Guild Wars 2

The problem of stealth in MMOs

Quite Interesting article

http://spinksville.wordpress.com/2010/06/23/the-problem-of-stealth-in-mmos/

Although the writer uses diffident examples of mmo’s; they offer similar concepts regarding Stealth and its problematic to mmo’s.

Highlights “Stealth classes are usually popular in games. Being able to pick your fights is a huge advantage in PvP – the classic stealther attack of leaping out of hiding and backstabbing an opponent is fun to play (and a nightmare to balance)”

Your thoughts…….

Cloak and Daggers against walls is one of the more annoying things in WvW these days.

Nobody should be able to perma-stealth.

Herr der Friedhoefe.2490:

Cloak and Daggers against walls is one of the more annoying things in WvW these days.

Nobody should be able to perma-stealth.

….WvW? -__-
sigh Do you really like to ‘hear’ yourself speak so much you can’t make a valid point in regards to a topic (most likely because you didn’t even bother reading the article linked-which is the basis of the thread I might add)? The impression your post gives is this:
looks and sees ‘stealth’ in new thread’
Thinks: MUST QQ MOOOAAAR!!!
*posts about pvp issue when the article on which the OP asks for feedback is illustrating the limitations of stealth in PVE
…then everyone else proceeds to facepalm

Anyhoo…
I agree with the views expressed in the article-I think those who play multiple professions including the thief will be hard pressed to counter his arguments. Pretty much ‘stealth’ in dungeons (I stay away from fractals so idk how it fares there) is shadow refuge and apart from some very situational set of conditions-none of which is ‘must bring thief’ I might add, its only real purpose in my experience is stealth rez (which again, depending on the boss/party member is really neither here nor there).

It isn’t as big problem in GW2 I might add because each profession gives you far more options to play-so yes stealth pretty much still has the problems it has in other games, but thief =/= stealth at the very least. One could argue that under this freedom of game play philosophy, stealth becomes something like the guardian’s consecrations-more limited application than other mechanics available to the profession in pve but becomes more viable in pvp situations. If that is the mindset then it resolves a great deal of the issues with stealth classes in pve-their reliance on stealth that…doesn’t ….really do anything. However because of the ineffectiveness of stealth in pve it makes stealth classes in general…let’s say less than desired for group content-to translate that to gw2, we need to ask’ are the other mechanics available to stealth professions good enough to make the profession enviable in pve?-since we’re going on the premise that stealth is pvp oriented‘…..unfortunately most would say the answer to that is a resounding ’no’. Is it functional? Sure. But it doesn’t have healing spring, easy access to party-wide protection/regeneration/vigor/fury/might/condi removal, reflections, variety of combo fields or even two-fire/water; arguably the best two for group pve content-it does have easy access to weakness but is it on par with the support available from other professions? Not sure-not too many thieves (side note: why do people say ‘thiefs’..I don’t even… -__-) I’ve run with apply that condi frequently.

Imo we can either request for changes that validates stealthy play styles in pve-turn traps into ‘ambush traps’ (not the actual in game skill) when set in stealth for added effects or something idk or request changes to other skills to make the profession more useful in pve-the boon steal is a good example, just perhaps need to reduce the refresh rates on boon-centric bosses a bit.

i really dont have a problem with perma stealth. the only problem with stealth in GW2 is that they ignored one thing every other game got right:

limited in-combat vanishes.

with cloak n dagger or bp+hs, thieves can stealth as often as we want. so we do. stealth, backstab. stealth, backstab. now youre low, maybe get lazy and heartseeker.

from the interviews on SOTG, Anet comes off as claiming that this makes the class a conundrum that is hard to balance (we cant make them tough because of infinite vanishes, but we cant take away their vanishes because theyre not tough).

in reality, if they only had 1 or 2 in combat vanishes, they could be balanced around being exposed more often. maybe higher base HP, better avoidance mechanics, something.

limiting the amount of re-stealths limits the amount of hugely powerful openers, which makes gameplay more involving for the thief (do i use my vanish for a second huge backstab or do i save it to escape), plus combat will last longer in general. it also limits escape potential, which makes it more rewarding to engage thieves.

the current state of not being able to kill any thief who doesnt want to be killed, not even remotely acceptable.

Raven.9603:

i really dont have a problem with perma stealth. the only problem with stealth in GW2 is that they ignored one thing every other game got right:

limited in-combat vanishes.

with cloak n dagger or bp+hs, thieves can stealth as often as we want. so we do. stealth, backstab. stealth, backstab. now youre low, maybe get lazy and heartseeker.

from the interviews on SOTG, Anet comes off as claiming that this makes the class a conundrum that is hard to balance (we cant make them tough because of infinite vanishes, but we cant take away their vanishes because theyre not tough).

in reality, if they only had 1 or 2 in combat vanishes, they could be balanced around being exposed more often. maybe higher base HP, better avoidance mechanics, something.

limiting the amount of re-stealths limits the amount of hugely powerful openers, which makes gameplay more involving for the thief (do i use my vanish for a second huge backstab or do i save it to escape), plus combat will last longer in general. it also limits escape potential, which makes it more rewarding to engage thieves.

the current state of not being able to kill any thief who doesnt want to be killed, not even remotely acceptable.

Problem being they’ve gone and tied both the defensive and the offensive options to stealth. S/D loses it’s control specialization without stealth, D/x loses it’s burst and P/D loses it’s conditions. Out of all the stealth sets only wouldn’t be completely wrecked would be D/D, retaining it’s condition options.

This gives me an idea though. What if they made 2 kinds of stealth, utilities having the traditional stealth and weapons having a semi visible stealth. And balancing as such like for instance swapping Last Refuge for Cloaked in Shadow?

You do understand you can still hit people in stealth right? They don’t get some sort of immunity. Theirs a reason you can use your 1 attack without a target or you could just put an ground target aoe on yourself their is literally hundreds of ways to deal with stealth and qqing on the forums isnt one of them

Raven.9603:

i really dont have a problem with perma stealth. the only problem with stealth in GW2 is that they ignored one thing every other game got right:

limited in-combat vanishes.

with cloak n dagger or bp+hs, thieves can stealth as often as we want. so we do. stealth, backstab. stealth, backstab. now youre low, maybe get lazy and heartseeker.

from the interviews on SOTG, Anet comes off as claiming that this makes the class a conundrum that is hard to balance (we cant make them tough because of infinite vanishes, but we cant take away their vanishes because theyre not tough).

in reality, if they only had 1 or 2 in combat vanishes, they could be balanced around being exposed more often. maybe higher base HP, better avoidance mechanics, something.

limiting the amount of re-stealths limits the amount of hugely powerful openers, which makes gameplay more involving for the thief (do i use my vanish for a second huge backstab or do i save it to escape), plus combat will last longer in general. it also limits escape potential, which makes it more rewarding to engage thieves.

the current state of not being able to kill any thief who doesnt want to be killed, not even remotely acceptable.

QFT!! Especially the last part.

Thanks.

Raven.9603:

i really dont have a problem with perma stealth. the only problem with stealth in GW2 is that they ignored one thing every other game got right:

limited in-combat vanishes.

with cloak n dagger or bp+hs, thieves can stealth as often as we want. so we do. stealth, backstab. stealth, backstab. now youre low, maybe get lazy and heartseeker.

from the interviews on SOTG, Anet comes off as claiming that this makes the class a conundrum that is hard to balance (we cant make them tough because of infinite vanishes, but we cant take away their vanishes because theyre not tough).

in reality, if they only had 1 or 2 in combat vanishes, they could be balanced around being exposed more often. maybe higher base HP, better avoidance mechanics, something.

limiting the amount of re-stealths limits the amount of hugely powerful openers, which makes gameplay more involving for the thief (do i use my vanish for a second huge backstab or do i save it to escape), plus combat will last longer in general. it also limits escape potential, which makes it more rewarding to engage thieves.

the current state of not being able to kill any thief who doesnt want to be killed, not even remotely acceptable.

What you and others fail to realize, time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time again (despite having it pointed out to you, repeatedly) is that in the current format, stomping a player <> winning.

A stealth thief is in no way contributing to their team – they aren’t capturing a point, they aren’t healing other players, they aren’t preventing a decap. Stealth effectively removes a thief from the game’s scoring mechanisms entirely until they are no longer stealthed.

In addition, as others have pointed out – unlike every other MMO I’ve ever PvP’d in, this game does not require you to have a target to use an ability. Stealth is powerful in other games because a stealth target is basically invulnerable – you don’t have a target to use any skills on, so you’re limited to ground target AoE’s (if you even have any). In GW2, you can use all of your attacks (with I believe a few notable exceptions) without a target. It’s pretty easy to guess where a thief might be going based on their weaponset when they stealth – they’re either trying to get behind you, or running away. In the case of the latter, you win – the thief didn’t capture your point, in fact, he wasted his time and probably some CD’s (unless you were fighting off point, in which case silly you.) In the case of the former, you get used to the timing rather quickly when you play the game rather than QQing pointlessly on the boards.

Edit: What was the point of OP’s article? It’s entirely focused on PvE stealth problems (and is in fact calling Stealth UP, less fun, and less group friendly). The only mention of PvP doesn’t apply to this game – GW2 thieves can’t “Pick their battles” because they don’t get toggle stealth like other games stealth classes do.

evilapprentice.6379:

What you and others fail to realize, time and time and time and time and time and time and time and time again (despite having it pointed out to you, repeatedly) is that in the current format, stomping a player <> winning.

A stealth thief is in no way contributing to their team – they aren’t capturing a point, they aren’t healing other players, they aren’t preventing a decap. Stealth effectively removes a thief from the game’s scoring mechanisms entirely until they are no longer stealthed.

In addition, as others have pointed out – unlike every other MMO I’ve ever PvP’d in, this game does not require you to have a target to use an ability. Stealth is powerful in other games because a stealth target is basically invulnerable – you don’t have a target to use any skills on, so you’re limited to ground target AoE’s (if you even have any). In GW2, you can use all of your attacks (with I believe a few notable exceptions) without a target. It’s pretty easy to guess where a thief might be going based on their weaponset when they stealth – they’re either trying to get behind you, or running away. In the case of the latter, you win – the thief didn’t capture your point, in fact, he wasted his time and probably some CD’s (unless you were fighting off point, in which case silly you.) In the case of the former, you get used to the timing rather quickly when you play the game rather than QQing pointlessly on the boards.

Edit: What was the point of OP’s article? It’s entirely focused on PvE stealth problems (and is in fact calling Stealth UP, less fun, and less group friendly). The only mention of PvP doesn’t apply to this game – GW2 thieves can’t “Pick their battles” because they don’t get toggle stealth like other games stealth classes do.

A stealth player can heal other players, can avoid stomps to him and other players with stealth, can prepare some ambush when someone goes cap a point and thinks there is no one at the point, can burst the enemy quickly and then cap the point (can cap or prevent the cap) and can pick up the target he wants.
And even if he runs away from a fight he is not given the 5 points to the enemy for the kill. And if he comes back back later with full hp he still can get the 5 points from kiling the enemy he left at 20% hp and cap the point.

That article just seems to talk about PVE… and it doesn’t have much depth. PVE stealth isn’t so good because it gives less rewards than straight up killing? I guess.

“Stealth” isn’t just a problem in MMO’s. Predator simulator classes/powerups/perks usually end up becoming a balancing nightmare and are hated by many. In games where open field, direct combat is 90% of the content, you can imagine that a single class or ability designed explicitly for the avoidance of direct, open engagement can cause a stir.

TPvP’s rulesets are designed in such a way as to limit the usefulness of stealth as much as possible – this courtesy does not apply to other PvP environments like WvW. The efficiency of stealth in SPvP is severely limited unless used for the purpose of killing or unexpected strategic movements. I can imagine how much more useful going invisible would be if you could contest points while doing so. This limits the class’ potential significantly for SPvP, considering how many useful things can be traited to happen in stealth. A necessary evil for stealth in its current state, however, since I would wager letting invisible players prevent points from being captured would be uncounterable and would reveal invisibility for the broken mechanic it really is. That said, stealth stomping, ressing from stealth, and of course the delicious Guardian group snipe from stealth all have their appeal.

The only things that can reliably hit stealthed targets in this game over other games are melee weapon autoattacks and some channeled abilities will continue to follow the lost enemy. Simply being able to activate an ability does not mean you can hit the target. Ranged weapons will often miss targeted enemies – let alone invisible ones. Otherwise it’s par for the course. AoEs and DoTs that haven’t been cleansed. Of course, in those other games merely taking damage in stealth breaks it.

D/P might as well just have a “toggle stealth” button. D/D requires your opponent getting hit, though in certain areas of the game, your enemies aren’t smart enough to move, like PvE content or mobs in WvW. Most other common forms of stealth are initiated by the stealthing player alone through combo fields or utility skills, so the stuff is of easy access and to many players can be overwhelming. This can be remedied with practice, against and as the class in question, but I can’t help but wonder why coincidentally there aren’t 20 threads all asking about how to counter Warriors and Necros which seem so impossible to manage…

silentnight warrior.2714:

A stealth player can heal other players, can avoid stomps to him and other players with stealth, can prepare some ambush when someone goes cap a point and thinks there is no one at the point, can burst the enemy quickly and then cap the point (can cap or prevent the cap) and can pick up the target he wants.
And even if he runs away from a fight he is not given the 5 points to the enemy for the kill. And if he comes back back later with full hp he still can get the 5 points from kiling the enemy he left at 20% hp and cap the point.

How is a stealthed thief healing other players (outside of SR, which if you used for the heal, you’re doing it wrong).

Every class has stomp avoidance mechanics – stealth isn’t special in this case. You might as well complain that people can knock you back while you’re trying to stomp.

That “Ambush” window is at max 4 seconds, unless SR is used – not a great use of SR (though loads better than “healing someone”). You’re still not “doing anything” for your team while you’re stealthed (you’re actively losing the cap if the enemy players makes it to the circle, in fact).

All you’re doing is listing stealth’s uses and trying to tell me they counter my point. You’re still not, in any way, contributing to the point scoring mechanics of the conquest game mode while stealthed.

If a thief ran away from the fight, it’s at worst a draw – he didn’t get 5 points for stomping you either. In most cases however, its a clear loss – if you were smart enough to fight on point, he contributed nothing (since he isn’t decapping due to the lack of KB, stealth, and so on) – you held the point, you won.

“How is a stealthed thief healing other players (outside of SR, which if you used for the heal, you’re doing it wrong).”

-With SR and others skills. (not the heal part of SR). I already saw some thiefes doing it right. It changed completly the battle. (heal the downed players). Its a pain to try to finish someone and then you are blinded, the DS player is in stealth and you cannot see the thief healing his ally and the then target rises from DS.
Thiefes can do that quite often.

“Every class has stomp avoidance mechanics – stealth isn’t special in this case. You might as well complain that people can knock you back while you’re trying to stomp”

-Totaly agree with the first part of your statement. But some classes have it way better than others. I would like to have thief DS and would like the thief to have the warrior DS. People would realise that the stomp avoidance mechanics is not that equal/efective for every profession.

“That “Ambush” window is at max 4 seconds, unless SR is used – not a great use of SR (though loads better than “healing someone”). You’re still not “doing anything” for your team while you’re stealthed (you’re actively losing the cap if the enemy players makes it to the circle, in fact).”

If you use that window and efectively burst someone before he gets to the point you prevent the cap and get the points. If you dont finish the player and he gets to the point, kill him before he caps (thiefs can do it) and then recap. Of course this is valid for every profession, not only thiefs. While you prevent the enemy to cap points, or even if they need to send 2+ to finish you they are with less manpower in other location. A good team takes advantage of it, so you still are doing something to help the team. If you see you cannot beat them, just let them go and then recap right after, this way they will always have to divide forces to cap points and to hold them. Thiefs can do it better than anyone (good movement speed, ports and stealth).

“All you’re doing is listing stealth’s uses and trying to tell me they counter my point.”

-I respect your points, as i belive you respect mine. Just a friendly discussion…

“You’re still not, in any way, contributing to the point scoring mechanics of the conquest game mode while stealthed”

-I agree with you here, but i must say that it was too strong the combination of stealth and being able to cap points while in it.

“If a thief ran away from the fight, it’s at worst a draw – he didn’t get 5 points for stomping you either. In most cases however, its a clear loss – if you were smart enough to fight on point, he contributed nothing (since he isn’t decapping due to the lack of KB, stealth, and so on) – you held the point, you won.”

-Has i said above, if you cannot beat him, let him cap (dont give him 5 points other classes would give (lack of escapes), and then recap. They will have to send 1+ people to cap and hold. If they do that just because of one men your team has advantage on the other points.

In my opinion stealth is strong as it is even without being able to cap while in it. It just requires diferent tactics.

Of course this is only my opinion. best regards.

Stealth is a pretty poor mechanic in any game that doesn’t have detection abilities to provide a skillful means to counter the stealth.

If you are going to have stealth without detection, it should not be an ‘in combat’ tactic, that forces opponents to be endlessly reacting to the stealth, and doing silly things like casting randomly at nothing hoping to hit where they lost saw a thief, or where they have to guess at where he might be.

Stealth without detection should be limited to a combat opener mechanic, or perhaps also be used to escape out of a combat, but then go on a long cooldown.

Not only is it a balancing nightmare, but even when it is balanced, it produces very un-fun frustrating fight mechanics for anyone that is not playing the stelather.

Pendragon.8735:

Stealth is a pretty poor mechanic in any game that doesn’t have detection abilities to provide a skillful means to counter the stealth.

If you are going to have stealth without detection, it should not be an ‘in combat’ tactic, that forces opponents to be endlessly reacting to the stealth, and doing silly things like casting randomly at nothing hoping to hit where they lost saw a thief, or where they have to guess at where he might be.

Stealth without detection should be limited to a combat opener mechanic, or perhaps also be used to escape out of a combat, but then go on a long cooldown.

Not only is it a balancing nightmare, but even when it is balanced, it produces very un-fun frustrating fight mechanics for anyone that is not playing the stelather.

I totally agree. I have played many MMORPGs that incorporate a form of stealth, but ALL of them allowed a chance for detection or a means to break the character’s stealth. In Guild Wars 2, you have NO chance at detecting a stealthed character and even if you set them on fire, they can still just turn invisible on you. All of the control mechanics for stealth are on the side of the Thief.

Derps.7421:

You do understand you can still hit people in stealth right? They don’t get some sort of immunity. Theirs a reason you can use your 1 attack without a target or you could just put an ground target aoe on yourself their is literally hundreds of ways to deal with stealth and qqing on the forums isnt one of them

Another one of these posts I see.

First of all, if you’re a Stealth based Thief, the only way you’re going to die WHILE stealthed, even against an entire zerg all rolling AoE, is if you’re simply bad. Period.

Derps.7421:

You do understand you can still hit people in stealth right? They don’t get some sort of immunity. Theirs a reason you can use your 1 attack without a target or you could just put an ground target aoe on yourself their is literally hundreds of ways to deal with stealth and qqing on the forums isnt one of them

Literally hundreds of ways to deal with stealth? Literally?

KK, I would very much love to see such a list posted. And that list should contain at least two hundred ways to deal with stealth since you reported there were “hundreds” of ways. Now, you mentioned just spamming your auto-attack (#1) skill and ground targeting an AoE on yourself, so that’s two of them.

What are the other one hundred and ninety-eight of them, please?

Thanks.

evilapprentice.6379:

silentnight warrior.2714:

A stealth player can heal other players, can avoid stomps to him and other players with stealth, can prepare some ambush when someone goes cap a point and thinks there is no one at the point, can burst the enemy quickly and then cap the point (can cap or prevent the cap) and can pick up the target he wants.
And even if he runs away from a fight he is not given the 5 points to the enemy for the kill. And if he comes back back later with full hp he still can get the 5 points from kiling the enemy he left at 20% hp and cap the point.

How is a stealthed thief healing other players (outside of SR, which if you used for the heal, you’re doing it wrong).

Every class has stomp avoidance mechanics – stealth isn’t special in this case. You might as well complain that people can knock you back while you’re trying to stomp.

That “Ambush” window is at max 4 seconds, unless SR is used – not a great use of SR (though loads better than “healing someone”). You’re still not “doing anything” for your team while you’re stealthed (you’re actively losing the cap if the enemy players makes it to the circle, in fact).

All you’re doing is listing stealth’s uses and trying to tell me they counter my point. You’re still not, in any way, contributing to the point scoring mechanics of the conquest game mode while stealthed.

If a thief ran away from the fight, it’s at worst a draw – he didn’t get 5 points for stomping you either. In most cases however, its a clear loss – if you were smart enough to fight on point, he contributed nothing (since he isn’t decapping due to the lack of KB, stealth, and so on) – you held the point, you won.

I’d have to disagree here. If you can choose your fights then the only two outcomes are “win” and “draw”, meaning the other player’s outcome is either “lose” or “draw”.

It is true that while a thief is hidden, they allow another player to take the point, but the thief has an option to stealth for defense OR offense, meaning they have a choice.

S/P, SB, or S/D thieves don’t need to stealth to do their damage; they can blind, stun, or evade while skill keeping the cap and still have that escape option. Other builds only need stealth to initiate their burst, losing very little time on a point and potentially ending the fight quickly anyways.

In the end, thieves maintain control of the fight from start to finish, and that is a powerful advantage any way you look at it.

On a side note: While it is true that most classes have a skill they can use to guarantee a stomp, the thief only has a 3 second CD while others need to wait much longer and sacrifice a utility. Thief sacrifices nothing.

CollegeDowntime.4187:

On a side note: While it is true that most classes have a skill they can use to guarantee a stomp, the thief only has a 3 second CD while others need to wait much longer and sacrifice a utility. Thief sacrifices nothing.

Theif hast to “sacrifice” his offhand slot and, depending on which weapon combination he runs a LOT of inititive !

Also you can interrupt stealth stomps !
And you can time to interrupt blinded stomps too !!
Many other classes have blind stomps too, ( perhaps you just did not notice )

Also do you know how vulnerable a thief is when stomping / ressing ?

It happend many many times that a thief loses more then half his life while stomping and i don’t think we need to talk about thief down state … you lose agains every class ( unless you trait for downfight // funny thing though ,…. ).

And regarding the topic, if many of you , who claim to have been playing “lots of mmos” complain about Stealth in GW2 i feel something is really wrong.

I mean , in any other mmo you could stealth forever, whereas in GW2 you have to “work” for it, and it comes with drawbacks – because of a) the gamemode and b) you need to spend you offensive-power to use it.

Also everybody who has played a little bit of PvP should know what happens when a thief goes into stealth , you see where he heartseekers – and unless he drops another BD and uses HS you KNOW what is coming.

You can also move, or use ( if you have it ) your AE / blocks / protection – whatever.
There are so many options.

If you decide to sit on the point, and don’t move or dodge preemtivly its a l2p issue.

Raven.9603:

i really dont have a problem with perma stealth. the only problem with stealth in GW2 is that they ignored one thing every other game got right:

limited in-combat vanishes.

Where thieves don’t have a finite number of vanishes in GW2 … there is at least a mechanic in place that prevents them from unloading damage super fast and then instantly stealthing again. Granted, it’s close to that anyway, and thieves are honestly a very gimmicky feeling class …

At least there’s the unreliability of stealth due to that mechanic to help “balance” things out! Even if you’re “able” to stealth because the revealed debuff isn’t on you, there’s always that chance the game will be the inconsistent trakitten is, and give you the revealed buff without even stealthing you, regardless of whether or not you made an action to break stealth. (Bad design / design flaws IMO … oversight after oversight)

This is exceptionally present for SA thieves, the first five points into the tree, to be exact, can really screw you quite often if it procs while you’re fighting, then you don’t have your stealth / heal / escape mechanic to remain a hidden presence in the fight. And it’s really quite easy for that to happen considering the spontaneous nature of PvP … you aren’t always going to know when your health is going to reach that threshold which will stealth you automatically … so then it breaks … after you’re already low … but then you’re stuck waiting 5 seconds to stealth again. This effectively makes an already barely viable playstyle, even less consistent / viable than it already is.

Personally my favorite is when I shadow refuge myself an allies, and instead of stealthing I’m just given the revealed debuff and the game gives me a nice big middle finger … accompanied by a kitten on top, because arenanet thinks that’s cute.

Then they pack it up and say this game is ready. And that they want it to be esports.

I lol’d and then quit for 7 months … then came back just in time for dragon bash while checking out changes, hoping the PvP in this game would be better … only to notice that this game is just the same crap on a different day. And that the dagr0n bash rewards are … lackluster, at best. Sure, they look cool … but aesthetically, the wings disappearing and reappearing (though you’re WEARING them) upon stealth / unstealthing … is really quite an eyesore.

Arenanet … disappointing PvP enthusiasts since day one, and continuing this trend as profoundly hard as they possibly can.