Guild Wars 2

Which is the better “Oh kitten!” button for roaming in WvW?

Blinding Powder is only a 3 second (4 traited) stealth and blinds nearby opponents and you can move around I guess. While Shadow Refuge is at least 15 Second Stealth and it heals you but you have to pray that your opponents don’t have an ability that knocks you out of that area and most opponents will swing their weapons and aoe your shadow refuge…

Depends, BP being able to be used on the move while SR last longer its a huge AoE HERE target and if you leave early you lose stealth.

I run with SR TBH.

shadow refuge, you just have to be careful when using it because any decent player will try to either knock you out or kill you while you’re in it

i don’t wvw, but honestly i think the best tool for getting away is shadowstep, it’s probably one of my favorite utilities

Setting a shadow refuge somewhere and teleporting out of it makes opponents VERY confused.

Definitely Blinding Powder for those “oh kitten” moments. It has saved my kitten many a time.

The thing about BP is that it’s a bit of a pseudo stun breaker. You can use it while stunned or CC’d but it doesn’t actually break stuns. Instead, it will blind the enemy and enable you to recoup with the stealth it gives you.

Smart enemies will continue to attack in the place where you used BP (assuming they successfully stunned or immobolized you). The dumb players (usually the ones who fail at countering a thief and come to complain on the forums) will stop attacking or break their chain. I see this happen all the time with 100 Blades warriors. When they get their opportunity with a stun or immobilize and start a 100B I will pop a Blinding Powder and they will often stop their 100B not realizing that I am still in front of them albeit in stealth. It works well with the heal skill Withdraw especially when you are immobilized and when you want to escape a mob.

Now, Shadow Refuge is another great escape skill but it takes longer to activate. If you step out of the circle while it is stealthing you then you will be revealed. It’s good to use if you’re at a safe distance. If you happen to use this when your enemies are attacking nearby, there is a chance you will still die. Smart players will immediately notice the Shadow Refuge and will proceed to AOE the crap out of it or pull/push you out of your SR. The mesmer pull curtain is a great example of a counter to Shadow Refuge. If you are forced to use Shadow Refuge in the heat then make sure you have some dodges so that you can partially evade some AOE or a mesmer curtain pull. The radius of Shadow Refuge gives you enough space to dodge without going out of its boundaries. Use it to your advantage.

When roaming in WvW, I run both skills with 20% CD reduction

Disengage -> Shadow Refuge
Re-engage -> Blinding Powder

It’s definetly harder to pull of a successful SR, but if you can you can disengage 100%

But if you just want to get a few seconds to reposition BP is the better choice.

Definately BP is my Get Outta here button due to its quick activation and no need to target plus I can shadow step away or fall over a hill – or even usually just pop Hide In Shadows afterwards. Shadow refuge which I also equip is applied in less critical moments and used to res allies, set up stealth for attack, or heal and cleanse conditions.

I run SR because it has more all-around utility as a heal, ambush method, or to hide an ally. However, SR is not a very good escape mechanism against anyone who knows what they’re doing.

As a pure escape mechanism, I’d take BP.

Your only “Oh kitten” button lies in a D/P weapon set (BlkPwder + HS), not in your utility skills. The long cooldown makes them unreliable. So always have a D/P weapon set handy.

It depends on two things: How smart are the general players you play against? What other skills do you use?

If your opponents know to either place a lot of AoE, or swing their greatswords around, whenever they see Shadow Refuge, you’re going to find that Shadow Refuge will kill you, just as much as it saves you. So in that case, you should use Blinding Powder. But because the stealth on Blinding Powder is rather short, you also really need an escape skill to combo it with, like Infiltrator’s Arrow, Shadowstep, Roll for Initiative, or Drawback. If you don’t play a stealth based build, Blinding Powder also has the bonus of being a much better stealth skill generator, then Shadow Refuge. Both because it has a shorter recharge time, and because it blinds your opponent. Blinding Powder is also an instant cast skill, so you can use it while you’re reviving someone, or on top of using another skill.