Guild Wars 2

Signet of Shadows: [Icon is eyes, active is a blind, passive is 25% run speed
Infiltrator’s Signet: [Icon is foot, active is shadowstep, passive is init regen

The passives seem like they were reversed after the flavor was added. Also the tradeoffs only make sense with the passives reversed, i.e. lose speed aura to gain a quick boost, lose some damage output to blind an enemy attack.

I have been curious ever since I got both signets at this perplexing arrangement.

Good observation, never thought about that before :P

But combining the +25% speed boost with a stun breaker would make a very OP signet to be honest.

Infiltrator’s signet being run speed and the shadow step WOULD be more useful. But perhaps the combination would be too powerful.

I wouldn’t slot signet of shadows anymore however. I already find the active to be weak and I find the stun break on infiltrator’s the thing that makes it worth having the other signet. Initiative regen is nice but having that emergency out is what really seals it.

How about this:

Signet of Shadows (45s cooldown): Passive – 1 initiative regen/10s, Active – Stealths you for 3s (not a group stealth, just you).

Infiltrator’s Signet (40s cooldown): Passive – +25% run speed, Active – Shadowsteps to target (breaks stun).

I think a 10s increased cooldown on that arrangement would be warranted and the signet would still be good.

Devildoc.6721:

Infiltrator’s signet being run speed and the shadow step WOULD be more useful. But perhaps the combination would be too powerful.

I wouldn’t slot signet of shadows anymore however. I already find the active to be weak and I find the stun break on infiltrator’s the thing that makes it worth having the other signet. Initiative regen is nice but having that emergency out is what really seals it.

How about this:

Signet of Shadows (45s cooldown): Passive – 1 initiative regen/10s, Active – Stealths you for 3s (not a group stealth, just you).

Infiltrator’s Signet (40s cooldown): Passive – +25% run speed, Active – Shadowsteps to target (breaks stun).

I think a 10s increased cooldown on that arrangement would be warranted and the signet would still be good.

Even at 40s cooldown, those two effects together would make it a must have for every Thief. It would be wonderful? Yeah, it would. But it would become a must have, or a “too good to pass on it” IMO.

Lokheit.7943:

Devildoc.6721:

Infiltrator’s signet being run speed and the shadow step WOULD be more useful. But perhaps the combination would be too powerful.

I wouldn’t slot signet of shadows anymore however. I already find the active to be weak and I find the stun break on infiltrator’s the thing that makes it worth having the other signet. Initiative regen is nice but having that emergency out is what really seals it.

How about this:

Signet of Shadows (45s cooldown): Passive – 1 initiative regen/10s, Active – Stealths you for 3s (not a group stealth, just you).

Infiltrator’s Signet (40s cooldown): Passive – +25% run speed, Active – Shadowsteps to target (breaks stun).

I think a 10s increased cooldown on that arrangement would be warranted and the signet would still be good.

Even at 40s cooldown, those two effects together would make it a must have for every Thief. It would be wonderful? Yeah, it would. But it would become a must have, or a “too good to pass on it” IMO.

Pretty much, but if you make it any longer of a cooldown, then it loses any niche it has, as shadowstep and roll for initiative would be the same cooldown.

I still do find the signet of shadows active to be very weak, though I am coming from the perspective of a thief that always has a pistol offhand in one of his sets.

Yep, SoS active is weak, I prefered the previous incarnation (during the beta) where it wasn’t AoE, but it had Blind + Inmob (technically a Stun that doesn’t prevents heals), I think it was changed because it was too much inmob, but with the current game state where inmobs are shorter than before, I think they could make it inmob again with a shorter duration.

Before it compensated the lose of speed in exchange of enemy inmob and blind, but the AoE blind generally doesn’t compensate so most of us take that signet as a trait that increases your speed by 25% with no secondary effects :P

Signet of Shadows is fine, there are times where the blind helps a lot, comes down to how good the player is

Infiltrator’s is weak.

I see almost every Thief build out there using Signet of Shadows. It may not be “fine”.

spif: that’s because for a class that relies on mobility, we kind of have to have that run speed. Have you looked at our traits/skills? We, unlike a lot of other classes, are lacking good sources of swiftness. You can dodge for 2s, and waste your steal for 10s, and maybe a stolen item can give you swiftness (only one that I can think of)

A thief running at normal run speed is a dead and useless thief.

As for the active, I’d really prefer a stealth. Blinding powder is unreliable (half the time I use it, the stealth doesn’t happen, and I don’t have revealed on me, it’s like I keep autoattacking, where other stealths halt your attacks) sword thieves don’t use hide in shadows, and shadow refuge requires you to stay in a small area for the majority of its duration or it will break as soon as you walk out.

Blazer Hellsing.9184:

Signet of Shadows is fine, there are times where the blind helps a lot, comes down to how good the player is

Infiltrator’s is weak.

I think both signets are great, maybe a little bit more initiative gain from the passive on Infiltratiors. But, as a D/D thief SoS is great for blinding a group of enemies as you finish them off or CaD to stealth to then be hidden after the blind. Infiltratiors is good for the stun break and extra Shadowstep.

spif.7580:

I see almost every Thief build out there using Signet of Shadows. It may not be “fine”.

It doesn’t matter where you put the 25% speed increase on, 80% of the thieves in sPvP will use it. They knew this and thought it was fine.

Most people just use SoS because they’ve gotten used to it and hate running around without it. It synergizes well with some high-mobility and/or signet-benefit setups, but most thieves are running it out of laziness. The active isn’t that good, and the passive does absolutely nothing any time you’ve got swiftness.

Devildoc – Thieves aren’t “lacking in swiftness” unless you want to compare every profession to the ones that can get permaswiftness for no effort. Thieves can run permaswiftness too if they want (especially when food is available), but more importantly can get swiftness on demand easily when they need it.

SoS is a crutch, and I think more thieves will come to realize that as time goes on. If you want to use it for running long distances you can and should switch it in/out, but when it comes to actual battle I’ll take a more useful utility skill any day of the week, especially since I can do something like burn Signet of Agility for >6s swiftness when I really need it along with the host of other benefits that utility offers compared to SoS.

For posted thief builds I’d like to see more people say “these are my three battle utility skills, I of course swap in SoS for traveling distance”.

I’m a SoS swapper. I use it get where I need to be, and depending on the situation I’ll tag it out. I’m like that with all my utilities and Traits, though – different situations need different tools.

That said, the SoS blind is really nice. It’s a ranged AoE, which a lot of people seem to forget.