Guild Wars 2

IMO they need to buff the overall damage of this weapon set. AA needs maybe a 25% dmg buff, skill 2 needs a 40% dmg buff. Skill 3 should be reverted back to what it was, just a 1 hit skill that rips boons. Before this was pretty OP but with the amount of boons that gets tossed around these days, it’s not. Skill 4 and 5 just leave as is.

Just this alone would allow S/D to compete with D/P or staff. Just imagine the build diversity if Anet could just be more competent.

Balance ini costs around a 12 ini pool, no reasons for it to have one of the biggest total ini costs, is the first thing.

I would avoid further buffs. S/D damage and survivability is ok. D/P having more burst is ok too couse s/d can meenage more direct pressure allowing more sustained damage. This playstyle and its sw#2 allows similar but different gameplay than d/p. The only games where it’s hard to be effective with s/d is where you are up against a d/p whith similar skill levels. Other than that it’s 100% que viable.

s/d is perfect as it is i think. d/p and s/d are totally different in play sets but d/p should beat s/d because of the nature of burst from d/x. if there is anything i would change is probably shadow shot… 4 inative for a 900 range port – blinds – unblockable and the avg thief in wvw can deal 5k dmg to an enemy power build. but thats a different story.

I’ve personally gotten Shadow Shot to hit for over 10k in WvW. The unblockable blinding teleport component for that much damage is absurd and most reputable thieves know it.

S/D is in a good spot imho. The set can deal damage if you build for it, get lots of sustain if you build for it, and has quite a bit of built-in utility that lets it enable pressure-based play, cause boon builds to fumble a lot with recent buffs to LS, and can kite pure-melee builds very nicely.

Of all of the weapon sets for the thief, I think D/D is in most dire need of a rework.

all i would ask for with s/d is a speed up of the auto attack and i mean just slightly so the animations actually look like im using a rapier (love bonetti’s skin)

And D/D really needs some tlc – i miss roaming in wvw as a d/d power thief.

S/D seems fine for the most part although I wouldn’t mind a small tweak to ini costs if it did get a buff.

The one skill I would have a look at is Dancing Dagger since it just isn’t worth using over other skills in almost every situation and it would give at least some kind of buff to power D/D if it ever makes a return.

I think for the most part s/d is fine and that any tweaks to be made should be to the offhand , that being #5 and #6 so as to give a boost to the d/d power set. These boosts need not be major,

I see a lot comments here that S/D is fine, but I never see anyone playing it. In the last 500+ PvP matches I’ve seen a total of 2 or 3 S/D thieves, whether on my team or the opponent’s team. WvW and PvE is not much different. If S/D was in a good spot, people would actually play it.

As someone who’s been maining S/D for a year plus:

The auto attack should apply cripple on strike #2, not strike #3

Flanking Strike should apply 1 second of cripple, to help land Larcenous Strike

Larcenous Strike should steal one boon and cost 1 initiative

Larcenous Strike should steal a small amount of life and have a slight damage boost

The Acrobatics tree should have a utility skill cool down trait. It’s the only tree that doesn’t, yet S/D players are obligated to take it because of Swindler’s Equilibrium

The Don’t Stop trait in the Acrobatics tree needs to be buffed in some way, any way to make it useful

My two cents.

Yeah I find S/D to be pretty good now with the last changes to the auto-attack. Infiltrator’s Strike already immobilises and is a teleport gap closer, so a damage buff would be a bit silly. However, Flanking/Lancerous Strike could do with some clearing up.

I don’t think we should strive for any weapon set to be on par with D/P, lest the power creep reach even more unmanageable levels.

changes i would make:

• aa applies cripple on 2nd hit like dingo said
• maybe spread the ini cost so both flank and larcen cost 3 ini (dont think that would change much, but w/e)
• make dancing dagger apply 3 sec of poison as well
• reduce cnd cost to 5 (or 4, hah! i mean srsly, no one uses this anymore. lets give it a huge buff!)

Stand The Wall.6987:

changes i would make:

• aa applies cripple on 2nd hit like dingo said
• maybe spread the ini cost so both flank and larcen cost 3 ini (dont think that would change much, but w/e)
• make dancing dagger apply 3 sec of poison as well
• reduce cnd cost to 5 (or 4, hah! i mean srsly, no one uses this anymore. lets give it a huge buff!)

i agree on AA. no dmg buff at all, 1st hit is normal, 2nd cripple third does weakness.
i think the initiative cost is fine
dancing dagger has is uses, especially when BV is up, but it could do with something else, may be longer cripple duration.
on the contrary, i use cnD a lot for tactical strike. still not sure if I like the idea of adding blind to it.

S/D is OK at the moment but there are a few things I think should be change.

1. The return on skill #2 should have a lightly shorter cast time and should have a small evade frame because it is silly when you try to use the skill to avoid melee damage, you still get hit on the way back.

2. The auto attack speed should be adjusted to be slightly faster if damage is not increased. The damage output of every class is through the roof, a s/d thief simply can’t stay long enough to finish the full chain, fight any decent warrior and you will get dropped in a second by GS#3 or berserker’’s GS F1 sometimes accidentally.

3. Most annoying part is the auto attack is slow to start after you do a cnd steal on target and daze them from behind. It takes a second before the auto attack chain starts.

4. Fix the pathing issue. Lots of time I’m dead because #2 return is affected by the same pathing issue affecting most teleport skills. To have #2 rendered useless when fighting someone on a bridge, staircase and some random uneven ground is just demoralising.

Fat Disgrace.4275:

s/d is perfect as it is i think. d/p and s/d are totally different in play sets but d/p should beat s/d because of the nature of burst from d/x. if there is anything i would change is probably shadow shot… 4 inative for a 900 range port – blinds – unblockable and the avg thief in wvw can deal 5k dmg to an enemy power build. but thats a different story.

What? You don’t even play S/D so how in the world can u say it’s perfect? Lol. S/D is a step or 2 below D/P and staff. Saying it’s perfect says a lot about your competency in this game.

Simonoly.4352:

Yeah I find S/D to be pretty good now with the last changes to the auto-attack. Infiltrator’s Strike already immobilises and is a teleport gap closer, so a damage buff would be a bit silly. However, Flanking/Lancerous Strike could do with some clearing up.

I don’t think we should strive for any weapon set to be on par with D/P, lest the power creep reach even more unmanageable levels.

Do you even play S/D? Skill 2 is very clunky and is only 600 range. Most of the time I found this skill to miss the opponent by just a hair. And we’re only talking a slight dmg buff. In PvP with Maruder ammy, that about 900 dmg lol.

how do you know i dont? ofc i play s/d, have done for over a year. s/d is in a good spot, but d/p is just that much better.

Shovel Face.4512:

Fat Disgrace.4275:

s/d is perfect as it is i think. d/p and s/d are totally different in play sets but d/p should beat s/d because of the nature of burst from d/x. if there is anything i would change is probably shadow shot… 4 inative for a 900 range port – blinds – unblockable and the avg thief in wvw can deal 5k dmg to an enemy power build. but thats a different story.

What? You don’t even play S/D so how in the world can u say it’s perfect? Lol. S/D is a step or 2 below D/P and staff. Saying it’s perfect says a lot about your competency in this game.

2 step bellow d/p and staff in what? burst damage? ye maybe. Imo “perfect” here means that does not need changes i think, where i can 100% agree.

Fat Disgrace.4275:

how do you know i dont? ofc i play s/d, have done for over a year. s/d is in a good spot, but d/p is just that much better.

You say it’s “perfect” and “in a good spot” but in relation to what? Because if it is perfect as you say it is, why don’t I ever see any thieves running S/D? I mean if it was prefect I should atleast be seeing a handful of S/D. In fact, I’ve seen more P/P Theives then S/D. All I’m saying is, if u want S/D to remain in its grave then go ahead, pretend like the weapon set is fine and doesn’t need a 2nd look at. That’s all fine with me, but I actually wanna see S/D return to its glory days.

MadVisions.4529:

Shovel Face.4512:

Fat Disgrace.4275:

s/d is perfect as it is i think. d/p and s/d are totally different in play sets but d/p should beat s/d because of the nature of burst from d/x. if there is anything i would change is probably shadow shot… 4 inative for a 900 range port – blinds – unblockable and the avg thief in wvw can deal 5k dmg to an enemy power build. but thats a different story.

What? You don’t even play S/D so how in the world can u say it’s perfect? Lol. S/D is a step or 2 below D/P and staff. Saying it’s perfect says a lot about your competency in this game.

2 step bellow d/p and staff in what? burst damage? ye maybe. Imo “perfect” here means that does not need changes i think, where i can 100% agree.

2 steps below in term of effectiveness. We all know D/p and staff are effective weapons for thief. High burst and good utility. S/D is NOT for burst. S/D is sustaing and pressuring. This, however, cannot be done because one, the dmg for this weapon is so low, it does not create enough pressure to where my enemy feels uncomfortable. Skill 3 is also too clunky as it is difficult to land the follow up attack. A little damage buff and a rework of skill 3 is really not a lot to ask for, especially when you consider the power creep we’re in.

Shovel Face.4512:

This, however, cannot be done because one, the dmg for this weapon is so low, it does not create enough pressure to where my enemy feels uncomfortable.

This, dear Sir, is not true.

Shovel Face.4512:

A little damage buff and a rework of skill 3 is really not a lot to ask for, especially when you consider the power creep we’re in.

and your answer to power creep is to add more power somewhere else. Decent. This is why this game is suffering atm.

Shovel Face.4512:

Fat Disgrace.4275:

how do you know i dont? ofc i play s/d, have done for over a year. s/d is in a good spot, but d/p is just that much better.

You say it’s “perfect” and “in a good spot” but in relation to what? Because if it is perfect as you say it is, why don’t I ever see any thieves running S/D? I mean if it was prefect I should atleast be seeing a handful of S/D. In fact, I’ve seen more P/P Theives then S/D. All I’m saying is, if u want S/D to remain in its grave then go ahead, pretend like the weapon set is fine and doesn’t need a 2nd look at. That’s all fine with me, but I actually wanna see S/D return to its glory days.

a lot of people do not play s/d because it is far harder to pull of, that is the reason why you see more p/p… smash that #3 man such skill well played. the weapon set is all about dueling and presure not burst but you can manage to land a burst if you proc impact with steal and LS all at once.

.#3 is far from clunky, it is only clunky if you spam AA and or, have AA on auto. what i have learnt is to disable AA and rely on postion/kiting to use flanking strike to its full potential. the old s/d was a gimmick, people just spammed #3 and use LS as a ‘spike’ or they just spammed #3 when it was just 1 move, infact i still see people do that now. i much prefer the change did to split that skill in half.

MadVisions.4529:

Shovel Face.4512:

This, however, cannot be done because one, the dmg for this weapon is so low, it does not create enough pressure to where my enemy feels uncomfortable.

This, dear Sir, is not true.

Shovel Face.4512:

A little damage buff and a rework of skill 3 is really not a lot to ask for, especially when you consider the power creep we’re in.

and your answer to power creep is to add more power somewhere else. Decent. This is why this game is suffering atm.

And ur solution is to keep it where it’s at? Lol. You have to look at both sides. The power creep won’t be going away anytime soon. I’d rather bring a weapon in line with this current power creep, whether it’s for better or worse, then to leave it behind.

To give you an analogy, it’s like someone having and using a flip phone in this day and age of smartphones and pretending the flip phone can compete with IPhones.

Well, understand that it’s never really going to be on par with D/P – at least, they can’t fill the same role. D/P is a pretty strong counter to S/D now (the nerf to Acrobatics means you can’t out-dodge Shadow Shot and Backstab anymore, and Daredevil equalized the dodging between the two sets). The power creep in defenses has also left S/D behind, as all the block / evade / invuln spam has put a big premium on burst damage in the small windows you get – and S/D has essentially zero burst damage (everything other than auto-attacking is a damage loss).

It’s not clear to me what a low damage utility set is supposed to be good against in the current meta. The only match-up where I’d rather be on a S/D than a D/P right now is against a Necro, where the extra condi clear and mobility helps quite a bit and you can whittle them down; against everything else they either have too much defense that requires bursting through, or they have too much sustain to whittle down with auto attacks.

Put another way, S/D has a combination of defensive (2+3) and bad (4+5) tools available, which sets it up as a more defensive, brawling class – but those defenses are laughable in comparison with what Scrappers or Chronomancers bring, and those classes don’t make huge damage sacrifices for those defensive tools.

Basically it got some big nerfs that it hasn’t recovered from, and has otherwise been power creeped out. Flanking Strike just isn’t all that exciting in a world where the competition can chain blocks and invulnerabilities for 20 seconds running. I don’t think the set is a couple small changes away from viability – and if it is, those changes need to be very specific and on point to address its role in the meta.

S/D is great against Engies and Eles to strip all boons, outside of that it’s lacking due to the power creep.

The problem with S/D is the combination of Conquest and the Thief’s nature.

The S/D style is built for sustain.
Conquest does not allow for 1v1 sustained fights.
The Thief is too squishy for team fights no matter the build.

It has the same problem as trapper builds.
Stealth can help you survive longer, but you cannot hold a point while in Stealth, nor can you kill quickly enough.

Time is the worst enemy of the Thief.
If you cannot kill quickly, bad things happen…
1. Your opponent will heal
2. Your opponent’s powerful attacks will recharge
3. Your opponent’s strong defenses will recharge
4. Conditions will kill you
5. But worst of all, your opponent will get reinforced

Not sure what your goal is here. You want to powercreep s/d to be tournament viable?
Couse i feel like i have to clarify that it’s 100% ranked viable if you have experience with it.

D/P will always have so much more utility than S/D really, the only thing they could do is lower Initiative costs a tad, they tried smoothing out AA animations, but I don’t know how much more they can do.

If something, they could work on the kitten pathfinging. #2k16NoValidPath

I think S/D is fine. It’s costs are a little bit high but it’s a sustained and tactical weapon set. It’s our only weapon set that has condi clear, on top of good mobility, cc, and boon steal. It does lack burst, with the amount of control we have, we have really no issues getting our sustained dps out.

Comparing D/P and S/D I agree with another persons sediment here, d/p is an overloaded weapon set. It has stealth, movement, interupts, blinds, and good damage. The main offender for me is shadow shot. It does way to much for its initiative cost. It blinds, it teleports you to them, it’s unblockable, and it has a unusually high damage coefficient. Our similar skill is a 2 part 6 initiative cost for an unblockable, some evade frames and some boon steal. I think if they toned shadow shot down a little bit in the damage department or matched the initiative cost, both weapon sets would be pretty equal by filling the same role by playing an entirely different styles of combat.

Shovel Face.4512:

A little damage buff and a rework of skill 3 is really not a lot to ask for, especially when you consider the power creep we’re in.

and your answer to power creep is to add more power somewhere else. Decent. This is why this game is suffering atm.[/quote]

^this. There is not need for more power creep.
I would rather see the synergy between d/p and daredevil tone down, make the other core spec viable, and also tone down the majority of the builds out there. Tho i truly doubt the game will change that way..

S/D is perfect if you want to climb the ladder with worse winrate and slower matches
than with staff and D/P.
Staff is even better than D/P for casual play because you can kill less skilled players before they can react, much like the zerker meta in dungeons where u kill the bosses so fast that u skip phases.
As for tourneys if it was only 1 tier below meta sizer and toker would have not stopped playing it. No matter how skilled you are with this weaponset you can’t do nearly as much burst/sustainted dmg as staff / d/p.
And let’s not forget the top 2 teams in the world don’t run a thief, not even D/P, but for ladder it’s still good so I dont think they should nerf it too hard as that alone wouldn’t help S/D. There could be a few tonedowns like Impacting Disruption(now grants might instead of dmg) and shadow shot slightly nerfed(blind application moved to the attack part, reduced blind duration from 5 years to 3s).
S/D should deal more damage but survival should be more skill-bound: e.g.: add 5-10s CD to dash’s immob removal.

PS: forget about Acro, it is terrible and if it has been bad for this long, why would they buff it now?

Edit: actually impacting disruption shouoldn’t deal dmg at all. too random. corrected to might gain

Kicker.8203:

S/D is perfect if you want to climb the ladder with worse winrate and slower matches
than with staff and D/P.
Staff is even better than D/P for casual play because you can kill less skilled players before they can react, much like the zerker meta in dungeons where u kill the bosses so fast that u skip phases.
As for tourneys if it was only 1 tier below meta sizer and toker would have not stopped playing it. No matter how skilled you are with this weaponset you can’t do nearly as much burst/sustainted dmg as staff / d/p.
And let’s not forget the top 2 teams in the world don’t run a thief, not even D/P, but for ladder it’s still good so I dont think they should nerf it too hard as that alone wouldn’t help S/D. There could be a few tonedowns like Impacting Disruption(-10%dmg, 3-4s cd) and shadow shot slightly nerfed(blind application moved to the attack part, reduced blind duration from 5 years to 3s).
S/D should deal more damage but survival should be more skill-bound: e.g.: add 5-10s CD to dash’s immob removal.

PS: forget about Acro, it is terrible and if it has been bad for this long, why would they buff it now?

What does nerfing Impacting Disruption and buffing Dash have to do with improving S/D?

kash.9213:

Kicker.8203:

S/D is perfect if you want to climb the ladder with worse winrate and slower matches
than with staff and D/P.
Staff is even better than D/P for casual play because you can kill less skilled players before they can react, much like the zerker meta in dungeons where u kill the bosses so fast that u skip phases.
As for tourneys if it was only 1 tier below meta sizer and toker would have not stopped playing it. No matter how skilled you are with this weaponset you can’t do nearly as much burst/sustainted dmg as staff / d/p.
And let’s not forget the top 2 teams in the world don’t run a thief, not even D/P, but for ladder it’s still good so I dont think they should nerf it too hard as that alone wouldn’t help S/D. There could be a few tonedowns like Impacting Disruption(-10%dmg, 3-4s cd) and shadow shot slightly nerfed(blind application moved to the attack part, reduced blind duration from 5 years to 3s).
S/D should deal more damage but survival should be more skill-bound: e.g.: add 5-10s CD to dash’s immob removal.

PS: forget about Acro, it is terrible and if it has been bad for this long, why would they buff it now?

What does nerfing Impacting Disruption and buffing Dash have to do with improving S/D?

Edit: TLDR: nerf broken rupt trait and dash, then buff s/d(dmg, reliability and initiative improvements)

d/p beats s/d because of flanking strike punish frames. only way to fix it be lower after animation time on flaking strike or completely changing how the skill works. honestly if it something like hold flanking strike consume 1 initiative every half second extending the eva frames. it could be very hard to deal with it.

Taobella.6597:

d/p beats s/d because of flanking strike punish frames.

*impact, blind uptime, stealth

Lol, it has nothing to do with flanking strike. It’s the blind and stealth at will. Impact is annoying but that just carrys more then it’s a reason why d/p beats s/d.

i agree that blind and stealth play a role but you can telegraph both of those main issue. is s/d core eva move has hardcore punish frame on it. if that was removed it raise the weapon set usefulness threw the roof. maybe not beat D/P but in choosing the weapon set overall i could see it being played more.

S/D just has too many delays; from the total initiative cost to its slow attack speed.

D/P has very few delays and it’s 4 second faster than S/D in terms of initiative pool (D/P has 16 total init skill vs. S/D’s 20 total init skills).

Looking at casting time, S/D has a bunch of casting time which lags it further behind D/P. S/D has a total casting time of 3sec while D/P has a total casting time of 1.5s, thanks to a couple of skills without casting time.

So the gap between these two sets is already big enough in terms of skill use frequency.

Now the animation delays, the pre-cast and after cast delays are plaguing S/D also. The set just became a very clunky set to use.

What needs to happen is to shave off some of these delays starting with Flanking Strike. This skill needs to be instant just as Shadowshot is instant. Instead of having a 360deg turn animation, the Thief will simply blurred out or something. The evade effect will simply continue for its current duration of 1/2s, just add a shadowy effect to show that the Thief still has the evade effect. Then, Larcenous Strike needs to also be an instant, reduced cost back to 1init, and would only steal a boon when striking from the flank or back. These changes will allow the weapon set the precision it needs to execute the skills successfully and it rewards players for positioning correctly. Which also bringing it up to par with Shadowshot in terms of effectiveness.

Other changes would require that CnD will have a shadowstep built in, casting time reduced to 1/4s, and cost reduced to 4 init. The damage and the vulnerability stacks can be nerfed for balance, since the important part is to make CnD useful and a reliable way to go in stealth.

Just start with those and let’s test them out.

I think facing a D/P thief will always be a bad match-up for S/D. You have to try and anticipate attacks from stealth and D/P can easily reset the fight when they make a mistake.

The release of HoT didn’t improve things for S/D. A well timed Infiltrator’s Strike could previously be used to deny access to stealth, but immobilize is easily countered now that D/P thieves can trait Daredevil.

I wouldn’t say the S/D is an underpowered weapon set. It’s still very effective when dueling and roaming in WvW. It’s just a selfish weapon set and doesn’t provide as much burst or support in team fights.

I’ve been hoping that Dancing Dagger will see some buffs to add more utility to both S/D and D/D. As a S/D thief I rarely use this skill since I have access to Infiltrator’s Strike and can swap to short-bow.

What needs to happen is to shave off some of these delays starting with Flanking Strike. This skill needs to be instant just as Shadowshot is instant. Instead of having a 360deg turn animation, the Thief will simply blurred out or something. The evade effect will simply continue for its current duration of 1/2s, just add a shadowy effect to show that the Thief still has the evade effect.

i disagree with idea of 360 degree turn animation making it become roughly a 1 second eva main problem is how hard s/d is telegraph play style so making eva longer would not fix core problem. of being thief should be able to just keep evaing with out people knowing when they will stop.
———————
Then, Larcenous Strike needs to also be an instant, reduced cost back to 1init, and would only steal a boon when striking from the flank or back. These changes will allow the weapon set the precision it needs to execute the skills successfully and it rewards players for positioning correctly. Which also bringing it up to par with Shadowshot in terms of effectiveness.

larcenous strike i find is not in a bad spot it does semi good dmg boon ripping is always nice it not very hard to land. personally i would like it something like steal 1 boon then destroy a second one.
——————-
Other changes would require that CnD will have a shadowstep built in, casting time reduced to 1/4s, and cost reduced to 4 init. The damage and the vulnerability stacks can be nerfed for balance, since the important part is to make CnD useful and a reliable way to go in stealth.

i disagree to part of this one as well. i am fine with CnD int but should not be a shadow step move they should add blind to it. even if it was at cost of removing vulnerability.

then if we want to talk about dancing dagger should scale in bonus pre hit and be able to bounce with the thief.
refunding 1 int on final bounce if it land on thief. something like

first bounce = cripple(3 second cripple) + 180 dmg
second bounce = cripple(3 second cripple) + blind(3 second blind) +180 dmg
final bounce = cripple(3 second cripple) + slow(1 second slow) + 180 dmg or if it land on thief refund 1 initiative