Guild Wars 2

Greetings, my new colleagues. When my mind was finally at ease again after watching a Thief escape the clutches of my Ranger for the hundredth time, I have decided to roll a Thief. On my Ranger, I am a big fan of the more defensive builds, or ‘bunker’ builds, as one might call them. I was wondering whether it was possible to build a bunker Thief, as I am little interested in the glass cannon style of things.

The weapon set I am considering for such a build is sword/dagger and shortbow. The sword has a nigh spammable evade with significant damage on the number three, and the shortbow has the teleport which can get you out of nasty situations.

My question to you is, would this be viable, or would I only be making a fool out of myself?

Welcome.

It’s viable. You would need to make good use of stealth and regen in stealth (30 in shadow arts) to get the most out of it imo. This works well as you get a daze on sneak attack and can win a war of attrition in P/V/T armor, not doing tonnes of damage but denying their heal and wearing them down.

Another option is to run a condition build in Carrion armor. Either a pistol/dagger build using a lot of stealth
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F8FcUCoyBQ

or a dagger/dagger + shortbow build doing AoE bleeds and poisons.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtUySqxInlI

Finally, you can run a dagger/pistol build in a variety of armors, which is initiative intensive but has the most reliable access to stealth. It also comes with the bonus of downing a playing in stealth immediately ready for the stomp with a well-timed Heartseeker from Black Powder.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m3d45T4FZw

As you can probably gather from the above builds, stealth is our major form of survivability. Learn to love it. It’s certainly viable to run with a shortbow/shortbow or sword/pistol without stealth, but I’d strongly argue that you are far more vulnerable this way.

I started as tanky P/D (0/0/30/20/20) and am now playing D/D+SB (0/25/30/15/0). All my WvW builds utilise 30 in shadow arts.

yes is posible:
- off hand dagger
-30 points in shadow arts trait ( major traits IV -remove 1 condition every 3 sec stealthed and XI -regen health stealthed – is over 300 hp /sec and is directly affected by wvwvw bonusses and healing power) 3’rd major trait is up to you.
-20 points in acrobatics, for faster movement while stealthed , 1 extra dodge roll , and remove cripple on dodge.
the last 20 points depends on your main hand weapon -for pistol you need condition damage ,for sword or dagger , critical strikes /deady arts
Items : – knight +valkeyere, combine those 2 to mentain over 2800 defence and add some critical damage and hp* for dagger or sword main hand.
for pistol main hand carrion mostly
runes are up to you for sword /dagger – you can start with beryl orbs or minor / major divinity.
for pistol – necromancer x5 runes add nice survaivability

What about Healing Power? In theory, loads of Healing Power combined with Signet of Malice should keep you alive for a good time.

I wouldn’t invest in healing power as you heals are fairly sufficient as they are. If you want to use Signet of Malice you would be far better off running D/D+caltrops or S/P than S/D.

IMO healing power ratios are too small to worry about the stat.

You get +300 Healing Power with the Shadow Arts traitline which is why 30 in SA for healing in Stealth combined with Shadow Refuge is practically equal to a second heal ability.

Why would sword/pistol be better than sword/dagger for Signet of Malice? The #5 is relatively useless without the dagger isn’t it? You want to leap through it to get stealth.

Roaming with a shaman Death Blossom/Malice build is the closest thief is ever going to feel even close to meaty without gimping themselves. :P
Sample Build:
http://www.intothemists.com/calc/index.php?build=-d33V;1Zwkb0S5FOVd0;9;44-4TT;71794278V-7;2jwmAjwmA9cp
Source:
http://forums.intothemists.com/index.php?/topic/46-top-gw2-tournament-builds/
PS
Anything with stealth is not a bunker build. You cannot hold a point while stealthed. It will be neutralized in seconds.

SoM only has good payback when you hit more then once per second, on average, and any stealth intensive build will not make that many hits. Hide in Shadows brings a stealth source and condition removal while Withdraw evades and breaks stun while it’s short recharge matches nicely with the vigor-on-heal Acrobatics trait.

Agadar.4931:

What about Healing Power? In theory, loads of Healing Power combined with Signet of Malice should keep you alive for a good time.

Healing power has a disappointingly low payback for the investment, if you try healing power gear in the mists you’ll see the SA-XI heal go from 300 something to 400 something.

One thing you must keep in mind with all of the suggested builds above is that they all make heavy use of stealth. While you will be a very “survivable” thief, you won’t exactly be a “bunker.” Whether in WvW or PvP, bunkering generally entails being able to stall and hold onto a point/camp/tower/etc. without dying and without losing control of the point. The problem is, you cannot hold a point while stealthed. So while you may not die, you will still inevitably lose the point from under your nose if you stealth too much. While the above builds are not ineffective at what they do, in the end they are not “bunker” thieves per se.

Agadar.4931:

Why would sword/pistol be better than sword/dagger for Signet of Malice? The #5 is relatively useless without the dagger isn’t it? You want to leap through it to get stealth.

S/P is not a stealth build. Pistolwhip connecting with multiple targets works well with signet of malice is all. The AoE blind (pistol offhand #5) has greater utility than just +leap finisher for stealth. It is good for blocking downed skills, blinding melee, protecting teammates etc.

Also, yes stealth is bad for point control, but the OP didnt specify if he does WvW or sPvP.

Sarrow.2785:

Agadar.4931:

Why would sword/pistol be better than sword/dagger for Signet of Malice? The #5 is relatively useless without the dagger isn’t it? You want to leap through it to get stealth.

S/P is not a stealth build. Pistolwhip connecting with multiple targets works well with signet of malice is all. The AoE blind (pistol offhand #5) has greater utility than just +leap finisher for stealth. It is good for blocking downed skills, blinding melee, protecting teammates etc.

Also, yes stealth is bad for point control, but the OP didnt specify if he does WvW or sPvP.

Open WvW, mostly.

I just tried Pistol Whip, and apparantly you have to stand still in order to execute the second part of the attack (the sword slashing). This is a total dealbreaker to me. I’ll stick with the off-hand dagger due to the synergy between #5 and #1.

Yea the only way S/P is gonna work in WvW if your not speccing some max damage/haste is if you put devourer venom on it. Nobody stands there and eats it all.

I think s/d is best for a build were your not really doing damage. I consider p/d to be durable also.

Its really hard to put tanky/buner in the same sentence with thief. A bunker/tank can go jump into 5 enemies head on to soak up some damage draw fire and team can come behind to help. Thief is just kind of distracting.

Perhaps ‘evasive’ tank is a better way of putting it. Thieves and Rangers cannot soak raw damage like a Guardian, Warrior or Necromancer can, but what they’re good at is kiting, evading, and dodging. At least, the Ranger is. I am yet to try a similar play-style on my new Thief.

frans.8092:

Healing power has a disappointingly low payback for the investment, if you try healing power gear in the mists you’ll see the SA-XI heal go from 300 something to 400 something.

Actually I think you’ll find that Healing>Vitality (You can pack on the toughness with either) with SoM. That stealth trait is awful and it’s not useful for what the OP is asking for anyways.

My thief is set up with carrion gear and is all about stacking bleeds and evading. I have traited for extra dodging and use Signet of Agility to refill my endurance if needed. With high vitality and enough dodging for 3 people I can often survive heavy attacks from multiple enemies, and have even outlasted many normal ‘tanky’ builds, though it does requires a lot more work. My Guardian for example has a much easier time surviving than my Thief does, but my Thief can escape danger a lot easier than my Guardian.

I am tempted to make a full on bunker Thief and may give it a go at some point. I’m sure it is possible to make a truly hard to kill Thief with the right stats, skills and traits.

Geewoody.2017:

frans.8092:

Healing power has a disappointingly low payback for the investment, if you try healing power gear in the mists you’ll see the SA-XI heal go from 300 something to 400 something.

Actually I think you’ll find that Healing>Vitality (You can pack on the toughness with either) with SoM. That stealth trait is awful and it’s not useful for what the OP is asking for anyways.

I never mentioned Vitality.

If I equip the healing oriented PvP amulet the amount of healing from Shadow’s Rejuvenation increases by a third – which is somewhat underwhelming. SoM sees an even smaller effect from healing power (half that of SR accoriding to wiki) and is only useful with AoE oriented weapons (shortbow and sword) and actually hitting multiple opponents or you won’t hit often enough to make it match up to a regular heal. It rocks with Cluster Bombs on groups though, no doubt, but you don’t need to spec healing for that.

frans.8092:

Geewoody.2017:

frans.8092:

Healing power has a disappointingly low payback for the investment, if you try healing power gear in the mists you’ll see the SA-XI heal go from 300 something to 400 something.

Actually I think you’ll find that Healing>Vitality (You can pack on the toughness with either) with SoM. That stealth trait is awful and it’s not useful for what the OP is asking for anyways.

I never mentioned Vitality.

If I equip the healing oriented PvP amulet the amount of healing from Shadow’s Rejuvenation increases by a third – which is somewhat underwhelming. SoM sees an even smaller effect from healing power (half that of SR accoriding to wiki) and is only useful with AoE oriented weapons (shortbow and sword) and actually hitting multiple opponents or you won’t hit often enough to make it match up to a regular heal. It rocks with Cluster Bombs on groups though, no doubt, but you don’t need to spec healing for that.

Vitality would more than likely be the only alternative to healing.

And Death Blossom is what is making use of SoM and even against one target it works very well. Seriously, SoM for sword and shortbow? What are you thinking?

Geewoody.2017:

frans.8092:

Geewoody.2017:

frans.8092:

Healing power has a disappointingly low payback for the investment, if you try healing power gear in the mists you’ll see the SA-XI heal go from 300 something to 400 something.

Actually I think you’ll find that Healing>Vitality (You can pack on the toughness with either) with SoM. That stealth trait is awful and it’s not useful for what the OP is asking for anyways.

I never mentioned Vitality.

If I equip the healing oriented PvP amulet the amount of healing from Shadow’s Rejuvenation increases by a third – which is somewhat underwhelming. SoM sees an even smaller effect from healing power (half that of SR accoriding to wiki) and is only useful with AoE oriented weapons (shortbow and sword) and actually hitting multiple opponents or you won’t hit often enough to make it match up to a regular heal. It rocks with Cluster Bombs on groups though, no doubt, but you don’t need to spec healing for that.

Vitality would more than likely be the only alternative to healing.

And Death Blossom is what is making use of SoM and even against one target it works very well. Seriously, SoM for sword and shortbow? What are you thinking?

Vitality is never an alternative to healing.

LDB would probably work too, and caltrops. Clusterbomb yields large hitvolume, important for use of SoM. And of course only as long as you have initiative to create hits. SoM being effective depends on the situation – and one on one isn’t such a situation.

The only bunker gear available to thieves is the Soldier’s gear, which comes in the Invader’s armor bought with Badges of Honor.

Defensively, I’d say go with P/D as Black Powder can be freaking amazing against anything use melee attacks.

As for using a shortbow, that’s a definite yes.

Ulysses.4765:

Defensively, I’d say go with P/D as Black Powder can be freaking amazing against anything use melee attacks.

Black Powder id for pistol offhand, I assume you meant D/P in your post?