(edited by Kayji.4390)
My Dream List for Thief Changes
Weapon Skills
Next I want to talk about our weapon skills. With the thief weapon skills, more care needs be taken in designing these skills compared to the other professions due to the risk of redundancies of certain weapon combos, and over dependencies of 1 or 2 skills on the bar because of the way their designed ( specifically unload (power p/p) and death blossom (condi d/d)) . My favourite weapon combo is S/d because I feel that I will use every skill on my in some point of a fight.
I think that all our skills should either be situational (not too situational kitten that their rarely used such as head shot) or require some sort of opportunity cost to use optimally with a good example being pistol whip and a bad example being unload to open room for buffs for both these skills. Furthermore, certain abilities we have are not rewarding enough even if used in their attended conditions. So I’ve made a list of suggestions which either buff existing skills when used in certain situations or added an opportunity cost to them (or a mixture of both) so that we’re more rewarded for using them competently.
Dagger
Backstab- Attack your foe from the shadows, striking for double damage and increased bleeds if you hit from behind. Additional 4xbleeds from the front and 8x bleeds from the back (2 sec)
Double strike-Strike your foe twice and apply 2x Bleed (1 sec)
Wild Strike- Strike your foe again and apply bleed (2 sec) (Remove endurance regen aspect)
Heartseeker-Leap and strike your foe. The less health your target has, the more damage you cause and more bleeds you apply.
• Damage Above 50%: 336 + 2x bleeds (2 sec)
• Damage Below 50%: 504 + 4x bleeds ( 2 sec)
• Damage Below 25%: 672 + 6x bleeds (2 sec)
Adding bleeds to dagger main hand should no longer be considered OP with the latest patch, as with the new condition scaling means that bleeds won’t benefit power builds so much. This would make hybrid main hand dagger builds more viable. I’m suggesting this to compensate for also suggesting to remove bleeds for DB later on. However, I’m personally against shoe-horning d/d into condition roles just to make them ‘distinct’ from d/p and imo it should be balanced for power.
Death Blossom- Do an evasive attack over your opponent, striking nearby enemies three times. Each strike applies 2 stacks of vulnerability (8 seconds) and regains 5 endurance (total 15). (Bleeds removed). Increase the evade window to ½ second. Refund 1 initiative when endurance is below 30.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think Death Blossoms original evade window was a ½ second but was nerfed. The reason being that the condi d/d set up has no access to damaging conditions outside DB and because of its evasion, would just spam the ability to apply pressure. So my suggestion is to remove the bleed from this skill, and allow it to be more of a defensive skill/set-up skill for increased damage. With the recent change to vulnerability, this would be useful to both damage and condi set-ups. However, now more than ever with the nerf to condition dmg for non-condi builds, the bleeds are useless for a power d/d thief, thus making DB even more useless than it already was.
Shadow Shot- Doesn’t really need to be changed much considering it requires some situational awareness and is certainly not a skill that you would spam (all the time).
Dancing Dagger- Throw a dagger that cripples nearby foes and returns to you. Gain might (10 seconds) for every strike made by this skill.
Not saying it is a necessary addition but would be nice as an incentive to use in outnumbered situations, especially considering we have lost other migh stacking methods such as power of inertia. The skill would be comparable to Rangers ricochet and mesmers mirror blade. This wouldn’t be OP, because even if you got all the bounces off and spent all your initiative on this skill, you would gain a maximum of 4 uses with 15 initiative times 3 might per use which is 12 might for approximately 9-10 seconds. This leaves you with no initiative to fully utilize the boon and it takes 15 seconds to fully regenerate your initiative. I’m also suggesting this to make it more distinct from Body Shot later on =P.
Cloak and Dagger- Replace the vulnerability with blind (2 sec).
I saw the blind aspect from another thread and it just makes sense. Other than that, the skill is already rewarding if you land it and quite punishing if you miss, so no need to change.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Pistol
Vital shot- I think they can afford to slightly increase the damage component of this skill considering the new condition scaling, to help power pistol builds a bit.
Body Shot- rename it to Ankle Shot (yes this is from the trait lines as I later suggest replacing it with ricochet and it sounds like a better name for a skill imo). The skill could be changed slightly so something I thought of is this:
Ankle Shot- Fire a shot to the ankles, crippling your foe for 3 seconds. Immobilise your foe for 1 ½ seconds if target is crippled. (cost 4 initiative) .
This just makes more sense considering the skill animation and effect. I don’t know about you but whenever I use this skill, it’s for the immobilization. AT first glance, this may seem like a nerf, but in actual fact could be used in combination with skills like caltrop.
Unload- this skill needs an overhaul and I would change it into a two part skill:
Parting Shots (3 initiative)-fire 2 shots at the target, causing 5 x vulnerability (3 seconds) per hit (total 10 x vulnerability). Shooting targets <300 range will cause you to evade backwards. Shooting targets >300 range will refund you 2 initiative.
The animation could be something along the lines of the charr’s racial ‘hidden pistol’. For those who didn’t know, if you look at the skill video on the official website for shadow shot, you’ll see the animation used there too; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezK-WzoNSrc at 2.00; this skill was originally going to be a pistol OH ability known as retreating shot.
—>Unload-as it is but allow it to do an additional 1% damage per vulnerability (stacks with vulnerabilities own effect) on the target and rebalance the damage appropriately. Reduce the initiative cost to 4.
To me, the p/p set up suffers from two major flaws, its lack of disengage, and the other being a spammable unload with no need for a prior set-up. This results in a difficult balance situation that requires Unload to lose its burst potential, and thus just like the condi d/d set-up, requires the player to spam it for on-par damage, leaving little initiative for defence. With Parting shot would obviously solve the first flaw but also having Unload as a follow up skill will remove the potential to spam. Also it would be more dependent on some sort of set-up prior to its use which would allow room for its potential burst damage to be buffed. I will also propose some traits which would synergize with this later on. But also a buff to Vital shots direct damage component would hopefully make p/p thieves less dependent on Unload for their damage. If someone can think of a more elegant solution to the unload problem in meeting the principals I’ve outlined, please share.
Shadow Strike- I think this skill is fine, its nots OP and it’s certainly not a skill you would spam as it requires some sort of opportunity cost.
Head Shot- Daze your foe with a head shot. Apply 5x Vulnerbaility (5 sec) when interrupting.
There needs to be more rewarded for skilfully using skills. As of right now, even if I interrupt a foe with this skill, I don’t gain much in most situations (except maybe interrupting a heal combination) because even if I put their particular skill on a 5 second cooldown, up to 40% of my initiative would have been used, which limits my ability to press on with my attack. Furthermore, it synergizes well with my proposal for the new unload.
Black Powder- Allow the player the chance to refund another initiative if they’re able to stay in the field for the full duration.
With the nerf to its application intervals, the only reason to keep the initiative cost so high is to ‘balance’ d/p thieves from access to stealth. But the p/p and s/p sets suffer for it as well and so rarely see use outside of d/p, with p/p spamming unload and s/p having access to pistol whip for their defence. Furthermore, this shouldn’t be too OP for d/p thieves with the removal of Infusion of Shadows, especially since it’s extremely difficult to stay within the black powder radius when chaining heartseekers through it.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Sword
Infiltrator’s strike- Change the skill animation to look like warrior’s Eviscerate
As of right now, I believe the s/d weapon set for thieves have got to have the most bland variety of skill animations in the game, with crippling strike, infiltrator’s strike and Larcenous Strike sharing the same animation while infiltrator’s return and cloak and dagger sharing another. As a result, a set which is supposed to be the most acrobatic in the game, looks the most static. Heck even MH Axe warriors look more agile than S/d thieves. Not only would this be aesthetically pleasing, but it also makes sense from a e-sport point o view. For example, the opponent should be more easily able to tell if we’re about to cloak and dagger or infiltrator’s return so they can react appropriately.
Infiltrators Return- Evade (1/4s) and return to your original location. Cure one condition. An alternative idea and more preferable is returning the cast time to being instant but unusable while stunned. A good example of where this is already in place is The Prestige on Mesmer’s 4# torch skill so why can’t it be done here?
Originally this skill was instant as to allow us to skilfully use to evade big attacks but was OP as it could also be used to port away while stunned. Anet added the 1/4s second cast time to stop us from being able to do that. While it is still useful as it is, it’s difficult to use as a way of avoiding an impending attack as it currently is since you take hits while casting it.) I envision the animation being something similar to disabling shot before shadow stepping away. If take a look at the thief’s skill video for steal on the GW2 website; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFxdwi18tiQ at 0.15; this was originally going to be the animation for infiltrator’s strike but thankfully that was changed. However, maybe have that return animation replace the current CnD copy.
Flanking Strike- Evade and stab your foe. Apply weakness (4 sec) if striking from behind or the side
Every successful build has at least two ways of mitigating damage/recovering whether it be their blocks, their blinds, stealth etc… S/d thieves are overly dependent on their evasion to mitigate damage as other means are limited and now that vigor has been nerfed all around along with the change to feline’s grace, their one defence is kitten in the face of all around increased damage. However, it seems to me that when Anet originally designed Sword on thieves, they intedned another defensive mechanic which is weakness on the 3rd strike of the auto attack. As of right now however, the s/d set is unable to reliably apply weakness. If we compare s/d to it’s cousin d/p thief, the d/p set has access to blinds, easier access to stealth, better endurance regen from auto, and arguably better access to weakness if traiting for Lotus Poison because of their quicker auto attacks; all while having a better ability to burst than s/d. Before someone has a hissy fit towards me, I’m not saying d/p is OP, but rather explaining why it seems to be fairing much better than s/d even before the patch. Furthermore, I don’t think something like this would be OP as Flanking strike can’t be spammed if hitting the target and it also requires some prior positioning.
Pistol Whip- no need for change since the opportunity cost is being rooted.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Shortbow
Disabling Shot- Return 1 initiative when successfully evading an attack
Again reward skilful play. This skill originally costed 3 initiatives anyway.
Choking Gas-Change so the first pulse provides 1 seconds of poison, second pulse provides 3 seconds of poison and, 3rd pulse 9 seconds of poison and last 6 seconds of poison.
I never understood why they nerfed this. It’s become useless for both condi and power builds as it is. Choking gas was never sought after for its condition damage but for its healing reduction. But with poison no longer stacking duration on top of the nerf to the poison duration per stack, means this skill no longer effectively be used for this role. Add this to the fact it can no longer be used from stealth (an understandable nerf tbh). With the setup I’m suggesting, there is still the possibility of gaining a long duration poison but requires more effort on the thief’s part to keep the opponent in the poison field for three seconds (which I think is doable). The final duration is comparable to what it would have been before the change to poison and the nerf to CG.
Infiltrator’s Arrow- return 1 initiative when blinding a foe.
Reward unconventional use for this skill. I personally use this skill sometimes as a gap closer onto my target followed by a cluster bomb burst.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Utility
There are a number of utilities that rarely/never see use or too weak for what they are. So here are a few ideas I came up with listed below:
Venoms
I propose that Venoms act in a similar fashion to the mesmer’s mantras. It would be split into a two part skill; Brew Venom—>Apply Venom. The difference would be that Venom skills will still have a higher cooldown than mantra skills. Apply Venom would act similar to how venoms work now but only apply 1 charge. Brew would be a 1 ½ to 2 second charge up time and your character will give off different coloured auras during that time to allow the opponent to determine whats going on. The cooldown only starts after all charges have been applied. The kind of Cds I envision is listed below:
Brew Skelk Venom-Heal yourself. (35 cd) (white aura)
Apply Skelk Venom-apply a charge of Skelk Venom which causes your next attack to heal you (5 charges)
I’m not going to list the other ‘apply’ Venoms since I’m sure you’ve got the idea (Their essentially the same as they are now)[i]
• Brew Devourer Venom-30 sec cd (brown aura)
• Brew Ice Drake Venom-25 sec cd (blue aura)
• Brew Skale Venom- 20 sec cd (yellow aura) Also remove the vulnerability
• Brew Spider Venom-20 sec (green aura)
• Brew Basilisk Venom-45 sec (purple aura)
[i]You would still be able to stack your charges but the idea is that you are given more freedom on when to use each charge rather have no choice in the matter. A good example is Basilisk Venom which is redundant when trying to stack.
Traps
Ambush-Add vulnerability?
Makes sense thematically, and would synergise with my proposed unload idea.
Signets
Assassin’s Signet- change active effect to next 3 attacks deal 20% damage and are immune to blind and block effects.
Assassin’s is underused and I do think it needs to be buffed. Now some may say that this would turn it into a superior effect to Signet of Might and/or Utility Goggles. However, these skills provide immunity for a specific duration, thus theoretically the number of attacks a warrior or an engineer which are immune to block and blind respectively is indefinite. Whereas my proposal will only affect a fixed number of attacks (3), and I think it’s an important buff to ensure we’re able to benefit from the signet’s active effect.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Traits
The specialization update was a good overall change for the game but the Thief definitely got the short end of the stick. (funny considering there were people who thought that S/d would become godly). Anyway, where I think our traits are lacklustre is a mixture of traits being in the wrong line to be useful, some traits being too weak for what their aim is, not enough traits to synergise and promote interesting playstyles which is also linked to a lack of creative traits in our traitlines, especially compared to other professions. These are some changes I constantly hear thieves asking for mixed with some of my own ideas.
Deadly Arts
Traits that I think should be removed or moved to another trait line
Potent Poisons-duration increase baked into Serpent’s Touch
Minor Traits:
Serpent’s touch-additional effect: poison’s last 20% longer
Adept Traits:
Dagger Training- Main Hand Dagger skills have 200% increased bleed duration. Offhand dagger skills apply 3 sec of poison.
In case you missed it in this big wall of writing, I proposed short duration bleeds to be added to dagger mainhand. So this trait would synergize well with that fact to make it a viable condition spec. The reason I’m not proposing that the duration be increased for the offhand is because cripple would become too long on Dancing Dagger.
Grandmaster Trait
New* Revenge Concoctions- Traps and Venom skills remove one condition. The condition is copied and applied to the next Venom Strike or when your trap is triggered.
There is a lack of condition clear on the thief, and I think it’s these utilities which need it the most.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Critical Strikes
Traits that I think should be removed or moved to another trait line
Flawless Strikes (the name is reused though) Critical strikes is such a bland traitline because of traits like this. It’s so unimaginative considering the minor adept does something similar.
Ankle Shots (used to rename Body Shot) – reading the forums, people seem to prefer ricochet over ankle shot. However I though Ankle shot was a pretty cool name and believe p/p thieves need more kiting tools too. Hence why I proposed earlier that Body shot be renamed Ankle shot, and the vulnerability be replaced with a cripple.
Sundering Strikes. I generally hate on hit effects because of their passive nature, and this trait in particular doesn’t even do that much to help us stack vulnerability.
Adept Trait
New* Pressure Striking- Gain haste when interrupting a foe
This is from the trickery line and essentially combines Flanking Strike and Pressure Striking. The original pressure striking didn’t make much sense to me considering /p builds would benefit most from a interrupt trait and yet none of them are used for condition builds. Flanking Strikes is a good trait however but I always thought it more suited the critical strikes line considering the haste effect synergizes well with No Quarter. Also the weapon sets which would benefit from quickness the most are p/p and s/p, yet have the worst potential for flanking. But with a trait like this, gives more reason for these builds to use head shot to set up their burst. Furthermore, Pressure Striking and No Quarters fit thematically.
Master Traits
New* Ricochet- Pistol shots have a chance to cause vulnerability and bounce to an additional target. Pistol range and damage is increased.
I know I said I hate on hit effects, but with my suggested change to unload, it would support the playstyle.
Current Practiced Tolerance renamed into Flawless Strikes (the name would be used elsewhere)
Just makes sense.
Grandmaster Traits
Hidden Killer- Gain 100% critical-hit chance while in stealth. Gain 2x might (12 sec) when you gain stealth. 3 sec ICD
Essentially the old Hidden Assassin baked in this trait. Do you guys think this would be OP. I personally think it spices it up a bit. Plus, thief’s ability to stack might was kitten badly this last patch with the removal of both power of inertia and assassin’s reward.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Shadow Arts
Traits that I think should be removed or moved elsewhere
Merciful Ambush (merged with Shadow Protector)
Cloaked in Shadows (Blind aspect moved onto CnD)
Minor Adept Trait
Shadow’s Embrace
If you go into Shadow Arts, then this trait is always a must, so why not just make it a minor trait to open room for more diversity. I’ve seen them use this logic for other traitlines such as the ele’s arcane line. Furthermore, the name fits thematically as the first trait.
Adept Trait
Shadow Protector (moved down from Master)- Stealth yourself and your target when reviving an ally. When you grant stealth to an ally, they gain regeneration. You revive allies faster.
Both supportive traits and needed to make room for the trait below:
New* Schemer- Reduce Venom Brew time while in stealth by 40%
Just a trait to accompany my idea for the Venom revamp.
Master Trait
Last Refuge (moved up from adept)- Remove revealed and use Blinding Powder when your health reaches a certain threshold. Release a blinding powder when you take falling damage, and take less damage from falling.
This trait will never be picked unless the revealed debuff is also removed. May be OP so CD may need to be readjusted.
Grandmaster Traits
Fleet Shadow (moved from acrobatics)- Increased movement speed by 50% while in stealth. Shadowsteps grant 2 seconds of swiftness (2 sec icd)
Fleet Shadow is a useless trait in the acrobatics line and a powerful trait in the Shadow Arts line. I think it would be interesting as a competing grandmaster trait with SR; one is defensive while the other helps you to land your attacks.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Acrobatics
Traits that I think should be removed or moved elsewhere
Fleet Shadow (moved to Shadow Arts)
Guarded Initiation (was kitten)
Assassin’s Reward (merged with Upper Hand)
Adept Trait
New* Fluid Repositioning-When dodge rolling, regain 2 initiative if a weapon skill is cancelled.
[i]Would be useful for pistol whip, unload and CnD.[i]
Minor Master Trait
Feline’s Grace- Gain 10 endurance upon evading an attack (1 sec ICD)
Don’t know if the number is good, but I’m thinking endurance be returned on all successful evades.
Master Trait
New* Practiced Tolerance-When you cleanse a condition, gain 4 seconds of resistance. (15 sec icd)
Non-stealth thieves suck at condi cleanse. This would be the type of trait which would help in the department while feeling different to other traits. To me, it’s not that non-stealth thieves lack condi-clear, it’s that we lack burst condi-clear. For example, if I dedicate my initiative to cleansing conditions using infilitrator’s return, I would only be able to cleanse 3 conditions max and that would take me 3 seconds to do and this current meta would mean I will take a lot of damage in the meantime while still leaving myself vulnerable.
Update*Swindler’s Equilibrium-maybe rebalance the number of seconds shaved from the steal cooldown per evade along with increasing the ICD. Tarkan.5609 suggests 3 seconds be removed from the Steal CD on evade with a 5 second ICD.
As it is, the difference is quite unnoticeable. Perhaps partly because its difficult to keep track of how much the steal CD is reduced per evade. Techanically, what Tarkan suggests is a nerf but in practice it will become more noticeable and allow us to more easily keep track of the CD reduction and plan accordingly.
Minor Grandmaster Trait
Endless Stamina- Gain 2 sec vigor upon dodging. Vigor is 50% more effective
Vigor is not that powerful a boon with the recent change so I wouldn’t expect this to be OP. Plus theoretically, by limiting vigor to dodge rolls means we would get less vigor up time compared to the current feline’s grace.
Grandmaster Trait
New* Attrition Tactics- When weakness or slow is applied to you or nearby allies, you gain vigor (4 sec) and weakness and slow (4 sec) is applied to the attacker (20 sec icd per foe). Weakness and Slow have 33% less duration on you and weakness you apply is 25% longer.
Thief lacks means to mitigate direct damage such as blocks and protection, so we depend on evade. Yet, like I mentioned earlier, why isn’t more weakness integrated into our playstyle. This could act like our protection essentially.
Upper Hand- Heal yourself whenever you use a skill that uses initiative. Heal yourself for each point of initiative spent. Regain initiative when you evade an attack.
These two just synergizes well with each other yet were put as direct competition against each other. Assassin’s reward was underpowered anyway.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Trickery
Traits that I think should be removed or moved elsewhere
Flanking Strikes
Pressure Striking
Reasons explained in the Critical Strikes section
Adept Trait
New* Cheap Opportunities- Cause 2x Vulnerability (8 sec) when you blind, daze, stun or knockdown your foe.
[i]Again encourages use of the offhand pistol skills and synergises with p/p, and hey look, black powder suddenly became an offensive tool too =)
Master Trait
Quick Pockets (moved down from Grandmaster)- Gain 3 initiative when you swap weapons. Reduce charge time of stolen skills by 50%.
Thought this trait needed a second part to it or something. I read somewhere that the trait could reduce the CD for weapon swap which I think is a better idea than mine tbh, yet for some reason don’t think will be implemented since Anet have reserved the low Weapon swap cooldown perk for warriors.
Trickster- Reduces recharge on tricks. When you use a trick skill, gain feigned injuries for 2 seconds. While under this effect, every attack reduces the duration of all current conditions on you by 5%.
The current trickster just felt underwhelming and unimaginative to me. While this doesn’t really clear any conditions, its more useful in dealing with condition bombs on you. So if you strike a foe, reduce the duration of all conditions on you by 5%, if you strike the foe again, reduces it by another 5%, so in total would be 1-0.952 so a total of 9.75% reduction. So 10 hits would result in a total of 40.13% reduction (in 1-0.9510) which is possible but more difficult in 2 seconds. Remember this can be countered by the opponent with a simple dodge roll so requires some setup on your part. Cleaves would count as only 1 attack by bouncing attacks would count for what they are. If this proves to be too weak or strong, the number could always be readjusted. Also notice how this would synergize well with some of our tricks utilities, notably caltrops, haste and dagger storm.
Grandmaster Trait
New* Swipe and Run- Steal now breaks stun effects. When you steal gain 3 seconds of super speed.
Thought this would be a cool trait and can help many builds which lack stun breaks such as venom and trap builds. Also, why don’t we have access to superspeed considering the name of the profession encompasses a lot of running away!
I would be impressed if you managed to read all that. Anyway, don’t be afraid to share your thoughts.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
Flanking Strike- Evade and stab your foe. Apply weakness (4 sec) if striking from behind or the side
Every successful build has at least two ways of mitigating damage/recovering whether it be their blocks, their blinds, stealth etc… S/d thieves are overly dependent on their evasion to mitigate damage as other means are limited and now that vigor has been nerfed all around along with the change to feline’s grace, their one defence is kitten in the face of all around increased damage. However, it seems to me that when Anet originally designed Sword on thieves, they intedned another defensive mechanic which is weakness on the 3rd strike of the auto attack. As of right now however, the s/d set is unable to reliably apply weakness. If we compare s/d to it’s cousin d/p thief, the d/p set has access to blinds, easier access to stealth, better endurance regen from auto, and arguably better access to weakness if traiting for Lotus Poison because of their quicker auto attacks; all while having a better ability to burst than s/d. Before someone has a hissy fit towards me, I’m not saying d/p is OP, but rather explaining why it seems to be fairing much better than s/d even before the patch. Furthermore, I don’t think something like this would be OP as Flanking strike can’t be spammed if hitting the target and it also requires some prior positioning.
Adds more play: Flanking strike is easy to see and can be dodged or even blinded at the end so this would make more incentive to avoid it.
Necessary for damage trading: After dodging key skills of your enemies, other classes out-DPS you just by autoattacking. This would make it possible to have beneficial auto-attack trades for thieves.
Thief balance thread here.
6k+ PvP games
6k+ PvP games
Infiltrators Return- Evade (1/4s) and return to your original location. Cure one condition.
Originally this skill was instant as to allow us to skilfully use to evade big attacks but was OP as it could also be used to port away while stunned. Anet added the 1/4s second cast time to stop us from being able to do that. While it is still useful as it is, it’s difficult to use as a way of avoiding an impending attack as it currently is.) I envision the animation being something similar to disabling shot before shadow stepping away. If take a look at the thief’s skill video for steal on the GW2 website; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFxdwi18tiQ at 0.15; this was originally going to be the animation for infiltrator’s strike but thankfully that was changed. However, maybe have that return animation replace the current CnD copy.
It doesn’t have have a CD in order to forbid the usage in stunned state. Look at Torch 4 for mesmers. With 1/4 sec cast time it’s too fast for opponents to react but you still take random hits while casting it. I’d suggest removing the cast time but making it respect the rules of aftercasts, like it does now.
Thief balance thread here.
6k+ PvP games
6k+ PvP games
I really like your ideas, some great suggestions here!
one thing, as mentioned above infiltrators return could be brought back to 0s cast time but made unusuable while cc’ed
also, one idea could be to make the one acrobatics trait give you a 3s redudced steal recharge on a successful evade on kitten CD (or thereabouts) instead of -1s CD per 1s…
would be more notable and evading a strike omce in 5s is more likely than once every second
right now all the ICD number does is look low, while it actually wont benefit you at all
PvP, Teef & Engi
The fact you are a casual player shows through
First
Stealth Attacks
“First order of business, I think most of the gw2 community agree that it’s fair to say that blocking, evading or causing the opponent to miss (from blind) their attack should reveal them. i.e if those icons come up.”
Terrible idea, and it always will be.
Second: “I think that all our skills should either be situational (not too situational kitten that their rarely used such as head shot)”
How casual are you?? Headshot is a very powerful skill that I and many good thieves use at very crucial moments.
Shadow Shot- Doesn’t really need to be changed much considering it requires some situational awareness and is certainly not a skill that you would spam (all the time). However, imo not enough considering its ease of landing it compared to other 3 skills and how hard hitting it is. But maybe make it so that the blind component only applies if the target is facing you, and a 1 second cripple when striking the foe from behind. That way, it can either be used defensively while in combat or as a chasing tool.
It is already a gap closer and works fine, I like my blinds thanks
“Ankle Shot- Fire a shot to the ankles, crippling your foe for 3 seconds. Immobilise your foe for 1 ½ seconds if target is crippled. (cost 4 initiative) .”
Once again stupid. the imobolize is there fore good reason. And who the kitten runs caltrops??
HOWEVER!! I must admit reading it all, there are some fantastic suggestions here and I love some of them
But you also missed reverting embrace back to removing all conditions.
Other than that, solid post and that is my critical feedback
Sorry guys for the late replies. Will only have time to reply once a day.
I really like your ideas, some great suggestions here!
I must admit reading it all, there are some fantastic suggestions here and I love some of them
Thx Guys =D
As for infiltrator’s Return;
It doesn’t have have a CD in order to forbid the usage in stunned state. Look at Torch 4 for mesmers. With 1/4 sec cast time it’s too fast for opponents to react but you still take random hits while casting it. I’d suggest removing the cast time but making it respect the rules of aftercasts, like it does now.
one thing, as mentioned above infiltrators return could be brought back to 0s cast time but made unusuable while cc’ed
This is preferable and more fluid for gameplay and I remember the debates around it when the cast time was first added, so I updated* the sword section to include this idea. However, I was under the impression that the reason they didn’t just do what you guys are saying from the beginning is because of technical reasons. Idk, can you guys link me a skill which is instant but unusable while stunned at the same time so I can add it to the OP for reference. Never mind, I realised you used prestige as an example.
We all recognize the problem of getting smacked while trying to cast this. My idea was essentially adding 1/4 sec evade time on the shadow return animation and while for other skills this evade frame would not be long enough, I was thinking it wouldn’t be so bad for this animation since it’s only a 1/4 sec cast time anyway. Plus, another evade on our bar can’t be bad for synergy with the benefit on evade traits Anet has going now.
also, one idea could be to make the one acrobatics trait give you a 3s redudced steal recharge on a successful evade on kitten CD (or thereabouts) instead of -1s CD per 1s…
would be more notable and evading a strike once in 5s is more likely than once every second
right now all the ICD number does is look low, while it actually wont benefit you at all
I haven’t used Swindler’s Equilibrium much because it is quite underwhelming, but I can’t really judge what the numbers should be. But your general idea sounds quite solid so I’ll add it to the list. However, I think this is one of those traits that has a small boundary for balance. What do others think of this trait?.
How casual are you?? Headshot is a very powerful skill that I and many good thieves use at very crucial moments.
Shadow Shot- Doesn’t really need to be changed much considering it requires some situational awareness and is certainly not a skill that you would spam (all the time). However, imo not enough considering its ease of landing it compared to other 3 skills and how hard hitting it is. But maybe make it so that the blind component only applies if the target is facing you, and a 1 second cripple when striking the foe from behind. That way, it can either be used defensively while in combat or as a chasing tool.It is already a gap closer and works fine, I like my blinds thanks
You speak as if being casual is a bad thing when I can argue otherwise =P. Anyway thinking about it, my proposed Shadow Shot idea would be a bad move in the general direction I would like thieves to go, which is less reliance on stealth for survivability . As for Head shot, maybe I suck with it because I profess I don’t play d/p much but I found that the only times I really benefited from interrupting my foe with it is to stop a heal combo which is too situational for my liking. But the main reason why I proposed a short duration (3 sec) vulnerability is to add extra flavor to my vision for the p/p playstyle as it would have synergy with my proposed unload idea.
(edited by Kayji.4390)
The fact you are a casual player shows through
First
Stealth Attacks
“First order of business, I think most of the gw2 community agree that it’s fair to say that blocking, evading or causing the opponent to miss (from blind) their attack should reveal them. i.e if those icons come up.”Terrible idea, and it always will be.
You didn’t really elaborate on your point. Here’s mine; first of all this change would not just affect thieves, it would affect mesmers as well. Secondly, when fighting against a stealthed opponent, if I were to anticipate his/her attack and evade say with a dodge roll, I would be half my endurance down while you would be able to execute the skill immediately again. So while I may have outplayed you, it doesn’t really benefit me. Just to illustrate my point, imagine (before the latest patch where they didn’t lose their adrenaline) that if you evade a warrior’s eviscerate, that their burst ability didn’t go on cooldown. You would no doubtfully agree that that would have been unfair. Even with the cooldown in place, Anet decided that on top that, they lose all their adrenaline as well which supports the philosophy that having your attacks evaded should be punishing to you. The only scenario that I can think of that this philosophy doesn’t apply is when a thief uses a stealth attack because of what I said.
However, that is not to say that d/p thieves, or any stealth thief for that matter is OP, it just means that they are balanced around this fact, which I will argue is not healthy for the overall gameplay of thieves and not really fun for the opponent. The issue for me is, why are thieves so risky when outside of stealth. Why would it be so punishing for a thief to miss his/her stealth attack and be revealed? Which is what I think you have issue with and not necessarily the idea itself.
A possible issue with the idea though is aegis, i.e. if a guardian pops it, there is nothing the thief can do in stealth without being revealed unless he/she wants to wait it out. But with the proposed change to Assassin’s signet, the thief can by pass this. Another possibility to solve this issue is putting a bonus for exiting stealth without being revealed so it doesn’t feel like a missed opportunity everytime you don’t get to land your stealth attack. I can’t think of anything atm though.
What do others think of a change like this?
Haven’t seen a change request… YOU HAVE BEEN ADDED.
(Yes, there’s 2 lists, hell even 3. Just one is more frequently used.)