Guild Wars 2

So I have been watching these forums for a while now hoping to find some validation for my play style, but nobody has ever mentioned it! This leads me to believe that I am doing something very wrong. Please give me some advice!

I don’t have any friends in the game, so I almost always play solo. I am at 80 and I just kinda wander from place to place doing DEs and what-not. That being said, let me explain what I do:

I play mostly PvE, but I have used this in WvW a bit as well. I like to solo mobs, especially when I feel like they are much tougher than me. Early on I discovered the D/P setup for Thief. I start by hitting Black Powder to blind the mob, and then I proceed to kill it. I usually drop Caltrops and occasionally throw in a Heartseeker to go stealth and then backstab. Then when Black Powder wears off I use it again. Basically the idea is that the mob is blind the entire fight and I pretty much never take any damage.

This works with large groups of mobs as well, especially if they are mostly melee. You gather them up, use Black Powder to blind them all, then kill them one-by-one. I have used S/P as well because of the AoE from the sword.

I love this setup and I have used it all the way from the beginning. It can be a bit slow to kill with really tough mobs, but because I pretty much never take any damage it is relatively safe.

My question, then, is this: why am I the only one who seems to do this? Am i playing Thief wrong?

Sword/pistol is pretty much the same, except you can hit 3 targets with auto attack.

Mostly the comments are about PvP and WvW my friend. PvE can be pretty easy so tactics there aren’t really discussed much. In PvP and WvW players get killed by thieves and get emotional about it hence all the threads of thief OP! I’m sure if mobs could post they’d be calling you OP

Elmuerto.9840:

Mostly the comments are about PvP and WvW my friend. PvE can be pretty easy so tactics there aren’t really discussed much. In PvP and WvW players get killed by thieves and get emotional about it hence all the threads of thief OP! I’m sure if mobs could post they’d be calling you OP

Good point. Ok I will stop feeling bad about my PvE ways.

So my new question, then, is this: how does a PvE player transition into the WvW/sPvP world? What kinds of changes do I need to make to be effective?

If yer havin’ fun ya can’t be doin’ it wrong. Me, I like ta switch me skills an’ trait builds out every once in awhile ta keep things fresh an’ try out new ways ah doin’ stuff; found allota builds I like that way. Unless people are complainin’ yer useless in a group, (an’ Thieves are almos’ never useless in a group) then yer doin’ it jus’ right.

Dietere.3476:

Elmuerto.9840:

Mostly the comments are about PvP and WvW my friend. PvE can be pretty easy so tactics there aren’t really discussed much. In PvP and WvW players get killed by thieves and get emotional about it hence all the threads of thief OP! I’m sure if mobs could post they’d be calling you OP

Good point. Ok I will stop feeling bad about my PvE ways.

So my new question, then, is this: how does a PvE player transition into the WvW/sPvP world? What kinds of changes do I need to make to be effective?

Relying on blindness spam won’t work anymore (enemy players aren’t polite enough to stand still all the time), so you’ll probably want to use a different weapon set.

A lot of direct damage thieves (including myself) use SB+D/D for WvW. (shortbow for group fights, daggers for bursting down single target)
You could also go for condition damage, but then you’ll have to change you armor and traits around.

Jack of Tears.9458:

If yer havin’ fun ya can’t be doin’ it wrong.

QFT

I don’t think you’re doing it wrong at all. In my opinion, using Dagger/Pistol requires more skill than any other Thief weapon set, especially in a PvE setting, so if you’re playing it and you’re having fun, you can’t be doing anything wrong.

The way to do it wrong is by not having fun.

I feel like you’ve just pretty much told my story… I have no friends in the game so I always play solo (I’d like to play with others, but I’m still only level 37 since you know… I work a lot)… I have D/P and all I do is essentially just spam blinding powder every 4-5 seconds to keep them blinded, then auto-attack them to death… dagger auto-attack does good dmg and I never get hit in PvE cause the enemies just stand in the circle and can’t hit me… perfect strategy lol…

basically I troll black powder all day…

This tactic works great for 1-2 enemies at a time, but as the game progresses you’ll have a much harder time of it because your initiative and skills will recharge slower than the enemies’ HP depletes.

I used that up until about level 50 in PvE and it was great for then.