Guild Wars 2

Hello fellow thieves.

Yesterday evening some very unfriendly guild didnt have anything else to do but to attack me and my mates inside Obsidian Sanctum while we were having fun with a Box´o´Fun. While that isnt unusual nowadays – and i think i know hy, because two people of said guild wanted to gank me 2v1 while i was on my way to the chest (didnt end well for them) – a specific happening got me scratching my head. I was the first to receive insults via whispering chat. Among personal insults were phrases like S/D should win over anything, i´m a meta scrub carried by the meta build and of course his grandma plays thief better than me. The author of those insults is a D/P thief.
Now i don´t want to rant, namecall or cry out loud or anything. I just want to know in which universe S/D Meta has advantage over D/P Meta, which would give that thief some truth into his talk, or if it was just the usual bitterness of a 12 year old.

Funny thing is that he said i´m a bad thief for being killed so fast. I want to ask you the very same question instead: Am i a bad thief for being killed so fast, when during the whole almost two-hour-long group clash (in which our opposing team got more and more people, eventually outmanning us – they started off 3 v 5 though), when all that thief did was looking for me, only to always burst from stealth while i was busy with someone else, or to get me teamspiked from fellow stealthed mesmer and/or ele. Does that make me a bad thief?

I´m the last one to say that i´m a good thief, but i´m pretty sure i´m way above average since i´m a roamer. However that “event” yesterday evening did hurt a bit. Never felt so much hatred in a game.

I’m just going to say stealth is stronger in team killing than S/D in no conquest
-They are less likely to take damage
-BP counter melee burst
-If traited with SA it will survive longer
-Free backstab against mainly other zerkers is very strong
-Steath can be given to allies like mentioned

I never played S/D but the ones I see don’t last long when focused on in team fights they either use SR,CnD or flee using SB so to me S/D is inferior in those situations and most of the “zerg taker thieves” are using SA. Most people hate all thieves so hate comes with the class S/D or not so to me your team should have focused on bursting or cc the thief while revealed,interrupt the BP+HS combo.

As above says, while in open teamfights with more than 3ppl on each side, D/P would be superior because of burst and and stealth.

Now having play the 2 specs and loving the S/D, if you go full defensive with S/D you can go full defensive and avoid their burst if you know it s coming, which is easy to achieve by keepin track of the enemy location, if they are all stealth or coming towards you you’re gonna have a bad time.

For me as a S/D thief, you have to feel when the enemy is gonna burst you up and then use your ton of evades to just dance around them while laughing heavily and when one of them overextend or is out of cd you just burst him and leave your mates to finish the job

D/P have it way easier than S/D
Both builds are easy in 1v1 or so because they can get out easily and just wait, if you are in a 2v3 – 2v4 situation you can’t, because if you move away from the fight it means that your teammate is going to get all the focus

But I really do hate D/P thieves, they’re so annoying in small fights because you can’t really focus them as it takes ages to take them down but you can’t even ignore them because they’ll burst you down as soon as you turn on someone else. I still think S/D is better (sword cleaves dagger doesn’t)

D/P thief should never lose 1v1 to an S/D Thief unless there is a LARGE skill cap, which is why you see so many D/P thieves lose to S/D, they’re freaking garbage. D/P thief is one of the easiest builds in the entire game to 1v1 with. That doesn’t mean that it’s GOOD at 1v1, it means that it has an incredibly safe playstyle because pistol 5 counters melee completely. It can even be called a soft counter to melee. This extremely face roll build and the perceived notion by idiots that S/D can easily beat D/P is why they act so immature towards S/D thieves. The “meta” build for S/D isn’t even for WvW where it struggles against condis, yet for some reason they think it’s still OP there? Just one question, did the D/P thief use Shadow arts? If a D/P thief beats you in a duel using shadow arts completely ignore any whisper you get from them and just go do something else for a bit. Another thing that I hate about most “non-meta” thieves is that they think S/D Thief is easy to play. That’s completely false, D/P if anything is easy to play. 5, auto, 2, 3 into backstab. There’s no reactive play. Sure you can be “good” at D/P, but the BEST thieves in the game play S/D and D/D in WvW because D/P is just as cheese as any condi built.

TLDR; No you’re not a scrub for playing S/D.

-Teef Teef Teef Teef

@Audiogasm and Sagat:
Well, when i´m engaging a D/P thief 1v1 i know how to react. That said, the constant blinds kill S/D because of its slow attacks, and 2 out of 5 weapon skills bring me right into his BP-field if i mistime them or if the D/P thief reacts accordingly. Additionally i cannot interrupt his HS through smokefield more than once every 21 seconds (steal) and 45 seconds using Basilisk Venom. Contrary i would be able to do so when i´d play D/P myself due to Headshot.

The situation i described above was a clash of about 10 people of my server, 12 of theirs and two or three from the third at peak. And 1-3 people almost constantly sticked to me once i re-entered the battlefield. There was no communication availiable on my side, cant tell for the others. But the guild which started that war definitely had communication as they clearly timed their stuff coordinated.

@Elitist and Delta Blues:
The thief i was talking about definitely had 6 pts in Trickery and 2 in Deadly Arts. Cannot tell where the remaining 6 could have been located. Either in Critical Strikes or in Shadow Arts. It could be the latter because of extreme frequent BP-Shot + HS combos (indicates usage of the +2 ini when going stealth trait) and seemed to have more Life when exiting stealth than before. Though i am not sure on this, it could also have been 26006 D/P tourney meta. Since it was a bigger group fight, things went messy from time to time.

Anyways, that is the current main gripe i have – i keep hearing S/D TEEF OP and meta kitten carried by build and evade spammer and whatnot though i´m neither using Sizers, Chozens or Jumpers traits / utilities and swap around accordingly, and i´m still looking for a more condition resilient variant (e.g.) 20246
Thank you all for clearing it up though. Good to know i do not need to feel bad for playing and enjoying tatcical, non-spammy S/D.

Both are really the ‘meta’ these days…and it’s funny that a blind spammy D/P would be all over you like that. I’ve encountered way more of the D/P wandering around. I wouldn’t call someone a bad anything for dying fast, in this game one wrong move or one lag spike and you are dead. So you like S/D…wish people would stop being so kitten over builds. Deal with it. This profession gets more flack than anyone else and to have it from one thief to another is stupid.

I agree with everything that Elitist said, and I’d like to add one more thing about D/P vs S/D: disengage/engage capabilities.

Assuming both thieves are using SB as a 2nd set, in a duel between 2 equally skilled players, the S/D one is at a loss when trying to disengage, due to the fact that the D/P has one more gap closing skill, Shadow Shot, which gives the D/P the ability to almost always reach a disengaging S/D thief (unless he’s a scrub and while the S/D is fleeing he wastes time in stealthing with BP+HS instead of going after him, but I said “two equally skilled players”).

LOL the scrubs in this game are so funny!

S/D is WAY higher skill cap than D/P. How do I know this? I mostly play D/P and never got the hang of S/D

OP – Please ignore scrub thieves they will always be mad when you beat them and it is never due to skill always due to something being cheesy in their minds. If you beat him with S/D then you are CLEARLY better than him no question about it. The best S/D thieves in this game can not beat me ( I can not beat them either ) but D/P should never lose to another thief set assuming equal skill

S/D is harder. Not that it matters, really. I play D/P (and I found this combo fun on my own, before reading forums >.> ) and every time I see someone crying it only makes me feel better – not only he is dead, but also I hit his brain so much he couldn’t help it but offend me. Report → block, problem solved, proceed to next kill.

Play what you like not what is “cool”.

TheBandicoot.5294:

Am i a bad thief for being killed so fast, when during the whole almost two-hour-long group clash (in which our opposing team got more and more people, eventually outmanning us – they started off 3 v 5 though), when all that thief did was looking for me, only to always burst from stealth while i was busy with someone else, or to get me teamspiked from fellow stealthed mesmer and/or ele. Does that make me a bad thief?.

This is merely a case of severe trolling that obviously got to your head. Someone managed to down you and then proceeded to break whatever spirit you had left. You’ll have to ignore it and move on because this will happen a lot Everyone has their off days. Keep practicing and rotate between any builds that suit you! Remember that its the player, not the build. Unless you absolutely know that the skill matchup is perfectly even, you don’t have to worry about builds.

Also like what Terkov said… Report → Block. These are people you’ll never have to interact with in your life. You will never meet them outside of the game. It’s simply not worth your time if all they have are negative things to say.

Just a tip: If there is an opposing thief, always hunt them down first. The other thief knew what he was doing. Take for example in pvp the roll of a thief is to first counter any other thieves, and then proceed to unbalancing any fight they can. A thieves worst opponent is one that can burst them FAST, which is… you guessed it, another thief.

Hunting down squishy targets – especially the enemy thief – is a thief’s main task during sPvP, so far i have understood it. But since i´m a solo roamer, i tend to stay away from group fights. Cannot handle them yet. This is also why i´m not a fan of sPvP. The mode itself promotes a thief to play a role i don´t quite enjoy (yet), thus i´m more or less inexperienced with group battles.

While i do know that it largely comes down to player skill and not build composition, the border at which the build does matter isnt as fine lined as you write, Panicbutton. There is a lot of stuff which is like scissor to paper for S/D thieves. Not unbeatable, but considerably harder… at least thats my opinion on that matter.

I won´t give up though. There were so many catastrophic changes and events i have survived so i´ll overcome this one as well. I was a bit too concerned though, even after almost 3k hours of thief PvE/WvW roaming some of the outcry you are almost permanently exposed to when playing thief will reach critical mass. Thanks again for all your kind answers

In your defense you chose a spec that isn’t quite as newbie friendly as people make it out to be. Positioning, timing, and understanding of other classes skills/tactics is a completely necessity to even be competent in fighting them with S/D — especially when roaming. Once you get more exposure you’ll notice you are the scissors to anyones paper, unless that paper happens to go into a full bunker build which you can just easily walk away from. The reason being is that S/D has the capability of being completely unpredictable, and sticks to no particular set of combination moves.

I used to hate sPvP too. I still roam more than I PvP, but I recently started to understand its importance to get a good balance of both gameplays. I feel like PvP made me carved out of wood. I still duel the same people and have been getting noticeably better on timing and anticipation. If you roam off prime hours you’ll be lucky to get any fight within 20 minutes leading to less practice and more downtime + chatting — opposite of what PvP will offer you. It’s not black and white either… you dont have to stick with pvp nor wvw. You lose nothing… you gain the benefits of both gaming styles.

Anyone who insists that any other thief weaponset is better than D/P has clearly never played the other weaponsets.

D/P is the most frustrating, easiest, face-rolliest, and overall scrubby build in the entire game. Yep, I think hambow warrior takes more skill, has more counters, and is generally more difficult to play than D/P thief. D/P blind-stealth spam is a downright insult to a lot of this game’s mechanics and makes thieves appear way stronger than they appear to be when played with other sets.

Best thing you can do is challenge them to use D/D if they think they’re good at dagger mainhand and/or just ignore them.

DeceiverX.8361:

Anyone who insists that any other thief weaponset is better than D/P has clearly never played the other weaponsets.

D/P is the most frustrating, easiest, face-rolliest, and overall scrubby build in the entire game. Yep, I think hambow warrior takes more skill, has more counters, and is generally more difficult to play than D/P thief. D/P blind-stealth spam is a downright insult to a lot of this game’s mechanics and makes thieves appear way stronger than they appear to be when played with other sets.

Best thing you can do is challenge them to use D/D if they think they’re good at dagger mainhand and/or just ignore them.

Yep. I think that P/D is even cheesiest though. Seriously you can condi burst anyone in no time at all and you almost don’t even need to get in melee range

DeceiverX.8361:

Anyone who insists that any other thief weaponset is better than D/P has clearly never played the other weaponsets.

D/P is the most frustrating, easiest, face-rolliest, and overall scrubby build in the entire game. Yep, I think hambow warrior takes more skill, has more counters, and is generally more difficult to play than D/P thief. D/P blind-stealth spam is a downright insult to a lot of this game’s mechanics and makes thieves appear way stronger than they appear to be when played with other sets.

Best thing you can do is challenge them to use D/D if they think they’re good at dagger mainhand and/or just ignore them.

It is because u r a D/D player and D/P is strong againt u.

D/D is way better in outnumber fights, and is not that hard to use as u try to sell to us.

There is always some one saying cheesy this cheesy that . . . and is always the hard countered side.

Much scrub, much noob, much suck…

Just kidding. Ignore the haters and kick butt. Play what you love; love what you play.

Delta Blues.8507:

DeceiverX.8361:

Anyone who insists that any other thief weaponset is better than D/P has clearly never played the other weaponsets.

D/P is the most frustrating, easiest, face-rolliest, and overall scrubby build in the entire game. Yep, I think hambow warrior takes more skill, has more counters, and is generally more difficult to play than D/P thief. D/P blind-stealth spam is a downright insult to a lot of this game’s mechanics and makes thieves appear way stronger than they appear to be when played with other sets.

Best thing you can do is challenge them to use D/D if they think they’re good at dagger mainhand and/or just ignore them.

Yep. I think that P/D is even cheesiest though. Seriously you can condi burst anyone in no time at all and you almost don’t even need to get in melee range

No melee means no Cnd+no Sneak attack +no SA traits usage= noob P/D please make sure you fight at least a decent one I hope that one didn’t kill you >.>

Sagat.3285:

Delta Blues.8507:

DeceiverX.8361:

Anyone who insists that any other thief weaponset is better than D/P has clearly never played the other weaponsets.

D/P is the most frustrating, easiest, face-rolliest, and overall scrubby build in the entire game. Yep, I think hambow warrior takes more skill, has more counters, and is generally more difficult to play than D/P thief. D/P blind-stealth spam is a downright insult to a lot of this game’s mechanics and makes thieves appear way stronger than they appear to be when played with other sets.

Best thing you can do is challenge them to use D/D if they think they’re good at dagger mainhand and/or just ignore them.

Yep. I think that P/D is even cheesiest though. Seriously you can condi burst anyone in no time at all and you almost don’t even need to get in melee range

No melee means no Cnd+no Sneak attack +no SA traits usage= noob P/D please make sure you fight at least a decent one I hope that one didn’t kill you >.>

I said “almost”, as for the most time you are not in melee range, infact you just need to jump in to land a sneak attack, and if you use refuge + blinding powder you already have 2 ways of stealthing with no cnd.
I did fight good ones, i’ve lost and won, i’ve played one too and i didn’t like the playstyle as i found it incredibly simple and powerful

I dare say that you would have recieved those insults if you were running P/P too. Some people just can’t take a defeat and therefore just has to tell the player who killed them that he is a bad player and so on.

I tend to just ignore them and if the insults get too personal I’ll just report and block the person.

A thief will always die fast in a group fight if focused, this is common knowledge to any thief. I dare say that D/P should win against S/D if it is between two equally skilled players. D/P can almost shut down a S/D build if done right.

A thief complaining about blind spam when fighting another thief needs to get slapped with a l2p revelation

The only advice that has kept me from raging when I lose to another thief or player is ask a single question. Did I lose to the player or did I lose to the build?

If I lose to the player I admit to myself that I lost fair and square and it was my fault but I can improve. If I lose to the build then I just shrug it off and try to not let it bring me down. The reason for this is I play D/D as a thief and D/P thieves are constantly giving me a hard time because it is a hard counter to D/D with the blind spam.

@OP:

Play whatever you want, Just understand that most likely S/D will get nerfed next balance patch. ANET seems to nerf whatever thief spec is considered meta.

D/P should also get a nerf…

In my opinion S/D can kill D/P, you have just to take advantage of what you are better at.

My 2 cents:

- If they use BP (very expensive in terms of ini), they will try to stay in the aoe as long as possible, so switch to bow and 1 1 1 1 them. As they stealth, I usually use 2 to aoe them, then dodge roll to avoid the backstab followed by a 3 of bow, if needed.

- if they BP, is it VERY important to notice that you can hit and kill them just pressing 1 while staying at the edge of their AoE.
In fact if they can hit you, YOU CAN HIT THEM, without being blinded.
Generally speaking they are more glassy than you (due to evades), so you may be willing to accept some 11111 battles, in order to get them low. Then when they stealth, spam dodge and then try to finish the job when they appear again.

In my opinion if I compare D/P with S/D, I think D/P is easier to get a hang off than S/D. However I think the skillcap on D/P is way higher than S/D since it uses all 5 of it’s abilities. It has more outplay potential in the right hands than any other spec.

P.S. I’m talking about 2/6/0/0/6 D/P and 2/0/0/6/6 S/D

EDIT: OP, play what you want, if you enjoy S/D more than play that, don’t let other ppl decide what you should play.

Those saying that D/P has an edge over S/D are mostly sore losers who use S/D and, having lost to a D/P, tell themselves that “D/P is stronger than S/D”.

In a 1v1 situation, S/D=D/P. It’s totally 50/50. D/P has some advantages (blinds, stealth) but S/D has many others (lots of evades, condition cleansing).
More specifically:
-S/D can cleanse the poison applied by the D/P (either through Steal, Shortbow or Dagger)→Withdraw has always a 100% heal effectiveness. Whereas, for D/P, Withdraw loses 33% of that because the only cleanse available to a D/P is through Shadowstep.

-S/D has lots of evades. It’s REALLY difficult to properly land a Steal on a S/D user if he is any good. Whereas, landing a Steal on a D/P user is fairly easy, because they don’t have build in evades and have lots of vulnerable frames. Also, interrupting a BP→HS, which is quite easy, totally screws the D/P. The same reasoning can be applied for Basilisk Venom (hard to land on a S/D).

-In a shortbow battle, S/D has an insane advantage due to all the evades they have.

Of course I’m talking about Trickery D/P. I leave people who 1v1 with Shadow Arts to their playground.

SoLeciTO.3490:

DeceiverX.8361:

Anyone who insists that any other thief weaponset is better than D/P has clearly never played the other weaponsets.

D/P is the most frustrating, easiest, face-rolliest, and overall scrubby build in the entire game. Yep, I think hambow warrior takes more skill, has more counters, and is generally more difficult to play than D/P thief. D/P blind-stealth spam is a downright insult to a lot of this game’s mechanics and makes thieves appear way stronger than they appear to be when played with other sets.

Best thing you can do is challenge them to use D/D if they think they’re good at dagger mainhand and/or just ignore them.

It is because u r a D/D player and D/P is strong againt u.

D/D is way better in outnumber fights, and is not that hard to use as u try to sell to us.

There is always some one saying cheesy this cheesy that . . . and is always the hard countered side.

I’ve played both. D/P is so much easier it’s not even funny. You have everything you need and more in your kit while having arguably the best method of shutting your opponents down built in.

The only reason I prefer playing D/D is because I prefer the assassin style. Simply, all that the set has more to offer is more damage. It has less reliability than D/P while obviously missing out on the bonus blind utility and chain stealth without needing a target/OOC. I know my P/P blindspam healing power thief has almost no problems in 1vMany situations because the blind application is just too high for opponents to actually do anything while I troll around until more people come and wipe them.

Whether or not I get shut down/hard countered is irrelevant. D/P is strictly stronger because it shuts down so many builds and styles without actually being dependent on particularly skilled play but through the sheer amount of application of certain mechanics it yields.