Guild Wars 2

I find that S/P is severely underwhelming. In the first place, the synergy between S/P is zero.

D/P – Leap combo, heartseeker damage + backstab, utilizes Shadow arts (SA) trait line. Daggers and pistols have several traits option. Typically people would want to have at least quick initiative recovery
D/D – Has huge burst damage, also utilizes the SA line.
S/D – No traits for swords. Offhand dagger is the main reason why you can use the SA line.
S/P – Worst of the lot. Received a 15% nerf in damage way back. Some people claim that auto attack does around the same damage as pistol whip. Blinding field is completely useless since sword has no finisher to speak off. But D/P has leap finisher (stealth after heartseeker), P/P has projectile finisher.

After all the nerfs, FS/LS is the only thing that got buffed, and it has nothing to do with the trait lines. And some people are stating, oh, it’s too powerful, it needs a nerf. People, are you dense in the head?

I think we’re lacking a thief dev. After 8-9 months of no buffs for sword traits (non-existent), there’s still nothing. So does this mean thieves only have daggers and pistols? (bows are way more utility than anything else)

If you think sword thieves need to have traits and especially receive buffs on S/P, please +1 this thread.

With the new “fix” to IS, It’s pretty depressing actually that I feel like I’m being forced to use gimmicky stealth builds for lack of a better option.

+1

I would like to see S/P get some buffs. Specifically in pistol whip.

LoneWolfie.1852:

You forgot to add: Black Powder doesn’t give S/P all the stealth like D/P and D/D

I suggested giving a whirl finisher combo for pistol whip just for the sake of a minor buff, but apparently the devs aren’t listening. I really have no idea what to say. If I could have my way, pistol whip should allow us to move while hitting.

LoneWolfie.1852:

I suggested giving a whirl finisher combo for pistol whip just for the sake of a minor buff, but apparently the devs aren’t listening. I really have no idea what to say.

Well, I will say this: S/P is NOT, NOT, NOT commonly played in this game. It is one of the least played specs by Thieves. People hate the “Korean” feel of Pistol Whip because it locks the player to the ground during its animation. D/D – D/P are played more by the ADD folks (not being mean, it’s known).

I find it way more powerful and its teleportations are insanely good (until today, not sure).

Because it is not played that much, ArenaNet see’s that the few people that do are doing well with it and find it as a problem spec that could become an up-rise if they don’t get a handle on it now. (that’s just my personal view).

However here’s a thought:
How did Cloak and Dagger not get looked at as an issue? (should not even be a stealth on this ability — it’s far too much stealth)
How did Backstab not get looked at as an issue?
Why were daggers intended to have more top-end damage than 1H Swords? Remember that one?!

Now ask:
Why did PW get a 15% nerf when the real complaints coming in were about D/D and D/P builds? To this day I am still scratching my head on that one.

Crawford.4135:

LoneWolfie.1852:

I suggested giving a whirl finisher combo for pistol whip just for the sake of a minor buff, but apparently the devs aren’t listening. I really have no idea what to say.

Well, I will say this: S/P is NOT, NOT, NOT commonly played in this game. It is one of the least played specs by Thieves. People hate the “Korean” feel of Pistol Whip because it locks the player to the ground during its animation. D/D – D/P are played more by the ADD folks (not being mean, it’s known).

I find it way more powerful and its teleportations are insanely good (until today, not sure).

Because it is not played that much, ArenaNet see’s that the few people that do are doing well with it and find it as a problem spec that could become an up-rise if they don’t get a handle on it now. (that’s just my personal view).

However here’s a thought:
How did Cloak and Dagger not get looked at as an issue? (should not even be a stealth on this ability — it’s far too much stealth)
How did Backstab not get looked at as an issue?
Why were daggers intended to have more top-end damage than 1H Swords? Remember that one?!

Now ask:
Why did PW get a 15% nerf when the real complaints coming in were about D/D and D/P builds? To this day I am still scratching my head on that one.

The community hate thieves in general. S/P was one of the first weaponset that got nerfed, I mean hitting 8-9k+stun+quickness PW was pretty amazing, a lot of players couldn’t react to it. I remember going from S/P to D/D to D/P and now S/D. I still mainly use D/P and S/P tho.

Edit: I forgot PW can also evade attacks during the sword attack animation.

Raidium.3916:

Crawford.4135:

LoneWolfie.1852:

I suggested giving a whirl finisher combo for pistol whip just for the sake of a minor buff, but apparently the devs aren’t listening. I really have no idea what to say.

Well, I will say this: S/P is NOT, NOT, NOT commonly played in this game. It is one of the least played specs by Thieves. People hate the “Korean” feel of Pistol Whip because it locks the player to the ground during its animation. D/D – D/P are played more by the ADD folks (not being mean, it’s known).

I find it way more powerful and its teleportations are insanely good (until today, not sure).

Because it is not played that much, ArenaNet see’s that the few people that do are doing well with it and find it as a problem spec that could become an up-rise if they don’t get a handle on it now. (that’s just my personal view).

However here’s a thought:
How did Cloak and Dagger not get looked at as an issue? (should not even be a stealth on this ability — it’s far too much stealth)
How did Backstab not get looked at as an issue?
Why were daggers intended to have more top-end damage than 1H Swords? Remember that one?!

Now ask:
Why did PW get a 15% nerf when the real complaints coming in were about D/D and D/P builds? To this day I am still scratching my head on that one.

The community hate thieves in general. S/P was one of the first weaponset that got nerfed, I mean hitting 8-9k+stun+quickness PW was pretty amazing, a lot of players couldn’t react to it. I remember going from S/P to D/D to D/P and now S/D. I still mainly use D/P and S/P tho.

Edit: I forgot PW can also evade attacks during the sword attack animation.

Oh, trust me I understand that. However Glass Cannon thieves are doing quite well for keeping hidden while hitting players (currently in game) for 10K BS. I am immune to hits for a moment swinging off my PW, but I’m not in stealth. D/D can BS off a 10K and go right back into stealth only to re-open again with one.

I don’t spec Glass Cannon by any means, very well balanced in Vit, Power, Toughness, Crit and Crit Damage. I want survival with damage but I know I must balance out my own personal weaknesses too, along with my character’s soft spots.

Crawford.4135:

Raidium.3916:

Crawford.4135:

LoneWolfie.1852:

I suggested giving a whirl finisher combo for pistol whip just for the sake of a minor buff, but apparently the devs aren’t listening. I really have no idea what to say.

Well, I will say this: S/P is NOT, NOT, NOT commonly played in this game. It is one of the least played specs by Thieves. People hate the “Korean” feel of Pistol Whip because it locks the player to the ground during its animation. D/D – D/P are played more by the ADD folks (not being mean, it’s known).

I find it way more powerful and its teleportations are insanely good (until today, not sure).

Because it is not played that much, ArenaNet see’s that the few people that do are doing well with it and find it as a problem spec that could become an up-rise if they don’t get a handle on it now. (that’s just my personal view).

However here’s a thought:
How did Cloak and Dagger not get looked at as an issue? (should not even be a stealth on this ability — it’s far too much stealth)
How did Backstab not get looked at as an issue?
Why were daggers intended to have more top-end damage than 1H Swords? Remember that one?!

Now ask:
Why did PW get a 15% nerf when the real complaints coming in were about D/D and D/P builds? To this day I am still scratching my head on that one.

The community hate thieves in general. S/P was one of the first weaponset that got nerfed, I mean hitting 8-9k+stun+quickness PW was pretty amazing, a lot of players couldn’t react to it. I remember going from S/P to D/D to D/P and now S/D. I still mainly use D/P and S/P tho.

Edit: I forgot PW can also evade attacks during the sword attack animation.

Oh, trust me I understand that. However Glass Cannon thieves are doing quite well for keeping hidden while hitting players (currently in game) for 10K BS. I am immune to hits for a moment swinging off my PW, but I’m not in stealth. D/D can BS off a 10K and go right back into stealth only to re-open again with one.

I don’t spec Glass Cannon by any means, very well balanced in Vit, Power, Toughness, Crit and Crit Damage. I want survival with damage but I know I must balance out my own personal weaknesses too, along with my character’s soft spots.

I’m a glass cannon thief and I could barely hit 6k with 10 stacks of might on my backstab. Where are you getting 10k backstab from? I also got full berserker with ruby orb.

Up leveled light armor target with stacks of vulnerability below 50% health.

YourOwnFear.2743:

Up leveled light armor target with stacks of vulnerability below 50% health.

You don’t even need that – I’ve backstabbed upleveled people for 10k damage straight off the bat without any vulnerability, while they are at full health too. (in a 0 30 30 10 0 build)

The damage on Pistol Whip needs to be brought to a comparable level with a Warrior’s Hundred Blades. Maybe not as high, but something close, maybe 75% of the damage. The evade during the animation kind of equalizes us having less health and armor than a Warrior, but we are able to spam this ability, which is why I would say it shouldn’t be equal damage to HB, but it should be more than it is now.

haha, I guess people count upleveled players for the thieves average damage? I know my pistol whip can reach 8k on them.

Wraith.9426:

The damage on Pistol Whip needs to be brought to a comparable level with a Warrior’s Hundred Blades. Maybe not as high, but something close, maybe 75% of the damage. The evade during the animation kind of equalizes us having less health and armor than a Warrior, but we are able to spam this ability, which is why I would say it shouldn’t be equal damage to HB, but it should be more than it is now.

It has a built in stun, evade, shorter animation and is spamable. It wont be 75% of hb but I hope it gets a good buff.

Raidium.3916:

I’m a glass cannon thief and I could barely hit 6k with 10 stacks of might on my backstab. Where are you getting 10k backstab from? I also got full berserker with ruby orb.

from 30-30-10-0-0 with 20 stacks of might

Is there anyone else who’s interested in S/X thieves? Or are the majority of the viewers actually non-thieves who comes in to QQ everytime?

I only care about sword thieves, but what is there to say?

S/D isn’t so bad but could seriously do with a dancing dagger rework, you know, so it actually has 5 skill instead of 4. That would also help d/d and p/d (a weapon set using two keys for god sake).

S/P is… well to be honest i really like this set (i use it the most) but pistol whip needs either a rework or some love. It could be a really good STEALTHLESS tanky control weapon set if anet actually tried, it’s not that far from being perfect. It’s one of the only weapon set along with d/p and sb where you would actually use your 5 abilities, i think it’s rare enough to be pointed. If you think about it, dagger off hand being kitten as can be might be a reason for this, i won’t even start about pistol main hand, it makes me want to punch puppies.

Crawford.4135:

Oh, trust me I understand that. However Glass Cannon thieves are doing quite well for keeping hidden while hitting players (currently in game) for 10K BS. I am immune to hits for a moment swinging off my PW, but I’m not in stealth. D/D can BS off a 10K and go right back into stealth only to re-open again with one.

10k BS? How? What? By whom? Are there thieves with 10 stacks of might and insta 10 stacks of vulnerability on the enemy? Highest i`ve seen was 8k and that was on myself a GC thief by another GC thief. And STILL it was weird. Please PLEASE for the love of god stop complaining about d/d or d/p for that matter GC builds just because ur feeling hurt that ur favorite build got nerfed. It might lead to us few GC thieves out there pulling our hair off to get even more nerfed, if that`s even possible. Don`t get me wrong if PW would be reverted, despite my loathing of it, i`d go for it in an instance. Thief`s viability is THAT bad don`t give the devs any ideas. As for too much stealth, now you are just silly…You like stuns and sword/pistol then the mesmer is for u, have at it.

You do realize that pistol whip does less damage than a sword auto attack chain right?

I say it should no longer lock us in place and the initial stun attack to the flurry should be alot faster in order to utilize the actual stun.

S/P used to be great before they nerfed quickness. With sigil of rage and critical haste, you could almost always decide when you wanted quickness by pistol whipping since it hit 9( or maybe 17 times if you hit 2 people). Then they nerfed quickness and it turned to crap. The weapon set does have great synergy though. stuns and evasion on 3( too slow w/o 100% quickness though), dazes for interrupting heals, and blinds on downed enemies. Not to mention the amazing-ness of infiltrator’s strike. And to people saying pistol whip does less damage than sword auto-attack chain, pistol whip with 100% quickness was more reliable since it kept them stunned the majority of the time. Once they dodge the last hit of auto-attack (the real big hit), than you lost a majority of your dps.

Noctis Assassin.4035:

S/P used to be great before they nerfed quickness. With sigil of rage and critical haste, you could almost always decide when you wanted quickness by pistol whipping since it hit 9( or maybe 17 times if you hit 2 people). Then they nerfed quickness and it turned to crap. The weapon set does have great synergy though. stuns and evasion on 3( too slow w/o 100% quickness though), dazes for interrupting heals, and blinds on downed enemies. Not to mention the amazing-ness of infiltrator’s strike. And to people saying pistol whip does less damage than sword auto-attack chain, pistol whip with 100% quickness was more reliable since it kept them stunned the majority of the time. Once they dodge the last hit of auto-attack (the real big hit), than you lost a majority of your dps.

Not sure how you play(ed) S/P, but it is STILL the most powerful setup. D/D & D/P thieves are a joke for me being a S/P setup. I have played S/P since day one and never looked back at the “Uh-Duh, Uh-Duh, Uh-Duh (Heartseeker)” spamming.

Back when the game was actually more fun till developer logic changes went out the window, I hated, HATED fighting S/P thieves. I’m glad I’m the 1% spec, because I don’t have to deal with them. In the past 5 months I’ve yet to fight a S/P thief, and I’m actually glad.

And with the way ArenaNet logic has been lately, I’ll never have to worry about people rolling S/P because they continue to shine the D/D & D/P setups over and over.

My thief’s sword is hilted, not shafted. Did I do something wrong?

Puru.4217:

S/D isn’t so bad but could seriously do with a dancing dagger rework, you know, so it actually has 5 skill instead of 4. That would also help d/d and p/d (a weapon set using two keys for god sake).

The sad part about this is that Dancing Dagger was viable until receiving a nerf for, what, being overly effective vs. rangers? It needs reduced initiative cost at the very least to compensate for the massive damage nerf.

As for S/P, the solution to the PW issue has always been pretty clear-cut in my mind. Give PW a 2-3 second Burning application when the initial pistol strike hits. That’ll bring the DPS back up, give thieves a method of applying a decent damage condition that isn’t bleed, give sword more condition damage synergy (it already has lots of condition duration synergy), and prevent people from effectively quickness-spamming PW since the Burning condition will force all damage to be strung out over a period of time instead of condensed. It also frontloads PW’s damage a little more (in the sense that the initial strike does more of the total damage) and thereby makes it less susceptible to being dodged out of.

D/P – Leap combo, heartseeker damage + backstab, utilizes Shadow arts (SA) trait line. Daggers and pistols have several traits option. Typically people would want to have at least quick initiative recovery
D/D – Has huge burst damage, also utilizes the SA line.
S/D – No traits for swords. Offhand dagger is the main reason why you can use the SA line.
S/P – Worst of the lot. Received a 15% nerf in damage way back. Some people claim that auto attack does around the same damage as pistol whip. Blinding field is completely useless since sword has no finisher to speak off. But D/P has leap finisher (stealth after heartseeker), P/P has projectile finisher.

If S/X is nerfed, then how bad is P/D such that it doesn’t even warrant a mention in all of the above possible combinations (and hasn’t been mentioned anywhere else in this thread)? What is it about P/D that seems beneath all consideration?

Sword has condition damage synergy? Where?

I don’t know of a single condition build that uses Sword.

Euryon.9248:

If S/X is nerfed, then how bad is P/D such that it doesn’t even warrant a mention in all of the above possible combinations (and hasn’t been mentioned anywhere else in this thread)? What is it about P/D that seems beneath all consideration?

The same problem P/P has. Vital Shot is terrible and not worth mentioning until it’s fixed to its intended state.

Auesis.7301:

Sword has condition damage synergy? Where?

I don’t know of a single condition build that uses Sword.

It lacks condition damage synergy, it already has plenty of condition duration synergy. Sword builds are godly debilitators with heavy condition duration, especially properly traited. Debilitating conditions are the thief’s major utility function, and in that respect sword builds are unmatched at melee range (SB is, as always, pretty good at everything).

I was using S/P before Shadow Return got nerfed and broken. It was lots of fun in WvW and in no way overpowered, I don’t think I ever saw another thief using it regularly.
It was great for milegate and open-field standoffs to get behind the enemy lines and create havoc, so fun.

Bummer.

Guess I’ll try to go with P/P now, just don’t want sword or a stealth build, probably start playing my guardian more…

Well, the P/P thing isn’t working out so great in WvW, condition removal is a big problem. If only the #2 skill was a light field… guess I’ll have to go cookie cutter like everyone else

Really miss the Shadow Return that actually did what the tooltip said: “returns you to your original location” yeah right… more like “jams you into terrain and discombobulates your camera view.”

They really needed to nerf it so bad they didn’t care about breaking it at the same time? What a joke.

i believe that shadow return shouldnt have a distance limitation….. its the non stealth version of escape. stealth uses shadow refuge. both shadow returns ….IF they were supposed to be the same….would have used the same coding…. since they didnt it was obviously on purpose so it got nerfed. they def do push thieves into certain builds lately. idk why….if thieves dont have the escapes they die…everytime. imagine if we couldnt get away at will……nobody would play thief….its kind of the saving grace of the class. do people hate it? absolutely!! do thieves hate how fast we die jsut as much? def!

The last patch killed my WvW S/P thief off, I’m so kitten ed, loved playing her.

I’ve been experimenting with Sword / Pistol lately, and I love it! I would really like to see the 15% increase in damage to PW, but until then I use it as a small burst and interrupt – it’s great for stopping an enemy burst! Other than that it’s a bunker build for tPvP, and because of the many evades and blinds I can go full berserker.

To OP: sword lack combo finishers, but the control and AoE damage this set is giving is just amazing. Ripping boons from guardians, interrupting big burst chains with PW and AoE blinding with Black Powder + Dagger storm (and healing with SoM). I just can’t see why I shouldn’t use sword in my main hand

Interesting note about sword thieves, the auto attack on your sword has higher DPS than warriors great sword QQ. (INB4 100 swags) Just in case you cant tell, I’m hardly being serious with that. I’ve NEVER seen a thief run sword/pistol, but sword thieves are for sure not being shafted by any means. With weakness getting a buff, the sword is going to get ‘even more’ love than it has already gotten. In PvP (wvw especially) S/D thieves seem to be the kings when it comes to roaming, not to mention my guildies that play S/D tell me thakittens ridiculously easy to fight guardians and warriors.

I play Sword/Pistol a lot in PVE, but it does feel like it’s really missing some things compared to other weapon sets.

There is a complete lack of finishers. We get projectile, and that’s it. Only one combo field too, and Black Powder’s radius is pretty small. It would be nice to see at least one finisher added to sword. Maybe Whirl added to Pistol Whip, or Leap added to Infiltrator Strike.

There’s also very few ways to get stealth while using sword/pistol. Pretty much all stealth comes from the utility skills and traits. While I don’t think that the sword sneak attacks are all that great, there’s a lot of defense that comes from being able to stealth often. Sword/Pistol gives that up for a short duration stun which only helps when fighting one foe at a time.

The one main thing I do like about Sword attacks is that it’s all AOE attacks. That’s why I enjoy it for PVE. But if I’m fighting just one tougher mob, I feel like I would be better off with daggers. And if I’m in a large group event, I think I’m better off sticking with the Shortbow for all it’s combo effects (and because thieves are so squishy when surrounded by mobs).

S/P is really strong in PvE. The constant blinds and the slow attack speed of mobs is just too easy. You can simply perma blind an enemy group while damaging them with auto attack or pistol whip..

s/p is also very boring to play…it’s like warrior mode for thieves in pve. the /p is nice in general, but the rooted pistol whip just makes it boring and generally unworkable in pvp/wvw.

i’m not sure how to fix this, but I think maybe switching pistol whip to something with less damage, more utility and no self-root, would be a good way to balance out the whole set. everything else in there is great, but relying on pistol whip spamming for dps makes s/p not fun to play, and either overpowered (when whip did more damage) or underpowered (in its present state).

here are some possible ways to do that- make pistol whip be a medium-dmg short stun that also transfers a condition to oponent. this sort of mirrors the new s/d changes, so thieves could use this is a counter condition build, or just an interrupt focused build. survivability comes from blinds and interrupts and condition cleansing.

Geiir.7603:

I’ve been experimenting with Sword / Pistol lately, and I love it! I would really like to see the 15% increase in damage to PW, but until then I use it as a small burst and interrupt – it’s great for stopping an enemy burst! Other than that it’s a bunker build for tPvP, and because of the many evades and blinds I can go full berserker.

To OP: sword lack combo finishers, but the control and AoE damage this set is giving is just amazing. Ripping boons from guardians, interrupting big burst chains with PW and AoE blinding with Black Powder + Dagger storm (and healing with SoM). I just can’t see why I shouldn’t use sword in my main hand

I don’t see how you can “interrupt” big burst chains because it takes 3/4 seconds to even interrupt a chain with S/P. Control for 1 single target with S/D is acceptable and quite powerful against boon users who cannot refresh their boons quickly, but is useless against bunkers because you can’t kill them anyway.

PW is so useless right now it’s not even funny. It costs 5 frigging init without even doing more damage than the auto attack. Anet NERFED PW twice, once with a really stupid 15% damage reduction when quickness was 100% and the fault was with quickness, and again with the 50% quickness reduction (which was ridiculous at first because Haste wakitten with a 100% no endurance regen, ROFL, now it’s slightly better for PvE dungeon runs), probably making it do the same damage as a PVT warrior doing his 100b. Thanks Anet.

You cannot be serious if you think PW is the best set. You must be trolling or blind. I like the part where you blew all your initiative by casting Black field + PW (11 initiative). Any PvP player will jump in joy to see all your init gone and practically committed suicide with your neck in a noose.

Out of all the nerfs done to thief, I think S/P is truly hit with the worst nerfs ever, till the point it’s completely crap in PvP. PvE? Heh. Thank goodness the AI lets you hit them with 100% of the PW damage. (Sarcasm)