Help with survival?

Help with survival?

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Posted by: Bloodsugar.2071

Bloodsugar.2071

I’ve always loved the Thief class, I’ve always loved being able to sneak, steal, and deal lots of damage. I’ve had an extremely rough time in the expansion with surviving as a thief. I’m pathetic at it. When I play my Necromancer, Warrior, or Revenant it seems like I am immortal and I can do whatever I want, but when I play my Thief I get one shot when I fail to dodge even a single attack. It’s extremely frustrating and I find myself constantly trying to go for the same unexplored part of the map over and over and over again just to be smitten down constantly.

I’ve tried a secondary set with +healing power and +Toughness, but then I don’t do any damage and I still die moderately fast.

Does anyone have any suggestions for me as far as builds, slotted skills, and weapons go?
I’m tired of being one-shot.

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Posted by: kash.9213

kash.9213

When I do my quartz run and when I need to go to HoT maps something close to the WvW staff build on metabattle has been the most fluid. I take scholar runes and I think a few valk pieces I’m too lazy to switch out of. You should be able to take or duck a hit pretty easily and you’ll do enough damage with few awkward pauses. Makes my dailies easier.

Kash
NSP

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Posted by: Alatar.7364

Alatar.7364

Try using Marauder stats.
Also what weapons do you use?
Pretty much any other weapon set than Staff/Shortbow will put you in a greater danger with little to now disengage options.

~I Aear cân ven na mar

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Posted by: Bloodsugar.2071

Bloodsugar.2071

I use mostly marauder stats with a few pieces only providing Power/crit/ precision for me. I run D/D and P/P most of the time for stealth and evasion

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Posted by: Bloodsugar.2071

Bloodsugar.2071

I have 12.5k hp and it seems like most things in the game hit me for about 7k. If two monsters attack me in HoT, I usually die before I can even react.

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Posted by: babazhook.6805

babazhook.6805

Try P/P with staff for AOE on staff using the evades. Build might or engage at range, close in and swap out with the might running.

Use this with IP out of the CS line . Try mixing in Valkyrie gear for a bit more health along with Daredevil runes. The Runes allow the Crit on dodge to help make up for what you may lose when you swap from marauders.

Go CS , DrD and Trickery first using IP as that IP will help fill your health. This works very well against Multiple targets while in Staff. You have to keep moving and using Blinds off the staff (or p/p) if in that while maintaining attacks. Ideally you use a mix and match of gear to push base precision up to ~60 so that with Fury it always around 80+ as this keeps that health coming in.

If you find this still not enough consider dropping Trickery and throwing in Acro so that you can trait up PR and Assassins reward. This will get more health coming in on every attack. Once you get used to how the build works you can try dropping the acro and going back to CS/DrD/Tr.

You want to rely more on dodges/evade than stealth. In PVE , if you are continually attacking the IP trait can generally ensure a nice amount of health coming back in to you. Withdraw should be your goto heal unless you want to be a bit more daring and go SOM. Using Trickster with the Withdraw heal ensures it on low cooldown and works well with RFI as a utility with SOA as a signet. The Withdraw and RFI can also be used as evades in a pinch and to open up range.

CV is also a good choice as a heal but if you are finding yourself getting one shot a lot its longer Cast time might see you not able to get it off in time and or just losing what you gained if you fail to dodge an incoming attack due to its longer cast.

The reason IP works in such a build is you can still focus on doing damage given IP is based upon the damage dished out and does not use the healing stat at all. The combo of staff and p/p work better with IP than most weapon sets due to Unload on P/P and the cleave and AOE of staff. (trying to set up a backstab with d/d for a singular attack is just not going to generate as much heal out of IP)

(edited by babazhook.6805)

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Posted by: Westenev.5289

Westenev.5289

I suggest taking Critical Strikes 323 over Tricker (guides will usually recommend 321, which might be optimal if you’re sure you can survive, not so great against trash). This allows you to forgo Signet of Malice for Channeled Vigor and still gain near full heals spamming staff 5 on trash.

Acrobatics is also a traitline to consider, especially if you want to use Bounded Leap over Unhindered Combattant. You’ll lose dps, but you’ll gain a lot of regeneration and heals.

Dagger/Pistol or Pistol/Pistol can be difficult to survive at times, because of its single target nature. Staff’s cleave makes it an all round easier weapon to use. Investing in a good shortbow can be a sub-paar but okayish ranged weapon, as the autoattack bounces across targets. This makes it perfect for a bloodlust sigil.

The most important thing for survival, I find, is to proactively kill everything before it can overwhelm you – meaning you need berserker/scholar stats to survive effectively. Failing that, retrait to Trickery/Shadow Arts/Daredevil and begin blasting/leaping through your smoke fields for permastealth.

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Posted by: Bloodsugar.2071

Bloodsugar.2071

How can you rely on evades so well when there is so many monsters that don’t have casts. I’ve seen tons of creatures in the Tangled Depths shoot lasers that instantly hit, or monsters that stealth and then unstealths with a sniper shot that instantly kills me. It’s like i’m doing all this fancy footwork for nothing just to be sitting on my ass throwing daggers 5 seconds later.

I will try the daredevil build. I think I have a few Valkyries I can swap for

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Posted by: Bloodsugar.2071

Bloodsugar.2071

this build works pretty well. I’m having a good time with it. Just did a 4v1 on PvE mobs. They still hit for 5k each but the damage is easy to get out while under constant evasion

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Posted by: Westenev.5289

Westenev.5289

You don’t just rely on evades, you rely on critical strikes to passively outheal what you’re hit. Channeled Vigor should make up the difference with a 20s burst heal. Don’t rely on this, however – your creed should be to kill everything before it kills you.

If you’re using p/p or d/p, this becomes a little more complicated as a daredevil, given how Deadly Arts and Trickery are borderline nessicary for these weapon sets.

I tend to find thief survives best while you’re actively hunting – if you’re having trouble, try to reset or lure mobs into a tight corner to cleave them. If you’re flat on your ass in 5 seconds flat, then you’ve likely just bitten off more than you can chew. If possible, try only to pull the number of enemies you feel comfortable fighting.

As for the mobs in TD – they get a little easier with time! Basically, there are places you “should go” and places you “shouldn’t”. Some places are more guarded than others, so it’s sometimes just better to dash through or outright avoid traversing a route. Basically, try to avoid fights where you’re going to get jumped!

(edited by Westenev.5289)

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Posted by: TwiceDead.1963

TwiceDead.1963

You may want to consider S/P. Pistol Whip will carry you through most engagements, and combined with CS healing trait, you’ll probably never go down. Sword has great cleave and survivability, a bit less bursty than staff and dagger though, and it’s stealth attack is rather bad, so you might as well forgo stealth entirely in favor of something else.

Engage, pistol-whip, disengage with a dodge. Pretty much a perma-evade cycle until the target is dead.

Kill the ranged opponents first though if you choose to do this, as they are what will be able to hurt you while you load up another stun from pistol-whip. Odds are that if you do enough damage you’ll be able to outheal the damage done to you because of Critical Strikes.

At the end of the day though, you can easily evade most attacks done to you without dodging, simply circle-strafe while hugging your target and they won’t be able to catch up due to the wind-up in their attack cycles. Unless they are ranged, kill them before they kill you.

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Posted by: Sifu.9745

Sifu.9745

I suggest you try a condi Thief: (Carrion)Power/Vitality/Condition. You don’t need crit for that extra maybe 10% increase in dmg.
Your weapon set is d/d + sb or p/d + sb. Take Venoms.
That way you will have way more health and Evasion then Power Thieves while only doing maybe 15% less dmg.

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Posted by: stone cold.8609

stone cold.8609

There are a couple approaches that I found worked for me.

A couple of things to keep in mind. Blinds, stuns, and evades help tremendously with survival. Bringing the damage is important for survival as a thief, so use the gear stats that have as much offense as you are comfortable with. Always try to keep attacking! Even after taking a big hit and low on health. Signet of malice passive (try to never activate it) is our one of our most sustainable heals as long as you do damage. It never leaves my bar in PvE, no matter condi or power build. Daredevil line is crucial to survival as well. Also I don’t rely on stealth for survival in PvE. It has it place for skips in group content, but that’s it for me. If you are getting shot from range, try leading with steal to negate the distance.

Power builds.
CS/Trick (or DA)/Daredevil: Staff/PP – Take dash. Take Invigorating precision for more heals on crits. Staff 4 gives you a long acting blind. So staff auto plus 4 liberally makes you almost invincible (as long as target not immune to blinds). PP unloads are almost a full heal and easily can give you 15+ stacks of might – great damage, heals. Try something like engage with steal, staff auto + 4, if things get too hot disengage with dash, switch to PP, couple of unloads to top of health and reposition, switch back to staff, steal to re-engage. I ran something like this with typical zerker stats in HoT for a long time with good success.

S/P is also worth looking at for skill 3 pistol whip’s stun. There is a root involved and a pause between skill that you have to manage. Skill 5 gives you a blind field, but at the cost of 6 ini I rarely use it since is starves my damage, and if you aren’t attacking, you aren’t healing!

Condi build
DA/Trick/Daredevil: DD/(DD, SB or PP) Take lotus training. Typical meta condi thief traits – caltrops on dodge, venom traits. This is my current favorite thief build. Very active play style, like nothing else I’ve tried in the game. Survival is based on evades (3 dodges, and dagger 3 lotus blossom spam) and condi damage (caltrops, venoms, bleeds, blinds). Feels crazy and out of control at first, but once you get the timing down, amazing damage and sustainability. Try something like this. Engage with steal, dodge, lotus blossom x 2, auto attack a few times, repeat. Always keep moving. If things get too hot, dodge away to lay down some caltrops and activate impaling lotus and give condis a chance to heal you a bit, switch to PP unload for some health and might (or SB 4), switch back to DD, re-engage with steal. I’m currently running this with Vipers stats everywhere with good success.

Good luck and I hope some of this is helpful!

(edited by stone cold.8609)

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Posted by: Straegen.2938

Straegen.2938

Short answer is P/P with Invigorating Precision and Unhindered Combatant. If you are dying with that setup, you need to practice a bit more. We call it god mode on team chat.

Sarcasm For Hire [SFH]
“Youre lips are movin and youre complaining about something thats wingeing.”