Guild Wars 2

I know this is a sore subject for some of the aNet staff, but now that DD thief is out and it is mostly underwhelming, and still no where near as fun and as effective as p/p thief with Ricochet…well I still have no reason to play thief in any aspect of the game. PvE or PvP. Just about any other class is more effective in whatever your objective is.

I just want to be able to tag mobs again with Ricochet. Not regularly get downed in areas where all my other alts breeze thru. I want to actually contribute to group play again. Not this current “run and hide from everyone and then do burst damage only when you think you will definitely win” crap.

Removing Ricochet just took an entire style of play and completely deleted it. And now us Gunslingers can say for certain we were not given anything in return that even comes close to filling the void. I mean even d/p builds became noticably less effective.

Please aNet. Please.

Prediction:

Gunslinger will be an elite spec with rifle. They’ll put buffed ricochet in it. It’ll be a GM trait in the same tier as a capstone rifle trait so you have to choose between them. The other gunslinger traits will have a common theme of pistol/rifle/utility choices. People will be mad about it for a week just like feline grace/daredevil. Then everyone will forget about it after a few months.

Probably true. Inb4 happens?

yeah I see that happening

PopeUrban.2578:

Prediction:

Gunslinger will be an elite spec with rifle. They’ll put buffed ricochet in it. It’ll be a GM trait in the same tier as a capstone rifle trait so you have to choose between them. The other gunslinger traits will have a common theme of pistol/rifle/utility choices. People will be mad about it for a week just like feline grace/daredevil. Then everyone will forget about it after a few months.

Have many forgotten though? I certainly haven’t. Spent my 55 dollar refund from HoT on better games, and I plan on asking where withdraws missing 10% is every patch. I see an awful lot of thief complaints on here and PvP forums – while they don’t exactly ask why Acro was made entirely non viable so it could be sold back to us in DrD, they are continually asking for thief core buffs, which would hopefully start at replacing acro with the Mobility arts line you pitched. After that, all we really need is SA “in stealth” traits modified to “when first entering stealth AND while revealed” functionality, and we’re probably almost well balanced.

Disheartening to know it’ll never happen though.

PopeUrban.2578:

Prediction:

Gunslinger will be an elite spec with rifle. They’ll put buffed ricochet in it. It’ll be a GM trait in the same tier as a capstone rifle trait so you have to choose between them. The other gunslinger traits will have a common theme of pistol/rifle/utility choices. People will be mad about it for a week just like feline grace/daredevil. Then everyone will forget about it after a few months.

Pulling a second stunt like that… won’t really look good on them or the Dev that’s in charge of such decisions.

Everyone makes bad decisions… though with something like this, a second time shouldn’t and won’t slip by.

PopeUrban.2578:

Prediction:

Gunslinger will be an elite spec with rifle. They’ll put buffed ricochet in it. It’ll be a GM trait in the same tier as a capstone rifle trait so you have to choose between them. The other gunslinger traits will have a common theme of pistol/rifle/utility choices. People will be mad about it for a week just like feline grace/daredevil. Then everyone will forget about it after a few months.

To give thieves the ability to wield rifles would require an elite specialization being made. Making an elite specialization for one profession requires making an elite specialization for all of them. Adding new specializations requires lore, which requires an expansion, which requires one year of development after focusing on at least a year’s worth of living story updates. So maybe it’ll come back; 2+ years from now.

Waaaat? Unload useful in event farming? Naaah THAT would be too much fun/op…

PopeUrban.2578:

Prediction:

Gunslinger will be an elite spec with rifle. They’ll put buffed ricochet in it. It’ll be a GM trait in the same tier as a capstone rifle trait so you have to choose between them. The other gunslinger traits will have a common theme of pistol/rifle/utility choices. People will be mad about it for a week just like feline grace/daredevil. Then everyone will forget about it after a few months.

Cool. See you in 3 years for your prediction to be verified then.

As I recall there was mention made of how they know pistols aren’t where they need to be and there was a rework in the makes, and specific mentioning that the 24-26% damage boost to the skills was NOT it but just to hold thief over until the rework came.

Now what it is or when it’ll be only god knows, but if I were a betting man I would say first quarter balance patch and not whenever they cook up another round of elite specs.

James Quall.6029:

As I recall there was mention made of how they know pistols aren’t where they need to be and there was a rework in the makes, and specific mentioning that the 24-26% damage boost to the skills was NOT it but just to hold thief over until the rework came.

Now what it is or when it’ll be only god knows, but if I were a betting man I would say first quarter balance patch and not whenever they cook up another round of elite specs.

Recall ~2 years ago when body shot didn’t have immob, a 10stack of vulnerability for a criminally short period, and a ridiculous aftercast? IIRC, they changed it to the current version with the reasoning that “This’ll give P/P the nudge it needs to be a useful weapon set”.

So don’t hold your breath for a functioning P/P – it’s been broken for 3 years, they might fix it a few months before the servers go offline permanently.

evilapprentice.6379:

Recall ~2 years ago when body shot didn’t have immob, a 10stack of vulnerability for a criminally short period, and a ridiculous aftercast? IIRC, they changed it to the current version with the reasoning that “This’ll give P/P the nudge it needs to be a useful weapon set”.

So don’t hold your breath for a functioning P/P – it’s been broken for 3 years, they might fix it a few months before the servers go offline permanently.

All fair points. I don’t know if their changes will be good or if it’ll make pistol/pistol more viable, but allegedly changes are on their way.

I believe they will come before another elite spec comes around and they said that they aren’t bringing ricochet back, but anything beyond that I really can’t say.

PopeUrban.2578:

Prediction:

Gunslinger will be an elite spec with rifle. They’ll put buffed ricochet in it. It’ll be a GM trait in the same tier as a capstone rifle trait so you have to choose between them. The other gunslinger traits will have a common theme of pistol/rifle/utility choices. People will be mad about it for a week just like feline grace/daredevil. Then everyone will forget about it after a few months.

that would be both nice….and a kick in the nuts…

i like pistol/pistol. but i also want rifle…

Anet forces me to make hard choices xD

they could just change acro line to be more range friendly
like

1. do more dmg from range above 500 do 5%, above 800 do 10%, above 1100 do 15%
2. pistol is now 1200 range
3. ricochet is back (or at least be an inherent pistol mechanism)
4. get back 2 initiative when evade and not 1

and for skills:
5. unload apply vulnerability 1 stack for each attack so total of 8
6. body shot immobilize for 3 sec (common everyone got nice immobilize duration) and put weakness instead of vulnerability
7. sneak attack puts 5 stacks of torment and not bleed as i want my enemy to stand far and not moving at me

It is not going to come back, dev already stated something along the lines “it hurts the purity of the weapon set” and it wasn’t even that good.

Also to the post on top of me, 3 sec immob on thief? that can spam it like 5 times in a row? that would be the definition of absurd

Public Service Announcement:

• You don’t have to have Ricochet to be a Gunslinger
• P/P is currently viable and has diversity
• Even if you don’t think p/p is a viable set, there are changes on the way. The only way things get better is if they’re improved. With enough improvements, suddenly it becomes good. Who would’ve thought?
• I can’t really say that I’ve seen anyone on these forums who actually understands what “preserving the purity of pistol” actually means. Chances are it’s best not to open that can of worms.

Zaerah.1630:

It is not going to come back, dev already stated something along the lines “it hurts the purity of the weapon set” and it wasn’t even that good.

Also to the post on top of me, 3 sec immob on thief? that can spam it like 5 times in a row? that would be the definition of absurd

if spammed you will left without initiative doing no dmg .

also consider lots of class have reduce immobilize duration with trait, runes so 1 sec immobilize is in fact 0

Ghotistyx.6942:

Public Service Announcement:

• You don’t have to have Ricochet to be a Gunslinger
• P/P is currently viable and has diversity
• Even if you don’t think p/p is a viable set, there are changes on the way. The only way things get better is if they’re improved. With enough improvements, suddenly it becomes good. Who would’ve thought?
• I can’t really say that I’ve seen anyone on these forums who actually understands what “preserving the purity of pistol” actually means. Chances are it’s best not to open that can of worms.

p/p set works for me in low ranked tier against zerk classes like mesmer/necro/guards/thief. i dont have to be melee range, i have stealth so i can be sneaky, and pressure the enemy for few seconds . but again seems that revenant took our place

Roy.7405:

PopeUrban.2578:

Prediction:

Gunslinger will be an elite spec with rifle. They’ll put buffed ricochet in it. It’ll be a GM trait in the same tier as a capstone rifle trait so you have to choose between them. The other gunslinger traits will have a common theme of pistol/rifle/utility choices. People will be mad about it for a week just like feline grace/daredevil. Then everyone will forget about it after a few months.

To give thieves the ability to wield rifles would require an elite specialization being made. Making an elite specialization for one profession requires making an elite specialization for all of them. Adding new specializations requires lore, which requires an expansion, which requires one year of development after focusing on at least a year’s worth of living story updates. So maybe it’ll come back; 2+ years from now.

False. Anet already said that additional elite specs are planned for living story roll out, not just for big expansion releases. They specifically stated this is why they designed the elite spec system the way they did, so they could more quickly balance and deploy new build options, as elite specs only balance against the core class, unlike the GW1 skill system where all new skills has to balance against an ever growing number of existing skills, meaking each new addition harder to balance than the last.

In my opinion, I think a Gunslinger elite spec would be the best way to implement a slew of firearms-enhancing traits. It may sound crazy, but it would be cool if by using said elite spec gave dual pistols their own set of unique weapon skills that utilized both pistols (unload would still be in, it’s our most important skill).

As far as Ricochet, I know Anet said they have no plans on bringing it back, but I’ve made this suggestion before, and I think it would work just fine. How about giving pistols the same functionality of Dragonhunter’s longbow AA skill, where bullets will bounce, but only to enemies in a cone behind your target? It would certainly encourage proper positioning, which thieves should already be good at.

I’m happy about the damage increase, but I’m anxious to know what else they have in mind to improve the state of the gunslinger thief.

or at least let the pistol pierce

I just laugh at the fact that the picture for Ricochet is still there!

P/P on its own is generally not strong enough to be a main weapon set but it is a good secondary weapon set. Unfortunately in WvW the new gap closers of other classes makes the shortbow a better secondary weapon since it allows a lot of space to be created. A similar issue presents in sPvP where map traversal makes the shortbow a better secondary.

Our two man thief team has started using one of us in P/P while the other is in S/P. This allows us to apply heavy range pressure in scenarios where it is needed (DragonHunter trapper, Reaper, etc) and S/P for everything else. One of us bombs them with Pistol Whip while the other finishes with Unload or pushes them out of their marks/wells/traps using Unload. Again putting us into the thief being good at +1 combat only.