Guild Wars 2

Hello,

I always have trouble fighting thieves in pvp.

You guys have any tips how to fight them as a condi reaper?

Drop marks around yourself, I usually do chill and fear. When they jump you just chain cc their hp will melt. If you can get a nice fear into reaper shroud 5 you can usually one shot them. If you are running curses and the weakening shroud trait popping shroud will give them weakness which will prevent their burst. Mostly its a skill matchup though, great thieves can take out a necro but its more or less learning what to dodge and what mannerisms to expect from the thief as a necro. They should have to outplay you to kill you.

Also do NOT try to chase them. The bad thieves will stealth and run away constantly, preventing any upper hand you might gain. But they also do it to bait you. Don’t take the bait. Make them fight on your terms. If they stealth away, you run away too. Make them work to get back to you. Now if it’s a good thief and he’s setting up a backstab chain then he won’t have gone far so you’ll have to judge for yourself which kind of thief you’re fighting ( usually not hard to tell, the bad ones are usually hyper aggressive and use lots of spammy attacks then run away and hide in stealth forever when they can’t insta-gib you- good thief will keep you engaged and only disengage fully when absolutely necessary). Their goal is to make you blow your best cooldowns then they can spike you out.

lmaooooooo

Renny.6571:

lmaooooooo

If you have nothing constructive to post, just don’t post anything at all

In the current state of the classes necros really shouldn’t have issues 1v1

How is that? Reapers not invincible…

1v1 vs thief is easy, in a teamfight if you have thief on you then it gets annoying. For 1v1, just drop some of the marks around you, don’t STACK them though because he can dodge them all at once if they are stacked. Also Rune of Nightmare is pretty much the best rune you can have against thieves. If you’re playing some weird power gs build then be sure to spam blind as much as possible(gs 4 and shroud 2).

Sorry i dont see it…even if you fear the theif he will just shadow step or roll for initiative. As for marks if you drop some that is all well and good but he will just evade thru them then blind you. If you think nec fan attack will work the theif will just kite you, wait for you to get out of shroud or sleight of hand you…dazing you and stealing your stability…then basi stun you or burst you down. Oh and no nec will use greatsword…again the theif wi just kite you…..but wait are you saying your build uses staff/gs?

Pulls, and minions. Anything else is a waste of time against a good evasive thief

Fighting a thief that actually plays well is extremely difficult as a Reaper. The only honest way you win the matchup is to severely outplay the thief. Use abilities such as Reaper Shroud 3 and Marks just before evade frames end so that by the end of the cast, the thief is between evades. If you manage to apply meaningful condition-based damage into the thief, it may be worth it to stop attacking, as to avoid proccing Escapist’s Absolution.

Ragion.2831:

Pulls, and minions.

So, you’re recommending Greatsword, Spectral Grasp and/or a MM build?
Translation: for the sole purpose of beating one class 1v1, become non viable for the entire game mode.

Ragion.2831:

Anything else is a waste of time against a good evasive thief

First of all, no, pretty much any necro build is currently stronger than thieves in a straight up duel. I’m not saying it’s always easy, but necros definitely have the advantage.
Also, thieves can’t fight on points. So unless they kill the necro, the one wasting time would be them.

@Sabtah: Experience is everything. Get a decent thief as sparring partner and practice.

KNOW THY ENEMY!!!

facing a theif is really just an l2p issue with the current meta, 1v1 set ups with full CD’s will always be in favor of the necro given the amount of CC and condi output.

for example you see thief approaching, drop staff 2/3 staggered on point and sit on it and wait. Once you get good you can time the thief burst, drop RISE to mitigate 50% of the thief burst or dodge (dodge timing is a lot harder and more unpredictable so i recommend rise). Once thief is revealed Staff 5 for fear (watch for blinds, dont waste skills), at this point you can either drop into shroud 5/3/3/4 but the thief will most likely try to disengage once the advantage has been flipped into Necro favor. i generally swap to Sc/W for some torment (min 4 stacks if you hit with staff 5) once you fill the thief up just wait (can drop Sc2 for AOE bleed/cripple) and auto attack. Thief’s tend to use staff for the evade/attack from skill 5 (uses 5 init/use) so they can get roughly 3/4 attacks until they are out. Leave you dodges for this since it is difficult to time a CC since they evade during the entire attack phase. If you survive this attack the thief will either disengage or die…their utilities are generally port/disengage and init gain (some run SR) with the elite being the DD skill to auto stomp after third strike (haven’t seen many with venom in a while). you can also CTTB after using St5 to lock the thief down at first engagement but i do not recommend using such a big skill in a 1v1 unless you cant win the fight. patience is crutial against the thief, as mentioned earlier do not get baited off point, or chase since Thief CD’s are alot shorter than Necro.

if you are running sinister/viper runes you can be stun burst so make sure you have SB’s (Soul Reaping GM makes shroud a SB) thieves are known to be glassy classes who can crit glassy light armor for 7-9k/attack…. i recommend mercenary amulet to deal with this issue, little less deeps but much more sustain.

but all n all you just need practice, in 2v2 fights make sure you and your teammate are focus firing and chain CC’s against the non thief player. most thieves will wait for their burst opportunity so it will be a 2v1 until they come into the fight, be ready for it and change focus once the thief is revealed to get them out of the fight and make it a 2v1 again. Also know your team player roles, 2 glass vs support/glass is a tough fight especially if the focus is just not there.

use RISE and save your shroud..

If thief is average of better necro can’t really do any dmg.

I actually run into a good condi thief that kept avoiding anything i threw at him and killed me twice 1v1. I managed to kill him the third time around, but the guy did eat my self esteem.

Any good thief will destroy a necro 1v1(maybe on a legit 1v1 you can defend yourself, but you’ll eventually die), evades/blinds/interrupts are the direct counter of necros

flow.6043:

Ragion.2831:

Pulls, and minions.

So, you’re recommending Greatsword, Spectral Grasp and/or a MM build?
Translation: for the sole purpose of beating one class 1v1, become non viable for the entire game mode.

Ragion.2831:

Anything else is a waste of time against a good evasive thief

First of all, no, pretty much any necro build is currently stronger than thieves in a straight up duel. I’m not saying it’s always easy, but necros definitely have the advantage.
Also, thieves can’t fight on points. So unless they kill the necro, the one wasting time would be them.

@Sabtah: Experience is everything. Get a decent thief as sparring partner and practice.

I said pulls but not greatsword as a whole for obvious reasons and there is also spec grasp. but since you are looking for a fight, ok ill bite.

GS can work but mostly two attacks, nightfall which for 1v1 purposes can be replaced by well of darkness and grasping shadows which is so slow and unreliable by itself but can work if chained with another cc.

For power, if you run sigil of agility and sigil of intelligence on gs with pulls you can win pretty often if you time the spec grasp to stop the evade strings after the stun breaks. You can also pull to stop the evades and prevent from stealthing (mostly) to more reliably get in damage with dagger AA laced with sigil of fire and air and the usual spite stuff.

With minions you already said it yourself, thieves cant fight on point, this is doubly true if there are a lot of minions including shamblings. It can get very difficult for a thief if taking chip damage from multiple sources while smacking a wall.

Anything else like condis, is very iffy because if the thief is highly mobile and patient, you will find yourself being circled and not landing much and anything you do land will just get cleansed thanks to acrobtics, daredevil and shadowstep cleanses.

Pretty much this^ also as mentioned alot of theif’s best skills, stun breaks, and cc removal have shorter cool downs. I mean it’s not even the fact they daze, and steal your stability but also get an aoe fear which if the nec has no stun breaker for since his stab just got stolen, is like free hits for thief.

EDIT: this has been my experiance on both sides of the field, as a nec, and a thief, I am also not saying it’s impossible, just really hard against a good thief. some of my best fights as nec were against thieves.

You could use skill or you could be like me. Spam all my AoEs and run, screaming like a little girl for my teammates to come save me.

Caessa.4806:

You could use skill or you could be like me. Spam all my AoEs and run, screaming like a little girl for my teammates to come save me.

nerf screaming like a little girl, too op

A good thief will just keep poking you and force you into RS. At that point he will run away forcing you to either stay in RS to avoid his burst (which is passively killing your RS) or leave RS and face him with your RS on CD. It’s really a lose/lose for necro to 1v1 a proper thief. Your only real hope is that you can CC him and he isn’t running a stun break.

I personally don’t run a stun break on my thief but I still have zero issues killing most necros 1v1 taking 30~45s (longer if started at 100% DS). Also don’t leave RS and instantly go for your heal… Your just asking for an interrupt, backstab, and instantly deleted by their elite finisher.

Also don’t underestimate the power of your marks, most thieves aren’t running any real condi removal so 5~6 bleeds, given enough time, will add up to quite a bit of damage (thief can still clear chill from withdraw or DD GM trait).