Guild Wars 2

Ive been doing dungeons on my thief for a little while now and I’ve mainly just been using zerk d/d with shortbow. I wanted to know if there were more supportive builds so that I can help the group out with more than just damage. I just don’t feel very necessary. Thanks!

There are supportive builds, however you’ll have to give up damage for it….

NINJA NURSE!

Any chance you could link one?

The most obvious support thieves can provide is boons via thrill of the crime and bountiful theft, or venom share, and healing with leeching venoms.

I ran with a group in AC a while ago that had trouble surviving the last boss. Leeching venoms and venom share turned out to be enough to keep everyone alive. We have less obvious support roles, but it can be done.

There isn’t much you can do in way of support.

Ignore venom-sharing builds. They detract so much from your personal DPS that encounters will drag out immensely and your supportive measures will be wasted when the fight could have ended sooner and less room for error would have been created.

Honestly, the only support you should worry about is Deception utilities and boons from the Trickery line. Other than that, you should be speccing as much as possible in to damage. Other classes are better at support than Thieves are. Don’t waste the party slot with it.

Stick with S/P and D/D, with builds like 25/30/0/0/15 or 25/30/10/0/5. If you want to be supportive, take builds like 10/30/0/0/30 to get the boons.

Auesis.7301:

Ignore venom-sharing builds. They detract so much from your personal DPS that encounters will drag out immensely and your supportive measures will be wasted when the fight could have ended sooner and less room for error would have been created.

Seconded. Venom-sharing requires investing 20 points into Deadly Arts and 30 points into Shadow Arts, traitlines which I think are massively less helpful in PvE compared to Critical Strikes and Acrobatics.

Not to mention that venoms in general are pretty lackluster, even when shared.

Blind. Smokescreen. Stealthy revival. Caltrops for area cripple. Weakness from poison and poison fields. Blast finishers. Group stealth. Boon stripping. Permanent cripple on mobs. Repeated dazes on mobs. Unique interrupts with basilisk venom. That’s all some form of support or another.

Most builds won’t enhance that. 10 points in trickery give you some handy support options though, as might venom share. Try out a completely different build and see how it goes.

Don’t forget your somewhat spammable blast finisher on Cluster Bomb, Shortbow #2.

Heal, heal, heal or Might, might, might. It’s a party.