Guild Wars 2

I would like to start a thread here that allow all of the members of our community to work towards something we all want, getting better. So, I hope for this thread to help you beat that pesky backstab thief, or the seemingly immortal guardian bunker giving you so much trouble.

-Please, keep it friendly, supportive and helpful. This thread is not meant for flamewars, arrogance, or a place to argue “OPness.” This is a place for presenting problems, and players finding solutions.
-No question is to trivial.
-I will do my best to keep things organized on the first two posts, however scrolling with most likely lead to finding things I over look, or haven’t had time to add to the top posts.

Let’s start with the currently most prominent, troublesome build: The backstab(BS from here forth) thief. I’ll give what has been successful for me(as both a necro and an elementalist) against them, and I invite other professions to share advice as well.

The Backstab Thief
Damage Mitigation: That is, anything that prevents you from taking damage.(whether large,small, or none) As an ele, I can use arcane shield to prevent the frontloaded damage of the thief. As a Necro, I often use DS to absorb the bulk of the damage. If it is not up, I will use spectral armor to give me protection, and to help me get enough lifeforce to fear the thief after his attack to give me some space to heal and recover. Other professions have access to similar abilities that will provide similar aid, ie endure pain for a warrior. Also, damage mitigation against a bs thief is mos useful if I can see him coming and negate the intial burst. This, however, leads to the next point.

Consistent Awareness: While this is helpful for countering the thief, it is good to develop the habit of being aware of everything around you. Seeing that thief coming can allow you to prepare yourself for the damage you’re about to take. Yes, sometimes it is hard to see them in the heat of battle, I understand that. However, keep in mind that the thief profession, especially this particular build, capitalizes on your being unaware. A bs thief will be at a disadvantage should you see them coming. So it pays to keep a mental note of the professions around you, and not tunnel visioning the meat sack you have targeted. Now, besides these main points I’ll compile a list below of other helpful tips.

Other tips
-Movement is extremely beneficial to your survival. So, when you see them steal, turn your character and auto attack. This puts pressure on the thief not only to regain positioning, but damage should you connect(some recommend watching your combat log to help you find them) Also, skills like blink can give you distance from the thief so that their stealth wears off.
-Dodge. I know, I know. You’ve heard this a million times. But that’s because it’s so crucial. When the thief steals, dodge. It gives you space to work, as mentioned above.
-Knockbacks and knockdowns can give you time to work and even waste the thief’s stealth that he/she is dependent on.

Please provide any other input, or feel free to ask others viewing this thread about another build or ability you are having trouble with.

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God bless your post and I hope this thread survives longer than most productive posts do here. I would post my own advice but I’ve come to realize it’s not welcome on these boards.

aydenunited.5729:

God bless your post and I hope this thread survives longer than most productive posts do here. I would post my own advice but I’ve come to realize it’s not welcome on these boards.

Haha. Thanks, I hope this goes awhile as well.

Let me tell you the perfect combo for a thief: Basilisk Venom + whatever attack you want. Since turned to stone for 1.5 seconds means you can’t do anything , you are dead. A thief only needs less than 1 s to kill you. How do you escape that?

Another great combo, I can escape that only if I’m very lucky (as a mesmer): stun + immobilize + attack. I have to have a stun breaker ready + a condi removal / phase retreat. Now most of the time it isn’t 1 vs 1 so chances are that the stun breaker/condi removal are on CD. And I have less than 1s to react and use 2 skills.

Yes, stack toughness and vitality and you lose ‘only’ 50% HP. Yeah and what next? Everybody plays bunker except thieves. GG

FYI I can survive 90% of times if I’m not stunned/dazed+immobilized.

About blink, let me tell you the funny story. I have to press blink + set the destination + click again to actually teleport and it’s quite funny to aim inside the kitten range while dodging or moving around. But managed to do that, no problem and in the same instant I’ve teleported the same thief leaped at me and proceed to auto attack. Basically I’ve just moved the fight to another place.

So blink is prety unreliable as an escape, dodge can’t happen if you’re rooted. Every solution to the thief problem is quite situational and it has prerequisites. And how many times I was figthing another class, having <50% HP and bam a thief comes out from nowhere and proceeds to down me before I can do anything. That on a mesmer with 2800+ /2900 armor and 16k HP.

Bottom line, you have to be lucky and hope that:
1. thief doesn’t use stun+immobilize / basilisks venom
2. you aren’t with utils on CD or fighting another enemy.

While 2 can apply to any profession, thieves do high damage easily so most of the time you’re dead. Btw I can say that the same problem is with warriors too. Eviscerate does way to much damage to a high armor spec.

How do I beat a guardian that uses them hammers that knocks you around constantly? From ELE

Let me tell you the perfect combo for a thief: Basilisk Venom + whatever attack you want. Since turned to stone for 1.5 seconds means you can’t do anything , you are dead. A thief only needs less than 1 s to kill you. How do you escape that?
Another great combo, I can escape that only if I’m very lucky (as a mesmer): stun + immobilize + attack. I have to have a stun breaker ready + a condi removal / phase retreat. Now most of the time it isn’t 1 vs 1 so chances are that the stun breaker/condi removal are on CD. And I have less than 1s to react and use 2 skills.
Yes, stack toughness and vitality and you lose ‘only’ 50% HP. Yeah and what next? Everybody plays bunker except thieves. GG
FYI I can survive 90% of times if I’m not stunned/dazed+immobilized.
About blink, let me tell you the funny story. I have to press blink + set the destination + click again to actually teleport and it’s quite funny to aim inside the kitten range while dodging or moving around. But managed to do that, no problem and in the same instant I’ve teleported the same thief leaped at me and proceed to auto attack. Basically I’ve just moved the fight to another place.
So blink is prety unreliable as an escape, dodge can’t happen if you’re rooted. Every solution to the thief problem is quite situational and it has prerequisites. And how many times I was figthing another class, having <50% HP and bam a thief comes out from nowhere and proceeds to down me before I can do anything. That on a mesmer with 2800+ /2900 armor and 16k HP.
Bottom line, you have to be lucky and hope that:
1. thief doesn’t use stun+immobilize / basilisks venom
2. you aren’t with utils on CD or fighting another enemy.
While 2 can apply to any profession, thieves do high damage easily so most of the time you’re dead. Btw I can say that the same problem is with warriors too. Eviscerate does way to much damage to a high armor spec.

I have never been killed in less than 1 second, nor 2 for that matter. In the heat of a fight it might seem like 1 second, though. Basilisk venom can put you in a bad situation, but not a hopeless one.

In your other situation, as a mesmer, you could break stun→shatter or drop a chaos field under you(as immo) is a condition. Then move from there.

If you’re having trouble clicking with blink, there is an option in your menus to cast it wherever you have your cursor at the time. Also, everything in PvP is situational.

Again, this thread is for constructive ideas that can help a player improve. This is not a thread for, “X is OP and Y is hopeless.” This is a thread for “X is giving me trouble, how can Y(the poster) play against this?” So please, if you aren’t willing to contribute to the thread in a meaningful way then do not reply.

Good tip for trapper rangers against backstab thieves. place a spike trap at your feet, and stand in it. When the trap triggers, the thief will be immobilized for 1 second, and crippled for 2, making the backstab impossible before the venom wears off, and you can dodge away.

Death Blossom, Caltrop spamming thief.
The solution is supposedly simple – “Remove those conditions” BUT when should i do it?
When his initiative runs out – 1/3 and more health has already gone because he had 10-25 stacks of bleed on me.
Anytime before – my condition removal is on cooldown and more conditions are still to come. I can use multiple condition removals with frequent intervals but after the first initial attack i’m completely vulnerable.

kaplis.7195:

<Request>
Death Blossom, Caltrop spamming thief.
The solution is supposedly simple – “Remove those conditions” BUT when should i do it?

In my experience, the best way to fight a caltrops thief is to not fight on his caltrops. Unless you’re running some kind of build that has spammable condi removal, you’re just gonna get annihilated.

2 things
How to counter Mesmer Moa?
To me the cast doesn’t look special. If the Mesmer is invis and casts it you’re done.
So how to predict it? Can you dodge it? Does it have a special sound?
Are the skills good for anything? I think I tried them all but they all seem to do nothing. Soem of them even lock you in position.

What might be the best behaviour once you got cought? Run behind pillar and such, predict and dodge the next big hit (zerk most likely)? Is there anything else I can do?
Once I get moa’d I die in 80% of the cases.

How to counter massive knock down/stun/daze chains?

Hammer guardians and warriors becoming more and more popular. 1on1 is pretty much doable if you concentrate on your enemy but once it’s a 2on1 (both either hammer warrior or guardian) you’re getting dominated because you’re getting knockdown-chained until you die. I main a thief at the moment so stability is not an option.
I thought about dropping shortbow and get sword/pistol as second weapon set and counter that with Blinding Powder (pistol 5). Does that work at least partly?

In your other situation, as a mesmer, you could break stun?shatter or drop a chaos field under you(as immo) is a condition. Then move from there.

If you’re having trouble clicking with blink, there is an option in your menus to cast it wherever you have your cursor at the time. Also, everything in PvP is situational.

What you don’t want to understand is that there isn’t a recipe that works every time. Your ideas shows me you don’t play a mesmer so basically you’re talking theories. I play exclusively a mesmer, i’ve tried all the tricks and chances are that when you’re fighting a thief/warrior which have OP combos, your tricks are on CD and you have less than 1s to do something.

Break stun – solves stun but not the immobilize condition, so bring one but wait.. that arcane thievery has 1/4s casting time and 45 CD and doesn’t work every time, while other condi removals either take to much time to remove condi or have a dead wieght like mantra of resolve which needs recharging. And boy conditions do fly in pvp.

Shatter – you need illusions up. Try create some without a target (stealthed thief). Also requires you to run a power build or else the shattering just makes the thief/warrior laugh.
Chaos field – you probably meant chaos storm. It requires Staff equipped and aiblity ready to go. Same for chaos armor.

The option to autocast fields where the mouse arrow is. Horrible to use as you need the mouse to actually steer the toon when you’re moving so you’ll cast the spell somewhere random. And in blink case that doesn’t prevent a thief or anyone with a leap skill to jump straight at you, while you didn’t escape and just wasted a stun breaker.

Sometimes you can do something and you might escape, most of the time you don’t. The reason build X is considered OP is because you don’t have a real counter or you have to change your whole build just to counter it.

As you’re saying, all sPvp is situational, the problem is I can’t change my build in mid combat to deal with a specific build.

Imo this thread will actually go nowhere, regardless of the good intentions, because in order to counter X you have to do Y which in turn requires Z and oh .. look, the next enemy has a differen build that needs the counter build A which requires B etc.

At best, this thread can contain general tips&tricks when using a profession, but not a collection of recipes of ’how to counter build ’.

So as a tip for mesmer, always stack toughness (so that you’ll get only 5-6k dmg instead of 10k+) and use the Staff to have Phase retreat ready.

How to counter Mesmer Moa?

If you can see it, you can run or interrupt. If you get moa-ed just run. I’ve been moa’d several times in the same round and I’ve survived every time. The only scenario where you’re toast is if you get immobilized/stunned and get bursted.

Noctred.6732:

kaplis.7195:

<Request>
Death Blossom, Caltrop spamming thief.
The solution is supposedly simple – “Remove those conditions” BUT when should i do it?

In my experience, the best way to fight a caltrops thief is to not fight on his caltrops. Unless you’re running some kind of build that has spammable condi removal, you’re just gonna get annihilated.

I think most people has the trait which drops caltrops on their dodge so it’s not that simple.

MikeSw.3041:

Let me tell you the perfect combo for a thief: Basilisk Venom + whatever attack you want. Since turned to stone for 1.5 seconds means you can’t do anything , you are dead. A thief only needs less than 1 s to kill you. How do you escape that?

How do you escape that?
>Stunbreak

a few tips on condition thiefes:

the caltrops on dodge are a very weak form of the actual utility so while it’s mandatory to stand out of the big caltrops at all times you don’t have to worry too much about the dodge caltrops

death blossom (dagger 3) is a fairly melee spell so staying out of melee range is a very healthy thing to do

if you want to land a stun try to time it so that it hits at the end of the death blossom animation, death blossoms last few frames are not invulnerable (i think) and neither are the first few frames of it or dodge either (due to delay i guess)

condition thiefes are usually low on toughness but usually run the condition removal heal & maybe trait aswell so power damage should be the way to go (but people are running weird builts so this might vary)

if you are necro you are in luck! use staff 4, dagger 4 or the signet to send those pesky conditions right back at the thief (also corruption on a dagger storm will corrupt the stability into a fear disrupting the channel and thus rendering the whole elite useless)

last note: don’t try to count dodges! with their easy access to long duration vigor, less endurance cost on a roll & weapon swap sigils you can dodge as much as 5 times in a row so be prepared to miss stuff

they have no stability on mostly only run the shadowstep stunbreak, stun them let the shadowstep and then wait until it wears off so that they can’t utilize the second stunbreak of it, then destroy them

edit: on when you are supposed to remove conditions: due to the initiative nature of thiefs most will probably open up with caltrops & a lot of death blossoms, so when you managed to crawl out of the caltrops would probably be the best moment to use condition removes

Bunzy.8674:

How do I beat a guardian that uses them hammers that knocks you around constantly? From ELE

I find blinds help, as well as arcane shield or the rock shield(name escapes me) that grants stability helps against them. Blinds are the most universal for an Ele as all our weapons have at least one. As a D/D or S/D you can untarget the gaurd, then use RoTL to quickly get some distance if you get into to much trouble. (the stun field o nthe D MH is great as well.

MikeSw.3041:

In your other situation, as a mesmer, you could break stun?shatter or drop a chaos field under you(as immo) is a condition. Then move from there.

If you’re having trouble clicking with blink, there is an option in your menus to cast it wherever you have your cursor at the time. Also, everything in PvP is situational.

What you don’t want to understand is that there isn’t a recipe that works every time. Your ideas shows me you don’t play a mesmer so basically you’re talking theories. I play exclusively a mesmer, i’ve tried all the tricks and chances are that when you’re fighting a thief/warrior which have OP combos, your tricks are on CD and you have less than 1s to do something.

Break stun – solves stun but not the immobilize condition, so bring one but wait.. that arcane thievery has 1/4s casting time and 45 CD and doesn’t work every time, while other condi removals either take to much time to remove condi or have a dead wieght like mantra of resolve which needs recharging. And boy conditions do fly in pvp.

Shatter – you need illusions up. Try create some without a target (stealthed thief). Also requires you to run a power build or else the shattering just makes the thief/warrior laugh.
Chaos field – you probably meant chaos storm. It requires Staff equipped and aiblity ready to go. Same for chaos armor.

The option to autocast fields where the mouse arrow is. Horrible to use as you need the mouse to actually steer the toon when you’re moving so you’ll cast the spell somewhere random. And in blink case that doesn’t prevent a thief or anyone with a leap skill to jump straight at you, while you didn’t escape and just wasted a stun breaker.

Sometimes you can do something and you might escape, most of the time you don’t. The reason build X is considered OP is because you don’t have a real counter or you have to change your whole build just to counter it.

As you’re saying, all sPvp is situational, the problem is I can’t change my build in mid combat to deal with a specific build.

Imo this thread will actually go nowhere, regardless of the good intentions, because in order to counter X you have to do Y which in turn requires Z and oh .. look, the next enemy has a differen build that needs the counter build A which requires B etc.

At best, this thread can contain general tips&tricks when using a profession, but not a collection of recipes of ’how to counter build ’.

So as a tip for mesmer, always stack toughness (so that you’ll get only 5-6k dmg instead of 10k+) and use the Staff to have Phase retreat ready.

How to counter Mesmer Moa?

If you can see it, you can run or interrupt. If you get moa-ed just run. I’ve been moa’d several times in the same round and I’ve survived every time. The only scenario where you’re toast is if you get immobilized/stunned and get bursted.

PvP does not provide a static, always perfect situation for the player. To assume your cooldowns should always be up, and that you are never to be at a disadvantage due to positioning, cooldowns, build, etc is an attitude that will net you a lot of frustration in any game that you play. Sometimes you will be set up to lose, there is nothing you can do to prevent that in a PvP environment.
Also, thank you for providing some tips as well.