Guild Wars 2

Any tips on how to beat a thief as rifle engineer? Their blinds are of course the main reason they are so annoying to fight, but still, I need to learn how surpass that.

Rilfle as a main weapon is not that good and is power based.
You need either pp and go condi or hammer and go scrapper.
If you go scrapper you can reveal them easily with sneak’s gyro toolbelt skill. You can take rifle if you want with scrapper also but hammer is unbeatable if you choose to be an actual scrapper. Also scrapper rune have reduced incoming damage if you re close to enemies

kitten , but rifle is so much more fun than hammer.

Rifle is bad, but it’s possible. Use Tools line Reactive Lenses or the gadget itself (not recommended) to counter blinds, Lock-On to counter stealth – it works pretty good with rifle autoattack since it’s semi-homing. Then pray you are lucky enough to time Overcharged Shot correctly so it interrupts Thief’s key combo, like (Black powder+Heartseeker). Spike them, throw Elixir X and finish him off with your kitten OP autoattack.

Aa a rifle Engi, i find thief duels fair to won if i have the right skills available, except against Staff thief, i can’t find a window for counter-attack against this matchup in particular, but for example with dp i use the Elixir U wall, for avoid those headshots since it will be his main source of window if it doesnt have basilisk venom available.

If you have a chance to stealth, use it, the more you can deal damage from stealth, the more chances you will have from win the duel, specially doing cc in stealth, if you are using Elixir X, triggering Juggernaut will Guarantee you an insta win against this duel, Tornado will make the work too as long as the match doesnt get +1 ed at his favor.

That’s all what i can tell you about it, its important to not be caught up in cooldowns, or otherwise, you will not stand a chance.

With theives I find AOE works relatiely well. So you start dumping your Mortar fields onto your relative location, and your napalm, time your acid bomb to open distance and repeat. Bunkerdown starts triggering mortars. An interesting choice is the AA for flamethrower, it can track them and will tick hits when the thief lands since it has continuous and many hits. When they are just about to land near me I jump back with acid bomb. Then I turn on flame thrower, as they get closer I do mortar again. Eventually you can get them with air blast or perhaps your overload shot. Also the EG poison spray has the same effect as FT in doing many hits. Flame throwers ball o fire detonation is useful to, and it can be blasting your own water field while getting them.

You know I bet bombs would be greatly amusing as well come to think of it…. all those fields….

Incoming Lengthy Response

You shouldn’t need reactive lenses or utility goggles. It will help but it’s not viable to run those against most other matchups, and there are other tricks engineer has to effectively and efficiently remove blinds. If you run rifle, I’d seriously recommend toolkit, elixir gun, and assuming no scrapper, mortar kit, as those will benefit you the greatest in every matchup. For the third slot I’d run elixir s but it can be fit to whatever you prefer (e.g. Elixir B is a very good substitute).

Here’s what can be down to beat them more consistently:

You’ve probably already found this out but overcharge shot is what carries power rifle engineers, so land it as often as possible.

The first step to beating a thief is using acid bomb at your feet (by cancelling it) and standing in it when the thief has engaged/about to engage. Also use the mortar blind/chill/poison fields while standing in super elixir/mortar 5. A good thief will stay the heck away and a bad one will try to engage and die in the AoE. In the circumstance that the thief is good, wait for him to engage and then follow it up with the AoE so that he is forced away. However, I cannot stress the importance of using flash shell and standing in it vs a thief as soon as he engages, it will mess him up very badly.

Second trick is to do blunderbusses where you think they are stealthed at as that’ll hit them like a truck and they will most likely not expect it (i.e. at their black powder or where they leaped to).

Another way around the blinds is to use box of nails. It’s cripple/bleed pulses will remove blinds so whacking that on top of the other AoE’s will also work, or using it by itself. It lasts a while so do it while he’s in stealth (but not immediately or when he’s stealthing up), as it generally lasts long enough that he will de-stealth/engage before it disappears, or when your kiting a bit away. This helps you land an overcharge shot.

Furthermore a stealthed thief generally doesn’t have too much time to engage (3 seconds or so) so if nothing happens for a while and ya know he’s going to engage within the next second or so, do a jump shot at your feet and he’ll probably be put to half health before/as he hits you or at least use up a blind which you can follow up with an overcharge shot. Alternatively, you can also jump shot away. This also applies to acid bomb and mortar F5.

If the thief has just stealthed up or is stealthing up and you’re not at full hp, use super elixir and/or mortar 5 and stand in it for some regen while you wait for the re-engagement.

Last trick is to spam mortar autos at your feet or a bit behind you when you try to kite away about or when he’s stealthed, as it’ll waste his blinds/make the engagement more unfavourable for him.

Here’s a quick summary if you don’t have the time/can’t be bothered to read it all:

1) Use overcharge as often as you can land it.
2) Use mortar fields and acid bomb at your feet as his engages. Flash shield will destroy him.
3) Blunderbuss in the direction you believe he is at when he is stealthed.
4) Use box of nails while kiting away or chasing, and before he engages from stealth.
5) Thieves can’t stealth forever. After it’s been a while and there’s been no engagement, jump shot at your feet or away from your position. Same goes for acid bomb and mortar.
6) Stand in super elixir/mortar 5 when your hp is low and the thief is stealthing up.
7)Spam mortar autos when the thief is in stealth, and if you’re doing a bit of kiting.

It comes down to mix of reactive, predictive, and defensive gameplay on your part. You pretty much want to make every engagement the thief does unfavourable for him, and when you’re a bit vulnerable from a lack of cooldowns/health, at least make it.

If they’re running d/p you can use your healing turret to bodyblock shadow shot and then immediately follow up with detonate and overcharged shot for good damage/cc. You can use stealth just as well as they can with toss elixir s/stealth gyro, and you should be abusing it for covering openers and repositioning. Don’t be afraid to blow jump shot for repositioning either— you’re probably not going to land that second hit against any semi-competent thief anyway.

utility googles = 10s blind imunity+fury and toolbelt = thief no stealth for 6s

Rezzet.3614:

utility googles = 10s blind imunity+fury and toolbelt = thief no stealth for 6s

I find the trait version of the toolbelt be more useful for this tough, i only use the toolbelt for spread the condis with thoose 10 stacks of vulnearbility