Guild Wars 2

Headline should be:
Assassin’s signet up to 75%

Omg i wrote clearly its not a buff nor a nerf, its a change only. I did tests on full vitality mesmer(1836 armor 28k hp) There was 1% increase in damage compared to old trinket.

However now, the innitiatial burst has around 15% less damage, and focuses more on heartseekers after the backstab to even out the damage.

In tottal it does not change the damage, however gives greater chance to survive if your reaction isnt that of a snail.

Having all that in mind its a very welcome change, since that signet is also usefull in other builds too, not only backstab.

P.S. Its not 75% buff… look steal>CnD>BS>HS>HS does 29k damage on non moving glass cannon light armor. The old signet increased 8k backstab to 12k=4k more damage.
New one gives 15% increase to whole combo=29k*1.15=33.35k
The increase is 4.35k.

Diffrence in damage is 350 damage, however the time to pull this off is larger, meaning its nerf to instagib combo which most people could not react. Otherwise its just a welcome change.

Buzzcrave.6197:

A spec which teleports to you from 900 away, stealths itself then kills you in less than 2 seconds is just not good game design whether there are counters or not.

So by your logic, even with ways to counter it, it’s still bad? Right. You see, now, because the DPS is more spread across the combo, you have a bigger window to retaliate. As soon as you get hit, you have every opportunity to hit any AoE, CC or bunker skills you have. A glass cannon backstab Thief will be instantly destroyed by any CC. Learn your class. This is coming from a Thief that specs in survivability and snaring. If I can beat a glass cannon Thief without stealth and with my pitiful HP, you can too.

Buzzcrave.6197:

Please, please don’t start fooling yourself by telling me how about those 1500 nukers… You have a kittening Sidestep skill in your phony backstab build for kitten sake.

D/D has no evade skills apart from Death Blossom, which wastes your initiative in seconds. Critical Strikes and Deadly Arts have no dodge enhancements. The only tree with dodging benefit is Acrobatics, a vitality tree with no relation to a backstab build. Your only hope is to run backwards and spam Disabling Shot with a Shortbow, and that will get you nowhere because you do pathetic damage and just make yourself an eyesore of a target.

What the kitten are you talking about?

I loved this change, it has unfortunately left us at the ridiculously over powered stage! assassins signet is now viable for other specs this has been a brilliant change.

I’ve never played a backstab spec… frankly I always found D/D to be a bit of a one trick pony so its nice to have a skill available to other specs, it is ridiculous with Shortbow now.

Have you guys been at home sick when they were teaching basic math in school?

Base damage = Mug 2k → CnD 2k → BS 10k.
With pre-nerf AS = Mug 2k → CnD 2k → BS 15k = 19k
With post-nerf AS = Mug 2.15k → CnD 2.15k, →BS 11k = 16k

It’s a 3k nerf to a burst we can only do when steal is up (every 45/40s).

Not to mention most classes can easily counter this.
Ele = Arcane Shield / Final shielding block backstab → burst down to 6k.
Grd = Passive Aegis / Protection → burst down to 6k.
War = Endure Pain / Defy Pain → burst down to 4.5k.
Rng = SoStone / Guard me → burst down to 4.5k.
Mes = Decoy → burst down to 5k.
Eng = Protection / Invis → burst down to 5k.
Thf = Shadowsteap → Burst down to 5k.
Nec = olololol I got 12 health pools who cares
Everyone = dodge

Too bad for you baddies that Anet isn’t Blizzard.
They do math properly before fixing skills, and they don’t nerf things when every single class can counter them.

Red Falcon.8257:

Have you guys been at home sick when they were teaching basic math in school?

Base damage = Mug 2k -> CnD 2k -> BS 10k.
With pre-nerf AS = Mug 2k -> CnD 2k -> BS 15k = 19k
With post-nerf AS = Mug 2.15k -> CnD 2.15k, ->BS 11k = 16k

It’s a 3k nerf to a burst we can only do when steal is up (every 45/40s).

Not to mention most classes can easily counter this.
Ele = Arcane Shield / Final shielding block backstab -> burst down to 6k.
Grd = Passive Aegis / Protection -> burst down to 6k.
War = Endure Pain / Defy Pain -> burst down to 4.5k.
Rng = SoStone / Guard me -> burst down to 4.5k.
Mes = Decoy -> burst down to 5k.
Eng = Protection / Invis -> burst down to 5k.
Thf = Shadowsteap -> Burst down to 5k.
Nec = olololol I got 12 health pools who cares
Everyone = dodge

Too bad for you baddies that Anet isn’t Blizzard.
They do math properly before fixing skills, and they don’t nerf things when every single class can counter them.

this only applies to one way of playing the thief, now you have a less effective backstab build which is frankly a good thing, as it was bordering on boringly kitten before, and you now have a skill that can be utilised by other playstyles.

there are other ways of playing that are now much more deadly than a backstab spec though so we are in a lot of ways vastly more OP once people start experimenting.

Red Falcon.8257:

Have you guys been at home sick when they were teaching basic math in school?

Base damage = Mug 2k -> CnD 2k -> BS 10k.
With pre-nerf AS = Mug 2k -> CnD 2k -> BS 15k = 19k
With post-nerf AS = Mug 2.15k -> CnD 2.15k, ->BS 11k = 16k

Maybe you should add a couple of heartseekers to the end of those so it’s actually a fair comparison by using all of the 5 boosted attacks.

I have no problems with this, I never used assassin’s signet and had no problems dealing with people.

If you used {Signets of Power} {Venomous Strength} and {Improvisation} to set up 25 stacks of Might before {Hidden Killer} [Backstab] while wearing +CritDmg gear then the 50% on the tooltip turned out to be closer to 200% because %Damage skills interact in almost an exponential manner with Might and CritDmg.

For that specific build, the change was quite a large nerf because you can’t sustain the Might stacks or 100% crit that push the %Damage buff far above the stated extra damage.

But who cares really. That build was never practical. It left you completely and utterly worthless outside of a single setup every 45 seconds.

Toned down the BS build and made other builds more viable.

What’s not to like? ANet have restored my faith in their balancing team.

phor.7952:

But who cares really. That build was never practical. It left you completely and utterly worthless outside of a single setup every 45 seconds.

Because Mugging is the only way to get to a mob.

Auesis.7301:

Buzzcrave.6197:

A spec which teleports to you from 900 away, stealths itself then kills you in less than 2 seconds is just not good game design whether there are counters or not.

So by your logic, even with ways to counter it, it’s still bad? Right. You see, now, because the DPS is more spread across the combo, you have a bigger window to retaliate. As soon as you get hit, you have every opportunity to hit any AoE, CC or bunker skills you have. A glass cannon backstab Thief will be instantly destroyed by any CC. Learn your class. This is coming from a Thief that specs in survivability and snaring. If I can beat a glass cannon Thief without stealth and with my pitiful HP, you can too.

Buzzcrave.6197:

Please, please don’t start fooling yourself by telling me how about those 1500 nukers… You have a kittening Sidestep skill in your phony backstab build for kitten sake.

D/D has no evade skills apart from Death Blossom, which wastes your initiative in seconds. Critical Strikes and Deadly Arts have no dodge enhancements. The only tree with dodging benefit is Acrobatics, a vitality tree with no relation to a backstab build. Your only hope is to run backwards and spam Disabling Shot with a Shortbow, and that will get you nowhere because you do pathetic damage and just make yourself an eyesore of a target.

What the kitten are you talking about?

Sidestep as in utility skill, it doesn’t take a genius to know that Sidestep is a must. Seriously do you even play this game?

Buzzcrave.6197:

Auesis.7301:

Buzzcrave.6197:

A spec which teleports to you from 900 away, stealths itself then kills you in less than 2 seconds is just not good game design whether there are counters or not.

So by your logic, even with ways to counter it, it’s still bad? Right. You see, now, because the DPS is more spread across the combo, you have a bigger window to retaliate. As soon as you get hit, you have every opportunity to hit any AoE, CC or bunker skills you have. A glass cannon backstab Thief will be instantly destroyed by any CC. Learn your class. This is coming from a Thief that specs in survivability and snaring. If I can beat a glass cannon Thief without stealth and with my pitiful HP, you can too.

Buzzcrave.6197:

Please, please don’t start fooling yourself by telling me how about those 1500 nukers… You have a kittening Sidestep skill in your phony backstab build for kitten sake.

D/D has no evade skills apart from Death Blossom, which wastes your initiative in seconds. Critical Strikes and Deadly Arts have no dodge enhancements. The only tree with dodging benefit is Acrobatics, a vitality tree with no relation to a backstab build. Your only hope is to run backwards and spam Disabling Shot with a Shortbow, and that will get you nowhere because you do pathetic damage and just make yourself an eyesore of a target.

What the kitten are you talking about?

Sidestep as in utility skill, it doesn’t take a genius to know that Sidestep is a must. Seriously do you even play this game?

Do you?? There is no such skill. Roflmao. Say good-bye to any form of credibility you might have had, bud. Really… if you want to offer advice, or even worse talk trash… please for the love of all that is good… fact check yourself first, k?

On topic; There wasn’t a nerf, anyone who thinks so is just being ridiculous. The initial burst is down on one very specific build, which is made up for + extra with another second… two tops. And it is a buff for many other specs who can now utilize the skill to far greater effect.

You should see how other classes get handled if you want to whine about this change, lol. Ranger just had their top direct damage build nerfed by about 20% to fix a freaking animation glitch no ones even seen. The difference between how that change, and this change were handled are night and day.

Innocuous irrelevant graphic fix: Ranger do 20% less damage.
Re balance to fix imba spec: Thief does 1% more damage.

You will find no sympathy. Embrace the change, because it is a very good one, well thought out, and brilliantly implemented.

Buzzcrave.6197:

Auesis.7301:

Buzzcrave.6197:

A spec which teleports to you from 900 away, stealths itself then kills you in less than 2 seconds is just not good game design whether there are counters or not.

So by your logic, even with ways to counter it, it’s still bad? Right. You see, now, because the DPS is more spread across the combo, you have a bigger window to retaliate. As soon as you get hit, you have every opportunity to hit any AoE, CC or bunker skills you have. A glass cannon backstab Thief will be instantly destroyed by any CC. Learn your class. This is coming from a Thief that specs in survivability and snaring. If I can beat a glass cannon Thief without stealth and with my pitiful HP, you can too.

Buzzcrave.6197:

Please, please don’t start fooling yourself by telling me how about those 1500 nukers… You have a kittening Sidestep skill in your phony backstab build for kitten sake.

D/D has no evade skills apart from Death Blossom, which wastes your initiative in seconds. Critical Strikes and Deadly Arts have no dodge enhancements. The only tree with dodging benefit is Acrobatics, a vitality tree with no relation to a backstab build. Your only hope is to run backwards and spam Disabling Shot with a Shortbow, and that will get you nowhere because you do pathetic damage and just make yourself an eyesore of a target.

What the kitten are you talking about?

Sidestep as in utility skill, it doesn’t take a genius to know that Sidestep is a must. Seriously do you even play this game?

There is no sidestep skill. Roll for initiative is bad if you meant that.

Devildoc.6721:

Buzzcrave.6197:

Auesis.7301:

Buzzcrave.6197:

A spec which teleports to you from 900 away, stealths itself then kills you in less than 2 seconds is just not good game design whether there are counters or not.

So by your logic, even with ways to counter it, it’s still bad? Right. You see, now, because the DPS is more spread across the combo, you have a bigger window to retaliate. As soon as you get hit, you have every opportunity to hit any AoE, CC or bunker skills you have. A glass cannon backstab Thief will be instantly destroyed by any CC. Learn your class. This is coming from a Thief that specs in survivability and snaring. If I can beat a glass cannon Thief without stealth and with my pitiful HP, you can too.

Buzzcrave.6197:

Please, please don’t start fooling yourself by telling me how about those 1500 nukers… You have a kittening Sidestep skill in your phony backstab build for kitten sake.

D/D has no evade skills apart from Death Blossom, which wastes your initiative in seconds. Critical Strikes and Deadly Arts have no dodge enhancements. The only tree with dodging benefit is Acrobatics, a vitality tree with no relation to a backstab build. Your only hope is to run backwards and spam Disabling Shot with a Shortbow, and that will get you nowhere because you do pathetic damage and just make yourself an eyesore of a target.

What the kitten are you talking about?

Sidestep as in utility skill, it doesn’t take a genius to know that Sidestep is a must. Seriously do you even play this game?

There is no sidestep skill. Roll for initiative is bad if you meant that.

roll for iniative is awesome! but no idea what he meant by sidestep… flanking strike?

Do you not lose the power for assassins signet on use? And as 90 power is roughly a 10% damage increase, you only gain 5% damage on activation? Or do you keep the power until the activation has been used (all 5 strikes).

Buzzcrave.6197:

Sidestep as in utility skill, it doesn’t take a genius to know that Sidestep is a must. Seriously do you even play this game?

Do you? Sidestep doesn’t exist. The only evasive utility is Roll For Initiative, which has a huge cooldown. Any “offensive” manoeuvres that also have evade attached are Death Blossom (as already discussed) and Flanking Strike. Both are useless at range and make you look like an idiot, and you’ll be exhausted of initiative almost instantly when spamming them. Not to mention that Flanking Strike is a sword skill and incompatible with a Backstab build.

Please, tell me more about how well you know this game.

Not sure but when I activate it the boon is still there and only wares off after the 5th strike. Didn’t look at my stats though.

It’s a very good question but I can’t try it out since I’m at work atm :\

Katsumoto.9452:

Do you not lose the power for assassins signet on use? And as 90 power is roughly a 10% damage increase, you only gain 5% damage on activation? Or do you keep the power until the activation has been used (all 5 strikes).

90 power is 10% increase from base damage. The damage from the signet is 15% to totaled damage.

Basically, they get added into the damage calculation in very different ways. Anything that give a % damage increase will be strictly better than something that would give the equivalent % increase through added power stat.

Example
Attack X does 10 damage at base power 916.
We have 1832 power. Therefor our attack X will do 20 damage. Let’s say we also have +50% crit damage. So it crits for 40 damage.

We equip the signet, and now have 1922 power, and our attack will do 21 damage.
It crits for 42 damage, that is a 5% increase.

So, we activate the signet, losing the 90 power, but gaining a +15% modifier.
Attack X does 23 damage, or 46 damage on a crit.

The difference between the two is not 5%. The higher your power is, the more a static % increase matters. The lower your power, the less so. This is because the % increase multiplies off of the power factored number, which in essence increases the relative value of power.

Ravnodaus.5130:

90 power is 10% increase from base damage. The damage from the signet is 15% to totaled damage.

90 power is around 5% increase in damage, unless you are a condition build

Base power: 916
Power from gear: ~900
Total power: ~1800

Adding 90 power to 1800 is +5% damage.

Activating the signet loses you that 5% damage, but adds 15% to what’s left. Basically a +10% damage increase

However if you have bloodlust stacks, might stacks, food, etc that increases your power, then you could be up to 2700 power. Then the passive part of the signet is worse (+3.33% damage) but the active part of the signet becomes a bit better.

Reap.7931:

Death Blossom build is gonna get nerfed next.

I don’t think any profession’s condition builds will get nerfed anytime soon, due to conditions being much weaker. Even if you get 25 stacks, one smite condition or shake it off and it’s gone, and those skills have really short cooldowns (16s potentially).

Ring.6928:

phor.7952:

But who cares really. That build was never practical. It left you completely and utterly worthless outside of a single setup every 45 seconds.

Because Mugging is the only way to get to a mob.

It’s not just [Steal] or getting to the enemy that becomes a problem.
[Assassin’s Signet] and [Basilisk Venom] are also on a 45 sec cooldown.
If you don’t use your Venoms and Signets to stack Might, your damage is MUCH lower.
If you just run in to attack, you might lose the 20% extra damage from {Exposed Weakness} and {First Strikes}, lowering your damage even more.

This build was COMPLETELY centered around abusing the exponential damage relationship between short duration Might buffs and Damage. You could pop everything you had to hit a ~20k backstab while the enemy is turned to stone.
But if you didn’t pop everything together then it just doesn’t work. Without Might and the 70 damage from Traits and [Assassin’s Signet], your backstab would only hit for ~9k. Outside of the setup, you have 0 utility skills and VERY low survivability.
That’s precisely why the build wasn’t practical.

I havent played a lot since this patch but I have read through most the posts. I Feel this is a nerf and hers why

1. people are talking about sustained damage. Well we all call thieves “GLASS” cannons. They arent meant for head to head. Take away the cannon? Take away the Glass then.

2. This burst build isnt as simple as running up to everyone and hitting a button. ALL your cool downs must off, have full initiative and then find the right opportunity to execute at least half of your skills at one time. If you dont pull it off, your done most often….no skills to use (cool downs) all initiative is gone. Its literally a all in attack. What other class has to walk around and look for opportunity to execute most of their skills at once? None that I have played (not saying there aren’t)

Im hoping I can live with it but in theory I dont see it working well. Especially in PVP where a thief relies on always having the opener. If you dont believe this watch any 2 thief’s duel and they will always try and reset the fight to have that advantage.

Forgot to mention. I have a full set of soulbond exotic gear geared to this spec. Maybe someone telling us to quit complaining will buy me new exotics with toughness stats? Any takers?

I’m sorry Scarlac, but I can’t buy into what your reasoning is.

What other class has to walk around and look for opportunity to execute most of their skills at once? None that I have played (not saying there aren’t)

Mesmers have to wait for the opportunity to execute our abilities, and when they do, they rush with all the skills in their weaponset, and then swap weapons to prepare another salvo of pressure. Dagger/Dagger Elementalists must execute all their skills within a small period of time, because they do not have the health pool nor do they have skills to mitigate damage.

Frankly, every top player needs to anticipate and wait for the right opportunity.
Now, you may claim that I have not addressed your argument of having to “execute at least half of your skills at one time” and “no skills to use”. I’ll address that later.

Well we all call thieves “GLASS” cannons. They arent meant for head to head. Take away the cannon? Take away the Glass then.

You are claiming that the change to Assassin’s Signet has killed the glass cannon. How does 50% upped to 75% spread across 5 attacks killed your glass cannon? You already say that you have “no skills to use”, which should mean that you have used more than 5 skills, which means you would have put all the buffs from the signet to use. I’m not even going to consider the possibility of not enough initiative, because Backstab and Steal do not cost initiative.

Now to your “no skills to use” argument. Let’s do quick napkin math here: You use Steal, then Cloak and Dagger, and then Backstab. That’s 6 initiative used. Unless you have done something else, you have 6 initiative leftover. With 6 initiative leftover, you can not only execute almost any move in your arsenal, but also switch to another weapon and play defensively.

The change increased the overall damage bonus. If you are bummed about your lucky ace becoming your lucky king, you need to take a good look at the rest of your hand and see why other thieves are taking that hand and turning it into a straight flush.

*edit: typo in first line.

Scarlac.4265:

I havent played a lot since this patch but I have read through most the posts. I Feel this is a nerf and hers why

1. people are talking about sustained damage. Well we all call thieves “GLASS” cannons. They arent meant for head to head. Take away the cannon? Take away the Glass then.

2. This burst build isnt as simple as running up to everyone and hitting a button. ALL your cool downs must off, have full initiative and then find the right opportunity to execute at least half of your skills at one time. If you dont pull it off, your done most often….no skills to use (cool downs) all initiative is gone. Its literally a all in attack. What other class has to walk around and look for opportunity to execute most of their skills at once? None that I have played (not saying there aren’t)

Im hoping I can live with it but in theory I dont see it working well. Especially in PVP where a thief relies on always having the opener. If you dont believe this watch any 2 thief’s duel and they will always try and reset the fight to have that advantage.

This is a load of rubbish. If you hit the entire combo, you’re still doing close enough to the same amount of damage (it’s 3-4k off, I believe), and if you don’t kill them, you have a 15% boosted Heartseeker or two to finish them off. You’re making it sound like they’ve completely nerfed the concept of backstabbing combos, when the opposite is true. You also only need 6 initiative, not your full bar (that being C+D, steal and backstab do not require any initiative). I have used this build pre- and post-“nerf”. I still have a large distaste for it and prefer my survivable builds, but it’s as “effective” as it ever was. Personally, I think it’s actually a boost overall and helps multiple builds instead of one lame build.

If you feel that you HAVE to rely on having the opening shot and resetting fights, you need to re-think your Thief. It’s very rare for me to see 2 Thieves constantly struggling to get a reset mid-fight to gain an advantage. Only with bad Thieves, perhaps. It’s always nice seeing the shock of a fellow Thief when I take his damage like a sponge and wipe the floor with him without even needing to stealth.

Scarlac.4265:

Forgot to mention. I have a full set of soulbond exotic gear geared to this spec. Maybe someone telling us to quit complaining will buy me new exotics with toughness stats? Any takers?

Oh, boo hoo. You and you alone made the choice to go full glass cannon, and it’s only on you if you suddenly decide that getting wiped the second you press a wrong button was a bad idea. I currently have 3 exotic sets, each for a different purpose. It’s not hard to get them. Besides, what makes you think you have the privilege of the entire game world revolving around you and your character’s needs?

Crumbs.7643:

Let’s do quick napkin math here: You use Steal, then Cloak and Dagger, and then Backstab. That’s 6 initiative used. Unless you have done something else, you have 6 initiative leftover. With 6 initiative leftover, you can not only execute almost any move in your arsenal, but also switch to another weapon and play defensively.

Actually you have 9-10 Initiative left over because you use Cloak and Dagger before Steal and with [Kleptomaniac] you regain 3 Initiative and you may regain 1 Initiative while preparing your Backstab.

Kyus.3812:

Devildoc.6721:

Buzzcrave.6197:

Auesis.7301:

Buzzcrave.6197:

A spec which teleports to you from 900 away, stealths itself then kills you in less than 2 seconds is just not good game design whether there are counters or not.

So by your logic, even with ways to counter it, it’s still bad? Right. You see, now, because the DPS is more spread across the combo, you have a bigger window to retaliate. As soon as you get hit, you have every opportunity to hit any AoE, CC or bunker skills you have. A glass cannon backstab Thief will be instantly destroyed by any CC. Learn your class. This is coming from a Thief that specs in survivability and snaring. If I can beat a glass cannon Thief without stealth and with my pitiful HP, you can too.

Buzzcrave.6197:

Please, please don’t start fooling yourself by telling me how about those 1500 nukers… You have a kittening Sidestep skill in your phony backstab build for kitten sake.

D/D has no evade skills apart from Death Blossom, which wastes your initiative in seconds. Critical Strikes and Deadly Arts have no dodge enhancements. The only tree with dodging benefit is Acrobatics, a vitality tree with no relation to a backstab build. Your only hope is to run backwards and spam Disabling Shot with a Shortbow, and that will get you nowhere because you do pathetic damage and just make yourself an eyesore of a target.

What the kitten are you talking about?

Sidestep as in utility skill, it doesn’t take a genius to know that Sidestep is a must. Seriously do you even play this game?

There is no sidestep skill. Roll for initiative is bad if you meant that.

roll for iniative is awesome! but no idea what he meant by sidestep… flanking strike?

There are much better stun breaks, infiltrator’s signet is on a much shorter cooldown, shadowstep is on a shorter cooldown and removes ANY 3 conditions rather than only a limited few. Haste shares the cooldown and has a drawback but can quickly turn a fight around, break a stun, and then open up on them.

1 dodge on a 60s cooldown is pretty terrible.

The skill USED to be amazing.

It got nerfed into being a niche skill at best.

it USED to remove ALL conditions and restore ALL initiative.

I think if it removed all conditions I’d use it again.

DesertRose.2031:

Crumbs.7643:

Let’s do quick napkin math here: You use Steal, then Cloak and Dagger, and then Backstab. That’s 6 initiative used. Unless you have done something else, you have 6 initiative leftover. With 6 initiative leftover, you can not only execute almost any move in your arsenal, but also switch to another weapon and play defensively.

Actually you have 9-10 Initiative left over because you use Cloak and Dagger before Steal and with [Kleptomaniac] you regain 3 Initiative and you may regain 1 Initiative while preparing your Backstab.

Ah forgive me. I don’t have a good idea of what the backstab build is, so I just wrote it for a generic case.

@DesertRose.2031:

I haven´t done any heavy testing, but if I remember correctly, the C&D cost is applied in the moment the skill hit/miss the target, so if you want to do steal/C&D combo, you should land steal in the middle of the C&D animation ideally, but that´s before the cost, so you will probably have full initiative at the moment, therefore kleptomaniac trait would be wasted…

Either way, it still means that there should be enough initiative leftover to execute a couple more abilities, and put the Assassin’s Signet to full use.

I just can’t believe the arguments people like Scarlac are giving to interpret this change as a nerf.

Crumbs.7643:

Either way, it still means that there should be enough initiative leftover to execute a couple more abilities, and put the Assassin’s Signet to full use.

I just can’t believe the arguments people like Scarlac are giving to interpret this change as a nerf.

You can have 8 initiative, maybe 9 (if one regens, the other two from the stealthing traitline), which is enough for 2-3 HSs, so no problem here