Guild Wars 2

I play the stealth spam d/p trapper backstab build so I rely on stealth for my dmg, my sustain, and condi clear. I can usually deal with the ranger sic em by evades and LOS. But I just can’t figure out how to deal with Engi reveal trait. Do I just avoid fighting them and IF I do engage on an engi, hope for the best? I just don’t know how any of the stealth spec thieves are supposed to win in this kind of fight.

As far as I can tell, you simply… do not.
They have a wide AOE spray attack that reveals. There is not really a counter to that except, maybe, an offhand pistol for a headshot… but that will only work for a few seconds, and almost certainly precludes a backstab-type build being used.
You could of course go for a stealthless burst Thief… but then your lack of defenses, cleanses and health pool will surely get you killed by Warriors, Guardians, Rangers that focus on burst damage, Elementalists using Fire, Mesmers that you can’t catch because Ricochet is dead, and Engineers with turrets or flamethrowers because you get melted before you can get close.
Ah, and stealthless Thief builds are essentially prey for Stealth Thieves.

We might be able to fight Revenents if we get to them before they are finished, however.

Slowmelt.8547:

As far as I can tell, you simply… do not.
They have a wide AOE spray attack that reveals. There is not really a counter to that except, maybe, an offhand pistol for a headshot… but that will only work for a few seconds, and almost certainly precludes a backstab-type build being used.
You could of course go for a stealthless burst Thief… but then your lack of defenses or health pool will surely get you killed by Warriors, Guardians, Rangers that focus on burst damage, Elementalists using Fire, Mesmers that you can’t catch because Ricochet is dead, and Engineers with turrets because you get melted before you can get close.
Ah, and stealthless Thief builds are essentially prey for Stealth Thieves.

We might be able to fight Revenents if we get to them before they are finished, however.

I thought as much. Pretty lame that one trait can destroy an entire spec line and a few weaponset mechanics. Pretty OP pls nerf. Analyze is enough reveal for the engi, they don’t need more.

learn to play with your blind and interrupt, spamming stealth is the mindnesss playstyle in this game.you can faceroll other build without your brain doesnt mean you are a well play thief

Last we tested. Engineer lock on trait applies reveal to thieves but does not strip stealth. It does strip stealth on mesmers so this is a bug. For the time being, make sure you know roughly how much time before lock on is off CD and when you get hit in stealth, don’t attack and just wait out the reveal. I haven’t seen any patch notes addressing this issue so it should still work for now. Let me know if they patched it.

Famine.7915:

Last we tested. Engineer lock on trait applies reveal to thieves but does not strip stealth. It does strip stealth on mesmers so this is a bug. For the time being, make sure you know roughly how much time before lock on is off CD and when you get hit in stealth, don’t attack and just wait out the reveal. I haven’t seen any patch notes addressing this issue so it should still work for now. Let me know if they patched it.

Ah, that sounds about right.
Thieves: If it’s good, it’s probably a bug!™

Famine.7915:

Last we tested. Engineer lock on trait applies reveal to thieves but does not strip stealth. It does strip stealth on mesmers so this is a bug. For the time being, make sure you know roughly how much time before lock on is off CD and when you get hit in stealth, don’t attack and just wait out the reveal. I haven’t seen any patch notes addressing this issue so it should still work for now. Let me know if they patched it.

Not true, maybe it is hit or miss. But earlier I got ripped out of stealth from it.

Arlowslol.1974:

learn to play with your blind and interrupt, spamming stealth is the mindnesss playstyle in this game.you can faceroll other build without your brain doesnt mean you are a well play thief

I could spam blinding shot all day on them and they still will apply a boat load of condis onto me. I suppose I could try to interrupt a few of their moves, but again boat load of condis. Stealth spam is not mindless at all, requires positioning and timing, plus our only viable traitline for defense is completely revolved around stealth. Like I said, I understand having a reveal move, but utility goggles (analyze) AND lock on together is stupid broken. Completely counters 2 weapon sets, and an entire traitline. They shouldn’t be able to have both, one or the other.

reinforever.8902:

I could spam blinding shot all day on them

Not really.
You can only keep that up for a very short period of time. Initiative management being what it is, it just isn’t going to work for any length of time, and then you get piles of Burning stacks that melt you to death.

Slowmelt.8547:

reinforever.8902:

I could spam blinding shot all day on them

Not really.
You can only keep that up for a very short period of time. Initiative management being what it is, it just isn’t going to work for any length of time, and then you get piles of Burning stacks that melt you to death.

Well yeah that too, lmfao. Point being, I am sad face.

hey reinforce! This time i can help you!

Engi main, the trait is on a ~21 second CD.
I find that when a thief needlessly invisses while still early in the fight, applies poison to me and then disengages for the reveal duration, I struggle!
The reason this works is engi’s have tons of AOE and its hard to “pull your punches” vs a thief because you tend to panic a bit.

That should buy you a good 15 seconds to deal dmg for freezies!

GrandHaven.1052:

hey reinforce! This time i can help you!

Engi main, the trait is on a ~21 second CD.
I find that when a thief needlessly invisses while still early in the fight, applies poison to me and then disengages for the reveal duration, I struggle!
The reason this works is engi’s have tons of AOE and its hard to “pull your punches” vs a thief because you tend to panic a bit.

That should buy you a good 15 seconds to deal dmg for freezies!

Got it, so pull out while revealed and let my poison do it’s dirty work. Is it uncommon for engi to have analyze slotted as well?

reinforever.8902:

Got it, so pull out while revealed and let my poison do it’s dirty work. Is it uncommon for engi to have analyze slotted as well?

Extremely common in PvP, not so common in WVW but some still run it to try and standup to the mesmer hoards.

The reason its so common is because mesmers are so oppressive, thieves are getting the short end of the stick as a side note..

Keep in mind this strat is ineffective vs elixir heavy engis. I have no idea how a thief would deal with them…

EDIT : Wait do you mean the utility skill analyze? Not at all, just teh trait is common. SOME SD burst varients will run the utility.

I don’t think you can do be honest. This is one case of reveal being applied to someone without any skill. I wonder if that trait has Internal CD because it is quite unclear.

It says"_Lock On – Striking a foe in stealth analyzes them._" Is it following Analyze’s 25 CD or does the trait not have a CD at all? It does not say.

Kocoff.7582:

I don’t think you can do be honest. This is one case of reveal being applied to someone without any skill. I wonder if that trait has Internal CD because it is quite unclear.

It says"_Lock On – Striking a foe in stealth analyzes them._" Is it following Analyze’s 25 CD or does the trait not have a CD at all? It does not say.

The moment you go into the tools line it drops to 21 and a 1/4 CD, that is the global CD for the reveal.

GrandHaven.1052:

Kocoff.7582:

I don’t think you can do be honest. This is one case of reveal being applied to someone without any skill. I wonder if that trait has Internal CD because it is quite unclear.

It says"_Lock On – Striking a foe in stealth analyzes them._" Is it following Analyze’s 25 CD or does the trait not have a CD at all? It does not say.

The moment you go into the tools line it drops to 21 and a 1/4 CD, that is the global CD for the reveal.

I may obviously be biased but Reveal skills should be at minimum 30 seconds CD. Anything lower than is unsustainable.

Kocoff.7582:

I may obviously be biased but Reveal skills should be at minimum 30 seconds CD. Anything lower than is unsustainable.

I don’t know, I think invis counter(in small amounts) are a good thing, I think the thief just needs different way of dealing with any soft of dmg sneeze in their direction.
This would make it less frustrating to be revealed.

A slightly larger health pool would be super helpful.
Just 2000HP.

Blind if you have to, but if you want to play thief well, don’t rely on winning 1v1s. Get to other existing fights quickly and outnumber the enemy.

Dahkeus.8243:

Blind if you have to, but if you want to play thief well, don’t rely on winning 1v1s. Get to other existing fights quickly and outnumber the enemy.

Yeah, it’s not like Thieves should be natural predators or anything.
Honestly, 1v1s should be our element. People should stick in groups for fear of being singled out by a Thief.
Not like that’ll ever happen though. Especially now that the Revenent’s Better Thief™ has that on lock.

GrandHaven.1052:

Kocoff.7582:

I may obviously be biased but Reveal skills should be at minimum 30 seconds CD. Anything lower than is unsustainable.

I don’t know, I think invis counter(in small amounts) are a good thing,

AoEs?

the fact that most of our stealth are either clearly telegraphed or leave a giant pulsing area that we can’t leave, both of which invite AoEs like there’s no tomorrow (which, for us, there isn’t)

Gray.9041:

AoEs?

the fact that most of our stealth are either clearly telegraphed or leave a giant pulsing area that we can’t leave, both of which invite AoEs like there’s no tomorrow (which, for us, there isn’t)

That is why it has a 21 second cooldown. Baiting the trait out is quite easy.
I just started playing thief a few weeks ago(engi main for near 2 years) and working around the trait isn’t that hard for me.

Just dont forget about it.

EDIT : I would like to add that yes, thief has its issues in the current state of the game, but this trait isn’t the reason for it. Right now eating even one decent AOE is bad on thief. The fact that it reveals you is just an afterthought as that AOE (reveal or not) forces you to disengage or stay in invis while recovering anyway.

GrandHaven.1052:

Gray.9041:

AoEs?

the fact that most of our stealth are either clearly telegraphed or leave a giant pulsing area that we can’t leave, both of which invite AoEs like there’s no tomorrow (which, for us, there isn’t)

That is why it has a 21 second cooldown. Baiting the trait out is quite easy.
I just started playing thief a few weeks ago(engi main for near 2 years) and working around the trait isn’t that hard for me.

Just dont forget about it.

EDIT : I would like to add that yes, thief has its issues in the current state of the game, but this trait isn’t the reason for it. Right now eating even one decent AOE is bad on thief. The fact that it reveals you is just an afterthought as that AOE (reveal or not) forces you to disengage or stay in invis while recovering anyway.

I meant that AoEs are a pretty decent thief counterplay – reveal isn’t even that necessary. (not blaming the reveal itself)

Depends, if it’s a condi burst Engi, I disengage and don’t get near him unless I know I can get him down easily because my teammates got himdown to like 25% Health.
If it’s a more power oriented Engi (very unlikely…), then you can use #3 and #4 and hope for the best.

You think flamer reveal is bad, try a power mortar reveal! (from an engi point of view, haven’t actually run into it on my thief).

Things to note with reveal: You have to pass up some other fantastic traits for it. As noted, it does have a cooldown so if you can force them to burn it early, DO SO (perhaps the p5d2 stealth is the best way to do this). Most of my Lock On kills were thieves that didn’t stealth aggressively and held it for escape on 25% health, which I promptly revealed and finished off.
If you can rely on engaging at range (say p/d) you’ll also do a lot better, since you’ll either be out of flamer ranger or at a distance where I have to randomwalk mortar shots because of travel time. At close range, if I’m running reveal and you try to stealth, you’re dead because I can then reply with most of the scary engi skills-the more positional uncertainty you can create against a reveal engi, the better.
The thing about reveal is it complements explosive tree, which gives 5% bonus against targets with vuln, so between the vuln stacks and that trait the engi will be hitting far harder.
Finally, if you’re up against a reveal engi, orbital strike is the scariest skill in the game.

Kind of funny that medium armor class that have more evade than other classes can’t stay alive couple sec without stealth. I think that this is just normal thief players learn to dodge issue.

Junkpile.7439:

Kind of funny that medium armor class that have more evade than other classes can’t stay alive couple sec without stealth. I think that this is just normal thief players learn to dodge issue.

Well the truth is that the thief doesn’t in any way have more evades than other classes since the Accrobatics nerf.

Junkpile.7439:

Kind of funny that medium armor class that have more evade than other classes can’t stay alive couple sec without stealth. I think that this is just normal thief players learn to dodge issue.

Signature proving true to the letter!

stof.9341:

Junkpile.7439:

Kind of funny that medium armor class that have more evade than other classes can’t stay alive couple sec without stealth. I think that this is just normal thief players learn to dodge issue.

Well the truth is that the thief doesn’t in any way have more evades than other classes since the Accrobatics nerf.

Medium armor also means nothing in this game… Don’t feed the troll

TBH every build has its weakness. In this chase your weakness are those engineers. However a sword/dagger thief could beat that engineer much more easily. Thats called balance

The V.8759:

TBH every build has its weakness. In this chase your weakness are those engineers. However a sword/dagger thief could beat that engineer much more easily. Thats called balance

True I agree with balance, but at the same time I believe in outplay potential. If you’re substantially better than your enemy, then you deserve to win regardless of counters. I don’t come here to play rock paper scissors, I want to outplay my opponent and crush him. There’s been some good suggestions but I think you’re totally right that I alone can’t take on the enemy unless he just doesn’t know how to play the build he’s running.

Slowmelt.8547:

As far as I can tell, you simply… do not.
They have a wide AOE spray attack that reveals. There is not really a counter to that except, maybe, an offhand pistol for a headshot… but that will only work for a few seconds, and almost certainly precludes a backstab-type build being used.
You could of course go for a stealthless burst Thief… but then your lack of defenses, cleanses and health pool will surely get you killed by Warriors, Guardians, Rangers that focus on burst damage, Elementalists using Fire, Mesmers that you can’t catch because Ricochet is dead, and Engineers with turrets or flamethrowers because you get melted before you can get close.
Ah, and stealthless Thief builds are essentially prey for Stealth Thieves.

We might be able to fight Revenents if we get to them before they are finished, however.

I play really really few stealths and max damage backstab build and I am doing fine. I have some probs with people spamming too many condis but still sometimes they are dead before they can apply more, after cleansing the first with shadowstep or the signet. Backstab thieves are still alive. Would like a few new tools though, and the new traitline might be good.

thaniretouni.4762:

I play really really few stealths and max damage backstab build and I am doing fine. I have some probs with people spamming too many condis but still sometimes they are dead before they can apply more, after cleansing the first with shadowstep or the signet. Backstab thieves are still alive. Would like a few new tools though, and the new traitline might be good.

I really find it pointless to say something along these lines : “I have success with X”, because honestly that is your playstyle, we don’t know who you are facing nor can we measure how “doing fine” is really doing.

We KNOW that thieves rely on stealth to setup burst and survive in any semi reliable way… Soooo, not quite sure what these kinds of posts are supposed to accomplish.