Guild Wars 2

Be quite a long time since i played. I used to run D/D thief in WvW all the time. I been playing all day and found it hard to kill people now. So am i just out of practice or has the thief been nerfed all to hell?

D/D is the hardest set up to pull off, mostly because it has got next to no utility. Don’t know when you stopped playing but yes, thief has been nerfed quite a bit- D/D not in particular though. At least not within the past year.

I love D/D thief in WvW. Depends on what traits you run and how you build it. You can’t for example run soldier’s gear and do any real damage. And I would say you can’t run zerk/valk/and the like and put traits in the bottom lines, same reason I felt D/P as weak but I don’t care for that playstyle either.

Only ones as D/D you should have issue killing is non-zerk guardians (even then they are likely to spam blocks/invuln and run from you. Mostly I don’t bother due to the time and effort but you can kill them) or warriors (because ouch, although so fun to mess with) or condi engineers or d/d ele. Rest should be fair game, with of course uplevels and any zerkish targets easy.

Edit: Unless you have spent like over 2 years since playing thief, nothing should have changed for d/d. It’s likely just out of practice. Although, shadowsteps do behave differently sometimes now, especially with the pathing changes.

Lunacy Solacio.6514:

I love D/D thief in WvW. Depends on what traits you run and how you build it. You can’t for example run soldier’s gear and do any real damage. And I would say you can’t run zerk/valk/and the like and put traits in the bottom lines, same reason I felt D/P as weak but I don’t care for that playstyle either.

Only ones as D/D you should have issue killing is non-zerk guardians (even then they are likely to spam blocks/invuln and run from you. Mostly I don’t bother due to the time and effort but you can kill them) or warriors (because ouch, although so fun to mess with) or condi engineers or d/d ele. Rest should be fair game, with of course uplevels and any zerkish targets easy.

Edit: Unless you have spent like over 2 years since playing thief, nothing should have changed for d/d. It’s likely just out of practice. Although, shadowsteps do behave differently sometimes now, especially with the pathing changes.

don’t forget every thief build beats d/d thief also

don’t forget every thief build beats d/d thief also

Everybody claims this, and indeed it is true assuming both thieves are of equal skill.
Some d/p thieves pose a major problem, other are so clueless as to allow a d/d thief to full burst them from open view.

I’m playing 66200 zerker, so one C&D + Steal + Backstab burst easily does 15-20k damage. If they manage to survive or mitigate this, then I can do it again using infiltrator signet.
Alternatively, 26600 offers so much reset power via healing in stealth and extra toughness that most other enemy thieves can’t 100-0 you, so if you happen to get jumped you can just reset the fight (although I won’t promote 6SA cheesiness).

The biggest challenges for me to solo kill in wvw are perplexi engis and good mediguards.

TL:DR
Regardless what people say, d/d is still very effective in wvw, moreso in small roaming groups where you have friendly fodder to tank and bait enemy dodges and defense utilities for you. You can then truly shine as an assassin, weaving from one downed body to the next.

Everything works better next to a friendly.

The reason some still play D/D in wvw are the extra stats and no reduced dmg on CnD (vs pvp). With that extra burst, D/D is okay for killing fast but still lacks the utility of other sets.

D/D is fun to me, D/P is boring to me and about the only reason I’d run it is permastealth annoyance but again boring. I’ve tried to make a D/P build that is as good as my D/D, and can’t, I’d have to give up far too much, and lose utility. I don’t care for S/D it’s a very different playstyle, more of a brawler though. I’d do that on a different class. P/D condi only did for a couple weeks during Season 2 when I had over 6 people consistently focusing me in every fight because they knew I was Power D/D just to give them a little surprise. Funny enough I still carry the entire armor set and haven’t used it since.

The D/D build that I run, has quite a bit of utility. With a bit of a change to it, namely different runes, can lose at most 1k on cloak backstab combo and gain more utility.

I’ve fought s/d thieves to stalemate, I’ve relished hunting d/p thieves before just because, and have them wonder why they can’t burst me down while I do 2-3x the damage they do. If they are really good, though, possible stalemate and it would again come down to whether or not they accidentally waste initiative or I do, or one or both deciding it’s a waste of time. Sometimes their reactions are rather funny when you walk into their blind field and keep attacking them. I suppose that’s more viable a tactic now with the change from 1s pulse to 2s.

No, D/D isn’t intended for brawling, you may need to run sometimes and return. And no it isn’t really viable in sPvP afaik, not without quite a differently playstyle and build setup, although in a dueling situation in an sPvP arena it was fine enough with friends, likely since that is what I was comfortable with already. (I don’t sPvP on thief though)

In WvW, D/D is most definitely viable. With the right setup you’ll have all the utility you need to survive solo/small scale and in zergs (of course if you are sitting in the middle of the zerg, you are dead, but that’s most thief power builds).

Lunacy Solacio.6514:

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The D/D build that I run, has quite a bit of utility. With a bit of a change to it, namely different runes, can lose at most 1k on cloak backstab combo and gain more utility.

I’ve fought s/d thieves to stalemate, I’ve relished hunting d/p thieves before just because, and have them wonder why they can’t burst me down while I do 2-3x the damage they do. If they are really good, though, possible stalemate and it would again come down to whether or not they accidentally waste initiative or I do, or one or both deciding it’s a waste of time. Sometimes their reactions are rather funny when you walk into their blind field and keep attacking them. I suppose that’s more viable a tactic now with the change from 1s pulse to 2s.

No, D/D isn’t intended for brawling, you may need to run sometimes and return. And no it isn’t really viable in sPvP afaik, not without quite a differently playstyle and build setup, although in a dueling situation in an sPvP arena it was fine enough with friends, likely since that is what I was comfortable with already. (I don’t sPvP on thief though)

In WvW, D/D is most definitely viable. With the right setup you’ll have all the utility you need to survive solo/small scale and in zergs (of course if you are sitting in the middle of the zerg, you are dead, but that’s most thief power builds).

I’ve fought with D/D this past weekend a lot and the only build that I feel like I can keep a momentum with is a panic strike/improv build. Not having a good gap closer aside from short cool-down Steal is a bit rough for me and feels uncomfortable and landing stealth can be a pain in large fights where people are flying around or being pulled and tossed. Though, I do like the build in terms of managing my Steal for the damage bonus, deciding who to Steal from and when to unload the bundle for a gap closer and what I Steal next, I don’t respect the decisions with Steal as much with other builds.

I’m going to play it more probably just because I like the look of dagger animations and the d/d animations, I just need to fill in the odd downtime where I can’t decide how to best spend my initiative and I space out for a second, no smoke, cc, or boon rip for the team so I’ll wake up from my short stupor and pull out the short bow and blast finisher until a reward chest pops up or I need to chose a waypoint.

D/D works with experience. It is a build best played running super high burst (66200 or 66002), and best played by a thief with +2 years on the class and who is very good with it. It takes a lot of skill to survive, but when played right will cut through stuff like a ranger through shadow refuge