Guild Wars 2

Hello all, firstly I’d like to say thank you for dropping in to perhaps help me with a couple short questions. I have recently started GW2, and am currently a level 14 Thief. I have been trying to find some help within guides, and builds. But I’m still fairly lost as to how I need to go about priority on early level stats. I am currently using a Shortbow with a secondary of pistol/dagger (not sure if I should swap these out yet or not). I have been primarily investing my armor/weapon stats into Precision. I feel my damage is fairly small and the only reason I have done this is based off what I read. So, is there a better stat to focus on? or do I tough it out until I get a little higher for some dual statted items? I know this post might seem like a ramble, but just pardon me, I have no clue what I’m talking about. Just make a general guide that could help me stat myself instead of trying to work with the vast majority of end game builds/guides.

The reason your damage is so low is because P/D is for condition damage. If you want to do high damage, stack power until the gear has power/precision, then finally at 60+, power/precision/critical damage. Personally I love and play S/D with a short bow. If you want easy leveling, use S/P for the blind field on the pistol offhand and just cleave everything down without taking damage from melee targets.

The reason there’s little to no leveling guides is because the sheer number of different builds that can be used to level from 30-80 and the extreme lack of any customization pre-30 (Where you’ll have at most one major trait and all gear is single stat…)

But things I did while leveling (Note – 2-30 is often best to try out all weapon to find ones you like whilst wearing Power gear)

Dagger/Dagger + Power/Precision
Dagger/Dagger + Condition Damage/Precison
Sword/Pistol + Power/Precison
Pistol/Pistol + Power/Precison
Pistol/Dagger + Condition Damage/Precison
Sword/Dagger + Power/Precision
Shortbow + Power/Precision
Shortbow + Condition Damage/Precision

That’s just for weapons, I could go on and on about the different trait set-ups I tried (Since it’s rather cheap to reset traits and I was earning a bit of money from selling things)

Usually it ends up being favourable to go into the Power line for the first 10 points as having an extra 100 Power at level 20-40 really helps, after Power you can go into anything you like the look of and at level 40 (When you can use Master traits) is the time to look a bit more into making builds.

Thank you Thorp & Taril. This information is greatly appreciated, and will be put to good use. It sure helps my stat focusing. I will for sure test out S/P as I seem to not use P/D as often as shortbow.

Hi there!
I had a hard time leveling my thief early on, basically because it was my first character and i had no idea of the game mechanics, i would’ve killed for some tips on good builds, so I hope this info helps you.
As a secondary weapon, shortbow seems like a safe choice, honestly i havent tried anything else because of how good it is in crowd control, if I may suggest something, try “signet of malice” as your healing skill and see how it works with your shortbow (especially with “cluster bomb”), basically you win health with each hit, and given the shortbow’s amazing multi-hits this combo can have you with top health most of the time (tip: try detonating cluster bomb in mid air, it does so much more damage)
Now, it requires some practice (not much if you ask) but try Dagger/Pistol, it works incredibly well in PvE… see, with this duo you can enter stealth easily and do backstabs, also interrupt the enemy’s attacks, so there’s practically no difficult mob if you time everything right.
Try this: enter a fight with 3 (you’ll teleport and blind the enemy, giving you a few secs to bash him) then press 5 (black powder, it blinds your enemy again, giving you more time to auto-attack him) and before black powder wears off, press 2 (heartseeker, does masive damage and will cloack you when used with powder), if you want you can sneak behind him and make a nice backstab.
Repeat 5, autoattack, then 2 (and backstab)
As I said, it requires a little practice, but it’ll increase your chances of survival by millions (honest, before this I kept dying)… thieves are incredibly easy to take down, but this guarantees you will not take damage if you do it right, also it helps you understand a lot of the game’s mechanics (namely combos and blindness)
For this build you shall use power/precision traits and equipment, it works best with those backstabs (signet of agility would be great too)

Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any doubts =)

Thanks Milo! I actually tried out your suggestion, and it actually is quite fun. It kind of brought life to my thief other then just straight kiting all day. I still need a little work. I assume its from me being use to kiting and not up in the action. But, I have been doing pretty well with it so far! Thanks again.

D/Anything will be your highest damage (generally) and short bow will be your friend especially when you start running dungeons or WvW. Precision is great but now without power for a thief, so stack power first, then precision. Also, as someone above recommended try out all of the weapon combos to see what you like. I love d/p, it’s a blast, has great mobility, and can blind mobs. In the end, play what you like and spec for it as your level increases, so if you like p/d then run a condition build, if you want to do d/d direct damage run a power/precision build.

It’s worth noting that /p also allows for some great support when you team up with others. Dropping powder in your ally’s line of fire will net combo aplenty and keep enemies blinded and, depending on attack types, can activate stealth. D/D #3 Death Blossom, can keep you extremely mobile while causing bleeding on every enemy it hits. It also evades throughout the animation and is a Whirl combo-finisher.
A huddled group will all recieve stacks of bleeds. Stacking condition with D/D allows you to get in, slap 3 or more stacks of bleed, a stack or two of poison, then get away and watch your enemy drop dead from a distance. Can be useful when dealing with longer encounters.

Rely on mobility above all else, you will never, no matter how well you stack defensives, survive more than a few hits. Dodge, shadow step, cripple effects from such as caltrops, stealth and blind will keep you alive longer than health stacking. that said, try to get some in. We all get unlucky sometimes, especially with group mobs and lag. Most players AFAIK tend to put more than a few points either the shadow arts or acrobatics tree.

Expect your keyboard skill to be almost as frantic as the engineer class.