Guild Wars 2

hi there,

i love my ranger , especially with the recent buffs. but i never ever slot this skill. when i duel vs thiefs (which is my main proffession) i dont want to win because i use a skill which hardcounters all SA based builds. i want to win through skill and outplaying my opponent.
before you call me a thief in disguise who got ganked by sic em too much, yes…i admit i often get killed from that skill and a group of wildly attacking zerglings. sometimes i can survive sic em and burn all my utilities and dodges, but is that fair?
i think, it does too much for absolutely no efford and thats the reason i dont like this skill. not even on my ranger which has sometimes real problems vs certain thief builds.

does sic em need a castime?
or a animation?
or both?
make it affected by blind?

what is your opinion on that skill in wvw?

It’s fine where it’s at. It’s a VERY niche skill that not many Rangers even use.

And, yes, I have/play both an 80 Thief and Ranger.

It’s a shout. No shouts should have cast times despite Guard setting a precedent.

Now that said, I do agree that these skills are too powerful in this game. I’d much prefer ANet change all of them to simply be ground targeted/point-blank AE skills that revealed everything in the area but didn’t actually attach a revealed debuff on the target.

Simply making a Thief/Mesmer restealth is enough of a counter. Attaching revealed is too much imo.

The only time I bother slotting it is if I run into a group of thieves that keep stealthing each other. 1v1 I don’t need it to kill a thief and there are a lot more useful traits to bring along.

I view it as just for getting rid of trolls. I’m not terribly worried about a normal thief stealthing.

what if thief had a venom that instantly renders all blocks from guardians useless for 6 seconds? essentially the same, evrybody fine with it? (would be awesome in pvp)

i like the ground target idea, its a nerf and buff at the same time. much more utility than now ( it could even have a revealed debuff for 3sec but only if you remove stealth).

Stealth on a thief or blocks on a guardian aren’t their only — or even main — lines of defense though, especially for a duration as short as 6 seconds. That’s a big investment for the ranger when you only have 3 utility skills, and have critical needs like stun breaks. The thief is not harmless and the ranger invulnerable; the ranger is being attacked as well.

i never said it was their only defense, but its a big part. 1 utility vs a full traitline and all stealth attacks? good deal.
my ranger and my thief only use 1 stun break, thats enough.

maybe i should ask the guards if they where fine with such a venom.

i do not want to remove that skill, not even its funcionality. just change it to something that requires a brain

Domey.9804:

sometimes i can survive sic em and burn all my utilities and dodges, but is that fair?

It’s amazing to see that thieves actually believe that they should be able to survive in 1 V many situation, and still cry about it when ONLY 2 skills in the whole game on a considerable cooldown counter their “legit” stealth mechanic.

You are not supposed to survive when outnumbered. In 1v1 situation, if you can’t survive for 6 seconds without stealth, you need to change your build and learn how to actually play the game.

So yes Sic ‘em and Analyze is far from OP. In fact I’d lower sic’em cooldown to 35-30 seconds.

Yelloweyedemon.2860:

In fact I’d lower sic’em cooldown to 35-30 seconds.

I agree; right now Sic ‘Em is almost entirely unused outside of PvE. It doesn’t do enough for the cool down. If someone takes it, it’s usually for the BM effects and nothing to do with the anti-trolling stealth mechanics.

Domey.9804:

i never said it was their only defense, but its a big part. 1 utility vs a full traitline and all stealth attacks? good deal.
my ranger and my thief only use 1 stun break, thats enough.

maybe i should ask the guards if they where fine with such a venom.

i do not want to remove that skill, not even its funcionality. just change it to something that requires a brain

It’s a 6 second reveal that requires a target on a 40 sec cooldown against the most mobile class in the game. If u can’t handle that you really need to up your game a bit.

Domey.9804:

hi there,

i love my ranger , especially with the recent buffs. but i never ever slot this skill. when i duel vs thiefs (which is my main proffession) i dont want to win because i use a skill which hardcounters all SA based builds. i want to win through skill and outplaying my opponent.
before you call me a thief in disguise who got ganked by sic em too much, yes…i admit i often get killed from that skill and a group of wildly attacking zerglings. sometimes i can survive sic em and burn all my utilities and dodges, but is that fair?
i think, it does too much for absolutely no efford and thats the reason i dont like this skill. not even on my ranger which has sometimes real problems vs certain thief builds.

does sic em need a castime?
or a animation?
or both?
make it affected by blind?

what is your opinion on that skill in wvw?

I like this skill where it is at. It is powerful against the very glassy theif builds and that is OK I think. Maybe a better tell so players know when they are revealed would be an improvement? Can you hear the Ranger yell “sic em”? I don’t feel like I’ve ever heard this from an opponent, but not many use this skill…

Fluffball.8307:

Yelloweyedemon.2860:

In fact I’d lower sic’em cooldown to 35-30 seconds.

I agree; right now Sic ‘Em is almost entirely unused outside of PvE. It doesn’t do enough for the cool down. If someone takes it, it’s usually for the BM effects and nothing to do with the anti-trolling stealth mechanics.

Tbh if the cd was 30 seconds, it could replace quick. zep. in PvE, in most cases. meaning you could use it twice in 60 secs window, one coupled with SotW, and one on its own.

Actually this is intresting, it would give the pet a good dps boost.

sic em is a rather weak skill. Stealth is a crutch for many unskilled players. One should not rely on one skill or mechanic. Since the patch a lot of rangers are relying on sos, but pre-patch one of the things rangers did well was to use an arrays of mechanisms for defense. Something I believe a lot of the other classes can learn from the rangers play book.

All of you thieves and mesmers rely on stealth as a crutch.

You do not know how to survive without it so you QQ when you can’t hide in stealth, regening health or letting AI do all the work.

SA and PU exist for a reason.

While there are skilled SA and PU players, the majority are noobs who can only win by playing those cheese builds.

Sick em is good as it is now.

Your justification is invalid.

shadowpass.4236:

All of you thieves and mesmers rely on stealth as a crutch.

You do not know how to survive without it so you QQ when you can’t hide in stealth, regening health or letting AI do all the work.

SA and PU exist for a reason.

While there are skilled SA and PU players, the majority are noobs who can only win by playing those cheese builds.

As a mesmer main it is really sad that the utility slots we have no matter what build will likely take in decoy blink a cleanse or port most of the time. It is hard to survive without them. It could be those 3 or 2 of them would be on those slots except for very niche situations.

I wish this wasnt the case but it is.

Oh, the typical “l2p”, “stealth is a crutch” Statements. I Forgot about this forum.
Anyway thanks for the reasonable answers.

You post a thread saying that you love your ranger and ask for a nerf on an already underused utility and have the nerve to talk about being reasonable. Nice try troll.

StickerHappy.8052:

shadowpass.4236:

All of you thieves and mesmers rely on stealth as a crutch.

You do not know how to survive without it so you QQ when you can’t hide in stealth, regening health or letting AI do all the work.

SA and PU exist for a reason.

While there are skilled SA and PU players, the majority are noobs who can only win by playing those cheese builds.

As a mesmer main it is really sad that the utility slots we have no matter what build will likely take in decoy blink a cleanse or port most of the time. It is hard to survive without them. It could be those 3 or 2 of them would be on those slots except for very niche situations.

I wish this wasnt the case but it is.

decoy, blinks, and those sort of things are fine.

im talking about condi PU.

I had a random thought last night. Sic ’em is quite weak against other players. What if the mechanics were this: Same pet buff, no stealth debuff for 20 seconds AND you can use it when someone is stealthed in the area to unstealth them, regular 40s cooldown.

Right now no one uses this skill because it’s ridiculously niche, but this would give it the BM buff on a reasonable CD, as well as the devs intended anti-trolling stealth mechanic.

No dev will ever read this, but I thought it was a neat idea.

Fluffball.8307:

I had a random thought last night. Sic ’em is quite weak against other players. What if the mechanics were this: Same pet buff, no stealth debuff for 20 seconds AND you can use it when someone is stealthed in the area to unstealth them, regular 40s cooldown.

Right now no one uses this skill because it’s ridiculously niche, but this would give it the BM buff on a reasonable CD, as well as the devs intended anti-trolling stealth mechanic.

No dev will ever read this, but I thought it was a neat idea.

What would be the point of revealing them without the debuff? The problem with thief stealth is how spammable it is. If they would do away with initiative and give thief skills proper cool downs your idea might work but right now the debuff is necessary.

Jim Hunter.6821:

What would be the point of revealing them without the debuff? The problem with thief stealth is how spammable it is. If they would do away with initiative and give thief skills proper cool downs your idea might work but right now the debuff is necessary.

I meant no debuff on the 20s cooldown version. So basically you can use it as anti-stealth and/or use it as a reasonable pet buff. Right now it’s an unreasonable pet buff due to cooldown and the stealth thing is useless 99% of the time.

A visual tell for revealed could help many new thiefs/mesmers/engis/ranger who rely on stealth.

I saw too many times a thief casting Shadow Refuge while on revealed, It’ funny because 8/10 stand still inside the circle and die XD

Fluffball.8307:

Jim Hunter.6821:

What would be the point of revealing them without the debuff? The problem with thief stealth is how spammable it is. If they would do away with initiative and give thief skills proper cool downs your idea might work but right now the debuff is necessary.

I meant no debuff on the 20s cooldown version. So basically you can use it as anti-stealth and/or use it as a reasonable pet buff. Right now it’s an unreasonable pet buff due to cooldown and the stealth thing is useless 99% of the time.

Yeah but then there is nothing stopping them from instantly restealthing. This is fine for mesmers, rangers and engi’s since they have cooldowns but thieves have too much access to stealth. Not having a debuff will make the skill completely useless against the only profession you really need it for.

When pets can stop being free Cloak and Daggers for SA trolls, then I’ll start caring.

nagymbear.5280:

You post a thread saying that you love your ranger and ask for a nerf on an already underused utility and have the nerve to talk about being reasonable. Nice try troll.

wow…calm down maybe.
yes i do love my ranger, atm i like it even more than my thief. i dont slot sic em, i find it cheap and boring , so for me a change to aoe destealth (+3sec revealed if removed stealth) ground targeted would be a buff cuz i would maybe use it from time to time, as it would have its uses vs more than only 1 proffession.
you could remove shadow refuge, mass invis, veil…what a nerf.
i will stop here. makes no sense to talk to others which just rage and call me a troll, bad player or whatever. i asked for opinions on that skill, not me.

I play most classes across the board. Mainly playing Ele, Thief, and ranger right now. I see absolutely no issue with Sic ‘em. Firstly, the CD on the skill is quite long paired with the fact that its effects do not last long at all. Thieves have a huge amount of dps and cap closer that can be utilized against a ranger to make this skill almost a moot point. Yes, if you are solely DPSing w backstabs in stealth then this skill is a burden. But pigeonholing yourself into that form of combat is solely on yourself (not to mention calling a skill that keeps you our of stealth for a few seconds is considered cheap to a person who wants to fight a duel entirely in stealth, seems very one-sided to me). Playing as a thief, I’ve been revealed with the skill before and it really doesn’t change the battle much unless it’s a well timed reveal before I need to retreat. I think the skill is quite balanced and this is a bit of a troll post to begin with; if the skill took you out of stealth it would be another conversation. I think mesmers have more to fear of this skill than thieves.

Domey.9804:

nagymbear.5280:

You post a thread saying that you love your ranger and ask for a nerf on an already underused utility and have the nerve to talk about being reasonable. Nice try troll.

wow…calm down maybe.
yes i do love my ranger, atm i like it even more than my thief. i dont slot sic em, i find it cheap and boring , so for me a change to aoe destealth (+3sec revealed if removed stealth) ground targeted would be a buff cuz i would maybe use it from time to time, as it would have its uses vs more than only 1 proffession.
you could remove shadow refuge, mass invis, veil…what a nerf.
i will stop here. makes no sense to talk to others which just rage and call me a troll, bad player or whatever. i asked for opinions on that skill, not me.

I am calm man. Your post is just rediculous. You ask to make a utility that barely anyone uses far worse, because you feel cheap. Your “questions” are laughable.

Domey.9804:

does sic em need a castime?
or a animation?
or both?
make it affected by blind?
what is your opinion on that skill in wvw?

I loved that skill and never wanted to take it off my bar. I finnaly swapped it out for flame trap and I’m a zerker lol. I occasionally put it on bar when a thief is being a jerk and bouncing around. Is it powerful? kitten ed right it is. Pewpewpew hehehe.

Domey.9804:

what if thief had a venom that instantly renders all blocks from guardians useless for 6 seconds? essentially the same, evrybody fine with it? (would be awesome in pvp)

Many counters to block are already in the game. Your thief has nine of em in fact. There is no need for a universal block counter.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Unblockable

Fluffball.8307:

Stealth on a thief or blocks on a guardian aren’t their only — or even main — lines of defense though, especially for a duration as short as 6 seconds.

Yeah. As I’ve said before, if having two skills in the game countering stealth so upsets your gameplay, that’s a pretty clear sign that stealth is too powerful and needs to be nerfed in order to encourage thief players to learn to effectively use other defensive measures.

I would like to give an opinion about how sic em shpuld be:

Instead of being a 1500 range instant reveal, it should be more powerful, but less unavoidable by making it like this:

Cooldown: 20 seconds
Cast time: .75 seconds (same as using necromancer´s staff #1 skill)
No longer requires target and doesnt end by any means other than running out of time
Duration: 10 seconds
Type: Shout
Description: Order your pet to focus on targets , making in ignore movement reducing conditions and deal more damage. Targets hit by your pet reveal targets for the duration of the skill.
Ignores: Cripple,Chill and imobilize
Damage increase: 20%
Revealed: 3 seconds (doesnt stack, it only refreshes if you are hit multiple times bofore the revealed expires).

This both makes the skill less frustrating for thieves that can avoid the pet and makes this skill more usefull against non thiefes because it makes your pet much harder to avoid because of the movmement speed conditions ignoring, makes it synergize better with natures voice becauce of the lower cooldown etc etc.

uri.6521:

I would like to give an opinion about how sic em shpuld be:

Instead of being a 1500 range instant reveal, it should be more powerful, but less unavoidable by making it like this:

Cooldown: 20 seconds
Cast time: .75 seconds (same as using necromancer´s staff #1 skill)
No longer requires target and doesnt end by any means other than running out of time
Duration: 10 seconds
Type: Shout
Description: Order your pet to focus on targets , making in ignore movement reducing conditions and deal more damage. Targets hit by your pet reveal targets for the duration of the skill.
Ignores: Cripple,Chill and imobilize
Damage increase: 20%
Revealed: 3 seconds (doesnt stack, it only refreshes if you are hit multiple times bofore the revealed expires).

This both makes the skill less frustrating for thieves that can avoid the pet and makes this skill more usefull against non thiefes because it makes your pet much harder to avoid because of the movmement speed conditions ignoring, makes it synergize better with natures voice becauce of the lower cooldown etc etc.

So you just want to add an induction, nerf the damage by 20%, nerf the movement speed considerably, and nerf the reveal duration by 3 seconds.

You must play ranger a lot!

The damage increase is 40% now on a 40 sec cooldown, i reduced both the damage and the cooldown to have the same damage increase over time.
But on the other side i dont see any movement speed nerf, since your pet has 99% chance in combat of having a movement speed condition, and by ignoring that, it can keep presure instead of just running crippled in circles for 10 seconds until the skill wears off.

Yeah and you are rigth, i only play ranger, i almost want to delete my other character sinche ranger is the only class i fell confortable playing.

Jim Hunter.6821:

Yeah but then there is nothing stopping them from instantly restealthing. This is fine for mesmers, rangers and engi’s since they have cooldowns but thieves have too much access to stealth. Not having a debuff will make the skill completely useless against the only profession you really need it for.

No no, it’s an either or scenario, so the skill does both. Either you unstealth/debuff someone who isn’t targeted, or you use the skill as a pet buff and it makes the cool down shorter; think Ride the Lighning. Right now it’s borderline useless as a pet buff in competitive play.

uri.6521:

The damage increase is 40% now on a 40 sec cooldown, i reduced both the damage and the cooldown to have the same damage increase over time.
But on the other side i dont see any movement speed nerf, since your pet has 99% chance in combat of having a movement speed condition, and by ignoring that, it can keep presure instead of just running crippled in circles for 10 seconds until the skill wears off.

Yeah and you are rigth, i only play ranger, i almost want to delete my other character sinche ranger is the only class i fell confortable playing.

Have you seen the pet’s run speed when traited agility training, using SotH, swiftness and Sic’em? You think movement conditions affect it?

Other than that, an induction to the skill is not needed, and the revealed duration is probably the only reason rangers using the skill in PvP/ WvW.

You just want to nerf it to the point of useless, because ? It already has no place in PvE, and your suggestion would make it useless in PvP as well. GG

I tested it and im sure that these dont stack, i used swifness, sick em and SotH at the same time and made chieftain from heart of the mist hit my pet and then make it attack me, and my ped had a lot of trouble hitting him.
Pets are still definetly affected by cripple and chill etc, even whith all those buffs.
And also, im sure that pet compat speed si capped at +33%, so even sic em doesnt make pet go 40% faster, i thik in makes it go 33% faster and the remaining 7% is used to mitigate movement speed decreases, but it is still affected considerably.

And also, the effect doesnt cancells when you order your pet something when the skill is in effect, which mean that you can do pet f2 with increased damage.

In short, i still think my change is a buff.

uri.6521:

I would like to give an opinion about how sic em shpuld be:

Instead of being a 1500 range instant reveal, it should be more powerful, but less unavoidable by making it like this:

Cooldown: 20 seconds
Cast time: .75 seconds (same as using necromancer´s staff #1 skill)
No longer requires target and doesnt end by any means other than running out of time
Duration: 10 seconds
Type: Shout
Description: Order your pet to focus on targets , making in ignore movement reducing conditions and deal more damage. Targets hit by your pet reveal targets for the duration of the skill.
Ignores: Cripple,Chill and imobilize
Damage increase: 20%
Revealed: 3 seconds (doesnt stack, it only refreshes if you are hit multiple times bofore the revealed expires).

Good changes, I would actually use the skill as BM, should only allow 1 reveal though

dylan.5409:

uri.6521:

I would like to give an opinion about how sic em shpuld be:

Instead of being a 1500 range instant reveal, it should be more powerful, but less unavoidable by making it like this:

Cooldown: 20 seconds
Cast time: .75 seconds (same as using necromancer´s staff #1 skill)
No longer requires target and doesnt end by any means other than running out of time
Duration: 10 seconds
Type: Shout
Description: Order your pet to focus on targets , making in ignore movement reducing conditions and deal more damage. Targets hit by your pet reveal targets for the duration of the skill.
Ignores: Cripple,Chill and imobilize
Damage increase: 20%
Revealed: 3 seconds (doesnt stack, it only refreshes if you are hit multiple times bofore the revealed expires).

Good changes, I would actually use the skill as BM, should only allow 1 reveal though

Aye. 3s reveal every 20s without needing to target? So its an AoE reveal? What about the radius and range? I’d increase cd to 25-30s if it was AoE.

as a ranger main, Sic Em is just a poorly designed skill that I never use for the same reason. it is very unfair to thieves (not really to mesmers cuz they don’t need the stealth to survive) and practically useless as a skill in general outside of trolling them. I just feel lame for using it, like I don’t deserve to win just cuz I pressed a single utility. The skill should be something completely different, that is not a hard counter to stealth. I would be surprised to know if any more than like, 1% of the ranger population even mains it, even on BM builds that can somewhat take advantage of the pet buff.

its just another lame, uninspired ranger skill.

I would remove the reveal from “Sic Em” altogether and make a new skill;

“Show Yourselves!”
600 Range
Applies 3s revealed to stealthed foes in range.
Targets: 10
30s CD

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

I would remove the reveal from “Sic Em” altogether and make a new skill;

“Show Yourselves!”
600 Range
Applies 3s revealed to stealthed foes in range.
Targets: 10
30s CD

This is an interesting idea for a non-pet shout skill, but sic em is nice where it is at. I am sure many beastmasters rely on the speed and damage increase for pet spike. It would be a shame to loose that option.

Yeah.. 3 secs reveal is not enough. it was 4 and it still lacked. It is fine as it is now. As I said the cooldown could still get reduced by 5-10 secs

Its true function is not everyday skill equipped on bar. Its for killing the bouncy bouncy troll thief who is begging to get gunned down with the longbow.

Justine.6351:

Its true function is not everyday skill equipped on bar. Its for killing the bouncy bouncy troll thief who is begging to get gunned down with the longbow.

Exactly. There’s hardly any counter for stealth in this game. People who want revealed duration to be nerfed either don’t play PvP or are just main thieves mesmers.

/thread

Domey.9804:

hi there,

i love my ranger , especially with the recent buffs. but i never ever slot this skill. when i duel vs thiefs (which is my main proffession) i dont want to win because i use a skill which hardcounters all SA based builds. i want to win through skill and outplaying my opponent.
before you call me a thief in disguise who got ganked by sic em too much, yes…i admit i often get killed from that skill and a group of wildly attacking zerglings. sometimes i can survive sic em and burn all my utilities and dodges, but is that fair?
i think, it does too much for absolutely no efford and thats the reason i dont like this skill. not even on my ranger which has sometimes real problems vs certain thief builds.

does sic em need a castime?
or a animation?
or both?
make it affected by blind?

what is your opinion on that skill in wvw?

One little problem.

Like many skills in WvW, it clearly doesn’t always work “as intended”.

Far more than just one time a day – and thieves laugh and laugh and laugh as they blink out even as your Sic Em’ should be revealing them for the allotted time of the skill.

Some might say I popped the skill at the wrong time, but I hate to tell you, I’ve gotten pretty good at it and I know when I’ve set it off and it isn’t working.