Guild Wars 2

Specifically, low-health blinding powder that’s built as a passive with 5 points in Shadow Arts. Why is this a thing? Could we get this as a selectable and something that ’doesn’t’ have a tendency to get people killed by hitting Dagger 5 and having it trigger between the ability’s execution and the button press? This has happened to me more times than I can count.

I tend to prefer a more active approach to surviving than passively going into stealth anyway. Do I just need to stop trying to stealth anytime my health gets low and predict this stupid thing, or is there any hope of having it moved to something that isn’t passive? It simply rubs me the wrong way to sit there content in the knowledge that this thing will proc when I get low health.

This wasn’t ‘quite’ a rant, but not far off. I apologize for that, but I’m so tired of dying to this idiot trait triggering at the worst possible times.

It sometimes is a hassle and is sometimes a life saver. I love it mostly as I am not a person who plays with auto-attack on. Which I see as the main cause for this to be a problem for most people with points in SA.

I also watch my HP to ensure that I know if it’s going to pop. :)

I probably need to get better at watching my HP, but auto-attack is never what brings me out of it. It’s always me trying to dagger 5 at the same time it procs. That .5 sec delay is deadly. XD

A good thief will make good use of it.
A bad thief will get killed (sometimes).
I know it can be frustrating, but try to play around it for a bit. Learn its cooldown, be prepared to get a free stealth if things get nasty.
Or, if you really hate it, make it proc when you are revealed

For somebody who is new to the 5 point trait SA, will have a surprise when they don’t have the feeling for this trait.

It will take some to master but the more skirmishes you make the better you can see when that trait triggers when your health drops to 25% health.

I would say that trait has saved my life more times against backstabbing thieves that manage to catch me with basilisk venom. What you need to be aware off is a couple of things:
How bursty is the enemy im engaging?
Where is my 25% health mark?
How long is 30 seconds in fights?

Once you get the concept of these 3, you can really fully appreciate this trait as a free reset to give you some breathing air to get a grip of the battle. Sometimes so much can be going on on the screen thakittens hard to fully know the situation but a good thief should always be aware of his surrounding so he doesn’t get caught off guard.

Hope it helps a bit. I would say its more of a life saver than a killer

This trait is actually a life safer for my victims. I haven’t run any points in SA for ages, but ppl who do mostly survive (for a while) my first attack because i can’t get my second pistol whip connected through this. They don’t get revealed with #5 or auto attack because they are stunned when the trait procs.

Back when I used SA, this trait saved me more than it killed me. True a x/D with c&d will get you to reveal easier than a x/P but like the one above me said, getting used to 3 concepts will make it save you more than it kills you.

Starlightmagus.8654:

I probably need to get better at watching my HP, but auto-attack is never what brings me out of it. It’s always me trying to dagger 5 at the same time it procs. That .5 sec delay is deadly. XD

same. they need to make CND faster by alot. should be no slower than .2 seconds

This trait is the reason why full burst backstab thieves can’t gib me in 1 combo.

Travlane.5948:

Starlightmagus.8654:

I probably need to get better at watching my HP, but auto-attack is never what brings me out of it. It’s always me trying to dagger 5 at the same time it procs. That .5 sec delay is deadly. XD

same. they need to make CND faster by alot. should be no slower than .2 seconds

It’s all about balance. If the cast time on CnD was any faster it would be overpowered. The slow cast time is to give good players the ability to react to it, dodge, interrupt, something.

If there’s only 1 ability worth using, compared to the others, either it’s overpowered and/or the alternatives are weak. We can’t have “I-Win” on abilities every number key.

The passive blinding powder gets me killed a lot more times than it saves me. Being just in the animation of cloak and dagger and having the passive proc is quite frustrating to be honest. You can say you have to pay attention to it and know when it procs, but you can’t always predict how much damage you’re going to take and when you’ll be taking it. And noone is going to countdown from 60 either just to know when it’s going to be back up.

Getting forced to have such a passive trait just for going into shadow arts (I got 30 points in it) is ridiculous, as for some people it’s a benefit whereas for others it’s only a liability. I don’t need such a passive to survive against other thieves backstabbing me, I like to be in control of when and how I stealth. As such I believe it’s way better to have it as a major trait so people can actually decide for themselves whether or not it’s helpful to them.

Another option is to just not trait into SA… that’s what I do