Guild Wars 2

Put a 2 second cooldown on it please, and/or double the initiative you need to use it.

This should not be spammable. If it really is a finisher, it needn’t be spammed relentlessly.

I would prefer the skill to just be able to use if your target has 25% or less health… but on the other hand it’s such a nice gap closer :/

Ugh people are still having problems with HS? If a thief spams HS then that’s good for you! They run out of initiative and then you can burst them. The key to fighting a burst thief is to dodge/cc/whatever their intial burst, then go to town on them. HS is probably the easiest to avoid since they become giant leap frogs- very easy to spot. Just drop a chill or immobilize or even dodge out of the way. There are many many many solutions to HS. HS is right where it needs to be right now.

I know how to dodge it, and it is avoidable, but it still should not be spammable. This coming from a thief. It is a super gap closer for sure.

I know the answer

Remove the Initiative regeneration and make it rechage with HITS or Combo.
Its easy, and they can be an awesome character with a lot of versatility

The only problem I really have with it now is it doesn’t seem to be affected by chill or cripple, is this intentional?

It’s not Heartseeker per say people have a problem with.

It’s the fact that they get spammed to death by a single ability. It just looks very cheesy.

ANet isn’t going to add cooldowns to Thieves…that goes against the entire Initiative system (flawed as it is).

I think they should just change the ability, not making it “seeking”. It could probably work the same way but it would feel less cheesy, which is really where all the Heartseeker hate comes from.

Memitim.9807:

The only problem I really have with it now is it doesn’t seem to be affected by chill or cripple, is this intentional?

That’s not the case, they either removed it (by that I mean your chill/cripple) or you didn’t apply it, it was affecting me fine earlier.

I will def sign off on heartseaker having a 2 sec CD.

Dee Jay.2460:

It’s not Heartseeker per say people have a problem with.

It’s the fact that they get spammed to death by a single ability. It just looks very cheesy.

ANet isn’t going to add cooldowns to Thieves…that goes against the entire Initiative system (flawed as it is).

I think they should just change the ability, not making it “seeking”. It could probably work the same way but it would feel less cheesy, which is really where all the Heartseeker hate comes from.

Where you saw ANet will add a CD to Thieves? can you share to us that info?

Thieves will occasionally perform the same animation more than once in succession, this apparently gravely offends people.

Get over it. This is not a class balance issue.

TeoH.2098:

Thieves will occasionally perform the same animation more than once in succession, this apparently gravely offends people.

Get over it. This is not a class balance issue.

Except that little combat log thing, or the death recap…You know, the ones that CLEARLY show heartseeker spam.

All these ideas here are pretty bad. Heartseeker is fine atm and can be easily dodged. The thieves still spamming HS are griefers more then anything. They are not good, they have no skill. They spam it until all initiative is gone, and stealth and get all back. They don’t attack bunkers and support eles because they wont do enough damage to kill them.

My guess if they want people to stop spamming it is only allow it to be use below 50%. Since that is when it really starts doing damage, or lower its damage above 50% to auto damage. But that wont stop morons.

Play a class that has to actually WORK for burst damage (Elementalist for example), and then play a Thief, you’ll see how stupid easy it is to burst as a thief. They don’t need a damage nerf, they need their playstyle difficulty increased.

Typical D/D Elementalist “damage rotation”
Start in Air
Ride the Lightning (4)
Updraft (5)
Signet of Earth (Util)
Shocking Aura (3)

Swap to Fire

Fire
Burning Speed (3)
Ring of fire (4)
Drake’s Breath (2)
Fire Grab (5)

Swap to Water

Water
Frost Aura (4)
Frozen Burst (3)
Cleansing Wave (5)
Cone of Cold (2)

Swap to Earth

Earth
Magnetic Grasp (Or Signet of Earth if its back up) (3)
Earthquake (4)
Armor of Earth (Util)
Churning Earth (5)

After that it takes an on-the-fly assessment on what to switch to next.

Thief
Assassin Signet
Steal
Haste
Heartseeker Heartseeker Heartseeker

I guarantee you just did more damage than my Elementalist.

Nerf the damage? Maybe its not neccessary, just nerf how kitten easy it is to achieve it.

Chris.7653:

Except that little combat log thing, or the death recap…You know, the ones that CLEARLY show heartseeker spam.

You seem to have some kind of comprehension problem.

Hammerheart.1426:

Play a class that has to actually WORK for burst damage (Elementalist for example), and then play a Thief, you’ll see how stupid easy it is to burst as a thief. They don’t need a damage nerf, they need their playstyle difficulty increased.

Typical D/D Elementalist “damage rotation”
Start in Air
Ride the Lightning (4)
Updraft (5)
Signet of Earth (Util)
Shocking Aura (3)

Swap to Fire

Fire
Burning Speed (3)
Ring of fire (4)
Drake’s Breath (2)
Fire Grab (5)

Swap to Water

Water
Frost Aura (4)
Frozen Burst (3)
Cleansing Wave (5)
Cone of Cold (2)

Swap to Earth

Earth
Magnetic Grasp (Or Signet of Earth if its back up) (3)
Earthquake (4)
Armor of Earth (Util)
Churning Earth (5)

After that it takes an on-the-fly assessment on what to switch to next.

Thief
Assassin Signet
Steal
Haste
Heartseeker Heartseeker Heartseeker

I guarantee you just did more damage than my Elementalist.

Nerf the damage? Maybe its not neccessary, just nerf how kitten easy it is to achieve it.

VERY well put…It almost makes you wanna give up on playing other classes when they can achieve in just a couple buttons what we have to actually work hard for.

Hammerheart.1426:

Nerf the damage? Maybe its not neccessary, just nerf how kitten easy it is to achieve it.

I must say I agree. The Backstab “instant gib” combo is one of the few elements of Thief damage dealing that requires skill and timing to pull off. Most other elements are really just “press the button and observe results”.

I think this is due to a number of issues, namingly the lack of weapon choices for Thieves, the fact that a ranged weapon is almost compulsory for all types of content, further limiting the choice and that even these few weapon sets include some really lackluster abilities.

Just comparing the various weapon skills of each class, the weapon skills of Thieves come off as very simplistic and one-dimensional in design.

This is further exaggerated by the Initiative system that encourages Thieves to spam their most efficient moves.

Hammerheart.1426 has make an OWNED!

I have an Elementalist and Engineer, and both classes are the most versalites in the GW2, when Ele or Engi need to think an strategy to kill someone with 10-15 buttons, the Thief think…. Who i want to kill with 2 skills? ._.

That’s is what ANet need to change, remove characters who can be used for my fking Dog

Hammerheart.1426:

Thief
Assassin Signet
Steal
Haste
Heartseeker Heartseeker Heartseeker

I guarantee you just did more damage than my Elementalist.

Nerf the damage? Maybe its not neccessary, just nerf how kitten easy it is to achieve it.

Thief vs Ele:
Steal
Backstab
Heartseeker

Thats only if the backstab doesn’t kill you

My biggest trouble with the thief is that he can backstab me then do anything else and wont be unstealthed for 2 or 3 seconds. Not sure if its a lag thing or not, I live in Australia. My friend who lives in the same town as me has the same problem, they don’t de-stealth till their pistol whip is almost finished (an un-hasted one).

Hammerheart.1426:

Typical D/D Elementalist “damage rotation”

Your “damage rotation” is achieved by pressing numbers on the keyboard in a predefined sequence.

Please explain why you believe the act of moving your fingers over several different buttons in a preset order requires some degree of skill that you should be praised for.

GW2 has zero executional requirement, pressing 1234 is as simple and mindless as pressing 2222. Your performance in the game hinges on the choices you make – how appropriate your decision is and how quickly you respond to the situation. What seperates players are the decisions they make outside of that sequence of damage dealing abilities.

That means the choice of target, the decisions of how to move and when to dodge, when to use utility skills or other weapon abilities as the need arises, which of your opponents abilities to watch for and how to respond to them. Elementalist doesn’t have any sort of patent on any of that, the fact that you press more buttons in a sequence to deal damage is not something to be proud of.

A Thief jumping you and mashing Heartseeker from full life is an example of a bad player who is not responding to the fight. An equally hilarious example would be an Elem walking up and performing your damage rotation, button by button, without responding to what their target was doing. Both of these examples are brainless and ineffective. The only difference is the Elem looks like he might be doing something clever and complicated, because his character is cycling through a varied sequence of different attacks, while the Thief is jumping at people repeatedly.

That is the only distinction, and that is the only reason people complain about HS – because they think it ‘looks silly’. That’s it. It’s not a gameplay argument, it’s not a balance issue, it’s an aesthetic problem because you don’t like watching a Thief perform the HS animation repeatedly.

And god help you if you’re suggesting it’s anything other than an aesthetic problem, because a Thief spamming HS at you from full life is

a) Dealing less DPS than he would deal with his default attack above 50% life
b) Completely open and vulnerable to all forms of damage and CC
c) Stuck in a long buffered cast animation which he cannot interupt to dodge
d) Performing a telegraphed sequence of attacks that can easily be avoided on reaction

and e) Never going to kill you.

TLDR: A bad player runs at you and mashes an ineffective sequence of moves while making no attempt to respond to or counter anything you do in return. You complain that the ability should be changed because you don’t like the way the fight looks when playing against someone who has no idea what they are doing. Maybe i should make a post asking for a cooldown on backpedalling because i think it looks ugly.

Still not a class balance issue.

Your “damage rotation” is achieved by pressing numbers on the keyboard in a predefined sequence.

If you mean predetermined by me, then you are correct. You just put quotes around a phrase that has been around MMO’s for as long as I can remember, in some weird attempt at cutting them down.

Please explain why you believe the act of moving your fingers over several different buttons in a preset order requires some degree of skill that you should be praised for.

First, I never asked for praise, I don’t know where you got that from my post.

Second, it is not the substance of the rotation, nor was it some kitten wagging, it was simply to show how long my rotation takes in direct comparison to a Thief, and how I still achieve lesser results even. That would be effort vs reward.

GW2 has zero executional requirement

This is just wrong. I gather that every skill ever on every profession “just makes sense” to you, and thus you have some warped view that everyone views everything the same way you do, so all the most efficient rotations must scream out at you from the skillbar, and anything else is just l2p.

That means the choice of target, the decisions of how to move and when to dodge…

A Thief jumping you and mashing Heartseeker from full life is an example of a bad player who is not responding to the fight…

…An equally hilarious example would be an Elem walking up and performing your damage rotation, button by button, without responding to what their target was doing. Both of these examples are brainless and ineffective…

Agree on all those points.

The only difference is the Elem looks like he might be doing something clever and complicated, because his character is cycling through a varied sequence of different attacks, while the Thief is jumping at people repeatedly.

You’re hung up on the aesthetics of it all. I was only pointing out the effort vs reward, which is so skewed in favor of the Thief vs All the other professions. Yeah bad players are bad, but if you can’t see the joke of thief damage output for what it is, I can’t help you.

You complain that the ability should be changed because you don’t like the way the fight looks when playing against someone who has no idea what they are doing.

Again, who complains about the animation? I don’t care if the animation was the coolest in the history of gaming, its the sheer lack of effort needed on a thieves’ part to achieve fantastic damage output.

Hammerheart.1426:

GW2 has zero executional requirement

This is just wrong. I gather that every skill ever on every profession “just makes sense” to you, and thus you have some warped view that everyone views everything the same way you do, so all the most efficient rotations must scream out at you from the skillbar, and anything else is just l2p.

That’s nothing to do with execution. Execution refers to the difficulty of performing a particular action once you have made the decision that you want to perform it. Executing a 1 frame link combo in a fighting game is difficult, performing a static damage rotation in an MMO is not. There is no effort required in executing a fixed sequence of Elementalist abilities, or 5 heartseekers: You just press buttons. with a ridiculous input buffer so timing doesn’t factor into it.

I can press 453324234511, it doesn’t require anything that i would describe as effort. Look, i did it just there.

Here i’ll do it again: 453324234511

I’m failing to see where this effort comes from. I suggest you move your argument away from the idea of performing a set sequence of abilities in GW2, because there is no scenario where i’m going to acknowledge that your rotation requires any effort worth mentioning.

If you were instead trying to make some point about the length of time it takes you to deal X amount of damage as an Elem by providing a long list, then your intention missed me completely, but in that case i fail to see what you’re getting at.

if you can’t see the joke of thief damage output for what it is, I can’t help you.

A full damage spec squishy zerker burst melee class hitting you repeatedly in melee does a lot of damage. However, it would do a lot more damage from the start of the fight if it used literally any button on D/D other than Heartseeker. So since the thread is called ‘Heartseeker’, i’m having some trouble seeing how the complaint is valid.

Hammerheart.1426:

Play a class that has to actually WORK for burst damage (Elementalist for example), and then play a Thief, you’ll see how stupid easy it is to burst as a thief. They don’t need a damage nerf, they need their playstyle difficulty increased.

Typical D/D Elementalist “damage rotation”
Start in Air
Ride the Lightning (4)
Updraft (5)
Signet of Earth (Util)
Shocking Aura (3)

Swap to Fire

Fire
Burning Speed (3)
Ring of fire (4)
Drake’s Breath (2)
Fire Grab (5)

Swap to Water

Water
Frost Aura (4)
Frozen Burst (3)
Cleansing Wave (5)
Cone of Cold (2)

Swap to Earth

Earth
Magnetic Grasp (Or Signet of Earth if its back up) (3)
Earthquake (4)
Armor of Earth (Util)
Churning Earth (5)

After that it takes an on-the-fly assessment on what to switch to next.

Thief
Assassin Signet
Steal
Haste
Heartseeker Heartseeker Heartseeker

I guarantee you just did more damage than my Elementalist.

Nerf the damage? Maybe its not neccessary, just nerf how kitten easy it is to achieve it.

Quoting for truth. I don’t care how “balanced” Anet’s combat stats are, the effort:result balance is terribly off in the Ele – thief comparison, and this makes thieves (and the game by extension) feel really cheesy. It’s plain irritating (read: not fun) to have to use 15+ precisely-timed/aimed skills to achieve a worse result (in terms of damage & kills) than another class than requires pressing 1-2-2-2-2.

Effort:result ratio ought to be roughly even across the classes.

I’m failing to see where this effort comes from. I suggest you move your argument away from the idea of performing a set sequence of abilities in GW2, because there is no scenario where i’m going to acknowledge that your rotation requires any effort worth mentioning.

19 button vs 5.

In the time it takes me to do one damage sequence, you can do it near 4 times as fast, and do more damage.

Is it clear now?

Execution refers to the difficulty of performing a particular action once you have made the decision that you want to perform it.

Then by your definition Execution is relative, not non existent.

GW2 has zero executional requirement

You’ve just shown how it does.

In any case, I hope another profession could weigh in with their damage rotations and the amount of effort it takes. If thieves are to remain as high-damaging as they are, they need to be more difficult to play, if not, nerf the damage output.

Have fun with your pattern reproduction game then won’t you, i’ll be somewhere else PvP’ing instead.

TeoH.2098:

Hammerheart.1426:

GW2 has zero executional requirement

This is just wrong. I gather that every skill ever on every profession “just makes sense” to you, and thus you have some warped view that everyone views everything the same way you do, so all the most efficient rotations must scream out at you from the skillbar, and anything else is just l2p.

That’s nothing to do with execution. Execution refers to the difficulty of performing a particular action once you have made the decision that you want to perform it. Executing a 1 frame link combo in a fighting game is difficult, performing a static damage rotation in an MMO is not. There is no effort required in executing a fixed sequence of Elementalist abilities, or 5 heartseekers: You just press buttons. with a ridiculous input buffer so timing doesn’t factor into it.

I can press 453324234511, it doesn’t require anything that i would describe as effort. Look, i did it just there.

Here i’ll do it again: 453324234511

I’m failing to see where this effort comes from. I suggest you move your argument away from the idea of performing a set sequence of abilities in GW2, because there is no scenario where i’m going to acknowledge that your rotation requires any effort worth mentioning.

If you were instead trying to make some point about the length of time it takes you to deal X amount of damage as an Elem by providing a long list, then your intention missed me completely, but in that case i fail to see what you’re getting at.

if you can’t see the joke of thief damage output for what it is, I can’t help you.

A full damage spec squishy zerker burst melee class hitting you repeatedly in melee does a lot of damage. However, it would do a lot more damage from the start of the fight if it used literally any button on D/D other than Heartseeker. So since the thread is called ‘Heartseeker’, i’m having some trouble seeing how the complaint is valid.

The ele rotation that was written here, has an execution time of over 15 seconds, and deals about the same damage as 3-5 heartseekers.
Now if something happens inbetween like a skill getting interrupted, a crucial skill like updraft or earthquake getting dodged, immobilize getting cleansed, you are taking too much damage/cc etc yourself… everything in these 15 seconds (with churning earth taking a huge chunk of this battle time tbh) can screw this perfect rotation. And then the ele has to improvise, which actually shows the real skill of that ele.

No compare this to heartseeker. It takes ~5s to do the same damage as said ele above (who is just cappable of doing so due to multiple CCs from his side), and if something bad like an interrupt, chill, cripple, blind, dodge… happens… just press it again!

Thief does not have to make real crucial decisions like, should I now use Heartseeker, or Death Blossom, to reduce his health a bit more. Then my Heartseeker would deal more damage… or a dancing dagger, so that he cannot escape if my heartseeker doesn’t kill him…

No the decision is:
I use Heartseeker, then I use Heartseeker again, and if he is still alive, I use Heartseeker again…

That btw isn’t just Heartseeker in my opinion. Every thief weaponset has abilities which are more likely to be spammed over and over.

Pimpslapper.2047:

Put a 2 second cooldown on it please, and/or double the initiative you need to use it.

This should not be spammable. If it really is a finisher, it needn’t be spammed relentlessly.

I personally like fighting thieves. 1 2 or 3 at a time. I don’t care at all.

I give them 50% fumble for 20 seconds, I get 12 seconds of retaliation, while my wells heal me and blind them, and oh wait, 16 seconds of 33% protection.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAW3YjQaV6Zaia87JAJFPj90jvHX8IFEPMA;TwAgyU7Y2RsjdH3OydWhMC5EyGkXIA

Roll a necro.

I copied and pasted link and it works… hmm…

Varonth.5830:

No the decision is:
I use Heartseeker, then I use Heartseeker again, and if he is still alive, I use Heartseeker again…

You don’t actually have the slightest clue how the class works or how much damage that ability does, do you. Not a clue.

TeoH.2098:

Varonth.5830:

No the decision is:
I use Heartseeker, then I use Heartseeker again, and if he is still alive, I use Heartseeker again…

You don’t actually have the slightest clue how the class works or how much damage that ability does, do you. Not a clue.

to support you with some numbers:
with 3.2k attack hs does about 650-690 damage above 50% hp. so assume 850-950damage critting.
you have about 20k hp?
how many hs to make you reach 50% hp? every hs costs 3 initiative. if traited you have 15 initiative. 5 hs put you to 50% hp? no. hf spamming hs against any half brained player.
oh and 5 hs means you have nothing to escape a fight. or if you can escape, opponent won because in this game hlding points make you win.

You don’t actually have the slightest clue how the class works or how much damage that ability does, do you. Not a clue.

Would it make you feel better if the thread was just called, “Thieves – Babbys 1st Profession?”

Let’s just clarify, Heartseeker is not the only problem with the Thief profession, its the consolidation of skill into a few key buttons that have unrivaled damage potential.

Effort: Low
Damage: Top Tier

Results: Angry non-thieves, and can you blame them?

I am fond of thief and elementalist in pvp. In addition, i enjoy necromancer and mesmer.

As far as complicated battle tactics and skill rotations, I have to agree with some previous posters. Not only is button spamming effective for a thief, so many of their abilities are combo finishers (almost every melee attack if I remember correctly) that they do not even have to take that into account for decision making.

Necro, Mesmer, and Elementalist, my abilities, position, and ability timings are heavily regulated by combo fields and finishers. When playing a thief, such nuances of battle never even cross my mind.

This is not to say every aspect of Thief is just single button spamming. As someone else mentioned, to play and effective and survivable backstab thief takes skill, patience and cunning.

Heartseeker (the most hated ability by my Mesmer) and Pistol Whip would be the greatest offenders (and yea, I know .5 sec stun, .75 sec cast…wow, a whole .25 seconds to react to an ability that can be used over and over again and interrupt my casting while leaving me immobile). Now my first run at thief SPvP, i had both of those abilities by weapon swap…talk about spam fest and top kills most matches.

On the flip side, these abilities seem to have little to no effect on Necros (and several other tanky classes/specs I am sure), so I do not know whether a toning down of Heartseeker is on order.

This post is about heartseeker spam… The nerfed one…

People still complain about it…..

However its one of the easiest things to destroy for me…

It really is just as issue of L2P here

Usually the complaints come to the forums after:

Person just used all his CD’s and has nothing left but standard abilites, a tiny bit of dodge and 50% or less health winning a fight…. thief joins in and finishes him with some HS spam

Complaints stay away from the forums when:

Thief attacks a fully prepared class spamming nothing but 2 till he runs out of initiative. He dies shortly after. There may have been a bit of stealth dancing and healing happening in between

Dabu.1258:

I know the answer

Remove the Initiative regeneration and make it rechage with HITS or Combo.
Its easy, and they can be an awesome character with a lot of versatility

Best reply i’ve read so far. Make them start out with 0 Initiation too, removing the spam and making them need to manage their Initiation.

It always appears to me that the Warrior and Thief developers are working on a different game than the developers for the other classes. Their damage is just on a different stratosphere than all the other classes. A big hit for one of them is anything surpassing 7k where for other classes a 3k hit is considered quite large.

Playing an Elementalist I would basically exhaust all 4 skills in a single element and not do as much damage as a pair of Heartseekers. Since both are supposed to be high damage classes if specced that way, I am not sure why they are not doing similar damage. In some cases the Thief’s damage is 2-4 times as great just by spamming one or two buttons.

GW2 takes a lot of things from MOBA games. I am not understanding how or why a thief’s damage seems to scale so much higher than every single other class in the game except warrior. If I was playing LOL or HON I could grab a host of different characters and achieve similar levels of PEW PEW through my speccing and gear. I am not seeing why GW2 has this problem.

An Elementalist specced for damage does 3k(rarely)… a Thief 7k+… the math is not right.

If this game wants to be an esport, it needs to bring these things in line.

What’s funny is, thieves are starting to become only viable in 8v8 spam, they are thinning out in tPvP because everyone knows their tricks (except for the good ones, and kudos to you for knowing how to play) but people are still screaming for nerfs… first HS, then PW, then BS…

And NOBODY is posting their builds when they go down like a wet sack of fail. I wonder why that is? I guess it’s easier to complain than it is to receive constructive criticism.

And I do not play as a thief.

math should consider some classes are ranged , and some are melee….. i would like to read what would you think about ranger hits for 7k each skill or necro doing the same, or ele having 20 skills each does 7k damage. a very balanced game isn’t it.
ofc every thief and war skills have 1200 range.

I think the thing that makes HS so good is that it’s a gap closer and essentially allows you to stay auto locked on a target. Even if HS did no damage the fact that you have a spammable gap closer is huge. Compare that to what other melee get……

They are thinning out in tPVP because everyone is running at least 2 bunkers. Bunkers can do quite well vs thieves and thus their effectiveness is pretty kitten. A Bunker character can stretch the fight out and by time they run out of juice help has arrived to remove the theif. They still make effective roamers though, people just are not using them as much.

In sPVP they are out of control though.

Hammerheart.1426:

Let’s just clarify, Heartseeker is not the only problem with the Thief profession, its the consolidation of skill into a few key buttons that have unrivaled damage potential.

Effort: Low
Damage: Top Tier

The levels of bullkitten in this thread are approaching critical mass so it’s time for some footage of the actual game.

Glass cannon zerker pendant Thief and Elementalist. Feel free to start crying about Elem 11111111 now instead of Thief 22222222.

Or you could realise that spamming either of them is just a stupid idea, and you were an idiot for suggesting that mashing Heartseeker from full life is effective at accomplishing anything at all.

Hs spam does less damage than auto attacks.

Actually in most case, you should be thankfull a thief actually use a skill in order to damage you (not including the bs combo in there since it’s a reliable rotation if the target is unaware/bad/vulnerable), since pretty much every single ones are situational and lack the dps output of auto attacks.

Shukran.4851:

math should consider some classes are ranged , and some are melee….. i would like to read what would you think about ranger hits for 7k each skill or necro doing the same, or ele having 20 skills each does 7k damage. a very balanced game isn’t it.
ofc every thief and war skills have 1200 range.

You clearly only play theif. The biggest hit I have ever taken by an Ele is under 4k. Ranger a bit over. I don’t think I have ever hit anyone for much over 3k on an Ele and Ranger usually I run a condition spec so can’t comment on what a Long Bow may or may not do.

I have copped some 12 and 15k backstabs though. And a series of Pistol Whip + Quickness that added up to 16k+ many times.

I have shot people with a warrior for 7k with no points put into rifles at all. Warriors and theives seem like they are from a different game to the rest of us.

I am not sure what Anet sees as acceptable damage. Usually, its some % of the smallest health pool. Even taking 30% of someone’s health pool using 1 ability is a monster of a hit.

It’s not really that it’s a spammable finisher, it’s that it’s a spammable finisher with a gap closer which makes it so you can’t just kite to avoid it. And most of the time you only need 1 HS at 25% to actually finish, so you need to avoid all (or most) of them, it can be tricky.

I had one incident where I got someone really low and they were throwing chills/cripples and kiting like crazy and I had the Initiative to just smash Heartseekers til I caught up and 1-2 finished them lol.

There’s really not much they can do to nerf it w/o making it useless or just changing it’s function completely.

Like, they could just reverse it and make it an opener and not something to finish with, basically only doing good dmg at high hp and essentially just becomes a gap closer. Hell, they could make Backstab the finisher and then it’s not spammable. Not sure how weird that would make things lol. Thematically I think it would make more sense, and CnD/Backstab synergy would be even better.

Relentliss.2170:

Shukran.4851:

math should consider some classes are ranged , and some are melee….. i would like to read what would you think about ranger hits for 7k each skill or necro doing the same, or ele having 20 skills each does 7k damage. a very balanced game isn’t it.
ofc every thief and war skills have 1200 range.

You clearly only play theif. The biggest hit I have ever taken by an Ele is under 4k. Ranger a bit over. I don’t think I have ever hit anyone for much over 3k on an Ele and Ranger usually I run a condition spec so can’t comment on what a Long Bow may or may not do.

I have copped some 12 and 15k backstabs though. And a series of Pistol Whip + Quickness that added up to 16k+ many times.

I have shot people with a warrior for 7k with no points put into rifles at all. Warriors and theives seem like they are from a different game to the rest of us.

I am not sure what Anet sees as acceptable damage. Usually, its some % of the smallest health pool. Even taking 30% of someone’s health pool using 1 ability is a monster of a hit.

have you ever tried to immobilize a thief and shoot him from max range(if ranged clas)? or chill him? or cripple him? i beg you to try it, it is fun to see a spamming HS thief doing litterally no damage because the HS close the gap effect is affected by these conditions.
i play thief as main, i play mesmer as backup, i tested necro, ele and engi…except for mesmer i understand how much the player skill stands out the class he plays.

The levels of bullkitten in this thread are approaching critical mass so it’s time for some footage of the actual game.

Glass cannon zerker pendant Thief and Elementalist. Feel free to start crying about Elem 11111111 now instead of Thief 22222222.

Or you could realise that spamming either of them is just a stupid idea, and you were an idiot for suggesting that mashing Heartseeker from full life is effective at accomplishing anything at all.

Golems? Your entire point is drawn from Golems? I would tell you to go make actual combat footage, but you wouldn’t, because you don’t want to put the effort into learning the Elementalist profession.

You showed us the thief build, but not the Ele build.

No one uses a full glass cannon build on an ele in pvp.

That video was stupid and proved nothing, I’m sorry you wasted your time making it.

Hammerheart.1426:

Golems? Your entire point is drawn from Golems?

Yea I hear that Golems have a magical effect on them that makes Heartseeker do less damage than Elementalist auto attack. Oh wait that’s not a magical effect, that’s how the game actually works.

Are raw numbers too complicated for you to work with? It seems to require significant effort for you to press a list of numbers in order so perhaps you actually do have difficulty understanding what i’m showing you. The Thief clip shows the Thief with optimal damage traits, that’s all i needed to show. The Elementalist is also of course running optimal damage traits, i don’t expect to have to convince you of that.

But you don’t personally run with a full glass cannon build that has no life? Yea no kitten. So why are you comparing your damage against people who are?

What people dont get is Trait points.

If I went into Trickery, Acrobatics and a bit of critical strikes, my heartseeker would do hardly any damage compared to a glass cannon with power and crit

If you destroy HS for the glass cannons, imagine the ripple effect on the classes that dont spec glass cannon… You make it useless

The ripple effect would be forcing everyone to glass cannon to get the most of what they can from an ability they want to use

jus saying….. Its more than an ability, and its more than just a class inbalance. You have to spend alot of points in making HS good. If you nerf it when its good then you make it useless for people who dont glass cannon

infact, in its current state, HS is useless for people who dont glass cannon

Glass cannon is just the current meta. Youll see alot of it and that means youll see alot of people complain about it. Im surprised that my P/P isnt being seen by alot of normal players. Only the best thieves are picking it up, and ive been lucky enough to have seen a few around

I can take on most classes, and a glass cannon backstab thief is really really simple to take down for me now, its a non-issue. I can do it with one button. number 5 and Quick recovery (wait for his burst then destroy him) Alternitavley I pop thiefs guild and hide/run and let them take him down to 50% whilst kiting before switching to pistols to finish

the ripple effect will then start to take effect in PvE encounters against mobs

(pistol/pistol thief)

Yea I hear that Golems have a magical effect on them that makes Heartseeker do less damage than Elementalist auto attack. Oh wait that’s not a magical effect, that’s how the game actually works.

Are raw numbers too complicated for you to work with? It seems to require significant effort for you to press a list of numbers in order so perhaps you actually do have difficulty understanding what i’m showing you. The Thief clip shows the Thief with optimal damage traits, that’s all i needed to show. The Elementalist is also of course running optimal damage traits, i don’t expect to have to convince you of that.

But you don’t personally run with a full glass cannon build that has no life? Yea no kitten. So why are you comparing your damage against people who are?

The difference is you posted a viable, very much used Thief build, then compared to an unused, downright stupid Ele build, and finally took it to the golem field to show the “hard numbers”. It was all done very poorly and your point was completely overshadowed by it.

I challenge you, go and make an elementalist. Go learn the ins and outs, how to swap, a proper build, etc. Go learn the strengths and glaring weaknesses of the Elementalist, and if you still aren’t convinced that thieves are easy mode, then you are a lost cause.

Hammerheart.1426:

I challenge you, go and make an elementalist.

How did you end up at that, from a Heartseeker thread? I have an elementalist, you just saw it hit a Golem. How about you make a Thief and go into a tourney game mashing number 2, and see where that gets you. Since you’re the one suggesting that is a viable way of playing the class.

Untill then, thanks for explaining quite clearly that you don’t run anything close to a squishy damage build, making your comparison of ‘19 moves versus 5’, meaningless. Join us next week when we complain that bunker guardians have to press signficantly more buttons before they have done as much damage as a Thief backstab opener.

Clearly the “effort” to damage ratio is just off there.

Hammerheart.1426:

How did you end up at that, from a Heartseeker thread? I have an elementalist, you just saw it hit a Golem. How about you make a Thief and go into a tourney game mashing number 2, and see where that gets you. Since you’re the one suggesting that is a viable way of playing the class.

Untill then, thanks for explaining quite clearly that you don’t run anything close to a squishy damage build, making your comparison of ‘19 moves versus 5’, meaningless. Join us next week when we complain that bunker guardians have to press signficantly more buttons before they have done as much damage as a Thief backstab opener.

Clearly the “effort” to damage ratio is just off there.

By your logic, less effort for more effectiveness is ok because its what you want. You’ve made that pretty clear. Everyone is wrong but you. Fantastic.

Enjoy using every excuse you have in your limited toolbox to continue justifying a
clearly broken profession.

The rest of us will go on knowing that your profession will be nerfed, and I hope your skills of persuasion help you in combat when the time comes.

by his logic you can’t compare apples with oranges aka burst damage, dps or support.
but thanks for sharing your hatred for thief class. i appreciate the objective point of view.
maybe thief will be nerfed, i don’t care, but good players will continue to kick kitten of unskiled players. and that is a fact.
cheers

GW2 counter META is to complicated for some to grasp…..

The thief class is not broken. If I grab a thief, go full Acrobatics, Trickery and some Stealth for Tricks, traps and deception and a ton of condition damage am I broken?

No……. Its just a different way of cutting the same cake with 3 thief pets and a 5% chance to spawn another pet on hit

You just dont know how to kill a burst prec/power build (The current preffered meta as everyone is going power/precision spec with other classes), and instead of changing your META and traits Hammerheart.1426 came in here complaining

If his one god build can not slay them all, one of them needs a nerf,

Pokemon, gotta slay them all

Ever heard of the game Rock Paper Sissors? One dominates the other in a continuous loop