Guild Wars 2

So, I’m an average player. Not terrible, not awesome. I also don’t frequent the boards, just come here off and on… so what I’m about to post may be a “no duh” thing for you guys.

With that in mind, I’ve been playing around with various builds in order to counter stealth spamming thieves. I know, I’ve read “oh they are easy to deal with” kinda thing, but that hasn’t always been the case for me.

Case in point, I was “dueling” one of these in Edge of the Mists, and I had two or three phantasms out. Three other players came to help, and after several minutes, he finally leaves.

Or so I thought. We lost sight of him, nowhere to be seen, so we go our separate ways. I was heading towards a group of veteran guards, was within seconds of them (I was actually heading past them, but you know…), and suddenly the thief appears right on top of me, pounds me, I desperately try to survive spinning out phantasms, dodging, etc.

This time he got me. Within breathing distance of those guards. Point being though, first time I was fighting him, I had seen him first and I did ok. Second time, though, he caught me by surprise and had me at half health before I even got a response up, and while I got a few hits in, he had me.

So, I started playing around with builds. I’m somewhat familiar with the idea of the PU with on death of clone/illusion triggers, but I thought a better idea would be phantasms, not only because phantasms can keep auto targeting and hitting for some real damage from a distance, but it seemed to me that conditions wont matter much if the thief just recloaks and washes them off.

But I also have to be able to survive that initial ambush.

So, I started out with a mostly defensive build (link at the end of this post to the build), PVT armor, runes of the dolyak, signet of ether, traits including regen <75% health, phantasms grant regen, protection granted when regenerating, illusionary defense, mender’s purity, prismatic understanding, and mirror of anguish.

Everything else basically went into buffing up phantasms. But the idea here is that if a thief comes out of stealth with a CC hit, it will reflect on him (MoA), I have two stun breakers, I can immediately cloak and spin out phantasms, meanwhile getting not only two sources of true regeneration, plus some Protection and the random boons from PU, but also the constant healing granted by Signet of Ether and Runes of the Dolyak.

The phantasms come out, and we start playing a game of attrition, where my phantasms can hammer him enough when he comes out, while my defensive setup keeps me alive, particularly when cloaking myself. I can’t maintain the stealth he can, but possibly I can maintain enough to survive and take him down.

Mostly, I expect a thief will run, but that’s fine too. I just don’t want to go down, and if the thief DOESNT run, maybe this setup will beat him.

Well, I tried several times to get into duels with thieves, but each time one side, the other, or both have interferred, but early experiments do appear promising.

More to the point, though, I was pleased when I fought two engineers and killed them both. They ganked me earlier when they took me by surprise and nailed me good in a part of EotM where I had no manevuering room and they were using some effect that kept yanking me back and forth.

I ran into the exact same pair on the plains between the Needle and the Needle reactor, and this time it was a different story. See, as I said I’m a strictly average player, and fighting 1v2 made me very nervous, but I was a bit out for blood, and I saw a chance for revenge… if I could pull it off.

They were both running with supply crates, flame throwers, bombs, I think with the kit refinement where when they drop a bomb it magnet bomb yanks you to them. But I was ready, if a bit nervous, this time.

I started out with a decoy. By this point i’d seen in pvp the trick where an engineer cloaks then flies a HUGE distance to their foe. I decoyed and ran past where I thought he’d be. I turned around and there he and his buddy was wailing on my poor decoy, heh.

From there started a dance of my cloaking and spinning out phantasms, the occasional clones as well, throwing off their scent. They kept on trying to get me into their turret nests with magnetic bomb kit refinement, but I kept my distance, edging in to throw out Phantasmal Mages and Phantasmal Duelists. They gave up and started pursuing me, I kept backing up, trying to keep out of range of flame throwers, watching for the gesture they would make for supply crates to dodge.

I think they finally gave up trying to get to me directly and went after my phantasms, but that seemed foolish, I just casted more. Rarely I’d be without phantasms, but I’d then pop clones and, when phantasms were recharged, I’d shatter then spin out the phantasms.

They got my health pretty low a few times, but they couldnt seal the deal. Honestly, I thought I was going to lose. I really did. Until the first engineer suddenly dropped… and I wasnt sure why, he just collapsed when I thought his health was higher, unless the confusion I had on him hit with some phantasms at the same time or some such… anyway, I went in and after one knockback I finished him off.

The second folded pretty fast after that.

Point being, I usually feel decent about 1v1, even thieves (except when they ambush me, sadly), but that 1v2 went far better than I’d suspected, I was very pleased.

I still want to try this against a thief, but I’m sold, heh.

and as promised, here is the build; note that the celestial trinkets are there because I USUALLY run with celestial armor, and while I have multiple sets of armor, I only have the one trinket set. Some of my gear are set they way they are because that’s just what I happen to have. In other words, the gear isn’t optimized for this build yet.

Anyway, I was pleased with the performance, and can’t wait to play the lame duck and lure some ambushing thieves out

But in the meantime, this is my pseudo-bunker anti thief phantasmal killer pu build :

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fgQQRAra8fnUE1UbRNi1wWbEx0jejCBuzMguor8BcD-jUDB4hYYLwIMBEtJRUDQ0GIkHBkABjIAO7pIaslNFRjVVjIqWfEDA-w

Morfedel.4165:

Mostly, I expect a thief will run, but that’s fine too. I just don’t want to go down, and if the thief DOESNT run, maybe this setup will beat him.

I’m not going to tell you how to play the game, so I’m not going to say that this statement is in some way wrong, because it really is subjective.
But (assuming we are talking about WvW) I simply don’t understand why people build to troll, or to end in a stalemate, or to be able to run away from 1v1 or 1v2 fights with neither side getting any kills and achieving nothing. Denying your opponent kills is pointless if you also don’t get a kill. If you are roaming simply to duel, at least build so you can reliably kill/stomp people. Fighting troll builds is pointless and annoying and running them is equally pointless.

But that’s just my opinion.

This is not mesmer criticism btw, it is equally horrible when a thief stealths and runs at the first sight of an enemy. Unless that person is a dedicated scout communicating with commanders he is just wasting his own time and everyone else’s.

If your build is very much designed to be anti-Thief, I would definitely recommend using Greatsword with your sword/torch. Spatial Surge and Mirror Blade are great skills to consistently keep pressure on a Thief that is kiting you and Illusionary Wave will allow you to knock a Thief out of Shadow Refuge. Also I’d swap out Mirror Images for Blink. You need something to put some distance between you and a Thief if you’re caught off guard.

Simonoly.4352:

If your build is very much designed to be anti-Thief, I would definitely recommend using Greatsword with your sword/torch. Spatial Surge and Mirror Blade are great skills to consistently keep pressure on a Thief that is kiting you and Illusionary Wave will allow you to knock a Thief out of Shadow Refuge. Also I’d swap out Mirror Images for Blink. You need something to put some distance between you and a Thief if you’re caught off guard.

interesting. Let me reply to you with the following:

1. I understand the idea of spatial surge, but i’m focusing on phantasms. Don’t you feel the iDuelist is superior to the Berserker in this instance?

2. I can see the blink being nice, but keeping the enemy confused with clones is nice too. I’ll have to try both up.

calavel.6249:

Morfedel.4165:

Mostly, I expect a thief will run, but that’s fine too. I just don’t want to go down, and if the thief DOESNT run, maybe this setup will beat him.

I’m not going to tell you how to play the game, so I’m not going to say that this statement is in some way wrong, because it really is subjective.
But (assuming we are talking about WvW) I simply don’t understand why people build to troll, or to end in a stalemate, or to be able to run away from 1v1 or 1v2 fights with neither side getting any kills and achieving nothing. Denying your opponent kills is pointless if you also don’t get a kill. If you are roaming simply to duel, at least build so you can reliably kill/stomp people. Fighting troll builds is pointless and annoying and running them is equally pointless.

But that’s just my opinion.

This is not mesmer criticism btw, it is equally horrible when a thief stealths and runs at the first sight of an enemy. Unless that person is a dedicated scout communicating with commanders he is just wasting his own time and everyone else’s.

I’d rather get a kill, but I think that most stealth spamming thieves, if they decide they are losing, can just escape no matter what I do, unless they are “stupid” or “courageous” enough to stick through the fight.

In other words, I can’t force a victory with a stealth spamming thief, unless they choose to stick around. So, I have to go for the next best victory, that of driving them off.

I don’t know about Mirror of Anguish, its 1 min cooldown is rather long and constant stunning from opponents (warrior etc) would render it pointless. I’d go for Debilitating dissipation just to add some punishment on people who wants to take down your phantoms.

Also I would want to add that you kind of lack condition cleansing. Since you have the chance of trying out inspiration trait line. Try change persisting images to restorative mantras and change signet of ether to mantra of recovery. You get total of about 7500 heals in 14.5 seconds and 6 condition cleansings at the cost of 20% phantom life.

calavel.6249:

Morfedel.4165:

Mostly, I expect a thief will run, but that’s fine too. I just don’t want to go down, and if the thief DOESNT run, maybe this setup will beat him.

I’m not going to tell you how to play the game, so I’m not going to say that this statement is in some way wrong, because it really is subjective.
But (assuming we are talking about WvW) I simply don’t understand why people build to troll, or to end in a stalemate, or to be able to run away from 1v1 or 1v2 fights with neither side getting any kills and achieving nothing. Denying your opponent kills is pointless if you also don’t get a kill. If you are roaming simply to duel, at least build so you can reliably kill/stomp people. Fighting troll builds is pointless and annoying and running them is equally pointless.

But that’s just my opinion.

This is not mesmer criticism btw, it is equally horrible when a thief stealths and runs at the first sight of an enemy. Unless that person is a dedicated scout communicating with commanders he is just wasting his own time and everyone else’s.

Why do you think people cry for stealth nerfs? Because it lets the stealther dictate the pace and the start/finish of the fight….90% of people asking for a stealth nerf will eventually slip-up and make a comment like: “its BS, I get them to 20% HP and they just stealth and run away”….

People really make me laugh, this is a rock/paper/scissors period, but yet they want every class to be able to beat every class and for ANET to adjust the builds accordingly when this doesn’t happen.

Myself, I am too proud of…well…myself, when it comes to fighting 1v1 so I rarely run from one if I am losing….But I have no problem when people do, sure I may /laugh or taunt them into trying to stay…But I build my toons to:

A. Be mobile
B. Stop other mobile players if they try to bail

Beyond that if they get away, they just get away…it happens.

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

I don’t know about Mirror of Anguish, its 1 min cooldown is rather long and constant stunning from opponents (warrior etc) would render it pointless. I’d go for Debilitating dissipation just to add some punishment on people who wants to take down your phantoms.

Also I would want to add that you kind of lack condition cleansing. Since you have the chance of trying out inspiration trait line. Try change persisting images to restorative mantras and change signet of ether to mantra of recovery. You get total of about 7500 heals in 14.5 seconds and 6 condition cleansings at the cost of 20% phantom life.

You got that right. My guild went to our arena to do some dueling, and they were very impressed with my build… until I went up against a condi necro, who cleaned my clock. OUCH!

Those are some great suggestions, I’ll try them out.

EDIT: as a side note, if I’m facing ONE constant stunner like a hammer warrior, I’m only concerned if I have to cap a point desperately, as I can evade and cloak a great deal, the few times he hits me my MoA will help – I know this because I’ve done it. It becomes more complicated if I have to cap a point and cant maneuver, or if I am facing a warrior with a friend.

In fact, in some pvp, I faced two hammer warriors. That was fun. I was in a constricted area too, so maneuvering was difficult. I ended up being a ping pong ball! Kinda funny actually, but….

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

I don’t know about Mirror of Anguish, its 1 min cooldown is rather long and constant stunning from opponents (warrior etc) would render it pointless. I’d go for Debilitating dissipation just to add some punishment on people who wants to take down your phantoms.

Also I would want to add that you kind of lack condition cleansing. Since you have the chance of trying out inspiration trait line. Try change persisting images to restorative mantras and change signet of ether to mantra of recovery. You get total of about 7500 heals in 14.5 seconds and 6 condition cleansings at the cost of 20% phantom life.

As a side note, the build was specifically designed to take on thieves, so MoA is a good place here for that purpose. Obviously, though, since I can’t guarantee running into thieves, that also makes it a less than optional choice against some other classes.

However, since you normally only get 2 mantra uses without the +1 mantra use trait, seems to me that its unlikely you will wipe out 6 conditions. More like 4. Unless… does it trigger on charging it too?

Well I got fooled by the tooltip into believing charging mantra of recovery would clear conditions. Anyways its a nice addition to healing but not necessary in clearing conditions. Using it depends on who you’re facing though, I tried that a bit myself and I usually have to pop all 2 mantras together while facing BS thieves.

NICENIKESHOE.7128:

Well I got fooled by the tooltip into believing charging mantra of recovery would clear conditions. Anyways its a nice addition to healing but not necessary in clearing conditions. Using it depends on who you’re facing though, I tried that a bit myself and I usually have to pop all 2 mantras together while facing BS thieves.

Condi Necros are the real vicious ones when it comes to conditions. Good lord, one ate me alive the other day!