Guild Wars 2

Fot the second time today I was defeated by a thief inside a castle and I can’t see them until they attack more than once. In both instances they had defeated another player and then myself. Apparently they have abilities that extend beyond a few seconds and can remain cloaked. My complaint is that they cannot be spotted for what seems like an 15 -20 seconds and apparently have full offensive capabilities to attack in addition to not being able to be spotted. Whats up with this? Why should I have to run for my life just because there is a thief in the area? If they just used resources to defeat another player then they shouldn’t have the advantage on another player who has full resources. What gives here, I read about this situation before, so it’s not that this is a unique occurrence?

Thieves can stay invisible forever if they want, so you won’t ever kill one in a 1v1 or even a 2v1 unless they let you. I would just suggest to build your char to have lots of toughness, vitality, healing and run to a group of allies or group of npc guards if you see a thief. This will cause the thief to run away in search of easier targets.

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

But they appear briefly, and will disappear. I play one spec’d to stealth, it’s not as cut and dry as everyone thinks. Your friend should lend the hand to note a thief is nearby, don’t res. It’s usually a bait situation. With a CnD (successful hit), BP, CnD, Tent, > CnD … you almost have a perfect window. But you still have to ‘hit’ your CnD’s and you can knock them outta tents with a push back, even in stealth form, punch them out of there tent.

Everyone hates thieves ~ because everyone hates stealth, hates dying from it, hates invis spikes… guess what 9 times outta 10, when your downed, it’s not going to matter if he is invis or not.

It sucks, I made one when I was kitten , he was fun, but there’s so much to counter a thief. blind for one, snares*, etc.

I hear ya though, I was there once, but now that I know how to counter them, I just wait for the window before randomly smashing my cooldowns on him.

Waffler.1257:

Thieves can stay invisible forever if they want, so you won’t ever kill one in a 1v1 or even a 2v1 unless they let you. I would just suggest to build your char to have lots of toughness, vitality, healing and run to a group of allies or group of npc guards if you see a thief. This will cause the thief to run away in search of easier targets.

This is the most flawed and absurd suggestion ever. No one class should force another to run full tank / with group just because they are in the area… How about fixing Thief, either by making Revealed debuff last 10seconds instead of 3 and some actual cooldowns.

Hexin.5603:

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

Here’s one of the first videos I found on Youtube by typing in perma stealth thief, please point out where the CD window is that you can see the thief to attack.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

OR you could roll one and learn they’re tricks/strategies so you can counter them just like every other competitive player does instead of taking the easy road and come to the forums complaining.

Judging by your post you clearly have no clue about thieves…

Do I die to thieves? Ofc I do as I die to every other profession if I’m not prepared for them (low HP / utilities on cd) otherwise I rarely lose a 1v1 and when I do I know I was outplayed because I did my best to win and it wasn’t enough.

Otaur.9268:

Waffler.1257:

Thieves can stay invisible forever if they want, so you won’t ever kill one in a 1v1 or even a 2v1 unless they let you. I would just suggest to build your char to have lots of toughness, vitality, healing and run to a group of allies or group of npc guards if you see a thief. This will cause the thief to run away in search of easier targets.

This is the most flawed and absurd suggestion ever. No one class should force another to run full tank / with group just because they are in the area… How about fixing Thief, either by making Revealed debuff last 10seconds instead of 3 and some actual cooldowns.

I never said I think thieves are fine, just saying the best way to currently deal with them. Thieves are what they are, and if you go glass cannon on any other class except a thief and maybe a mesmer you will get smoked by a thief.

just roll one

sooner or later it is just gonna be mesmers and thieves.. hell I joined the mesmer fotm ranks

Waffler.1257:

Hexin.5603:

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

Here’s one of the first videos I found on Youtube by typing in perma stealth thief, please point out where the CD window is that you can see the thief to attack.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

Video is outdated, stealth doesn’t stack like that anymore, d/p thieves are harmless if you died to one that you probably played bad. Plus to stop him from stealth all you had to do was get close to the smoking ring on the flor, one of the heart seeker will surely hit you and trigger reviled.

Volrath.1473:

Waffler.1257:

Hexin.5603:

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

Here’s one of the first videos I found on Youtube by typing in perma stealth thief, please point out where the CD window is that you can see the thief to attack.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

Video is outdated, stealth doesn’t stack like that anymore, d/p thieves are harmless if you died to one that you probably played bad. Plus to stop him from stealth all you had to do was get close to the smoking ring on the flor, one of the heart seeker will surely hit you and trigger reviled.

Which patch changed that? Most of the thieves I fight use this technique to stay in stealth indefinitely, including ones I’ve seen 1-2 days ago. And sure they won’t burst you down in a second or two like other thief builds, but in the wide open area of WvW you don’t need burst to kill another player when you can always stay just out of range and remain untargetable with stealth. I personally don’t die to them because I play a healing power guardian so there are very few things that can kill me, but I don’t waste my time trying to kill thieves either.

Marcarus.5012:

Fot the second time today I was defeated by a thief inside a castle and I can’t see them until they attack more than once. In both instances they had defeated another player and then myself. Apparently they have abilities that extend beyond a few seconds and can remain cloaked. My complaint is that they cannot be spotted for what seems like an 15 -20 seconds and apparently have full offensive capabilities to attack in addition to not being able to be spotted. Whats up with this? Why should I have to run for my life just because there is a thief in the area? If they just used resources to defeat another player then they shouldn’t have the advantage on another player who has full resources. What gives here, I read about this situation before, so it’s not that this is a unique occurrence?

Another foolish thread about stealth. If you actually played a thief for any length of time you’d know that we have all sorts of vulnerabilities. You’d also know that anytime we actually damage someone we come out of stealth for a few seconds, so unless you’re spec’d stupidly or he’s spec’d for burst you aren’t going to die without seeing him. If you’re dying to a thief 2v1 you’re going to die to a well-played mesmer or elementalist just as easily … you just won’t have the excuse to come here on these forums and whine about it.

Waffler.1257:

Volrath.1473:

Waffler.1257:

Hexin.5603:

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

Here’s one of the first videos I found on Youtube by typing in perma stealth thief, please point out where the CD window is that you can see the thief to attack.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

Video is outdated, stealth doesn’t stack like that anymore, d/p thieves are harmless if you died to one that you probably played bad. Plus to stop him from stealth all you had to do was get close to the smoking ring on the flor, one of the heart seeker will surely hit you and trigger reviled.

Which patch changed that? Most of the thieves I fight use this technique to stay in stealth indefinitely, including ones I’ve seen 1-2 days ago. And sure they won’t burst you down in a second or two like other thief builds, but in the wide open area of WvW you don’t need burst to kill another player when you can always stay just out of range and remain untargetable with stealth. I personally don’t die to them because I play a healing power guardian so there are very few things that can kill me, but I don’t waste my time trying to kill thieves either.

Out of interest, are you running sub 80 exotic chars? Ive never had a problem with permastealth thieves. But I didn’t play WvW until I was fully kitted. I have had problems, at least until I learnt how to play them, with GC thieves. Now I pretty much ignore perma stealth thieves and immediately turn and fight GC thieves.

Waffler.1257:

Volrath.1473:

Waffler.1257:

Hexin.5603:

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

Here’s one of the first videos I found on Youtube by typing in perma stealth thief, please point out where the CD window is that you can see the thief to attack.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

Video is outdated, stealth doesn’t stack like that anymore, d/p thieves are harmless if you died to one that you probably played bad. Plus to stop him from stealth all you had to do was get close to the smoking ring on the flor, one of the heart seeker will surely hit you and trigger reviled.

Which patch changed that? Most of the thieves I fight use this technique to stay in stealth indefinitely, including ones I’ve seen 1-2 days ago. And sure they won’t burst you down in a second or two like other thief builds, but in the wide open area of WvW you don’t need burst to kill another player when you can always stay just out of range and remain untargetable with stealth. I personally don’t die to them because I play a healing power guardian so there are very few things that can kill me, but I don’t waste my time trying to kill thieves either.

That’s the funny part about so many of these thief threads. People complain because they can’t find and kill the thief more often than they complain about being actually killed by the thief (not counting pure burst thieves, and I honestly don’t come across many of them anymore because the CDs are so long). If they can’t find the thief and he runs off they aren’t any worse off than if they didn’t see him in the first place … but somehow they don’t seem to understand that. Stealth is undeniably annoying (to me as well), but there’s a difference between annoying and being overpowered (ignoring culling for the moment).

That’s called culling, which is what allows them to attack you and appear to remain in stealth. This is going to be fixed in March patch.

It appears as if you are not sure the mechanics behind the thief profession. It’s actually a pretty simple and predictable class if you are experienced.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Having-trouble-against-thieves-Click-here/first#post1600918

Use this thread. Nobody has yet, 99% just complain without trying to see what they themselves are doing wrong.

Anyone who thinks Stealth isn’t overpowered is kidding themselves…

Its the combustion mechanic of this game….

The problem isn’t one thief, it is 2 or more. Their skills all feed off each other. Two D/P thieves are really OP. One guy powders, then they both heart-seeker for stealth followed by a backstab. Then the other guy powder. Hard to fight against that. Your side needs to time your stun and AOEs perfectly. They don’t. If you pop endure pain….no problem. They just back-up and repeat. They don’t need to be glass cannons either. Two thieves still hit hard no matter how they are specced. That gives them access to more initiative for more stealth and heal/condition removal on stealth. The icing on the cake is when you do get lucky and down one. The other guy just needs to drop a black powder and shadow refuge then revive. It works about 90% of the time. You have to get lucky to be able knock them out of refuge or kill the downed guy with massive AOE If not, by then the downed guy can port away, the other thief can use is AOE stealth and finish it. You won’t have any idea where they are.

And I am not even telling you the half of it. There are still some other tricks out there that make thieves even more powerful.

I’m a thief and im overpowered. Today i decided to be the most obnoxious, ruthless, killing machine and harass everyone i see until it gets nerfed. 4v1? pkitten, no problem. Fighting 10 ppl? fools, you cant kill me. ANet made me like this so it must be right.

Even theives are admitting their class being way OP. “I’m a terrible player and I’m sick of any class that can beat me”. Why don’t you ask that to a level 54 theif newbie who was in my party in wvw who took out 3 people in less than 5 minutes of how terrible player they are?
She told the party “they were way too easy” and laughed. So that justifies us for being a terrible player? In support to the Over Post.

Burnfall.9573:

Even theives are admitting their class being way OP. “I’m a terrible player and I’m sick of any class that can beat me”. Why don’t you ask that to a level 54 theif newbie who was in my party in wvw who took out 3 people in less than 5 minutes of how terrible player they are?
She told the party “they were way too easy” and laughed. So that justifies us for being a terrible player? In support to the Over Post.

I took out 3 thieves with a Necro 1v3 two nights back, therefore Necros must be OP and need a nerf.

sostronk, i encourage you to post that to the theif forum and get back to me, please!!

My only gripe with thieves is that you should not be able to hit 8k+ crits easily practically guaranteed with some builds, and still be completely invisible, unless that is the culling issue and not the stealth issue then please forgive me. And i get that they are squishy but that doesn’t mean anything if i cant see you, and sure every once in a while ill get lucky spamming AoE around me and nab one. Not complaining (i have no right to, im a D/D ele :P) just my 2 cents.

People need to stop crying thief nerf coming March 26 ……. no more culling cant wait to hear the thiefs cries (:-))

Waffler.1257:

Thieves can stay invisible forever if they want, so you won’t ever kill one in a 1v1 or even a 2v1 unless they let you. I would just suggest to build your char to have lots of toughness, vitality, healing and run to a group of allies or group of npc guards if you see a thief. This will cause the thief to run away in search of easier targets.

Clearly thieves are balanced when everyone either has to build bunker specs and run with groups to survive, lol.

sostronk.8167:

Waffler.1257:

Volrath.1473:

Waffler.1257:

Hexin.5603:

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

Here’s one of the first videos I found on Youtube by typing in perma stealth thief, please point out where the CD window is that you can see the thief to attack.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

Video is outdated, stealth doesn’t stack like that anymore, d/p thieves are harmless if you died to one that you probably played bad. Plus to stop him from stealth all you had to do was get close to the smoking ring on the flor, one of the heart seeker will surely hit you and trigger reviled.

Which patch changed that? Most of the thieves I fight use this technique to stay in stealth indefinitely, including ones I’ve seen 1-2 days ago. And sure they won’t burst you down in a second or two like other thief builds, but in the wide open area of WvW you don’t need burst to kill another player when you can always stay just out of range and remain untargetable with stealth. I personally don’t die to them because I play a healing power guardian so there are very few things that can kill me, but I don’t waste my time trying to kill thieves either.

Out of interest, are you running sub 80 exotic chars? Ive never had a problem with permastealth thieves. But I didn’t play WvW until I was fully kitted. I have had problems, at least until I learnt how to play them, with GC thieves. Now I pretty much ignore perma stealth thieves and immediately turn and fight GC thieves.

lol. Your main is a thief. No wonder you don’t have problems. they can’t see you.

thiagoperne.7340:

Someone died in wvw.

So instead of you stop, think, and try to understand why you can’t handle someone playing thief class in pvp you’d rather waste your time making drama on forums. Fortunately most of the players don’t do that, because they’r smart.

I tought these “thread openers” had realize that if theres anything wrong with the class they would have nerfed already. Well give them some time to get that.

Well well. that’s original. I guess only thieves know how to play. Lol.

Waffler.1257:

Thieves can stay invisible forever if they want, so you won’t ever kill one in a 1v1 or even a 2v1 unless they let you.

This is untrue, I beat a thief in a 1v1 not 20 minutes ago in the Jumping Puzzle in Eternal Battlegrounds.

The best way to beat thieves is to roll one yourself so you can see how they work.

Marcarus.5012:

Fot the second time today I was defeated by a thief inside a castle and I can’t see them until they attack more than once. In both instances they had defeated another player and then myself.

The way to defeat thieves is to anticipate their attacks. Often you’ll find they are very overconfident in their class and in particular, its stealth mechanic. They think it’s an “I WIN” button. Not true. They generally C’n’D then backstab. It’s very basic and unskilled in my opinion. :P

I digress…

So, when they backstab then C’nD…pop retaliation, or get a daze or interrupt ability ready for them. Spamming your target button (default: tab I think) helps a lot too when you see them stealth.

Quite often they will Shadow Refuge when it looks like they’re gonna lose, you have to (I like to call it) “Play to their humanity.” When they refuge, DON’T HEAL. They’ll get overconfident and their instincts will kick in, “YES, I CAN FINISH THIS!” This is when they come in for the backstab again, completely wasting their Refuge stealth. Spam the target button until they pop up, then use your heal and finish them off.

I still say roll a thief for 30 or so levels, then maybe you’ll understand what I’m talking about a bit more.

Guys you are wasting your time. There are tons of threads like this and guess what…nothing is gonna happen. Devs don’t consider wvw balance important (hey you devs you could prove me wrong on this point eheh…). Anyway it’s too late to balance classes in this game, lots of work should be made and they are way too slow at making changes.
Ahah tonight i was fighting a thief while on my guardian. He attacked me from distance at first, spamming sb #1 like a boss. The strategy didn’t pay off much so he switched to melee. No luck for him sadly…perfect time for a shadow refuge. I pulled him off ofc but i couldn’t finish him fast enough…he stealthed again. Last time i spotted him he was running away while spamming c&d on random mobs to keep himself stealthed, no way to catch him ofc. Working as intended.

Burnfall.9573:

sostronk, i encourage you to post that to the theif forum and get back to me, please!!

Im tempted to try this just to see what is said. My impression is that the class specific areas are mostly taken up by sPVP players who would tell me that most WvW players are casuals and bad at PvP, which I would agree with.

The devs will start to care when they want to sell their first xpack.

Balance is never perfect, but I am fed up with packs of perma invis thieves gibbing people.

Months go by with nothing. Just way below par effort and quality.

dooger.2640:

The devs will start to care when they want to sell their first xpack.

Balance is never perfect, but I am fed up with packs of perma invis thieves gibbing people.

Months go by with nothing. Just way below par effort and quality.

Agreed. put your feedback on amazon. I’ve never seen such an imbalanced stealth mechanic in a pvp game. it’s laughable op’d.

Losing 2+ v 1 Thief?

Hit your “F” key over your ally when they get downed.

Unless the Thief hastes, he’s not getting the kill.

Galsia.4102

Losing 2+ v 1 Thief?
Hit your “F” key over your ally when they get downed.
Unless the Thief hastes, he’s not getting the kill

lol…both of ya will in downstate….:P

I think that only d/d thiefs are OP. And that is if you only have sub 16k health. (steal>CnD>backstab hits for roughly 16k)

I play a S/D thief and theres no way im OP and i dont win many 1v1s. (yes im probably a terrible player but thats okay)

CRO.7658:

I think that only d/d thiefs are OP. And that is if you only have sub 16k health. (steal>CnD>backstab hits for roughly 16k)

I play a S/D thief and theres no way im OP and i dont win many 1v1s. (yes im probably a terrible player but thats okay)

I have 1700 toughness and 20k health on my ranger, and I’ve seen it hit harder than that.

Be careful what you wish for.. or what you might see when thieves get revealed!

Fjandi.2516:

Guys you are wasting your time. There are tons of threads like this and guess what…nothing is gonna happen. Devs don’t consider wvw balance important (hey you devs you could prove me wrong on this point eheh…). Anyway it’s too late to balance classes in this game, lots of work should be made and they are way too slow at making changes.
Ahah tonight i was fighting a thief while on my guardian. He attacked me from distance at first, spamming sb #1 like a boss. The strategy didn’t pay off much so he switched to melee. No luck for him sadly…perfect time for a shadow refuge. I pulled him off ofc but i couldn’t finish him fast enough…he stealthed again. Last time i spotted him he was running away while spamming c&d on random mobs to keep himself stealthed, no way to catch him ofc. Working as intended.

Exactly my point. The thief ran away, he didn’t kill you, and the only thing you lost was the time spent kittening with him. Annoying? Yes. OP? No … because you knew what you were doing.

Cactus.2710:

. You’d also know that anytime we actually damage someone we come out of stealth for a few seconds, .

Until culling is fixed this is always going to be a disconnect. Players playing thieves see themselves come out of stealth on their screen and they feel like they are vulnerable, and should be easy to counter, not realizing they actually are not visible to other players in many instants on the opponents screen, and that all the opponent sees is the thief blink into existence for like one second, then is gone again.

Where does the fault lie with this, in the bug yes, but until the bug can be fixed – and so far its proving a very difficult one – they may have to consider balancing around it. Like making the Revealed debuff be 4 seconds, and then you are still going to get 3 as intended due to culling.

Columba.9730:

Waffler.1257:

Thieves can stay invisible forever if they want, so you won’t ever kill one in a 1v1 or even a 2v1 unless they let you. I would just suggest to build your char to have lots of toughness, vitality, healing and run to a group of allies or group of npc guards if you see a thief. This will cause the thief to run away in search of easier targets.

Clearly thieves are balanced when everyone either has to build bunker specs and run with groups to survive, lol.

Thieves are ultimate 1V1ers. This wouldn’t be an MMORPG without one. To compensate for their good 1v1, they aren’t really that good on the front lines.

They’re good however, if you completely ignore them. But any class is good if they’re ignored.

Marcarus.5012:

Fot the second time today I was defeated by a thief inside a castle and I can’t see them until they attack more than once. In both instances they had defeated another player and then myself. Apparently they have abilities that extend beyond a few seconds and can remain cloaked. My complaint is that they cannot be spotted for what seems like an 15 -20 seconds and apparently have full offensive capabilities to attack in addition to not being able to be spotted. Whats up with this? Why should I have to run for my life just because there is a thief in the area? If they just used resources to defeat another player then they shouldn’t have the advantage on another player who has full resources. What gives here, I read about this situation before, so it’s not that this is a unique occurrence?

And once you’ve spotted that thief he used his shield to block attacks for like 10 minutes while kicking you as* and eating a sandwich ?
If not he didn’t do well.

btw gratz for the daily “thief QQ post”.

Don’t post much but I kind of find it amusing that people defending thieves often advise others to roll one themselves and learn how to play like them to beat them. If that’s not an indication of OP (either currently from culling or whatnot), then what is?

I mean did you ever have to roll a ranger to know how to beat them??

Clifford.4913:

Don’t post much but I kind of find it amusing that people defending thieves often advise others to roll one themselves and learn how to play like them to beat them. If that’s not an indication of OP (either currently from culling or whatnot), then what is?

I mean did you ever have to roll a ranger to know how to beat them??

No, but you can learn to beat them way better if you did roll a ranger. Speaking of rangers, they’re the easiest class to counter.

Here’s why thiefs are so annoying- you can’t see them. I have no doubt at all that along with the culling fix sometime (this month, maybe) thiefs will get some sort of boost to counter the fact we might actually see them before they finish their one second macro that does 18-20k damage before you can blink or move with basilisk on you.

I love the l2p arguments, one day I will learn how to counter being unable to move or use any skills during that one second that it takes for them to wipe out almost all my HP whilst not being able to see them….

Actually that’s not what really annoys me about them, it’s this: mesmer dead inside bay. Thief wonders around in Bay, happily picking off NPCs. Kills players when they come past (didn’t expect to be attacked inside their own bay, it’s been ours for an hour..). Even when you do try and take him on, he just stealths away until you all get bored trying to find him and go do something more fun.

Uncounterable stealth is the worst mechanic in a game ever. At least bring in some ‘detect’ potions if you are going to bring in a stupid mechanic, or make it so if someone is in ‘stealth’ they move at 25% normal speed.

Victory.2879:

I love the l2p arguments, one day I will learn how to counter being unable to move or use any skills during that one second that it takes for them to wipe out almost all my HP whilst not being able to see them….

I totally agree that culling is quite a big issue when fighting thieves that are heavily relying on stealth, which is by far the most of all WvW thieves. When that’s said, you can actually dodge Basilisk Venom and thereby also dodging CnD and Steal. That’s over half of the damage negated, right there, in one dodge. This can be very hard to do due to culling, I’m not denying that. But most of the times I have found that players sometimes wonders around forgetting to either look back or just get tunnel vision on something. I’ve often ran up to a player without being stealthed and been able to run behind them for some time before they even noticed I was there. If you are not aware of your surroundings then I would say a 100b Warrior or 100nades Engineer is just as strong as thief, in terms of dealing a crazy amount of damage in very short time.

tl;dr: Culling is a big issue, but a lot of times you can avoid being bursted down (and this is by every profession that has a GC build) by being aware of your surroundings.

I agree, Mesmers are OP. I don’t know any of their skills and they always kill me. D/D eles too.

I also can’t do any damage to guardians.

Oh wait… theves you say? Nope. Easy and predictable. I just count to 3 and dodge when the thief runs at me after that. Or if they’re stealth, dash skill or block or count to 4 and dodge. If I’m low health they may finish me, same as any other glass cannon burst build, but that’s about it. The glass D/D theves die in seconds or are forced to run. If they do get their spike off I’m still half hp and nothing left for them to do except die or run.

The permastealth D/P theves do low damage and/or low survivability and use all their initiative staying hidden all the time.

Oh and culling sucks. Hopefully will be fixed in the update this month.

Heijincks.9267:

Thieves are ultimate 1V1ers.

They really aren’t.

1v1 depends on the tools you have at your disposal. Some class specific builds are impossible for others to beat 1v1 because they don’t have the correct tools. Sometimes neither player has the correct tools or they both have them, which results in a stalemate that goes on indefinitely until someone makes a mistake or the futility of it makes one or both players give up.

Dagger/dagger/shortbow burst Thief vs a double or triple meditations sword/focus Guardian is a very very bad 1vs1 for the Thief player.

The best you can really hope for is to keep resetting the fight, keep coming back and hope you drop the best Thieves Guild ever whilst the Guardian player is sneezing IRL during a lag spike.

I know it has been dismissed already by a number of players but playing a class you have difficulty with is a really good way to understand how it works. Then when you have to fight that class, you know how it works, what its capable of, what its weaknesses are.

I think some players are conflating 2x separate issues – d/d thief burst play and getting ganked. If you see it coming, most classes have plenty of tools to deal with it as long as you aren’t super glass cannon. If you don’t see it coming and react too late then theres pretty much nothing you can do about it. You got ganked.

Its pretty much the same as getting immobilized from behind, bulls charge, hundred blades. Pretty easy to deal with if you can see it coming because the animation is fairly obvious if you ever play a Warrior but its rage inducing when you don’t.

Same deal with getting ganked by a shatter mesmer. You get hit with 12 stacks out of nowhere and you destroy yourself when you try to teleport away.

In every example I can think of, if you are prepared for something, you can deal with it. But WvW is a game with loads of people running around and sometimes you will just get ganked. Just take it on the chin, run back and take comfort in the fact that if the guy that killed you is a glass d/d thief running around WvW on his own, then hes probably died alot more than you have.

Waffler.1257:

Hexin.5603:

Not true, even traited with gear for duration, thieves have a window open on CD’s. Often will leverage CnD on npc’s in the area not to use there utilities.

Here’s one of the first videos I found on Youtube by typing in perma stealth thief, please point out where the CD window is that you can see the thief to attack.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSbw8Cpy-3s

I read people saying this doesn’t work any longer, I can assure you it does work but it gains a thief 0 advantage, all the traits go to extra iniative (thief’s energy), which means less healing/damage output in order to maintain the stealth. Attacking someone ALWAYS reveals you.. the “perma stealth” shown in this video is 100% useless. You aren’t attacking, you aren’t able to cap something.. you’re able to stay cloaked and that’s about it. It’s not worth the loss of traits to keep perma cloaked like that, because once you’re visible, you’ll likely die instantly.

Like I already said 1000 times before.. I agree in some situations stealth is OP.. mostly when a thief uses Shadow Refuge.. because that basically resets a fight. I don’t use Shadow Refuge on my thief because it takes away all skill literally, drop low on health? No problem, Shadow Refuge & get out..

Thief is so much more fun if you play without it, it means there is no room for error, one mistake kills you.

Thieves can kill 30+ zergs with one single strike if you see one in the open fields type /bow and move on, but you should be aware that the thief can teleport across the whole map infinitely whenever he wants so you might not be able to escape.

also they have a ability that kills you when you get into their LOS.

Bow to the masterclass and leave in awe !

Zephyrus.9680:

I agree, Mesmers are OP. I don’t know any of their skills and they always kill me. D/D eles too.

I also can’t do any damage to guardians.

Oh wait… theves you say? Nope. Easy and predictable. I just count to 3 and dodge when the thief runs at me after that. Or if they’re stealth, dash skill or block or count to 4 and dodge. If I’m low health they may finish me, same as any other glass cannon burst build, but that’s about it. The glass D/D theves die in seconds or are forced to run. If they do get their spike off I’m still half hp and nothing left for them to do except die or run.

The permastealth D/P theves do low damage and/or low survivability and use all their initiative staying hidden all the time.

Oh and culling sucks. Hopefully will be fixed in the update this month.

Might be the cause…

Thiefs can constantly one hit,evade,stealth,full hp,over and over and over and over,and you will not hit them once.The class has certain builds that are completely broken and unbalanced,yet anet doesn’t seem to think so since they are still not balanced out 7 months later.Its the most dumbest and broken class available in this game.

True true

Guess I should learn how a class works before complaining that I can’t fight it.