Guild Wars 2

I don’t know if I can speak for everyone but I was a little peeved with the Time Warp/Quickness nerf in this past patch, for obvious reasons, but it wasn’t until I reread the wording on the patch notes that I had a real problem:

As we push to improve balance in both PvE and PvP, a few mechanics in the game will be receiving updates to promote fun and balanced play. In the past, quickness has granted double the action speed normally available to players. In PvP, this speed gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities and allows for massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time. In PvE, the increased attack speed can trivialize a lot of content that would otherwise provide a good challenge. Therefore, we are reducing the speed that quickness allows by half of its current potential while slightly increasing the duration on player-activated skills.

Then I came across a thief in WvW today.. (see attachment)

I run a shatter build, 10/20/10/0/30, with half knights and half berserker exotic/ascended gear. While I don’t plan on tanking champs anytime soon, I do have some defense. Fighting the thief I got one dodge off, which he instantly followed with heartseeker, and one mind blast (downed 1).

He was a very good thief, and I’m by no means the best mesmer, but 22,000 damage in 3 seconds.. that seems a lot like “massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time” that “gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities.”

I was going to take my complaint to the Thief/WvW forum, but that’s probably a long wait for a train that won’t come. Instead, how do you guys deal with thief burst, do you have similar issues with them, should I build differently?

Any advice is welcome.

Hi mate.

Thiefs and mesmers will always be like 2 wildcats when we meet in the world. One will die or flee. There is several ways to manage em thu depending on your build and weapons. Mostly are sadly for a shatter mesmer reaction based and the one who know the opponent,s class and gamestyle best + hes own will win + a little bit of luck is invovlved (rng on crits, unexpected procs etc)

For the setup you use I suggest try get aonother 10 into 0-20-20, if you going versus burst thiefs, This will give you protection when you hit 75% and 33 less taken dmg. Also I dont know what weps you use but the backstab can be avoided with a sword 2 block.

Best tip I can give is duel alot. I duel so many tiefs, and it still best practice ever. Find a realy good one, one who kick u kitten tim afte time, kep duel him and sooner or later yolearn whats hurt most. Also when you face lesser skilled thief and fought a pro for 3 hours you notice big difference.

This vid I link is a tutorial ment for Shatter Cat, it do thu show almot only fights versus thiefs after 1st min,s tutorial section. I can reccomend the mobility part for fight em thu.

Gj.

/Osicat

Well, you’re using a scepter in an offensive shatter build, which is a no-no. Mainhand sword allows you to actually avoid thief burst with blurred frenzy. Also, you only have 1 stunbreaker, decoy. It is pretty easy to burn 1 stunbreaker, you need to have at least 2, especially against a thief.

Thief attacks are really obvious, especially burst thieves. They all start in the same way, they all continue in the same way, and they can all be countered in the same way. Dodge the opening with blurred frenzy, pop out a few clones for a mind wrack to hit him, maybe drop a chaos storm for additional aegis. Once the thief comes back out of stealth, burst again.

If you actually let the thief land their opening combo, you’re probably going to die. You have to avoid that. Blurred frenzy is a great way to dodge it. You can also drop a temporal curtain, and then yank them out of their combo even if you are stunned.

Once you have dodged the opening combo, you simply have to know the rhythm of a thief fight. Stealth, pause, stealth attack. Break the rhythm of the stealth attack with a dodge or a blurred frenzy, and you can force the thief to waste their time and become vulnerable.

Take Osicat’s advice, this guy has played the mesmer to a huge extent. Now let me add my own experience but first off, can you tell us how you react normally to thieves? What utilities and weapons do you have?

As you know it really is based on reaction against thieves and as a mesmer we have a lot of options to counter their attacks. I normally have mirror image and I usually react with either shatter 4 or mirror image + shatter 1/2. You could also simply use daze to give you time to think of your next move.

Once you know a thief is around, make it hard for him to reach you or make him think twice of approaching you. By the former I mean things like blink away, staff 2, focus 4, GS 5 that would make him waste time and initiative just to get near you again. Alternatively use things such as staff 5 or sword 3,3 ->2 and burst him down. Thieves generally don’t have high health or defense so you will be hurting him.

My own problem with thieves is catching up with them when they decide to run away, as stealth and that shortbow teleport is such a pain to catch.

EDIT: Your photo you put just loaded for me, can now see your setup. Decoy is a good move to get out of burst while he wails on your clone.

Well, if u was ambushed – u are dead. Thief burst damage is really overpowered. Last time i got ~2-3k dmg stealth, ~3-4k cloak and dagger, ~14k backstab. Even ele is not so deadly. (but ele can run away anytime =( .

But If u see thief before he attack u – u have plenty of things to counter him and kill.

Also, if you wish to continue running Scepter mainhand, you can also use your Scepter block when he invises (wait a second or so) to block his attack and reveal him. It gimps his combo by a long shot.

Osicat.4139:

For the setup you use I suggest try get aonother 10 into 0-20-20, if you going versus burst thiefs, This will give you protection when you hit 75% and 33 less taken dmg. Also I dont know what weps you use but the backstab can be avoided with a sword 2 block.

Thanks for the reply! I really like that protection trait but haven’t been using it over the other dps traits since it was nerfed, i’ll have to try it. I typically use Sword and Focus with Staff. This was just a rare occasion I was using scepter for clone generation/ranged. The thief got the jump on me so it wouldn’t have mattered too much either way.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Thief attacks are really obvious, especially burst thieves. They all start in the same way, they all continue in the same way, and they can all be countered in the same way. Dodge the opening with blurred frenzy, pop out a few clones for a mind wrack to hit him, maybe drop a chaos storm for additional aegis. Once the thief comes back out of stealth, burst again.

Yea, I tried dodging away to make some clones and put some distance between us but he closed the gap too quick. Perhaps things would’ve been different with blurred frenzy or if I popped the stun signet. It’s just frustrating that he killed me in the time it takes for me to cast confusing images once >.>

ATourist.8359:

Take Osicat’s advice, this guy has played the mesmer to a huge extent. Now let me add my own experience but first off, can you tell us how you react normally to thieves? What utilities and weapons do you have?

I mainly use sword/focus and staff, but on occasion play with scepter for clone generation. I only really use greatsword when sniping from keep walls, lol. Utilities are the same, but sometimes I’ll swap in feedback. Elite is usually Time Warp but I swapped in Mass Invis to help get across the map unseen. Needless to say it didn’t help lol.

Garr.1823:

But If u see thief before he attack u – u have plenty of things to counter him and kill.

That’s pretty much what happens for me. I try to stay with the group, but in 1v1 situations when running back to a zerg or if I’m a little off to the side it usually comes down to if I see him first or not.

Esplen.3940:

Also, if you wish to continue running Scepter mainhand, you can also use your Scepter block when he invises (wait a second or so) to block his attack and reveal him. It gimps his combo by a long shot.

Yea I’d have probably had better luck with scepter block or the stun signet. It was just too much damage too fast.

As a shatter mesmer: Press F4 when hes starting to use his combo. Then just finish him with sword#3,3,2, mirror images and mind wrack. ( assuming that its a GC thief, this should kill him with your build. )

FWIW, it’s not just Thieves. A Warrior can do the same if he’s lucky.

Another vid of another setup (Shatter Cat original), its less optimal for fight thiefs as original dont have protection or sword block. So here you se me use some other ways to fight those sneeky things.

Hope it help some.

/Osicat

PS If you done have rune of air already go get it, 6/6 rune of air take 50% hp of a burst thief, See first fight in this vid:

Quite a few great suggestions here. The one thing I don’t see is retaliation – running the retaliation on Confusing Cry trait is fantastic against burst classes. Plus, you mention usually using sword/focus – there’s another 14sec of retaliation if you can set it up (i.e. you have time to do so).

Not much funnier than having retaliation up and having a GC thief down himself on you when you never even saw him… xD

The advice given here for “Mesmer vs Thief” is pretty solid, so if they are a common problem for you, definitely commit it to memory.

I think one of the things the OP was getting at that hasn’t really been discussed much though was the fact that ArenaNet mentioned they nerfed quickness because:

In PvP, this speed gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities and allows for massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time.

Despite this, the OP saw a thief do an immense amount of spike damage to them, despite having (I assume) decent toughness from knight’s + 10pts in Chaos.

In regard to this, I have to half agree. I think thief burst is something they are still looking at toning down (somewhat mentioned in a recent interview), but they for some reason think a thief should be able to “burst a bunker” (what?!) so are being slow about it. On the flip side, one of the reasons quickness was nerfed was because it allowed certain content (namely PvE) to be trivialized which doesn’t have anything to do with this. Furthermore, think of how quickly the Thief could have done that burst if they had used haste … even more ridiculous. Lastly, a Mesmer can do the same thing. It requires higher APM, but the DPS spike is there.

Garr.1823:

Well, if u was ambushed – u are dead. Thief burst damage is really overpowered.

But If u see thief before he attack u – u have plenty of things to counter him and kill.

Really, how can you say this…? You get ambushed, if you don’t you have plenty of things to counter him and kill him, but still his damage is overpowered? If you get owned like this, then you deserve it, no matter what class stomps you.

Thief damage is not overpowered.

Garr.1823:

Even ele is not so deadly. (but ele can run away anytime =( .

Another strange remark… Off course, noobstomping is easier with the thief.

And another thing, thieves have better escape options then Ele’s.

On topic, blink is a great way to shake the initial attack of any thief. That can often be enough to tip the scales in your favor, especially with the skill level of the average WvW thief..
You need situational awareness. Constantly pan around. You can see thieves coming, them being able to stealth to close the gap should be no excuse. When you see the little house thing, that’s an easy give away to position yourself differently the next 10 seconds. Same thing for the puffs of smoke from blinding powder or black powder.

Good luck

I have to agree with the other posters, it’s all about breaking the combo and finishing him off. I use staff sword/sword most of the time and when I roam I perma have a staff out, soon as I get stunned, dazed or see a thief invis I go into phase retreat (2) then drop chaos storm on him, chaos armor, sword 3 then 3 again, sword 2 and 5 then I have 3 hard phantasms out and I usually F1 then dodge, mirror images then F2. If he isnt dead by that then you fought a good thief.

The best thing about thieves is they start of with steal, what I do is hit decoy as soon as its in range. I move to the side while my clone gets destroyed and make at least 3 clones to mind wrack him. This saves your blurred frenzy when he tries to come after you. You have the option to use it and use another shatter while you’re at it.

I’d rather use blurred frenzy … it’s a much shorter cooldown than decoy and hits the thief in the face when they steal to me.

Sebrent.3625:

I’d rather use blurred frenzy … it’s a much shorter cooldown than decoy and hits the thief in the face when they steal to me.

This. However I did fight 1 thief (spvp duel) who was quite skilled, he waited till I popped frenzy then shortbow teleported behind me then backstabbed. I loved that fight ahah.

Between Dodge Rolls, Blade Training giving Blurred Frenzy an 8 sec cooldown & Riposte a 9 sec cooldown, and 30 pts in Illusions giving Distortion a 46.25 sec cooldown, I’m not really bothered by builds that rely on burst (see: most thieves).

It’s the people that can apply constant pressure to me while eating my damage. These people make me run … or, if I’m too stubborn, die.

That said, the non-burst thieves are a pain in the butt. I’m not talking about the condition damage ones either. I’m talking about the knight’s armor ones using sword+dagger like my thief. Mean buggers.

It’s the Thieves that heal for over 500/hp a sec while stealthed and are smart enough to cloak and dagger on illusions that are what you need to look out for. You have 4 seconds to burst them or they are going to make you regret meeting them … and they are hard to burst as they are often using all Knight’s gear and Thief sword inflicts weakness on you.

yea I hate their regen and it also removes condition, they pretty much have it set.

My main is a thief, and I’ve played that profession since first beta weekends, so I like to say that I got an above average good understanding of how we think and fight. I’ve tried almost every single build you can find in these forums and made a few my self The last months I’ve been playing Mesmer, and I find the Mesmer far more superior in damage and survivability. Thieves have a better chance of running, but hey, that’s a win for me since I’m not dead.

First of all: a thief dishing out 22k damage in a few seconds isn’t uncommon so this is something every one should be aware of and ready to counter. Many here have said that you should use your blocks, teleports, dodges and flurry – and I agree. The best way would be to gain distance and let him burn his initiative (a thief with no initiative is a dead thief).

Second: a full shatter combo with 6-7 shatters about the same damage in the same amount of time. He was probably full zerker, which means a one trick pony. He either kill you in two seconds or he’ll die if you as much as sneeze on him.

Third: crying about damage. I’ve seen a warrior crit for over 30k in one hit. That’s three times a thieves health pool…

My best advice for you is to duel thieves in your guild. Adjust your build to counter them and they’ll run like small school girls when they figure out that they can’t kill you. My Mesmer build is glassy but tons of mobility. I laugh when I duel a thief

Geiir.7603:

My main is a thief, and I’ve played that profession since first beta weekends, so I like to say that I got an above average good understanding of how we think and fight. I’ve tried almost every single build you can find in these forums and made a few my self The last months I’ve been playing Mesmer, and I find the Mesmer far more superior in damage and survivability. Thieves have a better chance of running, but hey, that’s a win for me since I’m not dead.

First of all: a thief dishing out 22k damage in a few seconds isn’t uncommon so this is something every one should be aware of and ready to counter. Many here have said that you should use your blocks, teleports, dodges and flurry – and I agree. The best way would be to gain distance and let him burn his initiative (a thief with no initiative is a dead thief).

Second: a full shatter combo with 6-7 shatters about the same damage in the same amount of time. He was probably full zerker, which means a one trick pony. He either kill you in two seconds or he’ll die if you as much as sneeze on him.

Third: crying about damage. I’ve seen a warrior crit for over 30k in one hit. That’s three times a thieves health pool…

My best advice for you is to duel thieves in your guild. Adjust your build to counter them and they’ll run like small school girls when they figure out that they can’t kill you. My Mesmer build is glassy but tons of mobility. I laugh when I duel a thief

I’m guessing they kill you at the same rate you kill them? I think what the people want is an anti-thief build that demolishes all kinds of thief builds…especially the burst spec

knight.8926:

I’m guessing they kill you at the same rate you kill them? I think what the people want is an anti-thief build that demolishes all kinds of thief builds…especially the burst spec

Those people should take a look at Pyroatheist’s Immortal Mesmer build then. Burst thieves can unload on you and you’ll simply be standing there saying “ok, that was maybe 1/3 of my health, now what are you going to do”. You may even have to “help them” as they lay on the ground from your retaliation.

Sebrent.3625:

knight.8926:

I’m guessing they kill you at the same rate you kill them? I think what the people want is an anti-thief build that demolishes all kinds of thief builds…especially the burst spec

Those people should take a look at Pyroatheist’s Immortal Mesmer build then. Burst thieves can unload on you and you’ll simply be standing there saying “ok, that was maybe 1/3 of my health, now what are you going to do”. You may even have to “help them” as they lay on the ground from your retaliation.

I don’t know man those burst thieves hurt like hell even with 3k armor and all the protection I can get. Their burst isn’t just a one time deal, it’s pretty constant.

knight.8926:

Sebrent.3625:

knight.8926:

I’m guessing they kill you at the same rate you kill them? I think what the people want is an anti-thief build that demolishes all kinds of thief builds…especially the burst spec

Those people should take a look at Pyroatheist’s Immortal Mesmer build then. Burst thieves can unload on you and you’ll simply be standing there saying “ok, that was maybe 1/3 of my health, now what are you going to do”. You may even have to “help them” as they lay on the ground from your retaliation.

I don’t know man those burst thieves hurt like hell even with 3k armor and all the protection I can get. Their burst isn’t just a one time deal, it’s pretty constant.

If you read my thief fighting guide, it’ll explain it a bit better, but being able to absorb the burst is a stop-gap measure. It prevents you from being killed. To actually duel and fight the thief, you need to use your active defense to prevent them from continually backstabbing you.

knight.8926:

I’m guessing they kill you at the same rate you kill them? I think what the people want is an anti-thief build that demolishes all kinds of thief builds…especially the burst spec

It’s more about me knowing the thief I know what’s going to happen and I counter it. I’ll just watch him burn all his initiative on thin air and then I’m dropping my burst. Before he even realized he didn’t take much health from me he’s downed and soon to be dead

But you’re right. People want burst proof builds. Even those builds will require you to counter a glass cannon burst. If you’re just standing there like a piece of paper – then the thief will rip that paper in thousand pieces.

Geiir.7603:

Third: crying about damage. I’ve seen a warrior crit for over 30k in one hit. That’s three times a thieves health pool…

Although I agree with you that people complaining about thief damage need to stop whining, this is a bit off. The warrior does NOT have a single attack that can hit as hard as the backstab from the back. Closest to this is killshot, evis is even lower then that (and like 10% less strong then BS). In fact, to my knowledge, Backstab from the back is the hardest hitting single attack in the game that isn’t an elite.

Unless your talking about hundred blades, which isn’t one hit.

Overall, comparing warrior burst to Thief burst isn’t really useful, as they do it in completely different ways. Thieves can do burst in PvP much better, whereas warriors can do the single adrenaline burst then have to recharge it (and/or wait for 10 seconds CD), or use a hard to get lucky combo to land HB, which, again, isn’t a single hit.

Cygnus.6903:

Geiir.7603:

Third: crying about damage. I’ve seen a warrior crit for over 30k in one hit. That’s three times a thieves health pool…

Although I agree with you that people complaining about thief damage need to stop whining, this is a bit off. The warrior does NOT have a single attack that can hit as hard as the backstab from the back. Closest to this is killshot, evis is even lower then that (and like 10% less strong then BS). In fact, to my knowledge, Backstab from the back is the hardest hitting single attack in the game that isn’t an elite.

Unless your talking about hundred blades, which isn’t one hit.

Overall, comparing warrior burst to Thief burst isn’t really useful, as they do it in completely different ways. Thieves can do burst in PvP much better, whereas warriors can do the single adrenaline burst then have to recharge it (and/or wait for 10 seconds CD), or use a hard to get lucky combo to land HB, which, again, isn’t a single hit.

You’re right that backstab is the strongest attack without any cool down. But thieves that go for those insane backstabs usually have no defense at all. They’ll get downed if someone just give them a nice pat on the back. My thief build is made for sustained damage and pressure while the burst comes after my enemy reach 50% hp. And my strongest backstab so far I think have been about 6k. With a bs build you can get 12k, but you won’t have much other than that backstab and heart seeker.

Mesmers can stack confusion, and for a thief that’s deadly. We attack fast and many thieves pop haste right before their burst. Having 3 stacks of confusion equals downed thief if times right.

I’ve never played much warrior, but what I can get from them is that warriors have damage, and lost of it. They are able to keep a sustained high damage while most thieves have a 3 second burst. If they fail that burst they have to run away pretty fast.

And no, I was not talking about 100 blades. This attack was a critical hit with 25 stacks of bloodlust and might while the opponent had 25 stacks of vulnerability. But even with all that I’ve never seen a thief dish out 30k in one hit. Even 12k is rare for a thief to achieve.

The idea that thieves who use backstab are squishy is only true when facing bad thieves … in which case we don’t care too much about them.

Good thieves can take all knight’s/soldier’s/etc gear and do very respectable damage do you with backstab. They can do good damage with auto-attacks (MH dagger or MH sword) as well. It’s not as bursty, but they are a pain in the butt to take down as they can easily survive the 4 seconds of revealed and many take traits to rejuv health when stealthed and gain regen when stealthed so they heal for 500+ hp a sec while stealthed. That’s 2k hp every time they stealth … and then some as the regen lasts longer than stealth.

This is how I play my thief in sPvP (been too lazy to level him, tired of leveling alts) and it’s extremely successful.

True. A really balanced thief is hard to kill, like mine

But the fact is that the majority if thieves are squishy zerkers, which are pretty easy to counter.

why nerf this when Mesmer speed is lowest in game? makes no sense we won’t be balenced with other classes anymore and we will die easily thanks to not being able to kite well enough.

Sebrent.3625:

The advice given here for “Mesmer vs Thief” is pretty solid, so if they are a common problem for you, definitely commit it to memory.

I think one of the things the OP was getting at that hasn’t really been discussed much though was the fact that ArenaNet mentioned they nerfed quickness because:

In PvP, this speed gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities and allows for massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time.

Despite this, the OP saw a thief do an immense amount of spike damage to them, despite having (I assume) decent toughness from knight’s + 10pts in Chaos.

In regard to this, I have to half agree. I think thief burst is something they are still looking at toning down (somewhat mentioned in a recent interview), but they for some reason think a thief should be able to “burst a bunker” (what?!) so are being slow about it. On the flip side, one of the reasons quickness was nerfed was because it allowed certain content (namely PvE) to be trivialized which doesn’t have anything to do with this. Furthermore, think of how quickly the Thief could have done that burst if they had used haste … even more ridiculous. Lastly, a Mesmer can do the same thing. It requires higher APM, but the DPS spike is there.

thief is working as intend.

Ping.5739:

Sebrent.3625:

The advice given here for “Mesmer vs Thief” is pretty solid, so if they are a common problem for you, definitely commit it to memory.

I think one of the things the OP was getting at that hasn’t really been discussed much though was the fact that ArenaNet mentioned they nerfed quickness because:

In PvP, this speed gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities and allows for massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time.

Despite this, the OP saw a thief do an immense amount of spike damage to them, despite having (I assume) decent toughness from knight’s + 10pts in Chaos.

In regard to this, I have to half agree. I think thief burst is something they are still looking at toning down (somewhat mentioned in a recent interview), but they for some reason think a thief should be able to “burst a bunker” (what?!) so are being slow about it. On the flip side, one of the reasons quickness was nerfed was because it allowed certain content (namely PvE) to be trivialized which doesn’t have anything to do with this. Furthermore, think of how quickly the Thief could have done that burst if they had used haste … even more ridiculous. Lastly, a Mesmer can do the same thing. It requires higher APM, but the DPS spike is there.

thief is working as intend.

Lol. “Thank you” “ArenaNet employee” for that insightful feedback. :-p

Irena.1062:

why nerf this when Mesmer speed is lowest in game? makes no sense we won’t be balenced with other classes anymore and we will die easily thanks to not being able to kite well enough.

Haha, hahahaha. Ha. Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

I don’t have as much trouble with the backstab thieves these days. I either anticipate well and dodge at the right time and I kill the thief, or I don’t and he kills me. I’m also in full Rabid, so I can take a hit or two if I mess up.

The P/D thieves in WvW however, I can’t quite figure them out. Partially because you don’t get as many opportunities against them compared to some of the other builds, so I just don’t have enough practice I suppose. I try to dodge roll the Unload, stay away from them so they don’t CnD me so easily (they still just hit the clones), but the pressure always seems to be on me. Running a condition build, so the constant stealth giving them removal + healing is just a brick wall.

Mister Mustard.7203:

I don’t have as much trouble with the backstab thieves these days. I either anticipate well and dodge at the right time and I kill the thief, or I don’t and he kills me. I’m also in full Rabid, so I can take a hit or two if I mess up.

The P/D thieves in WvW however, I can’t quite figure them out. Partially because you don’t get as many opportunities against them compared to some of the other builds, so I just don’t have enough practice I suppose. I try to dodge roll the Unload, stay away from them so they don’t CnD me so easily (they still just hit the clones), but the pressure always seems to be on me. Running a condition build, so the constant stealth giving them removal + healing is just a brick wall.

use arcane thievery, mimic, or summon warden and stand inside it.

p/d thieves do VERY little direct damage, its all from bleeds.

Cygnus.6903:

Really, how can you say this…? You get ambushed, if you don’t you have plenty of things to counter him and kill him, but still his damage is overpowered? If you get owned like this, then you deserve it, no matter what class stomps you.

Still it is. No1 except thief can kill u in 1 second. Steal – backstab can do about 17k dmg. So save pathetic words to some1 else.

[Cygnus.6903:]
And another thing, thieves have better escape options then Ele’s.
[/quote]

Lol, no.
Thief rely on invis, and when he do it – simply F1 him, and “3” on GS. About 70%, that he is daed after it. Ele’s escape rely on fast moving and immuns. U can do nothing vs it.

The OP is asking for advice but his argument actually shows a major inconsistency from the devs with regards to their mechanical philosophy. Time Warp/quickness aparently is OP and “abuse” due to it’s allowing for massive damage to be released in periods of time to small for players to even react. However, as we all know, thieves exceed this sort of damage without the need for quickness. Yet, one is nerfed, the other isn’t touched.

That aside, I havnt died to a thief in more months than I can remember. Toughness + mad sceptre skills + confusion = dead thief. Skill spamming is their own demise.

Squee Squashington.5189:

I don’t know if I can speak for everyone but I was a little peeved with the Time Warp/Quickness nerf in this past patch, for obvious reasons, but it wasn’t until I reread the wording on the patch notes that I had a real problem:

As we push to improve balance in both PvE and PvP, a few mechanics in the game will be receiving updates to promote fun and balanced play. In the past, quickness has granted double the action speed normally available to players. In PvP, this speed gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities and allows for massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time. In PvE, the increased attack speed can trivialize a lot of content that would otherwise provide a good challenge. Therefore, we are reducing the speed that quickness allows by half of its current potential while slightly increasing the duration on player-activated skills.

Then I came across a thief in WvW today.. (see attachment)

I run a shatter build, 10/20/10/0/30, with half knights and half berserker exotic/ascended gear. While I don’t plan on tanking champs anytime soon, I do have some defense. Fighting the thief I got one dodge off, which he instantly followed with heartseeker, and one mind blast (downed 1).

He was a very good thief, and I’m by no means the best mesmer, but 22,000 damage in 3 seconds.. that seems a lot like “massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time” that “gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities.”

I was going to take my complaint to the Thief/WvW forum, but that’s probably a long wait for a train that won’t come. Instead, how do you guys deal with thief burst, do you have similar issues with them, should I build differently?

Any advice is welcome.

22,000 damage in 3 seconds? O.o to the extent of my knowledge, that’s only possible if

1. You have awful gear
2. You have ok gear but the thief has the best gear in the game
3. Somewhere along the line you counted incorrectly.

I can tell you that the thief sure didn’t backstab you for all of that damage; it’s just not possible. So the only thing I could guess would be a backstab followed by a few HS. Even then, though… The damage just seems wayyyyy too high to even be slightly plausible. That’s +7K DPS; that’s way more than I’ve seen anywhere, with any build, ever. I’ll have to look more into it.

Arganthium.5638:

Squee Squashington.5189:

I don’t know if I can speak for everyone but I was a little peeved with the Time Warp/Quickness nerf in this past patch, for obvious reasons, but it wasn’t until I reread the wording on the patch notes that I had a real problem:

As we push to improve balance in both PvE and PvP, a few mechanics in the game will be receiving updates to promote fun and balanced play. In the past, quickness has granted double the action speed normally available to players. In PvP, this speed gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities and allows for massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time. In PvE, the increased attack speed can trivialize a lot of content that would otherwise provide a good challenge. Therefore, we are reducing the speed that quickness allows by half of its current potential while slightly increasing the duration on player-activated skills.

Then I came across a thief in WvW today.. (see attachment)

I run a shatter build, 10/20/10/0/30, with half knights and half berserker exotic/ascended gear. While I don’t plan on tanking champs anytime soon, I do have some defense. Fighting the thief I got one dodge off, which he instantly followed with heartseeker, and one mind blast (downed 1).

He was a very good thief, and I’m by no means the best mesmer, but 22,000 damage in 3 seconds.. that seems a lot like “massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time” that “gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities.”

I was going to take my complaint to the Thief/WvW forum, but that’s probably a long wait for a train that won’t come. Instead, how do you guys deal with thief burst, do you have similar issues with them, should I build differently?

Any advice is welcome.

22,000 damage in 3 seconds? O.o to the extent of my knowledge, that’s only possible if

1. You have awful gear
2. You have ok gear but the thief has the best gear in the game
3. Somewhere along the line you counted incorrectly.

I can tell you that the thief sure didn’t backstab you for all of that damage; it’s just not possible. So the only thing I could guess would be a backstab followed by a few HS. Even then, though… The damage just seems wayyyyy too high to even be slightly plausible. That’s +7K DPS; that’s way more than I’ve seen anywhere, with any build, ever. I’ll have to look more into it.

a gc d/d theif vs another gc in full 80 exotics will do that much damage.

i’ve been hit for 7k mug, 7k cnd, 12k bs before in less than 1 second, of course this is before the quickness nerf, now it will probably take a little more than 1 second.

this is all very standard, every gc class is able to output that much damage to another gc class. if i do a similar damage rotation under quickness, it takes about 2 seconds to do similar if not more damage.

wads.5730:

Arganthium.5638:

Squee Squashington.5189:

I don’t know if I can speak for everyone but I was a little peeved with the Time Warp/Quickness nerf in this past patch, for obvious reasons, but it wasn’t until I reread the wording on the patch notes that I had a real problem:

As we push to improve balance in both PvE and PvP, a few mechanics in the game will be receiving updates to promote fun and balanced play. In the past, quickness has granted double the action speed normally available to players. In PvP, this speed gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities and allows for massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time. In PvE, the increased attack speed can trivialize a lot of content that would otherwise provide a good challenge. Therefore, we are reducing the speed that quickness allows by half of its current potential while slightly increasing the duration on player-activated skills.

Then I came across a thief in WvW today.. (see attachment)

I run a shatter build, 10/20/10/0/30, with half knights and half berserker exotic/ascended gear. While I don’t plan on tanking champs anytime soon, I do have some defense. Fighting the thief I got one dodge off, which he instantly followed with heartseeker, and one mind blast (downed 1).

He was a very good thief, and I’m by no means the best mesmer, but 22,000 damage in 3 seconds.. that seems a lot like “massive spike damage in extremely short periods of time” that “gives most players almost no chance to react to incoming abilities.”

I was going to take my complaint to the Thief/WvW forum, but that’s probably a long wait for a train that won’t come. Instead, how do you guys deal with thief burst, do you have similar issues with them, should I build differently?

Any advice is welcome.

22,000 damage in 3 seconds? O.o to the extent of my knowledge, that’s only possible if

1. You have awful gear
2. You have ok gear but the thief has the best gear in the game
3. Somewhere along the line you counted incorrectly.

I can tell you that the thief sure didn’t backstab you for all of that damage; it’s just not possible. So the only thing I could guess would be a backstab followed by a few HS. Even then, though… The damage just seems wayyyyy too high to even be slightly plausible. That’s +7K DPS; that’s way more than I’ve seen anywhere, with any build, ever. I’ll have to look more into it.

a gc d/d theif vs another gc in full 80 exotics will do that much damage.

i’ve been hit for 7k mug, 7k cnd, 12k bs before in less than 1 second, of course this is before the quickness nerf, now it will probably take a little more than 1 second.

this is all very standard, every gc class is able to output that much damage to another gc class. if i do a similar damage rotation under quickness, it takes about 2 seconds to do similar if not more damage.

Ah yes, that too. :P

In that case, @OP: run a more bunker-type build in order to avoid bursts like these. A few reasons:

- GC thief initiative pools tend to be somewhat low, meaning a lack of sustainable damage over time
- It’ll give you a little more time to orient yourself once a thief/whatever blasts you with its attacks. Those few extra seconds are absolutely precious.
- If you have enough defense/health, it becomes almost ridiculous for thieves/etc to try and burst you down like that.

Personally, I run what would seem a rather defensive-seeming thief build (0/0/20/30/20) which I balance out with good gear. Thieves can hit me pretty hard at first, but I usually just stealth, heal, orient myself, and proceed to absolutely rip my opponent to shreds. I think that defensive builds like these will, eventually, kill GC builds completely. To me, thief GC builds have a lot of power and crits, but their traits are somewhat “clunky” and make have very little synergy between themselves, with perhaps the exception of the 10/30/30/0/0 D/D build, but even that suffers from lower initiative pools, and a complete reliance on stealth in order to do pretty much anything. Those are my thoughts for countering, can’t give much better advice than that. All I might add is that, for a bit more of a “bunker” build that does good damage, you might want to lax down on the zerker gear and perhaps focus on more knight’s, since you already have somewhat lacking health, toughness, and healing pools anyways. With my build, I run pretty much full zerker gear because my thief build gives me an automatic 200 toughness and healing, as well as 300 vitality and 30% boon duration, so I can run practically full zerker gear with virtually no cost involved.

Squee Squashington.5189:

He was a very good thief, and I’m by no means the best mesmer, but 22,000 damage in 3 seconds.

Now imagine haste was NOT nerfed. You’d die in 2 seconds…

3 seconds is PLENTY of time to react – the people above have given you plenty of advice how to handle it.

If you’re full glass cannon, you will die to a thief that jumps you. It’s as simple as that.

If you want to run full glass cannon, then you have to avoid getting jumped or accept that you will quite likely die by the time you see them when it happens.

Otherwise, replace a few pieces of Berserker gear with Cavalier (toughness, power, crit dmg), Knight’s (toughness, power, precision), Valkyrie (power, vitality, crit damage), and/or Soldier’s (power, toughness, vitality).

Just made a build that can kill any type of thief (even burst ones). But…I traded of killing thieves to guardians. Now I don’t die from them but I also don’t kill them.

Honestly the one thing I want to see nerfed on a thief is the Mug trait damage. It’s absolutely ridiculous. This in conjunction with taking a bit off the top for shatter damage should help balance things out. I’ve gotten 11k mind wracks before and also feel this could be toned down a bit.