Guild Wars 2

I would like to hear from everyone a list of Buggy, or Useless Thief Mechanics (Utility skills, Traited skills, Initiative skills(1-5) etc)

This will properly give Arena Net an idea of what to do/change with Thief if any.

Please take time out of your day to add input.

Last refuge needs looking at, at least how it interacts with revealed.

Scorpion wire – obstruction/rangefinding in mobile combat

Shadowstepping skills – generally fine. Minor terrain obstructions i think.

Downed state – camera. Always camera. Skill 3, useless in pve generally.

Rfi – prohibitive cd

Pistols mh/oh – no mobility, needs lovs.

Pistol traits – terrible. Interaction with dual skills.

Improvisation – underwhelming and no bundle benefit past impractical pve things.

Hard to catch – prohibitive cd

Slowed pulse – too niche

All i got time for at present :/

- Traps (area and activation numbers)
– Poisons (strengh, aplications, misses)

First one out of my mind:

That Venom family for some reason all have a 45 seconds cooldown (other skill families have different ranges of cooldowns). Only 2 of them (Spider and Devourer) are ok with that cooldown (and one of them could do better with 40, 32 when traited). Icy and Skale should have much lower cooldowns (Skale should be around 25 seconds given how its effect is done much better with traited Spider Venom) and Basilisk Venom would give much less balancing headaches with a proper cooldown for an elite skill instead of 45 like every utility venom.

I guess the reason behind it is the “X next attacks or until 30 seconds” effect (Ranger’s Sharpening Stone is technically a Venom and has the same cooldown and mechanic), but it shouldn’t be a problem, simply make it so that new aplications of the same venom if the original one wasn’t used overwrite the old one (in fact I think that’s how it currently works with sharing venoms).

Those 45 seconds for all venoms is a design decission that makes half of the utility venoms not worth the recharge time, and the elite venom a complete headache for balancing (not only the skill, but many builds have been nerfed because of this venom being usable every 45 seconds). With a 90 – 120 seconds cooldown you could do something cool with it and properly call it an elite skill instead of the 4th utility that has powerful combos in particular builds.

Venoms – Their cooldown is disproportionate to their effects. Their effects are highly conflicting and limiting (For example, Basalisk Venom and Devourer Venom don’t stack with themselves yet Devourer comes with 2 charges and both gain an additional charge from the Residual Venoms Grandmaster trait and can be shared with the Venomous Aura Grandmaster trait)

This means it’s very easy to blow a 45 second (36 traited) cooldown and get a very minor effect (1.5 second stun/2 second immobilise) or gain a large duration condition that can easily be cleansed.

Traps – Making them easier to land via increased size or ground targeted would do wonders for making them more viable. Also make the Thief from Ambush trap more survivable or rework the skill.

Bodyshot – The pistol #2. Provides good amount of Vulnerability for too short a time whilst providing mediocre damage. This skill should be replaced by something that’s useful to both P/D and P/P Thieves (I suggested in another thread it be a 600 range shadowstep with 1 second of Burning AoE upon reaching the destination – A cross between Burning Speed and Infiltrator’s Shot giving Condition damage to P/D and mobility to P/P)

Roll for Initiative – The cooldown seems way too long for one of our few utility stun breakers. I get that since it provides 6 initiative that a low cooldown would make it abusable for spamming but 60 seconds base seems way too long. (I suggest about 45-50 seconds base cooldown)

Scorpion Wire – Suffers majorly from the “Obstructed” bug and also various other bugs. Would be nice to get a fix for them (Also Spectral Grasp and Dark Path for Necromancers would benefit from the same fixes)

Don’t criticize something unless you can think of something better, is my motto, so I’ll pick out ineffective mechanics and offer a solution [EDIT: I didn’t mean this as an accusatory “you better not complain if you don’t have a better idea!” kind of thing. It’s just my own personal motto, I didn’t mean it to come off like that] . (Btw I’m in complete agreement with the venoms, they are in severe need of some love, lowering the cooldowns would be a good start).

Quick pockets, gaining 3 initiative on weaponswap is nice but way inferior to warrior’s fast hands, because it still takes 10 seconds to swap whereas for warriors it takes 5. Yes warriors don’t get 3 initiative on weaponswap but since their skills operate on cooldowns they are effectively getting "initiative"+ the buffs from weapon sigils that activate on weapon swap. Fix: The cooldown from quick pockets need to be reduced for it to become viable.

Also, I personally feel like P/P weaponset is a really fun option but isn’t the most practical. This is because
1. It has such limited mobility
2. Eats so much initiative so quickly
3. Really no means of dealing with mobs (in a PvE setting)
4. The pistol major traits are all over the place (power, critical hits and trickery), there is no synergy. The minor traits don’t help out either.

Pistol support traits, I wouldn’t call these traits “useless” but they range from impractical to underwhelming.

1. Dual skills do 5% more damage, although not specific to P/P, this would benefit unload and pistol whip the most. I call this underwhelming.
2. 10% damage with pistols <- this is pretty good, it would be better if it was accompanied with some sort of initiative cost reduction or regen but hey, beggars can’t be choosers. I’m ok with this.
3. Ankleshots… I hate this trait, this needs some love. There is a 60% chance of this triggering cripple on a critical hit (which shouldn’t be too hard off of unload) with a 10s cooldown. Not helpful at all, doesn’t really improve mobility, doesn’t do AoE, no means of mob control besides possible cripple to ONE target. Totally not practical.
4.Dual skills have a 5% chance to critical hit —> meh.
5. Richochet, at least this attempts to address the AoE issue with pistols. But has only 20% chance to bounce, way too low.

Fix: This will never happen but it’d be nice if anet could consolidate all the pistol traits and have it in one line. Rochochet % needs to be up to at least 50% (ideally 100%). Ankleshots need to be changed to something like 25% chance on crit to gain 5 secs of vigor and/or quickness

All i had time for as i said.

I concur on ankleshots completely.

Does +10% pistol damage work on shadowshot/pw/p/d’s?

I’d like to see ricochet 70-100% chance.
I’d like to see p/p given some mobility, vital shot corrected, and bodyshot reworked. Its not my place since i fail at suggestions(bananna).

Im at work on my phone on breaks and lunches so i cant elaborate as id like to you see

Id be fine wth the cripple if 1-2s icd and 35-40% proc.

While they’re not useless, skills like pistol whip and dancing dagger should be tweaked, as suggested numerous times before.

Pistol whip offers damage that is less than the auto attack chain while using up 5 initiative. If you have the first strikes trait as well, using this ability can significantly lower your dps. Personally i’d like to see the first the part of the animation sped up so you can time the evasion part of the move more easily whilst also increasing the dps of the ability overall, but I think an increase in the damage at least is warranted.

4 initiative for dancing dagger is too much; it needs to be reduced to say 3 or increase the damage to gives builds like sword/dagger a little more burst. Obviously you don’t want to return to the huge amount of damage it use to pull off with 2 targets but the 50% reduction in damage was a little much imo.

With the nerf to quickness, critical haste also saw a nerf in burst damage also without any compensation iirc. It never offered much of an increase in your average dps to begin with but it’s very weak atm.

My apologies I did not mean the “dont criticize unless you have a better idea” thing as an accusation I just stated that as how my mind operates, so I was offering problems and possible solutions.

With regards to 10% pistol damage, I don’t know. Semantics wise, I don’t think they apply to shadoshot/pw/flanking strike, those are all considered dual skills. And on that note I’m not sure if it applies to unload since it is a dual skill too, which is silly. But I don’t know the answer to that.

Shadow Protector’s regeneration does not stack, unlike every other form of regeneration. This means it does nothing if you stealth before the last one is over. Which means boon duration is a negative stat.

Boon duration isnt a total waste – might and vigor(though iirc one of the vigor traits boon duration doesnt affect…), but that irks me about shadow protector as well.

I dont think +10% pistol damage affects those skills(dual), which was my issue.

I have to thank everyone for inputting their feedback, and from their side of the spectrum, the near to useless skills/utilities/etc. I do hope ArenaNet takes a look into this thread. You guys have given really course and on track feedback.

I would put some other minor things on the list, but i’d like to hear from more of you.

Thank you again, You guys make the Thief Community.

i see a troll saying 45 secs is too low on basilisk venom…this is obviously NOT a thief. if u think 45 secs is to low and want it at 90 or 120. lets also make the venom last for 3 secs or 3.5 secs when hit then too? cmon 1.5 secs is NOT a long time and especially when a stun break gets u out of it. if u dont have stun breaks in WVW then u deserve to die anyway :P

Travlane.5948:

i see a troll saying 45 secs is too low on basilisk venom…this is obviously NOT a thief. if u think 45 secs is to low and want it at 90 or 120. lets also make the venom last for 3 secs or 3.5 secs when hit then too? cmon 1.5 secs is NOT a long time and especially when a stun break gets u out of it. if u dont have stun breaks in WVW then u deserve to die anyway :P

If you read what I said I meant for tha skill to have something more “elite like” in its effect. Not trolling anyone here, I think it should have a longer recharge AND a proper elite treatment.

Really, it’s as easy as reading the next words following where I typed 90 -120 instead of stoping reading at the numbers to post that the poster is a troll or that he doesn’t plays a Thief when he has been there from the begining

I’m not that kind of victim of the skill you’re describing and I know how to survive against it even without using stun breakers because of how predictable it is. I’m doing the contrary of whining and calling for nerfs here, please read whole posts before comenting.

Current BV is a balancing headache because someone decided all venoms should have the same cooldown, so they had to adapt this Elite Skill to having a 45 sec cooldown. This results on the skill being REALLY BAD for an Elite in most builds, and cause to nerfs of many builds in others where it becomes too much (or at least that’s supposedly one of the reasons those builds got nerfed). If venoms had different CD it could have a proper Elite Skill treatment.

well u cant really upgrade it. anything more than 2 secs is just = to death. u can make it a 5 min cooldown. at 2.5 or 3 secs any nub can pretty much autoattack + haste anyone to death. maybe you mean the skill needs to be totally done away with and made a new one? if increase the CD and increase active venom duration….proportionally its still the same….1/2 as readily usable but also 2x stronger. ive killed a few poorly spec’d players in .5 seconds on my thief. thats their choice to go to glass cannon with no defense tho. if i can do that in .5 secs imagine what the worst player can do in 2 -3 secs. they would totally have to do away with the skill in order to change it. the 45 sec CD is just right for the 1.5 seconds of stone.

I know this thread isn’t for sugestions, sorry for going a bit off-topic here, but yep I mean something completly different.

What about doing something similar to Moa Morf’ Moa Morf takes one opponent out of the equation, what about stoning being a proper stoning instead of a breakable stun and make the stoned opponent invulnerable while it lasts? He can’t be damaged but you take him out of the equation during some seconds (apropiately balanced to cooldowns and playtesting). Say half the duration of Moa Morph. And a Moa can still die, a stone can’t move but can’t die. It would lose its current functionality (as affected targets won’t be affected by your hits), but would be great for new strategies.

To be honest that idea just came to my mind and I don’t mean the venom to become that obligatorily, probably it would be too exploitable if done wrong and as I said I don’t want to go too off topic and start with sugestions for this and that, I just mean that the whole skill could change as a whole, have an Elite cooldown and Elite effects.

Currently it can’t, the same way Skale and Icy can’t have lower cooldowns, because of the design decission of making all of them having 45 secs recharge which makes Devourer and Spider (when traited) the only useful ones from our utilities, and BV a headache.

so ud make an opponent invulnerable? thats worse than what it is now! atleast with the 1.5 secs u are hoping they arent ready for it and can capitalize on that fact. but i know what u mean. its a specialized skill and only works in a burst build. taking 1 person out of a fight changes nothing :P moas ahve 2 good skills 1 rupter and 1 amazing run skill number 5 skill. theres no pre requisite for elite skills to have a super long cooldown. they can be 240 or just 45 :P depends on the power of them.

Travlane.5948:

taking 1 person out of a fight changes nothing :P

You realize how good that is? You get a 2 vs 2, 1 opponent is suddenly unable to help the other for the duration of the skill, now you got a 2 vs. 1 and you can easily spike him. Not to mention stoning someone and placing loads of traps under him so when he’s unestoned he falls in all of them or that you can use that time to recharge your utility, initiative and heal.

But anyway I just said it as a possibility (and probably an OP one), not that I want to specifically change BV for that, it’s just that BV isn’t a “real” elite on its current state. It isn’t even the best stunner in the game.

Anyway I reafirm my first point: All venoms need different cooldown timers. I don’t understand that design decission they had.

Number 2 pistol skill is absolute trash.

Basilisk venom is fine if you use it right in PvE. My tip would be venom sharing with basilisk venom on the new Colossus Rumblus. This sort of use limits strengthening the skill elsewhere.

Traps? One good trap skill would be better than the 4 we have at the moment. The big problem, as with many thief skills, is that they doesn’t scale up well to large numbers of enemies. Ranger traps persist and create fields so they can affect more enemies. Traits for traps aren’t much use since traps are too situational.

More utility skills are needed underwater. A great number of traits are worthless underwater which is bad in itself but leads thieves to change their trait picks whenever they get into or out of the water. There should be a common theme for both land and water fighting.

The spear weapon skills seem ill balanced. It’s too good, virtually perfect, in some situations and hopeless in others. Tow line is only a PvP skill with no virtually use in PvE. The harpoon gun only has aoe on the auto-shots meaning that underwater combat will sometimes just be autoshots and little else.

The weapons themselves are the most erroneous issues.

Briefly mentioned here (and I keep mentioning it everywhere)

Vital Shot has a fire rate much slower than its listed 1/2 second. This makes it:
a) Far less powerful than a very similiar Ranger Shortbow skill – Crossfire
b) Lying to the player about its damage output

To be honest, I don’t think that will ever be ‘fixed’. I think the Vital Shot mechanic is indicative of the current state of the class, and since every other person in pvp kittenes about Thieves, the class will only see nerfs, and no buffs.

Vargs.6234:

Shadow Protector’s regeneration does not stack, unlike every other form of regeneration. This means it does nothing if you stealth before the last one is over. Which means boon duration is a negative stat.

In fact, shadow protector’s regen does not stack with regen from any source, for any player – making the trait almost completely useless.

So from all of what I am hearing, Essentially what everyone is saying is the Thief is a broken class that needs a lot of attention from Anet staff that ACTUALLY play a Thief as a regular.

You can look around and see other classes have broken mechanics as well, but Thief in total takes the prize.

Thank you again for this Feedback everyone. I’ll be contacting a friend to get in touch with one of the staff in Arenanet.

Thanks. Tell the testing staff (who will test thief in game): dont cry when party kick you out. lol.

AikijinX.6258:

So from all of what I am hearing, Essentially what everyone is saying is the Thief is a broken class that needs a lot of attention from Anet staff that ACTUALLY play a Thief as a regular.

You can look around and see other classes have broken mechanics as well, but Thief in total takes the prize.

Thank you again for this Feedback everyone. I’ll be contacting a friend to get in touch with one of the staff in Arenanet.

KingZ.2314:

Thanks. Tell the testing staff (who will test thief in game): dont cry when party kick you out. lol.

AikijinX.6258:

So from all of what I am hearing, Essentially what everyone is saying is the Thief is a broken class that needs a lot of attention from Anet staff that ACTUALLY play a Thief as a regular.

You can look around and see other classes have broken mechanics as well, but Thief in total takes the prize.

Thank you again for this Feedback everyone. I’ll be contacting a friend to get in touch with one of the staff in Arenanet.

Will do mate

I dont think we’re broken per say… okay maybe in pve.

Heavily fractured most everywhere else:
P/*
P/p
Traits. Everywhere traits.

I know the last one is broad and it’s not just us(thieves) in bungled traits/skill bugs.

I’m really hoping for overall bug fixes(through all classes/areas of the game) onto phase 2:
Splitting finally and forever splitting pve/pvp skills – wvwvw/spvp same ruleset. *consumables still usable in wvwvw, then to phase 3 – each month each class gets its balance/debug/revamp whats needed evaluation time.

what is your definition for ‘broken’? for me, when you see a guardian gives ally boons when land a critical hit, while get self heal base on the number of allies near by; when you get kicked by party say to you in the face: ‘no thief, selfish class’; when we have skill like ‘last refugee’ the condition of which will never occur in a million years; when i add 30 in SA and just reached 2200 armor(2700 armor for guard for same gear) in which a burn condition could result in death; when ……
these are called ‘broken’ for a class. or ‘in-balanced’ if you will.

I dont think we’re broken per say… okay maybe in pve.

Heavily fractured most everywhere else:
P/*
P/p
Traits. Everywhere traits.

I know the last one is broad and it’s not just us(thieves) in bungled traits/skill bugs.

I’m really hoping for overall bug fixes(through all classes/areas of the game) onto phase 2:
Splitting finally and forever splitting pve/pvp skills – wvwvw/spvp same ruleset. *consumables still usable in wvwvw, then to phase 3 – each month each class gets its balance/debug/revamp whats needed evaluation time.

Weapon Skills:

Body Shot – Very nearly a worthless ability. It does less overall damage than autoattacks (which are free) and the vulnerability doesn’t last long enough to treat it like an investment ability. Possible solutions detailed below.

Head Shot – Conceptually, this is an okay utility ability, but real world it just costs too much for too little return. Opportunity cost to the Thief using it is almost always higher than the control/damage done to the target. The ability either needs to cost less, daze longer (keep in mind dazes don’t stack), or do around 3x current damage.

P/P Set – needs help. It’s not unplayable, but there really is no objective reason to play it in light of there being other classes in the game.

Body Shot + P/P Solutions:

Option 1 – Completely replace Body Shot with a different ability. Make it a PBAoE ability with either a Blast Finisher or a Knockback….Proof Round or Overloaded Shot or something. It gives Pistol MH some multi-target damage, group utility, and helps break Shortbow’s monopoly on thieves a bit. If Blast Finisher, then it gives P/P access to stealth with BPS and would probably need to cost 3 Ini to be comparable to Cluster Bomb and D/P stealth combo. If Knockback, it would probably need to cost 5 Ini and do exceptional damage.

Option 2 – Make Vital Shot/Sneak attack and Body Shot essentially swap roles with vulnerability and bleeds. Essentially, crank up the direct damage on Vital Shot/Sneak Attack, but make them place 1/5 stacks of 6s Vulnerability, respectively. Then, make Body Shot a cheap multi-bleed generator – something like 3x 10s bleeds single target for 3 Ini. (It needs to be significantly better than Cluster Bomb shotgunning and Death Blossom for single target, but clearly not as good for 3+ targets.)

Heal Skills:

Withdraw – Roll direction needs to go in the direction held, just like dodges. It’s just ridiculously clunky controlling direction on this; I can’t stress it enough. (Same with Roll for Initiative.)

Utility Skills:

Traps – They actually look kinda good on paper until you actually try them and it’s a bunch of yuck. I’m really not sure what to do about them, but making them all ground targetable might help. (Shadow Trap would have to require a walking path.)

Venoms – The main problem with venoms is they require too much build investment to be good. Too many traits (and deep traits!) and too many slots to make those traits worthwhile, and then a thief is left with a one-dimensional build. Make Quick Venoms baseline thief, Combine Leeching and Residual into a 20 pt DA trait, and move Venom Share down to 20 pt SA. This way, players don’t have to go all-in on a single mechanic to get decent use out of it.

Roll for Initiative – Direction issue mentioned above with Withdraw, and make it either 4 Ini with 40s cooldown or 3 Ini with 30s cooldown so that it can be used more often without increasing the overall initiative gain. Anet should be encouraging slippery, visible getaway stuff like this in thieves instead of the stuff everyone else complains about.

Scorpion Wire – The buggy behavior wouldn’t be as intolerable if it didn’t go on cooldown when it fails. If the target literally immunes or the casting thief is blinded, that’s one thing. But if it’s LOS or similar failure, it should just report not being possible and stay off CD.

Elites:

I think these are in pretty good shape, actually.

I’ll try to hit traits later… So much to cover.

My broken is the defense mechanic (stealth) is situationally… defensive in pve.

Sure you can ninja communes/chests, sure you can bypass droves of risen, but the second youre in combat, need stealth, and get it, right after however youre back to scraping to stay alive unless someone dragged them away while stealth was up. If no one can do that coming out of stealth acts like a taunt for the most part.

Thanks for the input ANET staff has been notified and talked to.

P/P is just craptactular overall. It’s autoattack is a condition and it’s main dps is normal. 2 of it’s shots are basically useless due to the way resources work and the defensive tool takes so much initiative that you will be autoattacking only.

Starbird.4029:

P/P is just craptactular overall. It’s autoattack is a condition and it’s main dps is normal. 2 of it’s shots are basically useless due to the way resources work and the defensive tool takes so much initiative that you will be autoattacking only.

Much agreed~~

sword/dagger no3 skill. highly unreliable, ruins your game.

shadowstep across gaps and elevations fails 95% of the time.

Rejoice, Anet decided to revert 4s back to 3s on reveal stealth debuff with pve and WvW. Say it with me.
“Thank you Anet”

Next goal they need to accomplish will be trying to revert the aggro table, but I am aware how much of a hit rangers/mesmers/necromancers. Will take a hit from it in WvW, but quite honestly it just seems a bit too unbalanced.

“Thank you anet”

Also, what about shortbow #1, activation time is a lot higher than listed.

Yes the trick shot says .25 activation time but indeed it is .95.

AikijinX.6258:

Yes the trick shot says .25 activation time but indeed it is .95.

I started a bug thread for that and other broken Thief Activation times here:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Thief-Vital-Shot-and-Trick-Shot-Cast-Time/first#post1858427

Let’s keep it alive to get ANet to notice it

Close to everything will be resolved, just give them time.

AikijinX.6258:

Yes the trick shot says .25 activation time but indeed it is .95.

Wow.. I didn’t even know that’ that’s a massive difference..

Issues.5789:

AikijinX.6258:

Yes the trick shot says .25 activation time but indeed it is .95.

Wow.. I didn’t even know that’ that’s a massive difference..

No sarcastic remarks, this thread isn’t for that.