Guild Wars 2

Poxxia.1547:

Mrbig.8019:

wholeheartedly agree.

too much fuzz about the thief when inf strike just needs to be “shaved” in order to allow counterplay and to not be spammed mindlessly WHILE still being effective.

and if they do this, they’d better start buffing us too.

Just took the last post, sorry.

I wonder … if you see thieves as a class, that should be able to get in the battle and out again … isn’t that the case, for every GC-build (or at least the ones, who can roam … which is again another issue)?
Yet, I haven’t seen any class, that can do it with so little effort. I can’t help feeling, that the escape/engage-opportunities need some kind of timing, instead of being spamable.

Else it should be given to everyone (and mind you, be out of reach for all other GC-builds as well), and that would just be a mess.

I hope you understand what I am trying to say; not sure if it is very clear, else I will try to elaborate.

I think you should take a look at the meta mace+shield/Greatsword warrior. They are not GC, but hit like one, and can disengage like nobody’s business.

Stop complaining guys. Thieves are suppose to be like this. Vanish and escape beyond opponent’s reach. Without evades and teleports like Infiltrator’s strike, Thief is dead, besides – spamming Infiltrator’s Strike is a waste of Initiative which can be used for massive DPS spam. If you see someone doing it, they’re doing it wrong. You don’t know how to kill a Thief? Learn to play, they’re not as OP as you think.

Oh, one more thing! You complain about shadowstep that goes back poor 1200?
Remember Guild Wars 1. Aura of Displacement or Shadow Meld could shadowstep back through enitre map! MAP!

Besides, if some classes are iritating you, don’t complain and ask for nerf, I never do so. Mesmer is hard for me … so what? I’ll learn how to play against it and be a better player in result! ANet isn’t listening to you anyway! No matter how loud you scream and shout! Deal with it!

What will be the next thief skill you guys want to see get nerfed into oblivion after IS is beyond crap? I’m curious.

Sizzle Hint.1820:

What will be the next thief skill you guys want to see get nerfed into oblivion after IS is beyond crap? I’m curious.

I don’t know. I think thief will be dead after IS nerf. Or at least sword thieves will be dead.

The next one on the hit list will be black powder since it can perma blind, and can be comboed for stealth which can also cure conditions.

After black powder nerf, we can safely delete our thieves in peace.

Excalibur.9748:

I think you should take a look at the meta mace+shield/Greatsword warrior. They are not GC, but hit like one, and can disengage like nobody’s business.

Completely aware of the build. Warriors are in a league of their own, be that H+LB or GS+M/S. But the issue with warriors are of a very different nature (their ability to regen, clear condi’s, have high toughness/HP and still do silly dmg). Not better, but very different.

There is no need to diverge from the topic; what I am asking for is not nerf’s but some thoughts about a “greater view”, on how classes work. Imo we can’t all do it all (should we?). Once we accept that, we can perhaps find out, what we reasonably can expect to do.

Perhaps it is completely OK, that thieves have multiple ports and spamable stealth. Perhaps we are not all meant to have that kind of survival; perhaps it is only them. Perhaps their burst is even ok. But what are other burst-GC-classes then bringing, that justifies their attendance?

Sizzle Hint.1820:

What will be the next thief skill you guys want to see get nerfed into oblivion after IS is beyond crap? I’m curious.

just shut the kitten up lol. Stop kittening overreacting the skill is op and need a slight bump in initiative needs to stop ignoring line of sight. This way you have to use it wisely and actually keep track of your initiative.

kitten s.7421:

Sizzle Hint.1820:

What will be the next thief skill you guys want to see get nerfed into oblivion after IS is beyond crap? I’m curious.

just shut the kitten up lol. Stop kittening overreacting the skill is op and need a slight bump in initiative needs to stop ignoring line of sight. This way you have to use it wisely and actually keep track of your initiative.

bumping up ini cost won’t solve anything.

the skill needs range requirments, like shadow shot.

THIS will fix and prevent spamming withiut making the set clunky.

ah, and would rise the skill cap, of course

This really is not a hard fix. The 2 skill is the only thing that creates no counterplay. Otherwise it is perfectly fine. Everyone who complains about evades or stuff like that just doesnt know how it works

It’s mind boggling to me that people think it’s ok to have a play style of mindlessly spamming dodge to the point that you do this more than any other ability you have.

On top of this, they can teleport in and out of fights on a z-axis, with no cooldown, without LOS, and even when they’re CC’d.

All while doing really good sustained damage.

Follidus.8027:

It’s mind boggling to me that people think it’s ok to have a play style of mindlessly spamming dodge to the point that you do this more than any other ability you have.

On top of this, they can teleport in and out of fights on a z-axis, with no cooldown, without LOS, and even when they’re CC’d.

All while doing really good sustained damage.

Meanwhile, warriors, rangers, guardians are still more represented in the MLG tourny where winning actually matters.

Excalibur.9748:

Follidus.8027:

It’s mind boggling to me that people think it’s ok to have a play style of mindlessly spamming dodge to the point that you do this more than any other ability you have.

On top of this, they can teleport in and out of fights on a z-axis, with no cooldown, without LOS, and even when they’re CC’d.

All while doing really good sustained damage.

Meanwhile, warriors, rangers, guardians are still more represented in the MLG tourny where winning actually matters.

Representation doesn’t correlate with actual balance, when it comes to top players.

But if you want to go there, the finals of MLG featured a thief on each team. The PAX qualifiers featured a thief on each team, for both NA qualifiers and EU qualifiers. Granted, d/p thieves were used sometimes, but they’re in a much better spot. They’re just harder to play.

The power of the build also has nothing to do with my post you quoted. It’s the philosophy of the build that just seems so mind boggling stupid to me, and a lot of other people. The most used ability in the s/d build is dodge, and it’s spammed because you have so much of it. This takes what would potentially be the interesting and skillful thing about this game and destroys what’s interesting about it.

Representation doesn’t correlate with actual balance, when it comes to top players.

Are you saying top players like to use kittenty classes? And average gamers are the ones who use good classes?

Excalibur.9748:

Representation doesn’t correlate with actual balance, when it comes to top players.

Are you saying top players like to use kittenty classes? And average gamers are the ones who use good classes?

Formulate an opinion not based on players you watch on a stream. The game believe it or not is not represented in it’s entirety by a group of players in a tournament.

Follidus.8027:

Excalibur.9748:

Follidus.8027:

It’s mind boggling to me that people think it’s ok to have a play style of mindlessly spamming dodge to the point that you do this more than any other ability you have.

On top of this, they can teleport in and out of fights on a z-axis, with no cooldown, without LOS, and even when they’re CC’d.

All while doing really good sustained damage.

Meanwhile, warriors, rangers, guardians are still more represented in the MLG tourny where winning actually matters.

Representation doesn’t correlate with actual balance, when it comes to top players.

But if you want to go there, the finals of MLG featured a thief on each team. The PAX qualifiers featured a thief on each team, for both NA qualifiers and EU qualifiers. Granted, d/p thieves were used sometimes, but they’re in a much better spot. They’re just harder to play.

The power of the build also has nothing to do with my post you quoted. It’s the philosophy of the build that just seems so mind boggling stupid to me, and a lot of other people. The most used ability in the s/d build is dodge, and it’s spammed because you have so much of it. This takes what would potentially be the interesting and skillful thing about this game and destroys what’s interesting about it.

Why does this directly point to inf strike however? It doesn’t? I know what you’re talking about with the evades. I can play around inf strike, force it out and push accordingly. Chain dodges you have to sit through. Distracting shot and Flanking strike are the least punitive evades out of the four on weapon skills and FS brings significantly more to the table then Distracting shot. We see unorthadox stuff like evades on Dagger builds get thrown by players experimenting and it doesn’t work as well, even on DB because well DB has vulnerability time that a player grows accustomed to and can react accordingly to.

Excalibur.9748:

Representation doesn’t correlate with actual balance, when it comes to top players.

Are you saying top players like to use kittenty classes? And average gamers are the ones who use good classes?

No, that’s not at all what I’m saying. What I’m saying is not everyone is on the same skill level. Hypothetically, if one person can play elementalist and beat everyone in 1v1s, but no other elementalist can do this, are elementalists underpowered in 1v1s? In my opinion, no.

Also, again no offense to anyone, but the MLG tournament was far from the best competition the game will see. If someone is delusional into thinking their build is amazing, and they’re always in tournaments but lose in the first round, what does that say about representation? They always lose, but they’re still represented.

ensoriki.5789:

Why does this directly point to inf strike however? It doesn’t? I know what you’re talking about with the evades. I can play around inf strike, force it out and push accordingly. Chain dodges you have to sit through. Distracting shot and Flanking strike are the least punitive evades out of the four on weapon skills and FS brings significantly more to the table then Distracting shot. We see unorthadox stuff like evades on Dagger builds get thrown by players experimenting and it doesn’t work as well, even on DB because well DB has vulnerability time that a player grows accustomed to and can react accordingly to.

Because inf strike, along with dodge spam, just doesn’t seem right. You can’t stop a thief from going in and out of the fight. There’s no cooldown, there’s no LOS requirement, and he can shadow return while CC’d. The only way to stop it is by sitting on the place that the thief can shadow return to, but if it’s a team fight and you don’t have your whole team there, then the thief can just teleport to any of your teammates. This, combined with the evasion spam, just makes the play style very uninteresting to play against.

Follidus.8027:

ensoriki.5789:

Why does this directly point to inf strike however? It doesn’t? I know what you’re talking about with the evades. I can play around inf strike, force it out and push accordingly. Chain dodges you have to sit through. Distracting shot and Flanking strike are the least punitive evades out of the four on weapon skills and FS brings significantly more to the table then Distracting shot. We see unorthadox stuff like evades on Dagger builds get thrown by players experimenting and it doesn’t work as well, even on DB because well DB has vulnerability time that a player grows accustomed to and can react accordingly to.

Because inf strike, along with dodge spam, just doesn’t seem right. You can’t stop a thief from going in and out of the fight. There’s no cooldown, there’s no LOS requirement, and he can shadow return while CC’d. The only way to stop it is by sitting on the place that the thief can shadow return to, but if it’s a team fight and you don’t have your whole team there, then the thief can just teleport to any of your teammates. This, combined with the evasion spam, just makes the play style very uninteresting to play against.

There we go – the crux of the argument – because you can’t pin them down.

Thief exists to go in and out of the fight.

“We want thieves to be the class with the best mobility” – The game’s developers.

No Immunities
No Blocks
No Protection
No Aegis
Lowest base HP pool in the game
Sub-par condition removal (in the current meta)
Sub-par access to regeneration (in the current meta)
Constant nerfs to burst, nerfs to stealth with more to come.

But they shouldn’t be able to zip in and out of the fight either, because that prevents you from 3 shotting them.

evilapprentice.6379:

There we go – the crux of the argument – because you can’t pin them down.

Thief exists to go in and out of the fight.

“We want thieves to be the class with the best mobility” – The game’s developers.

No Immunities
No Blocks
No Protection
No Aegis
Lowest base HP pool in the game
Sub-par condition removal (in the current meta)
Sub-par access to regeneration (in the current meta)
Constant nerfs to burst, nerfs to stealth with more to come.

But they shouldn’t be able to zip in and out of the fight either, because that prevents you from 3 shotting them.

Ok, but the amount is absurd. It would be one thing if the thief couldn’t shadow return while CC’d, because at least that way you can do something to stop it. But you can’t deal with balance by isolating one ability. The dodge spam also comes into play, because what’s the point of CC stopping shadow return if you can’t reliably land CC due to the thief randomly spamming dodges to the point where you can’t even “count” all of the evades.

Also, Protection, Aegis, condition removal, regeneration, and other things can be given to the thief via support from his team. It’s not necessarily the end of the world that the thief doesn’t have these.

Also, stealth spamming needs to be nerfed further, or again there needs to be ways to deal with this, and being able to 1-shot people with backstab was also stupid.

This is also the only viable builds thieves have. I really dont think its overpowered at all compared to everything else. However the 2 skill could use a fix.

Follidus.8027:

evilapprentice.6379:

There we go – the crux of the argument – because you can’t pin them down.

Thief exists to go in and out of the fight.

“We want thieves to be the class with the best mobility” – The game’s developers.

No Immunities
No Blocks
No Protection
No Aegis
Lowest base HP pool in the game
Sub-par condition removal (in the current meta)
Sub-par access to regeneration (in the current meta)
Constant nerfs to burst, nerfs to stealth with more to come.

But they shouldn’t be able to zip in and out of the fight either, because that prevents you from 3 shotting them.

Ok, but the amount is absurd. It would be one thing if the thief couldn’t shadow return while CC’d, because at least that way you can do something to stop it. But you can’t deal with balance by isolating one ability. The dodge spam also comes into play, because what’s the point of CC stopping shadow return if you can’t reliably land CC due to the thief randomly spamming dodges to the point where you can’t even “count” all of the evades.

Also, Protection, Aegis, condition removal, regeneration, and other things can be given to the thief via support from his team. It’s not necessarily the end of the world that the thief doesn’t have these.

Also, stealth spamming needs to be nerfed further, or again there needs to be ways to deal with this, and being able to 1-shot people with backstab was also stupid.

So basically take theives out of the game? The last thing stealth needs is a nerf. Nothing we have is even viable besides s/d. This is incredibly biased and s/d is not even overpowered but i do think the 2 skill needs a small fix. Also you are wrong about each team having a thief. The most used classes were by far ranger, guard, engi and necro, theif and warrior were probably tied for 5th. There was more AI than players in this tourney lol.

Unfortunately there are lots of skills in GW2 which need a rework and
Infiltrator’s Strike + Shadow Return is one of them.

At First some comments about some statements:

Thief exists to go in and out of the fight.
“We want thieves to be the class with the best mobility” – The game’s developers.

Irrelevant.

No Blocks
No Protection
No Aegis

Thief spammable Evade on Weapon Skills is much better than Blocks and Aegis.
Thieves can steal Protection.

Lowest base HP pool in the game.

Wrong.

Ele, Guardian and Thief have the same HP pool.

Constant nerfs to burst, nerfs to stealth with more to come.

Irrelevant.

This is actually a nice list which describes the problem with
inifiltrator’s strike. Furthermore Infiltrator’s Strike + Shadow Return is a very good expample of the Risk vs. Reward Problem in GW2 already addressed in this thread:
Risk vs. Reward

1.ignores Line of sight in spots,
2. ignores the Z axis
3. has no cool down,
4. no counter play
5. Pretty much spamable
6. removes a condi,
7. causes immobilize,
8. can be used to completely negate stuns ( not stun break but you can give enough distance to stop stuns)
9. Low cost initiative
10. The opposing player has no idea where the port back spot is.
11. Other classes have to waste utility slots with 30+ second cds to have this mobility."

The 4. point is imo the most important, “no counter play”, but it is a
little unspecific. Why does Infiltrator’s strike not allow counter
play? Well mostly (but not only) because it has no animation and is
instant. Additionally Shadowreturn functions without target and even
if infiltrators’s strike misses. As an counterexample let us look at a
quite well designed skill (from a couter play perspective): Magnetic
Grasp + Magnetic Leap, one of the gap closers of the ele
profession. This skill has an animation (and Magnetic Leap only works
if Magnatic Grasp hits the target), therefore it can be dodged or
blocked and thus you can prevent the ele to close the gap and reach
you. => counter play (simple isnt it.)

If Infiltrator’s strike + Shadow Return would function similarly, if
Infiltrators’s strike gets an animation and Shadow Return only works
if Infiltrator’s strike hits than counter play would be
possible. Because now the opponent could prevent the thief from
closing the gap and moreover the thief could not riskless engage into
the fight because shadow return would not be available to teleport him
away simply with one button press.

=> counter play => more options and decisions for the thief and
opponent => better Risk vs. Reward

Estoroth.4310:

Unfortunately there are lots of skills in GW2 which need a rework and
Infiltrator’s Strike + Shadow Return is one of them.

At First some comments about some statements:

Thief exists to go in and out of the fight.
“We want thieves to be the class with the best mobility” – The game’s developers.

Irrelevant.

No Blocks
No Protection
No Aegis

Thief spammable Evade on Weapon Skills is much better than Blocks and Aegis.
Thieves can steal Protection.

Lowest base HP pool in the game.

Wrong.

Ele, Guardian and Thief have the same HP pool.

Constant nerfs to burst, nerfs to stealth with more to come.

Irrelevant.

This is actually a nice list which describes the problem with
inifiltrator’s strike. Furthermore Infiltrator’s Strike + Shadow Return is a very good expample of the Risk vs. Reward Problem in GW2 already addressed in this thread:
Risk vs. Reward

1.ignores Line of sight in spots,
2. ignores the Z axis
3. has no cool down,
4. no counter play
5. Pretty much spamable
6. removes a condi,
7. causes immobilize,
8. can be used to completely negate stuns ( not stun break but you can give enough distance to stop stuns)
9. Low cost initiative
10. The opposing player has no idea where the port back spot is.
11. Other classes have to waste utility slots with 30+ second cds to have this mobility."

The 4. point is imo the most important, “no counter play”, but it is a
little unspecific. Why does Infiltrator’s strike not allow counter
play? Well mostly (but not only) because it has no animation and is
instant. Additionally Shadowreturn functions without target and even
if infiltrators’s strike misses. As an counterexample let us look at a
quite well designed skill (from a couter play perspective): Magnetic
Grasp + Magnetic Leap, one of the gap closers of the ele
profession. This skill has an animation (and Magnetic Leap only works
if Magnatic Grasp hits the target), therefore it can be dodged or
blocked and thus you can prevent the ele to close the gap and reach
you. => counter play (simple isnt it.)

If Infiltrator’s strike + Shadow Return would function similarly, if
Infiltrators’s strike gets an animation and Shadow Return only works
if Infiltrator’s strike hits than counter play would be
possible. Because now the opponent could prevent the thief from
closing the gap and moreover the thief could not riskless engage into
the fight because shadow return would not be available to teleport him
away simply with one button press.

=> counter play => more options and decisions for the thief and
opponent => better Risk vs. Reward

So…..every weakness inherent to thieves is irrelevant but every one of their strengths is BIG KITTEN PROBLEM.

What a joke. Take your pseudo-intellectualism somewhere else. You can’t call every weakness of the profession irrelevant without explaining WHY.

Edit: Apparently you don’t understand how the skill works either. The immobilize + damage are NOT instant, they are tied to an attack that happens AFTER the teleport and HAS an animation. Stop moaning about lack of counterplay on thieves when warriors can stack 800 HPS of passive, unstrippable regen on zerk set and spirit rangers have as much built-in evade and unstrippable condi-cleanse as thieves (with a whole lot more utility).

Calm down and read it again. (I think the misunderstanding is my fault because of my horrible text formatting.)

I didn’t say that every weakness of thieves is irrelvant.

I said that this statement:

Thief exists to go in and out of the fight.
“We want thieves to be the class with the best mobility” – The game’s developers.

and this statement:

Constant nerfs to burst, nerfs to stealth with more to come.

is irrelevant to the discussion, not the general weaknesses (like no aegis, on demand protection, blocks) or the strengths (like evades, mobility, boon stripping etc) of the thief. Furthermore i didn’t say that every strengths of the thief profession is a big problem.

What i said is that the skill Infiltrator’s strike + Shadow Return allows no counter play because of the reasons above. The Problem is that Infiltrator’s strike as a gap closer is instant with no animation, i didn’t talk about the immobilize and damage, and that
Shadow Return functions even without Target and even when Infiltrator’s strike misses.

Stop moaning about lack of counterplay on thieves when warriors can stack 800 HPS of passive, unstrippable regen on zerk set and spirit rangers have as much built-in evade and unstrippable condi-cleanse as thieves (with a whole lot more utility).

The thread is not about warriors or spirit rangers but infiltrator’s strike (But you are absolutly right about warriors and that there are many more skills which need to be looked at). Like i said in my first post:

Unfortunately there are lots of skills in GW2 which need a rework and
Infiltrator’s Strike + Shadow Return is one of them.

@Estoroth

Please explain how the developers stating that they want thieves to be the most mobile class in the game is irrelevant to the conversation about the mobility inf strike grants them.

An HP “Pool” is occupied by multiple classes – Thieves belong to the lowest HP pool, with guards and ele’s.

How is the nerf to thief burst irrelevant? It’s part of the reason thieves need mobility.

Your list of points is laughably incoherent – half of it is incorrect (“I have no idea where the thief went when he ported back, it’s not like the ability leaves a handy little red circle or anything”), the other half is exaggerated or just observations on the base mechanics of the game, as if they were “points”.

“It has No CD” and “Pretty much Spammable”- congrats, you know how every single thief weapon skill works, why it necessitated a point is beyond me.

“No counter play” – because closing to the circle is never an option, and the game has no ranged weapons.

“Can be used to completely negate stuns” – So stability and blocks are broken too then – better, actually, because they actually completely negate stuns, as opposed to SR which leaves you stunned, just somewhere else. See point about ranged weapons / closing to the circle.

“Low cost initiative” – 5 total initiative is not “low cost”, its 42% of a thieves standard Init bar.

“Causes immobilize” a 1s immobilize on a set with lousy burst is hardly something to complain about. S/D has 2 highly telegraphed swings that do the majority of the damage in the weapon set – without immobilize, they would never hit against a moderately skilled player with half a brain.

I could keep going, but why bother? When you have points, they’re poorly supported or silly, and when you don’t, you just dismiss things with absolutely no insight or reasoning. You have little idea what you’re talking about – please gain some experience with the game and explain your points more clearly.

Estoroth.4310:

This is actually a nice list which describes the problem with
inifiltrator’s strike. Furthermore Infiltrator’s Strike + Shadow Return is a very good expample of the Risk vs. Reward Problem in GW2 already addressed in this thread:
Risk vs. Reward

1.ignores Line of sight in spots,
2. ignores the Z axis
3. has no cool down,
4. no counter play
5. Pretty much spamable
6. removes a condi,
7. causes immobilize,
8. can be used to completely negate stuns ( not stun break but you can give enough distance to stop stuns)
9. Low cost initiative
10. The opposing player has no idea where the port back spot is.
11. Other classes have to waste utility slots with 30+ second cds to have this mobility."

The 4. point is imo the most important, “no counter play”, but it is a
little unspecific. Why does Infiltrator’s strike not allow counter
play? Well mostly (but not only) because it has no animation and is
instant. Additionally Shadowreturn functions without target and even
if infiltrators’s strike misses. As an counterexample let us look at a
quite well designed skill (from a couter play perspective): Magnetic
Grasp + Magnetic Leap, one of the gap closers of the ele
profession. This skill has an animation (and Magnetic Leap only works
if Magnatic Grasp hits the target), therefore it can be dodged or
blocked and thus you can prevent the ele to close the gap and reach
you. => counter play (simple isnt it.)

If Infiltrator’s strike + Shadow Return would function similarly, if
Infiltrators’s strike gets an animation and Shadow Return only works
if Infiltrator’s strike hits than counter play would be
possible. Because now the opponent could prevent the thief from
closing the gap and moreover the thief could not riskless engage into
the fight because shadow return would not be available to teleport him
away simply with one button press.

=> counter play => more options and decisions for the thief and
opponent => better Risk vs. Reward

Too much.

They should simply put range requirments on Inf strike so that if the thief is not in range for the attack, it should fail its teleport and put shadow return under thief’s feet.

Like this the thief would no more be able to jump from a tearget to another without counterplay.

In this case, range would be the counterplay: keep the range so the thief won’t be able to reach you.

Again, this would be a HUGE nerf, and the point why most thieves don’t want Inf strike to be touched is because, with current power level of this class, any Inf strike nerf would completely remove thief viability ( basically any ranged prof, like power engies, rangers etc etc, would literally crush S/D thieves in 1vs1).

Inf strike needs to be balanced in order to allow counterplay, but this needs to be done with consequential buffs to the whole profession ( OH dagger, traits, pistols etc etc) because the thief currently NEEDS those uncounterable stuff in order to be viable.

Just like Fresh Air eles: without that insta burst with no counterplay, they would be trash.

So they need to remove the chesse and buff all the non-cheese, otherwise we simply have an inverted power creep that will remove the thief from high level PvP.

Lol you guys should play Bastet.

evilapprentice.6379:

@Estoroth

Please explain how the developers stating that they want thieves to be the most mobile class in the game is irrelevant to the conversation about the mobility inf strike grants them.

An HP “Pool” is occupied by multiple classes – Thieves belong to the lowest HP pool, with guards and ele’s.

How is the nerf to thief burst irrelevant? It’s part of the reason thieves need mobility.

Your list of points is laughably incoherent – half of it is incorrect (“I have no idea where the thief went when he ported back, it’s not like the ability leaves a handy little red circle or anything”), the other half is exaggerated or just observations on the base mechanics of the game, as if they were “points”.

“It has No CD” and “Pretty much Spammable”- congrats, you know how every single thief weapon skill works, why it necessitated a point is beyond me.

“No counter play” – because closing to the circle is never an option, and the game has no ranged weapons.

“Can be used to completely negate stuns” – So stability and blocks are broken too then – better, actually, because they actually completely negate stuns, as opposed to SR which leaves you stunned, just somewhere else. See point about ranged weapons / closing to the circle.

“Low cost initiative” – 5 total initiative is not “low cost”, its 42% of a thieves standard Init bar.

“Causes immobilize” a 1s immobilize on a set with lousy burst is hardly something to complain about. S/D has 2 highly telegraphed swings that do the majority of the damage in the weapon set – without immobilize, they would never hit against a moderately skilled player with half a brain.

I could keep going, but why bother? When you have points, they’re poorly supported or silly, and when you don’t, you just dismiss things with absolutely no insight or reasoning. You have little idea what you’re talking about – please gain some experience with the game and explain your points more clearly.

Bingo. Spot on.

I would totally support the whole ‘’S/D thieves are OP and need nerfed!’ bandwagon if you know… They were actually difficult to counter…

Mrbig.8019:

Estoroth.4310:

This is actually a nice list which describes the problem with
inifiltrator’s strike. Furthermore Infiltrator’s Strike + Shadow Return is a very good expample of the Risk vs. Reward Problem in GW2 already addressed in this thread:
Risk vs. Reward

1.ignores Line of sight in spots,
2. ignores the Z axis
3. has no cool down,
4. no counter play
5. Pretty much spamable
6. removes a condi,
7. causes immobilize,
8. can be used to completely negate stuns ( not stun break but you can give enough distance to stop stuns)
9. Low cost initiative
10. The opposing player has no idea where the port back spot is.
11. Other classes have to waste utility slots with 30+ second cds to have this mobility."

The 4. point is imo the most important, “no counter play”, but it is a
little unspecific. Why does Infiltrator’s strike not allow counter
play? Well mostly (but not only) because it has no animation and is
instant. Additionally Shadowreturn functions without target and even
if infiltrators’s strike misses. As an counterexample let us look at a
quite well designed skill (from a couter play perspective): Magnetic
Grasp + Magnetic Leap, one of the gap closers of the ele
profession. This skill has an animation (and Magnetic Leap only works
if Magnatic Grasp hits the target), therefore it can be dodged or
blocked and thus you can prevent the ele to close the gap and reach
you. => counter play (simple isnt it.)

If Infiltrator’s strike + Shadow Return would function similarly, if
Infiltrators’s strike gets an animation and Shadow Return only works
if Infiltrator’s strike hits than counter play would be
possible. Because now the opponent could prevent the thief from
closing the gap and moreover the thief could not riskless engage into
the fight because shadow return would not be available to teleport him
away simply with one button press.

=> counter play => more options and decisions for the thief and
opponent => better Risk vs. Reward

Too much.

They should simply put range requirments on Inf strike so that if the thief is not in range for the attack, it should fail its teleport and put shadow return under thief’s feet.

Like this the thief would no more be able to jump from a tearget to another without counterplay.

In this case, range would be the counterplay: keep the range so the thief won’t be able to reach you.

Again, this would be a HUGE nerf, and the point why most thieves don’t want Inf strike to be touched is because, with current power level of this class, any Inf strike nerf would completely remove thief viability ( basically any ranged prof, like power engies, rangers etc etc, would literally crush S/D thieves in 1vs1).

Inf strike needs to be balanced in order to allow counterplay, but this needs to be done with consequential buffs to the whole profession ( OH dagger, traits, pistols etc etc) because the thief currently NEEDS those uncounterable stuff in order to be viable.

Just like Fresh Air eles: without that insta burst with no counterplay, they would be trash.

So they need to remove the chesse and buff all the non-cheese, otherwise we simply have an inverted power creep that will remove the thief from high level PvP.

Imo the “power level” of other classes is the bigger problem. Nevertheless the problem with these kind of skills must be addressed. But changing just Infiltrator’s strike won’t solve the problem of course. If the adujustments are not done right the thief
will be in the same position as the ele profession.

But to be honest, with the power creep of the latest patches, the insufficient testing and resources for balancing and pvp in general i don’t think that there will be big changes regarding these things.

So they need to remove the chesse and buff all the non-cheese, otherwise we simply have an inverted power creep that will remove the thief from high level PvP.

+1

The answer is easy, get ANY MELEE SPEC CLASS and go 1v1 with a THIEF MELEE without any of the 2 move, THIEF will always LOSE thats why it has mobility cause it CANT stay still as a fuking regen warrior for exemple, without evade/blinks thief = dead meat

“Thief has the best mitigation in the game, since they have the highest chance and the access to the most tools that allow them to avoid damage entirely.”

Who stole my invulnerability skill?

Stooperdale.3560:

“Thief has the best mitigation in the game, since they have the highest chance and the access to the most tools that allow them to avoid damage entirely.”

Who stole my invulnerability skill?

Evade is invulnerability, both make it so you take no damage. Except if you are talking about the cannon from skyhammer and I’m guessing other siege weaponry.

I’d rather have evade spam than three secs of invul on a 180 cd. Who do you think mitigates more damage?

Evade and Invulnerability are pretty much the exact same mechanic with a different name.

A lot of bullkitten accusations concerning Infiltrator Strike. A iniative cost of 5 hardly makes it spammable, it immobilises the oppo just for 1 attack, it DOESNT port on Z axis mostly and is really unreliable on that behalf. In PvP for example you can port up and down the Clocktower, but thats due to bad map designing, not the skill itself. It is easily to see where the backport point is, it doesnt break stun anymore and only removes one condition. Negating stuns actually requires skill, because you need to set the port points correctly in order to prevent chain stunning. Range is perfectly fine if anything the backport is too low in range, as every class besides thief has a 1200 range weapon.

I’m really getting tired of this sciolism. I hope ANet won’t listen to these forum whiners, just because they’re not capable of adapting.

Good old times when S/D set wasn’t famous.

Talking about mobility, try to catch a Warrior using GS | S/WH

Can I get a thumb down so that I can apply it to half of these comments? Most of the people who’ve replied to this topic have absolutely no clue what they are talking about.

If the thief is using Infiltrator strike as a means to keep away from you then get near his SR spot.

Get off that kitten tear train and learn the profession.

EDIT: I am adding this thread to the “stupid kitten people say about thieves” thread.

Aza.2105:

Evade is invulnerability, both make it so you take no damage. Except if you are talking about the cannon from skyhammer and I’m guessing other siege weaponry.

I’d rather have evade spam than three secs of invul on a 180 cd. Who do you think mitigates more damage?

Evade and Invulnerability are pretty much the exact same mechanic with a different name.

Evade is different than invulnerability and significantly weaker.

Evade will not help you against certain attacks, like the final Jade Maw attack or the aforementioned skyhammer. Invulnerability will (last I checked).

Likewise, evasion will not save you against Retaliation, which is a big deal for some classes, like when the Mesmer had its Blurred Frenzy nerfed from being invulnerable to being an evade.

Block, Evade, and Invulnerability may behave similarly but there are significant differences between them.

This is really a neverending story, all complain about thieves without playing them.
Stop complain for nerf, thieves are almost 1 way to go now.

ohhhh…can some mod please close ALL thief threads? the whole thief forum?
99% of all threads here are about “opness”, “spamming”, “nerf”…

please nerf thiefs more ! thanks !!

Please keep in mind that if a Thief teleports back using Shadow Return, he can no longer contest the point he was fighting on.

You’re all talking about counterplay in terms of being able to kill the Thief. However, there is already a huge non-ini cost associated with Shadow Return in the sense that every use of it is a step towards loosing a point (or in the case of a teamfight, resulting in your team being down 1 member).

Shadow Return is a disengage. In WvW maybe I can see some validity in complaints about not being able to kill a Thief because they can disengage at any time. However, in sPvP, every time an enemy disengages, you’re 1 step closer to winning the fight. This must-get-kill mentality will only cloud your judgement in tournaments when your priority should be to secure the win for your team.

From mostly ranged player perspective, I find S/D Thieves most troublesome of all classes when it comes to keeping range. Ability to constantly spam one button and stick to the target as glue for whole time… It’s just too easily accessible when it comes with 1200 shadowstep and stealth. It has to be really toned down
My overall suggestion for Thief as a class would be to make them more combat-based than stealth-based. Atm they’re forced to run very glassy way and ANet, to compensate that, gives them more and more easy-access cheesy mechanics like evades on everything, teleporting all around and very high access to stealth.
Iml, they should be build less about everything-imay be one of options, but without current stealth-rate of D/P), more about toe2toecombat with a lot of blocks, dodges and defensive abilities coupled with some stealth of course , pr, protection…etc…etc. Currently, they’re crap in design. Ranger-The Edge of Insanity – but at the level of warriors.

I am a 5 signet warrior. I have huge problems with thieves. They need to be toned down.
First of all, they have stealth. When they stealth, I can’t hit them. This is stupid. I use my skills, they go on cooldown but nothing happens to thief. With one skill, thief ignores anything I can put on my skill bar. It needs to be nerfed.
Secondly, mobility. I understand thieves must be superior at movement, but not to this extent. I, while considering myself a decent warrior, am unable to use effectively any of my melee weapons against a thief. Sometimes, they manage to attack me in melee and get out of range before I can retaliate. That is so wrong. Thief mobility should be toned down.
Thirdly. The skills they spam. Why do I and 4 other classes have more or less balanced skills with balanced cooldowns while thief alone gets skills it can spam infinitely? If I use my skill to defend myself against a thief attack, my skill goes on cooldown but thief can use that attack again. And again. It is simply unfair. Thief skills should have longer cooldowns and higher costs.
Lastly. I thank developers for listening to me previous suggestion (about thieves being able to strip a boons from a 60-second cooldown skill with a PRESS OF A SINGLE BUTTON ANY TIME THEY WANT) and reducing the amount of boons stolen s/d dual skill. I still think it will be op and will need further nerfing.
/sarcasm

Ichishi.9613:

I am a 5 signet warrior. I have huge problems with thieves. They need to be toned down.
First of all, they have stealth. When they stealth, I can’t hit them. This is stupid. I use my skills, they go on cooldown but nothing happens to thief. With one skill, thief ignores anything I can put on my skill bar. It needs to be nerfed.
Secondly, mobility. I understand thieves must be superior at movement, but not to this extent. I, while considering myself a decent warrior, am unable to use effectively any of my melee weapons against a thief. Sometimes, they manage to attack me in melee and get out of range before I can retaliate. That is so wrong. Thief mobility should be toned down.
Thirdly. The skills they spam. Why do I and 4 other classes have more or less balanced skills with balanced cooldowns while thief alone gets skills it can spam infinitely? If I use my skill to defend myself against a thief attack, my skill goes on cooldown but thief can use that attack again. And again. It is simply unfair. Thief skills should have longer cooldowns and higher costs.
Lastly. I thank developers for listening to me previous suggestion (about thieves being able to strip a boons from a 60-second cooldown skill with a PRESS OF A SINGLE BUTTON ANY TIME THEY WANT) and reducing the amount of boons stolen s/d dual skill. I still think it will be op and will need further nerfing.
/sarcasm

sad thing is that’s what warriors actually think.