Guild Wars 2

Stealth is one of the strongest offenses and defenses a character can have. It can allow you to avoid damage, except for lucky AoEs and melee attacks, and it can also allow you to move unseen by the enemy, giving you the chance to make a clean get away or launch your strongest attack, without the enemy having the chance to avoid it.

That being said, i understand that for some classes, thief in particular, that stealth is their main defensive ability, thats all well and good but when the class has unlimited access to it ( black powder + heart seeker comes to mind) it can get pretty ridiculous. Add in heal while stealthed and condition removal on top of being able to move freely, avoid attacks and being able to land their strongest attack, back stabs for 7k on reasonable armor anyone?

Lets put aside my thoughts on how this game was obviously balanced by some kind of house hold furniture, you may have a different opinion, or you may agree with me. I have two suggestions to change stealth mechanics to make it more balanced with other defenses.

1.Damage knocks the player out of stealth, theres a 1 second grace period when entering stealth, any damage received within the one second will not place you out of stealth.
~or~
2.The revealed buff is upped to 4 seconds long and is received every time you exit stealth.

i guess i should state my class: necromancer. Id gladly trade DS for stealth every 10 seconds…You can be over 70% life force and your normal HP will still recieve damage nowadays..“yay”

Agree completely. Thieves can do too many things at once with little cost.

Sororita.3465:

Stealth is one of the strongest offenses and defenses a character can have. It can allow you to avoid damage, except for lucky AoEs and melee attacks, and it can also allow you to move unseen by the enemy, giving you the chance to make a clean get away or launch your strongest attack, without the enemy having the chance to avoid it.

That being said, i understand that for some classes, thief in particular, that stealth is their main defensive ability, thats all well and good but when the class has unlimited access to it ( black powder + heart seeker comes to mind) it can get pretty ridiculous. Add in heal while stealthed and condition removal on top of being able to move freely, avoid attacks and being able to land their strongest attack, back stabs for 7k on reasonable armor anyone?

Lets put aside my thoughts on how this game was obviously balanced by some kind of house hold furniture, you may have a different opinion, or you may agree with me. I have two suggestions to change stealth mechanics to make it more balanced with other defenses.

1.Damage knocks the player out of stealth, theres a 1 second grace period when entering stealth, any damage received within the one second will not place you out of stealth.
~or~
2.The revealed buff is upped to 4 seconds long and is received every time you exit stealth.

i guess i should state my class: necromancer. Id gladly trade DS for stealth every 10 seconds…You can be over 70% life force and your normal HP will still recieve damage nowadays..“yay”

stealth is highly annoying but not very effective. Its best for running away, which has very little value in objective based gaming. Also, canceling stealth is too strong a card to pull. it would mean thief could never use any stealth skills in pvp. And to be honest with the amount of aoe, its pretty hard not to get hit by it in any group fight, (90% of wvw fights)

there is a reason nobody asks for more thieves in their zergs, there is a reason in spvp, they are relegated to harasser and capping points no one is holding, there is a reason you rarely see lfm thief in group finder. and its because although thief doesnt make you feel good to fight, its pretty low teir as far as its actual ability to do anything.

theif, low teir in power, high teir in hatred since forever

read the December 10 patch notes, much of the thief perma stealth ability if getting nerfed through nerfing there initiative regain

denimdan.8642:

read the December 10 patch notes, much of the thief perma stealth ability if getting nerfed through nerfing there initiative regain

This. Plus I don’t think any necromancer should complain. Condition necro is really strong (as conditions in general are strong in the first place), and if you’re getting killed by thieves consistently 1v1 then that’s not an issue with the class, but rather yourself. Plus necromancer actually is very strong in the zerg as well (power build mostly), can’t say the same for thieves.

Perma stealth will be gone for the most part after the patch, which is good, but thief hardly needs more nerfs than that.

denimdan.8642:

read the December 10 patch notes, much of the thief perma stealth ability if getting nerfed through nerfing there initiative regain

Actually, as pointed out by a dev in their forum, due to the overall initiative regain being upped, the slight nerf to the trait will have little to no effect.

I think stealth is actually pretty balanced. Like others have noted, it’s only true value is shown when escaping. I have no issue predicting and killing a thief on multiple classes when stealth is used offensively.

The one thing I would alter, is that when a stealth player is hit by a melee attack, their cloaked form (the invisible man) is shown for a brief instant. The same form you see when grouped with them/pve.

This would make sense, seeing as when you connect with a melee attack, you would feel the impact/resistance on the person.

My 2 copper~

Okaishi.8320:

denimdan.8642:

read the December 10 patch notes, much of the thief perma stealth ability if getting nerfed through nerfing there initiative regain

This. Plus I don’t think any necromancer should complain. Condition necro is really strong (as conditions in general are strong in the first place), and if you’re getting killed by thieves consistently 1v1 then that’s not an issue with the class, but rather yourself. Plus necromancer actually is very strong in the zerg as well (power build mostly), can’t say the same for thieves.

Perma stealth will be gone for the most part after the patch, which is good, but thief hardly needs more nerfs than that.

I still come across some godly thieves that can take on 5-6 people (average to really good), kill them all and vanish into the scenery with no less than 50% HP. Not as often as it used to happen but stealth is still broken for those that know how to use it.

Araris.7839:

Actually, as pointed out by a dev in their forum, due to the overall initiative regain being upped, the slight nerf to the trait will have little to no effect

It will definitely have an effect on d/p thieves. During the duration of black powder, they will passively regain one more initiative from the buff. However, they lose 6 additional initiative from using their heartseeker 4 times through the black powder (that much is required for perma stealth), as only the first heartseeker will refund 2 iniative. So the normal combo in black powder will drain 5 more iniative, which means it will make it impossible for the usual 0/30/30/10/0 build to achieve permastealth through the d/p weaponset.

Julie Yann.5379:

I still come across some godly thieves that can take on 5-6 people (average to really good), kill them all and vanish into the scenery with no less than 50% HP. Not as often as it used to happen but stealth is still broken for those that know how to use it.

Those 5 players are not even average then, they’d have to quite bad to be beaten by a single thief, no matter how good the person is. I’ve watched a lot of thief videos, outnumbered and all, I’ve roamed a lot myself and I’m not too bad of a thief either, and never does either of them involve beating good players in a 1v3+ scenario.

Julie Yann.5379:

This. Plus I don’t think any necromancer should complain. Condition necro is really strong (as conditions in general are strong in the first place)

I main an ele and a guardian, and play all the other classes regularly to keep in shape and getting to know the current cookie cutter builds and try out some fun stuff sometimes. D/P thieves are cheese and everyone abusing it currently should die in shame. It’s far from effective in terms of actually killing players, but super annoying to fight against if the thief does not commit himself to the fight but retreats frequently.
Most condition remove from thieves revolves around their healing spell (two of which remove 3 fixed conditions each) and stealth if they trait it. Also they can use some shadow step spells to remove conditions, but that requires them to return to the starting position of their shadow step (indicated the white circles on the ground).

Condition specs can unload heavy condition pressure on a target without having a target – if a thief, relying on stealth for condition removal, gets condition pressure, it’s almost always gg for you. Power necros have some great defensive elements against thieves as well: blinds, untargetted AoE pressure, movement “indicators” via staff marks, hard cc via fears and warhorn #4, soft cc via snares (immobilize, weakening -> less dodging and direct damage output, chill) and so on.

Julie Yann.5379:

I still come across some godly thieves that can take on 5-6 people (average to really good), kill them all and vanish into the scenery with no less than 50% HP. Not as often as it used to happen but stealth is still broken for those that know how to use it.

It actually is not. Good opponents will give good thieves hard times in 1vs1; and especially in group fights thieves have a hard time if they don’t get support from boon-support builds because there is so much AoE going on.

If you’d tell me, some PU mesmer specs out there are brokenly overpowered, then I’d totally agree with you (almost guaranteed aegis and protection via stealth while phantasms and clones do damage and apply heavy condition pressure); but stealth on thieves? Either hard to play for them if you know how to counter them (especially D/D thieves), or just silly (D/P – but lacks the damage output) and not worth the time and effort.

As always please remember: turn around and try to face the (invisible) thief. If he cannot hit you from behind or from the side, more than 50% of the damage potential is gone. PBAoE blind also helps if the thief is stealthed and wants to backstab you or if he wants to use Cloak&Dagger on you.

Okaishi.8320:

Araris.7839:

Actually, as pointed out by a dev in their forum, due to the overall initiative regain being upped, the slight nerf to the trait will have little to no effect

It will definitely have an effect on d/p thieves. During the duration of black powder, they will passively regain one more initiative from the buff. However, they lose 6 additional initiative from using their heartseeker 4 times through the black powder (that much is required for perma stealth), as only the first heartseeker will refund 2 iniative. So the normal combo in black powder will drain 5 more iniative, which means it will make it impossible for the usual 0/30/30/10/0 build to achieve permastealth through the d/p weaponset.

Julie Yann.5379:

I still come across some godly thieves that can take on 5-6 people (average to really good), kill them all and vanish into the scenery with no less than 50% HP. Not as often as it used to happen but stealth is still broken for those that know how to use it.

Those 5 players are not even average then, they’d have to quite bad to be beaten by a single thief, no matter how good the person is. I’ve watched a lot of thief videos, outnumbered and all, I’ve roamed a lot myself and I’m not too bad of a thief either, and never does either of them involve beating good players in a 1v3+ scenario.

I knew those players in one instance and they aren’t bad a all. They ranged from average to good. It started by him fight 2, then 2 more showed up I showed up mid fight to help them out and I am a very experienced WvW roaming player. After several mins there was only me and him left and the way him vanished, shadowstepped, dodged etc. made it impossible to keep enough pressure on him to bring his health. He might have been botting for all I know, I rarely see a thief that good. yes, stealth can still be OP in the hands of a really good player (or cheater).

Stealth has been broken in every MMO I’ve played. It’s completely idiotic to give unchecked invisibility in a setting where knowing where your opponent is is 90% of the battle. The rogue archetype is ALWAYS kittenedly overpowered because stealth itself is overpowered. It should have been abandoned long ago, but sadly, there are too many people who get off on facerolling invisible characters for devs to risk not including it.

I still think the problem is shadow refuge. I have no problem with the short duration stealths of thieves mesmers or engi. The problem is shadow refuge can give up to 15 seconds of stealth. Virtually every single thief in the entire history of gw2 uses shadow refuge. It is a absolute must have utility for any build. Doesn’t that tell you something is overpowered when 100% of people playing the class use that utility. I feel its stronger than any other skill in the game even elites and it only has a 1 min cooldown.

Wait so, you play a necro? One of the strongest classes currently (didn’t a whole bunch of people quit pvp because of dhuumfire?(which didn’t get nerfed in wvw)), who can also spam a bunch of aoe, and you want thieves to be revealed if they take damage in stealth?

Would you like us to also /sleep every time we come across another player too?

Maybe it’s not the classes that’s over powered, but you who is underpowered.

Julie Yann.5379:

I knew those players in one instance and they aren’t bad a all. They ranged from average to good. It started by him fight 2, then 2 more showed up I showed up mid fight to help them out and I am a very experienced WvW roaming player. After several mins there was only me and him left and the way him vanished, shadowstepped, dodged etc. made it impossible to keep enough pressure on him to bring his health. He might have been botting for all I know, I rarely see a thief that good. yes, stealth can still be OP in the hands of a really good player (or cheater).

If 5 people don’t manage to pressure a thief enough during the 3 seconds of revealed then they simply aren’t good players. Sorry, but it’s as simple as that. Stuns, immobilizes, heavy burst, any of that will work. If they can’t do that much it means they aren’t capable in the slightest.

Like maeggle said, a single good player can pressure the thief heavily whenever he goes revealed. It’s the difference between them and bad players that don’t know how to handle thieves and run in panic after taking a single backstab.

dreztina.4820:

Stealth has been broken in every MMO I’ve played. It’s completely idiotic to give unchecked invisibility in a setting where knowing where your opponent is is 90% of the battle. The rogue archetype is ALWAYS kittenedly overpowered because stealth itself is overpowered. It should have been abandoned long ago, but sadly, there are too many people who get off on facerolling invisible characters for devs to risk not including it.

I’ll believe that there’s been players in every MMO who couldn’t be bothered to learn how to deal with stealth and instead complain repeatedly. Facerolling only happens to the ignorant.

It is good to see all the new people that the leagues have brought to WvW. This thread reminds me of a year ago. Newer players in general have trouble with stealth and that is understandable. What you will learn as you play more.

1. Stealth is used for roaming. Chain stealthing is the issue and that is what is getting nerfed in december.
2. Stealth, other than a mesmer veil, is not very valuable for zerg fighting.

Chuck Zitto.2367:

I still think the problem is shadow refuge. I have no problem with the short duration stealths of thieves mesmers or engi. The problem is shadow refuge can give up to 15 seconds of stealth. Virtually every single thief in the entire history of gw2 uses shadow refuge. It is a absolute must have utility for any build. Doesn’t that tell you something is overpowered when 100% of people playing the class use that utility. I feel its stronger than any other skill in the game even elites and it only has a 1 min cooldown.

No! Popularity of a utility skill for a profession doesn’t mean it’s overpowered. Every profession has popular utilities. You will have a hard time weeding through mesmers not running decoy, necros rarely don’t run epidemic, eles almost always have 1 cantrip on their bar, Endure pain is probably on almost every warriors bar.

Chuck Zitto.2367:

I still think the problem is shadow refuge. I have no problem with the short duration stealths of thieves mesmers or engi.

Imho this is a valid point. Long duration stealth (especially perma-stealth) in a setting where you can enter and exit stealth multiple times in a short period of time is kinda ridiculous.

Chuck Zitto.2367:

It is a absolute must have utility for any build.

I don’t slot it most of the time, because there are many better utilities for different builds and play styles. It is a nice utility in team fights with a squishy co-player, but comes at the cost of an additional stun break, venom or sigil. Shadow refuge’s effect is also hard-countered by some CC (i.e. knock-back, blowout, pull and push). Unfortunately some classes don’t have reliable CC-skills against it, but shadow refuge also works like a soft CC against the thief or his allies in such a way, that you know he cannot leave the circle without getting the “revealed”-debuff. Put down some AoE pressure or run in circles while using a cleaving auto attack to find the cloaked enemies – Just try to play builds and classes you find hard to fight to find out about their shortcomings and counters. Many players know them and will use them – just watch and learn, or try to find it out yourself.

Sororita.3465:

1.Damage knocks the player out of stealth, theres a 1 second grace period when entering stealth, any damage received within the one second will not place you out of stealth.
~or~
2.The revealed buff is upped to 4 seconds long and is received every time you exit stealth.

I would tweak these slightly…

Instead of any damage knocking you out of stealth, make it a certain amount of damage. For instance, if the thief takes more than 15% of their health in damage, they are revealed. Or maybe if they are hit a certain number of times, like 5 times. That way the thieves can still do what they do, but they can’t just stand around since there’s a possibility to be removed from stealth by anyone. The danger there is that it makes it more difficult to use when AoE is all over the floor and thieves may be reliant on their stealth to help them get through that kind of stuff.

I also wouldn’t set the revealed debuff that long, but I would have it apply every time stealth is exited, whether the thief attacks or not. I don’t really understand why the devs have supported chain stealthing all this time, and I was disappointed when they put in on the block for an update and then took it out at the last minute. If all the mobs and critters were removed from maps and you couldn’t do it off seige, then it wouldn’t be as bad, but I still think it’s completely silly, especially since you can’t do anything about it once they’re in it.

The only other thing that could be done is a larger number of stealth countering abilities in the game, similar to what they did with the ranger’s sic ‘em ability. I don’t think they should be all over the place, but if a few more professions had access to such things (i.e. engineer mines apply revealed), it would lessen any necessity there may be for nerfing stealth.

The problem with Stealth, and the OP touched on it in some points, is that it is EVERYTHING to a Thief.

Good game design is to force players to make decisions, trade-offs if you so like.

But Stealth in its current incarnation does not encourage this. Instead it is always the best thing to do.

• Stealth removes Conditions
• Stealth heals
• Stealth makes you invisible
• Stealth sets up your burst damage
• Stealth Blinds your enemies
• Stealth (can) increase your Initiative regeneration
• Stealth increases your movement speed
• etc.

Point being, going Stealth is ALWAYS the best possible choice for a Thief. He doesn’t have to make choices about offensive or defensive pressure. All he has to do is ensure he can Stealth as reliably and as frequently as possible.

Good game design would be to force this choice.

A Thief should have to chose between applying offensive pressure, or using Stealth as a defensive measure.

On that note, using Stealth should deplete Initiative…not add to it. Assuming cheaper offensive moves this forces a Thief to chose between offensive and defensive utility. And that’s good game design.

Dee Jay.2460:

Good game design is to force players to make decisions, trade-offs if you so like.

Thieves, rangers and necros in their most popular builds have the least efficient condition removal tools at their hands. One condition every three seconds with the current clusterkitten of condition spam which some classes can put out every few seconds is just insufficient. The healing skill which removes burning, bleeding and poison is on a 30 seconds CD. Most ways to enter stealth are either high cooldown spells or cost a lot of initiative (this does not apply to most defensive D/P builds, which will fortunately be corrected in December anyways). D/D thieves can use C’n’D but it is very unreliable and susceptible to positioning (especially range and LoS against gap closers), blinds, blocks and evades at 6 initiative per activation. D/P cannot do anything else than using backstab, which might hit hard, but perma-stealth builds have no room for optimal damage output anyways. (heartseeker-spam does laughable damage if you just turn around instead of running away from the thief)

Dee Jay.2460:

• Stealth removes Conditions
• Stealth heals
• Stealth makes you invisible
• Stealth sets up your burst damage
• Stealth Blinds your enemies
• Stealth (can) increase your Initiative regeneration
• Stealth increases your movement speed
• etc.

You have to trait for it, which means a somewhat defensive play style (e.g. 0/30/30/10/0). My D/D ele has a higher spike potential with a more defensive build (stats, boons and utilities)… just lacks the stealth if no smoke field or AE-stealthing friend is around.

Dee Jay.2460:

Point being, going Stealth is ALWAYS the best possible choice for a Thief.

You haven’t fought a (decent) S/P-thief then, I guess.

Dee Jay.2460:

He doesn’t have to make choices about offensive or defensive pressure. All he has to do is ensure he can Stealth as reliably and as frequently as possible.

Believe it or not, as a D/D-thief you are not that great at stealthing as some would think. C’n’D-rotation is obvious in most cases and the stealthing healing skill has a long casting animation which one could try to interrupt.

Dee Jay.2460:

On that note, using Stealth should deplete Initiative…not add to it.

This issue doesn’t apply to most effective builds. D/P won’t be that effective as a troll build after 10. december, and does almost no damage anyways. C’n’D, black powder, heartseeker and cluster bomb already come at a very high price if the fight does not only last 3 seconds – please keep that in mind always when arguing against stealth itself.
I think we can agree that there are some broken mechanics currently, but if Anet will deploy the announced changes, this issue will be fixed in a clean and effective way.

Stealth is not a problem for experienced players

I don’t think stealth is a problem. Do I wish it was implemented differently? Yes.

I think the problem is the thiefs ability to pull of an 8k, 3k, then heart seeker the foe down. (For you pro players saying dodge the head seeker…. duh. But any competent theif will wait for you to blow your dodge or escape skill) all that said, if you make the tier mess up 2 times during the fight, they’re dead.

clint.5681:

Stealth is not a problem for experienced players

I disagree, I have been playing since beta, and stealth is a problem. It is OPed and has been since day one. You can not have a class that can go stealth almost an entire fight.

World Warcraft did it fairly good for balancing stealth.

I have no problem with massive burst damage, and having some stealth to escape, but not all the time, along with stealthed finisher moves on top of it.

Stealth is only annoying but not difficult to deal with a player that is using it.

It is fine as it is. I have no problems with it and have learned how to deal with such tactics in relation to my build. I’ve even played a thief to learn how the class functions so I have an excellent understanding of what is going to happen or what that thief is about to try. You should also do the same instead of asking for changes to suit your defficiencies.

The only change to any kind of stealth is after a stealth stomp has been completed, that person stomping from stealth should get the revealed debuff after the stomp has been completed just like all other attacks from stealth.

Thief is the main user of stealth. The high burst Perma stealth dp thief spec will be nerfed dec 10 and thief will no longer be able to perma stealth as they are now. Honesty though the spec compared to many other things is not op but incredibly annoying.

kelman.9451:

clint.5681:

Stealth is not a problem for experienced players

I disagree, I have been playing since beta, and stealth is a problem. It is OPed and has been since day one. You can not have a class that can go stealth almost an entire fight.

World Warcraft did it fairly good for balancing stealth.

I have no problem with massive burst damage, and having some stealth to escape, but not all the time, along with stealthed finisher moves on top of it.

Thieves need to stealth to finish since they have no stability besides an elite skill and a limited health pool most of the time. Thieves don’t have the armor or health to tank people hitting them while stomping.

Honestly, your class should not have a problem 1v1ing thieves. Most thieves have to trait into getting condi removal every three seconds of stealth. With how many conditons, AOEs, and wells a necro has, he should of no problem dealing with a thief. My thief is in valkyrie gear and only has 16k health with no buffs. Seeing a necro complaining about thieves being annoying is hilarious.

Okaishi.8320:

Julie Yann.5379:

I knew those players in one instance and they aren’t bad a all. They ranged from average to good. It started by him fight 2, then 2 more showed up I showed up mid fight to help them out and I am a very experienced WvW roaming player. After several mins there was only me and him left and the way him vanished, shadowstepped, dodged etc. made it impossible to keep enough pressure on him to bring his health. He might have been botting for all I know, I rarely see a thief that good. yes, stealth can still be OP in the hands of a really good player (or cheater).

If 5 people don’t manage to pressure a thief enough during the 3 seconds of revealed then they simply aren’t good players. Sorry, but it’s as simple as that. Stuns, immobilizes, heavy burst, any of that will work. If they can’t do that much it means they aren’t capable in the slightest.

Like maeggle said, a single good player can pressure the thief heavily whenever he goes revealed. It’s the difference between them and bad players that don’t know how to handle thieves and run in panic after taking a single backstab.

dreztina.4820:

Stealth has been broken in every MMO I’ve played. It’s completely idiotic to give unchecked invisibility in a setting where knowing where your opponent is is 90% of the battle. The rogue archetype is ALWAYS kittenedly overpowered because stealth itself is overpowered. It should have been abandoned long ago, but sadly, there are too many people who get off on facerolling invisible characters for devs to risk not including it.

I’ll believe that there’s been players in every MMO who couldn’t be bothered to learn how to deal with stealth and instead complain repeatedly. Facerolling only happens to the ignorant.

I wasn’t talking about your average/good thief, I have fought plenty of those, I have killed many in my WvW career but I have never seen anybody move like this guy I wish I would have been recording at the time. Maybe some of you thieves could have debunked what happened. If he wasn’t cheating then Stealth is still OP beyond belief in the right hands. If in those 3 seconds of reveal he is throwing you a blind, or evade, or that ridiculous sword skill, good luck keeping the pressure on.

Even with my “OP Warrior” I can’t take on 5 and survive unless they are all seriously upleveled.

As much as stealth spamming thieves annoy me, the fact that you’re a necro automatically invalidates your entire argument. Necro is almost as OP as warrior, you should have no trouble whatsoever with any kind of thief no matter how good he is. I honestly thought this was some kind of troll thread at first. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a necro lose to a thief since necros got all their ridiculous buffs. You’ll either kill him, or he’ll run away. He absolutely shouldn’t be able to kill you unless you’re walking around naked and untraited. Did you change your build and forget to redistribute your trait points after refunding them? That could be the problem. Make sure you spent all your trait points.

Original Guild Wars did so good with Assassins. They didn’t have stealth, they had shadow steps and good mobility.

- and now with Guild Wars 2 they just had to cater to the already bad stealthing classes…

I wish World of Roguecraft videos would’ve reached out more than it did.

As a thief, I can honestly say that the way stealth is done in this game is horribly overpowered. I can’t recall another game where you can instantly stealth inthe middle of combat or never get knocked out of stealth by damage. Decent thieves don’t rely on cheesy high stealth mechanics because it puts the game on easy mode for us. As a thief, I encourage you to keep feeding your issues with this cheese design to anet.

I would like to see revealed being given whenever you spend initiative from a stealthed state…..Doesn’t it make sense?

No More self sustaining stealth blast finishers. If a thief wants longer stealth they need to blow a utility/heal in tandem with a stealth weapon skill. They could use it to escape but not constantly reset fights, which I feel is the major problem players are dealing with.

Stealth should last 8 sec, 300 sec cool down and -50% movement speed in stealth and you would lose stealth if you use some skill.

I still see the only real problem as shadow refuge. Next update thieves are gonna have a much harder if not impossible time trying to perma stealth. Short duration stealths are fine. Perma stealth and 15 second long shadow refuge stealth is not. Shadow refuge is like a 99.99% get out of jail free card every minute. Seriously the times I have killed a thief who used SR or the times I have died on my thief after using SR is like 1 out of 1000 times. Nearly every single thief in the game uses this utility its op face it.

I think even most thieves are glad to see perma-stealth being nerfed (and it is — the increase to base initiative gain is a drop in the bucket, compared to the losses this spec is eating). The thief spec that isn’t being nerfed is dagger offhand, D/D and P/D. Those rely on Cloak and Dagger to get into stealth. You can counter that most of the time.

As for Shadow Refuge, it’s like every other neat ability in the game — it’s useless against players who know how to counter it. Keep in mind that, for the thief to get that long lasting stealth, he has to sit there for quite a while (if he leaves before the little house graphic vanishes, he reappears). When you know the thief is standing in a small area, and he can neither move it nor attack you without revealing himself, most classes have a way to turn that right around (when I’m fighting another thief, I just switch to shortbow and poison/ clusterbomb the circle).

The problem i have with shadow refuge is that by the time theyve use it, i’ve already exhausted my mark fear and im unable to deny them from standing in there. Even spamming all my other marks isnt enough damage to down them.

From what i gather stated in this thread this is a completely learn to play issue and as a necro i should be downing every single person i come across without any problem what so ever. Personally i think thats entirely wrong myself. A well played thief should always be able to beat a necromancer, not saying i dont down my fair amount of thieves but when theyre played properly theres hardly anything one can do.

Their combined dodges,vigor, endurance regen,stuns, condition removal, stealth, movement and blinds out weighs my fears, basic two dodges,regen, my pitiful life steal and my death shroud. As a thief, could you imagine if you could only go stealth every 10 seconds and have to take 30 trait points for it to effectively work or be stuck at using no stealth for an extended amount of time?

Thats what its like, thief goes stealth, 7-10k backstab and then rinse and repeat throwing in blinds, heartseekers to stay on target and passive condition removals/heals.

Deathshroud nerfs and pitiful life siphoning all made it so much harder to fight thieves, maybe im playing the wrong class. No wonder you only see necros at the back of zergs and rarely at that.

Buns, necros are easily the most popular caster at the moment in WvW. Wellmancers are THE damage of a zerg. Even condibombers are useful to pick off people with low health.

My suggestion is to wait to use your fear mark. And anytime a thief goes stealth on you count to three and dodge. Or use your elite and blind spam them.

As a thief I have hated fighting necros for ages due to your DS. While it has been nerfed it still acts as a second health pool that absorbs a ton of damage. Necros are some of the most powerful zergers and roamers atm. Thieves are the other one. So you are just going to have to deal with it.

Also, a perma stealth thief is built entirely around it, so your comparison of having to out 30 trait points into something to even use it is a bad argument.

Seriously? This has to stop.

Thief is incredibly squishy unless he builds for defense, in which case he does no damage. Stealth is a thiefs only defense in wvw, the evade builds are really only effective 1v1. Without regen and condition cleansing in stealth, a thief will be pretty much useless anywhere in wvw. He will die to everyone and everything(except noobs).

Personally I have never understood this intense hatred for stealth. I understand how it works, how to counter it, and how most thieves use it. I find it much easier to deal with than a number of other profession mechanics.

Thieves are so easy to kill, I always target them first, and they usually die first in a skirmish(unless they manage to get away, in which case they are out of the battle and not helping their team). I actually am happy to see thieves in the enemy numbers, because I know it means they will go down fast.

I just can’t fathom how anyone can still complain about stealth after the culling fix and the incoming nerfs to black powder. You know what is nerf worthy? Perplexity engineers, PU/clone on dodge mesmers, knockdown warriors/guardians, and condition Necro damage. Thieves are cake compared to these.

Your suggestions would kill thieves in pvp, period.

After the number of nerfs that thieves have received over the last year and are continuing to receive, if you are having trouble killing them it really is a learn to play issue. This is coming from someone who also plays a Necro mainly. Thieves are easy to kill.

Oh and 7k backstabs on a target with armor? Please.

If a thief is built to deal that much damage, a sneeze will kill him. A slight breeze.

Stx.4857:

Oh and 7k backstabs on a target with armor? Please.

If a thief is built to deal that much damage, a sneeze will kill him. A slight breeze.

As a thief, i can do that and remain stealthed. try again. this class is hated for a few reasons. 1) perma stealth and very high dps makes killing enemies risk free; 2) whenever anyone points out the exploitive nature of perma stealth (anet used the term abused mechanic for perma stealth), my thief brethren just chanted L2P – well our foes are getting even now so thanks for that, arrogant thief players; 3) ability to disengage from a fight when losing – makes this class extremely hated. Some of us want good things for this class, but as long as thieves can kill without risks because of cheesy specs, anet will continue to keep us in the cellar.

Sanduskel.1850:

As a thief, I can honestly say that the way stealth is done in this game is horribly overpowered. I can’t recall another game where you can instantly stealth inthe middle of combat or never get knocked out of stealth by damage. Decent thieves don’t rely on cheesy high stealth mechanics because it puts the game on easy mode for us. As a thief, I encourage you to keep feeding your issues with this cheese design to anet.

You just come in at every topic about thieves to complain about (perma)stealth, it’s funny. I’m glad they’re fixing permastealth, but after that it’s fine. You know the one viable thief build in spvp/tpvp? No, it’s not d/d or d/p. Stealth adds some safety while roaming, and it’s a good tool versus multiple baddies that can’t figure out how to predict a thief. That’s the only thing that it has going for it, otherwise it’s too useless a tool for people to get so upset with. But hey, those zerglings running back to their blob have to complain about something.

Honestly, you’re obsessed with the topic stealth, and your argument “as a thief” (which is one of your favourite phrases as well) means nothing as you obviously hardly ever bother with stealth anyway.

Sanduskel.1850:

Stx.4857:

Oh and 7k backstabs on a target with armor? Please.

If a thief is built to deal that much damage, a sneeze will kill him. A slight breeze.

As a thief, i can do that and remain stealthed.

You can backstab for 7k without getting revealed? I applaud you.

Sanduskel.1850:

Stx.4857:

Oh and 7k backstabs on a target with armor? Please.

If a thief is built to deal that much damage, a sneeze will kill him. A slight breeze.

As a thief, i can do that and remain stealthed. try again. this class is hated for a few reasons. 1) perma stealth and very high dps makes killing enemies risk free; 2) whenever anyone points out the exploitive nature of perma stealth (anet used the term abused mechanic for perma stealth), my thief brethren just chanted L2P – well our foes are getting even now so thanks for that, arrogant thief players; 3) ability to disengage from a fight when losing – makes this class extremely hated. Some of us want good things for this class, but as long as thieves can kill without risks because of cheesy specs, anet will continue to keep us in the cellar.

That is exact;y why they are hated so much. Also because they often sneak up on you unseen with a surprise attack while your are busy fighting someone else or at a vista or mining a node. Cowards without honor, the whole lot of them (well 90% of them) There are some respectable ones out there that will stand up to you face to face. Those I enjoy fighting.

Wait. We are supposed to inform people wish to fight them? In WvW? Lolwut?

My hate is for the crazy p/d Thief, the ones who hit you then vanish – blinding you – then hit again… rinse and repeat until you are either dead or run away. No way to fight back.

Stx.4857:

Oh and 7k backstabs on a target with armor? Please.

I can hit as high as that with my D/D ele… if the enemies are stacked it will hit up to 5 targets for a total of 20-40k. Well of suffering, traited life explosion and lich form #1 from a well-specced power necro can do the same from 600 – 1200 range. A balanced shatter mesmer build is able AoE-damage ~10k with a full mind wreck shatter.
Ele and necro don’t have access to stealth without assistance of their team, but they also are not as squishy as most thieves to be as effective. Stealth is powerful, yes. But so are the skills, traits and mechanics at your hands. Just use them wisely. Why waste your staff#5 if you know the thief hasn’t used his SR yet?

Julie Yann.5379:

That is exact;y why they are hated so much. Also because they often sneak up on you unseen with a surprise attack while your are busy fighting someone else or at a vista or mining a node. Cowards without honor, the whole lot of them (well 90% of them) There are some respectable ones out there that will stand up to you face to face. Those I enjoy fighting.

I agree that most thieves are just bad players – being successful against unexperienced players is so much easier when using stealth mechanics. But this also applies to condition spamming engi and necro faceroll builds and CC-heavy warrior builds. They are extremely effective against most players, but in contrast to condition and CC spam, stealth burst is more easily countered by blocks, dodging, blinding and movement (create gaps and turn around – don’t run away) because backstab has a range of only 130 units and requires the target to expose their back or flank for full damage (otherwise it hits like a wet noodle).

What you describe are situations in which the thief is super effective. He can focus a single target and put some heavy pressure on it if the team does not assist, but has a hard time if he gets pressured slightly.
There are many faceroll and troll builds around at the moment, for almost every class; I hate them and I don’t play them outside the sPvP lobby. D/D thief is none of them and requires some skill and experience to be effective against better players, while D/P is just cheese. The latter will be hit hard by the balance bat in a few weeks, which is great.

If the two players are on-par skillwise, the thief is almost always at a disadvantage.

Tibstrike.2974:

Wait. We are supposed to inform people wish to fight them? In WvW? Lolwut?

We can see any other class coming and that is the problem. Thieves aresenal is full of cheap shots and have zero respect for players choosing that playstyle and abusing those mechanics. Personally, I think that stealth cheapens the game and should have never been implemented the way it was.

Okaishi.8320:

Sanduskel.1850:

As a thief, I can honestly say that the way stealth is done in this game is horribly overpowered. I can’t recall another game where you can instantly stealth inthe middle of combat or never get knocked out of stealth by damage. Decent thieves don’t rely on cheesy high stealth mechanics because it puts the game on easy mode for us. As a thief, I encourage you to keep feeding your issues with this cheese design to anet.

You just come in at every topic about thieves to complain about (perma)stealth, it’s funny. I’m glad they’re fixing permastealth, but after that it’s fine. You know the one viable thief build in spvp/tpvp? No, it’s not d/d or d/p. Stealth adds some safety while roaming, and it’s a good tool versus multiple baddies that can’t figure out how to predict a thief. That’s the only thing that is has going for it, otherwise it’s too useless a tool for people to get so upset with. But hey, those zerglings running back to their blob have to complain about something.

Honestly, you’re obsessed with the topic stealth, and your argument “as a thief” (which is one of your favourite phrases as well) means nothing as you obviously hardly ever bother with stealth anyway.

Sanduskel.1850:

Stx.4857:

Oh and 7k backstabs on a target with armor? Please.

If a thief is built to deal that much damage, a sneeze will kill him. A slight breeze.

As a thief, i can do that and remain stealthed.

You can backstab for 7k without getting revealed? I applaud you.

Exhibit A. Another thief claiming that it’s all the fault of the “baddies.” Well those baddies are getting their revenge on our class. Just like the nerds laugh at the dumb jocks from high school who now clean toilets.

MarkedOne.1309:

maeggle.6021:

If the two players are on-par skillwise, the thief is almost always at a disadvantage.

Correct.
The thing is, it is rare to find good players on the same skill level.
Everyone complaining about stealth just did not learn how to counter ir or adapt.
Bottom of the barrel is complaining about thieves all over the forums and they are being heard. (the d/p nerf is justified and well deserved, though.)

Condi stealth mesmer, condi engi, necro + retal guard or condi war/ hammer war are just horrendously OP compared to any thief. Yet those classes still complain because they are horrible players who dont know how to play their classes and are calling for nerfs – the easy way out.

And yet another example. A a thief, this overweening arrogance against other “baddies” is embarassing. Why aren’t these baddies complaining the same way about other classes? Logic please.

Chuck Zitto.2367:

I still see the only real problem as shadow refuge. Next update thieves are gonna have a much harder if not impossible time trying to perma stealth. Short duration stealths are fine. Perma stealth and 15 second long shadow refuge stealth is not. Shadow refuge is like a 99.99% get out of jail free card every minute. Seriously the times I have killed a thief who used SR or the times I have died on my thief after using SR is like 1 out of 1000 times. Nearly every single thief in the game uses this utility its op face it.

SR is decent but 99.99% is super exaggeration or all you do is roaming. If you engage in ZvZ you’ll know the zerg > all. Even SR can’t save you from that.

Thief should win every 1 vs 1 fight. They really doesn’t have any kind of chance to lose.