Guild Wars 2

Personally, I believe that Thieves are the most controversial class in the game. I mean, I can’t go a minute on this forum without reading one thread stating why thieves are OP and then seeing a thread right after that talking about how utterly weak thieves are. I’m making this thread is for all of the people whining about how horrible their thieves are.

10. You think that “thief” and “survivability” are antonyms

This is one that I see a lot. In my experience, far too many people think of the thief as a bit of a glass cannon profession, dealing out tons of damage in little or no time and being the biggest baller on the field. While that can be true, if you find that you’re the kind of person with this mindset, and you find yourself dying almost instantly, then you’re probably doing something wrong.

A good thief has access to a wide range of Stealthing and Shadowstepping tools that allow them to move in and out of battle fluidly, survive heavy damage, rez teammates, and deal sustainable damage. If you’re going to run a build like this, then you really need to know what you’re doing. It’s high risk, and often for little reward.

If you’re really interested in dealing decent damage, look for good ways to incorporate survivability with it. Maybe go for some traits in Acrobatics to get might buffs and a buff for having less than 100% endurance. Maybe look into Shadow Arts to get some good stealth and health regen before you decide to Backstab your opponent. Do that sort of thing.

9. You think that “stealth” and “survivability” are synonyms

On the flip side, you have the thieves that think that, if they have tons and tons of stealth, they will survive forever without ever taking any damage. While this is probably truer than the mindset listed in Reason #10, it still suffers from a few misconceptions. For one thing, there’s the Revealed debuff that you get whenever you leave stealth by damaging an opponent. Some people hate on it for being too short. Personally, I think that the amount of time that it keeps you from being in stealth is perfectly appropriate; it’s enough time for a n00by D/D Backstab thief to be taught a lesson in how not to live.

To make the best use out of stealth for survivability, you need to combine it with other aspects of surviving as long as possible. Toughness and Healing Power are still important concepts to keep in mind. Evading attacks often is important, too. Shadowsteps are very useful when you’re stunned, facing conditions, or just need that extra mobility.

Also keep in mind: no matter how much toughness, health per second, etc that your thief has, a thief that deals no damage is a dead thief. Seriously. Don’t read this post and decide to play a 0/0/30/20/20 build that focuses on spreading Caltrops everywhere and having fantastic stealth, toughness, hps, etc and expect to be mass-murdering opponents while remaining invincible. Eventually, you’ll make a mistake, be caught out in the open, and will find yourself getting slaughtered by the enemy. Case in point: if you don’t deal any decent damage, you’re going to find that, no matter how survivable you think you are, you’re still going to get destroyed. You also want to put some pressure on your enemies in order to sustain your survivability and eventually get them running away. A good thief can turn a small advantage on an enemy into a large one by applying tons of pressure on them.

8. You think that, because you’re a thief, you can take on an entire enemy army

This one’s pretty self-explanatory. Just because you’re a thief, doesn’t mean that you’re going to win every 1v1. It doesn’t mean that you’re going to win every 1v2. In fact, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re going to have a good chance to win either of those match ups, much less larger match ups. Don’t try to take on entire enemy groups unless you know that you have a big advantage over them. Instead, try to draw them out, split them up, and take them out one by one.

7. You don’t understand the weapon sets that you have at your disposal

I’m pretty sure that about half of the thieves that are whining about the profession right now used to be, say, necromancers, but then got pummeled by a single D/D Backstab thief and decided “hey, since thieves are so good, I think I’m going to play one!”.

Seriously, if I have to watch one more D/D thief get annihilated for having no survivability whatsoever…

Try out new weapon sets. Take the powerful, although somewhat dull, S/P and SB set. Or maybe try out a D/P and SB set that takes a lot of the good stuff from D/D and makes them better. Or maybe you want to learn how to use specific aspects of weapons. For example, the Shortbow. Learn how to use Infiltrator’s Arrow. Learn how to use Cluster Bomb effectively. Whatever.

[Reserved]

6. You haven’t found a good build to fit your play style

Ok, I would not be surprised if this is a problem that a lot of thieves face. GW2 is constantly evolving; people are discovering new builds to counter other builds, then those builds are being countered, and then those builds- you might find yourself getting extremely frustrated after a while, simply due to the sheer complexity of this phenomenon. I’ve played a thief almost since GW2 came out, and I still have not found a build that I really, truly like. I’ve begun to start getting closer and closer, though. I’ve run a lot of different S/P builds, for example. My two main choices for that have been 0/30/20/0/20 (for overall great damage over a short period of time) and 0/20/20/15/15 (a variant on the previous build that gives you more mobility and survivability in exchange for high damage). Take a while to look through as many builds as you can. Maybe make your own builds. Don’t be afraid to give up on a build if it looks unsuccessful.

5. You don’t understand how to fight other professions

This is probably a problem that every profession faces. Rather than giving you the full description, I’ll refer you to Lowell’s guid for PvP thieves. It has some pretty good advice for fighting each of the other professions. On the downside, it is slightly dated, given the evolution of this game, so your best shot might be to simply gain experience playing against other professions, or even playing as the other professions.

Link to Lowell’s guide:
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/45902-lowells-ultimate-spvp-thief-guide-wip/

4. You think that thieves make awful support classes

This tends to be something that people complain about when they define a “support class” as one that gives boons to all of its teammates, but could never survive a 1v1 on its own. Rather than going into detail about how this is misleading, I’ll just give you some reasons why thieves can make a good support class.

For one thing, thieves are irrefutably the class with the highest mobility in the game. We have teleports all over the place, tons of ways to boost our speed, and a great capacity to evade often. Thus, we are able to insert and extract ourselves from skirmishes in the blink of an eye. Use this to your advantage. If you see a teammate struggling to fight a bunker guardian, go help him or her out! Burst the guardian for a few seconds with (for example) the S/P Infiltrator’s Strike + Pistol Whip, add a few more bursts in there, then use Shadow Return and find somebody else to fight. I promise you that this will drive other professions completely insane.

Or maybe you and your party can work out a strategy where they will just damage as much stuff as possible, and then you can be the clean-up crew for them, wiping out enemies with moves like Heartseeker or Pistol Whip w/ the Executioner Grandmaster Trait.

Another idea: did your friend just get Downed? Maybe they were killed in an enemy-heavy zone. Use Hide In Shadows, Blinding Power, and then lay down Shadow Refuge with a 20 in Shadow Arts to get them up and fighting again.

One last thought: you know how annoying it is to fight entire mobs? Even if you have great AoE, it can be a real pain in the kitten, especially when you’re fighting higher-level hordes, like the Risen. Thieves specialize in 1v1, though, so make the most out of that. Find somebody who looks like maybe they’re causing a bit of trouble, and take them out. Reducing the size of the swarm one by one will make things surprisingly easier for your allies.

[Reserved]

3. You want to be a ninja

If you came to the thief thinking that you were going to Leaping Death Blossom + Stealth + Have 4K DPS + Heartseeker + Teleport constantly, then this isn’t your profession. Do thieves have all of that stuff? Sure. But that doesn’t mean that you can just spam those abilities and expect to survive.

2. You play a 30/30/X D/D full Zerker Gear thief

Maybe I’m just missing something, but I see these guys all. The. Time. These are the guys that you see in super-edited YouTube videos that are bursting down their Level 5 opponents in WvW practically instantaneously and doing insane amounts of damage. Unfortunately, the parts that are edited out tend to include the times where those thieves get stomped, then Waypoint, then go into battle again, get stomped, and rinse and repeat all day long.

1. Thieves just aren’t the class for you

Thieves aren’t for everyone. For one thing, they have pretty awful range. They have only two really good long-range options: Scorpion Wire and Cluster Bomb. Of course, Scorpion Wire relies on the fact that you have a sweet Close-Quarters Combat build on you that you can use to crush your opponent fairly quickly, given that they’re likely to be very confused by the sudden change in environments. On the other hand, Cluster Bomb is powerful, but it’s not an auto attack, and the projectile for it moves mind-numbingly slowly. Outside of that, if you want something with 1200+ range, you’re going to have to look at a combination like Shadowstep -> Infiltator’s Strike -> Pistol Whip/etc., with maybe an Infiltrator’s Arrow thrown in there, but those combinations rely on the fact that you’re not going to be teleporting right into the heart of battle, which is quite likely to be the case if you’re in, for example, WvW. If you want something with good range, look at any one of the three Scholar professions, Rangers, or even Engineers.

Maybe you enjoy the front-line capacity of soldier professions. If that’s the case, then thieves aren’t for you; typically, if there are two very distinct enemy armies, then they’ll find themselves right behind the front line (using the SB and often using Scorpion Wire), or on the flanks, weakening opponents and picking off others. If there are two armies that have collided together, and now there’s blood and bodies and projectiles and whatnot flying everywhere, thieves will make a great choice for you, however.

There are 8 different professions, and they all have their pros and cons. So please, if you’re going to whine about your thief, think before you make yourself look silly, and consider choosing another profession.

11. You like being able to use more than 1/3rd your normal utilities in underwater combat….

Aberrant.6749:

11. You like being able to use more than 1/3rd your normal utilities in underwater combat….

Because everybody loves underwater combat. [/sarcasm]

Arganthium.5638:

Aberrant.6749:

11. You like being able to use more than 1/3rd your normal utilities in underwater combat….

Because everybody loves underwater combat. [/sarcasm]

I enjoy it far more on all my other characters tbh… but thief underwater is just super sad. T.T

Aberrant.6749:

Arganthium.5638:

Aberrant.6749:

11. You like being able to use more than 1/3rd your normal utilities in underwater combat….

Because everybody loves underwater combat. [/sarcasm]

I enjoy it far more on all my other characters tbh… but thief underwater is just super sad. T.T

Meh. It’s nice on a ranger or a mes. From my experience w/ a thief, you can do a lot of damage with the harpoon gun. Either way, most combat takes place on land anyways so.

Arganthium.5638:

Aberrant.6749:

Arganthium.5638:

Aberrant.6749:

11. You like being able to use more than 1/3rd your normal utilities in underwater combat….

Because everybody loves underwater combat. [/sarcasm]

I enjoy it far more on all my other characters tbh… but thief underwater is just super sad. T.T

Meh. It’s nice on a ranger or a mes. From my experience w/ a thief, you can do a lot of damage with the harpoon gun. Either way, most combat takes place on land anyways so.

On thief you’re basically reduced to being a P/P unload spam thief… with less options for utilities… : /

I avoid fighting in the water near 100% of the time when I’m on my thief. If I’m on my mes I’ll hop into it any time… clones still applying confusion underwater = gg

If you do happen to be that person that wants to be able to fight underwater… thief is not for you…

Arganthium.5638:

Meh. It’s nice on a ranger or a mes. From my experience w/ a thief, you can do a lot of damage with the harpoon gun. Either way, most combat takes place on land anyways so.

I actually like underwater combat on my Necromancer, it’s fluid and rather powerful (Weapon skills for Necro are pretty amazing and also every utility has it’s cast time reduced by ~1 second)

My thief though? Nope.
Cannot stand underwater on my thief…. “Oh you’re entire class’s survivability is based around stealth? Lets give you access to only one stealth while underwater!”… Ugh…

In WvWvW, if anyone jumps into the water (Even if they’re at like 5% health) I just leave them… Not worth it to try and put up with the awful underwater combat a thief has access to (Doesn’t help that I’m a condition + stealth build, meaning there’s no synergy with anything underwater)

Aberrant.6749:

Arganthium.5638:

Aberrant.6749:

Arganthium.5638:

Aberrant.6749:

11. You like being able to use more than 1/3rd your normal utilities in underwater combat….

Because everybody loves underwater combat. [/sarcasm]

I enjoy it far more on all my other characters tbh… but thief underwater is just super sad. T.T

Meh. It’s nice on a ranger or a mes. From my experience w/ a thief, you can do a lot of damage with the harpoon gun. Either way, most combat takes place on land anyways so.

On thief you’re basically reduced to being a P/P unload spam thief… with less options for utilities… : /

I avoid fighting in the water near 100% of the time when I’m on my thief. If I’m on my mes I’ll hop into it any time… clones still applying confusion underwater = gg

If you do happen to be that person that wants to be able to fight underwater… thief is not for you…

Not really. It depends on your play style. If you prefer a safer, more ranged style (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing), then sure.

I usually avoid fighting in water 100% of the time on all of my toons. It’s just inconvenient, messy, and tends to be a bit… Odd. And it doesn’t really fit my tactical style either.

Taril.8619:

Arganthium.5638:

Meh. It’s nice on a ranger or a mes. From my experience w/ a thief, you can do a lot of damage with the harpoon gun. Either way, most combat takes place on land anyways so.

I actually like underwater combat on my Necromancer, it’s fluid and rather powerful (Weapon skills for Necro are pretty amazing and also every utility has it’s cast time reduced by ~1 second)

My thief though? Nope.
Cannot stand underwater on my thief…. “Oh you’re entire class’s survivability is based around stealth? Lets give you access to only one stealth while underwater!”… Ugh…

In WvWvW, if anyone jumps into the water (Even if they’re at like 5% health) I just leave them… Not worth it to try and put up with the awful underwater combat a thief has access to (Doesn’t help that I’m a condition + stealth build, meaning there’s no synergy with anything underwater)

1. See Reason #9.
2. Necro underwater is decent. Not my favorite though.
3. I’m sorry you think that way. Today I was playing PvP and I mauled multiple opponents with my thief underwater. I’m pretty sure that the only reason that you would want to live an opponent like that is because you’re trying to cap an objective. Otherwise… I mean, even if your opponent can do twice as much damage to you underwater as you can do to them, the fact that their health is at 5% will make them panic, which you can (and should!) take advantage of.

Mesmer is probably the only class i’d say to be stronger than thieves underwater atm (unless your a condition based thief and i agree it’s aweful if you are one), by far. Maybe ranger cause they can’t really die anyway.

I agree they did a bad job with utility skills choice for thief though, it’s really limited atm.

Also if you’re in wvw and you see a pool of water, it’s a good bet to run away there since for the very first time of your thief life, you really are the master of mobility and by far, withdraw + ink shot + roll of ini = you can’t get caught, they can’t escape. Also everyone is scared of water so they might not even follow you, hilarous.

Puru.4217:

Mesmer is probably the only class i’d say to be stronger than thieves underwater atm (unless your a condition based thief and i agree it’s aweful if you are one), by far. Maybe ranger cause they can’t really die anyway.

I agree they did a bad job with utility skills choice for thief though, it’s really limited atm.

Also if you’re in wvw and you see a pool of water, it’s a good bet to run away there since for the very first time of your thief life, you really are the master of mobility and by far, withdraw + ink shot + roll of ini = you can’t get caught, they can’t escape. Also everyone is scared of water so they might not even follow you, hilarous.

Guardian > Thief under water… by a mile and a half.

As some one said earlier… thief primarily uses stealth for their defense… underwater we have diddly squat access to stealth. I’ve never once been beaten by a thief under water on any of my other toons. I’ll purposefully jump into water because I know how HORRID they really are under water.

I can withdraw + roll + escape to run away… but running =/= fighting.

I still can almost outswim inkshot… >.>

kittenick all of those. Be right back. Rerolling.

Puru.4217:

Mesmer is probably the only class i’d say to be stronger than thieves underwater atm (unless your a condition based thief and i agree it’s aweful if you are one), by far. Maybe ranger cause they can’t really die anyway.

I agree they did a bad job with utility skills choice for thief though, it’s really limited atm.

Also if you’re in wvw and you see a pool of water, it’s a good bet to run away there since for the very first time of your thief life, you really are the master of mobility and by far, withdraw + ink shot + roll of ini = you can’t get caught, they can’t escape. Also everyone is scared of water so they might not even follow you, hilarous.

I don’t know that I’d say “strongest”, but I’d definitely call them undervalued. Playing PvP on RotC today, I dealt some pretty nice damage with my harpoon gun underwater, and the mobility is pretty fantastic (although the lack of shadowsteps that you get when you’re on land as compared to water has always bothered me).

Utilities- I’d agree with that. Like you said, only venom builds have any real viability when you’re underwater, and, not to hate on them too much, but, personally, I’ve always found them to be a bit too passive and, overall, weak. The other option, however, is to indeed use signets. Two of my main builds focus on a lot of signet and deception skill usage (both are S/P builds with one being 0/30/20/0/20 and the other has 0/20/20/15/15). Of course, you can’t use any of the deception skills underwater, but the signets- those you can use. Whenever I run either of those two builds, then, I spec specifically for signets, because I can use them to gain tons of initiative (the lifeblood of the thief) as well as instant might stacks.

Aberrant.6749:

Puru.4217:

Mesmer is probably the only class i’d say to be stronger than thieves underwater atm (unless your a condition based thief and i agree it’s aweful if you are one), by far. Maybe ranger cause they can’t really die anyway.

I agree they did a bad job with utility skills choice for thief though, it’s really limited atm.

Also if you’re in wvw and you see a pool of water, it’s a good bet to run away there since for the very first time of your thief life, you really are the master of mobility and by far, withdraw + ink shot + roll of ini = you can’t get caught, they can’t escape. Also everyone is scared of water so they might not even follow you, hilarous.

Guardian > Thief under water… by a mile and a half.

As some one said earlier… thief primarily uses stealth for their defense… underwater we have diddly squat access to stealth. I’ve never once been beaten by a thief under water on any of my other toons. I’ll purposefully jump into water because I know how HORRID they really are under water.

I can withdraw + roll + escape to run away… but running =/= fighting.

I still can almost outswim inkshot… >.>

Er… Read Reason #9 on my post. To think that thieves rely solely on stealth for defense is absurd. There’s a lot more to def than just “ermahgerd infernert sterth”, and, if you think there isn’t, then as a thief you’re probably either dying a lot or dealing virtually 0 dps. You need to make the most out of your evades (which, depending on your traits, can do a ton, including gaining a stack of might, removing weakness and cripple, spreading caltrops, and adding more endurance for future evades too).

If you’re jumping into water with the mindset “Ha, silly thieves, what are you going to do now?”, then you’re probably making another mistake. For one thing, when you’re in the water on WvW, and most PvP maps (excluding the obvious Raid on the Capricorn), you can’t capture any objectives. You’re going to have to leave the water eventually in order to do something, y’know, useful for your team. It kinda reminds me of something from the Halo series, actually (read the books a lot when I was younger). One of the things that they stated in one of the books is, basically, that the humans could easily win battles on the ground, but end up getting crushed from space. If you’re good in the water, that doesn’t make up for being bad on land.

Also, as Puru stated- we have pretty great mobility underwater. The harpoon gun has an absolutely fantastic evade built in with it, and ink shot… This isn’t used so much as a damage skill as it is a tactical skill. Simply, shoot off your ink shot in some direction on the flanks of your opponent, keep attacking your opponent, and then, when convenient (or when the shot goes far enough), you Shadowstep and disrupt your opponent with the sudden change in direction. Swim over him/her then, and your opponent starts to get confused as to where you are. I can tell you that guardians don’t have nearly that much mobility.

Finally, you’re right that running =/= fighting. However, note that running often can lead to traps that end up leading you to unwittingly giving your opponent an environmental advantage, which is especially likely when you’re in water because in water you have to worry about three different directions, all of which are easily accessible (z-axis is accessible on land, but only when you’re on high ground or the like. That’s not always going to be the case). Finding yourself getting attacked from above by a thief is not going to be a fun experience. There’s also the fact that now you have to worry about land, too. Most water battles are going to take place in areas right next to land, simply because, in GW2, land happens to be a much simpler and graceful battleground than water, where the three directions are going to have to be combined with crude tactics in order to rip apart opponents. Thus, if you find yourself in an underwater battle with any class, the moment they get out of the water and start firing on you from land, you’re going to start taking heavy damage without being able to do much in return. For a thief, with such great mobility, it’s easy to get back onto land. For a bunker guardian that can’t run without going into cardiac arrest, it’s going to be rather difficult.

Can you win underwater easily against thieves? Sure, but that’s assuming that the thief has limited tactical knowledge.

Not having hardly access to any stealth under water and seeing that as an obvious flaw =/= thinking it’s the only defense.

For a guard to get back on land it’s as simple as pushing JI… boom… you’re probably back on land. Why you would want to do that vs a thief when you have such a huge advantage as a guardian underwater though… I have no clue…

Again.. ink shot is rubbish… I can almost swim as fast as that slow moving shot… no point in wasting ini on it.

Again.. ink shot is rubbish… I can almost swim as fast as that slow moving shot… no point in wasting ini on it.I also notice you’ve only talked about speargun skills… I’ll take that to mean you agree that spear is rubbish… Heck… speargun is far from a good weapon it’s middle of the road at best.

Again.. ink shot is rubbish… I can almost swim as fast as that slow moving shot… no point in wasting ini on it.I also notice you’ve only talked about speargun skills… I’ll take that to mean you agree that spear is rubbish… Heck… speargun is far from a good weapon it’s middle of the road at best.XYZ doesn’t mean much when you auto lock on… it’s really not hard at all since you don’t have to aim on that axis. Underwater isn’t harder, it just has more imbalances and it’s quite unpolished (dear god give me replacement utilities and let me stomp some one underwater).

Again.. ink shot is rubbish… I can almost swim as fast as that slow moving shot… no point in wasting ini on it.I also notice you’ve only talked about speargun skills… I’ll take that to mean you agree that spear is rubbish… Heck… speargun is far from a good weapon it’s middle of the road at best.XYZ doesn’t mean much when you auto lock on… it’s really not hard at all since you don’t have to aim on that axis. Underwater isn’t harder, it just has more imbalances and it’s quite unpolished (dear god give me replacement utilities and let me stomp some one underwater).If you can beat some one as a thief under water? Sure, but that’s assuming the opponent had limited tatical knowledge. I’m sure you could also beat them as a P/P unload spam thief without needing a lot of utilities as well.

I like how the OP talks defense like we have any. Sure we have stealth and mobility, but those are getting nerfed soon, so we’ll need some actual armor buffs.

(sigh) did you come here to have a constructive discussion, or just to complain? If you really, truly hate the thief’s underwater skills, go play a different profession. If the tactical and strategic complexities underlying a successful thief are bad for you, go play a different profession. If you’re going to say things like

I also notice you’ve only talked about speargun skills… I’ll take that to mean you agree that spear is rubbish…

Again.. ink shot is rubbish…

I’ve never once been beaten by a thief under water on any of my other toons. I’ll purposefully jump into water because I know how HORRID they really are under water.

then I’m beginning to think that you didn’t understand the point of this post. I wrote this to tell thieves why they aren’t being successful with the profession, and, so far, I’d say that you’ve neglected reasons 9, 7, and 5, and possibly others as well. I’m here for constructive discussion that I hope will turn people away from thieves not because thieves are bad, but because thieves don’t match up with their style of play.

As a favor, please leave this thread and the Thief forum if all you are here for is describing the thief as a “rubbish” profession in any way, shape, or form. Go to the Guardian forum, or any of the other forums that dictate that they are absolutely 100% superior to thieves. In the meantime, I’ll likely be writing a post soon on an analysis of the thief’s underwater combat skills.

Iove.3902:

I like how the OP talks defense like we have any. Sure we have stealth and mobility, but those are getting nerfed soon, so we’ll need some actual armor buffs.

I’m not sure what your source for the nerf’ing parts are. Stealth and mobility are just two examples of defensive mechanisms that we have. Under the umbrella of “mobility” we have some of the best teleportation skills in the game, high speed, and tons of evades. Stealth, on the other hand, is only really particularly useful from a defensive standpoint as either a way to insert yourself into battle or extract yourself from it. Otherwise, unless you’re running a P/D or D/D build, it’s virtually unsustainable when you’re actually in combat, and even with those two builds, it doesn’t give you much room for dealing damage, if you’re planning on not taking the Revealed debuff.

Outside of that, I’m guessing you’re just another masochistic, stereotypical D/D thief that thinks of himself/herself as a complete ninja- that is, until you find yourself Downed again.

#8 is definitely me lol, run into 3 people at a node just for me to do a steal and swing my sword around a little then instantly teleport back to safety with sword 2. Then those 3 people are running around saying “Wheres the thief?”.

edit: Aside from how awesome sword is, I’m pretty sure stealth is getting a nerf but probably won’t affect many people unless your niche near permastealth or something.

Iove.3902:

I like how the OP talks defense like we have any. Sure we have stealth and mobility, but those are getting nerfed soon, so we’ll need some actual armor buffs.

No one knows this and its unlikely for PvE. You guys just like eles have to read context “Ohh No a nerf. Ohh its Spvp only who cares?”.

They wont nerf us in PvE for the obvious reason considering be the squishiest class out there. I actually had a thief complain as I melee Kholer in AC by myself that he cant melee.

Arganthium.5638:

Otherwise, unless you’re running a P/D or D/D build, it’s virtually unsustainable when you’re actually in combat, and even with those two builds, it doesn’t give you much room for dealing damage, if you’re planning on not taking the Revealed debuff.

Outside of that, I’m guessing you’re just another masochistic, stereotypical D/D thief that thinks of himself/herself as a complete ninja- that is, until you find yourself Downed again.

D/P high initiative regen build is the only one who can do it. I mean really do it.

Defensively http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Black_Powder and http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Shadow_Shot will outshine the stealth. Like he aid in #7 compared to D/D all the skills on the bar are useful much like S/D I find that those builds make DD look cheap.

Arganthium.5638:

(sigh) did you come here to have a constructive discussion, or just to complain? If you really, truly hate the thief’s underwater skills, go play a different profession. If the tactical and strategic complexities underlying a successful thief are bad for you, go play a different profession. If you’re going to say things like

I also notice you’ve only talked about speargun skills… I’ll take that to mean you agree that spear is rubbish…

Again.. ink shot is rubbish…

I’ve never once been beaten by a thief under water on any of my other toons. I’ll purposefully jump into water because I know how HORRID they really are under water.

then I’m beginning to think that you didn’t understand the point of this post. I wrote this to tell thieves why they aren’t being successful with the profession, and, so far, I’d say that you’ve neglected reasons 9, 7, and 5, and possibly others as well. I’m here for constructive discussion that I hope will turn people away from thieves not because thieves are bad, but because thieves don’t match up with their style of play.

As a favor, please leave this thread and the Thief forum if all you are here for is describing the thief as a “rubbish” profession in any way, shape, or form. Go to the Guardian forum, or any of the other forums that dictate that they are absolutely 100% superior to thieves. In the meantime, I’ll likely be writing a post soon on an analysis of the thief’s underwater combat skills.

Seeing problems with a class isn’t the same as telling others that it’s not worth playing. Just knee jerk defending EVERY part of a class regardless of its merits is just ignorance.

Telling some one who you disagree with to go post elsewhere shows you don’t want anything constructive…

Sorry but thief is weak underwater. It can run… and that’s about it. It really is about as good as a p/p theif with reduced utilities. It’s very easy to counter the foo unload type strategy regardless on land or under water. A thief can’t stand up to a similarly skilled mesmer/guardian/hunter under water. I’ve seen it from both POV’s and it’s just a world of difference in terms of what can be done with the different classes underwater.

2. You play a 30/30/X D/D full Zerker Gear thief

………I play 100% glass. I go in 1vX all the time. I leave healthy all the time. My cluster bombs hit people on walls for 3~8K dmg. My backstabs are insane. I can heal past anything but a zerk warrior who gets lucky on his kill shot.

@Sensei
And that is why we complement each other so well! 1 Zerk thief with 1 s/d thief using venom sharing. Burst damage AND stuns.

Iove.3902:

Outside of that, I’m guessing you’re just another masochistic, stereotypical D/D thief that thinks of himself/herself as a complete ninja- that is, until you find yourself Downed again.

Yup, a lot of those wannabes out there. There are some that are complete ninjas. But most fail and die. Really fast, cause GC don’t like armor or vitality. Nope, just HAVE to hit 20% more damage than that thief that is twice as survivable as you.

Aberrant.6749:

11. You like being able to use more than 1/3rd your normal utilities in underwater combat….

In PvP perhaps, but in PvE I don’t even need them when I can press 5-3-3-3-3-3-5-5-5-5-3-3-3-5-5-3-5-3-5-3-5-5-5-3 all day and win any fight with any amount of opponents.

Professor Sensei.2941:

2. You play a 30/30/X D/D full Zerker Gear thief

………I play 100% glass. I go in 1vX all the time. I leave healthy all the time. My cluster bombs hit people on walls for 3~8K dmg. My backstabs are insane. I can heal past anything but a zerk warrior who gets lucky on his kill shot.

Obviously, you don’t play 100% glass if you have such great healing ability. c:

That said, I know that there are some good 30/30/X GC thieves out there. I put this up as a reason, however, because I feel like the thieves that always tend to do worst are GC thieves who have no idea what they’re doing. A good GC thief, on the other hand, could very well win most matches easily, I don’t doubt that. I just think that the build is overhyped by our profession and other professions.

I want to use your initial post for my blog because it has inspired me to write about a topic. Is that alright with you Arganthium?

Authority.6145:

I want to use your initial post for my blog because it has inspired me to write about a topic. Is that alright with you Arganthium?

Of course, sounds great.

If you go in wvsw glass canon thief understand that d/d is only good for 1 target only 1! If there are 2 you will die. If they are not stupid that is. The best ting about full glass canon is shotbow with sigil of fire that ting hurts it really does in team fights :P

People are thinking that thief underwater is weak. Are you kidding me? We’ve got one of the best underwater sets in the game, especially with spear. In between the endless block or evades with 3 or 5, or the constant vulnerability and yet another evade with two, or even a pull with four…Well, I’m sort of confused at how one could be complaining about what is practically the best underwater class in the game, especially when you factor the various utilities that thieves have access to.

raahk.2786:

People are thinking that thief underwater is weak. Are you kidding me? We’ve got one of the best underwater sets in the game, especially with spear. In between the endless block or evades with 3 or 5, or the constant vulnerability and yet another evade with two, or even a pull with four…Well, I’m sort of confused at how one could be complaining about what is practically the best underwater class in the game, especially when you factor the various utilities that thieves have access to.

If you’ve ever tried to kill something with Spear…

The #2 + #5 may give evades, but they do bugger all damage (#2 especially hates moving targets) doing less than just auto-attacking in the time it takes for the animations to finish.

The #3 requires enemies to attack you, and be in melee range (Not that common, especially since people shy away from melee underwater due to positioning and mobility issues)

The #4 has a very short range, meaning it’s practically melee (It also pulls you, knocking you down whilst doing nothing to the enemy whom has ~1 second of free time to either attack you or move away so you need to use it again)

Utilities a Thief can use underwater:

Signets
Venoms
Tricks

Signets being pretty terrible most of the time (I run 3 underwater though due to the lack of anything else worth while)

Venoms are only good in a venom orientated build, which is great if you play one but if you don’t you’re out of luck

Tricks have effects that are either unhelpful (Haste, considering how bad a lot of the attacks are underwater… The lack of dodges is also a hindrance) or on really high cooldowns (Roll for Initiative, Shadowstep, Haste)

Compared to other classes such as Necro:

1. Does high damage and provides vulnerability in an area
2. gives life siphoning in an area around you as well as swiftness
3. area pull enemies close (Synergises extremely well with #3 + #2)
4. similar pull that Thief gets just provides Bleeding instead of Cripple

Utilities a necro can use underwater
Minions (With 1 second shorter cast time)
Signets (Still not very good, but 1 second shorter cast time)
All but 1 Spectral skill
All but 1 Corruption skill (With lowered cast times)

I could go on about Elementalits masses of control underwater, Mesmers and their huge damage through mass confusion, Engineers with high burst damage, or even Warrior and Guardian’s high damage output with their weapons.

All other classes can still keep their survivability intact underwater (Necro’s still have DS, Mesmers have mass clones + Shatters, Ele’s have all their boons etc whilst Thieves lack any stealth underwater that isn’t Hide in Shadows which can be a big part of their defences)

Btw, Authority, after you write your blog post, could you put a link to it on this thread? I’d be very interested in taking a look at it.

Taril.8619:

If you’ve ever tried to kill something with Spear…

The #2 + #5 may give evades, but they do bugger all damage (#2 especially hates moving targets) doing less than just auto-attacking in the time it takes for the animations to finish.

The #3 requires enemies to attack you, and be in melee range (Not that common, especially since people shy away from melee underwater due to positioning and mobility issues)

The #4 has a very short range, meaning it’s practically melee (It also pulls you, knocking you down whilst doing nothing to the enemy whom has ~1 second of free time to either attack you or move away so you need to use it again)

Utilities a Thief can use underwater:

Signets
Venoms
Tricks

Signets being pretty terrible most of the time (I run 3 underwater though due to the lack of anything else worth while)

Venoms are only good in a venom orientated build, which is great if you play one but if you don’t you’re out of luck

Tricks have effects that are either unhelpful (Haste, considering how bad a lot of the attacks are underwater… The lack of dodges is also a hindrance) or on really high cooldowns (Roll for Initiative, Shadowstep, Haste)

Compared to other classes such as Necro:

1. Does high damage and provides vulnerability in an area
2. gives life siphoning in an area around you as well as swiftness
3. area pull enemies close (Synergises extremely well with #3 + #2)
4. similar pull that Thief gets just provides Bleeding instead of Cripple

Utilities a necro can use underwater
Minions (With 1 second shorter cast time)
Signets (Still not very good, but 1 second shorter cast time)
All but 1 Spectral skill
All but 1 Corruption skill (With lowered cast times)

I could go on about Elementalits masses of control underwater, Mesmers and their huge damage through mass confusion, Engineers with high burst damage, or even Warrior and Guardian’s high damage output with their weapons.

All other classes can still keep their survivability intact underwater (Necro’s still have DS, Mesmers have mass clones + Shatters, Ele’s have all their boons etc whilst Thieves lack any stealth underwater that isn’t Hide in Shadows which can be a big part of their defences)

I agree that the underwater utility choices are kitten -poor, but I kill people 1v1 or even 2v1 underwater without much issue on spear. The combination of blocks and evades is very hardy, and I crit on almost every attack. The only times I typically switch to harpoon gun are when my opponent is downed, and trying to swim away. >:)