Guild Wars 2

Note: This is aimed towards PvP not pve/world.
Part 1: Understanding Basic Attack and Dodge Patterns-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLi9qZzsfFo
Part 2: Positioning, Targeting, and Shadowstepping-
[Coming Soon]-delayed due to recent nerfs/drastic mechanic changes

Just one thing, why are you calling urself father of double S/D? People have been using the build you play long before the flanking buff…

Because he thinks being the first to show footage with him duelling someone with the spec is enough to allow him to wear the self proclaimed title. Actually that duel did show the clear cut counter to it but what ever.

This is why we can’t have nice things…

Thanks for the guide <3

Nice just today i tryed S/D on my thief. But i have problem with Flanking strike. It miss too much on moving target. Am i doing something wrong or is this skill just so bugy?

Yes Jumper, how dare you contribute to the Thief community! J/K, this is good stuff. The patterns hold up in WvW as well, and the vulnerability times are very informative for the uninitiated (which this is of course intended)

I LOVE LS dodge, it’s a great way to do damage while still accomplishing avoidance. Kinda like an advanced Disabling Shot on SB.

I also like that you use FS as a small gap closer/evade.

Also, with a human/player there’s an interesting (and I guess obvious) maneuver I’ve used to great effect (and I see you using it in footage as well), and it’s the “flanking flanking strike”. Typically we always want to be behind the enemy, of course. And so they inevitably turn to face us, at which point you drop everything and LS again to stay behind them.

Another (since everyone loves steal/infil sig combos), is to start LS (or FS for that matter) and steal. This works especially well to “burst” boon steal, if you use Bountiful Theft, which I do (I’ve read your views on it, but I like the burst boon steal so I keep it).

I do both here: http://youtu.be/JksFoG5CsLQ?t=41s

Great job, keep it up!

The Primary.6371:

Because he thinks being the first to show footage with him duelling someone with the spec is enough to allow him to wear the self proclaimed title. Actually that duel did show the clear cut counter to it but what ever.

I guess being the first one to bring my build into competitive play doesn’t cut it.
Nonetheless winning NA’s first major cash tournament.
Before Curse, having a thief was viewed as a liability and it was difficult for even me to find a team even willing to try to play with a thief. Even I myself was questioning whether this experimental build that seems to do ok in hotjoins would even work.
Others even laughed at the idea of it being played in tournaments.

Jumper.9482:

The Primary.6371:

Because he thinks being the first to show footage with him duelling someone with the spec is enough to allow him to wear the self proclaimed title. Actually that duel did show the clear cut counter to it but what ever.

I guess being the first one to bring my build into competitive play doesn’t cut it.
Nonetheless winning NA’s first major cash tournament.
Before Curse, having a thief was viewed as a liability and it was difficult for even me to find a team even willing to try to play with a thief. Even I myself was questioning whether this experimental build that seems to do ok in hotjoins would even work.
Others even laughed at the idea of it being played in tournaments.

Haters gonna hate so just ignore them.

Even though your build is for PvP, I’m using your playstyle in PvE — very useful — since the basics are the same.

The Acrobat portion of the build (dodging/evading used with double identical weapon sets) was used long before, typically in condition damage builds, be it Lowell’s Leaping Super Immortal Death Troll Legendary Unicorn Blossom, or Trippseeker’s Condition Dodger. Nothing new there. Older evade (Acrobat) builds were used with S/D + SB.

The primary reason that build came “into competitive play” is the buff to Flanking Strike, lending to the ability to spam Larcenous Strike. Stealing boons is absolutely a contributor to small squad combat, team fights, etc. In a game where burst/spike is king, constant attack uptime and pressure is a key to winning fights. Stealth mechanics do not offer much in the way of that.

The Thief community needs more airtime, more guides, more exposure that helps increase overall player knowledge and lessen the targeted QQ towards Thieves.

Jumper has the platform to do this at the moment. He has put in the time and effort to show that Thieves are not just hidden wallflowers in PvP. The added bonus is that it’s not a Stealth reliant build, which helps to cut out a lot of QQ right there.

In the same vein, the Thief community (parts of which can be a little self-serving at times) could stand to use a little humility and respect, especially among ourselves.

Great guide; look forward to seeing more.

Babayum.9204:

Just one thing, why are you calling urself father of double S/D? People have been using the build you play long before the flanking buff…

but they can’t play as good as Jumper period.

Thanks for the S/D info Jumper. When I first built my thief back at the start of the game, I played a D/D and Sb build with condition damage (PvE). A couple of months later when I started getting into WvW, I switched to S/D and I’ve loved it ever since.

Sadly, my thief got “abandoned” when I moved on to rolling new alts but I decided to start playing it again in the last two weeks. I came straight here to the Thief subforum to catch up on all the thief buffs and nerfs that have happened since I last played the class and was thrilled to see that there’s some recent information out there about the S/D combo.

Thanks for your post!

There are two aspects to consider when using flanking strike and larcenous strike:

1. If you use larcenous immediately after flanking strike you actually cut the animation short giving you quite the element of surprise. Your larcenous will hit before the actual animation is completed. By doing so, experienced players (experienced in the sense that they are watching for animations when they dodge) who do not know that will usually get hit by it, because they end up dodging too late

2. If you follow up with larcenous strike immediately, you will not be able to get a slice in and inexperienced players who are actually randomly dodging larcenous as soon as you activate flanking, will end up evading larcenous as well

That’s just some random information I am throwing out there for thieves to consider.

Jumper.9482:

The Primary.6371:

Because he thinks being the first to show footage with him duelling someone with the spec is enough to allow him to wear the self proclaimed title. Actually that duel did show the clear cut counter to it but what ever.

I guess being the first one to bring my build into competitive play doesn’t cut it.
Nonetheless winning NA’s first major cash tournament.
Before Curse, having a thief was viewed as a liability and it was difficult for even me to find a team even willing to try to play with a thief. Even I myself was questioning whether this experimental build that seems to do ok in hotjoins would even work.
Others even laughed at the idea of it being played in tournaments.

sPvP is liek 5% of the population man…

i have used double S/D with 30 into acro like months ago in PvE and WvW and several of my guild mates did too, perma evade builds existed long before the flank strike buff so yea…

Babayum.9204:

Jumper.9482:

The Primary.6371:

Because he thinks being the first to show footage with him duelling someone with the spec is enough to allow him to wear the self proclaimed title. Actually that duel did show the clear cut counter to it but what ever.

I guess being the first one to bring my build into competitive play doesn’t cut it.
Nonetheless winning NA’s first major cash tournament.
Before Curse, having a thief was viewed as a liability and it was difficult for even me to find a team even willing to try to play with a thief. Even I myself was questioning whether this experimental build that seems to do ok in hotjoins would even work.
Others even laughed at the idea of it being played in tournaments.

sPvP is liek 5% of the population man…

i have used double S/D with 30 into acro like months ago in PvE and WvW and several of my guild mates did too, perma evade builds existed long before the flank strike buff so yea…

You should write a guide.

Honestly don’t care who the “father” of dual S/D’s is, just who wins and who has the better play style/ build crafted.

1st to publish is pretty important.

Takes effort to do that too.

These competitive PvE guys are leagues ahead of everyone else in meta apparently.

fun to watch and very informative. i also really like your other tutorial vids – keep it up!