Guild Wars 2

How as a non D/P thief do you counter it??? I run S/D and P/D trickery build for roaming on my thief (PVT gear with zerk weaps/accessories), I get consistently beaten by D/P thieves. They aren’t visible long enough for me to hit them, they just stealth, BS, rinse and repeat. There must be a counter to that build, any tips on how to counter it using S/D and P/D?

It’s still heavily favored toward the D/P, but getting out a shortbow and laying down Poison Fields and Cluster Bombs can help you fight through the blind, and dissuades the D/P thief from getting too friendly with your back.

You take advantage of how their set works. For example, when they Heartseeker through the field, they cannot cancel or change direction which tells you where they are. The stealth leap-finisher doesn’t last as long as other stealths, another thing to take advantage of to predict when they’re going to be behind you. If they’re stacking stealth, just stand in the field for them to accidentally reveal themselves. The blind they put on you can also tell you when they’re close to you when it gets removed by hitting them, telling you they’re right there for a Cloak and Dagger off of them. Immobilize after they drop their Black Powder can give you an opportunity to open up on them or force them into a bad position if they were low on initiative. Lastly, and most obviously, attack them from outside of their smoke field.

Play defensively when they’re in stealth, and counter them with burst. If they’re decent and actually use their daze, gain distance before healing.

Play d/p yourself for at least a week. Just play conservatively and patiently

Shadow arts thieves play themselves, don’t even bother its a waste of time.

Most are very predictable, they try to backstab just before their stealth ends, so try to either evade/dodge or c&D off them.

Half of d/p thieves kill themselves by jumping into my cluster bombs I shotgun under my feet. One of the reasons I prefer sb to other sets.

Keep moving to make landing backstab harder.

Use mobs as a meatshield (if there are any around) for same reason as above.

If the thief stacks stealth, you can try to hit him in his bp, sword’s range is enough if you stand just outside bp.

Best to attack him in the short window when he just got revealed. C&D + steal usually takes 30%-50% of his HP, and daze from sleight of hand prevents him to use bp again for a while.

You can try d/p for just couple of hours, I find it a lot easier to fight classes/builds that I tried myself.

If you find yourself fighting a thief that just stacks long stealth to keep his HP at 100% and then attacks, then just walk out from there. No point wasting time, imo.

Keep spamming sowrd 1 chain, put 1 on your ouse and spam like crazy especiallly if you can not the them. The chain will let you track them in stealth, move more eratically and change direction more to mess up the backstab. Watch the blinds and do not waste ini, use CnD on critters walls etc.

And most inportant: Drop P/D get a bow.

There is no “if he does that do this way to win” if it comes to thieves the whole point in the class is quick changes to tactics and guessing what the other guy is going to do.

But…

Keep spamming 1, the sword does a lot of AoE cleave damage.

when d/p thief does invis feel his movements after few sec try to kite dodge when u see “Evade” UI around you that means hes just behind you trying to backstab then use aoe cluster bomb around you or #3 evade and when you’re using S/P u can pistol whip him just face which side or direction this “evade” UI appear. but as always a really good thief is hard to counter so depends.

x/p is probably the best counter.
As mentioned above Headshot and Pistol Whip can interrupt their flow, and thus give you an window of opportunity to burst them down to low health.

But you also have to be aware of our other ways to access stealth aswell as the shadowsteps which can turn the fight around.
30 in trickery for Sleight of Hand can be used as another interrupt when they try to heal using Hide in Shadows.

CrimsonNeonite.1048:

x/p is probably the best counter.
As mentioned above Headshot and Pistol Whip can interrupt their flow, and thus give you an window of opportunity to burst them down to low health.

But you also have to be aware of the other ways to access stealth aswell as the shadowsteps which can turn the fight around.
30 in trickery and Sleight of Hand can be used as another interrupt when they try to heal using Hide in Shadows.

yeah x/p is the best counter to d/p thieves (headshot/sleight of hand while they’re in black powder or trying to use hide in shadows).

I mainly play s/d in sPvP and it really comes down to luck when fighting a d/p trickery thief. I need to get lucky enough to dodge their instant cast daze from steal and pray i don’t get backstabbed if they get sleight of hand/basi off. Other than dodging their burst, use infiltrator’s strike/bow stealth attack to immobilize them before they can heartseeker through black powder. It’ll disrupt their flow and initiative gain.

Also make sure they have steal on cooldown before you lay your basi venom/other stun burst into them. Good thieves will steal to you and stop your burst (1 second daze) as soon as you land basi venom on them. (This is easier said then done, if steal is on cooldown they always have 2 other stun breakers if they’re playing meta)

This vid may help. It’s Jumper using S/D vs Caed using D/P. S/D has been nerfed since the making of this, but the nerfs haven’t made that much of a difference in fights against a D/P thief since it’s mostly affected fights where you need more than just a single stun breaker.

Thanks for the advice guys, really helpful. I really like P/D for kiting melees, forcing them to chase me with small stacks of torment from Shadow Strike is nice sustain while I kite. I think the general consensus is to drop P/D for Shortbow?

Black powder (#5 of pistol) blinds once every second for 4 seconds. That being said pistol whip on S/P hits 9 times in around 2 seconds. This allows you to hit the thief even if you are standing in his black powder. Most D/P thieves run closer to glass cannon since they think they are invincible in black powder, so you will be able to drop them fast with pistol whip. Also the stun on #3 and #4 in S/P will interrupt their flow as stated above.

If they are running condition clear on stealth, there is no way you can beat them 1v1 unless they over extend.