Guild Wars 2

Hello fellow thieves!

I’ll keep this short. Tired of everyone whinning about our stealth because of a rendering issue and our ability to use backstab a lot to blow people up? Now this is a long shot suggestion and I’d hate to have to go back to how other MMOs have done this but here it goes. Permastealth. I’m sure someone has brought this up before but here are my thoughts and hopefully we can keep this productive and not smash the hopes and dreams of thieves. I’m only level 73 and I freakin love my thief.

Stealth: Invisible to enemies. If received (10% of thief’s life) become revealed for 10 seconds! (basically, upon exiting stealth you have 10 second debuff)

Now you wonder how blinding powder, Shadow’s Refuge, Smoke Screen, and CnD work with this right? Well your utilities won’t work properly until the revealed debuff goes away. CnD I think is a great ability that right now allows me to land continous amounts of backstabs so before anet nerfs our damage I think they can put a 20-30 second cool down on the ability and only give us 6 seconds in stealth because it’s basically our “vanish”. BUT you should only use it after the 10 second debuff of revealed! Once again, you get revealed debuff for 10 seconds.

SR gives us like 10-12 seconds of stealth. After that ability ends and we come out of stealth, REVEALED 10s debuff. Smoke Screen is a combo field that gives stealth after a leap finisher. Once in stealth you get 6 seconds then REVEALED! Blinding powder works the same way, 6 seconds of stealth then you reappear and REVEALED! So thieves can not chain stealth. Give thieves the ability to move around as they need to get the surprise attack but limit the amount of time spent in stealth once combat begins.

And fix that rendering issue….

TLDR – Permastealth with a revealed debuff of 10 seconds and a cd on CnD for our temp vanish.

Please share any possible ideas we can modify stealth so that it doesn’t remove the thief’s ability of surprise or lead to nerfs to our backstab. Compromises are better than nerfs

-Fellow Thief

Why is this on the suggestion forum?

Daecollo.9578:

Why is this on the suggestion forum?

A suggestion for stealth because everyone is complaining about how we chain stealth and abuse backstab.

Am I in the wrong forum?

Permanent stealth is not the answer. Looking at specific skills like backstab, however, is, if there’s truly a problem.

Cinder.4865:

Permanent stealth is not the answer. Looking at specific skills like backstab, however, is, if there’s truly a problem.

I like backstab. The damage should not change but it shouldn’t be an ability that we can use on a continous basis. I was hoping to offer a suggestion for the use of it and not so much the damage aspect.

Then make suggestions to tweak it based on that.

How are you using backstab on a continuous basis?

You need to be stealthed, you need to be behind your enemy.

When you attack from stealth, you are immediately removed from stealth.

Seeing as stealth has a 3 second debuff when you come out of stealth…. what is happening for that 3 seconds of visibility?

The problem is what’s happening in that time frame. Usually, it’s a subpar enemy derping his way to being a fat cow ready to be slaughtered by yet another BS setup in 3 seconds, instead of a playa dropping the 2 shot hammer on your weak, exposed, unstealthed, missing his used-up Assassin Signet, and probably low on initiative Thief.

These players probably also stand in Engy’s grenade circles or wonder what that big barrel of TNT is sitting on the ground. Then complain about Engy dropping them from 100-0 in 4 seconds.

The solution is fixing the issues, not redesigning the entire mechanic to work around the issues.

Then let’s lay out the issues. Stealth rendering issue, able to stealth every 3 seconds to get a huge attack off that costs no resources( bigger if flanking ), stealth doesn’t break with damage, and stealth stomping.

bwillb.2165:

The solution is fixing the issues, not redesigning the entire mechanic to work around the issues.

The issue, is flawed class design, in every game I’ve played, when they combine stealth->huge burst->escapiblity it causes problems and generally results in the said class swinging between OP & UP, because it is essentially impossible to balance.

In GW2 it is worse than many other games as the class is made faceroll to play by teleports/leaps, multiple ways to enter stealth, limited need for getting behind someone (outside of a couple of skills, the damage difference the traits make is tiny compared to some games where you really need to focus on being behind the opponent), the best mobilty in the game and truly idiotic inititave system making skills spammble.

The class needs an entire re-think, which is amusing given I seem to remember the claim was they were going to design a thief class that avoided the issues they casue in other games, apparently that just meant removing permastealth, other than that, it is the same old, same old.

ArtemisEntreri.4138:

Then let’s lay out the issues. Stealth rendering issue, able to stealth every 3 seconds to get a huge attack off that costs no resources( bigger if flanking ), stealth doesn’t break with damage, and stealth stomping.

After the initial contact combo (CnD→Steal→Assassin Signet→BS), the Thief is now missing TWO of those. Steal and Signet are gone for 45 seconds.

So at this point, the Thief is not getting “huge attacks of that cost no resources”.

At best, 3 seconds later he tries to CnD you again. But unlike the initial contact where the timing might have surprised you, NOW you KNOW where he HAS to be (even if he’s stealthed). Why aren’t you dodging away? Using any mobility abilities you have to relocate yourself for the 3 seconds he’ll be stealthed? Moving like a crazy man to make it HARDER for him to get your back for the BS?

See, this is what makes it so hard for Thieves to listen to this tripe. Players simply want to be lazy and have Thieves served up on a platter for them to kill in 2 hits with no effort. Instead of making life hard for the Thief, they act like fat cows then cry when they lose.

It wouldn’t be acceptable with any other class. You can’t stand there with your mouth hanging open, not bothering to use your abilities/traits/sense to get away from a Warrior Bull Charge→100derps, then cry when he kills you in 3 seconds. You can’t stand slackjawed watching Engy grenades FLY THROUGH THE AIR and catch them with your mouth, then cry when he kills you in 3 seconds. You can’t stand amok with your thumb in while a Ranger peppers you with the machine gun and his pet chews you dead in 3 seconds, then cry. Etc etc etc.

But if you play pathetically, with little to no effort at thwarting your enemy Thief…. why that class is OP. Gots to be nerfed. /rolls eyes