Guild Wars 2

Hi all,

Some WvW roaming footage and light commentary featuring the Trickery, Sword/Dagger, Shortbow, evasion build that I call “The Mirage”, for no particular reason.

Build:
http://tinyurl.com/mirage28

Video:
http://tinyurl.com/mirage28vid

All post Dec 10 footage of course, and from three play sessions.

Been itching to get something together for post patch, haven’t had a lot of time to play (like everyone else, I imagine!). Hope you enjoy.

You got my respect for continuing to run S/D in WvW after Dec.10

Respect

Great game play.

Excalibur.9748:

You got my respect for continuing to run S/D in WvW after Dec.10

I can’t bring myself to give it up. Been having trouble making a new build I like to kill boredom though, mainly due to bad cond removal, our healing skills being awful w/o SA and our generally awful master traits.

I actually tried something similar because it’s just impossible to make anything new if you focus on critical strikes~ (the trait line we’re shoehorned into, as with SA too.)

It’s fun but Withdraw and our other heals feel really weak like this. Pain response also annoys me. Wish they’d just change our traits that activate based on HP to something more reliable/helpful.

Thanks Excalibur.

Hey Shadowskill, I recognize that thief name, good to see you here! We’ll have to fight to a draw again next time we meet ;p

Very nice Woaden. That 30 in Trickery is quite interesting…

Rofl at the heartseeker spamming noob thievess!

tuurned this junk off after half of first fight.

you got him to like 7% hp and he didnt do 1 dmg to you. he was horrible
lol seriously. or u know him and he was helping make youlook good? idk whats going on but maybe he was lagging or afk? either way bad vid. bad build. s/d is horrible.

nothing against your build…my comments are against your opponent and anet.

please don’t show videos in which you fight bad (BAD) players.

I don’t to be a kitten, but WvW level is so kitten bad.

In my opinion ur build doesn’t work at all, 10 in SA is a waste of points, better to get 30 in acro and trickery + 10 in da for mug, I sometimes use it in tpvp and it’s viable.

And I don’t know why so many thieves are still crying about the nerf to s/d, ya it’s was totally unnecessary, but it’s still viable, d/p is still the strongest set though.

You do no damage…

Don’t get me wrong I love S/D and i would really want to see it works… but I could beat most of those players with ANY profession/build. Warrior that uses only rifle? C’mon.

I don’t find 30points in trickery to work that well for s/d, you don’t need condition damage, you get boost to your steal which is nice but you could get much more puting those points somewhere else, maybe not all, some for sure.

s/d will always look nice in use, all that mobility etc, but most of those guys you fought against did nothing.

This is a funny surprise. That obnoxiously colored P/D Fort Aspenwood char thief you kept tagging in the video is me. I was cheering for myself even though I knew I was gonna die. Congrats for using S/D and showing that sword isn’t as completely useless as nearly every thief on here thinks.

kabeo.9638:

Don’t get me wrong I love S/D and i would really want to see it works… but I could beat most of those players with ANY profession/build. Warrior that uses only rifle? C’mon.

I don’t find 30points in trickery to work that well for s/d, you don’t need condition damage, you get boost to your steal which is nice but you could get much more puting those points somewhere else, maybe not all, some for sure.

s/d will always look nice in use, all that mobility etc, but most of those guys you fought against did nothing.

Sleight of Hands is one of my favorite traits, hate how far you need to go to grab it.
Trickery gives good offensive support giving everyone fury, power, swift, boon stealing and transfering, vigor~ an instant daze and +15% dmg when ini is full; which is good with sword since it’s auto attack hits so hard and you don’t really need to spam ini to kill.

It gives 3-5 more ini overall which is even more useful after patch. Wish it had a better Master trait for defense/cond removal, like Steal transfering conditions for example. And its nice actually putting more use into our only class F skill.

Trickery is awesome. It just costs so many points and Anet seems like they want everyone to spec into critical strikes and shadow arts too badly.

Nice vid.
Glad to see someone puts time and effort into making these.

To some previous posts:
Yeah 30pts in critical is very nice but S/D is playable even with lower dmg, although it is not the most efficient option.

10pts in SA is almost mandatory for condi removal.

Trickery line is amazing with sword if your playstyle is based on positioning and confusing the opponent.

Post nerf sword is definitely not useless, harder to play in some situations but I haven’t seen myself die more often. Just needs the player pay more attention to what is going on around. What I personally don’t like is that cast time removed some useful combos from this weapon set, which imo lowers the skill ceiling on sword.

OP, you’re on Mag? I’m pretty sure you killed me the other night (blue-haired TC sword Thief) when I interrupted a fight between you and some FA in MBL (I just see a Mesmer and can’t help myself – with 95% boon duration Plasma Globules are more addictive than crack). If it was you – I want it to be known I blew my stun-break on the Magic Bullet! I want a rematch

If it wasn’t you, I’d like a duel anyway!

KillerJacket.9735:

This is a funny surprise. That obnoxiously colored P/D Fort Aspenwood char thief you kept tagging in the video is me.

Haha, thanks for the fun time. Looked like you were trying out a condi build, how did that work out? I’m guessing with everyone stacked to the gill with condi removals it is a challenge?

Docherty.8372:

OP, you’re on Mag?
If it wasn’t you, I’d like a duel anyway!

Wasn’t me, I am on SoS. I was previously on TC but transferred when [Grim] transferred with [EP] over to SoS. Would be fun to duel, just hit me up!

Jayden Ennok.3687:

…S/D is playable even with lower dmg, although it is not the most efficient option.
…10pts in SA is almost mandatory for condi removal.
…Trickery line is amazing with sword if your playstyle is based on positioning and confusing the opponent.

Thanks Jayden! You say it exactly right.

played the same build for long and noticed before as i tried to show ppl trickery builds on the german board that u played it too. its viable with pp/sb too.
only one question, y bp instead of sr? nearly same cd but longer stealth on sr where u can w8 up the cd on heal or ress somybody. u doing lyssa like me, so u nearly cant be kicked out of it, if u save it for that.

nice vid and tune

any classes u feel unconfortable with?

shinta.8906:

only one question, y bp instead of sr?
any classes u feel unconfortable with?

I dont like the idea of using Basil/Lyssa to stay inside of SR when needed, because that would mean I’ve used two condi clears on long CD, when I only needed one.

I like BP because it isnt a giant “place aoe here” symbol, and I also use BP because of the AOE blind, since I’m not using blind on stealth within SA. If I went 20 into SA, I might take SR over BP, or I might take them both!

Another reason I use BP over SR in my play style is that I like to use BP and then infil return, to misdirect. However, with SR im forced to stay put.

Finally, BP is instant cast, where SR is not. So BP can be used in response to a lockdown.

The hardest opponents for me are knockdown/pull engis, and condi burst necro.

well, it were two questions, right.. ;o) ty

how are you doing with this build nowadays?

Caruz.6389:

how are you doing with this build nowadays?

This build is not crazily different than my choice S/D build so maybe i can weigh in having played some of my variant this morning. It is still strong but not godly, 1v1 against heavy melee it suffers for it’s lack of blind but it is immensely stronger in any group setting. As with all sword play timing is king and knowing when to cut and when to slice is what decides the victor. You bring a lot of cleaving pressure and it is easy to force your opponent to react but you can go crazy and spam your life away like you can with some dagger builds. You need to be aware of your surroundings, you can make a split decision to run you need to set clear parameters and harass.

always good to see an arkadius video.

Asudementio.8526:

+1, yep!

Raven.9603:

always good to see an arkadius video.

Thanks Raven! Hey SBI, nice, I recently switched to SoS and since we’re in our second matchup, we should hit up OS sometime for some duels!

yea S/D needs some serious skill to roam with in WvW. but it’s also good in a way that it forces you to learn something other than rely on the perma stealth crutch.

panicbutton.1053:

Arkadius,

You’re my favorite thief! Why? Because your build takes so much skill and precision to execute. I have tried and failed so many times to run this successfully. IMO, this is the hardest build to play, and you execute it beautifully.

Wow thanks man that means a lot and it is very encouraging. Lemme ask you, what should I include in my next vid, content wise? It seems like people really like /bow /bow duels, as well as uncut roaming.

What would be the most entertaining for you, and what would be the most educational? Only thing is, I want to keep the vid length at around 10 mins, no more than 15. I know I should probably give more commentary but I just dont like to ;p

Cool thanks for your input! I’ll take what you said into account when I make my next vid.

Personally(and this is my own opinion), I think that the inability to use s/d effectively in wvw is a L2P issue. A cast time on #2 takes nothing more than better timing on the player’s part, it didn’t break the weapon set.

Sry to hijack your thread, but:
What did the 10dec patch to kill s/d? I’m a thief since the very beginning, but never liked the sword on thief. I really want to know why you guys think it’s dead (well, most of you)

@Woaden: Don’t want to say your build is not working but: What I think to see in the video are neither (really) good players (and I mean, really really, no offense guys), nor big numbers. I think your dmg output is relatively low for a thief, and I think that’s the reason you won so often. Nobody is expecting your defensive abilities as a thief. 99% run glass cannon only and drop instantly if attacked (and hit!).
I think it’s a viable build in overall wvw, but I don’t know, if it’s viable against really good players. Some of them are just annoyingly good. I played against some of them (in wvw) several times with different approaches and they always nailed me to the ground (I’m not saying I’m really good, but they were, and I think they would “easily” win against your build, for you not making enough dmg).

Hm… didn’t want this to be that pessimistic… hope you’ll get what I wanted to say ^^

Anyway: Nice tips in the video! Keep it up!