Guild Wars 2

Hi. Thief is my first and only 80, and since I leveled almost exclusively as d/d sb, I chose to craft myself a full set of rampager’s (With which I currently run d/d sb 25/30/0/0/15 cnd backstab).

Problem is, Im tempted to try other playstyles, likely involving S/ and I feel I might have shot myself in the foot with my choice of gear. Before any of you say “just get a second set” I do hear and understand it’s likely my only choice barring staying dd, but the process of getting a second set after all the trouble i went through for this one would greatly diminish my enjoyment of the game (not a fan of the grind).

Please help me figure out if I can still try other weapons and builds without changing out of this set of gear, or have I carved myself into a niche and would need to replace the set?
Thanks in advance.

doubleomar.2165:

Hi. Thief is my first and only 80, and since I leveled almost exclusively as d/d sb, I chose to craft myself a full set of rampager’s (With which I currently run d/d sb 25/30/0/0/15 cnd backstab).

Problem is, Im tempted to try other playstyles, likely involving S/ and I feel I might have shot myself in the foot with my choice of gear. Before any of you say “just get a second set” I do hear and understand it’s likely my only choice barring staying dd, but the process of getting a second set after all the trouble i went through for this one would greatly diminish my enjoyment of the game (not a fan of the grind).

Please help me figure out if I can still try other weapons and builds without changing out of this set of gear, or have I carved myself into a niche and would need to replace the set?
Thanks in advance.

Well, while you’re shooting yourself in the foot, you may try P/D, which should work fine with rampager’s (though less survivable than I’d like). P/D is more survivable than D/D and more reliable, but less dps vs unmoving targets. So for PvE this won’t be an improvement. For WvW it will be fun (and will do moderately more damage than Carrion – which is what I run – though you lose a lot of survivability).

If what you want is a perfect PvE build, zerker’s is really the best way to go – though rampager’s also works (as you probably know). People usually recommend mixing gear, starting with zerker trinkets, and combinations of berzerker / soldiers / cavaliers / knights / valk’s armor. There are a few posts talking about which combos work the best. The important thing to remember is that crit-damage pays off better on trinkets than on armor – so if something is going to have crit-damage – it should be a trinket first (i.e. don’t go zerker armor with pvt trinkets).

I typically run around with 6 out of my 8 bag slots full of different gear sets to change builds on the fly. It’s expensive, but so worth it.

Gear is hard to get in this game?
Compared to my last MMO, where I would put more effort into a single piece than an entire set here… It seems pretty easy to me.

gear is actually really easy to get in this game. heres some ways to get it WHILE you enjoy the set you have …use d/d.

WVW drops badges that you trade for any kind of armor(100-150 per ish)
PVE drops all kinds of goodies that sell for money
DUNGEONS give tokens to trade in for armor(100-170 per ish) 60 per run per path
FRACTALS great money….this will always let you walk out with 2-3g per full run.

so just play the game iwth what you have and you will get the rest of your sets. wont take long. the first set is always the longest bc ur starting from scratch. LOOK:

your noob char farming: lvls 1-80 (90% of which drops crap)
now your 80 with exo farming: you only fight/explore good areas droping good loot

so you will get another set in 1/5th of the time.

Thank you everyone for your responses!

I’ll definitely have to get other sets and I’ll do so while d/d I guess. Now, I was doing 25/30/0/0/15 but I’m feeling SUPER squishy (I did make my trinkets Settler’s to get toughness, healing and condi damage, which I’m sure will get critizised to hell and back but lesson learned, no?) Based on my kitteny gear (Rampager’s and Settler’s) I was wondering if I wouldn’t be better served with a different type of trait build. If so, what do you guys suggest? It seems I’m currently geared for a power, precision, toughness and healing mix with TONS of condition damage. And please please, remember I’m super noob and I look up to you guys for help, don’t shoot me down with flame or insults please. (also english is not my first language so pardon the mistakes)

put 15 into acrobatics and use dagger mainhand. If more evade is necessary use withdraw as the heal. That should be more than sufficient survivability for everything in the game.

I’m assuming you are talking strickly PvE btw, based on your initial post.

ryokoalways.3450:

put 15 into acrobatics and use dagger mainhand. If more evade is necessary use withdraw as the heal. That should be more than sufficient survivability for everything in the game.

I’m assuming you are talking strickly PvE btw, based on your initial post.

I actually wasn’t talking strickly PvE, and I apologize if I gave that impression; it’s possibly a side-effect of being noob that I may have misguided expectations about gear and weapon types and their relation to PvE or PvP. That said, I did go 10/0/30/0/30 stealing build cuz it seemed so much fun, and I’m rarely alone because I always play with RL friends and bountiful theft and thrill of the crime seem amazing. I figured I’d take the advantage of the condi damage for poisons and bleeds, shadow arts to take adv of my toughness and healing gear, and the trickery tree to compliment in synergy with the 10 points in deadly and hidden thief.

I know it’s quite likely I’m doing all the things wrong. But it feels I’m making lemonade with the lemons I got from my choice of armor :/

I’d say for your next set, go with something kinda cookie cutter, like those zerker damage builds.

You already strayed off the beaten course and are regretting it a bit (I get it – I’ve done it too). Now you should go back to something tried and true (like a power – crit set)…then when you get bored, you’ll be able to go back or throw in splashes of gear with slightly different stats…and you’ll have an idea of what those cookie cutter sets are capable of, so you’ll have a yard stick to compare.

One other thing – before working toward a specific set, give it a shot in pvp.

Don’t forget Temple Armor that you can buy with Karma. My PVT set is mostly that stuff…

doubleomar.2165:

Thank you everyone for your responses!

I’ll definitely have to get other sets and I’ll do so while d/d I guess. Now, I was doing 25/30/0/0/15 but I’m feeling SUPER squishy (I did make my trinkets Settler’s to get toughness, healing and condi damage, which I’m sure will get critizised to hell and back but lesson learned, no?) Based on my kitteny gear (Rampager’s and Settler’s) I was wondering if I wouldn’t be better served with a different type of trait build. If so, what do you guys suggest? It seems I’m currently geared for a power, precision, toughness and healing mix with TONS of condition damage. And please please, remember I’m super noob and I look up to you guys for help, don’t shoot me down with flame or insults please. (also english is not my first language so pardon the mistakes)

for rampagers….try this 10 30 0 0 30. have hit crit and high condi dmg with decent power and a nice 3k heal every 20 secs u might like it alot.

doubleomar.2165:

I actually wasn’t talking strickly PvE, and I apologize if I gave that impression; it’s possibly a side-effect of being noob that I may have misguided expectations about gear and weapon types and their relation to PvE or PvP. That said, I did go 10/0/30/0/30 stealing build cuz it seemed so much fun, and I’m rarely alone because I always play with RL friends and bountiful theft and thrill of the crime seem amazing. I figured I’d take the advantage of the condi damage for poisons and bleeds, shadow arts to take adv of my toughness and healing gear, and the trickery tree to compliment in synergy with the 10 points in deadly and hidden thief.

I know it’s quite likely I’m doing all the things wrong. But it feels I’m making lemonade with the lemons I got from my choice of armor :/

You really need at least 10 in critical for precision > vitality for survivability then. General condi thief is carrion or rabid, not so much rampager.

points in acrobatics won’t help much if you don’t go sword (or at least D/P), and condi thief is never ever going to touch sword.

Wow, OP we had the exact same problem and bought the exact same set. Not a good idea, huh? Just try to save around 30g and you can replace it in no time. That wish.1027 dude had a guide for a balanced, cheap, starter exotic set that as of now seems to do the job very well.

This is the build I’m talking about:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYEQNAoYFmQ2esTVIRx9IpMqmqrQUB-jEzAYLBRiCIVIQJPl1sXATfQtBl1+ggoeBTVKkqLjs3oIa1CBYeBA-w

meh, the precision > vitality trait gives so little HP XD it’s not really worth it unless you are desperate and got nothing to use in that slot.

Which happens more often than not cause crit trait line got very few good traits.

stof.9341:

meh, the precision > vitality trait gives so little HP XD it’s not really worth it unless you are desperate and got nothing to use in that slot.

Which happens more often than not cause crit trait line got very few good traits.

Oh I don’t really use that, just experimenting my EHP. I replace it with I when soloing or X if with zerg.