Condition dmg - is it really pointless?
There are very few specs that counter “everything.” Builds that rely on conditions typically turn into a battle of attrition if your opponent has any sort of condition removal, so if you are unable to overwhelm whoever you are fighting with Conditions then it will likely be a long fight (and seeing your build you probably rely solely on bleeds, and since you mention regening health while in stealth you are probably a P/D Thief).
Engineers and Necros (and Rangers, though I’ve never tried) have better options with regard to condition builds in pvp, so if you want a class with more satisfying condition damage try those. If you are asking for tips on utilizing a condition Thief… just know that you can’t every fight due to your build.
I have a condition Thief and typically don’t bother fighting Guardians and Elementalists. They are typically built defensively, and have an advantage against you before you engage them due to their abundance of opportunities to remove Conditions. Poison helps with dealing with their passive-healing, but the fights still are incredibly long, and if they are of equal skill level it isn’t uncommon for the fight to be endless.
P/D is really good. Even if they wipe your bleeds, you can still get them back fairly quickly. Sneak Attack is an extremely powerful skill because the ability itself does not rely on initiative. Depending on how many stealth abilities you utilize, you can pretty much always have a substantial stack bleeds going. Really the only thing P/D lacks is AoE, but for putting pressure on a single target pressure I would say P/D is probably on par with D/D backstab.
First of, Thanks for constructive replies.
Im d/d and d/d, why? because i use Sigil of agony and geomancer on both so every time i change weapons its 3-4 more AOE bleeds., and its is because the way i use the sigils and traits. I Can put 15+ on a target very very fast, But like you said, i cant think to win every fight, and yea, engis counter this build alot too. I guess ill think to pick wich targets more often instead of goin there and put on bleeds like a crazy crack mofo, hehe.
“rangers can spec to counter every littlle drop of bleed”
No, no we can not.
This is actually my current problem with using the D/D condition build. You spam DB, then you’re out of initiative and your enemy just clears the conditions off, while you are unable to do anything about it.
This, in my opinion at least, is why P/D is such a great condition weapon. Consistent bleeds will beat out burst bleeds in that everyone will be carrying around condition removal. If you remove P/D’s bleeds, they will simply reapply them right after.
As for bunker Ele, yeah, you won’t be killing them any time soon with a condition build. Doesn’t even matter if you’re P/D or D/D. When I was practicing P/D with a friend, I literally couldn’t kill him because of how easily he’d remove conditions. No matter how hard I tried, he’d run me out of health before he’d run out of health, simply because my conditions were removed over and over again. Like I said, I was just practicing it so it could have easily been an error on my part rather than simply an impossibility.
My condition build Uses P/D and SB with 10 points in DA for +33% poison duration, 30 SA for stealth boons and 15 in Acro and Trickery. Poison and Bleeds gibes me a bit more diversity and poison ticks are generally up constantly. I open with CGC switch to P/D, preload CnD, Steal, Sneak attack, drop Caltrops, blinding powder, sneak attack, shadowstrike and gnerally create distance while plinking from a distance and reapplying poison or get back into the fray and put all the bleeds up again.
This build does get completely negate by guardians and necros with mass cond removals and fighting another condi thief is like an endless dance of bleeding and stealth.
The Painted Norn of [WILD]We Intercept Lost Dolyaks
(edited by Elthuzar.9478)
All-in condition damage is marginal for a thief (it only really works well on a scepter necro or bunker ele, and even there it’s only due to design flaws in those sets). It’s a gimmick, albeit a pretty good one, that beats up classes that are unprepared for it.
Condition damage mixed into an otherwise good build is very strong, however. Strategically, you want your conditions to be just strong enough that your opponent will want to deal with them. Giving them a 25 stack of 120 tick bleeds is obvious; what about a 6 stack of 80 tick bleeds? When you have to judge duration on the fly, figuring whether it’s worth dealing with or not is difficult, and thus hard to counter.
I’ve been very happy with the results of mixed damage on the sets that support it – they don’t have quite the best case as the all-in builds, but are so much more robust and consistent that I can’t play ’em any other way.