Guild Wars 2

I have maxed my Ranger and Engineer and decided to make a new alt. Primarily because I want a character that uses the Temple Set from Orr because I like the look. I can’t make it an alternative set for my ranger, primarily because the set looks horrible with a GS, and it happens to look crappy on Asura so that’s a no for my Engineer. I made a new Sylvari called Andhslaine(Andh is Sanskrit for darkness/blind and slan is old Gaelic for defiance). So I decided to make this alt a thief. However I refuse to play the cookie cutter D/D builds since I WvW a lot and D/P lacks any AoE so it will not serve me well as a primary weapon set, hence that brings me to the Sword mainhand. (I would love to go P/P for the full gunslinger look but spamming Unload 24/7 would bore the hell out of me since Vital/Body Shot sucks). Hence SB will be my secondary weapon set, love the mobility and damage, not going to sway from it. I also like the idea of making a fencer type character since I dislike the sword on my Ranger and GS out performs it by miles(but that’s my personal opinion)

I am aware there are 2 main routes to go down as a Sword mainhand user.

Sword/Pistol- Great damage with Pistol Whip with a built in dodge, Black Powder for survival in melee range, Head Shot is a great interrupts.

Sword/Dagger- Good control and mobility, can potentially tank bosses without much investment in toughness by timing IS/SR, FS, and there is CnD too, ofcourse Dancing Dagger for control.

What I’m looking for, the pros and cons of the using either weapon set, a comparison if you will, what can be done with either set, in terms of survival, burst damage, or control(Using Venoms or whatever). I am not willing to play a tanky character since my main is almost one with 3000 armor, my Engineer is a high mobility Rifle/Tool Kit/SD burster with some toughness worked in as in not to go full glass cannon. For the thief I am willing to fore go toughness, but I’d like some vitality, since the low health doesn’t appeal to me.

Normally I design builds from scratch after intensely studying the class, but thief is a class I know nothing about and do not have much time to study. Any help will be appreciated.

P/P in WvW might amuse you actually, 6k damage on light/medium armor users with little toughness in their spec.

For the record, pistol whip damage sucks. I personally think S/D actually does more consistent damage right now because it has access to stealth (CC), immobilize and can combine that with FS for damage as well as boon removal. S/P right now is a bit weak. #1 and #2 are the same, #3 is not much better than autoattacking as people in pvp will dodge out of it anyway, #4 is only useful when you get people low enough to interrupt heals and #5 is only good for anti-melee. It doesn’t work as well with sword as it does with d/p.

S/D it is then, however does this work with a Venom build and does the sword cleave with a venom use up 3 ticks or 1 tick of the venom. Otherwise what options are there for S/D. 30 in Critical strikes along with 25/15 or 20/20 in the bottom two trees is a possibility. Low healing but maximizing the utility of my dodges, might, endurance and caltrops.

jpnova.4572:

S/D it is then, however does this work with a Venom build and does the sword cleave with a venom use up 3 ticks or 1 tick of the venom. Otherwise what options are there for S/D. 30 in Critical strikes along with 25/15 or 20/20 in the bottom two trees is a possibility. Low healing but maximizing the utility of my dodges, might, endurance and caltrops.

1 charge of venom is consumed per hit, per target.
3 targets = 3 charges.

Honestly, if you like being a semi-redundant buff bot for your party, go Venom Share.
If you want to kill people quickly while still remaining hard as hell to kill:
0/ (could drop the 10pts in acrobatics and grab mug if you’d like)
30/ 3, 6, 11
30/ 4, 5, 11
10/ 6 (2 or 3 are also decent choices)
0/
Fleet Shadow in acrobatics makes positioning sooooooooo much easier and faster, hence- higher up-time on TS Daze locking with greater ease.
Just my two cents.

edit: Alternatively, there’s a few Bursty S/D builds floating around, Formi – Crystal Desert (I believe) posted a video of a pretty vicious build about a week, or so, ago.

I’ll look for the thread, search function isn’t really helping though. Thanks for the idea though, my friend decided to run venom share, guess I won’t do that then.

jpnova.4572:

I’ll look for the thread, search function isn’t really helping though. Thanks for the idea though, my friend decided to run venom share, guess I won’t do that then.

I got you covered bro.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/thief/Video-S-D-D-P-Small-group-fighting/first#post1840069

S/P
Pro: has the most damage output when trying to take down Siege Engines and Gates. This is the only time that Pistol Whip shines in WvW.

Con: I personally won’t use S/P in any other situation. Pistol whip is clanky, often misses, when fighting other players.

S/D
Pro: very good at taking out players. Has access to stealth and boon removal. My auto-attacks deals 2k-3k crit damage using non-berserker weapon.

Con: I can only auto-attack structures and since we cannot crit or bleed/poison against structures, it does very little damage.

In WvW, I switch around several weapon sets depending on the situation.

S/D – is my general weapon set of choice
S/P – used vs structures using Pistol Whip (mini-100blades)
D/P – pursuit/ambush situation
P/P – taking a Supply Camp
SB – defending the walls

Sir Vincent III.1286:

S/P
Pro: has the most damage output when trying to take down Siege Engines and Gates. This is the only time that Pistol Whip shines in WvW.

Con: I personally won’t use S/P in any other situation. Pistol whip is clanky, often misses, when fighting other players.

S/D
Pro: very good at taking out players. Has access to stealth and boon removal. My auto-attacks deals 2k-3k crit damage using non-berserker weapon.

Con: I can only auto-attack structures and since we cannot crit or bleed/poison against structures, it does very little damage.

In WvW, I switch around several weapon sets depending on the situation.

S/D – is my general weapon set of choice
S/P – used vs structures using Pistol Whip (mini-100blades)
D/P – pursuit/ambush situation
P/P – taking a Supply Camp
SB – defending the walls

Thank you this comparison was exactly what I was looking for.

S/P also has its use on wvw when trying to take a camp quick.
SoM+CD
– Gether all the npcs in melee range with using edges for los.
– P/W first to get the scouts down (so their blind dont completely negate your attacks)
– BP + AA the rest

You get a Suply camp in a few seconds.