Guild Wars 2

Second round vs rank 49 warrior:

I have had no practise against a good s/d thief until 2 hours before the tourney thanks to loljumper <3<3

I think the fight went pretty good on my part, did all I could do. Got too greedy sometimes when he got low health and in the third fight I did lose my concentration started making mistakes.

Fun to watch fights. I have a few ideas/suggestions/possibilities.

Did you try running this as P/P instead of P/S? Part of the issue to me looked like you were doing very low DPS to him overall, as well as he kept getting stability and being immune to the knockback/stun from shield.

Glue shot is unblockable and buys enough time to set up some good offense.

Blowtorch is some intense added DPS when you seemed to be lacking the ability to keep the burn on him very much.

Cooldowns are shorter and you don’t spend enough time not in kits to truly benefit from the little bit of toughness the shield gets you. All personal opinion here, I used to be a big fan of the shield too.

Sometimes offense is the weakness of a build, not its defense/ability to survive. I think the offhand Pistol could have pushed those fights in your favor (granted you are practiced with OH pistol, I know I sucked when I first started using it instead of shield).

Elixir S would probably be superior to Elixir R for this as well. I really don’t think Elixir R compares to S for 1v1s and smaller fights, I usually only run it in team builds for the ally revive.

is the third fight not complete?

Nice video Koroshi. Its so interesting that you’ve posted this because I was going to actually ask you about fighting a S/D thief. More from a WvW perspective though. Now Jumper has a different playstyle than the way you play your S/D thief. And I’d imagine thats because playing a thief in sPvP is different than WvW.

And I was going to ask you if you could duel yourself on your thief — how would you do it? Haha. Because there’s a S/D thief I’ve been dueling recently that just tears me up everytime. We did several duels. And out of about 10 duels or more. I think I won twice.

One thing I did do to adjust to him was like Velron suggested — swapping shield for dual pistols. Mainly because the stun of the shield didnt make a difference because he’d just shadow return out of the stun immediately very much like Jumper did with you. Now normally the downside of that swap was losing the #4 ability to counter refuge. But this thief was really good and he never used refuge near me. So getting to the refuge to try and knock him out of it was futile. But when I switched to dual pistols he saw the difference and even commented on how much the burns really hurt. Which again would compliment Velron’s suggestion.

I still struggle with him though, because he adjusted too haha. But he plays a lot different than Jumper does. Jumper is way more aggressive and puts constant pressure. But perhaps I’ll switch to bombs instead of grenades. Maybe that will help. I see it worked pretty well for you.

The thing that ultimately wrecks me when fighting a good S/D thief in WvW is the daze. I’m just failing hard at avoiding it. He zips in, dazes me, gets some damage in and then zips out before I can really attack.

Rifle ftw

/15 Char

BrimstoneAshe.5043:

Nice video Koroshi. Its so interesting that you’ve posted this because I was going to actually ask you about fighting a S/D thief. More from a WvW perspective though. Now Jumper has a different playstyle than the way you play your S/D thief. And I’d imagine thats because playing a thief in sPvP is different than WvW.

I don’t think this thief build would be viable in WvW, however I would love to try it out it looks like so much fun.

BrimstoneAshe.5043:

And I was going to ask you if you could duel yourself on your thief — how would you do it? Haha. Because there’s a S/D thief I’ve been dueling recently that just tears me up everytime. We did several duels. And out of about 10 duels or more. I think I won twice.

Honestly on my thief skill level and build vs this engi, I’d have to be honest.. I would destroy my thief (Of course we could never know, I might be able to pressure myself a lot especially with the constant dazes). The reason this guy was able to pressure me this much was, because of 2 things:

- Loads of condi removal
- Insane amount of evades

I think if I had a bit more practise, I would be able to put a better fight and the elixer r actually weakened me here.. I think the FT would have been much better as a defensive/offensive weapon.

BrimstoneAshe.5043:

One thing I did do to adjust to him was like Velron suggested — swapping shield for dual pistols. Mainly because the stun of the shield didnt make a difference because he’d just shadow return out of the stun immediately very much like Jumper did with you. Now normally the downside of that swap was losing the #4 ability to counter refuge. But this thief was really good and he never used refuge near me. So getting to the refuge to try and knock him out of it was futile. But when I switched to dual pistols he saw the difference and even commented on how much the burns really hurt. Which again would compliment Velron’s suggestion.

I think it could have helped me a lot, but at the same time that means I would have lost a blast finisher aswell + I was using the 5th shield skill with the engi trick.. so apply 5th shield and quickly start shooting which allows you to attack while still have the shield stun ready for when he strikes.

BrimstoneAshe.5043:

I still struggle with him though, because he adjusted too haha. But he plays a lot different than Jumper does. Jumper is way more aggressive and puts constant pressure. But perhaps I’ll switch to bombs instead of grenades. Maybe that will help. I see it worked pretty well for you.

The thing that ultimately wrecks me when fighting a good S/D thief in WvW is the daze. I’m just failing hard at avoiding it. He zips in, dazes me, gets some damage in and then zips out before I can really attack.

For a non-evade build that gives you some time to move, I could suggest moving towards his shadow step location. It will shorten his escape and it will allow you to attack him more often.

Your Ulti is duel winner and u don’t use it.

Your elite would have won that last fight for sure…

Sorry, I need to clarify. I was only allowed to use my elite once during the best of 3 matches against this thief. I know I would have easily won with a second elite.

Intrestring to watch Koroshi, but there is some thing I would like to get explained:

First, why was he allowed to spam his elite skile to hearts content, and you only was allowed to use it once? that’s hardly fair? <.<

Second, why did you pick Elixir R in a 1vs1 situation vs a Thief? Don’t get me wrong on this one, Elixir R, Toss in special, is an amazing tool, in speical when doing teamplay! But in a 1vs1 situation like a duel, there is, at least in my humble openion, so far better options you could have went with that would give you more control over the fight, here I’m thinking:

Net Turret for CC reasons, it helps a ton vs those fast moving S/D Thief’s, and one stun can be all you need to kill them.

ELixir Gun: I have seen you use it, and your good at it :P It’s more healing power + another blast finisher and gap Closer, it really good for a 1vs1 situation where the only stun he got is his Elite, and S/D simply don’t burst as much as the god old D/P does, so you can take a little beating just fine :P

Heck, I personal would have run with Rocket Boot for the Rocket Kick, the extra burning would have helpt a lot on the situation, and i might actually agree on the off hand pistol probaly would have been better ofr this encounter, because it was mostly a race for damage that duel!

a last option that actually can destory that kind of Thief as well when used correctly, and also neating you another Blast Finisher, is actually Throw Mine, the Knock back gives you the ability to take control over a little area makes, hich makes it quite an amazing tool, and it will rip of some of the boons he try get/steal as a bonus! =)

So yeah, right, why did you end up picking Elixir R? I’m Curious about that one!

And yes, he was indeed using 6x Rune of Lyssa :P

Also, I can see you are a little bit to Trigger Happy with your Prybar after Magnet, using the skill even when you miss with the magnet, because you are to used to click it right after! I tend to do that a lot as well if I don’t focus a lot on it! You gotta save dat Prybar! It’s to improtant to miss!

Just a little hint: if u use magnet and swap out of the kit, magnet will still go on and u can do other skills in this time. This may hide your purposes with magnet maybe. Important: don’t swap via weapon switch key but via utility key.

I often use this trick with Big Bomb and Jump shot (yes i love rifle) for an evil combo.

Forestnator.6298:

Just a little hint: if u use magnet and swap out of the kit, magnet will still go on and u can do other skills in this time. This may hide your purposes with magnet maybe. Important: don’t swap via weapon switch key but via utility key.

I often use this trick with Big Bomb and Jump shot (yes i love rifle) for an evil combo.

I’m confused by this, what do you mean exactly? :o

You are correct that you can swap away from Tool Kit while you still will be channeling Magnet, and you can as well click the next ability that you want to queue, but you can’t actually use other skills, like in them actually activating when you press them and still be channeling Magnet?

Amadeus.5687:

Intrestring to watch Koroshi, but there is some thing I would like to get explained:

First, why was he allowed to spam his elite skile to hearts content, and you only was allowed to use it once? that’s hardly fair? <.<

Second, why did you pick Elixir R in a 1vs1 situation vs a Thief? Don’t get me wrong on this one, Elixir R, Toss in special, is an amazing tool, in speical when doing teamplay! But in a 1vs1 situation like a duel, there is, at least in my humble openion, so far better options you could have went with that would give you more control over the fight, here I’m thinking:

Net Turret for CC reasons, it helps a ton vs those fast moving S/D Thief’s, and one stun can be all you need to kill them.

ELixir Gun: I have seen you use it, and your good at it :P It’s more healing power + another blast finisher and gap Closer, it really good for a 1vs1 situation where the only stun he got is his Elite, and S/D simply don’t burst as much as the god old D/P does, so you can take a little beating just fine :P

Heck, I personal would have run with Rocket Boot for the Rocket Kick, the extra burning would have helpt a lot on the situation, and i might actually agree on the off hand pistol probaly would have been better ofr this encounter, because it was mostly a race for damage that duel!

a last option that actually can destory that kind of Thief as well when used correctly, and also neating you another Blast Finisher, is actually Throw Mine, the Knock back gives you the ability to take control over a little area makes, hich makes it quite an amazing tool, and it will rip of some of the boons he try get/steal as a bonus! =)

So yeah, right, why did you end up picking Elixir R? I’m Curious about that one!

And yes, he was indeed using 6x Rune of Lyssa :P

Also, I can see you are a little bit to Trigger Happy with your Prybar after Magnet, using the skill even when you miss with the magnet, because you are to used to click it right after! I tend to do that a lot as well if I don’t focus a lot on it! You gotta save dat Prybar! It’s to improtant to miss!

I didn’t fully agree with the tourney rules, especially with allowing the thief to have infinite elites while I was just limited to one. I still had a nice experience fought high ranking players, forced me to go in training to learn about very experienced s/d thieves.

On the elixer R:
It was pressure. I had no experience fighting s/d thieves at all until the 2 hours before with help from jumper. I went on builds that I wasn’t comfortable with. Honestly it was probably the biggest mistake in that match, getting elixer R. I think if I used my original build that works for me, flamethrower, bomb kit and tool kit! I would have been able to apply so much more pressure, especially the blind/flame wall as defensive skills, the extra knockback to keep him down or the incendiary ammo that does crazy amount of burning dmg on 3 shots.

On the pry bar part, I remind myself every day to stop using it asap! Especially with the laggy pulls sometimes where they are not on the spot where you see them, but still make the mistake daily. (+ put the toolbelt “throw wrench” in my rotation)

PS: awesome feedback thanks <3

koroshi.2658:

I didn’t fully agree with the tourney rules, especially with allowing the thief to have infinite elites while I was just limited to one

Those are crappy rules. I guess the intent behind them is to account for elites with long cooldowns vs. elites with short cooldowns. That is, a thief could use basilisk venom several times in the time it would take your supply crate to come off cooldown, so in a way it’s unfair to use it in every round because it could effectively mean you have a lower cooldown on it. But the way it was done in that tourney heavily favours the thief, especially since it allows him to completely capitalize on Lyssa runes. Your elite had been off cooldown for a very long time in the third match anyways, so the rules actually imposed an arbitrarily long cooldown on your elite. You easily would have won if the rules didn’t screw you over.

You won the first match by using your elite, but that thief made a really bad move by running into your turrets, especially after you had actually chased after him when he backed off. It’s fair to say supply crate could determine the way the match goes, but the same can be said about basilisk venom.

When I have casual duels, we usually just wait until all skills are off cooldown, so everything can be used in every match. I can understand why they wouldn’t want that in the tournament, but that was a really unfair way to manage it.

It was also a bit weird that there were no starting positions. He started the third match right at your gate, which gave him a significant positional advantage. There should have been some sort of neutral start at least. Was there even a moderator for this? I didn’t hear anyone saying or see anyone typing “Go” or anything like that.

Maybe if they had said the thief can only use basilisk venom once or twice per round that would have made it more balanced, since they could still use theirs more frequently than yours, but still have a similar restriction that you face to even out the playing field. But I doubt that would fly well with thief players. Or maybe they could have given you two uses for the tournament to mimic the longer cooldown without completely screwing you over.

An even better way would be have it so that you can’t use your elite on the next round if you won the previous round, which means your opponent is afforded an advantage but you’re still not completely screwed over if your opponent starts winning. They have a similar system in fighting game tournaments where the loser is generally allowed the option to repick their character(s) while the winner has to play the next round with the exact same setup. Thus, the loser is not put into an entirely disadvantageous situation against the winner.

I guess the main problem is that GW2 simply has no support whatsoever for 1v1 duels of this format, so everything is a bit ad hoc. If they had a dedicated 1v1 format, a lot of things would just be enforced by the engine.

Well, hopefully any other tournaments you play in will have more well-designed rules.

I have to give that thief lots of credit though. I don’t find many thieves that play so effectively without relying on stealth. He flew like a butterfly and stung like a bee.

The reason this was a hard fight is because an engineer MUST play perfectly

Yamsandjams.3267:

When I have casual duels, we usually just wait until all skills are off cooldown, so everything can be used in every match. I can understand why they wouldn’t want that in the tournament, but that was a really unfair way to manage it.

In duels I avoid using supply crate, I feel it gives me massive advantage. I will use it in real pvp no problem, but i practise without using it. Just because of the long cooldown.

Yamsandjams.3267:

It was also a bit weird that there were no starting positions. He started the third match right at your gate, which gave him a significant positional advantage. There should have been some sort of neutral start at least. Was there even a moderator for this? I didn’t hear anyone saying or see anyone typing “Go” or anything like that.

There were mods, but mainly to preview or make decision if the match was going to draw, but nothing during the fight. The winner gets the advantage. It was their first duel tourney and I think they did a good job, even if the rules weren’t too great. We had almost 1k viewers in total in twitch on the different tourney streams, great commentary from teldo + I had loads of fun and loved the pressure of training against a new type of enemy for me.

Yamsandjams.3267:

Maybe if they had said the thief can only use basilisk venom once or twice per round that would have made it more balanced, since they could still use theirs more frequently than yours, but still have a similar restriction that you face to even out the playing field. But I doubt that would fly well with thief players. Or maybe they could have given you two uses for the tournament to mimic the longer cooldown without completely screwing you over.

Fully agree! The only reason I went stun breaker is because I knew he had infinite elites, that thought process made me lose the battle, I honestly think I would have stood a better chance if I did use my original build.

PS: Uploaded round 2 losers bracket (edited the main post), Round 3 which should be really nice it is Engi vs Engi and a pretty good one aswell haha!

he Winner get the advantage is a horrible balance concept in any sort of game in my opinion, either the looser is the one that gets an advantage, or, which I prefer, no one gets an advantage!

It’s really cool that they make such an event and everything, but before they try push it and turn it into something really big with like price pools and stuff (not sure if that is what they want, but still), they really need to take a loong look at their rules, because, at least for my viewing pleasure, I get seriously annoyed by that kind of unbalancing rules!

The Warrior duels was a classic Engineer vs Warrior hehe :P That’s how it all ways end for them poor warriors =P

Already posted my opinion on these fights via reddit. The rules themselves just help everybody else meanwhile the non-elite usage fights were so close that you could’ve won them with it’s availability. Not a fan of glass cannon crap either. Which is basically 90% of thieves…