Guild Wars 2

…. really annoying fight this thiefs… they just keep invisible all the time… how you guys kill them?

Get help from allies? Honestly, there is no way to kill them. They will either kill you or realize that they can’t win and will just stealth and run away beyond the cull range and completely disappear.

The best you can hope for is to catch them in a lot of AoE by pure luck but since we don’t exactly have that ability you will have a hard time making it work.

They created a TF2 Spy without any of the drawbacks.

Barrage and trap? Also, soak up initial spike with SoS or protect me. My issue with thieves is that they slip away too easily.

place traps at your feet dodge when set off

when you seen the big stealth circle on the floor aoe it or randomly attack every part

use longbow rapid fire just before they stealth and follow your arrows

entangle them but doesn’t last long/ pretty much useless unless to stop them so your group can zerg

play one.. learn how the stealth mechanics work and you will have a better understanding

oh and watch your back thats where they are going for

Drakem.1620:

…. really annoying fight this thiefs… they just keep invisible all the time… how you guys kill them?

In WvW? You usually don’t which is BS, if a thief decides the fights over they’re gone, nothing you can do about it.

As for killing either a very determined stealth thief, or a stealth thief in sPvP, it’s simple, you make it hard as balls for them to hit you with their stealth opener, and you keep shooting/slashing them when they go invis. Unlike other MMOs you can kill the thief while they’re running around invis, and my god is that great!!

PS: in WvW you can track a thief while they’re stealthed, they move grass and that aside when they move and leave footprints/leave ripples in water as they move, learn to look for this.

Longbow rapid fire channels through their invisibility. Barrage is good too.

Eurantien.4632:

Longbow rapid fire channels through their invisibility. Barrage is good too.

lol… Maybe if a Thief doesn’t dodge.

One way to kill them: be hit for 8k steal/mug, 6k, 6k , your down in about one second, wait for stealthed finish, then hope that they die laughing.

If they are just your average thief you can kill them if they miss their opener and you know they are there and culling doesn’t render them invisible so much, but it takes timing and skill whereas they can be completely useless and get a couple lucky crits in and you’re downed.

If it’s a decent pistol thief, then if you are on your own sit down as it’s pretty much over- they do WAY more ranged damage than you do, can stealth and heal way better than you and healing spring (if you happen to use it-personally I don’t as you have to stand in it to benefit from it), and can run you down and backstab you if you try to get away. You can beat them in wvw 1v1 but it’s usually not worth the time and effort- just die, res, and get back to whatever mission you were on before.

I just hope my dogs will knock them back and pop zephyr when they do and hope it’s enough to kill them otherwise they just cloak, heal and kill you.

jkctmc.8754:

Eurantien.4632:

Longbow rapid fire channels through their invisibility. Barrage is good too.

lol… Maybe if a Thief doesn’t dodge.

Most thieves don’t dodge while in stealth because they assume they are safe enough. However, part of the reason I use rapid fire while they stealth isn’t only to damage them, but more of a way to track them and keep them in front of me.

I honestly have no issue against thieves, but that comes with experience. One very important thing I do is spam my auto target nearest enemy to target them when they aren’t in stealth and not rendered. If you are against a p/p thief, roll ~2.5s after they stealth to dodge unload (almost a guarantee they will use this first). As soon as a thief breaks stealth, try and cripple/chill to get some strikes in and then go for your daze/stun to keep them from going in stealth. If they come toward you with dagger storm, don’t shoot projectiles at them and focus on your positioning for when they are done or burst them with a melee weapon (often find them extremely easy to burst with the greatsword) since dagger storm doesn’t do more damage the closer you are. I could keep going, with other possibilities/situations, but what I guess I’m trying to say is that this all comes from experience. Play a thief, learn a bit about them, get on WvW and get 5k kills and you realize they aren’t as difficult as they may have seemed.

Indoles.1467:

jkctmc.8754:

Eurantien.4632:

Longbow rapid fire channels through their invisibility. Barrage is good too.

lol… Maybe if a Thief doesn’t dodge.

Most thieves don’t dodge while in stealth because they assume they are safe enough. However, part of the reason I use rapid fire while they stealth isn’t only to damage them, but more of a way to track them and keep them in front of me.

I honestly have no issue against thieves, but that comes with experience. One very important thing I do is spam my auto target nearest enemy to target them when they aren’t in stealth and not rendered. If you are against a p/p thief, roll ~2.5s after they stealth to dodge unload (almost a guarantee they will use this first). As soon as a thief breaks stealth, try and cripple/chill to get some strikes in and then go for your daze/stun to keep them from going in stealth. If they come toward you with dagger storm, don’t shoot projectiles at them and focus on your positioning for when they are done or burst them with a melee weapon (often find them extremely easy to burst with the greatsword) since dagger storm doesn’t do more damage the closer you are. I could keep going, with other possibilities/situations, but what I guess I’m trying to say is that this all comes from experience. Play a thief, learn a bit about them, get on WvW and get 5k kills and you realize they aren’t as difficult as they may have seemed.

Good advice – but one modification: Handling shadow refuge.

First, learn how it works – until I started playing a thief, I didn’t know, and it hurt my wvw skill. Shadow refuge is that invisibility-giving bubble with a house graphic above it It heals and provides 3 pulses of stealth – so if the thief doesn’t have the trait to give 1 second to stealth skills, it will provide 9 seconds total of stealth – 3 while it’s active, and 6 residual. If they ARE traited for +1 second to stealth, it’s 12 seconds (39).

The most important thing though From the wiki:

Moving outside the area of the refuge while it is active triggers revealed. You will be revealed even if you were stealthed by another skill. Once the field has expired, leaving the refuge will no longer trigger revealed.

Use your allied thieves shadow refuge likewise!
But if you can knock the thief out of the shadow refuge, he’ll have the stealth debuff that keeps him from re-stealthing for 3 seconds. So if you can fear or knock him out of that, it’s huge.

If you have greatsword out, it hurts because you don’t have to have a target.

If you’re fighting a condition thief, god help you. I can’t even kill them on MY thief.

By the by, thieves are fun to play. Give it a try!

Even if you’re good on a ranger played against a thief that knows wtf he’s doing you will lose. Ranger is extremely poorly built so the only thing you can do for now is wait for anet on a complete class overhaul (if that ever happens).

Only thing I can think of is a trap build, and having 3 traps set (Flame, Spike, and the poison one) and setting them down at your feet the second they go into stealth. Pull out the LB and pull a barrage at your position, and if they’ve already activated the traps, they’ll be in for a LOT of pain. Add Entangled to the mix for some more damage or just to root them in place.

It’s usually enough to either throw them into a down state, or make them run away. If they don’t run, it’s all up to luck and what weapon you have other than a LB to determine the win.

Drakem.1620:

…. really annoying fight this thiefs… they just keep invisible all the time… how you guys kill them?

My solution works better than any of the above. I don’t play any more. But before you whine about what I said, realize I think GW2 is one of the best MMOs to ever come out. But, I had the luck of choosing the class Anet seemed to like the least, and drag their feet over fixing the most. It wore on me, and I moved on. But back on the matter of stealth…

I think the concept of stealth and infiltration was done better in Planetside 2. Yea, it’s not a RPGMMO, but hear me out. Infiltrators in PS2 also have stealth, but it isn’t a 100% invisibility and it does not last for as long as the player wants, being on a short timer. This forces the Infiltrator to find cover, or otherwise play carefully and choose how, where, and when to pop stealth. At x distance or greater, the infiltrator’s stealth, when active, blends in with the environment and allows near invisibility unless movement by either the player or a watchful observer notes otherwise. It’s NOT a given that the Infiltrator will get away or stay hidden completely. Remaining still improves the stealther’s ability to remain hidden, although still, it is not 100% invisibility. Think of the Predator’s stealth ability in the movie with the same name and you get the idea. This is a better application of “stealth” here, imo. The stealther doesn’t get a free ride as they do in GW2. Anet, as I recall, promised during the beta periods they’d not give Thieves one, but lo and behold, they did.

They should take a page out of Planetside 2’s Infiltrator for a much more balanced approach. The current set up is just wrong.

What makes me laugh is that “stealth” is not the same as “invisibility”. Stealth implies you have a chance of being discovered, invisibility means you don’t appear AT ALL and cannot be targeted, and thus, not brought down. The Thief in GW2 does not “stealth”, they get a free ride without the need for skillful use and timing of abilities.

Some ideas (from the hip!):
1. Penalize damage out of ‘invisibility’ commensurate with the time spent hidden; they do less damage the more they prance around invisible.
2. Change the “stealth” nonsense to actually “being” stealth, or stop giving Thieves invisibility. How about camouflage, or unique use of skins and textures so they blend in to trees or walls, etc?

Thieves don’t like being controlled, even the good ones which there are very few, my thief main sure doesn’t. Keep them controlled while your pet has lunch and sit on Q zephyr or another burst for last hit before they can reset the fight then swap pet if you have 5 bm and stomp. Go for that quickness stomp if you can, even if they don’t trait for downed damage, that knife throw can turn any low health into a revive.

If the thief keeps hitting and running off for a reset, let them go rest up while you rest up, they want you to slowly kill yourself on them while they go in and out of stealth chasing them like any good zergling should do. I guarantee they’re going to rage on the inside if they come back at you and you’re rested and ready to roll with a smile with fully refreshed cool downs. They want to lure you, so deny them that and just go about your business while they slowly, or quickly, kill themselves on you.

40/60 vs them which is not that bad I guess

I am LB and GS with 20.20.0.0.30 build. Mostly valk stuff.

Rapid fire when you think they will stealth. Use your stun break of course. GS block really suprises them and hits like a truck.

Run double dogs for the two knockdowns.

I can get kills like I said 40% of the time. It could be higher, but there are times they get away and I am not going to chase them into a zerg.

honestly my biggest issue now is the 3-4 pack of guild rogues you see running around. No way you can beat that.

kash.9213:

Thieves don’t like being controlled, even the good ones which there are very few, my thief main sure doesn’t. Keep them controlled while your pet has lunch and sit on Q zephyr or another burst for last hit before they can reset the fight then swap pet if you have 5 bm and stomp. Go for that quickness stomp if you can, even if they don’t trait for downed damage, that knife throw can turn any low health into a revive.

If the thief keeps hitting and running off for a reset, let them go rest up while you rest up, they want you to slowly kill yourself on them while they go in and out of stealth chasing them like any good zergling should do. I guarantee they’re going to rage on the inside if they come back at you and you’re rested and ready to roll with a smile with fully refreshed cool downs. They want to lure you, so deny them that and just go about your business while they slowly, or quickly, kill themselves on you.

This is SO true. Knowing when and when not to chase an enemy is a huge part of surviving in WvW. When they come back after a difficult fight to see you just standing there not backing away, many thieves (other professions included) change their mind about continuing to fight you and will start targeting other players instead if any are nearby.

Indoles.1467:

kash.9213:

Thieves don’t like being controlled, even the good ones which there are very few, my thief main sure doesn’t. Keep them controlled while your pet has lunch and sit on Q zephyr or another burst for last hit before they can reset the fight then swap pet if you have 5 bm and stomp. Go for that quickness stomp if you can, even if they don’t trait for downed damage, that knife throw can turn any low health into a revive.

If the thief keeps hitting and running off for a reset, let them go rest up while you rest up, they want you to slowly kill yourself on them while they go in and out of stealth chasing them like any good zergling should do. I guarantee they’re going to rage on the inside if they come back at you and you’re rested and ready to roll with a smile with fully refreshed cool downs. They want to lure you, so deny them that and just go about your business while they slowly, or quickly, kill themselves on you.

This is SO true. Knowing when and when not to chase an enemy is a huge part of surviving in WvW. When they come back after a difficult fight to see you just standing there not backing away, many thieves (other professions included) change their mind about continuing to fight you and will start targeting other players instead if any are nearby.

I’d say this is true for most every other class except rangers. Maybe also engineers and necros but the standing firm might make them think “what’s this guy got up his sleeve?” Most people know the average wvw ranger is just going to try to axe #1 you to death and will go right for you.

I can’t even count how many times a thief has circumvented our zerg to go right for me thinking I’m an easy badge. Rangers aren’t really high on anyone’s “Oh kitten, better not try to 1v1 this guy” list.

Substance E.4852:

Indoles.1467:

kash.9213:

Thieves don’t like being controlled, even the good ones which there are very few, my thief main sure doesn’t. Keep them controlled while your pet has lunch and sit on Q zephyr or another burst for last hit before they can reset the fight then swap pet if you have 5 bm and stomp. Go for that quickness stomp if you can, even if they don’t trait for downed damage, that knife throw can turn any low health into a revive.

If the thief keeps hitting and running off for a reset, let them go rest up while you rest up, they want you to slowly kill yourself on them while they go in and out of stealth chasing them like any good zergling should do. I guarantee they’re going to rage on the inside if they come back at you and you’re rested and ready to roll with a smile with fully refreshed cool downs. They want to lure you, so deny them that and just go about your business while they slowly, or quickly, kill themselves on you.

This is SO true. Knowing when and when not to chase an enemy is a huge part of surviving in WvW. When they come back after a difficult fight to see you just standing there not backing away, many thieves (other professions included) change their mind about continuing to fight you and will start targeting other players instead if any are nearby.

I’d say this is true for most every other class except rangers. Maybe also engineers and necros but the standing firm might make them think “what’s this guy got up his sleeve?” Most people know the average wvw ranger is just going to try to axe #1 you to death and will go right for you.

I can’t even count how many times a thief has circumvented our zerg to go right for me thinking I’m an easy badge. Rangers aren’t really high on anyone’s “Oh kitten, better not try to 1v1 this guy” list.

Until they pour their burst into you only to find you still sitting pretty at +75% health, and they’re poisoned, cripples, and immobed and your 1h blades warrior friend is in the process of bulls rushing the poor thief who though you were some easy kill xD.

It never gets old watching a thief go for me thinking “Oh i’ll just burst him and leave” only to find himself unable to escape from one (or more) of my glass cannon friends i PvP with (i play as support, me doing no damage is due to how i built, not due to ranger as a prof).

I’m ex-ranger, now a thief. I’ve played about 300 hours on each.

I used to play a trap ranger using entangle for my elite.
Here is what I would use if I still played ranger.

- Stand in a combined spike and fire trap to avoid the backstab – thief won’t be able resist you standing still and will go in for a backstab. Spike will immobilise/bleed and Fire will burst them. Backstab will fail. This will put the thief on the back foot. Re-apply traps around yourself asap.
- Poison won’t impact the heal so don’t use poison trap (our heal skill cures poison before applying the heal)
- Don’t use channeled attacks early. Try to predict when you think they will re-stealth and trigger it. Channeled attacks continue to hit us when are in stealth. Use Zephyr if you think it will help down him.
- Dodge and kite so they can’t use Cloak and Dagger to regain stealth (they need to get within 130 radius). Use knockback on longbow to push them away as they approach for CnD – otherwise dodge or cripple to make them use a cooldown to gain re-stealth.
- Thieves in trouble usually use Shadow Refuge (the stealth AoE with the little house). When they do this, immediately use your wolf pet special F1 with Fear to drive them out of the refuge – this will give them a debuff called ‘Revealed’ which stops them re-stealthing for 3-seconds. I assume the F1 is still unreliable when pressed – or did they fix that..?
- Use Entangle works on thieves that are stealthed – pop it when they are they are low (or fleeing and still in range).

Most thieves run Shadow Step which can get them 1200 away from you instantly. So they are always going to hard to kill unless you can burst them into down state before they can use it.

I suggest you roll a thief and play it in the Mists. For utility skills use Blinding Powder, Shadow Refuge and Shadow Step and try both Thieves Guild and Dagger Storm for your elite.

Try to fight the Mist’s profession NPCs using Cloak and Dagger + Backstab and Heartseeker. We don’t tend to use Death Blossom because it is condition damage (and initiative expensive) and Dancing Dagger does too little utility/damage for the amount of initiative it costs.

Fighting as a thief in the Mists against the NPCs will give you a greater understanding.

The truth is that each profession has another profession that is their weakness. As a thief, I have a terrible time beating guardians and warriors even though I have good burst and healing – all my attacks seem to just bounce off them. Whereas guardians have a terrible time with necromancers conditions. Some professions have a difficult time with thieves. Sometimes you just have to happy with surviving a fight rather than winning a fight.

Any time you make a thief run away is considered a win in my books. You don’t have to make them die for it to be considered a victory.

What is stopping people from rolling norms for snow leop? If you’re losing a fight, transform and get the kitten out…

You see a p/d thief, transform stealth and charge out. Why waste your time?

This option is available to all classes in WvW.

There you go, every class has a way to reset fights like the thief does.

I run a Axe/Warhorn & Longbow, Ranged-Traps condition build,
Entangle as Elite, and after countless hours of play and many many fights against thieves, I’m able to win fights with thieves about 50% of the time…when everything goes right. Which it does not, especially where pets are concerned…

I do think it is the most effective anti-thief build for a Ranger however. Tonight I was able to kill a Thief and Ranger together solo, because things went very well. Having accelerated Endurance regen is believe it or not the key I think when it comes to thieves…staying mobile, causing some of those important attacks to miss, negating some of that crucial damage, makes a huge difference.

Short bow + condition dmg + BM (jaguar+lynx)

stack bleeds and kite+laugh heartilly

dottek.3461:

Short bow + condition dmg + BM (jaguar+lynx)

stack bleeds and kite+laugh heartilly

Thief stealth removes conditions, as does Hide in Shadows while also giving them constant regen boon.

dottek.3461:

Short bow + condition dmg + BM (jaguar+lynx)

stack bleeds and kite+laugh heartilly

sorry man but you honestly can’t be playing a ranger and post this.

1. They stealth and cure conditions
2. Pets have a hard time keeping up. When they do, thief CnD off pet and cures conditions.
3. Kite a thief? Ok again, no way you have faced one if you post that.

against 80% of the thiefs this works for me pretty well.
- Take initial backstab
- Lighning reflexes followed by Point blank shot (LB) (be fast)
- QZ, followed by Barrage and Rapid Fire (both within the QZ) + send in pet (i always have it on passive). If your first Rapid Fire arrow hits.. they usually already decided to go into stealth, but your arrows will keep tracking them.
- Switch to shortbow
- Concussion shot (tricky to time )
- finish with crossfire (if QZ off cooldown pop it again).

if needed i throw in a heal which gives me 5 sec protection with the Lyssa armor, so -33% dmg taken.
On top of that if you have the time.. you can always pop Rampage as one. 20 sec of stability and increased crit chance is very nice in such a fight.

oh.. and NEVER run away from a thief, cause that means certain death.

Best way is highly dependent on avoiding their bursts, so:
- Time your evades/blocks/stun breakers/heals just right for when they start hitting you. – - Do not run, make a stand, attack them by applying cripples and conditions the very first chance you get.
-You survived the initial burst? great, now you can learn to see when a thief is building up initiative. They usually start using normal attacks, this will be your short window to strike back at them, make them regret they are still fighting you. If you succeed they will stealth.
-The moment a thief goes into stealth, you continue to attack. They are either doing it to throw you off, to heal and to —- get at your back —- I cannot stress this enough. Learn to predict what a thief can do while in stealth. Sometimes it’s too good and you die, sometimes it’s just looping through its bursts, which you can learn to avoid.
-Keep your pet attacking them at all times. Yes a challenging feat to have to also focus on your pet doing a good job. If you can spare it, use ‘guard’ in the area you are fighting and the pet will protect you.
-Choose your pet wisely, know that the pet skills can either save or kill you, they definitely can make a difference against a thief.
-In my personal experience using troll unguent at the beginning of the battle usually saves my life. Also there is the all important decision of your ultimate. I tend to be 50/50 between entangle and spirit of nature. I have won and lost battles with either; at least if you time spirit of nature properly you can resurrect yourself and get constant healing from it.
-Remember, a thief is generally going to be weaker than you. That is why they can hide and attack faster than you can. Make sure they die fast by learning better combat tactics, switch your build to be tougher.
-The most important of all tips when fighting any thief: spot them first. This is easy to do if you realize you can die anytime, anywhere due to some lucky thief who spotted you first and will burst you down before you prepare to battle. If you spot them first, get ready, send in your pet and good luck!

I’ve created a S/D build, using 2x cats as pets and swapping them on cd. Stack toughness, healing power, condition damage, and vitality. The evasive nature of the build causes a ton of initiative wasting for thieves. Just gotta play this build balls-to-the-wall aggressive.
So far have not lost to a thief 1v1 in sPvP.

i’m a thief and a ranger that uses frost traps and long bow (volley) and short bow during combat seems to always get me.

i am a glass cannon thief – power/prec/crit dmg

dont have problems with thieves rly with my build… I have problems with mesmers

Adaneshade.2409:

I’ve created a S/D build, using 2x cats as pets and swapping them on cd. Stack toughness, healing power, condition damage, and vitality. The evasive nature of the build causes a ton of initiative wasting for thieves. Just gotta play this build balls-to-the-wall aggressive.
So far have not lost to a thief 1v1 in sPvP.

Why have condition damage with that spec? Just wondering, as I don’t see how it helps you with that weapon combo. (I have not seen Cond damage help pet bleeds either).

Lysico.4906:

Adaneshade.2409:

I’ve created a S/D build, using 2x cats as pets and swapping them on cd. Stack toughness, healing power, condition damage, and vitality. The evasive nature of the build causes a ton of initiative wasting for thieves. Just gotta play this build balls-to-the-wall aggressive.
So far have not lost to a thief 1v1 in sPvP.

Why have condition damage with that spec? Just wondering, as I don’t see how it helps you with that weapon combo. (I have not seen Cond damage help pet bleeds either).

Boosting the poison and bleed damage has worked very well thus far. I’m not certain if it improves pet at all, none of your stats do that I can tell. That’s not to say you couldn’t easily swap in power for condition damage. Most of the attacks have both a condition and a direct damage component. I just chose to buff the conditions since it translates really well to SB as well for weapon-swapping on targets that run from me.

I beat Thieves on a regular basis, but there is always this one who does far more damage than any other Thief out there.

Case in point, just now;

I have 2632 Armor

2636 Steal
- This triggered Natures Protection 5 sec Protection
*4,361 Cloak and Dagger
- Wait, I have a 33% damage reduction on.
6,662 Backstab Note: This happened in less than a second. Keybind or Mouse Macro.
- Wait, I still have a 33% damage reduction on.
- This was a frontal backstab, which I think should be removed, and require back only.
- Hit the Thief with Winter’s Bite.
- Try to trigger Lightning Reflexes, yet it goes on cooldown, nothing happens. WTF?!??!?
- I dodge, escaping the damage of auto attack, and one heartseeker, which triggers 2 seconds more Protection.
4,025 Heartseeker
- Funny that, I still have 33% damage reduction on.
- This also triggers Barkskin.
4,025 Heartseeker
- I still have 33% damage reduction from Protection.
- Barkskin is either bugged, or does not stack with Protection.
- I dodge escaping Cloak and Dagger, which reapplies my Protection for another 2 seconds.
4,025 Heartseeker
Dead
Send my pet into a camp solo, and watch him die for being worthless to me.

The entire fight was roughly 5 seconds, 6 at most. My pet barely even touched the glass canon Thief, and my damage wasn’t much help either.

jkctmc.8754:

I beat Thieves on a regular basis, but there is always this one who does far more damage than any other Thief out there.

Case in point, just now;

I have 2632 Armor

2636 Steal
- This triggered Natures Protection 5 sec Protection
*4,361 Cloak and Dagger
- Wait, I have a 33% damage reduction on.
6,662 Backstab Note: This happened in less than a second. Keybind or Mouse Macro.
- Wait, I still have a 33% damage reduction on.
- This was a frontal backstab, which I think should be removed, and require back only.
- Hit the Thief with Winter’s Bite.
- Try to trigger Lightning Reflexes, yet it goes on cooldown, nothing happens. WTF?!??!?
- I dodge, escaping the damage of auto attack, and one heartseeker, which triggers 2 seconds more Protection.
4,025 Heartseeker
- Funny that, I still have 33% damage reduction on.
- This also triggers Barkskin.
4,025 Heartseeker
- I still have 33% damage reduction from Protection.
- Barkskin is either bugged, or does not stack with Protection.
- I dodge escaping Cloak and Dagger, which reapplies my Protection for another 2 seconds.
4,025 Heartseeker
Dead
Send my pet into a camp solo, and watch him die for being worthless to me.

The entire fight was roughly 5 seconds, 6 at most. My pet barely even touched the glass canon Thief, and my damage wasn’t much help either.

That usually happens when they catch you by surprise. I think it is ok that we get caught off guard like this, after a while you learn to react to those type of thiefs. I was fighting one myself yesterday, killed me the first time. He felt confident so he found me again and tried to come in for the kill. Well I am a BM 0/0/30/10/30 build, lots of toughness.

Steal+backstab+ oh wait I used shortbow dodge, heartseeker? failed in mid air due to shortbow stun, pet was on him (wolf) and stunned him again meanwhile I was doing damage with auto attack from shortbow. As he was stunned I activated sick-em + QZ for a very quick and massive burst, his health dropped to about 35% + applied bleeds from superior sigil of earth (60% chance to bleed on criticals). At that point the stun was over, he used a cloaking skill, I used troll unguent. I used ‘guard’ on my feet, switched to sword/horn, started to run around in patterns which would make him get closer to my pet in order to do backstab again.

At this point he came back, managed to backstab me+land a heartseeker and a poison(ouch), I used skill 2 of sword, skill 4 or warhorn, skill 3 of sword and dodged a burst he had in mind. My pet landed a few hits which surprised him since he immediately cloaked. I figured he wanted to BS me again so I used root and started to swing my sword everywhere. Dead thief = happy ranger.

He tried 3 more times, did massive burst damage everytime, failed to do enough to kill me. Lesson learned: glass cannon build thief can only do so much, learn to react to their bursts, try to always keep your eyes open around wvw for them, good luck that you don’t get surprised again.

The whole process only proved one fact —- he is a bad thief player coz what he was doing is to fight you fairly. A good thief never engage into a fair fight since he always has the ability to choose. I play thief too, the main difference between a good one VS bad one is not skills but the way how you fight. To be a good thief, 1st thing to remember is to fight as cheap as you can.

awge.3852:

jkctmc.8754:

I beat Thieves on a regular basis, but there is always this one who does far more damage than any other Thief out there.

Case in point, just now;

I have 2632 Armor

2636 Steal
- This triggered Natures Protection 5 sec Protection
*4,361 Cloak and Dagger
- Wait, I have a 33% damage reduction on.
6,662 Backstab Note: This happened in less than a second. Keybind or Mouse Macro.
- Wait, I still have a 33% damage reduction on.
- This was a frontal backstab, which I think should be removed, and require back only.
- Hit the Thief with Winter’s Bite.
- Try to trigger Lightning Reflexes, yet it goes on cooldown, nothing happens. WTF?!??!?
- I dodge, escaping the damage of auto attack, and one heartseeker, which triggers 2 seconds more Protection.
4,025 Heartseeker
- Funny that, I still have 33% damage reduction on.
- This also triggers Barkskin.
4,025 Heartseeker
- I still have 33% damage reduction from Protection.
- Barkskin is either bugged, or does not stack with Protection.
- I dodge escaping Cloak and Dagger, which reapplies my Protection for another 2 seconds.
4,025 Heartseeker
Dead
Send my pet into a camp solo, and watch him die for being worthless to me.

The entire fight was roughly 5 seconds, 6 at most. My pet barely even touched the glass canon Thief, and my damage wasn’t much help either.

That usually happens when they catch you by surprise. I think it is ok that we get caught off guard like this, after a while you learn to react to those type of thiefs. I was fighting one myself yesterday, killed me the first time. He felt confident so he found me again and tried to come in for the kill. Well I am a BM 0/0/30/10/30 build, lots of toughness.

Steal+backstab+ oh wait I used shortbow dodge, heartseeker? failed in mid air due to shortbow stun, pet was on him (wolf) and stunned him again meanwhile I was doing damage with auto attack from shortbow. As he was stunned I activated sick-em + QZ for a very quick and massive burst, his health dropped to about 35% + applied bleeds from superior sigil of earth (60% chance to bleed on criticals). At that point the stun was over, he used a cloaking skill, I used troll unguent. I used ‘guard’ on my feet, switched to sword/horn, started to run around in patterns which would make him get closer to my pet in order to do backstab again.

At this point he came back, managed to backstab me+land a heartseeker and a poison(ouch), I used skill 2 of sword, skill 4 or warhorn, skill 3 of sword and dodged a burst he had in mind. My pet landed a few hits which surprised him since he immediately cloaked. I figured he wanted to BS me again so I used root and started to swing my sword everywhere. Dead thief = happy ranger.

He tried 3 more times, did massive burst damage everytime, failed to do enough to kill me. Lesson learned: glass cannon build thief can only do so much, learn to react to their bursts, try to always keep your eyes open around wvw for them, good luck that you don’t get surprised again.

CRrabbit.1284:

The whole process only proved one fact —- he is a bad thief player coz what he was doing is to fight you fairly. A good thief never engage into a fair fight since he always has the ability to choose. I play thief too, the main difference between a good one VS bad one is not skills but the way how you fight. To be a good thief, 1st thing to remember is to fight as cheap as you can.

awge.3852:

jkctmc.8754:

I beat Thieves on a regular basis, but there is always this one who does far more damage than any other Thief out there.

Case in point, just now;

I have 2632 Armor

2636 Steal
- This triggered Natures Protection 5 sec Protection
*4,361 Cloak and Dagger
- Wait, I have a 33% damage reduction on.
6,662 Backstab Note: This happened in less than a second. Keybind or Mouse Macro.
- Wait, I still have a 33% damage reduction on.
- This was a frontal backstab, which I think should be removed, and require back only.
- Hit the Thief with Winter’s Bite.
- Try to trigger Lightning Reflexes, yet it goes on cooldown, nothing happens. WTF?!??!?
- I dodge, escaping the damage of auto attack, and one heartseeker, which triggers 2 seconds more Protection.
4,025 Heartseeker
- Funny that, I still have 33% damage reduction on.
- This also triggers Barkskin.
4,025 Heartseeker
- I still have 33% damage reduction from Protection.
- Barkskin is either bugged, or does not stack with Protection.
- I dodge escaping Cloak and Dagger, which reapplies my Protection for another 2 seconds.
4,025 Heartseeker
Dead
Send my pet into a camp solo, and watch him die for being worthless to me.

The entire fight was roughly 5 seconds, 6 at most. My pet barely even touched the glass canon Thief, and my damage wasn’t much help either.

That usually happens when they catch you by surprise. I think it is ok that we get caught off guard like this, after a while you learn to react to those type of thiefs. I was fighting one myself yesterday, killed me the first time. He felt confident so he found me again and tried to come in for the kill. Well I am a BM 0/0/30/10/30 build, lots of toughness.

Steal+backstab+ oh wait I used shortbow dodge, heartseeker? failed in mid air due to shortbow stun, pet was on him (wolf) and stunned him again meanwhile I was doing damage with auto attack from shortbow. As he was stunned I activated sick-em + QZ for a very quick and massive burst, his health dropped to about 35% + applied bleeds from superior sigil of earth (60% chance to bleed on criticals). At that point the stun was over, he used a cloaking skill, I used troll unguent. I used ‘guard’ on my feet, switched to sword/horn, started to run around in patterns which would make him get closer to my pet in order to do backstab again.

At this point he came back, managed to backstab me+land a heartseeker and a poison(ouch), I used skill 2 of sword, skill 4 or warhorn, skill 3 of sword and dodged a burst he had in mind. My pet landed a few hits which surprised him since he immediately cloaked. I figured he wanted to BS me again so I used root and started to swing my sword everywhere. Dead thief = happy ranger.

He tried 3 more times, did massive burst damage everytime, failed to do enough to kill me. Lesson learned: glass cannon build thief can only do so much, learn to react to their bursts, try to always keep your eyes open around wvw for them, good luck that you don’t get surprised again.

Hardly a fair fight bro… he killed a thief, it’s not hard to do. And as hard as it is for a lot of people to believe, in non WvW scenarios the thief can’t actually escape as easily (not enough terrain to hide behind), i’ve noticed that in most scenarios BM counters thief because if that pet gets ANY time to just stand there and wail on him (oh look, majority of the fight when it’s a good BM ranger), you’ll win. ESPECIALLY if you get downed, the thief will try to finish you giving your pet ample time to just destroy his face, usually downing him in the process, and a ranger will ALWAYS win a downed fight against a thief (unless lick wounds bugs but even then if you didn’t take to much damage you still got your BM buffed pet to throw onto him and can still win it).

A good thief will eat you and your babies, just prey on the bad ones there are lots of them about.

Very hard to kill a good thief. If they thief is a chain stealther, it should be almost impossible for him to kill you as well.

Either way the thief is specced, they can usually get away any time they want. The trick is that they WANT you to follow them, cause then they get their cooldowns and strat ready and own you quickly. DONT play into their game. Chase at a safe distance and prepare to kite at a moments notice or DONT chase at all. Forcing a thief to run away from a fight HE chose is a win in my book. If he wants to stop being a kitten and actually fight to the death, well he’s welcome to come back.

In general for thieves I attempt to get a rapid fire off anytime they are likely to stealth. A quickness rapid fire is better because if they don’t think to roll right away, they take too much damage to recover from. That brings me to the key to fighting high damage thieves. DO DAMAGE. They lack defenses, so bring them down quickly and efficiently and you will be alright. Also use 2 dogs, the CC they bring is imperative for killing them. Knockdowns give you a second+ of them not being able to dodge or stealth. Longbow knockback also does a knockdown for you.

When you go down, don’t give up. The wolf howl is great at stopping a stomp, as is getting lucky with any of the dogs knockdown. Using the pet CC and #2, you can keep yourself up long enough to rez with the pet and if the thiefs not quick you can bandage and petrez yourself back up, i’ve done it. Also while stopping the stomp dont forget to throw dirt. If you down the thief while you are downed you have a 90% chance of beating his kitten as long as your pet rez doesn’t bug out.

Lastly: when they stealth house, i rush in and frost trap plus swing my sword around. you’ll hit him a couple times. My newest move is to actually run in an use #5 with offhand axe. It will hit most of the area, so they might panic and move out of it if his health was too low, which it usually is because they save the house for trouble.

Don’t despair when you die to thieves. Their play style is to pick the best situation you can and if it gets hairy, to escape. Experience is your friend so learn from every thief death until you start killing them more than they kill you.

The backstab thieves aren’t so bad, if you survive or avoid the initial burst and slow/chill them to help mitigate the heartseeker spam they go down pretty easy.

The pistol dagger thief is the especially tough one for Rangers as they can stealth off your pet, lay caltops, and are only out of stealth briefly at any one time for the duration of the fight. Being in stealth a lot with condition removal in stealth etc makes it hard even for trap rangers- they don’t have to be close to you since they stealth off your pet. I even saw one dodge over a ranger’s traps leaving caltops while not setting off the traps, haha amazing.

Conclusion: if you are lucky, and you see them coming (which means spending half your time turning around 360’s whilst trying to run somewhere….), then you have a chance of surviving their 8k steal/mug, 6k skill, 6k cnd all done in less than a second IF you are superman and can react INSTANTLY after that steal. A good thief will rip any of the above suggestions to shreds, and if he doesn’t then he will wonder off leaving you swinging at thin air and running in patterns while he is half way across the map.

Backstab thiefs are easy kills most of the time- as soon as you see the house pop up hit charr racial slot skill, qz, barrage on it and by the time they realise it’s not a normal barrage they will be lying around downed when their house stealth comes off.

P/D thief played well will rip you to shreds and there isn’t a lot you can do about it, I only wish rangers had a skill that hit as fast as unload…

Good luck killing a p/d thief, a bs thief you can counter if you see them coming but a p/d thief will kill you no matter how skill you are, bring their hp down to half? they stealth, want to immobilize them and bring their hp down to half? good luck with that since we don’t have large bursts, even a s/d build won’t able to burst them down since they can just stealth. It takes no skill playing a p/d thief, if you see one, run the other way, it’s mind boggling that a kittening developer can call this balance. I wish them good luck on e.sport.

Btw did i mention how our pets are useless and take forever to catch them, or how most of our kittening f2 take 2+ seconds to cast? anyone, and i mean anyone who thinks that allowing a thief to go in stealth in combat/ have 100% vigor all the time, and can burst 20k damage in seconds is balance is kitten in the head.

My vote is jump in the water, lol, after trying and trying and trying without luck against a thief in the eternal JP I found my only chance was to jump in the water, I got her down to 20% health about 50 times and she always had stealth ready for it, I even respeced to every freaking setup possible to try and counter this one but they all proved equally useless, burst, condition, survival, healing, BM doesn’t matter she’ll run off stealth and cleanse everytime she gets low anyway and none of the pets could even reach her for a second, totally hopeless fight I even needed to take 3 days off from GW2 it was so aggravating.

Manekk.6981:

My vote is jump in the water, lol, after trying and trying and trying without luck against a thief in the eternal JP I found my only chance was to jump in the water, I got her down to 20% health about 50 times and she always had stealth ready for it, I even respeced to every freaking setup possible to try and counter this one but they all proved equally useless, burst, condition, survival, healing, BM doesn’t matter she’ll run off stealth and cleanse everytime she gets low anyway and none of the pets could even reach her for a second, totally hopeless fight I even needed to take 3 days off from GW2 it was so aggravating.

It’s understandable, they are the typical MMO class that requires very little skill or effort to make work but the players of them insist that their success is all done to their own skill.

I say this as someone who does well against them, it’s Mesmer’s that give the most trouble.

This game only came out for less than half yr, and we have already seen thief get nerfs. A good balance need time, I can clearly remember when I play thief in AION, after monthes of dominating, 1 single patch made my thief become dying to anything from killing everything. For right now, you just have to overplay a thief or just simply reroll a thief if you don’t have the patience to wait.

I’ve noticed if a person goes invisible while they have a DoT such as burning bleeding or poison on them they are revealed with each tick of the damage and you can see the small DoT number damage going off. This helps to find them. You’ve got a few poison and burning options available to you as ranger so that’s not too hard and bleeds galore.

Many of the traps under your feet are great against them when they come into melee range mainly Muddy terrain ( immobilize and cripple) or Spike Trap ( bleed DoT and cripple).

Being 100% honest here…
I just throw down my traps and stand in the middle with a canine out. The thief stabs me, my canine cripples him, and the fights over. Thief dead in 3 seconds. If he manages to get away and wipe off conditions with his stealth heal, I just use Troll Ungent and dodge/use my evasive abilities until his Initiative is used up.

My Traps: Spike/Flame/Viper
Weapons: Shortbow (Earth) + Sword/Torch (Energy, Corruption)
Gear: Rabid Amulet, Undead Runes

Not much, but one tactic I have found success with:

When they stealth, wait until you see the numbers on you(when they start attacking you), and pop muddy terrain, and burst down as much as you can. This also works with traps, though they can be laid immediately, and after one of those two options, a follow up with Entangle will leave the thief a trapped animal, waiting for the hunter to finish them off.

Conditions + reflexes and/or toughness.
Don’t chase too much try to make them step in to the fields/traps.

We can’t kill them if they are good… because they: can hide, and they with dagger can kill u in half second. We havent enough life to reach 2 attack from a full damage thief
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBVN9WewPyM no one can beath he… look regeneration and damage/Health

I’m not saying thieves are easy to kill by any chance but:
1. If you can’ take 2 hits from him you are too glassy. This is not a ranger problem it’s generally true for all. Besides armor is more important than life. You can take more hits with 16k life and high armor than 25k life and low armor.
2. If he uses the build from this video, he just doesn’t kill you in 2 hits.

Half of the time the people in this video were shooting him with auto attacks. No class can survive being outnumbered vs players of equal skill with and adequate build.