Guild Wars 2

Hey people I recently used my leveling tomes to get my Thief from level 56 to level 80.. And since the only PVE I plan on doing is daily dungeons for the gold, I thought i’d ask you people for some advice for a newbie..

I’ve played around 30-40 matches as a d/p thief in Spvp, but frankly I am not really good.. I just end up spamming the black powder combo to go invis and use backstab, which doesnt do enough damage to kill anyone, and I often end up getting bursted down before killing anyone..

This is ofcourse due to my lack of skills..

I am very curious in trying S/D or D/D in WvW. Because some people told me to try things out myself..

But problem is, certain builds requires certain armour, runes and traits..

So what would you people recommend for someone who wants to play WvW (roaming or small groups)? Honestly I dont mind if its bit hard to learn.. As long as it is fun to play and most of all effective… But I would prefer if it was easier to try out..

Thanks alot for any tips!

PS : Is full zerker gear the most common gear to be used?

No thief expert, suffered a bit of the same as you. Thieves are mainly good for roaming in WvW, small groups of 1-5, and some of the best solos. The most common builds I see used are D/P power builds (mainly Berserk, with some mixes), and P/D condi builds (Mainly Dire, some mix with apotechary).

These two are very different from each others, and I’d try to play and get used to them in pvp first, before starting to buy all the equipment.

Most people that play WvW a lot, will either run "meta builds" or something similar, either from having come to similar conclusions from playing a whole lot, or because they’ve taken a Meta build and adapted it for their own preference and style. So take a look at this site to look at the most common thief builds, and see what you like, then try it in pvp to get a "taste" for it.

http://metabattle.com/wiki/MetaBattle_Wiki

Just don’t take it as the holy gospel or anything, sometimes they don’t fit your style, and you need to reinvent the wheel yourself.

Edit: Forgot to add, my main problem with playing thief is getting the key skills to hit, from other classes I’ve played, I’m not used to the larger time for activating certain skills, so I tend to flounder about and not hitting with the most important skills. Definitively something I need to practice on more.

The meta builds have some mistakes – if you opt for the trait executioner go full zerker (you need all critical chance you can get).
If you want to use hidden killer don’t use the trait side strike if you’re D/P (you won’t hit your enemy from the side and have a 100% crit chancewhen hitting from behind anyway).
Otherwise the builds are solid.

but what are you peoples opinions on S/D builds?

Haven’t played against many sword based thieves, I do love them for not running SA, thus making it a more fun fight for me on the other side. But I haven’t really tried a sword build yet myself (outside of pve). So I can’t really comment.

Though sword is better off with more power based stat sets of that is what you wondered about. I looked at one of the S/D meta builds, and saw a mix of berserk, soldier and valkyrie stats.

joneirikb.7506:

Haven’t played against many sword based thieves, I do love them for not running SA, thus making it a more fun fight for me on the other side. But I haven’t really tried a sword build yet myself (outside of pve). So I can’t really comment.

Though sword is better off with more power based stat sets of that is what you wondered about. I looked at one of the S/D meta builds, and saw a mix of berserk, soldier and valkyrie stats.

Best fight I had against a S/D thief was when he used stealth – that fight lasted 20 mins – I’ve lost to two S/D thieves who I duelled a lot of times and who are my friends So, you have to be really good to pull that off. D/P is still the easiest to play thief as you can stealth “on demand”.

Edit: I’m a D/D thief myself. But mostly because I love D/D if it were for effiency I would go D/P, probably.

There are three variations of builds that I use for teef in WvW.

Like you, I’m a mediocre teef, but I’ve had success with any of these three builds:
S/D Panic Strike : 6/0/2/0/6:
Mug, Improvisation, Panic Strikes,
Cloaked in Shadow,
Thrill of the Crime, Bountiful theft, Sleight of Hand

D/P SA: 2/0/6/0/6
Mug
Shadow’s Embrace, Cloaked in Shadow, Shadow rejuvination
Thrill of the Crime, Bountiful Theft, and Sleight of Hand

S/D 2/0/0/6/6
Mug
Power of Inertia, Vigorous Recovery, Quick Pockets
Thrill of the Crime, Bountiful Theft, Sleight of Hand.

I’ve had to do a lot of fiddling to figure out what works for me armor wise. My experience tells me that running super tanky does not really help you as a teef. You need to evade almost everything. I’d recommend that you run berserker armor, with Runes of the Pack. Get some Cavalier Trinkets ( Toughness, Power, Ferocity) in order to keep you from getting 1shot. If you fiddle with the balance of Cavalier gear to zerker, you’ll be able to take some hits, while your auto attacks critical hit for 3k.

Of the three builds, I like the first one the most. It gives you incredible lockdown, and If you’re good at using CnD +Mug (steal) you can do a very good job of keeping stealth up. Blinding on entering stealth is a very valuable trait, and it will do an excellent job of keeping you alive in smaller fights.

For general Teefing, your fights should be like doing the hokey pokey, you steal in, auto attack once or twice, blink out, wait for another opportunity to go in for some more auto attacks, and blink out. (sword2)

Anyway, I’m hardly an expert on teef, but that’s the advice that helped me enjoy the class. I dont really have an excellent feel for the initiative regeneration. The best teefs get the groove of their initative gain/loss and they can make the class sing. There’s my $0.02

You may find these two links helpful…

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Guide-Book-of-Shadows-The-Thief-Handbook/first

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Advice-List/first

I haven’t tried anything serious Zerg-wise with thief. I consider myself below average at the profession despite it being one of my favorites.. I’ve had experience playing S/D and condi thief builds.

I prefer S/D as it’s easy, the distance coverage and catching up/evades/bouncing around is very fun. I use metabattle but have made my own variation as I prefer S/D with D/D.

Then there’s the condi thief build if you feel like making someone’s day extremely miserable.. It has it’s ups and downs. It all depends on the situation too. I have good days and bads when playing condi.. If you see a necro just run away because you won’t stand a chance using condi on them. Sigh.

I heard d/p is apparently the easiest but I have never tried plus I fail at landing the heartseeker/black powder combo. Oh well.

I am currently levelling an alt thief that will be a medic thief build as my friend keeps joking about it and I like to theorycraft; making my own builds etc.

When in doubt just go look up metabattle. Sorry for any spelling mistakes as I’m on my phone atm haha.

Zephyra.4709:

If you see a necro just run away because you won’t stand a chance using condi on them. Sigh.

The first player I killed with my condi thief when I have been a 100% noob was a necro – I used to run away from them with my power thief afterwards until someone told me how to kill them. In fact I lost about 5% of the fights while playing condi thief. And I was bad back then, believe me And I only played condi thief for a week (it was boring and I felt OP).

Zephyra.4709:

I heard d/p is apparently the easiest…

It is, because you have a gap closer, an interrupt (crucial when facing necros), blinding powder for “being invincible” and for stealth on demand all that on your weaponset, so you can use whatever traits you like wheras all other weaponsets have to use their traits to be able to do that, except S/P but S/P isn’t as mobile.