Guild Wars 2

In the early days of GW2 I was running a phantasm build in WvW. Thieves often fell victim to it, unless they played smart and actually killed my main auto targeting dmg source: The phantasms.

However, these days I am hunting thieves with power shatter in a mix of assassins and zerker armor and some trinkets with toughness. I am not full glass canon, but almost:

Si Lly shatter – hunting thieves

It is true though, if I make one too many mistakes the thief will kille me. However, if I am on top of my game, thieves usually end up running from me or dying. Shadow refuge usually is no issue, having focus and GS to pull/push them out of SR. Unless I used it already. D/P is fun, when they try to stealth via blinding powder and heart seaker and they fly in a very awkward manner towards me as they try to go invisible^^

Playing shatter mesmer requires experience. And having a shatter mesmer and thief in a 1v1 it can go either way very very fast. And a 10k shatter is not a rare event, even against heavier targets…

However, I am also playing sometimes a condition shatter with some reflection: click me

This build is much fun. It has decend toughness, better in combat mobility than the power shatter with GS and wrecks people usually. S/F is usually to disrupt enemy rotation or chase/pin down target for shatter. Also fun is to fight longbow rangers with this. They usually have no chance^^

When I want to go solo roaming, I pick a thief. Why? Because it has by far the most potential to get in, kill someone quickly and get out before the zerg runs you over. Low risk vs. high reward. That’s thief gameplay for you.

When I go roaming in a small group I… Ok who am I kidding. We still pick thieves because of the funnies of instagibbing anything and disappearing before they even realize one of them died.

If you play ANY class badly you die really easily. Thief included. Its largely active defenses over passive (dodges, activating skills/utilities at the right time.) That said I still STRONGLY recommend you go with Knight stats (PPT) over zerker. It gives you time to react. The people who run, or the ‘meta’ of zerk are people who have been playing this game nearly none stop for 2 years and know every in and out of every fight and can use their active defenses to their fullest.

Tom Gore.4035:

When I want to go solo roaming, I pick a thief. Why? Because it has by far the most potential to get in, kill someone quickly and get out before the zerg runs you over. Low risk vs. high reward. That’s thief gameplay for you.

When I go roaming in a small group I… Ok who am I kidding. We still pick thieves because of the funnies of instagibbing anything and disappearing before they even realize one of them died.

That’s the reason I play ranger. I get to bathe in the tears of all the thieves qqing about rapid fire tracking through stealth.

There are hacks or something in this game.. I fought Guardian last night beat his kitten and Necro came feared me I pop up stability for 6 sec and bam next sec I was feared again under my stability….weird kitten.

But yes Theves should be toned down. I have 3.1k armor and i still see dmg like 7k backstabs and 5k heartseekers spamming on my kitten . No class should have autoattack for 10k plus perma stealth. Bring them CD nerfs like other classes have. Or leave this as is but if they unstealth they cant stealth in next 30 sec. They have too much mobility teleporting stealth dmg…too much.

I actually ran into a few of these Fresh air eles last night, they hit kittening hard.
They used Mist form/Rock barrier (I think) to avoid my burst, but they were pretty easy to burst down – as long as you knew how to avoid their burst.

I didn’t have much sustain being a Trickery Thief, so I have no complaints if I went down fast (which wasn’t the case). :P

Jim Hunter.6821:

Tom Gore.4035:

When I want to go solo roaming, I pick a thief. Why? Because it has by far the most potential to get in, kill someone quickly and get out before the zerg runs you over. Low risk vs. high reward. That’s thief gameplay for you.

When I go roaming in a small group I… Ok who am I kidding. We still pick thieves because of the funnies of instagibbing anything and disappearing before they even realize one of them died.

That’s the reason I play ranger. I get to bathe in the tears of all the thieves qqing about rapid fire tracking through stealth.

I believe you kill lots of bad thieves intrigued by the low risk high reward gameplay I mentioned. A good thief will still eat a LB ranger for breakfast. They don’t even have to spec for it. Just slot a couple more teleport gap closers and you’re done. Most bad rangers at that point panic and try to run. Good ones might still have a chance, but they’re up for an uphill battle for sure.

Tom Gore.4035:

Jim Hunter.6821:

Tom Gore.4035:

When I want to go solo roaming, I pick a thief. Why? Because it has by far the most potential to get in, kill someone quickly and get out before the zerg runs you over. Low risk vs. high reward. That’s thief gameplay for you.

When I go roaming in a small group I… Ok who am I kidding. We still pick thieves because of the funnies of instagibbing anything and disappearing before they even realize one of them died.

That’s the reason I play ranger. I get to bathe in the tears of all the thieves qqing about rapid fire tracking through stealth.

I believe you kill lots of bad thieves intrigued by the low risk high reward gameplay I mentioned. A good thief will still eat a LB ranger for breakfast. They don’t even have to spec for it. Just slot a couple more teleport gap closers and you’re done. Most bad rangers at that point panic and try to run. Good ones might still have a chance, but they’re up for an uphill battle for sure.

Most thieves only run 1 stun break, it’s pretty easy to draw that out and then chain cc them to finish them off. A glassy thief in no way counters a ranger, you need to be running a high sustain build like cele ele or medi guard for it to be an uphill battle for the ranger. Only ranger a thief will eat for breakfast is a bad ranger.

Ragnarox.9601:

There are hacks or something in this game.. I fought Guardian last night beat his kitten and Necro came feared me I pop up stability for 6 sec and bam next sec I was feared again under my stability….weird kitten.

People often call about hacks way too soon you probably just got hit by Corrupt Boon

“You critically hit Rabbit for 173,315 using [Mirror Blade]”

Did I instakill the rabbit?

Now I’m not sure do I understand the combat log. That is insane big damage. What is going on?

AnniMira.2506:

Thief vs my mesmer:

“You critically hit … for 623 using [Ether Blast]” (best damage in that short fight)

“critically hits you for 8,277 using [Heartseeker]”

8,277 vs 623 WTF

lol. you do know that mesmer currently has the best burst in the game right?

Rangerdeity.5847:

retsuya.4708:

one does not simply run full zerk on wvw

not true i run full zerk ele and necro daily however my mesmer….. soldiers motherkittener triumphant distortion null field feedback blink mass invis reflecting focus skills the whole 9 yards of defense on mesmer because bruuuuuuh your not meant to be a damage nuker your meant for attrition

I didn’t say its not possible, but yea, you need to know what you’re doing if you want to run full zerk on wvw

Thieves counter Mesmer pretty hard these days, so don’t be surprised if you get your kitten handed to you often by competent Thieves. Really not a good idea to go full zerker if you’re not too experienced. A mixture of zerker, knight’s and possibly Cavalier’s might be a better idea for learning the ins and outs of the power Mesmer.

^ If you’re not dealing enough damage, it’s probably because you’re not landing your attacks, rather than being because you don’t have enough offensive stats. If you’re struggling, mixing in defensive stats will give you some breathing room to actually land attacks and learn how to put pressure on your opponent.

AnniMira.2506:

“You critically hit Rabbit for 173,315 using [Mirror Blade]”

Did I instakill the rabbit?

Now I’m not sure do I understand the combat log. That is insane big damage. What is going on?

You hit an ambient critter (gray name, no exp on kill, nonthreatening). The only thing you can do to not instakill them is to bring an incredibly underleveled character to far higher level area (say, bringing a level 2 character to Orr, + levels from the unavoidable map completion). There’s an achievement for dealing 300k+ damage in a single hit; hitting an ambient for it is the only way to do it afaik.