Guild Wars 2

People usually think thieves are OP because D/D can do complelty unbalanced damage in WvW thanks to buff food, stack sigil and wvw power stacks from guards.

Thieves in general are weak against builds that dont rely on big hitting skills to deal damage because you cant dodge/stealth all those 1 spam from a necro or engi.

Mayama.1854:

People usually think thieves are OP because D/D can do complelty unbalanced damage in WvW thanks to buff food, stack sigil and wvw power stacks from guards.

Thieves in general are weak against builds that dont rely on big hitting skills to deal damage because you cant dodge/stealth all those 1 spam from a necro or engi.

so can my longbow ranger. my LB ranger can even stealth. The only difference is that you cannot “dodge” the ranger burst, as it is constant.
If rangers were given Shadow Refuge, all the QQ would belong to them, not thieves…

OP talking about dueling builds. If you are WvW dueling without a dueling build you will lose. Thief is OP in most circumstances like roaming/spvp where you face normal builds

This depends so much on the game format you take into account.
1. Judging by the mild toxicity of some comments I would say that for sPvP the thief is fine. Though arguably it be nice if there were more viable builds.

This then leaves PvE and WvW:
2a. For PvE-Solo and PvE-group/dungeon (5), it would say the thief is also fine, though it would be nice if the thief would be less self-centred, some support wouldn’t hurt for dungeons … I were to argue that for PvE-solo, most builds are viable, for dungeons I were to guess some more build diversity wouldn’t hurt…
2b. For PvE open world big group fights, the Thief is doing ok-ish, here it’s usually a matter of another body, which they provide. Again though, being a bit less self-centred would be nice.

Which then leaves WvW:
3a. For WvW Roaming solo, the thief only shines when taking on the lost straglers, or for taking down sentries, capping a BL-point. There are few thieves that I see take a camp on their own, and I hardly ever succeed. For WvW-small group Roaming, the thief is excellent (esp. with a Mesmer), you can use the other person as a distraction (hence mesmers work so well) and go after each other small group member 1 by 1.

3b. For WvW zerging, the thief is worse than a ranger, all you basically have is 2 skills on the short bow, that have a range that makes you feel like an old man with prostate problems. You can’t take a hit (though arguably the new elite-trait deals with this ‘slightly’ and only if you are stealthed). The only support (contribution) you can make is blast stuff with your shortbow, and one utility. The venom share looks like a great thing, but you rely so much on the build of somebody else with it, if they don’t have a condi build you might as well share a pancake with them. And for those builds that do have a condi-build, well it’s more then likely your venoms would add anything they don’t already have…

Now there is one ‘but’, and that is if you manage to stay largely hidden in the fray, and pick on hurt back liners. Though as soon as that train turns around, and you are not aware of it, it’s done for.

lastly, I will say that part of this also has to do with the fact that ‘commanders’ see thieves only for their roaming quality, instead of for their stealth, and communication/coordination can be very hard. And yes, Mesmer stealth is much easier to apply and ‘idiot-proof’ (meaning I don’t really blame the commanders). But technically shadow-refuge can be a very useful skill, seeing that people that enter it also get stealth, and as such there is no 5man limit (it only applies to people in the circle when it is cast).

So is the thief ‘the weakest’? No, not really, it’s mainly the inherent ‘glass canon’ quality of them that makes them useless in a zerg. As well as a great lack of support and being largely ‘self-centred’. This then leads to only a few builds being ‘viable’ and only for the formats they shine in.

The thief could do with, more viable builds (diversity) and group support:
- Bound in Shade (blast): bind allies (5) in shade, giving them stability for x sec.

- Trip wire: knock down foes, or remove stability.

- etc… might make some more…

I wouldnt say weakest, but they are for me definetely in the same state like Rangers, that they need definetsl some bigger redesigns to their whole core system to just make more fun to be played, to become less reliant on 1 mechanic. like rangers are heavily reliant on their pets, its stealth for thieves and thieves don’t use the utilities, which should be their real strategetic core mechanic – venoms and not steal.
Venoms would be a perfect option to improve the thief in what it all lacks mostly, support gameplay and strategetic diversity in combat becomming much lesser predictable, like they are currently by just moving the venom utilitiy and heal skill to F1-4.

like ANet shoudl also rework all the pet command utility skills of the ranger into the F1-4 skilsl of the ranger to significantly improve thsoe 2 classes in their gameplay mechanisms.

The second biggest problem of the thief compared to the other classes is, thieves got with each balancign update always nerfed, theres no patch, that really buffed them for once significantly in anything or improved as said their horrible gameplay mechanisms that let the class lack for group support and better strategetic gameplay in overall with the help of venoms.

The steal skilsl of the thief need all to be improved, most are total weak/useless.
There are only a few skills, that can be useful, when used at the right time/situation, like the glob of ectoplasm for an all boon buff, the invincibility bottle for 3 seconds of gettign no damage or the chill attack, that can be a good livesaver against elementalists with that you can significantly outplay them if used at the right moment. Or the attack that deals several random conditions and the whiling axe is one of the better skills.

But all other stuff is most of the time useless, like that claw that deals 1 ridiculous stack of bleeding, the club/mace dealign too less damage and so on of thiose thigns that deal once damage and a few conditions that are weak..
The thief could definetely need here better stolen skill options and a thief shouldn#t also always steal the same thing from a class.

Stolen skills shouldnt be to only 1 stolen skill per class. Each class should offer multiple different options to receive as stolen skill, including also options with that the thief should steal skills from the classes self.

Example stealing from an elementalists should result also in receiving as stolen skill one of their elemental weapon skills, like Frost Bow, Lava Axe, Lightning Hammer, Earth Shield ect. to use those elemental conjured weapons as stolen skill.
Would be far better, and interestign, than to steal always only that chill attack from elementalists….

why is everyone saying thief’s only defence is stealth? did everyone forget we also have blinds, evade’s and teleports?

Magische Boek.2530:

why is everyone saying thief’s only defence is stealth? did everyone forget we also have blinds, evade’s and teleports?

Elementary my dear Magische; because they are all WvWers that run 6 shadow arts builds with refuge.

@Orpheal
you’re getting this the wrong way . Rangers are not relying on their mechanic the way it is. They are hindered by it. While thieves can use steal and stealth without much of a downside to their performance, rangers relying on their mechanic CANNOT do so without having to expect problems with hitting targets. problems with having good enough burst, problems with pet uptime, pet responsiveness (still a issue, just less so than before).
Thief problems is indeed too much reliance on interacting with stealth, but the class as a whole is FAR FROM being weak. just gotta learn to utilize all your tools instead of clinging to the few that has been “proven to always work”.

Thieves have really good tools like Tripwire, Needle Trap, Devourer Venom, Smoke Screen. How often do i see anyone using even one of these? almost never. But they are seriously good ways to control and manage opponents with the least effort you can possibly require.

>>>3a. For WvW Roaming solo, the thief only shines when taking on the lost straglers, or for taking down sentries, capping a BL-point. There are few thieves that I see take a camp on their own, and I hardly ever succeed. For WvW-small group Roaming, the thief is excellent (esp. with a Mesmer), you can use the other person as a distraction (hence mesmers work so well) and go after each other small group member 1 by 1.

I do not understand this statement at all. I took out camps solo all the time in WvW as a thief. I play every profession and my thief does it just about the fastest.

This either a condition build or a power build. I can not recall the last time I failed to flip a camp as a thief unless it when I was hit by some of the enemy players coming in to defend the same.

I have a love/hate relationship with this class. I enjoy the burst and ‘edge of your seat’ playstyle of the class. But one the more aggrivating experiences playing a thief is being on the receiving end of other thieves and being 2 shot.

While burst is still high overall in this game, I’d argue the class most susceptible to it is also the class most capable of abusing it. And it’s this that kind of makes me hate the class.

I can’t build for armor because starting armor is so low, if you don’t spec shadow arts it’s not worth the investment. It’s made even worse because I need to build for health because condis will wreck my day because of how poorly the class handles condis. But even if I found room to build for enough armor to blunt reasonable burst and enough health so a few seconds of condi pressure don’t kill me, I’m still 2 shot by fellow thieves which makes me question why I bothered to run anything but full zerker or valk+zerk at all.

I would gladly trade some burst if in return I got some tools to help survive while outside of stealth for more than a split second. It would feel good to be able to stomp someone I managed to kill in WvW without fear of the zerg’s random AE absolutely destroying me.

So yes, I would say the Thief is actually a pretty weak class overall but it has some fairly overpowered mechanics masking the issues the class has. Without those things being toned down and allowing some of the weaknesses to look like real weaknesses, nothing will change.

@OP:

Depends on PvE, PvP, WvW roaming, WvW zergs

PvE: Below average. It is way easier to use a guardian or warrior here. If you want big damage, an ele is better.

PvP: Decent spot right now. Will likely be much closer to the bottom after the next balance patch. S/D and D/P are both getting nerfed.

WvW roaming: Goes well here, but that is mostly against the quality of players. You mostly see people who are zerg builds. Might take a while to kill them, but they aren’t going to kill you either.

WvW zerg: Change classes. Your blast finishers are not worth it.

Stealth is still the dumbest thing in a 1v1. You win, they stealth and blink away, heal up. You lose? They kill you because of all their blinks and stealth.

It’s a lose-lose for every other class that doesn’t go full tank and the way thief is designed is 1 in 100 reasons the pvp in this game will never be taken very seriously. What a downgrade from gw1.

Atherakhia.4086:

I have a love/hate relationship with this class. I enjoy the burst and ‘edge of your seat’ playstyle of the class. But one the more aggrivating experiences playing a thief is being on the receiving end of other thieves and being 2 shot.

While burst is still high overall in this game, I’d argue the class most susceptible to it is also the class most capable of abusing it. And it’s this that kind of makes me hate the class.

I can’t build for armor because starting armor is so low, if you don’t spec shadow arts it’s not worth the investment. It’s made even worse because I need to build for health because condis will wreck my day because of how poorly the class handles condis. But even if I found room to build for enough armor to blunt reasonable burst and enough health so a few seconds of condi pressure don’t kill me, I’m still 2 shot by fellow thieves which makes me question why I bothered to run anything but full zerker or valk+zerk at all.

I would gladly trade some burst if in return I got some tools to help survive while outside of stealth for more than a split second. It would feel good to be able to stomp someone I managed to kill in WvW without fear of the zerg’s random AE absolutely destroying me.

So yes, I would say the Thief is actually a pretty weak class overall but it has some fairly overpowered mechanics masking the issues the class has. Without those things being toned down and allowing some of the weaknesses to look like real weaknesses, nothing will change.

Other classes are just as capable of huge burst, some don’t even need to use weapon skills to burst down a squishie. WvW wise it’s stealth that makes it a lot easier to play zerker for thief than other class with zerk build. That’s why you don’t see other classes with zerker builds as often as zerker thieves.

Thief strongest defenses are the active ones, blinds, stealth, evasion, teleports, those your best tools to survive. Thieves are not meant to be build to take dmg, you should avoid it. Trading thief burst for survival would just make us a weaker version of warrior. No thanks.

If you want to be able to stomp someone in zerg aoe, you picked a wrong class.

Leger.3724:

Stealth is still the dumbest thing in a 1v1. You win, they stealth and blink away, heal up. You lose? They kill you because of all their blinks and stealth.

It’s a lose-lose for every other class that doesn’t go full tank and the way thief is designed is 1 in 100 reasons the pvp in this game will never be taken very seriously. What a downgrade from gw1.

No, they kill you cos you go full tank and can’t kill a fly.

Orpheal.8263:

The steal skilsl of the thief need all to be improved, most are total weak/useless.
There are only a few skills, that can be useful, when used at the right time/situation, like the glob of ectoplasm for an all boon buff, the invincibility bottle for 3 seconds of gettign no damage or the chill attack, that can be a good livesaver against elementalists with that you can significantly outplay them if used at the right moment. Or the attack that deals several random conditions and the whiling axe is one of the better skills.

But all other stuff is most of the time useless, like that claw that deals 1 ridiculous stack of bleeding, the club/mace dealign too less damage and so on of thiose thigns that deal once damage and a few conditions that are weak..
The thief could definetely need here better stolen skill options and a thief shouldn#t also always steal the same thing from a class.

Stolen skills shouldnt be to only 1 stolen skill per class. Each class should offer multiple different options to receive as stolen skill, including also options with that the thief should steal skills from the classes self.

Example stealing from an elementalists should result also in receiving as stolen skill one of their elemental weapon skills, like Frost Bow, Lava Axe, Lightning Hammer, Earth Shield ect. to use those elemental conjured weapons as stolen skill.
Would be far better, and interestign, than to steal always only that chill attack from elementalists….

I’m a bit confused here, you don’t seem to understand how the thief steal skills work or what you steal from each class, yet you also dismiss the mechanic itself as poor.

Guardian > Mace > Gives a really long daze. Like ridiculously long. If you proc this on an enemy with no stability or stunbreaker with low endurance you can practically mash them to death with no worries.

Necro > Skull Fear > An AoE fear that has huge duration, it’s really really powerful and can be used to outplay a necro, especially if they are inexperienced. Really fun in PvP as well.

Mesmer > Consume Plasma > Every buff. This is really strong, nothing more needs to be said here tbh.

Ranger > Healing spring > Water field that also provides regen and removes conditions. Really nice for placing over a point when duelling a ranger as it can negate a ton of their condition damage. You can also kite inside the circle blasting with Short Bow for heals. You can also steal blinding tuft from their pets for an extra free stealth.

Warrior > Whirling Axe > A reflect that also does decent melee damage. Personally this is one my least favourite skills to use as it doesn’t actually work that well against warriors. I think this one should be replaced with a skill that lets us perform a knock down on the warrior or something similar. Something with CC at least. As it is right now it leaves you rather exposed against decent players, but at least you can kite with it.

Engineer > Throw Gunk > Throws a pile of gunk at enemy that procs a different condition on every tick. Also provides an ethereal field. This is my least favourite stolen skill and the only one I really feel totally “meh” about. It is easy to dodge, the range is short, the field small, the conditions weak. This would be imroved MASSIVELY if the gunk travelled a bit quicker, had a slightly further distance and produced some kind of soft CC on your opponent. A short cripple would be nice.

Thief > Blinding Tuft > Free Stealth and blind on your opponent, a nice reward for taking the initiative in a thief vs. thief matchup and a reward for taking the risk to blow extra gap closers to take the fight to your opponent.

Jayden Ennok.3687:

No, they kill you cos you go full tank and can’t kill a fly.

Wut full dire tank specs have the easiest time against thieves.

Mayama.1854:

Jayden Ennok.3687:

No, they kill you cos you go full tank and can’t kill a fly.

Wut full dire tank specs have the easiest time against thieves.

Until that condi tank bumbs into someone who knows how to deal with condis builds, which are easy to play but generally limited in comparison to power builds.

Jayden Ennok.3687:

Mayama.1854:

Jayden Ennok.3687:

No, they kill you cos you go full tank and can’t kill a fly.

Wut full dire tank specs have the easiest time against thieves.

Until that condi tank bumbs into someone who knows how to deal with condis builds, which are easy to play but generally limited in comparison to power builds.

Well we talk about thieves here and the 2 most played condi specs are engi and necro which both make it a uphill battle for thieves.

@TrOtskY.5927

My complaint here was more about Pve, than PvP, where the thigns you steal are more or less designed to be skills to counter said classes from that you stole something.

I would just like to see in the PvP centric gameplay of GW2, (WvW/SpvP) to have more different resultsa as stolen skills from a class, than to steal always the same thing.

Each Class should provide like 3 different options.
the Elementalist is a perfect example for it, where it would fit so extremly good to steal from them their conjured elemental weapons to get that way for a short while some new skills (stealing skills, we are thiefs, we steal), what could be an option for example, if said Elementalist self has these skills in his bar.
It would make playing the thief just more interestign and fun, if they wouldn#t just always steal the same things from classes in Wvw and SPvP.

In PvE on the other rand, there have thieves alot more options on what they can receive, but alot from the stuff just feels more or less useless and very weak.

Skills like:

• Explodign Venom Sack , which would be alot more fun and usefull, if you would deal a random Venom, instead of Poison, in its curerent form its just a cheap choke gas.
• Rusty Scrap Strike, deals just a single stack of Bleeding, Poison and Weakness, would be more useful, if it would deal like several stacks of Torment and Confusion.
• Shoot Rifle – so silly with the self knockdown, should deal more Vulnerability
• Tooth Stab -WOW, 1 frigging Stack of Bleeding, so useful … their 60s won’t get reached, because it gets healed away instantly, before those 60s are reached, reduce the duration by 90% and raise the bleedign by 10%, then we have a useful burst bleeding thats a DANGER
• Use Scepter/Staff, needs finally two different icons, so annoyning to hover always overw the icon to see, if you have a scepter or a staff

Some of those Skills in my opinion could also get merged to make place for some new interesting and more useful Steal Skills, example:

• Drink and Eat Egg healing yourself, get some initiative and be for 3s immune to all damage sources. place for 1 new steal skill
• Mace Head Crack, Bone Crack + Club Shockwave, they are basically exactly the same skill twice letting it become a shockwave attack that stuns foes in its line of sigh. Would be so much more useful then and make place for 2 new more interestign steal skills
• Blinding Tuft and Throw Feathers, again both the exact same thing … why? makes no sense, merge it and create place for a better new steal skill.
• Throw Gunk, Throw Scale, Throw Coral Shard, cause Gunk makes the other two basically obsolete as it pulses and deals much more conditions, would make place for another two more useful interresting steal skills.

Thats basically together 6 Slots that could deserve a better Steal Skill to make Thiefs maybe in PvE better supporters.
And Thieves should have more than only 1 Slot for a Steal Skill, they should have maximum 3 (2 if untraited, 3 if traited for it) and steal automatically, to that F1 gets freed for a needed Venom Redesign so that the Venoms become the thieves integral gameply among F1-F4

Examples:

Steal from Warrior to get either:

• Whirl Axe
• Rageful Gauntlet = Smash your foe = launch, receive Might, Fury and Swiftness
• Banner Spear = Throw it like a Spear to deal Damage and cause a random Banner Effect for you.

Steal from a Ranger and get either

• Healing Spring
• Stolen Trap = Receive one of the Ranger Traps by randomness
• Pet Whistle = Calls a random Animal that helps you for 60s, or until it dies.

Steal from an Engineer to get either:

• Throw Gunk (improved like mentioned above)
• Stolen Goggle – Become Immune to blindness and reveal foes while receiving Fury also
• Stolen Boots – Perform a quick dash attack with the stolen rocket boots, stun breaks and heals chill,cripple and immobilize, and burns your hit target if you hit a target.

Steal from a Thief to get either:

• Blindign Tuft
• Exploding Venom Sack (improved like mentioned above)
• Shurikens = Throw multiple bouncing Shurikens that cause torment stacks (similar to that shuriken skill of the assasin aetherblades in EotM)

Steal from a Guardian to get either:

• Mace Head Crack (improved like mentioned above)
• Defensive Shield = Block the next incoming 2 hits and gain after that Aegis, Stability and by random either Protection or Retaliation.
• Randomly Use Staff or Use Scepter

Steal from a Necromancer to get either:

• Skull Fear
• Necronomicon = Create at your chosen Ground a random Mark or Well Skill
• Bloody Dagger =Down yourself to revive instantly up to 5 dead allies in your near. Your Downed Skills will be after that 50% stronger.

Steal from an Elementalist to get either:

• Stolen Frost Bow = Get a Frost Bow with 5 Charges for 60s
• Stolen Lightning Hammer = Get a Lightning Hammer with 5 Charges for 60s
• Stolen Lava Axe = Get a Lava Axe with 5 Charges for 60s
  If the Elementalist has no Conjure Weapon in his Skill Bar, then randomly either
• Ice Shard
• Lava Rock
• Branch Bash

Steal from a Mesmer to get either:

• Consume Plasma
• Shadow Clone = Copy the Mesmer by creating a Clone of yourself for 30s
• Chaos Crystal = Lets you create a Chaos Storm at your chosen ground target or when under water to appear a Chaos Vortex.

Thats how I personally would like to see the Thief gettign a bit more Steal Skill variety

Some examples for 6 more useful interesting Steal Skills as Replacements for merged ones like suggested above:

• Stolen Blueprints = Lets appear randomly either a Turret or a Golem.
• Blessed Mirror = Moves all Conditions on you over to your target
• Mystic Relic = The next 3 Boons that you and your allies receive, will have 50% longer duration
• Stolen Torch = Throw it to cause a fire field, that burns, reveals and removes boons.
• Pretty Jewels = Gives you temporarely a Stat Boost to all your equipped Accessoires of + 10%
• Stolen Whip = Pulls your target to you and dazes it.

Yea, I’m gonna say no to adding RNG to steal. If you think that’s a good idea, go ask engis what they thought of having random effects on all their elixirs before the devs fixed them all.

babazhook.6805:

>>>3a. For WvW Roaming solo, the thief only shines when taking on the lost straglers, or for taking down sentries, capping a BL-point. There are few thieves that I see take a camp on their own, and I hardly ever succeed. For WvW-small group Roaming, the thief is excellent (esp. with a Mesmer), you can use the other person as a distraction (hence mesmers work so well) and go after each other small group member 1 by 1.

I do not understand this statement at all. I took out camps solo all the time in WvW as a thief. I play every profession and my thief does it just about the fastest.

This either a condition build or a power build. I can not recall the last time I failed to flip a camp as a thief unless it when I was hit by some of the enemy players coming in to defend the same.

Then cuddo’s to you, in general when I try, the whole pack in the camp comes for me and I’m overwhelmed basically, sure going invis helps to get away, but not in order to take it… then again, I am not a thief pro, so if you say so I take your word for it. But I am not sure when the last time was that you did this, but maybe things have been nerfed?

Arghore.8340:

babazhook.6805:

>>>3a. For WvW Roaming solo, the thief only shines when taking on the lost straglers, or for taking down sentries, capping a BL-point. There are few thieves that I see take a camp on their own, and I hardly ever succeed. For WvW-small group Roaming, the thief is excellent (esp. with a Mesmer), you can use the other person as a distraction (hence mesmers work so well) and go after each other small group member 1 by 1.

I do not understand this statement at all. I took out camps solo all the time in WvW as a thief. I play every profession and my thief does it just about the fastest.

This either a condition build or a power build. I can not recall the last time I failed to flip a camp as a thief unless it when I was hit by some of the enemy players coming in to defend the same.

Then cuddo’s to you, in general when I try, the whole pack in the camp comes for me and I’m overwhelmed basically, sure going invis helps to get away, but not in order to take it… then again, I am not a thief pro, so if you say so I take your word for it. But I am not sure when the last time was that you did this, but maybe things have been nerfed?

Not to be rude, but if you have issues flipping camps with thief (or any other class), you should take a look at your general gaming skills, cause … they suck.

Arghore.8340:

babazhook.6805:

>>>3a. For WvW Roaming solo, the thief only shines when taking on the lost straglers, or for taking down sentries, capping a BL-point. There are few thieves that I see take a camp on their own, and I hardly ever succeed. For WvW-small group Roaming, the thief is excellent (esp. with a Mesmer), you can use the other person as a distraction (hence mesmers work so well) and go after each other small group member 1 by 1.

I do not understand this statement at all. I took out camps solo all the time in WvW as a thief. I play every profession and my thief does it just about the fastest.

This either a condition build or a power build. I can not recall the last time I failed to flip a camp as a thief unless it when I was hit by some of the enemy players coming in to defend the same.

Then cuddo’s to you, in general when I try, the whole pack in the camp comes for me and I’m overwhelmed basically, sure going invis helps to get away, but not in order to take it… then again, I am not a thief pro, so if you say so I take your word for it. But I am not sure when the last time was that you did this, but maybe things have been nerfed?

If you want to solo cap a camp, equip Sword/Pistol, then line of sight all the enemies around a corner. After that, just drop a blind field and auto-attack. Dancing Daggers works pretty well if you can’t line of sight everyone.

Dahkeus.8243:

Yea, I’m gonna say no to adding RNG to steal. If you think that’s a good idea, go ask engis what they thought of having random effects on all their elixirs before the devs fixed them all.

who says here something about RNG, An automatism is not = RNG.

Orpheal.8263:

Dahkeus.8243:

Yea, I’m gonna say no to adding RNG to steal. If you think that’s a good idea, go ask engis what they thought of having random effects on all their elixirs before the devs fixed them all.

who says here something about RNG, An automatism is not = RNG.

A random chance to get one of several effects is RNG.

Karolis.4261:

Not to be rude, but if you have issues flipping camps with thief (or any other class), you should take a look at your general gaming skills, cause … they suck.

How can I even take that as ‘not rude’, you may want to check your general people or comprehensional use of language skills there…

Dahkeus.8243:

If you want to solo cap a camp, equip Sword/Pistol, then line of sight all the enemies around a corner. After that, just drop a blind field and auto-attack. Dancing Daggers works pretty well if you can’t line of sight everyone.

Ah, that might be it then, cuz I use neither D/D nor S/P, nor do I generally bunch AI in corners, as that sort off feels like ‘abusing a feature’ in the game. Seeing 2 people is generally enough to pull off a capture I’m not to worried though, but it’s nice to know how I could do it, or even how others pull it off.

Guess then on that bit I was proven to be wrong, nothing ‘wrong’ with that

ens.9854:

Magische Boek.2530:

why is everyone saying thief’s only defence is stealth? did everyone forget we also have blinds, evade’s and teleports?

Elementary my dear Magische; because they are all WvWers that run 6 shadow arts builds with refuge.

because they’re going to nerf the crap out of thief blinds…and evade…

It took me awhile to realize that almost everything I wanted out of the Thief actually exists – in the Ranger.

Particularly the Sword/Warhorn + Sword/Dagger build. It’s evasive, applies plenty of conditions (bleeding and poison mostly), and hits hard. Also more survivable.

I stopped hating the Thief when it dawned on me that “Thief” in my mind = Ranger.

Anet just has a weird way of designing things.

The only thing the Ranger doesn’t have is (in my mind) is Stealth. That’s the big difference. If Ranger had Stealth, they would be the perfect Thief.

>>Then cuddo’s to you, in general when I try, the whole pack in the camp comes for me and I’m overwhelmed basically, sure going invis helps to get away, but not in order to take it… then again, I am not a thief pro, so if you say so I take your word for it. But I am not sure when the last time was that you did this, but maybe things have been nerfed?

Well I actually go right into the middle of a camp to draw as many as I can on me at once so I can flip it faster. If you take too long the bad guys might show up, and I hate it when the guards already downed regen because it took too long to flip a camp.

This is what I do P/d thief using conditions. Dire armor Condi damage 2000+ with at least 60 percent bleed duration.

Get into middle of camp with steal allow them to come your way..dodge if you have to then drop caltrops. Pop SR and just wait a few seconds. They will stand in the field. Swap to D/D and load some Death blossoms on them. This is an evade that will avoid a lot of attacks. One venom like poison on your utility bar will help as with DB’s you can lay out 5 poisons and slow their healing.

Then unleash daggerstrom. this is stability so you can not get knocked down and will reflect projectiles as well. This also allows you to fill up on ini. dont stand in one spot with daggerstorm. Move around. They will all be crippled and slower then you.

Now if you are low on health swap to P/d shadowstrike away make a few shots . Use your heal if you have to then get in again. Caltrops/deathblossom off d/d and daggerstorm are your friends. They are all AOE attacks and load lots of bleeds.

With a power build I like to use Pistolwhip and daggerstrom. The dagger storms pound out huge raw damage. The SOM can usually keep your health full. Another option is Ricochet and p/p and hit one fringe of the camp in a high power build. As you wade closer you are pounding out huge raw damage on multiple enemies. Fall back slowly and whittle them down.

Others seem to have better luck with S/d . I don’t in camps.

The ones that worked the best for me was the p/d d/d set for condition type with the focus on d/d deathblossom for bleeds and the s/p p/p combo for power builds.