Guild Wars 2

With all the nerfs and stuff, I just wanted to focus on the good and say thanks for this buff to S/P, it was much needed and much appreciated. I have played S/P for a long time now in WvW primarily, and I notice a huge difference. Now I don`t have to either be facing bad players or depend on other peoples stuns when I go roaming, I can actually get off some dmg with PW solo!

+1, the change to PW is pretty nice. If only they would shave a bit of the cast time from the stun portion. Then I think it would be in a nice spot.

I know, right?

I’m glad that I can use Sword again without a gimmicky build to support it.

Excalibur.9748:

Well S/P is a gimmicky build depending on who you ask…

Ask who? Someone who doesn’t know what “build” means? S/P is just a weapon set.

can use PW then use infil sig/steal to keep it going and gap closer! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Yeah I was messing around with S/P in Spvp, It’s defiantly a lot stronger with speed fix and works well with 30 Acrobatics’s Assassin Reward, but I can’t bring myself to really enjoy it. I still hate how it roots you in place when you’re swinging. >.< We’re supposed to be a fast~mobile class.

I also like the Sundering Strike changes, but not sure if it’s good enough to replace mug with my wvw S/D build since it’s defensive capabilities were badly damaged.

With S/P you can get 10+ vulnerability stacks pretty fast,

Interceptor.2653:

Excalibur.9748:

Well S/P is a gimmicky build depending on who you ask…

Ask who? Someone who doesn’t know what “build” means? S/P is just a weapon set.

Why do you sound so kitten ed?

Anyways, I use S/P but the “gimmick” is that black powder doesn’t work too well against people who just move out of it, and pistol whip is a stationary skill so once again rely on people to stay still for you.

This boost is much needed, and hopefully I can land some hits with PW now.

Ah great!

Now we need to add Pistol Whip to the nerf list.

It still needs the root removed.

Yea it was a nice change but sp is weaker post patch due to the infiltrators return nerf.

Doggie.3184:

I still hate how it roots you in place when you’re swinging. >.< We’re supposed to be a fast~mobile class.

This is fair, but at least we auto-evade during the slashing animation.

Excalibur.9748:

Why do you sound so kitten ed?

I give flippant responses to people who make flippant comments. It’s only fair.

Anyways, I use S/P but the “gimmick” is that black powder doesn’t work too well against people who just move out of it, and pistol whip is a stationary skill so once again rely on people to stay still for you.

BP is not the be-all end-all, but it does at least give you control over an area, which isn’t nothing. S/P benefits from anything that holds people in place, like Devourer or Basilisk or maybe even Stun duration sigils after this patch.

A Guild War 2 character build has pros and cons, and many choices involve trade-offs. Film at 11.

vincecontix.1264:

Yea it was a nice change but sp is weaker post patch due to the infiltrators return nerf.

That`s true, but I mainly used sword #2 as a gapcloser and immobilize anyway so I havent noticed it that much so far.

Interceptor.2653:

Doggie.3184:

I still hate how it roots you in place when you’re swinging. >.< We’re supposed to be a fast~mobile class.

This is fair, but at least we auto-evade during the slashing animation.

Yea it is a tradeoff, but I personally love the evade. I can see why people dont though. [Edit: As pointed out right above me hehe]

I give flippant responses to people who make flippant comments. It’s only fair.

I don’t want to argue with you since we’re both thieves but there are always people who think all thief builds are gimmicky.

And pistol whip was definately part of some gimmicky builds near the beginning of the game. ie frenzy pistol whip before frenzy and PW were both nerfed

I have my doubts regarding s/p in spvp. With all recent nerfs(don’t forget stun duration nerf) it just won’t shine.

You can make all the QoL changes you want to Pistol Whip, it’s still going to melt in a single instance of Retaliation, which was the problem to begin with.

Until they split it (as they mentioned in the balance preview thread) I don’t think I’ll use it. I like front loaded evades that can be used in reaction to a key attack, and this just hopes to possibly evade key attacks due to the windup. Alright as an aggressive attack I guess, but I like using my weapon evades/blinds more defensively.

Pistol whip is working just fine to me, don’t see need of a split in relation to that. The damage flows better than before making the skill feel a lot more like one entity than two.
However, Shadow return feels off and that bleeds into the kits flow.

Well the way I see it going is interrupt this key ability, pocket the flurry then pop it an another key ability, or IS into them and then flurry (similar to a mesmer setup). I mean, if this works for you that’s great, but don’t prefer this playstyle (not bad or good, just doesn’t fit me).

Shadow return was wrong.

You essentially already do this in S/P with Headshot. The kit is not Pistol whip alone.
If a mesmer channels a phantasm for instance, you headshot it, inf strike, PW, this is cohesive. At melee range you can already do the same but you aren’t going to cancel PW to Inf strike, because that just straight out does less damage in the same time frame than just letting PW complete itself when a mesmer can’t damage you anyways because you are evading.
With Shadow return normally (well prior to today) doubling as your second advantage to avoid damage, if the stun, flurry, headshot and BP were insufficient.
S/P really didn’t have defensive problems in the slightest prior to shadow return having a cast time and abilities flowed together.

Not to disagree that a split has advantages. They can do what they want, I’m not going to lose sleep over Anets designs decisions.

What I meant was if the split were to happen, then you could Whip>IS(to immobilize them)>flurry and hopefully land more hits, not cancel PW and then cast the full PW again(its current form). I meant it would be similar to a mesmer setup where they often use swap>blurred frenzy to make sure more of the hits land.

I know what you mean, Im saying the situation you paint is possible atm but clunky. That would be less so if it split. However doing the same scenario post-split is less damage within the same timeframe. Yes you could fit all your whips in, however post-patch PW actually does land most of its hits, so it’s really split it to guarantee all damage. Especially given the ease of preventing Swap vs dodging an Inf strike.
Even then it wouldn’t be the same since (in the same setting of S/D) arbitrarily throw out FS/Stun to Inf Larcenous/Flurry which is the more common occurrence then trying to dodge an attack (given S/D’s track record post-split).

But I find the S/P kit feels weird due to a mentioned change, and I don’t feel a split will make it more appealing for myself, especially with what has occurred. So after playing today I think I’ll return Smite or play Elementalist until something is done for Shadow return as I find PW as a skill in a good spot but the set is too easily forced into relying on stun breaks to stay in “the fray” that they said they wanted sword to be in.
Til next month.

Well, agreed on that last point. I don’t see that sword offers any advantage D/X. S/P was never my cup of tea and the nerf to IR just makes sword less appealing overall. We’ll see what happens; maybe it’ll be another 4 seconds reveal where it seemed virtually all thieves disappeared from WvW because they became very awkward and non-fluid. Hope for a revert. I can’t see atm what they could possibly nerf anymore at least.

but i can:
step1. split pw + increase stun (as they mentioned)
step2. oh… have to nerf pw dmg by another 15%
step3. was not enough, must increase ini costs of the the second half of pw
step4. warriors still crying…must nerf random other skill from this set

Domey.9804:

step4. warriors still crying…must nerf random other skill from this set

Fastest way ever

To all of you retaliation naysayers, I’ve run my own S/P build and never died to retaliation. Run 20 in Trickery and take Bountiful Theft. Many of the times I steal, both stability and retal are the first boons to go.

Viking Jorun.5413:

To all of you retaliation naysayers, I’ve run my own S/P build and never died to retaliation. Run 20 in Trickery and take Bountiful Theft. Many of the times I steal, both stability and retal are the first boons to go.

That’s all well and good until you’re trying to contribute to a contested mid with more than one enemy target around. SYG isn’t just a self buff.