Guild Wars 2

Hey hey,

This is mostly a question more then a statement.

Am I the only one that always get targeted by Thief in team fight?

Like, if we are a group of 5-6, if we are ganked by thiefs, they will all go directly for me.

Been 2 days of WvW, and I have usually don’t die often, but I would say 90% of my deaths have been from thief. They will by pass other class and go directly for me. And I’m not a glass cannon ether (nor a bunker).

Is that only bad luck, am I the only one to receive this traitement?

If not, are engineer juicy prey for Thief? I personnally hate fighting thief, but only because I hate fighting ennemies I can’t see.

Make sure you have elixir S equipped at all times, When they open up on you pop your elixir, straight away then switch to bomb kit and drop glue bomb and big ol bomb and move away from them.

Thieves like to target me all the time in Spvp also I guess it’s because they don’t think that we can counter them but it’s the complete opposite we have so many counters for theives to keep them away from us whilst doing decent damage to you. Take pistol and shield for the extra defense as the 5 can stun if the decided to hit you which is an added bonus.

I actually love fighting thieves because over time i’ve learnt to counter them effectivly.

It’s not about countering them.

Well sure I have some issue, but my build isn’t made to fight them. I switched to Bomb kit just for them. I’m using gear shield to block their first attack, then big ol bomb and stun with #4 rifle. then I bomb everything.

But my question was less about how to counter them, and more about am I the only one that get focused by thief?

Seems like you also get focused a lot by them. Is there a reason? Sometime I think it’s because I’m launching grenade, and that’s annoying. So they want to silent me.

Could also be because they see easy prey into engineer? I think we aren’t, but maybe they didn’t we are.

I juste hate to fight them, especially in WvW since most of the time they can hit you 1-2 time before they appear. Half of your HP is then gone and after you have to fight the invisible ennemy. It’s difficult yes, but it’s more because it’s not fun for me to tab and rotate my camera around like a crazy man.

We’re are the underdog class at the moment, much like rangers so i guess they see us as easy targets possibly?

It’s a pretty even fight against a d/d thief. If they get the opener on you and you don’t have an out, you’ll likely die. Same can be said for them if you get the jump on them with shadowstep on cd. Now the real question comes into play in who wins downed vs downed.

Depends on your build.

Infinitus’s example. Elixir S, bomb, pistol/s. No offense, but if you are running that in WvW, I hope you are on a different server..
Oh, it will certainly do you well, if you are running around solo. But why are you running around solo in WvW?

Obviously, most of us run grenades, probably elixirs, and probably even zerkers to lean on that massive aoe damage. This does leave us pretty close to defenseless vs a burst thief in open field.
Grenade builds also have little recourse vs daggerstorm. Rifle and grenades all reflect off it. you dont have a reflect/block(probably).

Supply drop is what you have. Another option if you run the typical elixir B, Elixir R is to swap out B, for U.
2 out of 3 of U’s throw are block/reflect. This is very effective vs daggerstorm.
The self use U, also gives you burst. If you survive the initial burst, you can use rifle KB and/or net. Elixir U for quicken. Then spam 1/2. A burst thief will be glass cannon, and should not be able to survive 3 seconds of hasten grenades.

Surviving that burst. Run a bit of toughness/vit. use thoughness/vit food. no more then +200 toughness. 30 alch gives +300 vit. realm bonuses.. would not recommend more then +100 vit on gear.
CC. aoe hits thieves in stealth. If you see him coming. swap to grenades. Throw flash grenades on yourself the moment he steals you. This will blind his backstab. (CnD will land first) So instead of 6k, 6k, 11k. its 6k,6k, miss.
Back to rifle. Only grenade a thief that is CC’d. They have too much mobility. Withdrawn will let them get away good.
Supply drop is still an Iwin button.

I have not noticed thieves doing any specific attempt to go after me, mid fighting.
Only that really, I have no real counter to dagger storm as an engi. Forced to use an inferior shield, or toolkit to half defend vs it…
Shield is 3s or 2s. Dagger storm is 8.

Toolkit does have a block. again 3s out of 8. but enough to get into melee.
prybar, and tk1 are all melee attacks, which will not be reflected. tk2 is also a ground aoe, and will hit without being reflected.

Ahaha getting a jump on a thief

Man it doesn’t happen often, the only time I can jump them, they usually stealth away.

Usually when I manhandle them, there is 2 option :

1- I combo them with rifle and toolbet perfectly, they are glass cannon and they die right away.

2- They run away never to be seen again. (heartseeker + shortbow port + swiftness + stealth)

But yeah, I don’t see us personnally has an underdog class. I do usually very good vs most class. Thief are the worse matchup for me, I need more thoughness, and I happen to fail a lot my stun/combo/dodge.

Casia.4281
Just to confirm my example was from a Tpvp/Spvp point of view on how i deal with theives usually, i never do WvWvW, however the example was down to if a thief decides to open up on me that’s how i react.

Kardiamond.6952:

Ahaha getting a jump on a thief

Man it doesn’t happen often, the only time I can jump them, they usually stealth away.

Usually when I manhandle them, there is 2 option :

1- I combo them with rifle and toolbet perfectly, they are glass cannon and they die right away.

2- They run away never to be seen again. (heartseeker + shortbow port + swiftness + stealth)

---

But yeah, I don’t see us personnally has an underdog class. I do usually very good vs most class. Thief are the worse matchup for me, I need more thoughness, and I happen to fail a lot my stun/combo/dodge.

If you took grenades out of the equation. People would be flipping out how UP engineers are.
All our kits/weapons are too similar in function. Meaning. Melee. Both are “primary” weapons are 100% ranged. which like I mentioned, really screws us vs reflect.
Turrets are probably better then most people give them credit for. Net is pretty great.
Flame is “close to being amazing”. Smoke screen requires being in combat. Which is lame. if I could use flame turrets smoke field ooc. wow. that would be a killer utility.
But even then, the spammable blind is ok. ranged aoe kb on exploding turrets.

If you want to duel a thief. blind. A pistol/bomb build will mess them up as stated above. Blinds, confuse all day. But that wont be all that useful in WvW. Even a small roaming pack, grenade/rifle. Higher focused burst, and vul stacking. just play with allies that know you are burst, and protect you accordingly. If you are playing a solo game in WvW, when surrounded by 20 allies, you aren’t doing it right.

A good Thief will beat any non-bunker build, and beat it hard. Bunker or die.

The main reason thieves go for engi’s is because we are typically very squishy, and most of our builds use a lot of projectiles.

If an engineer is not running elixir S they are a free kill to a good thief / team of thieves.

There are also a lot of engi’s in pistol / rifle specs that kill themselves on dagger storm with the reflects.

Pretty much the only way to counter a thief is elixir s + shield. Any good thief will not die to an engi unless if they make a major mistake.

We do not really have a way to deal with the constant stealth and burst dps they can get without shield in a lot of spec’s.

Engi’s tend to be the weak link in the chain, we have very few tools that guarantee survivability, and when we’re down we’re dead. We do not have the ability to stealth, make clones, or move to a friendly player for a revive. We just sit there unable to target them as they stake us.

Even without Grenade, a static discharge Build isn’t bad ether.

But I agree that I tried a condition damage Engi, and relying on a dot that doesn’t stack (Burn) isn’t really effective. Even worse is, many of our condition skill are close combat.

Turret Build, I just don’t like it. I created a Engineer to use turret, but after using them, I just can’t stand them.

Their cooldown is too long, once you move, you lose half your dps. They doesn’t even scale with stats, so forget the progression. I personnally have a hard time using flame turret, as the damage is weak, and it use yet ANOTHER burn condition.

The only turret I use sometime is the rifle turret, but only because of the traited 7 sec CD instant toolbelt. I used rocket turret for a bit, using the double stun. But it was not reliable at all.

And Thumper turret, what?

:)

Wear a shield, automatically win all fights against thieves.

Rocket placed in a funky spot with deploy-able turrets can be a good counter to a thief 1v1. Especially if they do not see it, since turrets seem to shoot through stealth when a thief re-stealths, that and culling doesn’t affect their targeting. The auto attack rockets also hit fairly hard vs a thief. 800-1000 with another 1200 of burning over 4 sec is pretty much a 1/7th of a thiefs health pool. 2-3 hits + the knock down is enough the swing the fight in your favor, and if you chain more CC to the knock down you can down them before they stealth and run away with SB.

But after you kill a good thief like this, he will simply find the rocket turret, one shot it with shortbow AA, and then go after you with impunity.

But the damage from flame / rifle / thumper is extremely low, and any turret placed next to you is going to get instantly taken out by a dancing dagger or AoE off backstab.

The fact that Flame turret only gives a 1 sec burn every 2s that has no condition. 300 damage every 2 sec! Makes it the weakest pet for dps in the game, excluding pets that do not do dps like net / healing turret. Rifle is not much better.

I run a flamethrower build, and flame-jet does not count as a projectile.

Xae.7204:

A good Thief will beat any non-bunker build, and beat it hard. Bunker or die.

This. I switched from using Rifle to a Pistol/Shield bunker build in WvW and I’ve been handling Thieves a lot better lately.

Ya, a Bunker build or anything high healing/high toughness can handle a Theif pretty easily. I have yet to lose to a thief, even ones that jump me, in WvW or sPVP

People started talking about turrets. Its a bit off topic. But still.
i have been considering some turret builds.
They have the potential for being really good. 1 is completely broken by deployable turrets not working in pve.

The massive trolllollo build.
(this does work in spvp)

Rifle, healing turret, rifle, net, flame, supplydrop.

20 explosives, accelerant packed.
10 firearms hair trigger
30 inventions. rifled, energized, explosive descent.
10 tools deployable.

Combo fields and finishers.
healing turret heals. and drops a water field on toolbelt. adding regen or direct heal.
Flame turret drops a LARGE smoke field when used while in combat. 450aoe. that is MASSIVE. the problem is you need to be in combat to use it. But in the battlefield that is huge and just spamming blinds all over the place with allies.
2s blind every second for 5s IN the field itself as well. again, huge aoe. You can drop this on an entire raid. THIS is why I like flame turret. not its terrible burn. I like the massive and long duration smoke field.

Surprise shot is 100% projectile combo. (rifle and pistol AA are only 20%.)
100% blind with smoke, rgen on water.
Rifle jump shot is a leap. stealth in smoke, and direct heal on water.
every explode turret is a blast, as well as supply drop. aoe stealth, and aoe direct heal.
Blasting fire fields for might, ethereal for chaos armor.

Control is what this is really about though.
rifle. net. knockback.
toolbelt net.
deployable turrets and accel packed. 1207 damage to heavy golems exactly. It doesnt scale and it doesnt vary. no crits. 1500-2k on most players. that is not that low honestly. Especially with the ranged aoe kb. off walls, off cliffs, throw it past runners, knocking them back at you, etc. Just all around disruption.
4 turrets to explode. Rifle is here because of that 20s cd. You can do this alot. Net and fire are good as turrets, but also have shortish cds.
Net turret. decent immobilize. overcharged to add a stun. stun means most cant use a skill to clease it. And being able to throw the turret, means you can immobilize even farther.
Supply drop stun as well.

You would be a giant pain against entire raids on the battlefield. however, it is broken by deployable turrets being broken in pve. Intentionally to prevent this? I don’t know.

Toolkit build. similar, but makes use of 30 tools instead of explosives. and uses TK instead of rifle. Net and fire are used for themselves. again the net is really good. As well as that smoke field. TK’s toolbelt also has 100% projectile.
TK scales well. and using net, and the pull, you can stay melee very well. Its a viable wvw build I think.

If it’s a melee thief I saw while looking for builds a pretty good speedy engi build with bombs. it was pistol shield with enhanced bombs, with speed on equipping a kit, speed on crit, and vigor when speedy pretty much gives you an almost endless speed boost. It had a cc like ram or rocket boots, it had bigger explosions with more damage, longer burn times, and it had the elixir U so you can do hasted bombs if they come near. This setup seemed to have the best escape options. (I think they used the potion for healing on 6).

If a charr I would personally suggest (as I’ve used this in PVE) the hidden pistol as it has a jump back and you can use the U on it when thieves are doing ranged to you to kill them quickly all at once with the toolbelt spell while this is equipped. The bombs kit would ensure if they got close they would still take damage as far as i know. (I’ve used that on jaguars and skale and it seems to work even while they are invis)

I have the same experience as OP. In most small team fights inside W3 the enemy thieves always seem to ignore everybody else and target me. I think it’s due to the fact that grenade builds are mostly glass-cannons. I run a 30/0/20/20/0 grenade/rifle build that I came up with because I solo or roam in small teams a lot and I need the survival traits. I also run with around 2900 armor.

Elixir S is really good against their opening, and I also use the traited supply crate (guaranteed net turret). Most thieves will be right on top of you (most likely behind you), so even if you can’t see him just drop the supply crate right on (or behind) yourself. Pay attention to see if your supply crate turrets are shooting at seemingly empty air because that’s where the thief is (AI is not bothered by culling). Drop your biggest bursts (such grenade barrage, rifle 5), spam grenades, and just hope for the best (i.e. the net turret successfully immobilized him and he hasn’t gotten out of it yet).

Never try to outrun a thief because from my experience you can’t. You always want to hit them back because most of the FoTM are glass-cannon backstab builds. You need to pressure them and hope they make a mistake.