Guild Wars 2

Level 23 Thief here. First time playing through the game. I am finding that I struggle with taking down multiple mobs, even some lower than me. My gear is mostly around level 15 so I am not sure if that is a huge difference maker or not. I am typically running D/D and Shortbow.

My traits are specced into Shadow Arts currently. I feel very squishy and I am sick of dying to mobs lower than me. I am not new to MMOs, so this isn’t a L2P thing. But before I spend any coin to respec traits or buy any weapons (again this is my first play-through so I am not made of gold) I would like to know suggestions on the best builds for leveling.

Thanks!
Veetus

I’m roughly following this and it’s working quite well with sb/dd:
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/64903-thief-a-basic-guide/

I upgrade all my armour/weapons every 10 levels, plus anything i loot in between (would have last done yours at 20)

as far as leveling I would suggest using sword/pistol or condition damage dagger/dagger and pistol/dagger

the sword/pistol method revolves around the aoe damage from auto attack/pistol whip, and control such as the PW stun, and blinds from black powder and smoke screen.

as far as a condition damage build, dagger/dagger and dagger/pistol would be the preferred weapon sets combined with the caltrops utility skill. you jump in with dagger/dagger and death blossom to stack bleeds, drop caltrops and kite while the enemies die. or using pistol/dagger run in, drop caltrops, cloak and dagger, then use sneak attack to stack bleeds, run back in to cloak and dagger after a couple auto attacks, and repeat while keeping enemies in caltrops. Generally D/D is better for groups, and P/D is better for single target.

another few things to take into account are that at lower levels the stats from traits are very significant, but gets less important compared to traits as you level, and learning when to dodge can make many group encounters (and encounters in general) much easier, as you aren’t supposed to take many hits in this game.

most anything is viable in pve at higher levels, but in the mid level range it can get kinda difficult for thieves that try direct damage with dagger/dagger. we are quite a fragile class, so even though we can drop a single enemy quickly with that spec, hoards are hard to fight without kiting,blinding or other defensive measure, which are more lacking until you get access to more traits/skills than you do now. it will get easier though.

There are a few ways to look at this. Firstly, Shadow is a traitline that you would not want to specialize in at the start of your Thief – if you want to AoE/kill multiple mobs at once. It’s an assassination tree, with stealths, which is kitted for something completely different. I would recommend going into Acrobatics for the Assassin’s Reward (health for init used), Feline Grace (get half your endurance back from dodging), Quick Pockets (3 init when weapon swapping) and Assassin’s Retreat (4s of swiftness on kill).

If you’re fighting multiple melee mobs, shortbow and Signet of Malice are your friend. Kite the mobs, fire the #1 arrow skill, and use #3 to evade if you’re out of endurance. If you get the time, throw out a #4 to put some lingering poison on the pack. If you really wanna make it feel fun, use Shadowstep in your build, and play monkey in the middle with your mob pack while lobbing #1’s at them.

The same can generally go with multiple ranged mobs so long as they are within close proximity of each other. However, you’ll be getting your kitten pelted the entire time unless you use something like Smoke Screen to block the ranged attacks (for a limited amount of time!). In this situation I prefer to LoS enemies until they stack on top of each other, and then go to D/D or S/D and either S/D #1 (hits multiple targets) til they die, or D/D #3 (death blossom) to stack the bleeds and inflict damage before switching back to shortbow for auxiliary damage.

Also, at level 23 there’s no reason at all for you to be running around in level 15 gear. You should easily be able to buy a full set of level 20 greens from the TP for dirt cheap; even the gear you get from personal story or event karma should keep you more updated than that if you for some reason have zero money to spend.

This is my personal preference, but I usually go with the 15/25/35/etc gear levels as they have better stats and start moving into masterwork levels (level 20/30/40 gears are usually crafted as /fine/)

By far the fastest way to level is with D/D condition damage. You can run Pistol Whip builds, but you’re gonna hurt against Dredge (read, can’t be blinded).

Traits
At level 20 your first ten trait points should go into Trickery for the minor (+3 init on steal) and the major V (might, swiftness, and fury on steal.) With this you can put down 2 Deathblossoms, steal, and get one more DB.

At level 30 your next ten points should go into Deadly Arts for minor (you’re condition damage after all) and major III (damage on steal).

Up to level 40, you can take your pick between Acrobatics (for might on dodge) or Critical Strikes (for higher chance to proc sigils, etc.). It doesn’t really matter, ‘cause you’ll respec immediately at 40.

When you get your Master tier book, dump 15 points into Trickery for the extra 3 initiative. Keep 10 points in Deadly Arts, and start putting points back into whichever you took the five from.

What this does (from level 1-40) is trait for condition damage and duration, allow you to make really good use of steal (adds poison, generates 3 init, gives 3 boons). At level 40, you should be able to get 3 DB’s back-to-back, steal, and one more DB before having to wait for init recharge.

Utilities
Always, ALWAYS have Caltrops on your utilities bar. It’s just too flippin’ good to not use. The cool down is short enough to use for every fight, and sometimes twice in longer fights. The AoE range is huge, and the bleed stacking will let you keep 12+ stacks of bleeds on multiple mobs. I’ve had 22-25 stacks up on a regular basis.

I always have Roll for Initiative, just because D/D doesn’t have an inherent stun-break. Also, you can completely refill your initiative by using RfI and then steal back into the fray. This allows for a LOT of DB’s. I don’t do this constantly, though, simply because RfI has a long CD (60 secs).

The last slot is really up to you. I usually have Signet of Shadows for the run speed. The blind-on-use is a great panic button. Signet of Agility is great for added precision (again, if you’re using proc-on-crit sigils). There’s some flexibility here. You really won’t use any stealthing skills since you’re doing all of your damage through DB, and you’ll dodge and kite.

Heal
Signet of Malice is a must. There is a split second after every DB where you’re rooted and not evading. You’ll take damage here. Signet of Malice will proc a heal for all three DB hits on all targets hit. Plus, every time Caltrops “pulses” you’ll get healing from every mob tagged.

Gear
In short, this is a great way to get to lvl 40 quick. From there, you can stick with the build (which is completely viable) or change it up. As far as gear goes, though, focus on power and condition damage. Runes and sigils that increase duration are good, but most mobs will die crazy fast with 9+ stacks of bleeds on them.

Once you get gear with three stats, go after Rampager’s if you’re relying on crits to regen initiative (heavy on the Critical Strikes tree), or Carrion if you’re focusing on the Acrobatics tree.

Your daggers should always have a sigil of agony on it, but your choice for the off-hand. Once you get superior sigils, the energy-on-swap or might-on-swap becomes very viable if you want to use two sets of the same daggers.

At level 80, this is what my build looks like.

I have not even been using Sigils. So I will try to invest in those. Also, isn’t there a trait that drops caltrops on dodge? Wouldn’t that be better so I can free up a utility slot for something else that can help me out?

Thanks so much for the advice everyone. I have a lot of catching up to do in how I play/build my Thief.

:)

The caltrops on dodge are vastly inferior to the utility slot skill. The spread (despite the graphic) is tiny—240 I think? The damage and duration are also minimal. The trait is only really useful if you’re being chased by something that’s following you in a straight line and you wanna drop a quick cripple to gain some distance. As a damage dealer, it’s pretty bad.

The utility skill on the other hand packs a much bigger punch, lasts longer, and has a much bigger spread (I believe it’ll cover an entire control point in PvP).

S/P, D/D, SB. Everything else is mediocre to bad.

You will want Caltrops and probably Ambush Trap. Everything else is peripheral

Sounds good. Do you guys have a link to a build possibly that I could follow with traits mostly?

Off hand pistol has effectively perma-blind which allows you take on any number of melee foes (even vets) solo. Also works against (most?) spell-casters, as long as they’re in your area-of-effect. Mixed melee and ranged (rifle/bow) can pose problems though.

BTW, I am absolutely loving the Caltrops and Ambush utilities for taking mobs and whatnot out. Very effective. My third utility is Shadow Refuge in case I need to get the heck out of dodge.

But yeah, I would still like a good build to follow if you guys have any for me. I am about to hit 30 and re-spec to something more condition based.

get daily karma jug. Consume, go to WvW, speak to karma vendor and buy new gear with karma. Karma is a heck of a lot cheaper gear-wise when other things take gold in large quantities. It’s only Power gear, true, but it’s still better than underlevelled gear, especially if you are being levelled down, as it’s a scalar mechanic that scales it down by a percentage according to your level, regardless of the level of the gear itself (thus if you were 80 and wearing 80 gear and go to a level 40 dungeon, your gear would get scaled down 50%, so a level 40 wearing level 40 gear. If you were wearing level 40 gear to start, then you would be a level 40 wearing level 20 gear; An obviously bad situation.)

I’ve been following Phenn’s tips above and been having a blast with my level 22 thief. I had a couple questions though:

1) With the skills he suggests having slotted, how do you get rid of bleed or poison conditions? Do you have to swap a skill out after a battle?

2) What should you use in your level 30 skill slot? So far I’ve got Signet of Malice, Roll for Initiative, Caltrops, and Signet of Shadows.

Thanks for the advice.

If you put 10 pts into the Shadow Arts line, you have access to Shadow’s Embrace (skill IV) which cures conditions everytime you go into stealth, no matter which skill you use to acheive it. This helps tremendously with conditions, especially if paired with the D offhand skill 5 cloak and dagger. If you use mainhand sword, attack 2 will cure one condition on use. Also, some utilities will cure conditions (Infiltrator’s signet is one that is available early for example). If you are willing to change out your healing skill, Hide in Shadows cures both bleed and poison on use.

Since you are using the method outlined by Phenn, then probably one of the easiest way to do it is to drop the Signet of Shadows utility for Infiltrator’s signet.

Depending on what you want to do, popular choices include Thieve’s guild, Dagger storm, and Basilisk venom

Since early levels, I’ve been D/P almost exclusively except when I, on occasion, needed to kite/kill multiple mobs at the same time (Shortbow), even though, in those cases as well, D/P still works great, but you’ll only kill one at a time obviously.

Recently, I played around with other options. Used Sword mainhand with Pistol offhand, because I rely on Black Powder (#5 pistol offhand – aoe blind ground effect that effectively gives 1-3 misses per mob), just to see if Sword did more damage. And, whereas it did more damage per hit, I felt like the poison and bleeding from the dagger added up to more, though I’d love to see a dps meter.

Condition curing from Sword main would be nice, but I rarely get hit as it is with pistol offhand, so conditions aren’t generally an issue.

Don’t misunderstand me. D/P isn’t the fastest killer, not even close. D/D with Deathblossom and Stealth seems like it would win that battle.

I think I’ll stick with D/P and SB, grabbing the “heal when using initiative” (Assassin’s Reward – X – Acrobatics), also picking up “gain 2 initiative every 10 seconds” (Quick Recovery – IX – Acrobatics) for maximum survivability.

I honestly haven’t even toyed around with ANY Stealth builds yet, and still barely understand stealing…I’m also level 16 so…grain of salt.

And yeah, as mentioned before, “Immune to blind” mobs suck. Having something relying on evasion rather than blind would be nice for those, such kitten D or D/D. But for anything blindable, D/P basically means I can just stand in one spot, throw down Black Powder and just whittle them down without any concerns.

I use dagger/pistol. I haven’t died so far, then again I don’t count downed (lvl 32). I find the perma blindness really useful- I don’t have to have lots of toughness and-or vitality, because the mobs attacks never hit me (due to blindness). I use my shortbow when I know I’m not going to be the one focused by the mob(s) and I need to be at range (group events).

My life went better when I switched to S/P for leveling purposes. I usually deal with several mobs at once because it is faster to clean zones that way. Keep them always blind and kill them with auto attack/pistol whip. Use signet of malice for healing while you attack and #4 to interrupt casters/blind immune mobs. If everything goes wrong, switch to SB, caltrops and let the kiting begins!