Guild Wars 2

According to Karl;

Karl McLain.5604:

Traits:
This iteration was mostly bug fixes. I’ve seen a lot of feedback on how Escapist’s Absolution should be baseline. It is the case that we believe this trait is powerful enough that it should be a choice in the trait line between damage, survivability and utility, rather than just a given.

So let’s look at this design philosophy if this has been applied in our Core traits.

Critical Strikes – Major Adept
Flawless Strike – Deal increased critical damage while your health is above the threshold.
Side Strike – Gain bonus critical-hit chance when hitting a foe from behind or the side.
Signets of Power – Gain might when activating a signet. Signet recharge is reduced.

I fail to see where are “survivability” and “utility” from these choices. Next;

Critical Strikes – Major Master
Ankle Shots – Critical hits with pistols and harpoon guns have a chance to cripple foes. Pistol and harpoon attacks deal increased damage to crippled foes.
Practiced Tolerance – Gain ferocity based on your precision.
Sundering Strikes – Critical hits have a chance to cause vulnerability.

Again, I fail to see where are the “survivability” and “utility” from these choices. Lastly;

Critical Strikes – Major Grandmaster
Hidden Killer – Gain bonus critical-hit chance while in stealth.
Invigorating Precision – You are healed for a percentage of outgoing critical hit damage.
No Quarter – Landing a critical hit while under the effects of fury increases the duration of fury. Gain increased ferocity while under the effects of fury.

Now this is different from the rest because this one has no “utility”, one “heal” and two “damage” traits. So I begin to wonder how closely are the designer following this Design Philosophy because from that post from Karl, it sounds like an excuse not to improve the Thief’s gameplay by making Escapist Absolution baseline.

Does this philosophy only apply to the DD traits? If so, why?

Why aren’t we getting the same design philosophy to our Core traits?

Why do you have to create/follow different kinds of design philosophy for each trait?

If the Core traits were designed (when you had the opportunity) with the same approach that you have with the DD trait, then we wouldn’t even have this kind of discussion because what we can’t get from DD, we’ll try and get it from the other trait line. However, there is no such choice from other trait line.

If you believe that the DD trait line is powerful enough, do you also believe the same way with Acrobatics? How about Shadow Arts?

With all the conditions, CC, and anti-stealth coming out from other professions, the design process that was conducted on the behalf of the Theif is unfair and imbalance.

If you maintain the belief that this EA is perfect where it is, then do us a favor and improve our other traits.

- Starting with restoring Feline Grace where it refunds 15 endurance on dodge.

- Reduce the cooldown of Shadowstep to 20s.

- Remove casting time from Sword #2 (Infiltrator’s Return ).

- Remove Reveal from Thief skills — if you need to, I’m ok with adding CD to stealth attacks (i.e. add 3s CD to Backstab).

- Add Shadow’s Refuge to grant Stability.

- Lastly, P/P Unload to have Ankle Shot and Ricochet as baseline part of the weaponskill.

I hope you find these reasonable tradeoffs.

Too much work, not enough paid hours, job’s stressful plus you got kids screaming you suck on the forums – I’ll just leave a note saying do it tomorrow (3 years later… the note is covered by another note saying the same thing) and do what makes me happy today, I guess, or maybe go help the gem store people out/HoT sales/marketing team.

I think that’s core philosophy.

While I haven’t played DrD, let alone the game for god knows how long now (end of LS 2?), reading the DrD traits did make it seem like it was the most coherent line out of all the other thief lines…

In all honesty guys, everyone that’s been rattled lately, and everyone that’s been pouring out suggestion after suggestion, I highly doubt that we will see core changes for BWE3 or even before/at release of HoT. The earliest possible balance patch would be a couple (3-4) months after the release of HoT, and even then I think it will be geared more around elite specs. – ( This is just speculation of course, but it would make sense, since the elite specs, given enough actual play time will show their unbalances ) – And you can also tell that nothing this “grand” will happen because they would have likely announced it as “The Big Core Rework”, followed by a couple of weeks of PoI (or w/e the new stuff is called) with of course a couple breaks/holidays in between, and around next year summer would be the earliest that they actually implement it.

It’s of course admiring how much you guys care about the game/class… If that makes you feel any better.

Passing back to say “he who knows his name” do yourself a favor and put trash traits next to EA if it’s not going to be a minor. If you really play base thief you will know why.

Yes. yes. yes.

ShadowSteps to 20 seconds! and RFI to 30-40, just a beautiful utility that is rarely used because of the stupid CD.
OP should be a detective cause he keeps asking the right questions.
Also, I am going to keep nagging about EA and BD until i get banned.

The cooldowns on a number of utility skills require a rethink. Given the sheer amount of reveals out there It becomes harder and harder to justify SR on a 60 second cooldown on ones utility bar. Shadowsteps two stun breaks and 3 condition cleanses every 60 seconds is underwhelming.

SR should be 30 tops for what it does.
Shadowstep 25 tops.
RFI 30 tops.

Zero Day.2594:

Too much work, not enough paid hours, job’s stressful plus you got kids screaming you suck on the forums – I’ll just leave a note saying do it tomorrow (3 years later… the note is covered by another note saying the same thing) and do what makes me happy today, I guess, or maybe go help the gem store people out/HoT sales/marketing team.

I think that’s core philosophy.

Disturbingly accurate.

Zero Day.2594:

Too much work, not enough paid hours, job’s stressful plus you got kids screaming you suck on the forums – I’ll just leave a note saying do it tomorrow (3 years later… the note is covered by another note saying the same thing) and do what makes me happy today, I guess, or maybe go help the gem store people out/HoT sales/marketing team.

I think that’s core philosophy.

---

While I haven’t played DrD, let alone the game for god knows how long now (end of LS 2?), reading the DrD traits did make it seem like it was the most coherent line out of all the other thief lines…

In all honesty guys, everyone that’s been rattled lately, and everyone that’s been pouring out suggestion after suggestion, I highly doubt that we will see core changes for BWE3 or even before/at release of HoT. The earliest possible balance patch would be a couple (3-4) months after the release of HoT, and even then I think it will be geared more around elite specs. – ( This is just speculation of course, but it would make sense, since the elite specs, given enough actual play time will show their unbalances ) – And you can also tell that nothing this “grand” will happen because they would have likely announced it as “The Big Core Rework”, followed by a couple of weeks of PoI (or w/e the new stuff is called) with of course a couple breaks/holidays in between, and around next year summer would be the earliest that they actually implement it.

It’s of course admiring how much you guys care about the game/class… If that makes you feel any better.

We can’t lose hope. I also think that we should not be turning away suggestions we don’t like. It doesn’t paint a good picture of us as the Thief community. As you say, everyone is pretty rattled…no one sees any positive change on the horizon…but we can’t give up…regardless of whether or not the devs come to read our suggestions, if we stop giving them our feedback, there will be NO chance of change. It’s probably a good idea to also stop talking about how bad we think they are at their jobs. It doesn’t help. We all know it doesn’t…so stop it.

GM trait SA line replacing CIS.

Assassins revenge damage 1800.

On being force revealed port immediately to person casting the reveal. Gain 25 stacks of might for 5 seconds. Apply 10 stacks of burning to target for 3 seconds. Gain stability for 2 seconds. Skill is unblockable. (range 1200)

There…all fixed.

I suppose my only issue is that Driven Fortitude is on the lower end of the average section. Some numbers:

*Endurance Regenerates at 5 per second, and a dodge requires 50 endurance. Thus, you get one dodge every 10 seconds.
*This gives Driven Fortitude a maximum base healing of 45.6 health per second, which isn’t that much.
*Factoring in additional endurance gain uses the following formula: 456 x (endurance gained) / (50 x recharge time). So, factoring in steal giving an additional dodge per second, this comes to 15 additional health per second from dodging.
*You can consider the 3 starting dodges as an additional 1,368 starting health.
*Thus, the baseline effect of Driven Fortitude is 1,368 additional starting health + 60.6 health per second.

That.. .isn’t a lot. Now, these numbers go up and down depending on how efficiently you dodge, the number of skill dodges you use, and how much endurance regeneration your build has. But just looking at the base healing you’ll get, it isn’t that good.

You can tell if this trait contributed to your win if your health drops below the amount of healing you received. Assuming a 15 second fight, you’ll receive a total of 2.2k healing. Unless your health drops below 2.2k, then Driven Fortitude didn’t contribute to your victory. Hence the issue: this trait only meaningfully contributes if you’re barely losing the fight.

I imagine this is what a lot of players intuitively see wrong with the daredevil traits. The daredevil would be leaps and bounds more powerful if we had a different master minor. Take any other trait in this line, swap it with Driven Fortitude, and our class becomes so much more powerful. The community is focused on Escapists Absolution because that is the most needed trait.

I’m hesitant to actually suggest any of these changes, though. For one, I fear what kind of monster we’ll make of we can take Escapists Absolution and Impacting Disruption at the same time. For two, I keep thinking that, with additional balance changes coming to the class, our need for condition cleansing will be reduced. Third, while the base healing of Driven Fortitude is really low for any “average” build, at maximum dodging it can be quite a bit stronger (I.E. spamming skill evades adds 114, trickery steal recharge add 7.8 on steal, vigor adds another 11, withdraw adds 25, totaling for 218 health per second). 218 health per second , by contrast, is quite significant healing, and an evade spamming build will actually love it.

But hey, I don’t PVP, so I can only math so hard in a void.

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

Zero Day.2594:

Too much work, not enough paid hours, job’s stressful plus you got kids screaming you suck on the forums – I’ll just leave a note saying do it tomorrow (3 years later… the note is covered by another note saying the same thing) and do what makes me happy today, I guess, or maybe go help the gem store people out/HoT sales/marketing team.

I think that’s core philosophy.

---

While I haven’t played DrD, let alone the game for god knows how long now (end of LS 2?), reading the DrD traits did make it seem like it was the most coherent line out of all the other thief lines…

In all honesty guys, everyone that’s been rattled lately, and everyone that’s been pouring out suggestion after suggestion, I highly doubt that we will see core changes for BWE3 or even before/at release of HoT. The earliest possible balance patch would be a couple (3-4) months after the release of HoT, and even then I think it will be geared more around elite specs. – ( This is just speculation of course, but it would make sense, since the elite specs, given enough actual play time will show their unbalances ) – And you can also tell that nothing this “grand” will happen because they would have likely announced it as “The Big Core Rework”, followed by a couple of weeks of PoI (or w/e the new stuff is called) with of course a couple breaks/holidays in between, and around next year summer would be the earliest that they actually implement it.

It’s of course admiring how much you guys care about the game/class… If that makes you feel any better.

We can’t lose hope. I also think that we should not be turning away suggestions we don’t like. It doesn’t paint a good picture of us as the Thief community. As you say, everyone is pretty rattled…no one sees any positive change on the horizon…but we can’t give up…regardless of whether or not the devs come to read our suggestions, if we stop giving them our feedback, there will be NO chance of change. It’s probably a good idea to also stop talking about how bad we think they are at their jobs. It doesn’t help. We all know it doesn’t…so stop it.

Exactly this. Blaming ANet doesn’t solve anything, while giving constructive feedback might solve something.

As by Design Philosophies… I’d consider what Karl “classification” said in the context of which identity they gave each core specialization.

For example, on yours about Critical Strikes. It is a trait line that focuses on “improving” critical chance/damage benefits for the Thief, so keeping in mind that it is a purely offensive trait line:

Adept: There isn’t any survivability, but I’d say there is utility on the Signet trait: it adds to one skill type Access to might and a reduced recharge. (If it’s good or under powered is another talk).

Master: Here, I’d say that both Sundering Strikes and Ankle shots are a mix of damage and utility. Ankle Shots we can even say it helps survivability because it cripples the enemy, so you can get away more safely, as well as getting onto them. Sundering Strikes is more of a soft party buff, as everyone would benefit from the vulnerability. (Again, if traits are underpowered or good, is another topic).

Grandmaster: There we have a raw surivivability trait and two “damage” traits. If No Quarter Fury+Ferocity group interaction wasn’t nerfed, I’d even say it has group utility (as a buff).

It depends on how you look at things and if you agree with their Philosophies. I think that Critical Strikes needs some work, as well as Acrobatics but they both accomplish “at some extent” what Karl talked about. That’s what I like to think at least.

Poliator.7021:

For example, on yours about Critical Strikes. It is a trait line that focuses on “improving” critical chance/damage benefits for the Thief, so keeping in mind that it is a purely offensive trait line:

So what’s Invigorating Precision doing in this trait line if it is “purely” an offensive line?

Adept: There isn’t any survivability, but I’d say there is utility on the Signet trait: it adds to one skill type Access to might and a reduced recharge. (If it’s good or under powered is another talk).

Adding Might is not utility, that’s damage. Adding Stability, removing cripple, and stun break are utilities.

Master: Here, I’d say that both Sundering Strikes and Ankle shots are a mix of damage and utility. Ankle Shots we can even say it helps survivability because it cripples the enemy, so you can get away more safely, as well as getting onto them. Sundering Strikes is more of a soft party buff, as everyone would benefit from the vulnerability. (Again, if traits are underpowered or good, is another topic).

You have an odd way of defining what survivability is. Protection and healing are considered survival skills, not cripple. Sundering Strikes doesn’t remove conditions nor replenish Initiative nor refund endurance…so no, it’s not a utility skill.

Grandmaster: There we have a raw surivivability trait and two “damage” traits. If No Quarter Fury+Ferocity group interaction wasn’t nerfed, I’d even say it has group utility (as a buff).

Buffs are not utility, they are either damage or survival.

As an example of a group utility skill, take a look at “Shake it Off!”/“Shug it off!”

It depends on how you look at things and if you agree with their Philosophies.

I’m sorry but I don’t agree with your perspective.

I think that Critical Strikes needs some work, as well as Acrobatics but they both accomplish “at some extent” what Karl talked about. That’s what I like to think at least.

No they don’t. As I have listed above, this design philosophy sounds more like an excuse than a rule.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Poliator.7021:

For example, on yours about Critical Strikes. It is a trait line that focuses on “improving” critical chance/damage benefits for the Thief, so keeping in mind that it is a purely offensive trait line:

So what’s Invigorating Precision doing in this trait line if it is “purely” an offensive line?

Adept: There isn’t any survivability, but I’d say there is utility on the Signet trait: it adds to one skill type Access to might and a reduced recharge. (If it’s good or under powered is another talk).

Adding Might is not utility, that’s damage. Adding Stability, removing cripple, and stun break are utilities.

Master: Here, I’d say that both Sundering Strikes and Ankle shots are a mix of damage and utility. Ankle Shots we can even say it helps survivability because it cripples the enemy, so you can get away more safely, as well as getting onto them. Sundering Strikes is more of a soft party buff, as everyone would benefit from the vulnerability. (Again, if traits are underpowered or good, is another topic).

You have an odd way of defining what survivability is. Protection and healing are considered survival skills, not cripple. Sundering Strikes doesn’t remove conditions nor replenish Initiative nor refund endurance…so no, it’s not a utility skill.

Grandmaster: There we have a raw surivivability trait and two “damage” traits. If No Quarter Fury+Ferocity group interaction wasn’t nerfed, I’d even say it has group utility (as a buff).

Buffs are not utility, they are either damage or survival.

As an example of a group utility skill, take a look at “Shake it Off!”/“Shug it off!”

It depends on how you look at things and if you agree with their Philosophies.

I’m sorry but I don’t agree with your perspective.

I think that Critical Strikes needs some work, as well as Acrobatics but they both accomplish “at some extent” what Karl talked about. That’s what I like to think at least.

No they don’t. As I have listed above, this design philosophy sounds more like an excuse than a rule.

Well Vincent you were a little harsh with Poliator, but I must admit that your critics are on point.

We tend to confuse Utility/ Damage and Survival a lot. I believe one buff from a specific category can help in the other.

By that I mean, that I think inflicting Cripple can help me Survive a great deal, even though Regen and Protection are the true life savers.

When it comes to designing traits, it’s truly crucial to understand the difference between Utility Damage and Survival. Vincent made good examples.

But we should focus back on Escapist’s Absolution…. please.

Kocoff.7582:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Poliator.7021:

For example, on yours about Critical Strikes. It is a trait line that focuses on “improving” critical chance/damage benefits for the Thief, so keeping in mind that it is a purely offensive trait line:

So what’s Invigorating Precision doing in this trait line if it is “purely” an offensive line?

Adept: There isn’t any survivability, but I’d say there is utility on the Signet trait: it adds to one skill type Access to might and a reduced recharge. (If it’s good or under powered is another talk).

Adding Might is not utility, that’s damage. Adding Stability, removing cripple, and stun break are utilities.

Master: Here, I’d say that both Sundering Strikes and Ankle shots are a mix of damage and utility. Ankle Shots we can even say it helps survivability because it cripples the enemy, so you can get away more safely, as well as getting onto them. Sundering Strikes is more of a soft party buff, as everyone would benefit from the vulnerability. (Again, if traits are underpowered or good, is another topic).

You have an odd way of defining what survivability is. Protection and healing are considered survival skills, not cripple. Sundering Strikes doesn’t remove conditions nor replenish Initiative nor refund endurance…so no, it’s not a utility skill.

Grandmaster: There we have a raw surivivability trait and two “damage” traits. If No Quarter Fury+Ferocity group interaction wasn’t nerfed, I’d even say it has group utility (as a buff).

Buffs are not utility, they are either damage or survival.

As an example of a group utility skill, take a look at “Shake it Off!”/“Shug it off!”

It depends on how you look at things and if you agree with their Philosophies.

I’m sorry but I don’t agree with your perspective.

I think that Critical Strikes needs some work, as well as Acrobatics but they both accomplish “at some extent” what Karl talked about. That’s what I like to think at least.

No they don’t. As I have listed above, this design philosophy sounds more like an excuse than a rule.

Well Vincent you were a little harsh with Poliator, but I must admit that your critics are on point.

I tried to be gentle in defending my premise, however changing the perspective doesn’t alway change the facts, just the interpretation.

We tend to confuse Utility/ Damage and Survival a lot. I believe one buff from a specific category can help in the other.

By that I mean, that I think inflicting Cripple can help me Survive a great deal, even though Regen and Protection are the true life savers.

So is running away and logging out of the game, but that is not what we’re talking about.

When it comes to designing traits, it’s truly crucial to understand the difference between Utility Damage and Survival. Vincent made good examples.

But we should focus back on Escapist’s Absolution…. please.

Yes, please.

Ghotistyx.6942:

I’m glad OP had a severe lack of statement comprehension from Karl’s explanation. OP was so gracious as to misinterpret the intent that they made a post about it. Better yet, they cherry picked examples from a completely unrelated trait line to try and prove an erroneous point.

Thanks

His explanation was acknowledged as part of one of my questions that you obviously skimmed to make such an unproductive and unrelated comment.

Care to explain how the Core trait lines are not related to this design philosophy? As far as the design decisions that were made on the DD spec that they follow such belief, yet failed to incorporate this belief to other trait lines.

My question is why?

Why must there be two types of philosophy when it comes to the Core vs Elite traits?

You, sir, are the very example of what you have described in your post.

Thank you for your contribution.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

- Starting with restoring Feline Grace where it refunds 15 endurance on dodge.

- Reduce the cooldown of Shadowstep to 20s.

- Remove casting time from Sword #2 (Infiltrator’s Return ).

- Remove Reveal from Thief skills — if you need to, I’m ok with adding CD to stealth attacks (i.e. add 3s CD to Backstab).

- Add Shadow’s Refuge to grant Stability.

- Lastly, P/P Unload to have Ankle Shot and Ricochet as baseline part of the weaponskill.

I hope you find these reasonable tradeoffs.

• @ Feline Grace: Let it refund 15 endurance on a successful dodge (not evade!). It was too strong pre patch and the successful-dodge-part gives it a more skill based and active defense.

• @ Shadowstep: 20s? For port, port back + condi clear? if you look at blink (30s, only port) or lightning flash (30s, port and dmg), 30-35s seems better. It’s an often used ability though and i’d ratherhave underused abilities (Roll for initiative for example) get buffed

• @ Infiltrator’s Return: remove the cast time, but it shouldn’t be activateable if youre disabled, similar to mesmers torch #4

• @ Reveal: don’t like that suggestion, after all every single class gets revealed while attacking out of stealth. other classes reveal skills should only make you visible though, while still allowing you to gain the boni from stealth (apart from the actual invisibility)

• @ SR: why exactly Stability? what would you gain from that? I’d rather get protection or resistance for 1s each pulse

• @ Unload: Nothing wrong with that, D/D #3,#4+#5 and P/P need a rework though anyway (even though for C&D it would suffice to lower the dmg a little bit while reducing the ini to 5 and giving it a small radius blind)

Zero Day.2594:

Too much work, not enough paid hours, job’s stressful plus you got kids screaming you suck on the forums

I highly doubt that we will see core changes for BWE3 or even before/at release of HoT.

This. Reroll or Alt+F4.

I’m kittened off that my class that I sunk so much money and time into is pretty much useless now, but I’m not going to bash anyone for it. It wont get it fixed faster.

Tarkan.5609:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

- Starting with restoring Feline Grace where it refunds 15 endurance on dodge.

- Reduce the cooldown of Shadowstep to 20s.

- Remove casting time from Sword #2 (Infiltrator’s Return ).

- Remove Reveal from Thief skills — if you need to, I’m ok with adding CD to stealth attacks (i.e. add 3s CD to Backstab).

- Add Shadow’s Refuge to grant Stability.

- Lastly, P/P Unload to have Ankle Shot and Ricochet as baseline part of the weaponskill.

I hope you find these reasonable tradeoffs.

• @ Feline Grace: Let it refund 15 endurance on a successful dodge (not evade!). It was too strong pre patch and the successful-dodge-part gives it a more skill based and active defense.

• @ Shadowstep: 20s? For port, port back + condi clear? if you look at blink (30s, only port) or lightning flash (30s, port and dmg), 30-35s seems better. It’s an often used ability though and i’d ratherhave underused abilities (Roll for initiative for example) get buffed

• @ Infiltrator’s Return: remove the cast time, but it shouldn’t be activateable if youre disabled, similar to mesmers torch #4

• @ Reveal: don’t like that suggestion, after all every single class gets revealed while attacking out of stealth. other classes reveal skills should only make you visible though, while still allowing you to gain the boni from stealth (apart from the actual invisibility)

• @ SR: why exactly Stability? what would you gain from that? I’d rather get protection or resistance for 1s each pulse

• @ Unload: Nothing wrong with that, D/D #3,#4+#5 and P/P need a rework though anyway (even though for C&D it would suffice to lower the dmg a little bit while reducing the ini to 5 and giving it a small radius blind)

@ Feline Grace, we cannot revert it back to its original. I have to say, S/D Acro was crushing a lot of profession in Conquest. Something between 20 end and what it currently give should be reasonable. just a small buff, or make buff Vigor.

@Shadowstep, I think i said ealier Shadowstep 20 sec being fine.. I stand corrected, 30 seconds should be lowest. Vincent ! you were against my Bandit’s defense back to 10 but you want Shadowstep down to 20 seconds :p. come on bruv.

@Infiltrator’s Return: I approve this message.

@Tarkan, If Shadow Refuge gets stability, you could be immune from those Knockbacks, fears and taunt that make you waste your precious life saver. So I think it’s important.

@ Unload, I agree with Vince, disagree with Tarkan. P/P needs to be restore and Ankleshot is truly terrible.

Tarkan.5609:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

- Starting with restoring Feline Grace where it refunds 15 endurance on dodge.

- Reduce the cooldown of Shadowstep to 20s.

- Remove casting time from Sword #2 (Infiltrator’s Return ).

- Remove Reveal from Thief skills — if you need to, I’m ok with adding CD to stealth attacks (i.e. add 3s CD to Backstab).

- Add Shadow’s Refuge to grant Stability.

- Lastly, P/P Unload to have Ankle Shot and Ricochet as baseline part of the weaponskill.

I hope you find these reasonable tradeoffs.

• @ Feline Grace: Let it refund 15 endurance on a successful dodge (not evade!). It was too strong pre patch and the successful-dodge-part gives it a more skill based and active defense.

I agree that it was too strong pre-patch within the pre-patch meta. However, looking at the upcoming meta from HoT, this needs to be reverted back since this has severely crippled the Thief’s survivability.

Just look at the Dragonhunter, despite its name, the skills the Guardian gets from this trait has too much survivability on top of a lot of condition damage. Compare that to what we get from DD, we have to successfully evade, not dodge, to get something out of the trait.

The hoops that we have to jump into are unfair and unnecessary while other professions get survivability even when just pressing random keys.

• @ Shadowstep: 20s? For port, port back + condi clear? if you look at blink (30s, only port) or lightning flash (30s, port and dmg), 30-35s seems better. It’s an often used ability though and i’d ratherhave underused abilities (Roll for initiative for example) get buffed

Those professions have other ways to cleanse conditions, Thieves do not. Steal is approx. 21s CD and this utility skill simply matches the shadowstep capability of Steal.

Again, with professions focusing on Chill this coming meta, Shadowstep needs its CD reduced to 20s — or some odd number between 20 and 25 but not 25 or over.

• @ Infiltrator’s Return: remove the cast time, but it shouldn’t be activateable if youre disabled, similar to mesmers torch #4

Again, the purpose of the nerf on Sword #2 was based on the pre-patch meta that is no longer relevant to the upcoming meta. If I can use Steal while disabled, it makes no sense why I can’t activate Sword #2’s return.

• @ Reveal: don’t like that suggestion, after all every single class gets revealed while attacking out of stealth. other classes reveal skills should only make you visible though, while still allowing you to gain the boni from stealth (apart from the actual invisibility)

This countermeasure should not been part of the Thief’s skill. This should be part of the other profession’s skills. If they want to counter stealth, then they should bring this skill — Thief shouldn’t be punishing themselves for using their mechanic. It needs to be removed from the Thief’s skills and keep Revealed debuff on non-Thieves. Other professions are not master of the shadows after all.

• @ SR: why exactly Stability? what would you gain from that? I’d rather get protection or resistance for 1s each pulse

Ever gotten knocked out of SR before? That’s why.

We shouldn’t be forced to waste endurance by dodging inside SR, it is called “refuge” for a reason thus it needs to grant refuge as it should.

• @ Unload: Nothing wrong with that, D/D #3,#4+#5 and P/P need a rework though anyway (even though for C&D it would suffice to lower the dmg a little bit while reducing the ini to 5 and giving it a small radius blind)

Normally I would disagree with blind on CnD, but at this point, I would agree with anything that will improve the Thief experience post-HoT release.

Kocoff.7582:

@Shadowstep, I think i said ealier Shadowstep 20 sec being fine.. I stand corrected, 30 seconds should be lowest. Vincent ! you were against my Bandit’s defense back to 10 but you want Shadowstep down to 20 seconds :p. come on bruv.

My opinion about BD was before the Engi’s reveal. After the reveal, I agree with anything that will improve the Thief’s experience which includes the BD’s CD to 10s.

Opinion changes with new facts.

If Escapist’s Absolution becomes baseline it would really help us out, and put an end to the “chicken” Thief as we know it. However it would be too drastic and the QQ from outside won’t stop whatsoever.

I suggest EA to be minor, but for the baseline skill, I suggest it revolves around a Resistance boon like I read earlier today. Resistance upon leaving Stealth, Resistance upon criting on a reasonable ICD or even a Resistance boon when receiving 3 conditions or more.

I think this boon is made for us.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Tarkan.5609:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

- Starting with restoring Feline Grace where it refunds 15 endurance on dodge.

- Reduce the cooldown of Shadowstep to 20s.

- Remove casting time from Sword #2 (Infiltrator’s Return ).

- Remove Reveal from Thief skills — if you need to, I’m ok with adding CD to stealth attacks (i.e. add 3s CD to Backstab).

- Add Shadow’s Refuge to grant Stability.

- Lastly, P/P Unload to have Ankle Shot and Ricochet as baseline part of the weaponskill.

I hope you find these reasonable tradeoffs.

• @ Feline Grace: Let it refund 15 endurance on a successful dodge (not evade!). It was too strong pre patch and the successful-dodge-part gives it a more skill based and active defense.

I agree that it was too strong pre-patch within the pre-patch meta. However, looking at the upcoming meta from HoT, this needs to be reverted back since this has severely crippled the Thief’s survivability.

Just look at the Dragonhunter, despite its name, the skills the Guardian gets from this trait has too much survivability on top of a lot of condition damage. Compare that to what we get from DD, we have to successfully evade, not dodge, to get something out of the trait.

The hoops that we have to jump into are unfair and unnecessary while other professions get survivability even when just pressing random keys.

As a Thief, we have a lot of traits related to dodges.
Making these traits skillful to make use of ensures to not make these combinations op.
If you get endurance on any dodge, I believe it should be 10, not 15.

• @ Shadowstep: 20s? For port, port back + condi clear? if you look at blink (30s, only port) or lightning flash (30s, port and dmg), 30-35s seems better. It’s an often used ability though and i’d ratherhave underused abilities (Roll for initiative for example) get buffed

Those professions have other ways to cleanse conditions, Thieves do not. Steal is approx. 21s CD and this utility skill simply matches the shadowstep capability of Steal.

Again, with professions focusing on Chill this coming meta, Shadowstep needs its CD reduced to 20s — or some odd number between 20 and 25 but not 25 or over.

Our lack of condi remove should not be fixed by a skill that also acts as a double stunbreak and 1200 range port.
These port skills (also for example Judge’s Intervention) have different upsides and therefore different CD’s, ours is one out of the following:

• Blink: 1200 range port (30s)
• Judge’s Intervention: 1200 range port, burning, dmg, requires target (30s)
• Flesh Worm: 1200 range port, life force, deals minor dmg over time, needs setting up, killable (40s)
• Lightning Flash: 900 range port, dmg (40s)
• Shadow Step: 1200 range port + port back within 10s, on that one 3 condi clear
  I think our Shadow Step shouldn’t be 20s as it would be lower than any other port, while offering way more than they do. You can definitely see the way they decided the CD’s of the ports, but as our port requires porting back for maximum payoff I think 30s or 35s would be apropriate.

• @ Infiltrator’s Return: remove the cast time, but it shouldn’t be activateable if youre disabled, similar to mesmers torch #4

Again, the purpose of the nerf on Sword #2 was based on the pre-patch meta that is no longer relevant to the upcoming meta. If I can use Steal while disabled, it makes no sense why I can’t activate Sword #2’s return.

because steal has a CD
Sword #2 doesn’t. Would almost be like a free porting stunbreak, no chance of ever getting a Hammer stun off on a thief no matter how bad he plays (which is imbalanced).

• @ Reveal: don’t like that suggestion, after all every single class gets revealed while attacking out of stealth. other classes reveal skills should only make you visible though, while still allowing you to gain the boni from stealth (apart from the actual invisibility)

This countermeasure should not been part of the Thief’s skill. This should be part of the other profession’s skills. If they want to counter stealth, then they should bring this skill — Thief shouldn’t be punishing themselves for using their mechanic. It needs to be removed from the Thief’s skills and keep Revealed debuff on non-Thieves. Other professions are not master of the shadows after all.

Revealed is no part of any skill, but rather a part of the mechanic. Giving BS a CD wouldn’t allow you to use it multiple times though, if someone dodges BS a CD wouldn’t be better than the revealed mechanic currently.
Which is, imo, not even bad. Only all the revealed from other classes make stealth moreless a gamble against engineers and in WvW with stealth traps.

• @ SR: why exactly Stability? what would you gain from that? I’d rather get protection or resistance for 1s each pulse

Ever gotten knocked out of SR before? That’s why.

We shouldn’t be forced to waste endurance by dodging inside SR, it is called “refuge” for a reason thus it needs to grant refuge as it should.

Knicking people out of SR is a good thing though imo, allowing for some counterplay. After all, they have saved up their knockback for that reason alone (probably).
The Stability should only last 3-4s though and be one stack, if that ever gets implemented (which i doubt).

• @ Unload: Nothing wrong with that, D/D #3,#4+#5 and P/P need a rework though anyway (even though for C&D it would suffice to lower the dmg a little bit while reducing the ini to 5 and giving it a small radius blind)

Normally I would disagree with blind on CnD, but at this point, I would agree with anything that will improve the Thief experience post-HoT release.

also @ Kocoff:
Only buffing Unload won’t change the overall viability of P/P in a PvP setting, unless thr conbo of taking Daredevil and Bounding Dodger proves viable.

Tarkan.5609:

As a Thief, we have a lot of traits related to dodges.
Making these traits skillful to make use of ensures to not make these combinations op.
If you get endurance on any dodge, I believe it should be 10, not 15.

Imagine if Warrior and Guardian has to actively use a skill or ability to survive, meaning all their passive healing and protection are active instead…that would make these profession a pain in the donkey to play. The player experience will go down the drain.

So if Thief has to rely on dodges to survive, there shouldn’t be a setback in their defense mechanic — that’s just design stupidity to spite the Thief profession for no reason.

By creating anti-stealth skills, Feline Grace needs to be restored.

Our lack of condi remove should not be fixed by a skill that also acts as a double stunbreak and 1200 range port.
These port skills (also for example Judge’s Intervention) have different upsides and therefore different CD’s, ours is one out of the following:

• Blink: 1200 range port (30s)
• Judge’s Intervention: 1200 range port, burning, dmg, requires target (30s)
• Flesh Worm: 1200 range port, life force, deals minor dmg over time, needs setting up, killable (40s)
• Lightning Flash: 900 range port, dmg (40s)
• Shadow Step: 1200 range port + port back within 10s, on that one 3 condi clear
  I think our Shadow Step shouldn’t be 20s as it would be lower than any other port, while offering way more than they do. You can definitely see the way they decided the CD’s of the ports, but as our port requires porting back for maximum payoff I think 30s or 35s would be apropriate.

You are looking at the port while I am looking at the cleanse. Shadow Step does no damage like Judge’s Intervention and Lightning Flash. Blink, IMO, shouldn’t be 30s either, but that’s for another topic.

So we agree that this skill is way overpriced that the cost needs to be reduced.

because steal has a CD
Sword #2 doesn’t. Would almost be like a free porting stunbreak, no chance of ever getting a Hammer stun off on a thief no matter how bad he plays (which is imbalanced).

Oh come on. Every Thieves knows that weapon skills have cooldowns albeit shared among the other skills. Also Sword #2 was never a stun break.

Revealed is no part of any skill, but rather a part of the mechanic.

Revealed is part of attack skills from stealth in addition to being knocked out of Shadow Refuge. These needs to be removed since it is no longer necessary with all the new anti-stealth skills that is going around. They can instead keep this on non-Thief professions.

Giving BS a CD wouldn’t allow you to use it multiple times though, if someone dodges BS a CD wouldn’t be better than the revealed mechanic currently.

The purpose of the CD is to prevent a CnD→BS→CnD→BS chain…it mildly forces the Thief to stay in stealth for at least 3 seconds before BS again.

Which is, imo, not even bad. Only all the revealed from other classes make stealth moreless a gamble against engineers and in WvW with stealth traps.

Thief skills shouldn’t be self-punishing…no other profession have skills that punishes themselves.

Knicking people out of SR is a good thing though imo, allowing for some counterplay. After all, they have saved up their knockback for that reason alone (probably).
The Stability should only last 3-4s though and be one stack, if that ever gets implemented (which i doubt).

One stack of Stability for 3s would suffice.

Knocking people out of SR is a counterplay, however, with the new anti-stealth, SR becomes a joke skill that provides neither Shadow nor Refuge.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Tarkan.5609:

As a Thief, we have a lot of traits related to dodges.
Making these traits skillful to make use of ensures to not make these combinations op.
If you get endurance on any dodge, I believe it should be 10, not 15.

Imagine if Warrior and Guardian has to actively use a skill or ability to survive, meaning all their passive healing and protection are active instead…that would make these profession a pain in the donkey to play. The player experience will go down the drain.

So if Thief has to rely on dodges to survive, there shouldn’t be a setback in their defense mechanic — that’s just design stupidity to spite the Thief profession for no reason.

By creating anti-stealth skills, Feline Grace needs to be restored.

let’s just agree to disagree here… imo 15 endurance flat would justify needing some skillful play, in yours it doesn’t. all good.

because steal has a CD
Sword #2 doesn’t. Would almost be like a free porting stunbreak, no chance of ever getting a Hammer stun off on a thief no matter how bad he plays (which is imbalanced).

Oh come on. Every Thieves knows that weapon skills have cooldowns albeit shared among the other skills. Also Sword #2 was never a stun break.

I never said it was. But making it – again – a skill that ports you back 1200 units and can be activated while stunned, it would be almost as good as a stunbreak. On a (in theory) kitten CD (even though that can’t be fully applied here you gotta accept that this is madness for any build involving melee stuns)

Giving BS a CD wouldn’t allow you to use it multiple times though, if someone dodges BS a CD wouldn’t be better than the revealed mechanic currently.

The purpose of the CD is to prevent a CnD->BS->CnD->BS chain…it mildly forces the Thief to stay in stealth for at least 3 seconds before BS again.

But it also prevents using BS for a second time while stealthed. Every time you C&D/BP+HS you only want one chance of hitting BS? I doubt that, for that it’s way too easy to miss (blind, dodge, invul, out of range,…)

Revealed is no part of any skill, but rather a part of the mechanic.

Revealed is part of attack skills from stealth in addition to being knocked out of Shadow Refuge. These needs to be removed since it is no longer necessary with all the new anti-stealth skills that is going around. They can instead keep this on non-Thief professions.

Which is, imo, not even bad. Only all the revealed from other classes make stealth moreless a gamble against engineers and in WvW with stealth traps.

Thief skills shouldn’t be self-punishing…no other profession have skills that punishes themselves.

As you said yourself before, a CD for BS would mean to prevent chaining BS+Stealth right after each other… same as Reveal currently, no self-punishing but rather balanced. Thats like saying the CD on an Eviscerate on a Warrior is just punishing him because it’s his class mechanic.
Problem with no Reveal is, that it would allow you to stealth, BS and immediately stealth again. Wait in stealth until the CD for BS is over and then go in again. Effectively perma stealth with short breaks for Burst, but no 3-4s being visible to other players.
That would mean you could just simply be invisible all day long while still dishing out incredible amounts of dmg (5-8k every 3s).
Repeating myself but whatever, reveal from other classes should only make you visible to them while you are still getting the stealth benefits, the only way to apply revealed should be by dealing dmg while in stealth.

Knicking people out of SR is a good thing though imo, allowing for some counterplay. After all, they have saved up their knockback for that reason alone (probably).
The Stability should only last 3-4s though and be one stack, if that ever gets implemented (which i doubt).

One stack of Stability for 3s would suffice.

Knocking people out of SR is a counterplay, however, with the new anti-stealth, SR becomes a joke skill that provides neither Shadow nor Refuge.

alright with all the Reveal from other classes stability should actually be the case, i agree you convinced me.
Still rather be visible while stealthed instead of revealed when others use their Lock On trait on me :<

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Imagine if Warrior and Guardian has to actively use a skill or ability to survive, meaning all their passive healing and protection are active instead…that would make these profession a pain in the donkey to play. The player experience will go down the drain.

So if Thief has to rely on dodges to survive, there shouldn’t be a setback in their defense mechanic — that’s just design stupidity to spite the Thief profession for no reason.

By creating anti-stealth skills, Feline Grace needs to be restored.

Thief skills shouldn’t be self-punishing…no other profession have skills that punishes themselves.

Knocking people out of SR is a counterplay, however, with the new anti-stealth, SR becomes a joke skill that provides neither Shadow nor Refuge.

These are all great points. Thief’s riddled with skills that are self punishing, even Steal is useless in some of the more difficult PvE content because you need to stay at range. No other profession’s mechanics are outright useless in some encounters.

Since people complain about stealth making thieves too hard to fight in sPvP, restore feline grace and let us be a more nimble combatant than the 1 extra dodge DrD is getting.

Tarkan.5609:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Imagine if Warrior and Guardian has to actively use a skill or ability to survive, meaning all their passive healing and protection are active instead…that would make these profession a pain in the donkey to play. The player experience will go down the drain.

So if Thief has to rely on dodges to survive, there shouldn’t be a setback in their defense mechanic — that’s just design stupidity to spite the Thief profession for no reason.

By creating anti-stealth skills, Feline Grace needs to be restored.

let’s just agree to disagree here… imo 15 endurance flat would justify needing some skillful play, in yours it doesn’t. all good.

Feline Grace was a perfect defense alternative to stealth, it needs to be restored.

I never said it was. But making it – again – a skill that ports you back 1200 units and can be activated while stunned, it would be almost as good as a stunbreak.

Are you then telling me that a 21s Steal should not happen either because it functions exactly the same way?

On a (in theory) kitten CD (even though that can’t be fully applied here you gotta accept that this is madness for any build involving melee stuns)

It has to be.

Why Thief should be an easy target for melee stuns while other professions have multiple ways to get out of that situation?

But it also prevents using BS for a second time while stealthed. Every time you C&D/BP+HS you only want one chance of hitting BS? I doubt that, for that it’s way too easy to miss (blind, dodge, invul, out of range,…)

It doesn’t really matter at that point because you can still go back to stealth while BS is in CD instead of being punished by Revealed for the same duration.

Thief skills shouldn’t be self-punishing…no other profession have skills that punishes themselves.

As you said yourself before, a CD for BS would mean to prevent chaining BS+Stealth right after each other… same as Reveal currently, no self-punishing but rather balanced.

No. What Revealed does is not only prevents chaining BS but also deny the Thief its defensive mechanic — Revealed and CD are not the same.

Thats like saying the CD on an Eviscerate on a Warrior is just punishing him because it’s his class mechanic.

You’re wrong. Using the Warrior as an example, it’s like stripping Warrior naked after using Eviscerate denying them their defensive mechanic. If that happens to the Warrior, would you still think that Eviscerate is not punishing them?

Problem with no Reveal is, that it would allow you to stealth, BS and immediately stealth again. Wait in stealth until the CD for BS is over and then go in again. Effectively perma stealth with short breaks for Burst, but no 3-4s being visible to other players.

I never said that there should be no Revealed. What I said is to remove Revealed from Thief skills. If any professions want to counter stealth, then they have to use their own skills to do so — why is Thief being punish for using their skill by self-revealing?

That would mean you could just simply be invisible all day long while still dishing out incredible amounts of dmg (5-8k every 3s).

As we should. Isn’t that the reason why we’re seeing more and more anti-stealth skills? If those skill are really necessary, then they should be stapled on their build, but the Thief skills should be free of self-revealing.

Repeating myself but whatever, reveal from other classes should only make you visible to them while you are still getting the stealth benefits, the only way to apply revealed should be by dealing dmg while in stealth.

Self-revealing skills is a stupid way to address the issue. What they are doing now, giving anti-stealth skills to other professions is the way to do it. Thus, Revealed should be removed from the Thief’s skills and mechanic.

One stack of Stability for 3s would suffice.

Knocking people out of SR is a counterplay, however, with the new anti-stealth, SR becomes a joke skill that provides neither Shadow nor Refuge.

alright with all the Reveal from other classes stability should actually be the case, i agree you convinced me.
Still rather be visible while stealthed instead of revealed when others use their Lock On trait on me :<

Revealed is a bad design no matter how we look at it. It’s a sign of laziness and uncreative approach to balance.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Are you then telling me that a 21s Steal should not happen either because it functions exactly the same way?

Exactly.
1st: 21s CD, not a 5 second (5s gets censored?) theory CD
2nd: You need to target something – likely get some more dmg until then.
3rd: There actually needs something to be targeted.
4th: Steal is a really nice boonstrip + daze + provides (depending on the situation) a useful skill -> you can use it to interrupt your opponent or get out of there, but it has the downsides i just mentioned.

It has to be.

Why Thief should be an easy target for melee stuns while other professions have multiple ways to get out of that situation?

Usually melee stuns are easy to evade/blind though.
Hammer or Mace on Warrior have obvious animations, GS#5 on Guard as well… Giving the Thief a way out on EVERY SINGLE mistake can’t be the solution, even OP eles have a limited amount of stunbreaks.

But it also prevents using BS for a second time while stealthed. Every time you C&D/BP+HS you only want one chance of hitting BS? I doubt that, for that it’s way too easy to miss (blind, dodge, invul, out of range,…)

It doesn’t really matter at that point because you can still go back to stealth while BS is in CD instead of being punished by Revealed for the same duration.

Thief skills shouldn’t be self-punishing…no other profession have skills that punishes themselves.

As you said yourself before, a CD for BS would mean to prevent chaining BS+Stealth right after each other… same as Reveal currently, no self-punishing but rather balanced.

No. What Revealed does is not only prevents chaining BS but also deny the Thief its defensive mechanic — Revealed and CD are not the same.

Thats like saying the CD on an Eviscerate on a Warrior is just punishing him because it’s his class mechanic.

You’re wrong. Using the Warrior as an example, it’s like stripping Warrior naked after using Eviscerate denying them their defensive mechanic. If that happens to the Warrior, would you still think that Eviscerate is not punishing them?

Problem with no Reveal is, that it would allow you to stealth, BS and immediately stealth again. Wait in stealth until the CD for BS is over and then go in again. Effectively perma stealth with short breaks for Burst, but no 3-4s being visible to other players.

I never said that there should be no Revealed. What I said is to remove Revealed from Thief skills. If any professions want to counter stealth, then they have to use their own skills to do so — why is Thief being punish for using their skill by self-revealing?

That would mean you could just simply be invisible all day long while still dishing out incredible amounts of dmg (5-8k every 3s).

As we should. Isn’t that the reason why we’re seeing more and more anti-stealth skills? If those skill are really necessary, then they should be stapled on their build, but the Thief skills should be free of self-revealing.

• we are not naked when out of stealth. Dodges, interrupts, blinds, kiting with SB.
• Reveal only temporarily prevents the thief it’s defensive mechanic. Not permanently, and you gotta admit, Shadow Rejuvination and SE (better than pre change against condi builds, worse against direct damage builds) are too strong to be always up. Shadow Rejuvination gives you almost as much healing as Healing Signet for warrior after all, and everyone was complaining about that some time back.
• Stealth, Wait, Backstab, Repeat… sounds like an awesome playstyle, I’m rolling Warrior even that would be less one-sided and boring. perma stealth + burst dmg every 3s is just too strong in any PvP setting as opponents don’t see you. You have an insane tactical advantage, you can chose when to burst, you can move, outmanover the opponent, force CD’s.
• I don’t know what game mode you play but I rarely see an Sic ‘Em or Analyze going on. Stealth Gyro also won’t see too much use in WvW Solo Roaming or PvP I bet, the only thing is the occasional Lock On. Reveal on opponent’s skills is the worst kind of counterplay I have ever seen though, a mechanic as bad as this should be thrown out of the garbage bin along with it’s creator.
• Thief is “punished” (I’d call it balance) for using their skills because they are really strong. BS hits hard and can’t really be seen coming.

Tarkan.5609:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Are you then telling me that a 21s Steal should not happen either because it functions exactly the same way?

Exactly.
1st: 21s CD, not a 5 second (5s gets censored?) theory CD
2nd: You need to target something – likely get some more dmg until then.
3rd: There actually needs something to be targeted.
4th: Steal is a really nice boonstrip + daze + provides (depending on the situation) a useful skill -> you can use it to interrupt your opponent or get out of there, but it has the downsides i just mentioned.

Sword #2 is a weaker version of Steal. I don’t see the problem you’re having with it.

It has to be.

Why Thief should be an easy target for melee stuns while other professions have multiple ways to get out of that situation?

Usually melee stuns are easy to evade/blind though.
Hammer or Mace on Warrior have obvious animations, GS#5 on Guard as well… Giving the Thief a way out on EVERY SINGLE mistake can’t be the solution, even OP eles have a limited amount of stunbreaks.

I’m sorry but that is no longer the meta. I hardly see any stun-ham-mace Warrior anymore. Most are building around Longbow, banner, or shouts. Let’s focus on the relevant meta.

• we are not naked when out of stealth. Dodges, interrupts, blinds, kiting with SB.

Of course we are, that’s why Escapist Absolution needs to be baseline because Revealed denies Thief their defensive mechanic.

This shouldn’t be a problem if stealth doesn’t provide their defensive capability.

If they just increase our toughness, our vitality, and restore Feline Grace, we wouldn’t even rely on stealth for defense.

• Reveal only temporarily prevents the thief it’s defensive mechanic. Not permanently, and you gotta admit, Shadow Rejuvination and SE (better than pre change against condi builds, worse against direct damage builds) are too strong to be always up. Shadow Rejuvination gives you almost as much healing as Healing Signet for warrior after all, and everyone was complaining about that some time back.

“Too strong” base on what? Based on the current meta? I highly doubt that.

Keep in mind that Healing Signet requires no hoops for Warriors to jump into. Thieves get no passive healing — there’s always hoops to jump into.

• Stealth, Wait, Backstab, Repeat… sounds like an awesome playstyle, I’m rolling Warrior even that would be less one-sided and boring. perma stealth + burst dmg every 3s is just too strong in any PvP setting as opponents don’t see you. You have an insane tactical advantage, you can chose when to burst, you can move, outmanover the opponent, force CD’s.

That’s how it’s suppose to be. You speak as if the Thief aren’t allowed to do this. If the Warrior wants to prevent stealth, then they should bring their own anti-stealth skills — Thieves shouldn’t be self-revealing themselves.

• I don’t know what game mode you play but I rarely see an Sic ‘Em or Analyze going on. Stealth Gyro also won’t see too much use in WvW Solo Roaming or PvP I bet, the only thing is the occasional Lock On. Reveal on opponent’s skills is the worst kind of counterplay I have ever seen though, a mechanic as bad as this should be thrown out of the garbage bin along with it’s creator.

The gyro will definitely see play in sPvP only because it can both stealth and detect stealth which will be very useful in defending or capturing a node.

Reveal skills should be on the opponent’s skill bar, not on Thief skills.

• Thief is “punished” (I’d call it balance) for using their skills because they are really strong. BS hits hard and can’t really be seen coming.

Yes, BS hits hard against critters and that’s the only thing it can actually deal decent damage to. Against other professions? Wet noodles.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

His explanation was acknowledged as part of one of my questions that you obviously skimmed to make such an unproductive and unrelated comment.

Care to explain how the Core trait lines are not related to this design philosophy? As far as the design decisions that were made on the DD spec that they follow such belief, yet failed to incorporate this belief to other trait lines.

My question is why?

Why must there be two types of philosophy when it comes to the Core vs Elite traits?

You, sir, are the very example of what you have described in your post.

Thank you for your contribution.

Each trait line has its own individual design philosophy. Likewise, the trait lines combine to form the overall profession design. So then, it is not unreasonable to expect that different lines might use a different philosophy in their design.

Take Guardians and Dragonhunter for example. The Dragonhunter has concepts of Virtues, Longbow, and trapping (literally or conceptually). These 3 are not the same as Daredevil’s 3. Likewise, the design for daredevil is not the same as it was for critical strikes, nor for shadow arts. They’re different for a reason.

So that’s why I made a post equally as useful to a third party as OP’s. You’re welcome.

Ghotistyx.6942:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

His explanation was acknowledged as part of one of my questions that you obviously skimmed to make such an unproductive and unrelated comment.

Care to explain how the Core trait lines are not related to this design philosophy? As far as the design decisions that were made on the DD spec that they follow such belief, yet failed to incorporate this belief to other trait lines.

My question is why?

Why must there be two types of philosophy when it comes to the Core vs Elite traits?

You, sir, are the very example of what you have described in your post.

Thank you for your contribution.

Each trait line has its own individual design philosophy. Likewise, the trait lines combine to form the overall profession design. So then, it is not unreasonable to expect that different lines might use a different philosophy in their design.

That utterly made no sense.

The Design Philosophy in question is about their belief that there should be a choice between damage, survivability and utility.

So what in the world are you talking about?

Take Guardians and Dragonhunter for example. The Dragonhunter has concepts of Virtues, Longbow, and trapping (literally or conceptually). These 3 are not the same as Daredevil’s 3. Likewise, the design for daredevil is not the same as it was for critical strikes, nor for shadow arts. They’re different for a reason.

You’re arguing against a part of what I’ve posted instead of taking what I’ve posted as a whole — this is why you’re not making any sense.

So that’s why I made a post equally as useful to a third party as OP’s. You’re welcome.

Not.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

- Reduce the cooldown of Shadowstep to 20s.

I think this would be too strong. However, I do agree it should be reduced from the current 50 second cool down. Its cool down should be 40 seconds maximum, no less than 30.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

- Add Shadow’s Refuge to grant Stability.

I don’t think this is needed and would be a bit too strong. Getting knocked out/leaving the Shadow Refuge area early shouldn’t reveal you though. It should either just remove your current stealth(no reveal), or just simply cause you to miss some of its stealth pulses. Currently, getting knocked out of Shadow Refuge(getting revealed) not only negates the entire skill, it makes you worse off than if you didn’t use it at all. That is too much of a hard counter.

So…I was just thinking about an idea for Shadow Refuge…what if it was tuned to be used more aggressively, rather than for escape?

The idea is something like this:
Shadow Refuge reduces duration of revealed by 1s each second. Grants 1s of stealth each second. Grant 1s protection per second (so we don’t just get aoe’d to death instantly). Lasts 10s. 45 second CD.

In my mind, this gives the feel of diving in and out of stealth and assaulting enemies from where they least expect…I think it would be a pretty powerful area denial skill against single targets, but maybe it’s too strong?

Edit: apparently if I abbreviate 45 seconds it becomes kitten

I have an opinion on what weapon escapist’s absolution favors. I think it favor’s sword clearly, because of the extra evade frames you get from it.

Because it favor’s sword so much it’s BWE2 iteration just wasn’t very good on any other weapon set imo. Because condition management is so important in builds, I think this trait needs to be balanced in a way that it’s good on all weaponsets.

To me that means allowing for more condition removal in smaller increments of time, but not necessary more condition removal overall.

Something like “remove a condition everytime you evade for up to 3 conditions. Recharges every 7 seconds”

^^^

I think every traits favors a specific playstyle or weaponset. That’s the main purpose of a trait, it makes us choose. In our situation however, you make a point that condition management is real problem but EA isn’t really the solution if you want something for all playstyle.

I think 3 conditions every 7 seconds is a lot more OP than the current EA, and what you proposed still favors swords.

I think every time a trait mentions “on evade”, you know it favors Sword.
A piece of advice: if you want something to favor most playstyles, avoid the “on evade” mechanic.

It’s difficult to find a condi cleanse mechanic that fits every playstyle… the only one that i have in mind is the aggressive one:

Optimistic killer : “remove a condition when landing 5-10 hits” or
Poisoned Gift : " transfert 2 conditions upon successful stealing."

Sir Vincent III.1286:

That utterly made no sense.

The Design Philosophy in question is about their belief that there should be a choice between damage, survivability and utility.

So what in the world are you talking about?

Every line has its own design philosophy. The reasons daredevil is created the way it is, is not the same as why critical strikes or any other line is created. Not every line is going to have damage, survivability, and utility. Those three are extremely broad representations of daredevil only. Crit strikes is not necessarily going to be built with damage, survivability, and utility sub-lines in mind.

That’s the whole point.

Ghotistyx.6942:

Every line has its own design philosophy. The reasons daredevil is created the way it is, is not the same as why critical strikes or any other line is created. Not every line is going to have damage, survivability, and utility. Those three are extremely broad representations of daredevil only. Crit strikes is not necessarily going to be built with damage, survivability, and utility sub-lines in mind.

That’s the whole point.

I don’t agree that Crit Strikes can’t be built with the design philosophy in mind. They would just have to be implemented in a creative way…for example

on crit – gain health (defense)
on crit – regain initiative (utility)
on crit – apply harmful condition (offense)

Ghotistyx.6942:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

That utterly made no sense.

The Design Philosophy in question is about their belief that there should be a choice between damage, survivability and utility.

So what in the world are you talking about?

Every line has its own design philosophy. The reasons daredevil is created the way it is, is not the same as why critical strikes or any other line is created. Not every line is going to have damage, survivability, and utility. Those three are extremely broad representations of daredevil only. Crit strikes is not necessarily going to be built with damage, survivability, and utility sub-lines in mind.

That’s the whole point.

You keep saying the same things but you have not answered the question “why”?

I have already pointed out that there is a design difference, you’re just repeating what I’ve already said, but now you can’t even explain why you even bother posting what you posted.

You see, you get into this situation when you don’t read the whole post.

Have a great day.

Kocoff.7582:

^^^

I think every traits favors a specific playstyle or weaponset. That’s the main purpose of a trait, it makes us choose. In our situation however, you make a point that condition management is real problem but EA isn’t really the solution if you want something for all playstyle.

I think 3 conditions every 7 seconds is a lot more OP than the current EA, and what you proposed still favors swords.

I think every time a trait mentions “on evade”, you know it favors Sword.
A piece of advice: if you want something to favor most playstyles, avoid the “on evade” mechanic.

It’s difficult to find a condi cleanse mechanic that fits every playstyle… the only one that i have in mind is the aggressive one:

Optimistic killer : “remove a condition when landing 5-10 hits” or
Poisoned Gift : " transfert 2 conditions upon successful stealing."

The point of my suggestion was to make the trait more favorable to builds that Live in evade frames less than Sword thieves.

Not to redesign it completely.

You get more value out of less evades this way.

It would take 3 evades for a Dagger or Pistol build to remove 3 conditions With the current iteration of the trait. That means 3 dodgesdodges, then you have to wait 30 seconds to remove 3 more conditions. 3 evades for a sword thief means 1 dodge and 10-12 initiative. Which is 10 seconds to recover from.

So really to make the trait more fair the numbers being at 3 conditions over 10 seconds makes more sense than 7 seconds. Sword is of course still favored because it has more evade uptime, but it is worth taking on Dagger or pistol as well with the suggestion (because 1 condition 3 times over 30 seconds just isn’t worth it) .

Shockwave.1230:

Kocoff.7582:

^^^

I think every traits favors a specific playstyle or weaponset. That’s the main purpose of a trait, it makes us choose. In our situation however, you make a point that condition management is real problem but EA isn’t really the solution if you want something for all playstyle.

I think 3 conditions every 7 seconds is a lot more OP than the current EA, and what you proposed still favors swords.

I think every time a trait mentions “on evade”, you know it favors Sword.
A piece of advice: if you want something to favor most playstyles, avoid the “on evade” mechanic.

It’s difficult to find a condi cleanse mechanic that fits every playstyle… the only one that i have in mind is the aggressive one:

Optimistic killer : “remove a condition when landing 5-10 hits” or
Poisoned Gift : " transfert 2 conditions upon successful stealing."

The point of my suggestion was to make the trait more favorable to builds that Live in evade frames less than Sword thieves.

Not to redesign it completely.

You get more value out of less evades this way.

It would take 3 evades for a Dagger or Pistol build to remove 3 conditions With the current iteration of the trait. That means 3 dodgesdodges, then you have to wait 30 seconds to remove 3 more conditions. 3 evades for a sword thief means 1 dodge and 10-12 initiative. Which is 10 seconds to recover from.

So really to make the trait more fair the numbers being at 3 conditions over 10 seconds makes more sense than 7 seconds. Sword is of course still favored because it has more evade uptime, but it is worth taking on Dagger or pistol as well with the suggestion (because 1 condition 3 times over 30 seconds just isn’t worth it) .

What about a weaponset with no access to evade? What would you have P/P do?

This is why the EA needs to be baseline instead of a choice and by extension changed to “on dodge” instead of “on evade”.

The problem with “on evade” is that, if you are facing an opponent who simply applies conditions and watch you deteriorate, this “on evade” requirement to remove conditions is not well thought of. While you wait for an attack to evade from, you’re dying in the mean time, thus the value of the current iteration of EA is useless.

What I don’t understand is that, why do the Dev require that Thief has to rely from outside source to remove a condition? It just doesn’t make sense.

I know they wanted evade to be more rewarding, but this is not the right way of doing this. Same goes with the trait the heals on evade.

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

I don’t agree that Crit Strikes can’t be built with the design philosophy in mind. They would just have to be implemented in a creative way…for example

on crit – gain health (defense)
on crit – regain initiative (utility)
on crit – apply harmful condition (offense)

Oh, don’t hey me wrong. It absolutely could be designed with that in mind. It just hasn’t, as defined by the original post and other’s. I’m not here to argue that it can’t be designed similarly, I’m just here confirming that is not designed that way, just like it’s been explained before I got here. Why people are complaining about it is really beyond me. Each trait line of thief (and every class) is internally different from another. Even if you shoehorn all the traits into the three extremely broad and not well defined categories of Damage, Utility, and Survivability, you’ll end up with very uneven numbers for each line. One could then assume, each line individually is not based on Damage, Utility, and Survivability, but rather something else likely more specific to their respective lines.

This all comes back into some of the discussion that isn’t directly related to design and design philosophy. Traits like Escapists Absolution are naturally going to work differently with certain weapon sets, utility skills, and various other factors. It’s not really particularly useful in complaining about why it doesn’t work well with X weapon when they haven’t been designed to work well. What gives us power, is creating builds using the tools we have to either improve our strengths (if we’re good at evading, EA works very well), or shore up or weaknesses (if we already have removal on stealth and we don’t need more removal on evade, then maybe we could take a different, more useful trait instead. Or perhaps, we’re just that weak to conditions, we need to double up on traits, and even take a sigil or two to increase our capabilities).

This all may seem obvious, but it’s so easily forgotten.

Ghotistyx.6942:

blarghhrrkblah.3412:

I don’t agree that Crit Strikes can’t be built with the design philosophy in mind. They would just have to be implemented in a creative way…for example

on crit – gain health (defense)
on crit – regain initiative (utility)
on crit – apply harmful condition (offense)

Oh, don’t hey me wrong. It absolutely could be designed with that in mind. It just hasn’t, as defined by the original post and other’s. I’m not here to argue that it can’t be designed similarly, I’m just here confirming that is not designed that way, just like it’s been explained before I got here. Why people are complaining about it is really beyond me. Each trait line of thief (and every class) is internally different from another. Even if you shoehorn all the traits into the three extremely broad and not well defined categories of Damage, Utility, and Survivability, you’ll end up with very uneven numbers for each line. One could then assume, each line individually is not based on Damage, Utility, and Survivability, but rather something else likely more specific to their respective lines.

I would have agreed with you if they didn’t change Mug to not crit and heal instead or if they don’t have Invigorating Precision under Critical Strike — I would totally agree.

But the fact that these decisions were made to be what they are now, proves that they have attempted to follow the D/U/S philosophy but not to its full extent. Again, the question is why?

Would it be too bad that each trait has a D/U/S option?

This all comes back into some of the discussion that isn’t directly related to design and design philosophy. Traits like Escapists Absolution are naturally going to work differently with certain weapon sets, utility skills, and various other factors. It’s not really particularly useful in complaining about why it doesn’t work well with X weapon when they haven’t been designed to work well. What gives us power, is creating builds using the tools we have to either improve our strengths (if we’re good at evading, EA works very well), or shore up or weaknesses (if we already have removal on stealth and we don’t need more removal on evade, then maybe we could take a different, more useful trait instead. Or perhaps, we’re just that weak to conditions, we need to double up on traits, and even take a sigil or two to increase our capabilities).

Two things needs to happen; Either they change the effect triggered by EA on evade to trigger Resistance instead or change EA to dodge instead of evade.

Either way, it needs to be baseline because it’s something that Thief will need to survive the post-HoT meta.

I would really care one way or another if their had a D/S/U option in each trait line. I don’t really care that they don’t either.

Things like Invigorating precision and Mug are interesting. Mug still does damage in addition to healing, so even if it doesn’t crit, you could place it under damage or survivability. Invigoration precision heals, but only if you crit. Looking through the line, there seem to be 3 main ideas that don’t actually revolve around the D/S/U concept. As they stand, I wouldn’t consider them to follow that line of thought, but rather something closer to More crits, heavier crits, and utility based around crits. Even among those, they don’t fit perfectly, but better than D/S/U. Could the traits be reworked? Sure, but we’d need to see a drastic change from how they are currently. Practiced Tolerance was recently changed from granting vitality to granting ferocity. That’s changing what would be considered a survivability trait into a damage one. Ankle Shots and Sundering Strikes should both be considered Damage and Utility.

So what caused these traits to be as they are now? I think it’sa combination of giving lines distinct flavor, and keeping lines from being self sufficient. Critical Strikes is straightforward. Shadow Arts deals with Stealth. Acrobatics deals with mobility, etc. With this refocused attitude, if you want damage you go into the line that gives you more damage. If you want survivability grab the line that helps you survive. Within each trait line, you should expect different options to accomplish your goals. They already had this idea going before the specialization patch. Each line distinctly gave 2 sets of attribute points.

I’m the end, I believe it’s less about a D/S/U dichotomy, and more about getting the flavor you want. There are multiple ways to deal damage, survive, and provide utility, so grab the options that serve your ideals best.

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Shockwave.1230:

Kocoff.7582:

^^^

I think every traits favors a specific playstyle or weaponset. That’s the main purpose of a trait, it makes us choose. In our situation however, you make a point that condition management is real problem but EA isn’t really the solution if you want something for all playstyle.

I think 3 conditions every 7 seconds is a lot more OP than the current EA, and what you proposed still favors swords.

I think every time a trait mentions “on evade”, you know it favors Sword.
A piece of advice: if you want something to favor most playstyles, avoid the “on evade” mechanic.

It’s difficult to find a condi cleanse mechanic that fits every playstyle… the only one that i have in mind is the aggressive one:

Optimistic killer : “remove a condition when landing 5-10 hits” or
Poisoned Gift : " transfert 2 conditions upon successful stealing."

The point of my suggestion was to make the trait more favorable to builds that Live in evade frames less than Sword thieves.

Not to redesign it completely.

You get more value out of less evades this way.

It would take 3 evades for a Dagger or Pistol build to remove 3 conditions With the current iteration of the trait. That means 3 dodgesdodges, then you have to wait 30 seconds to remove 3 more conditions. 3 evades for a sword thief means 1 dodge and 10-12 initiative. Which is 10 seconds to recover from.

So really to make the trait more fair the numbers being at 3 conditions over 10 seconds makes more sense than 7 seconds. Sword is of course still favored because it has more evade uptime, but it is worth taking on Dagger or pistol as well with the suggestion (because 1 condition 3 times over 30 seconds just isn’t worth it) .

What about a weaponset with no access to evade? What would you have P/P do?

This is why the EA needs to be baseline instead of a choice and by extension changed to “on dodge” instead of “on evade”.

The problem with “on evade” is that, if you are facing an opponent who simply applies conditions and watch you deteriorate, this “on evade” requirement to remove conditions is not well thought of. While you wait for an attack to evade from, you’re dying in the mean time, thus the value of the current iteration of EA is useless.

What I don’t understand is that, why do the Dev require that Thief has to rely from outside source to remove a condition? It just doesn’t make sense.

I know they wanted evade to be more rewarding, but this is not the right way of doing this. Same goes with the trait the heals on evade.

Please reread, you’ve completely missed the point that my suggestion makes the trait viable for dagger and pistol mainhand while keeping it’s current flavor.