Guild Wars 2

In sPvP match. On medium armor with Soldier amulet and jewel.
Can someone please explain me the math behind this? And consequently, tell me how are thieves angry that they are called “HS spam *”? This is a bit of a QQ thread but I am genuinely curious about this particular number given that it comes from this particular ability.

Probably a lucky crit by a thief using the +20% damage on players under 50% HP and you where under 25% HP too for the highest HS range.

HS spam is bad because it does ridiculously weak damage on high HP targets, thus making the thief waste a lot of initiative. But the skill IS still very strong on a target under 25% HP. Slightly weaker than backstab.

Awe.1096:

In sPvP match. On medium armor with Soldier amulet and jewel.
Can someone please explain me the math behind this? And consequently, tell me how are thieves angry that they are called “HS spam *”? This is a bit of a QQ thread but I am genuinely curious about this particular number given that it comes from this particular ability.

So, you were at 1/3rd or less hp and were hit by a glass cannon thief with Scholar runes. If you think this makes HS spam legitimate, then you’ve never read the tooltip.

1 thief spamming Heartseeker = dead thief wasting all the initiative pool

1 thief properly using Heartseeker at the right time on low health enemy = good thief that deserves that kill

and please, for God’s sake, everyone should stop posting on the forum everytime he loses

Only you know why you were hit be that number. We can only speculate based off what traits and skills the thief could have. Thieves have a lot of damage modifiers, bonus damage for you being under 50% hp, for use being above 90%, for not having full endurance, and much more. That plus if he had might or you have vuln. also with what everyone else said if your HP was under 25%.

As for HS spam, The reason its so widely used is its so easy to do. Its a cheap gap closer and you can basically HS→autoattack all day. Its common for bad players to use this tactic as it only works on bad players and only for so long. A lot of thieves have “rotations” of skills and only use HS as a finisher or a gap closer but don’t spam it. Hopefully that kinda explains why some thieves find HS spam offensive.

Kolly.9872:

1 thief spamming Heartseeker = dead thief wasting all the initiative pool

1 thief properly using Heartseeker at the right time on low health enemy = good thief that deserves that kill

and please, for God’s sake, everyone should stop posting on the forum everytime he loses

I loose to thieves all the time. Same as I win with them all the time. I dont post every time however. But if a move which is probably the single most used move in game apart from autoattack does such number in spvp enviroment, I want to know more.

If the arena you’re in supports spectator mode, you can always hop to spectator and check out that guy’s build. That might give you an idea of why they did that much damage.

But yeah, probably you were low HP and they had a lot of damage bonus against low HP targets through runes and traits, in addition to what HS already provides.

Some people also spam HS to stay on someone’s heels since it’s a fairly mobile ability, but there’s a way to do that properly and a way to not.

Awe.1096:

Kolly.9872:

1 thief spamming Heartseeker = dead thief wasting all the initiative pool

1 thief properly using Heartseeker at the right time on low health enemy = good thief that deserves that kill

and please, for God’s sake, everyone should stop posting on the forum everytime he loses

I loose to thieves all the time. Same as I win with them all the time. I dont post every time however. But if a move which is probably the single most used move in game apart from autoattack does such number in spvp enviroment, I want to know more.

That may have been the case at one time (before it was nerfed), but HS is far from the most used move in the game. Any thief who spams that ability is really hindering themselves since you’re almost always better off using the initiative to stealth for a backstab.

Dahkeus.8243:

Awe.1096:

Kolly.9872:

1 thief spamming Heartseeker = dead thief wasting all the initiative pool

1 thief properly using Heartseeker at the right time on low health enemy = good thief that deserves that kill

and please, for God’s sake, everyone should stop posting on the forum everytime he loses

I loose to thieves all the time. Same as I win with them all the time. I dont post every time however. But if a move which is probably the single most used move in game apart from autoattack does such number in spvp enviroment, I want to know more.

That may have been the case at one time (before it was nerfed), but HS is far from the most used move in the game. Any thief who spams that ability is really hindering themselves since you’re almost always better off using the initiative to stealth for a backstab.

HS has gone out of style a bit, except maybe for D/P stuff… S/D seems to be the new spam flavour of the month XD

A very basic glass cannon D/D build
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAoYVlUmaNXcy7E/5Ex2jeuTe6VgsaPupNbJA-T0Ag0CnI4SxljLDXSuscNKYZxBiZBPIA

With 25 BL stacks, 5 might, the base HS dmg is 2347 dmg on targets below 25% hp
the 58% crit dmg puts its critical damage at 208% base damage, 4937.92 crit dmg.
(since base crit dmg is 150% afaik)

Then from traits, runes/sigils these percents:
4937.92 : 5% + 5% + 5% +10% + 10% + 10% + 20%

246.8 + 246.8 + 246.8 + 493.7 + 493.7 + 493.7 + 987.5 = 3209 + 4937 = 8146crit.

Activating the Assassins Signet.
4788 : 5% + 5% + 5% + 10% + 10% + 10% + 15% + 20%

239.4 + 239.4 + 239.4 + 478.8 + 478.8 + 478.8 + 718.2 + 957.6 = 3830 + 4788 = 8618crit.

This formula looks pretty accurate to me, just a theory though since I have no clue
about how these percents scale. And this is on 2600 armor.

Well here’s an example thief

Here’s the same thief with Soldier accessories, as a rough comparison to the OP.

Now let’s do some numbers.

Damage = Power * Weapon Damage * Coefficient * Other Boring Stuff / Armor
Damage = 2,904 * 981 * 2 * 2.08 * 1.15 * 1.2 * 1.1 * 1.05 * 1.05 * 1.1 * 1.05 * 1.1 / 2724
Damage = 9,250

That’s with:

• 25 stacks of bloodlust
• 10 stacks of Might (from activating 2 signets)
• 15% damage from Assassin’s Signet
• 5% damage from Dagger Training
• 5% damage from sigil
• 10% damage from Exposed Weakness
• 20% damage from Executioner
• 10% damage from 6 rune bonus of Rune of Scholar
• 5% from Flanking Strike
• 10% from First Strikes

So there you go. Even if the bonuses are additive, it’ll still be 7,831. Which you could push higher with some might stack tinkering. For example, throw in a third utility signet, Signet of Malice and Basilisk Venom, then take Venomous Strength and you’ll be up to 22 stacks of Might instead of 10, putting your base power at 3,324 rather than 2,904, making the additive total into 9,212.

@Ghostwolf: That’s not going work, for the simple purpose that you cannot stack 2 of the same Sigil.

Either way, the point is the same as what has been said already: Yes you can have Heartseeker smacking you for 8,000+ damage, but it takes some pretty kitten perfect conditions. In my above example, we had a full slew of preparations, an enemy with <20% health and a crit with a maxed damage roll. That’s beating all the odds several times over.

I’ve gotten up to 10K using heartseeker in sPvP, but only through the use of a signet build (activating signet gives you 5 stacks of might. I activate my healing signet, followed by my 3 utility signets) and the player must be <25% HP to deal that much damage. Either way it usually screws me over because I used my heal and all utilies + basilik venom elite.

HS is an executioner skill if you’ve ever played a war in WoW. He was also lucky with a crit and you must have been at 25% health he was also most likely buffed with bloodlust sigil or lots of might. Nothing to see here really…

Yep loaded up and served at the correct temperature with front loading damage. There’s a trade off with this – these guys need to be very quick cuase they can go down easy too.