Guild Wars 2

Hi all,

A few days ago I just got my first character to lvl 80 (a ranger) and now I am looking to level up another. I’ve played around with a few classes (guardian, ele, and thief) and in many ways I’m most enjoying my little lowbie thief, who is level 16 now.

But I die. A lot.

And even when I don’t die, I am often ending fights with only one-third, or a quarter, of my health left. So even if I don’t die, I’m often flirting with disaster.

This is just open-world questing, trying to complete maps, do events when they pop up, etc. I’m not doing any pvp or WvW.

I realize things are probably tough now partially because I have no traits and very few skills (have only opened up the “first row” of utility skills and can only equip 1 currently). But still, I seem really squishy and don’t really have a good grasp on what to do about it.

I usually run either D/D or Sw/D. Last level I finally got weapon switching so I have tried a short bow some, but don’t feel like I am really using that weapon very effectively.

Realistically, a probably just need to “l2p” the class by playing it more. But if any of the experienced thieves here can think back to what it was like when you were a lowbie and can give any little tips that might help me, I’d appreciate it.

D/D in PVE is all about cloak and dagger > backstab > repeat. You should’nt take much damage doing that. S/D is for pvp or wve, not PvE. S/P is pretty good for PvE, but I find it very boring.

kaikalii.4198:

D/D in PVE is all about cloak and dagger > backstab > repeat. You should’nt take much damage doing that. S/D is for pvp or wve, not PvE. S/P is pretty good for PvE, but I find it very boring.

He “has no traits and very few skills”. By the time he gets them he’ll probably have a passable idea of how to use them and will survive better.

My best advice is to either keep a sword or shortbow available as a secondary weapon. While S/P is the easiest to level with, it doesn’t teach the player anything about the class aside from how to press 3 to deal damage and press 5 to avoid damage.

There’s nothing wrong with using D/D early on. It’s not optimal for speed/DPS, but it will teach you more about how to play better.

Regarding the secondary set choices:

S/X (it doesn’t matter the offhand) is a little more difficult but will let you kill things faster. Before combat you can use Infiltrator’s Strike to close distance/lay down infiltrator’s return (make sure you’re far away from the monster enough so that this skill does not land/deal damage), swap to D/D, and if you start getting low very quickly, swap back to S/X and cast Infiltrator’s Return to re-gain the distance, kite around, etc. You can opt to use S/D or S/P for evasion on skill #3 as well while maintaining in the fight and dealing damage. You can keep kiting in a similar way with S/D by removing your target to use IS in place such that you do not teleport, kite the monster(s), and again return back to that spot once you divert them elsewhere. Of course, there’s also Blinding Powder on S/P.

For the shortbow secondary, this is basically just an escape to buy time on your heal and kite around while dealing small amounts of damage or AOE’ing a larger group of monsters. The evade and reposition on Disabling Shot can get you out of a hairy situation if you have no dodges, and Infiltrator’s Arrow can be used to kite monsters or gain larger distances rapidly. This will take some swifter camera movements as well.

I recommend S/X against monsters with a lot of conditions as the return removes a condition, something you won’t have access to at all until your first trait, if you really feel the need to spec into Shadow Arts early on (I’d go for Deadly Arts for Mug as it’s a heal and does considerable damage), or once every 60 seconds from the Shadowstep utility.

Otherwise, there’s not much to it aside from practice and learning the ins and outs of the class/role.

Simply use d/p. #3 for porting from mob to mob with extra blind and good opening damage. #5 for black powder which makes you nearly invincible. Few auto attacks and (i you want) 1 heartseeker at 20%. It’s so easy, give it a try. You will be surprised.

/repeat till 80

Thanks the the advice, all!

Go SP – DP – SB. SB2 airbursting on large groups of targets is one of the highest aoe dps options any class has for weak crap, and SB3 gets you the distance you need to continue using it. DP is the go-to for moving quickly through the world, and DP3-D2 generally kills most mobs outright if your gear is updated. Against Dredge, Champions and other unblindable targets, or targets that do a lot of attacks per second, use SP and learn to time SP3 so that the mobs’ attacks are during your evade frame.

You can learn S/D, D/D and P/D later. And don’t use P/P, for the love of all that’s still holy.