Guild Wars 2

so i’m hearing alot of people saying P/p thief is bad in WvW and PvP and there is no good build for them.

and i’m wondering why?
is it cause the skill set up is to varied? (being condition on its first skill, imobilize vulnerbility on the 2nd, raw burst on 3rd, interupt on 4nd, and blind aoe on 5th)

if it is indeed broken (and i’m not saying it is) then what would need to be fixed?

its not supposed to have the raw dmg output of d/d because its ranged, thus giving theif a bit of survivability that d/d doesnt offer.

i can understand people being dissapointed in unload (being its a raw dmg skill that is weak compared to ranger’s longbow burst skill)
but i dont think giving it more raw dmg would help, as then whats the point of d/d

maybe giving it bleed?

or is that not what people dislike about p/p? is it the lack of evasion option that some ranged skills get?

or is it the trait line (i’ve never had an issue with it seeing as how toughness has condition dmg, so thats a bonus!)

just trying to figure out what is it people think kills P/p in comparison to other options/classes

besides dmg it lacks utility/defensives/mobility… not to mention that every class in this game has more range than p/p thief – GL getting in range w/o moblity while they pew pew at you

another problem is while p/p by itself isn’t great the pistol combos with other weapons are; if they buffed p/p in some way it would just cause p/d or d/p being too good

so the problem is the range with bad mobility?

i know theres a trait that gives it +150 range and makes it bounce between enemies(like ranger axe or thief throwing dagger)

if they moved that trait from the 5th traitline to one of the others would that fix it?

I think people find P/P disappointing because it doesn’t quite meet the sweet spot of damage and survivability that melee sets do. Ostensibly it’s safer because it’s permanently at 900 range, so the reduced damage is fair. But unlike melee sets, it doesn’t have a shadowstep or an evasion move or access to stealth in its weapon skills. So while it looks a little safer at first, if something actively chases you, you’re forced into a second set / utilities / traits or something to escape with your life.

If you were ever to ‘fix’ P/P, it would probably have to be on Unload. (since as Cynz mentioned, both P/D and D/P are really good sets, so buffing either of them by association is questionable) I’m not sure what you’d do to fix it, if such a thing is possible / necessary: Maybe make unload reduce the cost of your next non-unload skill by 1 or something? As it is, the set often loses what utility it has because of the necessity of unload spam for moderate damage.

Maybe you could somehow let people use their dodges without breaking the channel? Putting free evasion frames on it seems a little too cheaty in my opinion.

Softspoken.2410:

I think people find P/P disappointing because it doesn’t quite meet the sweet spot of damage and survivability that melee sets do. Ostensibly it’s safer because it’s permanently at 900 range, so the reduced damage is fair. But unlike melee sets, it doesn’t have a shadowstep or an evasion move or access to stealth in its weapon skills. So while it looks a little safer at first, if something actively chases you, you’re forced into a second set / utilities / traits or something to escape with your life.

If you were ever to ‘fix’ P/P, it would probably have to be on Unload. (since as Cynz mentioned, both P/D and D/P are really good sets, so buffing either of them by association is questionable) I’m not sure what you’d do to fix it, if such a thing is possible / necessary: Maybe make unload reduce the cost of your next non-unload skill by 1 or something? As it is, the set often loses what utility it has because of the necessity of unload spam for moderate damage.

Maybe you could somehow let people use their dodges without breaking the channel? Putting free evasion frames on it seems a little too cheaty in my opinion.

ok so yeah i see what you guys are saying, and yeah unload would be the thing to change to fix it (jsut got done reporting thief’s shortbow’s 5 skill for being able to exploit itself over walls in WvW….)

so lets see..

unload could give endurance to recover energy for additional evasions?

or perhaps it cripples your opponent (that many shots would hit thier feet and legs and be painful) (how that would work idk…since its 8 shots 8 cripples woudl be overkill so they would have to rework unload to work like ranger’s 2 skill on the longbow with a flat 1 time cripple)

thanks for feedback =) hopefuly the devs will help us out

p/d is around conditions
so AA should do more dmg
every class AA does more dmg then the p/x AA
also p/p set need stealth / evade skills like d/d #3 #5, d/p #5#2 , s/d #3 ,p/d #5

if they could make some p/p skills to blast or leap then using #5+#? would give the thief stealth with the cost of using 70% of initiative points

i played a bit in wvw trap power build with trapper runes . it almost was perfect in group play as i could burst, use stealth, find new location and burst again
sure if i was targeted i was in trouble

also i like the p/p+dp set and use it only in group play as p/p can handle 1v1 or 1v2 so d/p is for escape (or d/d with cnd)

Eh. There’s always Sir Vincent’s idea … namely modding the two “same-type” dual sets (P/P, D/D) so that they have a separate skillset of their own. Then you don’t need to worry about what happens to ?/D or ?/P specs.

Unfortunately, this is probably asking too much. I personally would have been fine with some form of mobility on P/P. Well, that … and ANet not hosing the hell out of Black Powder. Guess they expect a Gunslinger to use harsh language for survival? :P

As for sets I use: I’m generally running with either P/P + SB or P/P + S/P. Need my evades, ya know.

A large part of P/P’s problem is that shortbow is simply too good by comparison (which sucks because I hate shortbow). An auto-attack that hits multiple targets and can immob from stealth, a high-damage blast finisher that also provides aoe bleeds, an evade, a poison field, and a freaking SHADOWSTEP ON DEMAND. It’s pretty much the single best utility weapon in the game and only stubborn idiots like myself refuse to use it.

P/P is still capable of doing some serious damage, but physical damage overall has sort of fallen off as the game evolves towards a higher percentage of players running some form of sustain or celestial build. There’s also other inherent weaknesses with the build such as requiring a target for any of its skills to do damage, its heavy reliance on initiative, and just being an incredibly easy set to counter. Plus, Ricochet itself is kind of an oddball trait that sometimes screws things up more than it helps (try using it with Shadowshot from the d/p set) and is, at best, still dependent on RNG. Besides, shortbow gets the same effect without even being required to trait for it.

The set just needs some kind of adjustment to distinguish itself as a viable ranged set from shortbow. Obviously, you can’t really tweak all of the skills too much or else risk unbalancing p/x and x/p builds, but maybe something crazy like a 20% chance to strip a boon on each shot of Unload would make it more attractive. Suddenly, Ricochet builds might become more threatening in teamfights.

There’s been plenty of threads with several great ideas on how to improve the set, but nothing’s ever come of it. I wish Anet would be more willing to test things out.

TeamBattleAxe.3901:

A large part of P/P’s problem is that shortbow is simply too good by comparison (which sucks because I hate shortbow). An auto-attack that hits multiple targets and can immob from stealth, a high-damage blast finisher that also provides aoe bleeds, an evade, a poison field, and a freaking SHADOWSTEP ON DEMAND. It’s pretty much the single best utility weapon in the game and only stubborn idiots like myself refuse to use it.

P/P is still capable of doing some serious damage, but physical damage overall has sort of fallen off as the game evolves towards a higher percentage of players running some form of sustain or celestial build. There’s also other inherent weaknesses with the build such as requiring a target for any of its skills to do damage, its heavy reliance on initiative, and just being an incredibly easy set to counter. Plus, Ricochet itself is kind of an oddball trait that sometimes screws things up more than it helps (try using it with Shadowshot from the d/p set) and is, at best, still dependent on RNG. Besides, shortbow gets the same effect without even being required to trait for it.

The set just needs some kind of adjustment to distinguish itself as a viable ranged set from shortbow. Obviously, you can’t really tweak all of the skills too much or else risk unbalancing p/x and x/p builds, but maybe something crazy like a 20% chance to strip a boon on each shot of Unload would make it more attractive. Suddenly, Ricochet builds might become more threatening in teamfights.

There’s been plenty of threads with several great ideas on how to improve the set, but nothing’s ever come of it. I wish Anet would be more willing to test things out.

ok that was ALOT of info.
and yeah i see what you saying. comparing p/p main attack to ranger’s shortbow main attack. they are very similar (in range, dmg, and condition) but while ranger shortbow needs to flank to bleed. pistol can do from front.

yet shortbow has 2 attacks for every 1 pistol. so they need to balance it.

It lacks in both damage and utility. The main problem is that they are overly dichotomous to one another. Vital Shot isn’t quite strong enough, so you have to dump all of your Initiative into Unload to keep up damage pressure. Not only does this leave you starved of resources for utility, but it also hinders your mobility dramatically since Unload is channeled.

It’s just all in all a poorly designed set and they keep missing the mark when they try to tune it.

P/P is a hot mess of poor design decisions. Let’s dissect it, shall we?

3 of the weaponsets skills are pure utility. With poor damage scaling (BS is .5, BP and HS are .25), you’ll never use these skills with the intent of dealing damage to your opponent. While this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it leads us to my next point.

When 3 of your 5 skills are utility only, your other 2 skills are going to need to work together with themselves and your utilities amazingly to make the set worth running. Hilariously, P/P’s AA is a condition based skill that gains very, very little from powe/crit, and the dual skill is a power/crit skill that gains bupkis from condition damage. That’s right, the 2 skills are almost completely incompatible with eachother! It doesn’t even make sense to run the set as a hybrid setup because of how poor Vital shot (AA)’s direct damage scaling is, and how Unload (dual skill) gains absolutely nothing from condition damage.

…But wait, there’s more! On top of being poorly designed for offense, the set is similarly poorly designed for defense as well!

For the most part, thieves rely on the following for their survival – Evades, stealth, blind, and mobility. P/P Has absolutely no access to evades, stealth, or mobility. On top of that, their blind (Black powder) was recently nerfed into the ground, making it almost useless as a defensive utility if you were counting on it to blind your opponent.

There are other issues of course (900 range, ricochet being too gimmicky for serious pvp, etc) but the majority of P/P’s issues stem from the fact that it’s awfully designed for both offense and defense.

The big problem with the set is that you’re too dependent on Unload to deal respectable damage, and it’s a real initiative hog – which locks out all the utility the set offers.

Things the set could use:

- A modest boost to the power ratio on the primary attack. +0.1-0.15 or so should do it.

- A boost to the damage on Unload against targets at low health, ala Heartseeker. With an improved auto-attack, this gives it a more clear use pattern than ‘spam as much as possible’ – auto and utility to get a target low, then Unload to finish.

- As more of a ‘this would be nice’ addition, changing Black Powder into a GTAoE so you can use it as a ranged support skill without hurting its current PBAoE utility on D/P.

A lot of posts here and a lot of people in general are acting under the misconception that P/P does poor damage or can’t sustain or whatever.

P/P does very good damage and sustains decently well in 1v1’s. In fact, P/P does extremely well against other glass builds, especially against other thieves (save perhaps D/P permastealth or P/D dire).

Where P/P falls behind other sets is in team fights, simply because you have no way of avoiding focus. Once your utilities are blown, nothing in your weapon set will prevent you from getting focused down.

Unload hogging the initiative on P/P is definitely a problem, but it’s not the biggest problem. Even if you cut the initiative cost of unload in half, P/P would still suffer from its inability to avoid focus. Thieves in general rely on evades, ports, and stealth to escape focus in a group fight; P/P offers none of those.

As others have iterated, the issues with P/P can only be fixed via unload or some kind of minor power scaling tweak (or a very creative idea) to the AA. The other skills on the set if buffed would make the already-strongest sets (D/P and P/D) too strong.

Unload can’t be buffed in damage scaling, seeing as it already deals respectable damage at range – and I don’t think lowering the base initiative cost is really what needs to be done.

That said, unload is intended to be a primary DPS skill used to apply constant pressure; kind of like the ranger’s strong auto-attack on longbow. Because it’s spammable, damage just can’t be increased, else it would be overpowered (I.E., think of a longbow ranger with no RF cooldown using it twice in a row). And of course, the skill IS named unload after all, implying that it’s unleashing everything for one attack. A flavorful and mechanical solution I believe is to allow for better unload chaining. As it stands, you get two uses out of the skill – which is about the equivalent of a backstab – per ten initiative. Consider adding this effect to the skill in its current form:

>Every consecutive cast of Unload reduces the next Cast of Unload by 50% of its initiative cost (minimum 1).

But golly! That would make Unload have an infinite uptime on a full bar of initiative! It would, but that’s actually the point. While unload has quite a bit of damage attached to it, using unload as a means of “bursting” down your target would require you to maintain ~0 initiative while constantly pumping damage and pressuring your target, and in doing so, also preventing utility effects, heal skills, etc. from being used without interrupting the chain. Over time, your initiative would slowly rebuild as well, allowing for the use of another effect or skill, or simply allowing for 2 unloads with a few initiative to spare.

Well i’m going to go for the crazy idea’s. they won’t work but im stating them anyway

Since unload/pistol whip/repeater all took nerfs due to synergizing to well with haste, then they nerfed haste. how about adding a trait
-haste gains 50% ias while duel wielding pistols. (this pretty much reverts the haste change for pistols) and since there dmg has already been “balanced” around haste + unload it should normalize things again.

And / Or also
Since Arena net has a fascination with life steal (SoM, Invigorating Precision , hm can’t remember the name atm healing on int use)They could add a life stealing ability to unload. (or heal per hit) its much easyier for them to tweak it over the signet/traits, this would open up an option for offhand use (healing) while keeping Ls low on other set’s (we can’t have a repeat of the LS meta can we thieves) and since thieves lack def, i doubt it will ever be considered op.

Course none of these suggestions deal with the fact that it has limited mobility. (which translate into p/p still being a bit weaker) These are outside the box so to speak but i firmly belive p/p should have something a bit diffrent.

Highlie.7641:

Well i’m going to go for the crazy idea’s. they won’t work but im stating them anyway

Since unload/pistol whip/repeater all took nerfs due to synergizing to well with haste, then they nerfed haste. how about adding a trait
-haste gains 50% ias while duel wielding pistols. (this pretty much reverts the haste change for pistols) and since there dmg has already been “balanced” around haste + unload it should normalize things again.

And / Or also
Since Arena net has a fascination with life steal (SoM, Invigorating Precision , hm can’t remember the name atm healing on int use)They could add a life stealing ability to unload. (or heal per hit) its much easyier for them to tweak it over the signet/traits, this would open up an option for offhand use (healing) while keeping Ls low on other set’s (we can’t have a repeat of the LS meta can we thieves) and since thieves lack def, i doubt it will ever be considered op.

Course none of these suggestions deal with the fact that it has limited mobility. (which translate into p/p still being a bit weaker) These are outside the box so to speak but i firmly belive p/p should have something a bit diffrent.

life steal would be nice, i’d much prefer it to haste…

it would be nice if P/P had a movement skill or access to stealth
P/p is the one weapon set with out a movement skill or access to stealth
i think that is the weapons biggest weak point.

idk how well this would work but 2 things

1) what if u change unload to a 2 part skill like flanking strike.

2) what if they make the last shot of unload a blast finisher so u can combo with BP

The only viable means I can see as to fixing P/P is with traits with some sort of “if two pistol traits” or a "one pistol gives XXX two pistols give XXX times 2. It that or put it all on unload which just means the other skills used less and less.

I do use P/P almost exclusively on one of my thieves and it can be a lot of fun but you ARE using 90 percent unload .

So things like the IMMOB skill 2 being 1 second per pistol along with a doubling of the vulnerability stacks with two pistols or the damage factor on the AA skill doubling with two pistols is what I am talking about.

THAT said in the existing form the best defense I have found and that which makes it the most viable is evades over everything else. Since the set has no evades built in this means sigils of energy, feline grace and the like.

I tried a stealth mode p/p and just did not see it as viable as you rely two much on a utility slot for stealths. This the same with ports. Evades you can get without those utility slots being eaten up.

That all said next to the evades the sources of INI become most important. The p/p set has to be putting pressure on all the time with damage because if you let the enemy get the upper hand in that regard you have little in the way of outs.

I use P/P almost exclusively (i’m an idiot and a horrible thief, I admit it). I mostly spam 3 and use builds with lots of init access. I’d like to see the range increased, reduce init amount on black powder, change either 2 or 4 to an AoE (call it “spray and pray”), change either 2 or 4 to a poison or torment based attack. Move ricochet out of trickery (4 in trickery just to get the one trait sucks. Nothing else in the line is related to pistols with the exception of increased init with trickery 3). Add a trait that grants speed or some other mobility to pistol users.

P/P has lots of issues. But, I find it works well when I use it in WvW for breaking up mass attacks or turning a retreat into a rout. Defending or attacking in closed spaces (e.g. along the wall tops or in passages) it is especially powerful. I firmly believe that if you put together a guardian, a warrior, and 3 p/p thieves, you’d have a hardcore assault team that could absolutely slaughter zergs. Make one of the thieves venomshare and the other two high power/crit with crit based sigils, all with ricochet, and go to town.

actually…seeing the number of stealth spam thiefs in wvw…it might be a good idea to nerf those stealth spammers somehow and buff p/p

how? seeing as the stealth spam is from the trait line, remove the time it takes to use stealth trap in wvw. this will avoid gimping thief in PvE

then buffing unload to provide evade while shooting.

this will make P/P useful, and make the stealth spamming options not overshadow it without making them obsolete(as you can counter with a supply removing trap to prevent them using stealth trap)

Unload’s shots restore X endurance on hit (5 maybe? compare it to d/p or d/s amount of evasion…).
After a full unload, your next basic attack is empowered/gives you stealth/makes you evade/a combination of those.
No need to implement any difficult code, no mechanics are changed.
Seems reasonable to me.

I put a lot of thought into it, and I think I’ve thought of a solid solution.
The main problems are that it lacks defense, sustainability and utility.
The reasons for this being that it depends too much on Unload as the sole source of offense, and Unload is too much of a resource hog for this role.
If they buff non-Unload abilities enough to be viable alternatives, it makes D/P and/or P/D overpowered.
If they buff Unload enough to make the set viable single-handedly, it exacerbates the existing problem and makes it a ridiculous one-trick pony spam-fest.

So here’s my idea.
First increase the cast time on Unload, then add a secondary activation to it (a la Shadow Return and such). The increased duration of Unload is important for several reasons.
It will weaken it enough to help balance the addition of the secondary activation.
Draw out activations of Unload, both to reduce down-time spent on condition-based auto-attacks, and reduce the reliance on Initiative traits without making them overpowered.
And finally, to prevent it from allowing too much burst potential with the secondary, and make it that much easier to trigger the secondary (since it would be available while Unload is active).

The secondary could be called something like Reload. It stops the Unload mid-cast, triggers a small evade window during the early portion of the cast, and restores a couple Initiative.
The cast time of Reload would be sizable, and only give back the Initiative when it completes. Something like a 1 second cast with a 1/2 second evade at the start.
This would give a bit of much needed defense (particularly while using Unload, which currently jams up defense and utility further by locking out other abilities), and gives back some Initiative to help with stringing in non-Unload attacks more frequently.
It would also make Unload spamming for offense significantly less boring and more involved.

Grimwolf.7163:

I put a lot of thought into it, and I think I’ve thought of a solid solution.
The main problems are that it lacks defense, sustainability and utility.
The reasons for this being that it depends too much on Unload as the sole source of offense, and Unload is too much of a resource hog for this role.
If they buff non-Unload abilities enough to be viable alternatives, it makes D/P and/or P/D overpowered.
If they buff Unload enough to make the set viable single-handedly, it exacerbates the existing problem and makes it a ridiculous one-trick pony spam-fest.

So here’s my idea.
First increase the cast time on Unload, then add a secondary activation to it (a la Shadow Return and such). The increased duration of Unload is important for several reasons.
It will weaken it enough to help balance the addition of the secondary activation.
Draw out activations of Unload, both to reduce down-time spent on condition-based auto-attacks, and reduce the reliance on Initiative traits without making them overpowered.
And finally, to prevent it from allowing too much burst potential with the secondary, and make it that much easier to trigger the secondary (since it would be available while Unload is active).

The secondary could be called something like Reload. It stops the Unload mid-cast, triggers a small evade window during the early portion of the cast, and restores a couple Initiative.
The cast time of Unload would be sizable, and only give back the Initiative when it completes. Something like a 1 second cast with a 1/2 second evade at the start.
This would give a bit of much needed defense (particularly while using Unload, which currently jams up defense and utility further by locking out other abilities), and gives back some Initiative to help with stringing in non-Unload attacks more frequently.
It would also make Unload spamming for offense significantly less boring and more involved.

nice

I would recommend to change only the Unload skill :
- Initiative cost from 5 to 4
- Grant it additional range of 300 up to 1200 (only for this skill not for AA)
- Additional shot 9th as a blast finisher (so you could combo it with a Black Powder)

This changes would make P/P more viable and fun to play. It would have a bit more dps and ability to gain stealth with BP combo which is needed in my opinion.

Grimwolf.7163:

I put a lot of thought into it, and I think I’ve thought of a solid solution.
The main problems are that it lacks defense, sustainability and utility.
The reasons for this being that it depends too much on Unload as the sole source of offense, and Unload is too much of a resource hog for this role.
If they buff non-Unload abilities enough to be viable alternatives, it makes D/P and/or P/D overpowered.
If they buff Unload enough to make the set viable single-handedly, it exacerbates the existing problem and makes it a ridiculous one-trick pony spam-fest.

So here’s my idea.
First increase the cast time on Unload, then add a secondary activation to it (a la Shadow Return and such). The increased duration of Unload is important for several reasons.
It will weaken it enough to help balance the addition of the secondary activation.
Draw out activations of Unload, both to reduce down-time spent on condition-based auto-attacks, and reduce the reliance on Initiative traits without making them overpowered.
And finally, to prevent it from allowing too much burst potential with the secondary, and make it that much easier to trigger the secondary (since it would be available while Unload is active).

The secondary could be called something like Reload. It stops the Unload mid-cast, triggers a small evade window during the early portion of the cast, and restores a couple Initiative.
The cast time of Reload would be sizable, and only give back the Initiative when it completes. Something like a 1 second cast with a 1/2 second evade at the start.
This would give a bit of much needed defense (particularly while using Unload, which currently jams up defense and utility further by locking out other abilities), and gives back some Initiative to help with stringing in non-Unload attacks more frequently.
It would also make Unload spamming for offense significantly less boring and more involved.

However that’d require quite an amount of coding involved.
IMO adding endurance when shots hit your target would be an acceptable lazy way of boosting p/p’s survivability.

That’s basically one free evade if you hit all 8 shots.

ButterOfDeath.2873:

Grimwolf.7163:

I put a lot of thought into it, and I think I’ve thought of a solid solution.
The main problems are that it lacks defense, sustainability and utility.
The reasons for this being that it depends too much on Unload as the sole source of offense, and Unload is too much of a resource hog for this role.
If they buff non-Unload abilities enough to be viable alternatives, it makes D/P and/or P/D overpowered.
If they buff Unload enough to make the set viable single-handedly, it exacerbates the existing problem and makes it a ridiculous one-trick pony spam-fest.

So here’s my idea.
First increase the cast time on Unload, then add a secondary activation to it (a la Shadow Return and such). The increased duration of Unload is important for several reasons.
It will weaken it enough to help balance the addition of the secondary activation.
Draw out activations of Unload, both to reduce down-time spent on condition-based auto-attacks, and reduce the reliance on Initiative traits without making them overpowered.
And finally, to prevent it from allowing too much burst potential with the secondary, and make it that much easier to trigger the secondary (since it would be available while Unload is active).

The secondary could be called something like Reload. It stops the Unload mid-cast, triggers a small evade window during the early portion of the cast, and restores a couple Initiative.
The cast time of Reload would be sizable, and only give back the Initiative when it completes. Something like a 1 second cast with a 1/2 second evade at the start.
This would give a bit of much needed defense (particularly while using Unload, which currently jams up defense and utility further by locking out other abilities), and gives back some Initiative to help with stringing in non-Unload attacks more frequently.
It would also make Unload spamming for offense significantly less boring and more involved.

However that’d require quite an amount of coding involved.
IMO adding endurance when shots hit your target would be an acceptable lazy way of boosting p/p’s survivability.

That’s basically one free evade if you hit all 8 shots.

Not any harder than when they introduced the secondary activation for Flanking Strike.

Grimwolf.7163:

I put a lot of thought into it, and I think I’ve thought of a solid solution.
The main problems are that it lacks defense, sustainability and utility.
The reasons for this being that it depends too much on Unload as the sole source of offense, and Unload is too much of a resource hog for this role.
If they buff non-Unload abilities enough to be viable alternatives, it makes D/P and/or P/D overpowered.
If they buff Unload enough to make the set viable single-handedly, it exacerbates the existing problem and makes it a ridiculous one-trick pony spam-fest.

So here’s my idea.
First increase the cast time on Unload, then add a secondary activation to it (a la Shadow Return and such). The increased duration of Unload is important for several reasons.
It will weaken it enough to help balance the addition of the secondary activation.
Draw out activations of Unload, both to reduce down-time spent on condition-based auto-attacks, and reduce the reliance on Initiative traits without making them overpowered.
And finally, to prevent it from allowing too much burst potential with the secondary, and make it that much easier to trigger the secondary (since it would be available while Unload is active).

The secondary could be called something like Reload. It stops the Unload mid-cast, triggers a small evade window during the early portion of the cast, and restores a couple Initiative.
The cast time of Reload would be sizable, and only give back the Initiative when it completes. Something like a 1 second cast with a 1/2 second evade at the start.
This would give a bit of much needed defense (particularly while using Unload, which currently jams up defense and utility further by locking out other abilities), and gives back some Initiative to help with stringing in non-Unload attacks more frequently.
It would also make Unload spamming for offense significantly less boring and more involved.

The benefit isn’t worth the nerf. In any event, they just shortened the time (thank god!).

I don’t have issues with Init hogging when spamming Unload. My issues revolve around staying alive long enough to be useful and keeping moving targets within strike range. Increased range would go a long way to making me happy with P/P. I’d settle for an adjustment to pistol #2 or #4 that mimicked sigil of purity or maybe did a swap condi for boon ability.

So much of what makes P/P builds even mildly useful involves having to fill the design holes with sigils, runes, upgrades, and utility slots. Other builds usually benefit from synergies between various bits and pieces of the build, but P/P has little to no synergy for interesting effects. You end up nerfing the build to make it viable or running as a glass, underwhelming, one trick pony.

how about they jsut make unload all shots combo finishers. pop black powder and then hit unload to unleash blinding shots non stop until unload is finished.

maybe make unload firing in a cone to hit multiple enemies in front of it and spread the blindness

As someone who mains a P/P, S/P thief, I can definitely say that P/P could use a little more pepper. There’s been a handful of good suggestions toss around, so I hope Anet is keeping an eye on this thread and perhaps brainstorming ways to improve this loadout.

Changing/adding some properties to Unload could do some good, as that seems to be the general consensus on this thread (i.e. lower initiative cost, boon strip, might or fury gain, endurance regen per hit for mobility, etc. I’ll admit, I’m not that good at drumming up ideas, but I like reading others’ suggestions).

Maybe changing the way the AA works when you’re dual-wielding pistols? Maybe you shoot as fast as the ranger short bow? (I say “while you’re using P/P” because otherwise that would make dire thieves even more deadly) That would probably take much more work, though, so I’m not sure the devs would go for that, which sucks because with the AA being geared toward conditions and Unload being geared toward power and criticals, there’s really no synergy at all with those two skills.

It also seems that, from what I hear, P/P’s main weakness is due in large part to the fact that it has no access to stealth or mobility. Maybe adding a finisher to the last bullet of Unload or maybe even Headshot so you can stealth yourself from a smoke field (I think the pistol has an awesome stealth attack skill, btw), or what I suggested earlier to have each bullet of Unload restore a bit of endurance so you can have more evades for defense?

I will point out that Ensign made a rather interesting suggestion about making BP a GTAoE skill. I never thought about that… but the nerf on that skill really lowered the usefulness of that move overall.

Meh, like I said, I don’t think I’m very good at coming up with good suggestions, but I can say that I would like to see P/P get a buff or two to make it a more viable weapon set.

If P/P shot at ranger shortbow speed, Dire perplex would just move from P/D to P/P because the bleed DPS would be basically the same as a constant sneak attack, and head shot provides a spammable long-range daze for many, many procs of the perplexity confusion, all the while supplying ample durability from dire gear and utilities meant to restore initative for spamming 4 harder.

The problem with P/P is that what holds it back is the rest of the skills in P/P, and those can’t be buffed to to the strength of D/P and P/D. P/P will pretty much always remain a one-trick pony build so to speak in terms of damage, with sub-par control abilities and mobility on the basis that it shares skills with two other very strong weapon combinations. Anything but straight up buffs to unload which helps make the spam less intrusive on initiative (see my above suggestion as an idea) won’t really work unless the entire thief class’s weapon skills are re-worked, which obviously isn’t happening.

Maybe there is a way to tweak things without too much drama.

Turn Head Shot into a melee range skill, keep the daze, and add an evade and retreat move onto the end. That gives the P/P thief a much-needed tool for breaking melee contact and evading. Up the init cost to 5 to give you 2 per 10 instead of 3 per 12.

Give pistols a base range of 1000, make Ricochet add 200. While that adds range even to D/P and P/D shots, all of the sets are down one ranged shot from the Head Shot change and the 1000 range is outside of normal steal range. The thief can maintain distance but he gives up a gap closer to do it or he spends a trait for Long Range Steal to keep the option open. That also fits with the Trickery line since both Ricochet and LRS are in that line.

I’m not much of build master or anything, but I think this avoids some potential other problems with existing sets, but maybe there’s something I’m not seeing. I also considered making the new head shot a leap finisher, to combo with the BP and give P/P some stealth, but unless HS was changed from Leap to something else or nothing at all, that’s a bit too much spammable stealth. Maybe a blast finisher for head shot?

P/P has issues, but after playing it so long, I think it has a “secret” but powerful strength. With a crit build, even builds that don’t include some sort of 100% crit chance, Unload is virtually guaranteed to proc every crit-based ability you possess. There are lots of interesting ways to use that fact, not least of which is Opportunist for a constant resupply of initiative. Throw in SoM and Invigorating Precision you get some serious HP restoration. Even when you’re being eaten alive with condis, you can stay up for a long time. Add in lifesteal on crit food (for both the healing and bonus damage vs armored targets) and fury (thrill of the crime), and you’ve got a real engine going for as long as you can keep Unload going.

Ricochet. Much simpler. Each pistol adds 150 to range. Thus one pistol 1050 two pistols 1200.

why not just add the burning condition to unload?

babazhook.6805:

Ricochet. Much simpler. Each pistol adds 150 to range. Thus one pistol 1050 two pistols 1200.

hmmm this will just make us like another pew pew ranger. But even if this was implemented, the ranger’s LB still would have more utility than the p/p set.

pepper.6179:

babazhook.6805:

Ricochet. Much simpler. Each pistol adds 150 to range. Thus one pistol 1050 two pistols 1200.

hmmm this will just make us like another pew pew ranger. But even if this was implemented, the ranger’s LB still would have more utility than the p/p set.

I was just speaking to Ricochet and not other changes that might be implemented. The single largest issue is how to fix the set without adding too much to p/d and d/p. Unload is already like pew pew ranger and rapid fire. nothing changes that

Let Unload grant Swiftness, Vigor, and Stability for the duration of the channeling. Problem solved.

Also Thieves should have a Trait called “Requip”;
Requip: Swapping weapon while it’s in cooldown costs 1 initiative for each remaining seconds.
If the remaining cooldown is 5s, it will cost us 5init to swap weapon. This Trait will give P/P access to defensive skills when needed.

Just more ideas to be tossed in Anet’s “ignore” pile.

What I’ve said a dozen times, and what remains true, is that they need to buff or redesign Vital Shot. Having a weak autoattack is bad for any weapon set, but it’s especially bad within the Thief’s Initiative system. You are all but required to put all of your Initiative into Unload, and no updates made to Unload are going to change that (in fact, they will likely just reinforce it). This means you have crap utility and crap mobility.

I’m aware of the concern about how this affects P/D, but that isn’t enough reason to remain paralyzed and allow P/P to remain forever terrible. Even if changes to Vital Shot make P/D OP (unlikely) they can find other ways to tweak P/D.

I also do not think it’s a good idea to attempt to balance weapons’ weaknesses by buffing their traits unless the trait itself is weak. Ricochet is not weak.

Einlanzer.1627:

What I’ve said a dozen times, and what remains true, is that they need to buff or redesign Vital Shot. Having a weak autoattack is bad for any weapon set, but it’s especially bad within the Thief’s Initiative system. You are all but required to put all of your Initiative into Unload, and no updates made to Unload are going to change that (in fact, they will likely just reinforce it). This means you have crap utility and crap mobility.

I’m aware of the concern about how this affects P/D, but that isn’t enough reason to remain paralyzed and allow P/P to remain forever terrible. Even if changes to Vital Shot make P/D OP (unlikely) they can find other ways to tweak P/D.

Its a hot mess. P/P affect P/D affects D/D affects D/P affect S/P back to P/P.

First step: Disconnect and Isolate.

If they want to fix something for P/P, there should not be any connection to other weapon set, else it’s not going to work.

Without doing the first step leaves us in a standstill.

Here’s an idea of how to maybe help P/P.

First, buff the scaling on the autoattack like others have suggested. The DPS (including the bleeding ) is barely on par with SB, and it has to be traited to maybe bounce. Dire P/D won’t see a buff, so it’s not much of a concern. Hybrid might but we don’t have the might stacking to really push it over the top like other Celestial classes. If they are worried about runaway damage, they could make it do extra damage on targets with vulnerability (like they did for warrior’s rifle) instead of just a straight up damage boost.

Second, get rid of unload in its current form. Rapid fire and volley work alright because they don’t affect the skills on the rest of the set. Instead, change the skill into a gap creator:

Fire a shot at point blank range (range 130, instant cast, up to 3 targets, 0.5 multiplier ). This shot destroys a boon(prioritizing stability). Evade backwards (.75 sec, distance 300, i.e dodge roll backwards ). Fire a second shot that weakens and cripples the target (3 seconds weakness and cripple, 1.5 multiplier). There should be a 0.25 second after cast as well so it’s not entirely evade frames.

I think this would allow P/P to retain cohesiveness as a power set and also be a threat to some of the boon-brawler builds running around right now. The damage portion of the skill is decently telegraphed by the dodge roll, keeping the skill from being overpowered. It also sets up nicely for headshot to be useful, and if they make the autoattack deal more damage to vulnerable foes, body shot will have its place as well as CnD in P/D hybrid.

It’s bad, but its fun.

I like using P/P with Roll for Initiative + Withdraw. It makes me feel like a gunslinger. If P/P gets buffed, I don’t want unload to be removed.

I rather that Unload gets a damage increase and/or lower the initiative cost. Maybe increase the dodge range/initiative gain or lower the cooldown for RoI because it goes very well with P/P.

runeblade.7514:

It’s bad, but its fun.

I like using P/P with Roll for Initiative + Withdraw. It makes me feel like a gunslinger. If P/P gets buffed, I don’t want unload to be removed.

I rather that Unload gets a damage increase and/or lower the initiative cost. Maybe increase the dodge range/initiative gain or lower the cooldown for RoI because it goes very well with P/P.

Unload gets a damage increase? The damage is already crazy, but yeah let’s turn p/p thief into a faceroll class like ranger rather than simply give it a skill cap.

oEnvy.3064:

runeblade.7514:

It’s bad, but its fun.

I like using P/P with Roll for Initiative + Withdraw. It makes me feel like a gunslinger. If P/P gets buffed, I don’t want unload to be removed.

I rather that Unload gets a damage increase and/or lower the initiative cost. Maybe increase the dodge range/initiative gain or lower the cooldown for RoI because it goes very well with P/P.

Unload gets a damage increase? The damage is already crazy, but yeah let’s turn p/p thief into a faceroll class like ranger rather than simply give it a skill cap.

When P/P become a face roll, then we have something to talk about. Right now is not the time to assume the worst that could happen.

After reading the thread, and having a P/P thief myself, I think the two easiest changes would be:
Decrease Vital Shot base damage. Significantly increase the power scaling instead.
Give Unload a flat amount of endurance. Preferably per hit, but after a full channel could work too.
I also like the idea of “Reload” letting you cancel the channel early to evade for an amount of time.

so i was playing engineer. they have a pistol skill that gave me an idea

make unload dodge as you shoot.

for example, if you are backing up when you hit unload, you evade backwards
if you are strafign left or right when you hit unload, you evade in that direction
and evade forward if you running forward.

but, if you arent moving when u hit unload, then no evade animation (cause lets face it. some of us like standing still as we fire to feel epic.

I can understand wanting more evades, but on unload with P/P that can be counter productive. With 900-1050 range, doing anything that puts you farther away from your target is bad. If you’re working at range, to close the gap you’ll have to skill with SS or SoI or rely on your steal. You’ve got no weapon-based gap close/mobility to catch back up to your target. If he was already trying to get away, he’s now get a bigger lead. That’s why, though I love RfI, I stopped using it. The stun break was awesome, but I got a lot less use out of it than I expected because it kept taking me out of pistol range AND steal range.

In WvW the range issue comes up a lot with all the group movement going on. That and targeting. Tabbing through targets is useless with such large groups, roughly the same goes for click targeting. When people are constantly moving forward and backward or repositioning as part of a zerg, you’re getting nothing but Out of Range. Also with so many cleanses in a zerg, even mobility reduction like cripple, immob aren’t terribly reliable or effective.

I’d like to be able to break melee contact without being forced to move during my prime DPS time.

Happiethyme here, YEAH WTF DEVS it’s only 900 range, bring back the 1200 with ricochet and make it bounce to 9 targets that way I can bust a cap on both blue and green wvw zergs. Also the 2nd string of unload should apply 5 secs of stability cause that’s around the time the rangers, warrs, notice I’m capping them and pop off their knockbacks. It’s also about when the necro that got ripped to about 10% HP pops his/her fear on me. We can have it farther traited at 6 points to add a homing bug if you manage to get a 5th string off and hit them with the 5th string of unload that way we can close that gap to them without switching to DP.

HANDLE IT (MFer)

Maugetarr.6823:

Here’s an idea of how to maybe help P/P.

First, buff the scaling on the autoattack like others have suggested. The DPS (including the bleeding ) is barely on par with SB, and it has to be traited to maybe bounce. Dire P/D won’t see a buff, so it’s not much of a concern. Hybrid might but we don’t have the might stacking to really push it over the top like other Celestial classes. If they are worried about runaway damage, they could make it do extra damage on targets with vulnerability (like they did for warrior’s rifle) instead of just a straight up damage boost.

Second, get rid of unload in its current form. Rapid fire and volley work alright because they don’t affect the skills on the rest of the set. Instead, change the skill into a gap creator:

Fire a shot at point blank range (range 130, instant cast, up to 3 targets, 0.5 multiplier ). This shot destroys a boon(prioritizing stability). Evade backwards (.75 sec, distance 300, i.e dodge roll backwards ). Fire a second shot that weakens and cripples the target (3 seconds weakness and cripple, 1.5 multiplier). There should be a 0.25 second after cast as well so it’s not entirely evade frames.

I think this would allow P/P to retain cohesiveness as a power set and also be a threat to some of the boon-brawler builds running around right now. The damage portion of the skill is decently telegraphed by the dodge roll, keeping the skill from being overpowered. It also sets up nicely for headshot to be useful, and if they make the autoattack deal more damage to vulnerable foes, body shot will have its place as well as CnD in P/D hybrid.

If you’re playing a Thief, learn how to dodge. What you’re describing is a short bow, in case you haven’t noticed we thieves already have one of those. Have you even played with PP, and I’m not talking about shooting the golems in the mist. I played PP from level 6 or 7 when we got to dual weld up to level 80 and I still main those weapons now. Sure Dagger main hand is a great single target dps but if the Guard or whoever is tanking can’t get and maintain aggro for me then I’d rather go 100% up time with PP than about 85% with Daggers on certain pve bosses and mostly all the bosses in an F50.

Battlerobot.9461:

Maugetarr.6823:

Here’s an idea of how to maybe help P/P.

First, buff the scaling on the autoattack like others have suggested. The DPS (including the bleeding ) is barely on par with SB, and it has to be traited to maybe bounce. Dire P/D won’t see a buff, so it’s not much of a concern. Hybrid might but we don’t have the might stacking to really push it over the top like other Celestial classes. If they are worried about runaway damage, they could make it do extra damage on targets with vulnerability (like they did for warrior’s rifle) instead of just a straight up damage boost.

Second, get rid of unload in its current form. Rapid fire and volley work alright because they don’t affect the skills on the rest of the set. Instead, change the skill into a gap creator:

Fire a shot at point blank range (range 130, instant cast, up to 3 targets, 0.5 multiplier ). This shot destroys a boon(prioritizing stability). Evade backwards (.75 sec, distance 300, i.e dodge roll backwards ). Fire a second shot that weakens and cripples the target (3 seconds weakness and cripple, 1.5 multiplier). There should be a 0.25 second after cast as well so it’s not entirely evade frames.

I think this would allow P/P to retain cohesiveness as a power set and also be a threat to some of the boon-brawler builds running around right now. The damage portion of the skill is decently telegraphed by the dodge roll, keeping the skill from being overpowered. It also sets up nicely for headshot to be useful, and if they make the autoattack deal more damage to vulnerable foes, body shot will have its place as well as CnD in P/D hybrid.

If you’re playing a Thief, learn how to dodge. What you’re describing is a short bow, in case you haven’t noticed we thieves already have one of those. Have you even played with PP, and I’m not talking about shooting the golems in the mist. I played PP from level 6 or 7 when we got to dual weld up to level 80 and I still main those weapons now. Sure Dagger main hand is a great single target dps but if the Guard or whoever is tanking can’t get and maintain aggro for me then I’d rather go 100% up time with PP than about 85% with Daggers on certain pve bosses and mostly all the bosses in an F50.

I’m talking about adding utility and evasion while keeping the DPS up since it’s a single target weapon. Most of our dual skills (or #3 on shortbow) have an evasion tied to them; For reference, deathblossom (poor, i know), flanking strike, and pistolwhip all have an evade in them. D/P has a blind and gap closer, while P/D has a gap creator that punishes people chasing you. P/P has a nearly 2 second animation (including aftercast) with a 2.4 (total) multiplier. My objective was to punish bruiser classes while still giving a readable animation for counterplay. It also gives it a great reason to use it tactically rather than pressing 3 for damage. Also, when used in point blank range, the DPS would be higher than what we currently have, but the reposition would punish consecutive repeated use in terms of damage.

Adding a +20% damage modifier to the autoattack when the enemy has vuln in addition to that would give every skill on the set a clearly defined purpose in a P/P set.

Autoattack: Mediocre power damage until vuln applied (.585/sec with the boost vs shortbow’s .579/sec)

Body Shot: apply immobilize and vuln (increase your damage from auto)

Unload: evade, reposition, set up headshot to use against stability. Makes it difficult to maintain melee range (2.0/sec in point blank range vs. the current 1.37/sec. 1.5/sec when at a range greater than 130)

Headshot: interrupt

BPS: still meh for the initiative (on this paricular set)

(multiplier/sec were calculated using the total cast time including aftercast, not just the listed time)

If you’re saying that this would make P/P closer to shortbow, I’ll take that as a compliment.

Man, I just wanna see P/P get some love. There’s plenty of viable ideas here.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQRAqa4al0Mp3pFOx4J0PNRPRt9BEADIXjg3PxVkEA-TpREwAFeAA52fAyBBwxRAAwJAAbZAA XD