really design a game based around a player being able to defeat other players by hitting ONE BUTTON MULTIPLE TIMES? I wish I screen shotted it but I was too concerned with exiting the game and wiping its existence from my hard drive before it tainted my computer any longer. I’m all for buffs over nerfs and thief is my favorite class in every game that allows it, but this is like unbelievable. I’m by no means a bad player and very rarely have a problem with thieves on my necro and even less so on my thief. Thieves LOVE to defend their class by saying, “Good players don’t die to HS spam” to try and cover the ability’s overpowered mechanics. As a thief against a HS spamming thief it’s easy to CnD and make them waste their initiative HS’ing away from me. As a necro it’s even easier to well bomb/immobilize/fear/knockdown during HS spam. But when you’re actively waiting for a thief that you know is only going to hit Haste and spam HS, and you’re completely prepared to effectively nullify that attack, and instead immediately die, there’s really nothing you can do. I don’t care what you say should have been done differently, I KNOW what should have been done. I was physically UNABLE to do it.

Before you guys start diving into making your next whatever Holiday event maybe you should take a look at crap like this that’s completely ruining this game. It’s bad enough every class plays the same build basically anyway (have you seen a non-100b warrior?). Initiative was a good idea to try and keep the spirit of the thief alive but in a game like this it just doesn’t work. Heartseeker would be fine if it wasn’t spammable. STOP RUINING THINGS AND MAKE THEM BETTER. Take haste out of the game and you’ll solve so many problems: people won’t flock to FotM burst builds and players won’t keep getting killed by level 2 FotM rerolled burst builds! I don’t care what you do, because I’m done with this game. It’s more like an exit interview from a crappy job; I’m hoping that by being honest you’ll make things better for the people who stick it out.

I hate to be the bringer of bad news mate, but I don’t think you’re quite as skilled as you think you are.

You seem to have this preconceived notion of how fights should go, and when someone does something that you weren’t expecting then you panic and lose the fight. Then the excuses come.

A real pvp fight is not about executing perfect DPS rotations while locking people down with CC, it’s about watching what the enemy is doing and reacting to it as quickly as possible.

At the end of the day, you lost to a “baddy pub scrub”. If you can’t even beat someone like that, then why do you expect to win any fight?

Bad.