Guild Wars 2

I like the pistol/pistol thief from the rp and animations aspect, but it seems that it won’t hold up compared to other builds. Is there a recommended build for p/p?

Are there certain skills that really help it out?
thanks

I came here looking for information on this exact topic just because I love the way it plays.

not very useful. It also can’t go stealth.

Go full glass cannon and use haste + unload ( once the target hits 50% use Assassin’s Signet) and you have yourself a free kill it’s really good tbh

VERY easy to counter/mitigate unload. Lacks stealth. You won’t kill any good players with it unless they are distracted already. A PP thief is the equivalent of a 100b/rifle warrior.

^ Much less. 15char.

I personally was more interested in the viability of a p/p in pve only, not sure what the OP wanted to know.

Disturbed.9305:

I personally was more interested in the viability of a p/p in pve only, not sure what the OP wanted to know.

Anything works in PVE. Even just standing there spamming shortbow auto attack on a group of NPCs. However, I’m sure you’re talking about being actually useful.

There is an actual build for P/P in PVE, and it does some decent damage, but your build will be dedicated purely for P/P and nothing else. You won’t do the single target damage of a backstab build, but since fractal and many dungeon bosses are so melee unfriendly, P/P builds are very safe to fractal/dungeon run with while still putting out a decent amount of damage. You also have the added benefit of being an interrupting power house with pistol #4.

Unfortunately, I don’t run P/P so someone else will have to provide a build. However, just by glancing at the traits, your build will be at least a x/30/x/x/x.

First, I’m saying this from a PvE (World, dungeons) perspective.

If you’re using P/P, you can aim to use unload as much as possible, while also staying safe at around 800 range and healing constantly. When I tried this, my ‘rotation’ was something like Unload -> Dodge -> Vital Shot. Rinse and repeat, interrupting with head shot and black powder as needed.

Build wise, I’d suggest something like this . Gear should have a healthy amount of Power / Precision, but straight Berserker’s could be unwise: you want a little bit of defense since you don’t have great access to a stealth-out-of-jail-free card. So a few pieces of Knight gear seems wise.

Although I’d also recommend trying these traits:
Acrobatics IX (Quick Recovery, 2 initiative / 10 seconds) if you can’t keep up your unload spam, and aren’t having trouble healing up damage done to you via signet of malice.
Critical Strikes X (Critical Haste, chance for 2 seconds of quickness) it’s a quick burst of damage + healing (with Signet of Malice) but is in my experience too unpredictable to be especially clever with. Still nice, but I like always having my signets ready.
Acrobatics II (Power of Inertia, Might on Dodge) the reason for vigor on heal is so if you have to burn SoM because you can’t attack your way back to health, you get a few extra dodges while you’re waiting for SoM to come off of recharge & for your initiative to regenerate.

Utility wise, you’re kitted for 2 stun breaks and significant initiative regen, plus a condition cleanse because you have zero condition removal as is.

I mostly made this up on the spot, but I recall running something a lot like this. It worked amazingly well if I could kite my foes even a little, and got scary fast if I got swamped by conditions. You could probably switch some things around (10 into Deadly Arts…?) for more condition removal, especially depending on your secondary set.

I can’t speak for PvP or WvW, but I loves me my P/P in PvE. I often push the limit by never switching to my other weapons, just to see what I can do with it. You can get up to 6 Unloads in a row with the right build. I use 25/20/0/10/15 (I’m still fine tuning and was previously using a venom heavy build that worked great) and the dodge benefits of might and swiftness combined with the Signet of Agility is a lot of fun.

I’m Asuran so I combine it with Radiation Field and I use Rata Sum for armor, so I get the extra Radiation Field to work with. I use the dodge effects to kite spin NPCs in circles within the radiation field while pumping them full of lead.

You can do a lot with the 4 and 5 depending on the situation. I get a lot of mileage with the blind effect; if you don’t get hit, you don’t have to worry about healing and damage. With Hide in Shadows or other stealth effects, you can stretch your Unload-like attacks with the #1 Sneak Attack. Fun stuff. I love dual pistols. Love. Them.

There was a build posted here for 30+ fractals using P/P have to search for it though probably a few pages back.

Pistol /Pistol is only good vs champions without minions in PvE
in PVP can be countered to easy
in Pve ,in general aoe is supperior

danbuter.2314:

I like the pistol/pistol thief from the rp and animations aspect, but it seems that it won’t hold up compared to other builds. Is there a recommended build for p/p?

Are there certain skills that really help it out?
thanks

P/P is awesome in duels.

It beats P/D, S/D, S/P, SB, D/D, etc you name it.

But WvW isn’t about duel and you really need a weapon set that allows you to be flexible. P/P isn’t that.

Sifu.6527:

danbuter.2314:

I like the pistol/pistol thief from the rp and animations aspect, but it seems that it won’t hold up compared to other builds. Is there a recommended build for p/p?

Are there certain skills that really help it out?
thanks

P/P is awesome in duels.

It beats P/D, S/D, S/P, SB, D/D, etc you name it.

But WvW isn’t about duel and you really need a weapon set that allows you to be flexible. P/P isn’t that.

Really? if your dueling full glass when you blow the load then I can see. I never had a problem with P/P. Its so front loaded that after the initial burst is avoided they are basically naked and ripe for the taking. Just speaking from my experience against P/P thieves I always see them as free kills. Always the same openimg and dump most if not all of their damage. If it fails then Hide in shadows is almost always a certain after that.

I wouldn’t recommend you main as P/P, but it’s not useless. Condition thieves can benefit from P/P against Bunker Eles and other thieves as the Headshot’s daze interrupts skills (Bunker Eles can’t escape as fast). And although P/P itself doesn’t have a stealth-me skill, you can still use Blinding Powder and Hide in Shadows to stack those bleeds faster.

For PvP/use in WvW, it’s very weak.

Essentially you have no mobility nor stealth, making your survival as a thief heavily compromised (little boon access, low hp, low defenses in general). Your forced either into a tanky build with PVT gear and 30 in both the vit and tough tree’s to stand a chance at ‘facetanking’ and getting the extra dodges, or full glass and pray they don’t simply dodge unload nor blow in your general direction.

The pistol off hand and pistol main hand are epic weapons in their own right, combined however they compromise the other. Pistol main hand is good at condition stacking, which to do effectively requires stealth which requires an off-hand dagger. Pistol off-hand is great for interrupts and blinds, but without a dagger main-hand lacks access to stealth doesn’t provide my favourite thief gapcloser (d/p skill 3). Sword/pistol is kinda meh in its current state IMO, at least for pvp, i imagine its far better in pve.

The other trouble with the set, they contradict one another. Mainhand pistol is great for condi damage, which needs stealth which off-hand pistol cannot provide, whilst off-hand is great for direct dmg which granted is provided by the main-hand in combination via unload, but then auto attacks are weak as can be and unload becomes the only means to do any meaningful damage.

P/P works well in PvE. I actually also think it works in PvP/WvW as a ton of dodges give plenty of mobility… but the clincher is that Stealth is so OP that you are handicapping yourself to not have it in PvP/WvW (though you’re perfectly fine in PvE without it). The key to winning is being unpredictable so you can stomp them while they can’t stomp you. Stealth just is an auto win button in that catagory, so if you’re looking to do P/P in PvP/WvW and have it as your best option, you can forget about it. However if you want to do it and still be able to do well, you’re fine. I do it in PvP for fun, and still win most of my battles. Dodges have been enough to keep me alive in 3v1 while I waited for reinforcements to wipe them.

Now for builds. As you don’t have stealth to rely on with P/P, I consider 15 in Acrobatics a requirement. It equates to one free dodge, which is super powerful. Couple that with vigor and signet of agility, and you can pretty much consider your dodges unlimited. I run with Withdraw to add yet another dodge/mobility debuff breaker. Sigil of Generosity + signet of agility has been more than enough for me to handle the non-mobility debuffs. So debuffs = no prob. Mobility = no prob. The only thing left with your P/P is laying in the damage. For this I’ve developed a few builds. This will take some meta crunching to determine the best damage (initiative regain for spamming skills vs how hard those skills hit), which I have not done yet

A 25/30/0/15/0: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAqaVlYmCO3dy8E95Ex2DgqTeqzAnvs/AXB
This is obviously about having unload hit hard as possible. This is also beautiful with shortbow. You have limited initiative regain, but most targets don’t survive the melt so who cares? This is what I use in open world PvE.

A 10/30/0/20/10: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAqaVlYmCO3dy8E9JFx2DgqTe6V4raFwZnCuaVA
This adds a good amount of initiative regain. 2 every 10 seconds and 3 from every steal. On top of this your copious amount of dodges now drop caltrops, making it harder for mobs and people to chase you on top of additional bleeds. I’ve been using this in Dungeons and PvP/WvW (when I decide not to be cheap and go for a stealth spam build). This works well in Dungeons as it makes it easy to run past/controls trash for the whole party with all of your caltrops. Switch traits to this for bosses: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAqaVlYmCO3dy8E9JFx2DguTe6VgsaFwZniraVA. Unless you’re dodge tanking the boss, I’d also switch signet of agility for smoke screen. Helps protect the party from projectiles if the boss has them, and also provides a blind spam field at no initiative cost. The higher initiative gain is because I lean towards that as better long term DPS for bosses, and needed due to the fact people will be dodging/blocking several of your unloads in PvP so having more at your fingertips is more important.

I won’t claim my builds are perfect, but they’ve been working well for me.

Sifu.6527:

danbuter.2314:

I like the pistol/pistol thief from the rp and animations aspect, but it seems that it won’t hold up compared to other builds. Is there a recommended build for p/p?

Are there certain skills that really help it out?
thanks

P/P is awesome in duels.

It beats P/D, S/D, S/P, SB, D/D, etc you name it.

But WvW isn’t about duel and you really need a weapon set that allows you to be flexible. P/P isn’t that.

I really doubt that, unload chain is countered by , flanking strike death blosson
and by an simple smoke screen.

It’s an ok build for PvE, particularly dungeon content that is difficult for your group; it’s a pretty strong ranged DPS character, though it offers little else.

Traits are 10/30/0/30/0. In acrobatics, take the initiative regen and healing when using initiative from tier two; you could also run the initiative on weapon swap with two sets of pistols for even more initiative. The 10 in Deadly Arts could go into any of the other lines, but honestly nothing in that first tier is good for P/P in the other lines.

Full or nearly full Berserker’s is a great set for P/P. You will be getting a lot of health from 300 Acrobatics and can supplement that with Practiced Tolerance, so you should not need a lot of additional defenses. Condition damage is good enough that you can use a piece of Rampager’s or two on the margin (Pants, helm) where crit damage has really bad returns, or a defensive piece there, but it’s not necessary.

Sigils should be a Force/Accuracy sigil accompanied by a proc in the other weapon – Air, Fire, and Blood are all solid. You can take a stacking sigil if you like. Pick your favorite damage runes, Divinity is fine, ruby orbs are fine, Scholar are probably ideal.

Any heal will work situationally, and utilities change to match.

Good luck!

Rayya.2591:

Sifu.6527:

danbuter.2314:

I like the pistol/pistol thief from the rp and animations aspect, but it seems that it won’t hold up compared to other builds. Is there a recommended build for p/p?

Are there certain skills that really help it out?
thanks

P/P is awesome in duels.

It beats P/D, S/D, S/P, SB, D/D, etc you name it.

But WvW isn’t about duel and you really need a weapon set that allows you to be flexible. P/P isn’t that.

I really doubt that, unload chain is countered by , flanking strike death blosson
and by an simple smoke screen.

Or just being able to dodge… it’s VERY telegraphed…

I’ve been using this build since beta

30/30/0/0/10 (PVP) http://www.gw2build.com/builds/simulator.php#1.7.6.10.20.0.17.22.22.0.155.168.169.160.179.2.2.25.453.460.461.470.474.476.0.0.0.0.0.0.515.0.0.30.30.0.0.10
Panic Strike + Devourer Venom = Immobilize 8s
if they survive that somehow just kite, a well timed headshot is an insta win

for PvE+WvW i go 25/30/0/0/15, full berserkers + rubys, swap venom for Shadow Refuge

every weakness p/p has can be solved by having a shortbow as a secondary weapon (like everyone should)

oZii.2864:

Sifu.6527:

danbuter.2314:

I like the pistol/pistol thief from the rp and animations aspect, but it seems that it won’t hold up compared to other builds. Is there a recommended build for p/p?

Are there certain skills that really help it out?
thanks

P/P is awesome in duels.

It beats P/D, S/D, S/P, SB, D/D, etc you name it.

But WvW isn’t about duel and you really need a weapon set that allows you to be flexible. P/P isn’t that.

Really? if your dueling full glass when you blow the load then I can see. I never had a problem with P/P. Its so front loaded that after the initial burst is avoided they are basically naked and ripe for the taking. Just speaking from my experience against P/P thieves I always see them as free kills. Always the same openimg and dump most if not all of their damage. If it fails then Hide in shadows is almost always a certain after that.

Yes, for dueling only. There is nothing you can do vs a P/P thief in duel.

Ensign.2189:

It’s an ok build for PvE, particularly dungeon content that is difficult for your group; it’s a pretty strong ranged DPS character, though it offers little else.

hmmm – a spammable near instant interrupt (making it not only easy to twitch interrupt, but keep their big attacks shut down), the ability to singularly bump a target to 25 vuln for a party burst, a blind spam, and one of the best field projectile finishers in the game. It may not be the DPS of backstab spam, but it has other features, and is always reliable dps. But then to be honest, a thief should carry ALL his weapons. Your pistol burst build would work as a dagger backstab burst too. So against a boss that is relatively static and no constant AoE to keep you off him? Use daggers. Have a boss that can 1-shot you or is completely anti-melee? Use pistols.

Every weapon combo is viable for thief – but not for every single situation. P/P is not ok, it rocks socks if used right. Same with any other combo. If there are 20 trash mobs, I’ll think you’re foolish for using D/D. If three warriors are perma-25 stacking bleeds and you step in with P/D, I’ll sigh. If you’re twanging away with SB on the single boss that is already being effectively poisoned/weakened, I’ll be wishing you packed P/P.

TL;DR – If you think any given weapon set sucks for a thief, it’s because you haven’t properly explored it yet. Seriously explore for yourself before you down talk anything. Pick weapons that fit your playstyle, and have fun. Just try to stay flexible as changing to fit the situation is the key to being effective vs just ‘ok’.

Even once you have a good pistol build you might find yourself doing more damage in melee with sword/pistol, so keep that in mind as you develop your play style.

Stooperdale.3560:

Even once you have a good pistol build you might find yourself doing more damage in melee with sword/pistol, so keep that in mind as you develop your play style.

You probably will, since it’s a melee weapon. For a thief the advantage of P/P is not having to get close to what you’re killing at any point. So it’s a damage vs. safety issue.

P/P is always the same, very predictable, easy to counter, very limited on strategy and very boring: 3333333333333333333333333333333333 (you trait to get the most out of Unloads, which makes silly wasting initiative in anything else, and even without traits BP isn’t useful as ranged set for 6 ini, and Body Shot is a mathematical waste of initiative so you just use 3333333).

I hope some day it becomes more viable and versatile as I love the aesthetics of the set.

I main a P/P no-stealth thief build for WvW and have zero problems. Great dps, excellent burst, high survivability from almost limitless dodging, multiple stunbreakers, and incredible mobility to either tackle runners or escape combat. It is a bit like playing an orchestra on your keyboard at break-neck speed, though, so if twitch-play isn’t your style, you’d be better off trying a different weapon set. But if you do enjoy that kind of stuff, you’ll really like this weapon set.

Just don’t go in and start spamming Unload. Headshot will win you more battles than pure damage will.

Imo it is not bad but it isn’t very good either. The stealthed ability Is useful for pistol/dagger condi thief but it is plain bad for pistol/pistol burst.
Why do ppl say that p/p thieves have no stealth? Don’t they have healing/utility slots?

Stealth just doesn’t synergize with P/P all that well because the weapon set is based around damage and interrupts, yet the pistol stealth attack is condition damage. That leaves escaping a fight as your only real reason to carry any stealth on your bar, but there’s plenty of other skills you can use to achieve that same goal with less cooldown and more flexibility.

Volrath.1473:

Imo it is not bad but it isn’t very good either. The stealthed ability Is useful for pistol/dagger condi thief but it is plain bad for pistol/pistol burst.
Why do ppl say that p/p thieves have no stealth? Don’t they have healing/utility slots?

Pretty much what TeamBattleAxe said, but also:

Heals / utilities don’t quite match the access that a /D or even a D/P build has to stealth. A /D just needs 6 initiative. A D/P needs a lot more (9, I think?) but can do so without being near their opponent. Both of those tend to be recharges shorter than the typical stealth utility.

P/P

0/30/0/10/30

In Critical Strikes I take V / X / XI

III in Acrobatics.

And V/III/XII in Trickery

Full berserker’s gear.

For skills: Hide in Shadows, Haste, Roll for Initiative, Shadow’s Refuge. Elite switches between Basilisk Venom and Dagger Storm, depending on the situation.

It’s quite a powerful build in PvP, but, alas, fairly single target and lacks the “spike” of a Dagger build. It trades some spike damage for safety and control of a fight. Definitely viable, however.

P/P is very initiative hungry and doesn’t put out the numbers comparable to meleeing (or the shortbow). The 900 range is really a handicap.

I only use it in PvE on boss fights that are single target and ranged only. Lupi is an example.

Sifu.6527:

oZii.2864:

Sifu.6527:

danbuter.2314:

I like the pistol/pistol thief from the rp and animations aspect, but it seems that it won’t hold up compared to other builds. Is there a recommended build for p/p?

Are there certain skills that really help it out?
thanks

P/P is awesome in duels.

It beats P/D, S/D, S/P, SB, D/D, etc you name it.

But WvW isn’t about duel and you really need a weapon set that allows you to be flexible. P/P isn’t that.

Really? if your dueling full glass when you blow the load then I can see. I never had a problem with P/P. Its so front loaded that after the initial burst is avoided they are basically naked and ripe for the taking. Just speaking from my experience against P/P thieves I always see them as free kills. Always the same openimg and dump most if not all of their damage. If it fails then Hide in shadows is almost always a certain after that.

Yes, for dueling only. There is nothing you can do vs a P/P thief in duel.

You are going to have to expand on it Sifu… I’ve dueled P/P as full glass and full condition and smashed them to bits far too easily.

TeamBattleAxe.3901:

I main a P/P no-stealth thief build for WvW and have zero problems. Great dps, excellent burst, high survivability from almost limitless dodging, multiple stunbreakers, and incredible mobility to either tackle runners or escape combat. It is a bit like playing an orchestra on your keyboard at break-neck speed, though, so if twitch-play isn’t your style, you’d be better off trying a different weapon set. But if you do enjoy that kind of stuff, you’ll really like this weapon set.

Just don’t go in and start spamming Unload. Headshot will win you more battles than pure damage will.

Could you share your build? Certain aspects of the thief interest me but I’m not a fan of melee so I haven’t found a build that works for me yet. I haven’t tried p/p before but now I’m considering it, so it’d be nice to know about a viable build.

I can’t believe some ppl choose Roll for Initiative over Shadowstep, and call themselves thieves

Well I run D/D SB for wvw, but for fractals I always include P/P and SB the interrupt and higher single target damage makes it superior for the bosses there.

I run 10/30/30/0/0 with S/P and P/P also my gear is mostly valkierys with berserkers and the chest piece p/t/v , I run 3 invis on my hot bar and absolutely love this build. The sword pistol is a great opener or spam on top of resurrectors , you can hit lots of targets in front of you for a chain of about 5 – 9 k depending on your targets toughness. Once your target knows your after them switch to P/P for a quick burst of 5 -9 k at ranged. My attack floats around 3200 after I get my power charges up and u make more might if you shadow refuge before a fight starts to jack up your attack higher.

Bassman.9245:

I can’t believe some ppl choose Roll for Initiative over Shadowstep, and call themselves thieves

Really? Roll for initiative also breaks stuns/knockdowns/control moves without my having to port back to remove conditions, and gives me 6 init while doing it. With P/P I want that initiative, and I’m still in range after the roll.

There are situations where Shadowstep is better, and some where Roll for Initiative is better. Both are pretty kitten good utilities.

dreztina.4820:

TeamBattleAxe.3901:

I main a P/P no-stealth thief build for WvW and have zero problems. Great dps, excellent burst, high survivability from almost limitless dodging, multiple stunbreakers, and incredible mobility to either tackle runners or escape combat. It is a bit like playing an orchestra on your keyboard at break-neck speed, though, so if twitch-play isn’t your style, you’d be better off trying a different weapon set. But if you do enjoy that kind of stuff, you’ll really like this weapon set.

Just don’t go in and start spamming Unload. Headshot will win you more battles than pure damage will.

Could you share your build? Certain aspects of the thief interest me but I’m not a fan of melee so I haven’t found a build that works for me yet. I haven’t tried p/p before but now I’m considering it, so it’d be nice to know about a viable build.

Sure, but I’m constantly swapping out utilities on the fly depending on the situation. My traits/armor/weapons always stay the same, though.

Here’s my default WvW build (aka “The Bandito”):
http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/thief/?7.3|a.1g.h19.a.1g.h17|8.1g.h1h.a.1g.h17|1c.73.1c.73.1c.73.1c.73.1c.73.1c.73|1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67.1g.67|a3.u57b.0.u389.0|1b.1|59.5c.5h.5i.5v|e

I run in a small, organized roaming group. My build is based around mobility, so I went with Centaur runes to give the whole group perma-swiftness. For group fights, I usually draw fire (tanking through evasion!) and set up bursts on primary targets. During sieges, my job is to scout/intercept (Ambush Trap is a good “alarm system”). I’ll swap in Roll for Initiative against cc-heavy groups and Scorpion Wire for slower sieges with many embedded defenders. For duels, I’ll add more traps and Basilisk Venom to the skill bar.

The main weakness of this build is that you absolutely can’t stop moving. There’s just enough toughness/vitality in there to survive a sneak attack from a glass cannon thief, but you get melted quick if you ever sit still against a group. That makes spiking and rezzing very dangerous, but thankfully you can still achieve a bit of stealth by combo’ing Pistol5 + Dagger2 if the fight gets too hot and you really need to land that clutch spike.

The sPvP version of this build is a bit different because the customization is so dumbed down and there’s no access to consumables (goodbye, 40% endurance regen!). I drop the signet for Roll for Initiative right off the bat since I’m way squishier than in WvW. Still pretty effective, though. Just have to watch out for reflects/retaliation.

Thanks for that. I mostly roam solo/duo (although I’ll be playing the build in spvp a while before spending the money to get the thief to 80/geared), so I’ll have to tweak some things to fit my playstyle, but that gives me a good place to start.

Hammerhorn.1347:

I run 10/30/30/0/0 with S/P and P/P also my gear is mostly valkierys with berserkers and the chest piece p/t/v , I run 3 invis on my hot bar and absolutely love this build. The sword pistol is a great opener or spam on top of resurrectors , you can hit lots of targets in front of you for a chain of about 5 – 9 k depending on your targets toughness. Once your target knows your after them switch to P/P for a quick burst of 5 -9 k at ranged. My attack floats around 3200 after I get my power charges up and u make more might if you shadow refuge before a fight starts to jack up your attack higher.

This. While my build is different armor as well, this is the best way to use p/p in wvw i have found. Rolling s/d my damage is moderate, but withthe daze people often dodge a bunch then burn defensive cds. A perfect time for a unload or 2 to burn them down. If they can dodge and are paying any attention to you unload makes me sad. So slow.

Although running straight up p/p might be fun, people always seemed confused when a thief doesnt come charging at them.

Bassman.9245:

I can’t believe some ppl choose Roll for Initiative over Shadowstep, and call themselves thieves

is really situational , shadowstep. is superior in zerg vs zerg , team vs team etc.
But in 1 vs 1 situations RFI is supperior
If A-net decide to reduce cooldown of RFI i might consider to add it on my skill bar as an direct damage build.

Pretty bad.

I just killed one with one skill attack while retaliation and autoattacks took care of the rest.

I started at 30% hp.

No, it didn’t really require much skill either.

Bassman.9245:

I can’t believe some ppl choose Roll for Initiative over Shadowstep, and call themselves thieves

That would be because you’re a bad “copy paste” Thief who doesn’t know what each skill is for.

Shadowstep is absolutely godlike for melee builds that have to get in and out quickly. It gives you a massive teleport and two stun breakers that allow you to either instantly catch up with an enemy, or get away from pursuers.

Roll for Initiative is far better for ranged builds. Not only is it a stun breaker, but it allows you to create distance from an enemy quickly – while keeping your face turned to them (which is far more useful for a ranged build) AND giving you an initiative boost AND cleaning cripples, chills and immobilizes – The three most dangerous conditions to any ranged build.

If your build can accommodate both – even better.

The reason you see Shadowstep used more often is because most thieves are melee, dagger based, builds, in wich Shadowstep rules supreme.

From a pvp standpoint: Overall not that great. While unload can do enough damage to wipe half a glass cannon’s hp, a d/ mainhand would’ve simply 3 hit ko’d them. S/D in my experience does more damage with its autoattacks. Now normally this is all well and good because p/p is fully ranged. The problem comes in when your only decent damage output is being generated by unload and the initiative costs make it an either or situation (utility/damage) with the initiative regeneration rate unreliable and slow enough to cost you your life. This is compounded by the fact that vital shot does no upfront damage at all and is also terribly slow.

I’d like to see Vital Shot have a much faster rate of fire. Not unload fast but at this point it’s about as slow as rifle warrior 1 and that’s not good.

P/P isn’t “GREAT” but it’s not as bad as people make it out to be.

It basically has 2 things going for it:

1. It’s the only significant range damage option for a Thief that can actually pressure an opponent.

2. Blind blind blind blind blind blind blind at very low cost.

The part that I find most interesting is that Thief players tend to forget that they have an offhand weapon set they can swap to in-combat for shifts in fighting. Thieves tend to use the off-set only for a specific capability (Shortbow escape).

EasymodeX.4062:

2. Blind blind blind blind blind blind blind at very low cost.

The problem is that BP in a P/P set isn’t half as good, and even if you manage to sustain it, you’re losing a lot of damage as there is no way to constantly use a 6 initiative skill while damaging with uses of a 5 initiative (with some recovery through multi-strike and criticals) and still keep some reserve for a 4 initiative interrupt when they heal.

One of the main problems is that the auto-attack is made to synergize with P/D Carrion builds, but synergizes poorly with P/P Bers+Valk (aka: PvP Bers amulet distribution). The original design was that the auto-attack was Body Shot and applied Vulnerability, which was much better for Unload, but it was before the introduction of Sneak Attacks (something that I think shouldn’t have happened and the Thief should’ve been balanced without them in mind as right now many builds are too dependant on stealth attacks).

Currently if you change the bleed for vulnerability you’re ruining Carrion P/D builds so there is no way to change it and you have to acept that bleed is meant for your direct damage to not scale as strongly without investing initiative on Unloads.

The only ways I see a fix here would be to either make an overhaul on many weapon synergies or:

Make Body Shot an spread arc of 5 bullets, each one applies 1 Vulnerability and does 60%-70% damage of current Body Shot. Considering most Spread Shots in the game have more damage PER IMPACT than current Body Shot single impact, this wouldn’t be OP at all. The only reason I propose the damage reduction is because of initiative, but still those other spread shot skills have VERY low recharge.

This way Body Shot CAN be an alternative. At long range it would be a complete waste, but currently it IS a waste and mathematically it serves no purposse when you can use the initiative on Unload for more damage/initiative, even factoring the damage increase from vulnerabilities.

But at close range, it can do 3 times the damage from the old body shot (depending on the distance as you may not hit with the 5 shots, so most times it would be 1.8 or 2.4 times the damage, which isn’t very impressive considering the current damage is VERY low). It still isn’t a lot of damage compared to Unload, but the fact that it can make 5 impacts makes it synergize with the same traits you use for Unload, which allows for spammability without wasting a ton of resources.

Damage/Initiative is still higher for Unload when you do the maths, but if you play “in your face”, in exchange for survivality you can get higher DPS if you manage to stick to your opponent, and you can combine it with BP to use the Smoke Field at close range, and then if you need safety you return to Unload ranged behaviour.

This way P/P can constantly alternate distances depending on the opponent and the situation.

Plus, BS would be a great “tag” skill in PvE events without needing to use the Shortbow, as all spread attacks in the game pierce so with enough distance to get more mobs in your arc you could tag a lot of them, giving an alternative to Shortbow.

Unload could too use something to to make it something else tan boring damage (in an initiative set, a skill just bringing damage is boooooooring… even on a cooldown set there are very few only-damage skills). A 0.5 seconds Weakness per bullet would be interesting (4 seconds if hitting with the 8 shots) and would serve for defense aswell as limiting their dodges (one of the main counters to the whole unload chain).

P/ kitten taring into a world with no thief stealths. Basically it turns you into a rifle warrior with less DPS and less HP. Not worth it. Just roll a warrior if you wanted ranged DPS.

Pve is good pvp wise meh

The problem is that BP in a P/P set isn’t half as good, and even if you manage to sustain it, you’re losing a lot of damage as there is no way to constantly use a 6 initiative skill while damaging with uses of a 5 initiative (with some recovery through multi-strike and criticals) and still keep some reserve for a 4 initiative interrupt when they heal.

How many of the opponents’ cooldowns do you soak with that 5 init?

Shrug.

You basically get free damage (not a huge amount, but mentionable), and the enemy loses cooldowns of one flavor or another.

You’re not going to win a fight via 511111111111111111111111111111. I’m not sure why so many Thieves think so linearly. It’s kind of silly.

Unload could too use something to to make it something else tan boring damage

Unload is not ‘just damage’; it is:

a) ranged
b) multi-hit (both good and bad)
c) multiple combo finisher (RNG)
d) low init per second

Mostly the first item raises it above pure vanilla and gives it unique tactical flavor.

In any case, generally speaking I’d prefer if body shot dealt less damage and cost less initiative, while maintaining the same vuln stacks (or reduced the damage per shot by 60% and make it a spreadshot as you describe, with 1% per hit — however that makes it more of a melee-ish ability which I don’t care for with P/P). That way you could use it more fluidly as a debuffer without it partially negating your use of the debuff (by draining resources with which to deal damage).