Guild Wars 2

I’m really glad you finally decided to share your perspective, I already thought you had left the game. Unfortunately I’m sure that they’ve already settled their minds for the S/D changes, eventhough we tried our best to explain that it’ll literally kill sword setups.

Pretty much agree with everything, thanks for the effort though.

agree with everything (playing non perma stealth d/p btw)

i hope devs take their time to watch this vid

ty for making it

RIP S/D My beloved sword, they’re beating the crap outa it so much.
They really are revolving too much of Thief around stealth, they don’t seem to want us to do anything else to protect ourselves. Not enough diversity when everything revolves around one ability. It’ll be hard to spec into any good steal and evasion builds.

epic thread is epic

Bumpedy bummpp. Bump bump

i think the problem as we all know is stealth
ppl dont know or have hard time to learn how to deal with it while ppl who learn the thief mechanism getting better in the game
anet fail to realize that the thief class getting more and more hard to play which cause to only the good and great player stay and play it but the mediocre and new player will stay away from it but the result will be the same as good thief will still be hard opponents to kill or even annoying one which result in more QQ from the community

as you said SA line will pretty much got nerfed but is still viable with 1 more seconds stealth, health regen, condition clear, blind and stealth.
thus i think as you said we should be pushed to be more out of stealth if anet and the community wants us too. and this is done by buffing us outside of stealth like
1. protection for 2 seconds while getting out of stealth (like PU mesmer) (or aegis but maybe OP )
2. condition clear when we go in and when we go OUT of stealth
3. 3 seconds more % dmg when we out of stealth

and agree to all the other thing you’ve said regarding s/d will be spammable and maybe still good in 1v1 but not in group fight
d/p need more love on controlling you enemy with #4+#5
and p/p need more AA dmg and maybe skill stealth/evade option

they buff a bit the d/d and p/p with more ini regen but still with no defenses other than 3 utilities with huge cd so after i burn them i have to run to restart the fight
more hard time to kill ele and guardian

Be rumored go Bruno Ed brjmp bump bumps buiujmpppp

Bumppppppppppppppppppppppppppppp

Jumper, that was an interesting video. I agree with almost all of the points you made. I’m wondering what your plan is for the December 10th patch. Personally I’ve been running a 10/30/0/0/30 build since the steal update patch (first as a s/p user and then after the stun change d/p). The trickery build has been very popular recently and I’m thinking it will have a net gain in initiative regen. Do you it will keep its popularity? It counters the hambow build pretty well 1v1, but after the changes to warrior i’m not sure how the meta will change. I personally am thinking we are gonna see a pretty heavy bunker meta with 1-2 damage classes per team (like a mesmer and necro). I’ve been theory crafting some more dps oriented builds, but I’m not sure its worth bringing over an axe warrior, burst mesmer, or maybe even a s/d ele.

I’d love to hear your plans/thoughts.

I agree with everything you said. I would much prefer the thief class have a greater risk:reward ratio. The current proposed changes make me want to quit the class. Nerfing infusion nerfs every single on stealth trait. S/x is going to be useless. What do we get in exchange for big nerfs ? We get less initiative because of opportunist nerf.

Just sad day for people who enjoy thieves. I have warrior but I don’t think its as fun as thief, but definitely stronger.

I really hope they increase the daze on headshot to .5 seconds. I was dueling Cruuk a couple of days ago and when he would drop a black powder and i could hit him with a headshot as he was heartseekering through the bp to prevent him from stealthing, but the daze is so short on headshot, and with daze not giving thieves a a 2-3s cooldown on the interrupted skill like other classes Cruuk was able to use a second heartseeker through the black powder to stealth. So i would have to use another headshot to interrupt his second heartseeker, which would put me out 8 initiative, or he would stealth and i would have wasted 4 initiative from the first headshot. Now that was a super specific example, and there might not be many other situations similar to that, but i think a .5 or even a .75 second daze wouldn’t be too strong.

I fully agree, this is how to look at thieves with open eyes and take their own issues as well as the issues of others in account, while increasing risk:reward and skill cap, and making the strength of the class to be more dependent on the skill of the player, which this game truly needs a lot more of.

What’s going to happen at 10th December is reduction of both skillcap and overall strength of the class, reducing their ability to compete at the top.

I’d just like to know what Anets vision for the thief is. What exactly was the role they wanted for it.

I don’t understand why they’ve buffed mesmers and guardians in the dec 10 patch, 2 of the most popular and powerful classes yet decide to hurt thieves again.

I still won;t go back to my warrior though, it’s just a ridiculously easy class to play.

phaeris.7604:

I’d just like to know what Anets vision for the thief is. What exactly was the role they wanted for it.

I don’t understand why they’ve buffed mesmers and guardians in the dec 10 patch, 2 of the most popular and powerful classes yet decide to hurt thieves again.

I still won;t go back to my warrior though, it’s just a ridiculously easy class to play.

DPS guardian has been seeing some pretty decent buffs. I’m starting to think it might find its way to the meta in the next patch.

I agree with everything said in this video, you addressed everything with a very good alternative fix, we should not be losing options in a fight, managing all your ability’s and when to use what and prioritize skills over others is what made this profession for me, as well as others, it does sift out the good from the bad, I love this about the thief, you can always tell within 5 seconds of a fight who is a skilled thief and who is not.

I totally agree with infusion of shadow giving 3 rather then 2, and the, nurf it was needed to stop the cheese purma stealth, anyone defending this is either bad, or just really can’t play this profession, and should look toward a new one, but why are they not giving anything back to us? why are they not shaving us, but rather changing skills as a whole, until they “find something that might work” I was ok with the past nurf on nurf on nurf every patch, but this dec 10 I am very disappointing in a team I had once though where doing things “for the better of the class” that I love so much, but this just shows me how little they know about the thief and how it’s ACTUALLY played.

Very unhappy with the direction they are taking this, and again, agreeing with Jumper 100%, you can hear the disappointment in his voice just explaining how ridiculous this is, it’s so sad so see anet acting this way and singling out this profession.

u think IR is strong? lol wtf…how many stuns and blinds guards n warriors have? its impossible to play without it!

+1

15 characters and all that…

ur a troll….+2 or +3 init of infil return? ur crazy. its 5 init to remove 1 condi and immob for 1 sec plus move out of dmg 600 range. 5 init. tyhats so much weaker than skill 3 on d/p…… seriously…. 5 init for infil return? its already hard as hell to play bc its so risky

im not saying jumper is a bad player. hes pretty good. but heres the thing. lets see a 30 min video of gameplay in spvp/tpvp and wvw. i think you guys would see a whole different player. and thats not a dig on jumper…thats a dig on the class. u guys and everyone thinks thief needs to be downgraded….they need to be buffed.

CHALLENGE>>>>>>>> make a 30 min video withing 1 day of this challenge of jumper playing in wvw not romaing or in spvp trying to win and or in tpvp playing hard and nto picking off loaners

“spam it over and over again” …. if it so strong why thieves die about 5x more than other classes :P….. i get what ur saying alot in this video…. but you are looking at it from a nook n cranny perspective. try it from the big picture. other classes run thru aoe an have all these defense. if a thief wantzs to spam somethign let em.

Burnfall.9573:

A suggestion to thieves;

Yet another post about thieves to be disregarded, courtesy of Burnfall.

This is an example of what I mean when you should have to play well to do well with S/D.
The point at which you dodge predict and bait each dodge from your opponent.
Don’t get me wrong, Folly is a great player. I just counterplayed his counterplays to near perfection in that instance baiting out every single one of his dodges.
This was when Beastmasters were considered near godmode 1v1.
Given, this was before the +1init and -1Boonsteal nerfs, but still..
At the moment you can get away with random 3 spam without even thinking about what your opponent is doing and reacting. What it should be more about is the above.
S/D does probably deserve more nerfs when played to this degree. But to kill it completely in this way is just sad.

Jumper.9482:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SgWmA2IIw0

This is an example of what I mean when you should have to play well to do well with S/D.
The point at which you dodge predict and bait each dodge from your opponent.
Don’t get me wrong, Folly is a great player. I just counterplayed his counterplays to near perfection in that instance baiting out every single one of his dodges.
This was when Beastmasters were considered near godmode 1v1.
Given, this was before the +1init and -1Boonsteal nerfs, but still..
At the moment you can get away with random 3 spam without even thinking about what your opponent is doing and reacting. What it should be more about is the above.
S/D does probably deserve more nerfs when played to this degree. But to kill it completely in this way is just sad.

all that fancy work…nice and all but in a 3 v 3 your are dead. u barely won that fight and this was BEFORE the LS nerf. if this ranger had a stun break might have been different. good play and you really have a good point. this video really exemplifies the fact that thief shouldnt be nerfed ever again in any fashion. we barely get by as is.

Have u guys noticed that everything that rcvs some buff is nerfed to the ground afterward ?

Buff dancing dagge => Nerf dancing dagger
Buff shadow trap => Nerf shadow trap
Buff S/d => Nerf s/d
Buff iniciative => next step increase all skills initiative cost

Anyway, the Nerf is always bigger, lol

The Dev team believes that moving hard to catch down a tier is a “Survivability Buff”. They also suggest that for ease of stomping, thieves should think about bringing pistol OH in their second set.

They also failed to foresee how reducing LS to 1 boon steal would reduce it’s effectiveness in countering boon bunkers back to pre-FS split (when it was useless for countering boon bunkers). Somehow as a mere player, I predicted this the second it was suggested, and I only played S/D for a month or so before the FS split.

Anyone who’s played thief for a week can see how ridiculous the above suggestions/changes are, and these are just a few of them. When the developers of the game make it blatantly obvious they have no clue how the class works, we have a problem, and frankly little hope.

Travlane.5948:

all that fancy work…nice and all but in a 3 v 3 your are dead. u barely won that fight and this was BEFORE the LS nerf. if this ranger had a stun break might have been different. good play and you really have a good point. this video really exemplifies the fact that thief shouldnt be nerfed ever again in any fashion. we barely get by as is.

wtf are you talking about? Jumper has a good point and posted a good vid. Less spam 3, more actual thinking about what you have to do – this is a good thing. The last thing we want is to have the thief be a brain-dead warrior class. People should actually have to be good at the class they are playing. You should actually have to think about what the opponent is doing.

Travlane.5948:

Jumper.9482:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SgWmA2IIw0

This is an example of what I mean when you should have to play well to do well with S/D.
The point at which you dodge predict and bait each dodge from your opponent.
Don’t get me wrong, Folly is a great player. I just counterplayed his counterplays to near perfection in that instance baiting out every single one of his dodges.
This was when Beastmasters were considered near godmode 1v1.
Given, this was before the +1init and -1Boonsteal nerfs, but still..
At the moment you can get away with random 3 spam without even thinking about what your opponent is doing and reacting. What it should be more about is the above.
S/D does probably deserve more nerfs when played to this degree. But to kill it completely in this way is just sad.

all that fancy work…nice and all but in a 3 v 3 your are dead. u barely won that fight and this was BEFORE the LS nerf. if this ranger had a stun break might have been different. good play and you really have a good point. this video really exemplifies the fact that thief shouldnt be nerfed ever again in any fashion. we barely get by as is.

You forgot this fight was when BM rangers were like INVENCIBLE and i mean it, it was so kittenng op they are not the same now…

Good comments Jumper. I’ve always supported LS doing less damage but keeping the 2 boons stolen. I think IR could be changed in several different ways rather than this absurd cast time. One way is how you suggested. Another is to reduce the return range or reduce the time that it remains available. Your suggestion is probably the best though… just make it a larger investment to use it so more thought is put into when to press 2.

I don’t play sword very often but I have enjoyed it on occasion. Even though I rarely play it I fought pretty hard when the patch notes were released because it was pretty obvious it was limiting build diversity. One viable build here we come!

Jumper,

First of all, thanks for sharing your thoughts on these changes with us. It’s awesome to have someone on the high end of things to give some perspective.

However, I was going to mention that I think Infusion of Shadow and the SA tree is still in a good place for WvW on D/D thieves without any changes. A D/D thief rarely uses a stealth while stealthed, so the change doesn’t really hurt them there. If you want a good example of this, take a look at Yishis’ build.

For sPvP, I can see how it hurts, but it seems like SA builds were often overshadowed by glass D/P builds anyways (25/30/0/0/15 or 10/30/0/0/30).

Anyways, going forward, what thief build do you think you’ll be leaning towards on Dec 10th?

Chicago Jack.5647:

Travlane.5948:

all that fancy work…nice and all but in a 3 v 3 your are dead. u barely won that fight and this was BEFORE the LS nerf. if this ranger had a stun break might have been different. good play and you really have a good point. this video really exemplifies the fact that thief shouldnt be nerfed ever again in any fashion. we barely get by as is.

wtf are you talking about? Jumper has a good point and posted a good vid. Less spam 3, more actual thinking about what you have to do – this is a good thing. The last thing we want is to have the thief be a brain-dead warrior class. People should actually have to be good at the class they are playing. You should actually have to think about what the opponent is doing.

wtf are YOU talking about. i said it was good play and he played PERFECTLY and still was a close match. my point is that even tho he played PERFECTLY or darn close…. it was close. so here we are at the dawn of another HUGE thief nerf when we are at the brink of being unviable in many formats. wvw is a joke for us. pve we are the bottom 2. spvp/tpvp we can be good…conditional….in the sense if its only 1 v 1 or 2 v 2….. and ive seen all if not most of jumpers videos. without stealth he can only do 1 v 1. and even with stealth its 1 v1 2 v 1 3 v 1 and mostly mediocre players. now that doesnt mean hes a bad player, hes good. but what it DOES express is the fact thieves are at the edge of extinction and being the butt of every joke. to take a thief is to make your team weaker than i could potentially be….even now before dec 10th

Walker.3056:

Travlane.5948:

Jumper.9482:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SgWmA2IIw0

This is an example of what I mean when you should have to play well to do well with S/D.
The point at which you dodge predict and bait each dodge from your opponent.
Don’t get me wrong, Folly is a great player. I just counterplayed his counterplays to near perfection in that instance baiting out every single one of his dodges.
This was when Beastmasters were considered near godmode 1v1.
Given, this was before the +1init and -1Boonsteal nerfs, but still..
At the moment you can get away with random 3 spam without even thinking about what your opponent is doing and reacting. What it should be more about is the above.
S/D does probably deserve more nerfs when played to this degree. But to kill it completely in this way is just sad.

all that fancy work…nice and all but in a 3 v 3 your are dead. u barely won that fight and this was BEFORE the LS nerf. if this ranger had a stun break might have been different. good play and you really have a good point. this video really exemplifies the fact that thief shouldnt be nerfed ever again in any fashion. we barely get by as is.

You forgot this fight was when BM rangers were like INVENCIBLE and i mean it, it was so kittenng op they are not the same now…

i played p/d and noticed the being strong but never truly a problem. but i did hear about it on s/d d/p yeap.

Travlane.5948:

[…]it was close.

Lol! No it wasn’t!

Chicago Jack.5647:

Travlane.5948:

[…]it was close.

Lol! No it wasn’t!

Jumper had about MAYBE 40% hp..prolly less to the rangers 10% before he finished him off. the ranger was good from what im hearing. but 1 mistake would have equaled death for jumper. 1 knockdown….1 stun… blind or w.e. ….. it was a good fight and if it wasnt for BV who knows what would have happend. but 40% to 10% is still a close fight before jumper finished him

This is going to be so much fun to be chain feared by necros while losing the ability to do anything about it, except wasting up to 3 stun breakers for litteraly nothing.

Travlane.5948:

Chicago Jack.5647:

Travlane.5948:

[…]it was close.

Lol! No it wasn’t!

Jumper had about MAYBE 40% hp..prolly less to the rangers 10% before he finished him off. the ranger was good from what im hearing. but 1 mistake would have equaled death for jumper. 1 knockdown….1 stun… blind or w.e. ….. it was a good fight and if it wasnt for BV who knows what would have happend. but 40% to 10% is still a close fight before jumper finished him

Agreed with this. Running around with the lowest health pool in the game and using a zerker amulet makes health disappear fast. Close fights with thieves are decided on evades, not on % of health.

Dahkeus.8243:

Travlane.5948:

Chicago Jack.5647:

Travlane.5948:

[…]it was close.

Lol! No it wasn’t!

Jumper had about MAYBE 40% hp..prolly less to the rangers 10% before he finished him off. the ranger was good from what im hearing. but 1 mistake would have equaled death for jumper. 1 knockdown….1 stun… blind or w.e. ….. it was a good fight and if it wasnt for BV who knows what would have happend. but 40% to 10% is still a close fight before jumper finished him

Agreed with this. Running around with the lowest health pool in the game and using a zerker amulet makes health disappear fast. Close fights with thieves are decided on evades, not on % of health.

This is one of the big problems with evade – players perceptions.

If an S/D thief wins a fight at 80%, a lot of players will feel they stood no chance. But as you said, the health % has almost nothing to do with it, the real question is how many evades did the thief have left? It’s not something your opponent can see, so if they aren’t aware of how a thief plays (and most players who complain about thieves really have absolutely no idea how a thief plays), it looks as if the thief was practically invincible the entire fight, and that just isn’t true. Good luck convincing them of it though.

Dahkeus.8243:

Travlane.5948:

Chicago Jack.5647:

Travlane.5948:

[…]it was close.

Lol! No it wasn’t!

Jumper had about MAYBE 40% hp..prolly less to the rangers 10% before he finished him off. the ranger was good from what im hearing. but 1 mistake would have equaled death for jumper. 1 knockdown….1 stun… blind or w.e. ….. it was a good fight and if it wasnt for BV who knows what would have happend. but 40% to 10% is still a close fight before jumper finished him

Agreed with this. Running around with the lowest health pool in the game and using a zerker amulet makes health disappear fast. Close fights with thieves are decided on evades, not on % of health.

and poorly timed evades = loss of HP. so HP aka % of health is pretty relative to how u did in a fight.

a wvw thief full zerk vs a wvw warrior full zerk…………

if both start auto attacking each other at same time warrior will win with about 50%of his HP left.

can anyone explain this to me? and yes ive tested. sometimes less but basically 45% is solid………. not sure how thats fair but ill be open to hear it.

Yeah. I agree with pretty much all your points. Especially as a Thief who’s mained S/D since the betas. Its getting hard to watch thieves get nerfed in all the wrong ways, be it the LS boon nerf that made it so thieves would have to spam LS even more to be effective, or this change to Shadow Return which has pretty much nuked S/x’s survivability in general.

Hi.
I am not sure I understand why a 1/4 second cast time on Infiltrator’s return will render the skill useless.
I understand it is a nerf, but useless?

Forgive me for asking, I am not a thief so I might have missed something completely here.
I asked a thief friend of mines, and he think it is not a problem (for S/D at least), because it is somewhat difficult to counter pressure them in the first place. If you can’t punish them when they are not evading or fail to dodge, then there is very little risk for a S/D to jump someone in the first place.

If anyone eats a full shatter combo or a skull crack followed by 100 blades, then they are in trouble as well. If anyone else gets stunned for 3 seconds and have loads of players attacking them, they are most likely dead as well. If anyone else uses a stun break, they don’t teleport away but are still right next to you and still vulnerable to attacks.

I mean no disrespect, but I honestly don’t understand why a short cast time brings the skill from being strong to be at: No point at ever using it again?
Is it not a very nice disengage to have still, if things are starting to look bad?
What am I missing here?

Reesha.7901:

Hi.
I am not sure I understand why a 1/4 second cast time on Infiltrator’s return will render the skill useless.
I understand it is a nerf, but useless?

Forgive me for asking, I am not a thief so I might have missed something completely here.
I asked a thief friend of mines, and he think it is not a problem (for S/D at least), because it is somewhat difficult to counter pressure them in the first place. If you can’t punish them when they are not evading or fail to dodge, then there is very little risk for a S/D to jump someone in the first place.

If anyone eats a full shatter combo or a skull crack followed by 100 blades, then they are in trouble as well. If anyone else gets stunned for 3 seconds and have loads of players attacking them, they are most likely dead as well. If anyone else uses a stun break, they don’t teleport away but are still right next to you and still vulnerable to attacks.

I mean no disrespect, but I honestly don’t understand why a short cast time brings the skill from being strong to be at: No point at ever using it again?
Is it not a very nice disengage to have still, if things are starting to look bad?
What am I missing here?

Cause as it is now if u get stunned u can return BUT u still stay stunned, u just return…
With cast time u WONT be able to return at all if disabled and thats gg a shatter combo on a guard/warr get them in a hard position? lol thats funny they dont even get to 60% hp depending on build but on thieves… its death or 10% hp left

Yeh. I don’t know.
Maybe it is just me failing to understand the thief mechanics. I would hate if I couldn’t use blink when stunned as well. I guess they work much the same then. I am sorry to bother you thieves with questions about this, but I figured the thief forum would be the best place to learn something. (That is why I watched Jumper’s video in the first place after all.)

Warriors are (to put it nicely) slightly over powered. So they are most likely not the class I would compare anything with.
Guardians are usually support specced, so their damage is not a threat like that of a thief.

How about any other dps class then?
It is my understanding (I might be mistaken), that while a S/D thief takes their health away, they (or their team) have a hard time counter pressuring the thief because of the evades.

I am currious. How would you implement a gap then, where the S/D thief can actually be pressured, but without this change to Infiltrator’s return? Or am I again missing something?

Reesha.7901:

Yeh. I don’t know.
Maybe it is just me failing to understand the thief mechanics. I would hate if I couldn’t use blink when stunned as well. I guess they work much the same then. I am sorry to bother you thieves with questions about this, but I figured the thief forum would be the best place to learn something. (That is why I watched Jumper’s video in the first place after all.)

Warriors are (to put it nicely) slightly over powered. So they are most likely not the class I would compare anything with.
Guardians are usually support specced, so their damage is not a threat like that of a thief.

How about any other dps class then?
It is my understanding (I might be mistaken), that while a S/D thief takes their health away, they (or their team) have a hard time counter pressuring the thief because of the evades.

I am currious. How would you implement a gap then, where the S/D thief can actually be pressured, but without this change to Infiltrator’s return? Or am I again missing something?

The other nerfs thieves are getting are enough to change that, initiative nerf (yes its a nerf) vigor nerf kittene for evades… and the buffs in other classes like mesmer, they are getting really nice buff and changes on traits that will for sure make them really strong, im not a very exp player with eles so i wont coment, about engi i think they are very strong right now and in team fights they can keep pressure on many target at same time really nice, but warr as you said its a on different level. They can specy with zerk amulet and yet stay really really had to drop with some nay blocks, damage mitigation stuff and their burst/stun are as strong as never

PS: sry about my english, its really bad too..

Nah. Your English is fine! It is not my native language either so I make loads of mistakes.

Thanks for taking the time to explain this to me. Much appreciated.

I really wish A-net would adjust things faster. Then if something is buffed or nerfed drastically, we wouldn’t have to worry about how many months before something that turned out to be too much or too little is changed.

Reesha.7901:

Nah. Your English is fine! It is not my native language either so I make loads of mistakes.

Thanks for taking the time to explain this to me. Much appreciated.

I really wish A-net would adjust things faster. Then if something is buffed or nerfed drastically, we wouldn’t have to worry about how many months before something that turned out to be too much or too little is changed.

i agree with the speed of their fixing. they really need 2-3 months to figure out if somethign is working/not working? lol

btw yes its you, you need to learn thief mechanics. infil return nerf coming dec 10th is unarguably the end of s/d. period. >.

Yeh I meant to offense by asking. I just didn’t quite understand why (which Walker was kind enough to explain to me).

I try to read up on the other class forums, because it is hard to fight what you don’t understand and I do want to better myself.

As I said above, my friend plays S/D, but he has a very different opinion on the matter, so I was curious about the concerns voiced here. They make sense to me now.

Reesha.7901:

Yeh I meant to offense by asking. I just didn’t quite understand why (which Walker was kind enough to explain to me).

I try to read up on the other class forums, because it is hard to fight what you don’t understand and I do want to better myself.

As I said above, my friend plays S/D, but he has a very different opinion on the matter, so I was curious about the concerns voiced here. They make sense to me now.

There is a palpable chicken little attitude in the thief forums right now Reesha. I don’t think you will get much valuable information out of most people on here, due to all the drama. Best to turn your attention to people like Jumper or other well-known, well-established players who arn’t fotm’ers of a class for a better understanding.

You ARE right that it’s pretty ridiculous that people legitimately have such a hard time counter-pressuring S/D thieves. Jumper seems to be providing an alternative to what is being proposed by Anet, and I think it’s a good idea to start. I think it would be even better, though, if Anet found a way to make dagger offhand actually useful again so that S/D thieves don’t just have to sit there and 3 spam with a few 1+dodges thrown in there all the time. As it stands now, it’s pretty ridiculous that any weapon spec doesn’t even need to think about what the other person is doing in order for it to be preformed well – as long as they can dodge stuff. It’s just an additional kick in the balls, or a facepalm, that it turns out to be a spammy weapon set too.

Thanks a lot for the elaborate answer Jack.
I think Jumper has a lot of valuable suggestions in his video (with my limited understanding of the predicament that thieves faces.)
I just wasn’t sure about why that one skill would become useless.

And yes, I to prefer changes that makes things less spammy. Sadly that doesn’t seem to be a direction Arena net is taking any of the professions atm.

IMHO Anet created thief more than one year ago and still dont know what they expect the class to be/do thats why they make changes in a really bad way…

Use#1: The (very) limited condi removal of #2 spam increased by 1/4s. If you wanted to remove 4 conditions (eg. confusion burn bleed torment), thats adding an ENTIRE SECOND to your condi removal—likely WELL OVER half of your hp EVEN IF you had the 20 initiative to pull it off (which you won’t because of the initiative nerfs).

Use#2: Actively reacting to move out of 1shot skills such as baiting out shatters and air bursts, dodge burning speeds phoenixes eviscerates earthquakes earthshakers, etc.

Use#3: displace yourself from a CC. A thief is still a thief, get hit by one Doom and you’re already loaded up with enough conditions to kill you twice over. One Earthshaker and you’re half hp about to eat another knockdown and knockback for the other half. A smart player will attempt to bait the thief back to his shadow return point and CC him there for the 1hko. Unfortunately ANET wants to dumb down their game even further apparently throwing any sort of strategic thinking out the window.