Guild Wars 2

StormWolf.7645:

(The Mesmer I’m iffy on…They really seem able to take WAY too much punishment when their entire Build is based around avoiding being hit, I’d say THEY are the ones with the highest potential.)

Difference between a mesmer and a thief is the gap between a bad mesmer and good mesmer is enormous whereas the gap exists but is not anywhere near as big for thieves. Even a clown can get decent mileage from a thief. A bad mesmer is a poor mans ele, a good mesmer is an unholy terror that all should run from.

At the end of the day that is probably the best thing about the mesmer class, it sorts the wheat from the chaff.

This isn’t a solution for culling in general but may help balance the thief issue and help a class which is currently in need of attention.

From other posts, most classes have something going for them but the Ranger class seems limited.

Why not give Rangers a tracking skill so they can see thieves and mesmers who are hiding. In other games I’ve played, thieves can’t just wander around hidden with out some chance of being seen.

This proposal helps the Rangers which need a lift, and stops thieves from having the free reign they’ve had up to now.

Raincrow.1840:

Pboogie.7418:

It easy to kill a thief…….just gather

Sorry to cut your post up… but I just want to make a point here.

Any class in which “just gather” (meaning you need more than one person) is the 1st step in killing them… is broken.

I also play guardian and ele also and i beat any thief in the game even they troll supply camp. It sad people just don’t know how to counter a thief. Learn your CC, and stop crying about thief. Thief is so useless in wvw. Without there stealth they would be more easy to kill. Anet don’t even nerf thief. Without stealth they be more useless. They key is killing a thief is knock them out the ring of shadow refuge. Look If you want to learn how to kill a thief. Just play the class and lean it pro and con. Stop crying about thief. LIKE I SAID USELESS CLASS

Kalemar.4873:

This isn’t a solution for culling in general but may help balance the thief issue and help a class which is currently in need of attention.

From other posts, most classes have something going for them but the Ranger class seems limited.

Why not give Rangers a tracking skill so they can see thieves and mesmers who are hiding. In other games I’ve played, thieves can’t just wander around hidden with out some chance of being seen.

This proposal helps the Rangers which need a lift, and stops thieves from having the free reign they’ve had up to now.

first of all rangers have some of the best utility and conditions in the game, they are hardly limited. I wish I could have access to poison, burning, bleeding and chill between two weapons.

Secondly, tracking in any form can be hacked once in the game. Every MMO out there that has tracking has a hack available on the internet that can grant tracking without using the profession. Age of Conan being the most popular that come to mind. Even if it were available and there was no hack it would just add to the culling issue because of extra processing required. Not only that but how are you going to see a red dot on your mini map and be able tell where the thief actually is?
Or would you prefer an ability that allows you to target through stealth? So you can happily pluck away at your bow from the safety of 1500 yards. Sorry bud but if a class gains the ability to see through stealth or break stealth, then there should be an ability to disarm your traps, banish your spirits and charm your pet in battle. Just saying.

Elthurien.8356:

Kalemar.4873:

This isn’t a solution for culling in general but may help balance the thief issue and help a class which is currently in need of attention.

From other posts, most classes have something going for them but the Ranger class seems limited.

Why not give Rangers a tracking skill so they can see thieves and mesmers who are hiding. In other games I’ve played, thieves can’t just wander around hidden with out some chance of being seen.

This proposal helps the Rangers which need a lift, and stops thieves from having the free reign they’ve had up to now.

first of all rangers have some of the best utility and conditions in the game, they are hardly limited. I wish I could have access to poison, burning, bleeding and chill between two weapons.

Secondly, tracking in any form can be hacked once in the game. Every MMO out there that has tracking has a hack available on the internet that can grant tracking without using the profession. Age of Conan being the most popular that come to mind. Even if it were available and there was no hack it would just add to the culling issue because of extra processing required. Not only that but how are you going to see a red dot on your mini map and be able tell where the thief actually is?
Or would you prefer an ability that allows you to target through stealth? So you can happily pluck away at your bow from the safety of 1500 yards. Sorry bud but if a class gains the ability to see through stealth or break stealth, then there should be an ability to disarm your traps, banish your spirits and charm your pet in battle. Just saying.

Very good point about hacking. The idea really was not to see dots, but actually show thieves in the same way they are seen for friendlies as an outline. I used the term tracking as a possible name of the spell but really it would be ‘see invisible’ or ‘see hidden’. Perhaps it could be a thief ability? Just felt it suited a ranger class more than the others, if it was to ever eventuate.

One of my toons is a Ranger and I think they’re fine but they’re copping a flogging in the forums when compared to other classes, hence why I made the suggestion.

if traps and AOE or melee hits broke stealth than there wouldn’t be a need for a ‘see hidden’ spell but I’ve not seen that happen unless culling is preventing me from seeing it. Thieves are very squishy, once you can target them but the culling really makes the thieves OP.

Tulisin.6945:

Relentliss.2170:

classes that can remain stealthed while they slaughter people.

Not how it works. Either they’re abusing culling, which isn’t stealth, or they’re “slaughtering people” at a rate of 1 hit every 3 seconds.

I watched 2 thieves slaughter people for about 3 minutes the other day. Mind you they were very good players but basically of that 3 minutes I think they were only visible for about 20 seconds total. Most people died in under 5 seconds and whatever retaliation they were capable of was severely limited by the fact they were eitehr A stunned or B unable to target their foe.

Now I think this is a little unreasonable and takes stealth + culling problems to whole new levels.

Did I say in my post nerf XYZ? No. I only said they need to revisit stealth and determine what should make people visible and what shouldn’t. They obviously need to fix culling in WvW. And if they can’t it needs to be removed from some skills. If you are doing damage to someone they should be able to see you. I don’t think that is so unreasonable.

I remember playing NWN online and on every single PVP server Hide in Plain Sight was removed. Why? Because it was kitten OP that’s why.

Damage doesn’t break stealth so your eyes are just fine. Thieves do still take full damage while in stealth though and even with the rendering issue tab target will still stick to them. Not only that but if you start a channel or rapid fire type shot as the thief stealths it will still hit them. Ranger traps are great vs thieves especially if you have spike and burning on top of each other. Some thieves will have condition removal on stealth but not all of them. I know I had trouble vs rangers when I played Sword/Pistol because of the camouflage on stun trait.

A thief’s biggest weaknesses are knockdown/knockback/blowout effects as the only stability they have is on dagger storm (90s elite) and immobilising. If you have any of these abilities you can shut down a thief.

My thief is so jealous of the ranger weapons I have 2 ranger alts that I am working on hitting 80. Two rangers mainly for the cultural armor and weapons but also as I want one to be fully exotic with bows and one to be fully exotic with melee.

The grass is always greener so to speak. You only need to look at the thief forums to see that we would rather have better weapon variety and range instead of gimmick builds.

Elthurien.8356:

Sorry bud but if a class gains the ability to see through stealth or break stealth, then there should be an ability to disarm your traps, banish your spirits and charm your pet in battle. Just saying.

Actually stealth should just cease to exist in games period. It causes problems in ALL of them, it’s despised by the majority in ALL of them. Fun for the guy using it, not fun for the people without it available. There’s a reason that stealth, and search both ended up being “must max” skills in Conan as well. Because it’s both OP to use on people and it’s lame to have it used against you. It’s just a terrible terrible playstyle and mechanic. Amen.

once the cap restriction is patched in, and the culling issues resolved, thieves will be fixed imo. No need to nerf abilities.

Braxxus.2904:

Elthurien.8356:

Sorry bud but if a class gains the ability to see through stealth or break stealth, then there should be an ability to disarm your traps, banish your spirits and charm your pet in battle. Just saying.

Actually stealth should just cease to exist in games period. It causes problems in ALL of them, it’s despised by the majority in ALL of them. Fun for the guy using it, not fun for the people without it available. There’s a reason that stealth, and search both ended up being “must max” skills in Conan as well. Because it’s both OP to use on people and it’s lame to have it used against you. It’s just a terrible terrible playstyle and mechanic. Amen.

As much as I hate thieves, i fully disagree with your post. Stealth have culling issues, which probably won’t ever be fixed, but I manage just fine against thieves with my engineer. I time the abilities that i should use, and then I throw one CC on that thief and burst all my skills on to him, including elite for an additional 3 seconds of stun, and i win, if the thief is a squishy thief. If he isn’t a squishy thief, well he ain’t going to kill me, and I ain’t going to be able to kill him, and the fight will just drag on, because everytime i get close to killing a non squishy thief, they run away, literally out of combat to full heal because they already used their heal for stealth.

Braxxus.2904:

Elthurien.8356:

Sorry bud but if a class gains the ability to see through stealth or break stealth, then there should be an ability to disarm your traps, banish your spirits and charm your pet in battle. Just saying.

Actually stealth should just cease to exist in games period. It causes problems in ALL of them, it’s despised by the majority in ALL of them. Fun for the guy using it, not fun for the people without it available. There’s a reason that stealth, and search both ended up being “must max” skills in Conan as well. Because it’s both OP to use on people and it’s lame to have it used against you. It’s just a terrible terrible playstyle and mechanic. Amen.

I would have had no problem with Thieves not having stealth if the game were designed around it. Imo if thieves didnt have stealth it would have been better if Thieves had more smoke screen/blinding powder style effects that would grant miss chance and blind or protection. If you replaced all of the thief stealth options with PBAoE blinds or smoke effects that cause confusion and grant protection or miss chance then hell yeah bring it on.

I could have quite easily have played a Thief that utilised dirty tricks like that rather than have teleports, invisibility and venoms (assassins use venoms not thieves). I’ve been playing thieves for a very very long time though (when a 1st level thief had 5% chance to hide in shadows and couldn’t move while hidden)

Relentliss.2170:

If you are doing damage to someone they should be able to see you. I don’t think that is so unreasonable.

It isn’t unreasonable, and it is also exactly the functionality stealth should have were culling not an issue. However, fixing culling isn’t going to change anything about the ability to go glass cannon, stack multiple people onto one called target, bring them down, and restealth. The question is: is the ability to execute those kind of attacks unbalanced? I don’t believe so, particularly with how the downed state functions to stop people from being instantly killed.

If they can not fix culling, and I am betting they can’t, they need to revisit each skill and make thieves more tolerable. I don’t have a huge issue with thieves personally, as I play a Guardian, but I see how they grief other players and put new players off WvW.

Pboogie.7418:

Learn your CC, and stop crying about thief.

You missed the point completely.

I know my CC, lol. The fact remains that pretty much any class in the game can be beaten, but thief is by far the most difficult.

They also kill other classes much faster than most, and without as much risk. If you play an Ele you should know that.

Relentliss.2170:

If they can not fix culling, and I am betting they can’t, they need to revisit each skill and make thieves more tolerable. I don’t have a huge issue with thieves personally, as I play a Guardian, but I see how they grief other players and put new players off WvW.

Or they say if you cannot see them join em

I have seen a lot of people rerolling Thieves in WvW.

My Engi is know only a dust catcher or for PvE. WvW is now the Thief, and it is awesome in compare to the Engi.

how about:
“You take 20% more damage during stealth”?

Alodar.5794:

When ONE thief can hold down a supply camp when a zerg of 50 people are there simply because of a rendering issue that is not fixed… something needs to be done.

Yes, you are right.
When 50 people blame a rendering issue on their inability to counter one single player, something must be done, but it is not the something you obviously think it is.

Excession.2198:

Yes, you are right.
When 50 people blame a rendering issue on their inability to counter one single player, something must be done, but it is not the something you obviously think it is.

Hmm

When many people complain about a block bug on their inability to counter one single bunker, something must be done in the same manner right?

A bug/exploit/mechanical failure which has a major detrimental effect on gameplay must be accounted for. Because of the rendering issue one single class is capable at times of being invisible 100% of the time while killing someone or denying a cap for an objective.

Trying to defend this as ‘ok’ in any way shape or form is just asinine.

Braxxus.2904:

Excession.2198:

Yes, you are right.
When 50 people blame a rendering issue on their inability to counter one single player, something must be done, but it is not the something you obviously think it is.

Hmm

When many people complain about a block bug on their inability to counter one single bunker, something must be done in the same manner right?

A bug/exploit/mechanical failure which has a major detrimental effect on gameplay must be accounted for. Because of the rendering issue one single class is capable at times of being invisible 100% of the time while killing someone or denying a cap for an objective.

Trying to defend this as ‘ok’ in any way shape or form is just asinine.

Well they’ve stated in this thread that they’re changing the capping rules of WvW to those of sPvP. So that should have an impact on the whole invis-cap blocking at the very least. As for culling, I wondering how much of the issue is server side and how much of it is local.

Dual.8953:

Well they’ve stated in this thread that they’re changing the capping rules of WvW to those of sPvP. So that should have an impact on the whole invis-cap blocking at the very least.

Yes, which proved that it was not working as intended. I all but danced and yelled hallelujah a few pages back when the dev posted it.

Braxxus.2904:

Excession.2198:

Yes, you are right.
When 50 people blame a rendering issue on their inability to counter one single player, something must be done, but it is not the something you obviously think it is.

Hmm

When many people complain about a block bug on their inability to counter one single bunker, something must be done in the same manner right?

A bug/exploit/mechanical failure which has a major detrimental effect on gameplay must be accounted for. Because of the rendering issue one single class is capable at times of being invisible 100% of the time while killing someone or denying a cap for an objective.

Trying to defend this as ‘ok’ in any way shape or form is just asinine.

Asinine would be 50 people stood around not using their brains, or abilities, and allowing 1 person to stop them doing something, while blaming it all on a rendering issue.

No matter how you try to spin it, it is not that hard to counter a Thief trying to stay in stealth and block a camp being flipped, especially if you have 50 people.

Feel free to carry on crying for Thief nerfs on the forums though, as once idiots that cannot learn how to play are done with Thief’s, they will move on to the next class/ability/mechanic/whatever that they have no clue about, and cry and whine until that is nerfed too, but its all good right? as long as “many people” are complaining, it must be right.

nahj.2870:

stingz.2169:

Or a permastealth thief destroying all siege weapons one after the other beyond enemy lines during a stonemist siege. sarcasm mode on Sure that’s not a problem sarcasm mode off

Permastealthing doesn’t seem like it would be an issue at all in this situation. Siege equipment should be protected anyway, so if one person, permastealthing thief or not, manages to take out numerous siege weapons back to back by themselves then that sounds like a serious failure on the part of the assaulting server. I can see culling issues being a factor, but it shouldn’t be a deal breaker since siege should never be left undefended like that unless it’s no longer needed.

Also, from the OP

Cosec.9802:

If it just me or are there a Per stealth rouge at every dang supply now a days. I play a thief I do not perm stealth because I play the thief as its intended I don’t exploit. I believe this needs to be fixed asap. IMO this is ruining wvw. Not one of any profession should be capable of holding off an entire 20 man group of players from capping a point they fought hard to get. This will end up being a big game breaker for wvw if they don’t find a way to fix this. I for one can’t stand you types of thieves your weak players dependent on a defect of design and your never gonna convince me otherwise. Stop exploiting the game. Play with skill not cheap dirty tricks.

So yes, this thread is literally about the cap issue.

Last time I’ve checked the title of the thread was: “Perma Stealth thieves are ruining WVW.”.
So, if in my opinion the cap issue is not the only issue about “permstealth thieves” and “ruining wvwvw”, I’ll write it here.

Siege weapons undefended? Do you think we were just standing there watching while he was attacking our siege weapons? Really? There were like 30 ppl around those siege weapons… How do you know they were unprotected? You were there too? Or you are just jumping to convenient conclusions? Never mind I think I already know the answer.

stingz.2169:

nahj.2870:

stingz.2169:

Or a permastealth thief destroying all siege weapons one after the other beyond enemy lines during a stonemist siege. sarcasm mode on Sure that’s not a problem sarcasm mode off

Permastealthing doesn’t seem like it would be an issue at all in this situation. Siege equipment should be protected anyway, so if one person, permastealthing thief or not, manages to take out numerous siege weapons back to back by themselves then that sounds like a serious failure on the part of the assaulting server. I can see culling issues being a factor, but it shouldn’t be a deal breaker since siege should never be left undefended like that unless it’s no longer needed.

Also, from the OP

Cosec.9802:

If it just me or are there a Per stealth rouge at every dang supply now a days. I play a thief I do not perm stealth because I play the thief as its intended I don’t exploit. I believe this needs to be fixed asap. IMO this is ruining wvw. Not one of any profession should be capable of holding off an entire 20 man group of players from capping a point they fought hard to get. This will end up being a big game breaker for wvw if they don’t find a way to fix this. I for one can’t stand you types of thieves your weak players dependent on a defect of design and your never gonna convince me otherwise. Stop exploiting the game. Play with skill not cheap dirty tricks.

So yes, this thread is literally about the cap issue.

Last time I’ve checked the title of the thread was: “Perma Stealth thieves are ruining WVW.”.
So, if in my opinion the cap issue is not the only issue about permstealth thieves and wvwvw ruining the game, I’ll write it here.

Siege weapons undefended? Do you think we were just standing there watching while he was attacking our siege weapons? Really? There were like 30 ppl around those siege weapons… How do you know they were unprotected? You were there too? Or you are just jumping to convenient conclusions? Never mind I think I already know the answer.

I call BS.

Are you really trying to claim that ONE Thief, stayed perma stealthed, and SINGLE-HANDEDLY destroyed multiple seige weapons, and around 30 people could not stop them?

Again, I call BS.

What probably happened was the seige weapons in question were being hammered by everyone that was defending SM, and a Thief just happened to turn up and get a few hits in too, but hey, bandwagon time, lets blame every bad thing ever, in the history of bad things, on a Thief!!!

Whats next? an eye witness account of how the third shooter from the grassy knoll was aThief too?

Excession.2198:

stingz.2169:

nahj.2870:

stingz.2169:

Or a permastealth thief destroying all siege weapons one after the other beyond enemy lines during a stonemist siege. sarcasm mode on Sure that’s not a problem sarcasm mode off

Permastealthing doesn’t seem like it would be an issue at all in this situation. Siege equipment should be protected anyway, so if one person, permastealthing thief or not, manages to take out numerous siege weapons back to back by themselves then that sounds like a serious failure on the part of the assaulting server. I can see culling issues being a factor, but it shouldn’t be a deal breaker since siege should never be left undefended like that unless it’s no longer needed.

Also, from the OP

Cosec.9802:

If it just me or are there a Per stealth rouge at every dang supply now a days. I play a thief I do not perm stealth because I play the thief as its intended I don’t exploit. I believe this needs to be fixed asap. IMO this is ruining wvw. Not one of any profession should be capable of holding off an entire 20 man group of players from capping a point they fought hard to get. This will end up being a big game breaker for wvw if they don’t find a way to fix this. I for one can’t stand you types of thieves your weak players dependent on a defect of design and your never gonna convince me otherwise. Stop exploiting the game. Play with skill not cheap dirty tricks.

So yes, this thread is literally about the cap issue.

Last time I’ve checked the title of the thread was: “Perma Stealth thieves are ruining WVW.”.
So, if in my opinion the cap issue is not the only issue about permstealth thieves and wvwvw ruining the game, I’ll write it here.

Siege weapons undefended? Do you think we were just standing there watching while he was attacking our siege weapons? Really? There were like 30 ppl around those siege weapons… How do you know they were unprotected? You were there too? Or you are just jumping to convenient conclusions? Never mind I think I already know the answer.

I call BS.

Are you really trying to claim that ONE Thief, stayed perma stealthed, and SINGLE-HANDEDLY destroyed multiple seige weapons, and around 30 people could not stop them?

Again, I call BS.

What probably happened was the seige weapons in question were being hammered by everyone that was defending SM, and a Thief just happened to turn up and get a few hits in too, but hey, bandwagon time, lets blame every bad thing ever, in the history of bad things, on a Thief!!!

Whats next? an eye witness account of how the third shooter from the grassy knoll was aThief too?

That’s exactly what im saying yes. Almost ten ppl tried to report him that night, want me to ask all my guildmates, who were talking to me on TS and saw what happened, to write here? People wrote about it even in /map.
Even if other siege weapons were firing on our siege weapons spot, and they were not, that cant justify the fact a single thief can jump inside a group of 30 people and attack without being counterattacked. That’s just insane.

You know, Necros got something called “Marks”. They are very effective at defending stuff against thieves.
In general, thieves can’t win against a good necro, so if you had 30(!) people in that huge zerg and not a single necro with you, you should reconsider your group composition.

It takes perma-stealth thieves so long to break siege equipment you’ll have time to respec and even log out and switch characters before they achieve anything. I’ve seen a pair of them try that before; it took three patient players to wait for them to show themselves briefly and CC them down.

Were it not for the rendering bug it’d be easier. I’ve only played a thief to level 6 so far – so I don’t know the ins and outs of the class by any means – but the perma-stealth builds seem to be pretty weak by comparison to the glass cannons. And even those…

I hesitate to suggest people should be building in WvW to deal with one class, but it’s not just thieves that can make a mess of you as a glass cannon. Invest in ways to negate a glass cannon’s spike and keep them too busy trying to stay alive. Most classes seem to be capable of taking on a decent thief and winning. A couple aren’t, but that’s because they’re horribly underpowered, not because there’s no answer to thieves.

That being said, if thieves are the main consideration when making a build, that’s a good sign they need some rebalancing. Hard for me to say yet whether glass cannons are the only thing a thief can do well, or whether it’s just the best option. That would be no surprise to me, I’ve played games in totally different genres where the same principle holds true: if you’re going to kill them before they get the chance to fight back, what’s the point investing in defense?

Things worked a bit differently in GW1 PvP, where you needed four or five people concentrating fire to bring someone down within a second. Spiking was a viable technique, if co-ordinated well, but it didn’t render pressure builds obsolete, it complemented them.

Excession.2198:

When 50 people blame a rendering issue on their inability to counter one single player, something must be done, but it is not the something you obviously think it is.

If it was “inability” they wouldn’t just have a problem with just thieves…. they’d have a problem with every class in the game.

The fact is, not one single other class would even consider trying to hold a point against a group of high level players, doesn’t matter if it’s 50 or 5.

Only a thief can jump solo right into the middle of a group of enemy players with a very good chance of downing one or more in a matter of seconds…. and then just disapear while hitting a killing blow, then get away to do it all over again in a very short time.

naphack.9346:

In general, thieves can’t win against a good necro, so if you had 30(!) people in that huge zerg and not a single necro with you, you should reconsider your group composition.

Well if the composition of my group is affected by the presence of thieves in wvwvw… That explains why we are here talking about thieves. Also, we had a necro in our group but with a different build. So, you need a necro in the group and with the right build too. Just for thieves. That sounds soooooo stupid to me.

???
You should always carry a staff with you anyway as necro/ele.
Same as you should always carry a shortbow with you as thief. There’s even people saying, you should always carry 1 weapon of each type, you can use, but there I disagree. No need for a hammer/sword guardian to carry a mace with them. A scepter on the other hand…

It doesn’t matter what you have traited and what you are using, there’s some weapons you should have at the very least in your inventory in case you need them.
Don’t tell me, the necro had like scepter in one slot and dagger in the other while not having a staff with him.
Simple fix: Open inventory, grab any white staff, you just picked up, and just spam a bunch of marks. But normally, you should have a rare/exotic staff with nice upgrades with you. Who the hell cares what’s traited in or whatnot. Just use the kitten skills when they are needed. It’s not like you need any traits to cast a kitten reapers mark.
All you need against thieves is area control and any level 1 necro can grab a level 1 white staff and deliver that just fine, tho he will lack in damage. What’s important, is the fear effect and the “oh crap, there are big red/dark greenish circles, I should avoid these”, it causes.

edit: so god darn gets replaced with kitten too? :X

Thiefs should become visible on making or receiving damage. Two second delay before being able to use a stealth after making damage to enable solo people to have a chance against one. That will stop perma stealth as well as making it possible to reveal a thief by using aoes.
It should not be the case that one player needs 10 or more to be able to find him.

As we noticed, this topic, turned into an off-topic discussion. Habib Leow stated, this issue will be fixed in an upcoming patch, this thread will now be closed.