Guild Wars 2

In SPvP mesmers and thieves compete for the exact same role, solo roamers meant to harass nodes and help burst down targest. The question is why are there rarely any mesmers in high tier SPvP or even average tier like solo ques while there are thieves all over – inside and out in hotjoins games and up to high tier matches?

The answer is quite simple, thieves are easier to play, less risk, higher reward, their burst is easier to land with no complicated maneuvers needed for it to succeed and more. Lets compare shall we?

The main (and currently only top tier spec) that mesmers use in order to burst down targets and fill the role of roamers as best as they can is with a shatter spec in which they utilize their class mechanic to inflict as much damage possible in a short amount of time requiring for their clones (which are constanlty being destroyed by AOE and even random auto attacks) to reach their targets and explode. The more the clones up the more damage – getting as many clones up, keeping them up and then forcing your target to go near them long enough for the to shatter is quite a challenge. Thieves on the other hand have lots of viable specs that rely on different weapon sets such as S/D, S/P and D/P. These specs are, unfairly, much easier to play – and S/P and S/D for example are specs that are based around a single attack – and are not only viable, but are incredibly potent with low risk and astoundingly high reward with their insane damage output allowing thieves to both burst and completely avoid damage all together (and with S/P even CC at the same time).

Another comparison that is made between mesmer and thief is their mobility. Another quality that is crucial for roamers to have is mobility, mesmer’s portal can be used in a variety of ways that can easily turn the tide of a match one way or another – but in a solo que or hot join matches where your team and you are not coordinated it is rendered quite useless. Unlike mesmers thieves have access to plenty of mobility skills ranging from their shadow step (a 1200 range stun break and condi cleanse), to their shortbow #5 skill which can be used repeatedly to cover great distances along with their signet and steal to close the gap between them and their target which require no coordination what so ever.

Another comparison is stealth. The stealth mechanic is one shared by both professions allowing their glass cannon specs a little extra breathing room when they are in tight situations and could potentially help their team-mates avoid getting stomped and for a quick un-expected burst (and an escape if needed). Mesmers have access to 1 stealth via torch offhand #4 for 3sec, their elite with a long cast time for a 5sec stealth, decoy for 3sec and veil (which i have yet witnessed to be used in SPvP by anyone) for another 3sec stealth. Thieves on the other hand have their heal for a 3sec stealth, blinding power for 3sec and more that escape me at the moment. Then why am i bringing this up? Due to the fact that they can achieve near perma stealth if needed to using weapon sets that include a pistol off hand and being allowed to spam skills, along with shadow refuge which grants a ridiculously long stealth with a MUCH shorter cast time than the mesmer ELITE for a much longer stealth – and did i mention that it heals? And one last thing… its cool down… you guessed it, a whole 30sec less than the mesmer elite. In other words a thief utility skill achieves much higher stealth uptime, while healing the thieves, on a lower cool down – and a much shorter cast time compared to another professions ELITE skill.

All these points (which are all i could think while typing this up) bring to ask myself the question that most other mesmers asked themselves: Why should i play mesmer if a thief can do my job, better, with greater success, less risk, less hardships in order to land their burst – and all for the same goal.

Thanks for reading, and if im wrong or forgot to add something to this massive wall of text let me know and ill make sure to edit it.

It’s not just mesmers that suffer, its all other glass trying to roam, and the bigger reason is simply thieves demolish glass anything. It’s not that the combo is easier to pull off, etc…. its just that in glass v glass, the first one to land a substantial hit wins, and thieves control the opening of a fight normally.

To answer your question though, if you play to win, play one of the few accepted meta builds.

Whit what you say in my opinion is correct and a huge part of what gives thieves the upper hand in duels and becoming the only roaming profession in SPvP. What i don’t agree with is the need to conform to the passive faceroll (sorry for the description – i know it doesn’t feflect all the meta builds, but most) builds in order to win or contribute to my team. That is exactly what needs to be changed, if the meta, and in topic discussed above, thieves get some much needed changes then professions like mesmer and elementalist and unviable specs might finally get a chance to see the light in SPvP solo and team ques.

Yes, Thieves and Mesmer compete for the same roles and yes, Thieves have an easier time applying their damage.

But they also pay a price by having much lower base-line survivability.

Even a glass-cannon shatter Mesmer has a decent base-line survivability thanks to their Illusions and shatter skills. Mesmers are unpopular focus targets for a reason. They also get to apply much of their damage passively, in the form of Phantasms, while being able to do something else for a moment (like revive or stomp).

Mesmers also have their Portal, which means near-instant relocation in the right scenario.

The only defense and 10/30/0/0/30 Thief brings to the table is his offense. When focused they drop much faster than any Mesmer.

Point being, Thief and Mesmers are different classes with different mechanics. Thieves just happen to be more popular and more “workable” in the current meta. But it’s not because they are somehow overpowered or Mesmers are somehow underpowered.

It’s just that the meta has no room for sort of hybrid builds. You’re either as bunkerish as you can be or you are as bursty as can be. And in terms of burst, nothing beats a Thief due to the way the class works.

Dee Jay.2460:

Yes, Thieves and Mesmer compete for the same roles and yes, Thieves have an easier time applying their damage.

But they also pay a price by having much lower base-line survivability.
<snip>
Point being, Thief and Mesmers are different classes with different mechanics. Thieves just happen to be more popular and more “workable” in the current meta. But it’s not because they are somehow overpowered or Mesmers are somehow underpowered.

Neither of these statements are true. Thieves may have fewer HP, but have significantly higher survivability than Mesmers, under all conditions.

And yes, thieves are overpowered.

1. Pistol Whip is more powerful than Blurred Frenzy and has no ICD. PW does more damage, and it stuns and evades.
2. Portal has a 90 second cooldown and is very visible. Shadow Trap has a 45 second cooldown and is invisible. AND it gives 10 stacks of Might and Fury.
3. Shadow Refuge is better than Mass Invisibility, and it has a shorter cooldown.
4. Infiltrator’s Strike is a superior version of Illusionary Leap. It has no cooldown, instantly immobilizes, does damage, has no terrain issues, returns you safely out of range and removes a condition.
5. Sword Auto-attack. Thief sword auto-attack does 45% more damage. 45% (!!!) And it does cripple + weakness. Mesmer sword removes 1 boon.
6. Shortbow5 (6 initiative) >> Blink (30s cooldown)

You’d have to work on the Balance Team not to see how broken thieves are when it comes to roaming.

Grim.4795:

Whit what you say in my opinion is correct and a huge part of what gives thieves the upper hand in duels and becoming the only roaming profession in SPvP. What i don’t agree with is the need to conform to the passive faceroll (sorry for the description – i know it doesn’t feflect all the meta builds, but most) builds in order to win or contribute to my team. That is exactly what needs to be changed, if the meta, and in topic discussed above, thieves get some much needed changes then professions like mesmer and elementalist and unviable specs might finally get a chance to see the light in SPvP solo and team ques.

I also dislike the current “meta” and passive builds. They’re boring to play, boring to play against, and unhealthy for the pvp population in general. That said – if you truly want a “play to win” team, then go with a proven meta comp (not only for you, but the entire team).

BUT, that’s really only the case if there was a competitive scene here, and let’s be honest – there isn’t. And because there truly isn’t a competitive scene, you can run anything effectively.

Mesmer is still a decent roamer (personally I dislike them due to being slow, but that’s just me). Hell, I main a glass ele and use it as a roamer… One thief means the game just got much trickier (and if he’s at all competent, I’m down for most of any fight he is a part of). It just doesn’t matter though. There is no competitive scene, MMR doesnt mean much (and given either the population or algorithm you end up fighting a small group of people repeatedly from all skill levels anyhow), and Rank is completely meaningless (beyond knowing map basics and awareness, I still cringe at sub-rank 10s).

Since winning is meaningless (beyond simply wanting to win – like skirmish during practice), and there is no real competition – play what you want. Or play to win if you find that fun.

I’ll just summarize your post:

Why play a mesmer when a thief (which- we are going to assume- fulfills the same roll) has better:

• Burst
• Mobility
• Stealth

And to summarize Den’s points:

Thieves are (again, supposedly) better in that:

• PW is better than Blurred Frenzy
• Shadow Trap is better than Portal
• Shadow Refuge is better than Mass Invis
• Infi Strike is better than iLeap
• Thief’s auto on sword deals more damage
• Shortbow 5 is better than Blink

So first, to address Grim…

1. OK, so I don’t have any doubts at this point that S/P and D/P specs are incredibly easy to play for the reward that they give. However, are they really better than Mesmer’s burst? That’s a very different question. Yes, clones have to run up to opponents. However, just as there are disadvantages to this, there are also very strong advantages to this. For example, an evade during a Mind Wrack is less likely to evade the full burst, which is untrue of other burst attacks in the game, and using Diversion can interrupt your opponent three times in a row. Also, while clones are running towards an opponent, it is possible (if I remember correctly) to generate more clones that will not explode while those other clones are running towards the opponent, meaning that you could potentially have 6 clones up (three of which are about to burst) in battle. This allows you to “mix and match” bursts by using, for example, Mind Wrack to use up an opponent’s evade and then iZerker once your opponent’s defenses go down. Otherwise, the fact that there is no cast time on using burst skills and the fact that you have very strong burst has great synergy with your class mechanic is hard to overlook.

And if you’re going to talk about thief burst builds, please, for the sake of Zhaitan, do not use S/D as an example of a thief burst build. At best, it’s GC, but far from being burst. I’d also like to see a video of you using S/D, and for you to reconcile how “amazing” the weapon set is with the fact that very few people are using the set any more (one of the most prominent modern S/D users, Sizer, was recently asked by his team to swap to D/P. That should tell you something).

2. I’m pretty sure that’s more of a problem with teammates than with the skill itself. Otherwise, on my build (linked in my sig) I often get roughly the same amount of mobility in my build as a thief, and can significantly impede enemy mobility (which my thief can’t do) as well.

3. Most people consider a reliance on stealth to be a disadvantage. Either way, mesmer has lots of defense through a wide variety of defensive mechanics, such as BFrenzy, strategically using your shatters, interrupts, and so on. However, I do think that SRefuge should have its CD increased to 75s. Otherwise (for reasons I can expand upon later) I think that SRefuge is well-balanced, as is Mass Invisibility.

Now on to Den:

1. That’s a difficult thing to determine. PW, for instance, is worse as a defensive skill. It also typically has an effectively longer “cool down” than BF does because of how hard it is to land. PW also has a significantly longer animation, and a much more resilient root as well.

2. Shadow Trap bugs literally all the time. It’s way too unreliable to be used much, and isn’t very flexible either. I haven’t seen anybody use this utility in the last half a year, and for a good reason.

3. See point 3 to Grim.

4. If it’s better, it’s only because iLeap is bugged, and that isn’t a problem with IS. Otherwise, iLeap has an effectively shorter cast time, produces a clone, has a 2x longer immobilize, applies cripple, has an immob that is harder to evade (since Swap can be used at any time), is a pseudo-stunbreaker, and is way better for setting up combos. On the other hand, IS has somewhat lackluster damage, and is extremely costly to just use whenever. It also has a more impeding cast time, especially when IR is taken into account. It’s also rare that it will bring you back into safety, unless you either have 1. very good positioning or 2. your opponents are idiots. Typically, no matter what class I play, I can instantaneously catch up with a thief that has used IR. Also, you should really stop using the “lol haz no CD is there4 OP” excuse that you’ve been using, otherwise we can start talking about how strong clones, Virtues, DS, etc are.

5. Thief’s auto also is less fluid and has longer cast/aftercast times.

6. How? SB 5 isn’t a stun breaker and doesn’t have an instant cast. It also requires you to use up a weapon slot, which is far worse than using up a utility slot. It’s also bad to use in-combat, particularly because of how it requires you to swap to your utility weapon, SB.

Comparing abilities side by side doesn’t help your point as you obviously gloss over some pretty important aspects.

LoL especially at the Mass Invisibility (quick-cast, applied instantly, lots of targets, usable on the move) vs. Shadow Refuge comparison (ground-targeted, fairly obvious, easy to counter with a knock-back or damage).

Or the fact that Portal can teleport up to 20 targets but Shadow Trap only the user and can’t even be controlled. And really, do many Thieves use Shadow Trap? Not to my knowledge.

Mesmer has always had more of a support aspect to it and that shines through in the way their abilities are designed. Let’s not forget that during the early days having a Mesmer was considered ESSENTIAL for any competitive team.

I’m not saying you’re wrong about Thieves being more desirable than Mesmers currently. But I disagree with your reasoning. You seem to blame the profession entirely (although balance really hasn’t changed much at all in the past 7 months).

I say it’s because the current meta has become so bunkerish that the support the Mesmer used to bring to the table is no longer appreciated. You don’t need Portal for fast home-ports when you have a Minion Master or Spirit Ranger who can tank two players for 60 seconds.

Boon removal, interrupts and general chaos that Mesmers added to a fight just aren’t as appreciated as they used to be. But it’s not the Thief’s fault, it’s the meta’s.

weakness and blind. the factor that decides the winner in every gc vs gc fight. nuff said!
s/p s/d easy and fast access to weakness. s/p static blind. d/p mobile and static blind.

another point thief is op compared to other gc:
u cant shut down big hitters. if a attack like pw or blinding shot isnt hitting the target u just try it again. other professions have the problem of cooldowns. so evade and dodge and other active defense is esp. rewarding for a thief and not against a thief. couple that with easy stealth access.

another point thief is op compared to other gc:
with teleports and shadow steps he can more easy kite and engage and disengage any fight. couple that with easy stealth access.

minor problem:
vigor.
some classes has no real access to vigor in gc builds. like necro, ranger and warrior. having more dodge is important in gc vs gc fights. some classes have access but after the recent change a boonsteal from thief hurts even more.. considering the dodges are more rewarding for a thief u need in a fight vs a thief more dodges then he. esp if u count the easy access to multiple evades he has.

Don’t bother arguing with Thedenofsin. He keeps whining on these forum about the OPness of classes other than Necro & Mesmer. Apparantly all he does is think about his next possible ranting thread. I’m really getting tired of seeing the same whine threads over and over again with the same people arguing about how broken / not broken something is.

We’ve had this very same discussion at least 3 times already, ANet probably already knows what we want to see fixed/nerfed/buffed and whatnot. Just save your rant for the next balance patch, spamming these rant topics won’t make you look more credible or will make them work any faster.

It’s funny to see those comparisons..
Ever compared GS burst to a Heartseeker/pistol whip attack?
And yes, thiefs can spam but the illusion berserker also attacks every 5s and deals more dmg.
Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)
I do admit that Pistol Whip is somehow broken and should be divided into 2 skills, just like sword/dagger 3 skill.

Coming from a guy who loves to play both classes glass cannon, so I know for myself what the capabilities are of both.

NOTE: if u really complain about the stealth of thief, go hear about PU-mesmers who are utterly destroying your fun. That is pure afk-fight and win.

Dee Jay.2460:

Yes, Thieves and Mesmer compete for the same roles and yes, Thieves have an easier time applying their damage.

But they also pay a price by having much lower base-line survivability.

Even a glass-cannon shatter Mesmer has a decent base-line survivability thanks to their Illusions and shatter skills. Mesmers are unpopular focus targets for a reason. They also get to apply much of their damage passively, in the form of Phantasms, while being able to do something else for a moment (like revive or stomp).

Mesmers also have their Portal, which means near-instant relocation in the right scenario.

The only defense and 10/30/0/0/30 Thief brings to the table is his offense. When focused they drop much faster than any Mesmer.

Point being, Thief and Mesmers are different classes with different mechanics. Thieves just happen to be more popular and more “workable” in the current meta. But it’s not because they are somehow overpowered or Mesmers are somehow underpowered.

It’s just that the meta has no room for sort of hybrid builds. You’re either as bunkerish as you can be or you are as bursty as can be. And in terms of burst, nothing beats a Thief due to the way the class works.

^ Yeah you’re right, low survivability.

Countless

Terrorsquad.2349:

It’s funny to see those comparisons..

Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)

Can you explain why thief hardcounter mesmer then?

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

It’s funny to see those comparisons..

Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)

Can you explain why thief hardcounter mesmer then?

Because the mesmer isn’t played right?
I easily kill thiefs with my mesmer (since I got alot of hours on my thief so I know how to deal with them)

EDIT: I do find trouble sometimes against pw-thiefs, thats right, but that’s often by my mistake, not their pw in total.
(But as I said earlier, I would def agree seeing pw getting toned down)

Vice versa cannot be said since I play mesmer alot aswel but still have alot of trouble killing mesmer with my thief. Thiefs are predictable (since they got no cd), mesmers are not.
It mostly comes down if u got situational awareness and experience/knowledge of the class you play and also the class you play against. It helps alot, trust me.

I got equal experience in both in sPvP

Trigr.6481:

Dee Jay.2460:

Yes, Thieves and Mesmer compete for the same roles and yes, Thieves have an easier time applying their damage.

But they also pay a price by having much lower base-line survivability.

Even a glass-cannon shatter Mesmer has a decent base-line survivability thanks to their Illusions and shatter skills. Mesmers are unpopular focus targets for a reason. They also get to apply much of their damage passively, in the form of Phantasms, while being able to do something else for a moment (like revive or stomp).

Mesmers also have their Portal, which means near-instant relocation in the right scenario.

The only defense and 10/30/0/0/30 Thief brings to the table is his offense. When focused they drop much faster than any Mesmer.

Point being, Thief and Mesmers are different classes with different mechanics. Thieves just happen to be more popular and more “workable” in the current meta. But it’s not because they are somehow overpowered or Mesmers are somehow underpowered.

It’s just that the meta has no room for sort of hybrid builds. You’re either as bunkerish as you can be or you are as bursty as can be. And in terms of burst, nothing beats a Thief due to the way the class works.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RwKNkwcEZo

^ Yeah you’re right, low survivability.

Countless

Right, because all of the dodging does so much damage!
Plznerf

Trigr.6481:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RwKNkwcEZo

^ Yeah you’re right, low survivability.

Countless

I respect you as a player, Countless, but not as a theoretician or a strategist. For a build that was clearly designed totally to be defensive and evasive, my (granted, somewhat superficial, but nonetheless relatively accurate) calculations showed that you had an 82.5% evade uptime. Undoubtedly, that’s pretty high- that’s inarguable. Yet, given that the damage output from that build was virtually nonexistent, and the fact that you had to sacrifice a whole lot of resources (all of your initiative, endurance, heal, and utility). At best, in the context of how little damage/control you had, the lack of defensive ability (inherent in being a thief) outside of evasion, and the huge risk you would run in a match of getting off point and losing ticks on one, I would say that your video shows a great example of a possible bunker build but one that ultimately would be weaker than any bunker guardian build.

Your video shows a build that is severely deficient in damage and point control, and contains serious weaknesses that would be exploitable by any half-decent player. It also lacks the proper ability to stay on-point at any given time. Of course, you could try to establish that this much evasion is a hallmark of thief builds in general. That’s grossly inaccurate; virtually all D/X and P/X builds have absolutely nothing to give them additional evasion on top of base, except, possibly, from Bountiful Theft, but that’s been nerfed to the point where BT’s vigor is highly unreliable. You could go a bit deeper and say that Sword builds have high evasive abilities, but the same thing applies to S/P that applies to D/X and P/X, particularly given that the standard S/P build is 10 30 0 0 30. So the only real weapon set that you can make this argument for is S/D, but S/D is becoming increasingly more uncommon in today’s meta anyways, and S/D builds can’t evade as much as the build you showed could because FS chains into a non-evasive skill (unlike Disabling Shot). Furthermore, that 17.5% “window of opportunity” (and that’s being extremely pessimistic about how large that “window” is, given my previous argument) is much more significant since S/D practically requires high DPS, low stat-survivability in order to word. There’s also the after cast on the auto attack and FS that make the build vulnerable as well. The net result is that you really can’t argue from that video that thief has any efficient level of survivability (certainly not from evasion, and not in sPvP, either).

But thieves are vulnerable to blinds and blocks and pushes/pulls(if you use D/P) since they rely on a very predictable rotation. Mesmers are definitely less predictable and have the advantage of clones that negate aegis/blinds by quite a bit. Not to mention thieves must be up close and personal in order to burst down a target, something that mesmers do not need to do.

Also mesmers have portals, which are very useful for a multi point defense. They can easily port back and forth between mid and far when necessary.

I’ve never thought of the mesmer as a roamer class. They have minimal swiftness access, no perma +25% access, and only 1 teleport. Portal is solid, but other than that, they roam about as well as a necro.

Ele, Warrior, and Ranger are the other classes that roaming would be suited for. Guardian and Engi can sort of pull it off too.

Regardless of how people want to play Mesmer, it’s not a profession that in it’s current design is roaming friendly. As such, I find the Mesmer comparison to a Thief largely impractical.

At this point only thieves who know how well off they are remain as the people who defend the class. Often by pointing at equally broken warriors.

Backstab and spammable/invisible burst skills should have never been in game.

If my ele misses a fire grab, that’s 36 seconds of not having any burst besides air 2 and the arcane utility.

Thief is basically the one class that can miss a burst and try again shortly after, and in that downtime he’s not even punished with receiving damage because he can promptly restealth or port out until he can try his burst rotation as well.

There is no punishment to the class. If my necro or ele miss key skills, they are dying. There’s no such thing as resets.

Zenith.7301:

At this point only thieves who know how well off they are remain as the people who defend the class. Often by pointing at equally broken warriors.

Backstab and spammable/invisible burst skills should have never been in game.

If my ele misses a fire grab, that’s 36 seconds of not having any burst besides air 2 and the arcane utility.

Thief is basically the one class that can miss a burst and try again shortly after, and in that downtime he’s not even punished with receiving damage because he can promptly restealth or port out until he can try his burst rotation as well.

There is no punishment to the class. If my necro or ele miss key skills, they are dying. There’s no such thing as resets.

There’s punishment to the Thief.

1. If you waste iniative by spamming skills you have no burst and less escape options.

2. You have little sustain as a zerker thief. Vs bunkers 1v1 a bunker can always out sustain you. Other players roaming that avoid your burst will outsustain you.

These 2 things together mean you have to manage your resources carefully. When I play thief, I mostly play without stealth, and I simply use SB5 and Shadowstep to get away. That works for sword main hand, because S/X has evades, but doesn’t work for dagger main hand, so they have to use stealth.

When you run away in PvP, you lose, because that’s time wasted, which means points gained by the opposition and numbers advantages elsewhere.

When you play zerker thief, it’s a simple game of down quickly or escape to bide time otherwise get downed. There’s much less constant back and forth with a zerker thief than other zerker professions.

Go to any of Blu’s streams and watch some EU PvP. You’ll see how disadvantaged the Mesmer is because it is lacking when compared to the thief in multiple ways:

1. Survivability
2. Mobility
3. Damage

Yes, survivability. If for no other reason, survivability. Why? Because a thief can just train down a Mesmer quickly and easily. Why? Because the thief does better damage, has more evades and escapes, and better in-and-out of combat mobility. Create two identical teams, A and B. Team A has a thief, Team B has a Mesmer. Team A will win. Why? Because all Team A needs to do is have the thief train down the Mesmer. Team B now has to exert energies in peeling for the Mesmer, resulting in a loss of resources. The reverse (training down the thief), results in Team B losing resources because the thief has superior escape abilities.

Mobility. SB5 is better than any mobility ability Mesmers have. Stealth+SB5 allows a thief to escape a fight and quickly decap a node before people realize the thief is no longer fighting.

Damage. Like I said earlier, thieves deal far more damage than Mesmers overall. Especially the autoattack. I mention the autoattack because it requires no initiative and allows the thief to conserve initiative for escape and/or burst.

@Shockwave. If you don’t think Mesmers are a roamer class, you really haven’t played PvP in this game and definitely have not watched any high-end PvP gameplay.

glass thiefs are not glass

with uptime from evades and blinds + other CC they have much more EHP (effective HP) than most classes
and the damage is easy to land as a thief – low risk high reward

ele or mesmer has to do alot more to land dmg on a target while being much more glass than thiefs

and thief has way to much gapcloser´s – that alone is OP and freewin vs most other classes

Arganthium.5638:

Trigr.6481:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RwKNkwcEZo

^ Yeah you’re right, low survivability.

Countless

I respect you as a player, Countless, but not as a theoretician or a strategist. For a build that was clearly designed totally to be defensive and evasive, my (granted, somewhat superficial, but nonetheless relatively accurate) calculations showed that you had an 82.5% evade uptime. Undoubtedly, that’s pretty high- that’s inarguable. Yet, given that the damage output from that build was virtually nonexistent, and the fact that you had to sacrifice a whole lot of resources (all of your initiative, endurance, heal, and utility). At best, in the context of how little damage/control you had, the lack of defensive ability (inherent in being a thief) outside of evasion, and the huge risk you would run in a match of getting off point and losing ticks on one, I would say that your video shows a great example of a possible bunker build but one that ultimately would be weaker than any bunker guardian build.

Your video shows a build that is severely deficient in damage and point control, and contains serious weaknesses that would be exploitable by any half-decent player. It also lacks the proper ability to stay on-point at any given time. Of course, you could try to establish that this much evasion is a hallmark of thief builds in general. That’s grossly inaccurate; virtually all D/X and P/X builds have absolutely nothing to give them additional evasion on top of base, except, possibly, from Bountiful Theft, but that’s been nerfed to the point where BT’s vigor is highly unreliable. You could go a bit deeper and say that Sword builds have high evasive abilities, but the same thing applies to S/P that applies to D/X and P/X, particularly given that the standard S/P build is 10 30 0 0 30. So the only real weapon set that you can make this argument for is S/D, but S/D is becoming increasingly more uncommon in today’s meta anyways, and S/D builds can’t evade as much as the build you showed could because FS chains into a non-evasive skill (unlike Disabling Shot). Furthermore, that 17.5% “window of opportunity” (and that’s being extremely pessimistic about how large that “window” is, given my previous argument) is much more significant since S/D practically requires high DPS, low stat-survivability in order to word. There’s also the after cast on the auto attack and FS that make the build vulnerable as well. The net result is that you really can’t argue from that video that thief has any efficient level of survivability (certainly not from evasion, and not in sPvP, either).

Haha, the sole purpose of the “poking fun at gw2” video was to take a jab at how much dodge thieves had access too. You’re kinda going overboard with assuming I was trying to make a build for thief just for that video. :P

Countless

Thedenofsin.7340:

Go to any of Blu’s streams and watch some EU PvP. You’ll see how disadvantaged the Mesmer is because it is lacking when compared to the thief in multiple ways:

1. Survivability
2. Mobility
3. Damage

Yes, survivability. If for no other reason, survivability. Why? Because a thief can just train down a Mesmer quickly and easily. Why? Because the thief does better damage, has more evades and escapes, and better in-and-out of combat mobility. Create two identical teams, A and B. Team A has a thief, Team B has a Mesmer. Team A will win. Why? Because all Team A needs to do is have the thief train down the Mesmer. Team B now has to exert energies in peeling for the Mesmer, resulting in a loss of resources. The reverse (training down the thief), results in Team B losing resources because the thief has superior escape abilities.

Mobility. SB5 is better than any mobility ability Mesmers have. Stealth+SB5 allows a thief to escape a fight and quickly decap a node before people realize the thief is no longer fighting.

Damage. Like I said earlier, thieves deal far more damage than Mesmers overall. Especially the autoattack. I mention the autoattack because it requires no initiative and allows the thief to conserve initiative for escape and/or burst.

@Shockwave. If you don’t think Mesmers are a roamer class, you really haven’t played PvP in this game and definitely have not watched any high-end PvP gameplay.

I would love to see u spam auto attack with a thief vs shatter mesmer. Pls show me.
All comparisons done here in this thread are followed to be in the most perfect situation, where the enemy doesn’t attack you. While in the fight, u barely hit the mesmer with your auto-attack. Invalid argument. This whole thread is.
EDIT; all what thiefs has and mesmer don’t, doesnt make mesmer useless or underpowered at all. Does thief have clones? While dodging? While attacking? Does he have clones doing conditions AND damage? Does thief has conditions removal (null field) for the team? Does it? Does thief has fast long range pressure as mesmer? Does it?

Like I said, this thread is useless because ppl are comparing attacks and damage while you are forgetting what mesmer has but thief doesn’t. All classes have something the other one doesnt.

I do agree pw needs to be nerfed still.

Implying PW is actually meta in high tier thief play. I generally only see PW used by scrubs or in hotjoins where kids can’t handle thieves. PW isn’t hard to avoid, and its basically the only real damage a S/P thief has. Watching a thief spam it just means the thief has no initiative. Once you realize that you can basically just sneeze on the thief to kill it.

PW not OP.

the sober ninja.6539:

Implying PW is actually meta in high tier thief play. I generally only see PW used by scrubs or in hotjoins where kids can’t handle thieves. PW isn’t hard to avoid, and its basically the only real damage a S/P thief has. Watching a thief spam it just means the thief has no initiative. Once you realize that you can basically just sneeze on the thief to kill it.

PW not OP.

PW it’s mechanic is somehow. When you look at third skill of sword/dagger, you need to press twice to do the whole skill. I would agree something like this should be on PW aswel since stunning, damaging and evading 1.5s long attack is quite overpowered.
It is overpowered because we can spam it, it wouldn’t be overpowered if we could use it every 8s or so. It’s just too much in one single button.
And I kinda stopped playing s/p since it’s so cheesy and people keep complaining.

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

It’s funny to see those comparisons..

Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)

Can you explain why thief hardcounter mesmer then?

Because the mesmer isn’t played right?
I easily kill thiefs with my mesmer (since I got alot of hours on my thief so I know how to deal with them)

EDIT: I do find trouble sometimes against pw-thiefs, thats right, but that’s often by my mistake, not their pw in total.
(But as I said earlier, I would def agree seeing pw getting toned down)

Vice versa cannot be said since I play mesmer alot aswel but still have alot of trouble killing mesmer with my thief. Thiefs are predictable (since they got no cd), mesmers are not.
It mostly comes down if u got situational awareness and experience/knowledge of the class you play and also the class you play against. It helps alot, trust me.

I got equal experience in both in sPvP

So you must be better than Supcutie, Helseth, Sensotix, etc. Interesting….

Terrorsquad.2349:

the sober ninja.6539:

Implying PW is actually meta in high tier thief play. I generally only see PW used by scrubs or in hotjoins where kids can’t handle thieves. PW isn’t hard to avoid, and its basically the only real damage a S/P thief has. Watching a thief spam it just means the thief has no initiative. Once you realize that you can basically just sneeze on the thief to kill it.

PW not OP.

PW it’s mechanic is somehow. When you look at third skill of sword/dagger, you need to press twice to do the whole skill. I would agree something like this should be on PW aswel since stunning, damaging and evading 1.5s long attack is quite overpowered.
It is overpowered because we can spam it, it wouldn’t be overpowered if we could use it every 8s or so. It’s just too much in one single button.
And I kinda stopped playing s/p since it’s so cheesy and people keep complaining.

If they split PW into more button presses like the S/D evade, I think it would make PW more OP. S/D is really good because you can evade when you want, then larcernous strike when the time is right. With PW, you know its all coming at the same time and you can take measures to ensure that it won’t murder you.

Also: trololol larcenous strike unblockable, which nearly guarantees a basilisk venom proc on a guardian or whatever.

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

It’s funny to see those comparisons..

Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)

Can you explain why thief hardcounter mesmer then?

Because the mesmer isn’t played right?
I easily kill thiefs with my mesmer (since I got alot of hours on my thief so I know how to deal with them)

EDIT: I do find trouble sometimes against pw-thiefs, thats right, but that’s often by my mistake, not their pw in total.
(But as I said earlier, I would def agree seeing pw getting toned down)

Vice versa cannot be said since I play mesmer alot aswel but still have alot of trouble killing mesmer with my thief. Thiefs are predictable (since they got no cd), mesmers are not.
It mostly comes down if u got situational awareness and experience/knowledge of the class you play and also the class you play against. It helps alot, trust me.

I got equal experience in both in sPvP

So you must be better than Supcutie, Helseth, Sensotix, etc. Interesting….

Pls go watch in 1v1 King of the hill server more and see what I’m talking about.
This thread is pure about 1v1/thief vs mesmer and not team situations.

Do me a favor and watch the guys in the 1v1 server, then we’ll continue talking

Trigr.6481:

Haha, the sole purpose of the “poking fun at gw2” video was to take a jab at how much dodge thieves had access too. You’re kinda going overboard with assuming I was trying to make a build for thief just for that video. :P

Countless

No, I’m just saying that you can’t use that video to also say that thieves have a ton of defense as well, realistically speaking. The first time I watched it, I thought it was pretty funny, but I didn’t think that it was meant seriously enough to actually be used in an argument.

Idk, man. I guess I’m just sick of people totally underrating mesmer and then using thief as a scapegoat for all of their problems.

I still would say that thief is a valid scapegoat not because mesmer is bad, but because thief has an inherent advantage vs. all glass (assuming the impossible equal competency and all that).

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

It’s funny to see those comparisons..

Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)

Can you explain why thief hardcounter mesmer then?

Because the mesmer isn’t played right?
I easily kill thiefs with my mesmer (since I got alot of hours on my thief so I know how to deal with them)

EDIT: I do find trouble sometimes against pw-thiefs, thats right, but that’s often by my mistake, not their pw in total.
(But as I said earlier, I would def agree seeing pw getting toned down)

Vice versa cannot be said since I play mesmer alot aswel but still have alot of trouble killing mesmer with my thief. Thiefs are predictable (since they got no cd), mesmers are not.
It mostly comes down if u got situational awareness and experience/knowledge of the class you play and also the class you play against. It helps alot, trust me.

I got equal experience in both in sPvP

So you must be better than Supcutie, Helseth, Sensotix, etc. Interesting….

Pls go watch in 1v1 King of the hill server more and see what I’m talking about.
This thread is pure about 1v1/thief vs mesmer and not team situations.

Do me a favor and watch the guys in the 1v1 server, then we’ll continue talking

I live in the 1v1 server and PW thieves can kill Mesmers there too of any quality and the PW thief can also be of any quality.

The fact that a lot of the best mesmers in the game have to switch to other classes in tournament play says a lot.

the sober ninja.6539:

Implying PW is actually meta in high tier thief play. I generally only see PW used by scrubs or in hotjoins where kids can’t handle thieves. PW isn’t hard to avoid, and its basically the only real damage a S/P thief has. Watching a thief spam it just means the thief has no initiative. Once you realize that you can basically just sneeze on the thief to kill it.

PW not OP.

Must be american/never joined team queue recently or watched esl/mistpedia since the initiative regen buff?

Coulter.2315:

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

It’s funny to see those comparisons..

Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)

Can you explain why thief hardcounter mesmer then?

Because the mesmer isn’t played right?
I easily kill thiefs with my mesmer (since I got alot of hours on my thief so I know how to deal with them)

EDIT: I do find trouble sometimes against pw-thiefs, thats right, but that’s often by my mistake, not their pw in total.
(But as I said earlier, I would def agree seeing pw getting toned down)

Vice versa cannot be said since I play mesmer alot aswel but still have alot of trouble killing mesmer with my thief. Thiefs are predictable (since they got no cd), mesmers are not.
It mostly comes down if u got situational awareness and experience/knowledge of the class you play and also the class you play against. It helps alot, trust me.

I got equal experience in both in sPvP

So you must be better than Supcutie, Helseth, Sensotix, etc. Interesting….

Pls go watch in 1v1 King of the hill server more and see what I’m talking about.
This thread is pure about 1v1/thief vs mesmer and not team situations.

Do me a favor and watch the guys in the 1v1 server, then we’ll continue talking

I live in the 1v1 server and PW thieves can kill Mesmers there too of any quality and the PW thief can also be of any quality.

Ofcourse thiefs can kill mesmers, but since you live in the 1v1 server, you must’ve seen how many thiefs also died from mesmers
And for the third time, I agree pw needs to get toned down but Im talking thiefs in general, not only pw , but also d/p s/d.

So it’s quite a shame ppl call mesmer underpowered when they are totally not.
Took me 1 hour to learn staff/gs shatter mesmer and owned in hotjoin/solo q. Took me months to decently play s/d or d/p thief.
The current meta (steal meta) made it easier to learn it but still takes more patience/situational awareness than GS/staff shatter mesmer.

Both are very strong classes to be precise, yet I agree once again that s/p (pw in general) should be toned down. I won’t argue that.

Terrorsquad.2349:

Coulter.2315:

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

Terrorsquad.2349:

It’s funny to see those comparisons..

Mesmer is and will stay the best class for 1v1 scenario’s. (lets say the GS/staff shatter build)

Can you explain why thief hardcounter mesmer then?

Because the mesmer isn’t played right?
I easily kill thiefs with my mesmer (since I got alot of hours on my thief so I know how to deal with them)

EDIT: I do find trouble sometimes against pw-thiefs, thats right, but that’s often by my mistake, not their pw in total.
(But as I said earlier, I would def agree seeing pw getting toned down)

Vice versa cannot be said since I play mesmer alot aswel but still have alot of trouble killing mesmer with my thief. Thiefs are predictable (since they got no cd), mesmers are not.
It mostly comes down if u got situational awareness and experience/knowledge of the class you play and also the class you play against. It helps alot, trust me.

I got equal experience in both in sPvP

So you must be better than Supcutie, Helseth, Sensotix, etc. Interesting….

Pls go watch in 1v1 King of the hill server more and see what I’m talking about.
This thread is pure about 1v1/thief vs mesmer and not team situations.

Do me a favor and watch the guys in the 1v1 server, then we’ll continue talking

I live in the 1v1 server and PW thieves can kill Mesmers there too of any quality and the PW thief can also be of any quality.

Ofcourse thiefs can kill mesmers, but since you live in the 1v1 server, you must’ve seen how many thiefs also died from mesmers
And for the third time, I agree pw needs to get toned down but Im talking thiefs in general, not only pw , but also d/p s/d.

So it’s quite a shame ppl call mesmer underpowered when they are totally not.
Took me 1 hour to learn staff/gs shatter mesmer and owned in hotjoin/solo q. Took me months to decently play s/d or d/p thief.
The current meta (steal meta) made it easier to learn it but still takes more patience/situational awareness than GS/staff shatter mesmer.

Both are very strong classes to be precise, yet I agree once again that s/p (pw in general) should be toned down. I won’t argue that.

You don’t think you learned transferable skills playing thief? You think winning hotjoin/soloq means you can play mesmer well? You might want to watch how mesmers can kill thieves its because the thief lets them do it – they have a sbow and are too stupid or have a sense of honour so don’t use it (points to the thieves in the 2nd category). Pretending thief isn’t at a massive advantage to mesmer if a delusion.

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

So you must be better than Supcutie, Helseth, Sensotix, etc. Interesting….

Pls go watch in 1v1 King of the hill server more and see what I’m talking about.
This thread is pure about 1v1/thief vs mesmer and not team situations.

Do me a favor and watch the guys in the 1v1 server, then we’ll continue talking

Re-read the OP.

This thread is NOT about 1v1, and has NOTHING to do with 1v1. It has everything to do about conquest mode fighting. Stop posting in this thread because you are off-topic and clearly don’t know what the discussion is about.

Go talk about 1v1 garbage somewhere else.

Thedenofsin.7340:

Terrorsquad.2349:

OhMyTaeyeon.5831:

So you must be better than Supcutie, Helseth, Sensotix, etc. Interesting….

Pls go watch in 1v1 King of the hill server more and see what I’m talking about.
This thread is pure about 1v1/thief vs mesmer and not team situations.

Do me a favor and watch the guys in the 1v1 server, then we’ll continue talking

Re-read the OP.

This thread is NOT about 1v1, and has NOTHING to do with 1v1. It has everything to do about conquest mode fighting. Stop posting in this thread because you are off-topic and clearly don’t know what the discussion is about.

Go talk about 1v1 garbage somewhere else.

Pls don’t be mad cuz I’m right, even if I was off-topic.
EDIT: I started talking about 1v1 because the discussion turned that way so I answered 1v1-wise.
Therefor I forgot it was all about those comparisons of skills which doesn’t make sense anyway. (you can’t compare a pig with a teddy)
I am sorry.

Carbonize.1530:

The fact that a lot of the best mesmers in the game have to switch to other classes in tournament play says a lot.

This says alot right here. People can interject their opinions all they want. However the reality of the matter is most hard core mesmer players have moved to another damage dealing class in the game because that class does it better….cough Thief cough

Carbonize.1530:

The fact that a lot of the best mesmers in the game have to switch to other classes in tournament play says a lot.

As does the fact that some of the “top Mesmers” (like Helseth) continue to get smashed or play like complete noobs no matter what class they’re on.