Guild Wars 2

I’ve tried everything. Researched other’s builds, took suggestions from other thief players, went over the builds with a fine toothed comb…but I really loathe being a class cannon on this particular class. I’ve played thief/rogue classes since my very first MMO ever way back in the EverQuest days and I know how to play them. They’ve always been my fav class…until this game. I don’t PvP. I can, I just don’t like it. In PvE, it seems this class is way waaaay too squishy for a leather wearer. My clothies have more survivability even in close combat. They nerfed one of the bread-n-butter abilities I used in PvE (likely because of QQ by PvP’rs) and lowered the survivability of an already squishy class even lower. In short, they sucked the fun out of the thief class in this game. No -real- stealth of any duration. No sneaky sneaky. Every time I steal, I auto combat. Even with short bow the main auto shot is one designed to pull multiple mobs…which, of course, the thief is too squishy to actually handle well. The DPS output in comparison to other DPS classes is pathetic. No, I’m not level 80 but I’m far enough along to have given this class a darned good try and it’s been frustration after frustration. When I want to play my rogue/thief class, I’ll do so on Rift. My poor little thief is now extra storage space. Maybe, if they decide to make the class stealthy, survivable and with actual DPS that doesn’t require a math major to discover how to make it work, I bring her out again. It’s a sad sad day.

I think if more people who complain about the OP-ness of the thief would actually play one we would no longer see any “Thief is OP” posts.

Sounds like you want to push one button to win….

Thief requires commitment to weapon swap and know when to burst and when to setup…

I take 3-4 targets down with ease… single target die so fast i can’t even complete rotations….

all that and I am not even spec’ed glass cannon…

honestly, probably the best spec for solo PVE is sword/pistol or dagger/pistol with a shortbow offset.

sword/pistol used to be about pistol whip and bursting multiple mobs down with signet of malice procs keeping your health up. Since the nerf however I found it’s more effective and safe to bunch them all up and use black powder once every 4s while you autoattack them all to death. With dagger/pistol on a single target you have a little more flexibility, you can black powder, heartseeker, backstab, and heartseeker again for quite a bit of damage while they remain blind. You can pull with shortbow and choking gas/cluster bomb the area around you before swapping to your melee set if you want to get fancy but make sure you keep 6 initiative at all times for black powder.

You’re hanging it up too early friend…. At 80:

1. The DPS output compared to other classes is fantastic. My Dagger Dagger rotation is extremely high sustained DPS. (4-5k cloak and dagger, 4-7k backstab, x3 auto attack), this is easily 15k + and with the proper traits, you can do it over and over. I cannot understate how hard daggers hit. For AOE, shortbow is king. Every ranged class wants OUR shortbow. 2-4k on every target for clusterbomb, plus bleeds, and spammable. AOE weakness, teleport, etc. Don’t be using death blossom when the SB is so good for aoe fights.

2. In Dungeons on my thief, I survive BETTER than other classes… Why? Stealth. Every time you enter stealth in that rotation, the mobs are focusing elsewhere. Warriors die more than me. Rangers die more than me. Seriously, we have so many tools for surviving (extra dodging, stealth, etc).

I’m not going to say you were doing it wrong…it seems to have tried a lot. When leveling I ran a death blossom spec (for the evasion) and caltrops. At EVERY level in pve, i could take 6+ mobs my own level with out breaking a sweat. At 80, i switched to the tactics i outlined above. If you want to take another shot at this class (which you should, we are better off than many others), PM me and we’ll chat.

D/P
Hit 3, wait for auto attack chain, hit 3, auto attack chain, 3, chain, 3 chain
You win and took no damage!
Sub in 5 for 3 against multiple enemies or fast attacking enemies, occasionally dodge away and kite for a few seconds to gain initiative or heartseeker out of your smoke field to stealth.

Solo PvE is really QUITE easy for Thf.
But if you can’t make it work, just try another class.
Mesmer and Engineer can both make use of stealth as well.

I have no idea what you are talking about. My thief is usually the last one left alive. I’ve been working on soloing somewhere around 100 centaurs (it seems like that many) during a crazy event where all the waves show up at once but I generally die after about 30-40.

Try this build for PvE: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fYAQNAV4YlUmKP3ey5E+5ExmidqT/DftTxVjPA

It’s set up for level 65 (I don’t know what level you are) and you use it like this. Start with a shortbow and skill 4 right under the feet of up to 3 monsters. Skill 2 and detonate it in the air right before it hits. Kite them close to each other and just keep shooting them with skill 1. It’s generally as simple as that. Use dodge frivolously, use caltrops if you need to for more bleeds and the cripple effect. Is things get rough and you’ve already hit your heal, pop your sanctuary and let them bleed for a bit.

If you need to, switch to D/D for more single target damage, using skills 3, 5, & 1 for bleeds and backstabs. Stay away from heart seeker unless they are very low on health. It’s also great for escape if you need to do so. Just turn around, remove the targets from your sight, and use 2 + dodge as needed.

Using this, you can generally solo anything that comes your way aside from heroic bosses. Just remember to use the dodge (with caltrops) as often as you feel like. Stay agile, stay nimble, and let conditions do the majority of your damage. It’s a slow process at times but you can usually take out lesser enemies pretty quickly.

Hope this helps :-)

I can see were you are coming from because the Thief IMO has one of the largest skill caps. For PvE and for lvling b4 I hit 80 I was a Tuff CD build using D/D and SB. This build work great for really learning how to play the thief because you can take a hit or two without much worry if you happen to mess up and are not able to get out the way. Once you start to notice that you are not getting hit much at all anymore then I would recommend changing over to a glass cannon (my current build is a D/D P/D glass cannon).

Just to sum it up I recommend a more defensive build while you are still learning the class as Thieves can not take a hit all to well.

mrsrachelm.7618:

The DPS output in comparison to other DPS classes is pathetic.

I had to read that line 3 times to make sure there wasn’t a typo or sarcasm, not completely sure what game you are playing but let me tell you thief has one of highest sustain and burst damage in the game.

Which profession are you comparing this to?

I’ve yet to have significant issues with PvE as a thief. If you want advice or a build critique, post what you’re using and how you’re using it and you’ll get solid advice.

If you just want to say you’re giving up, that is fine, but you aren’t going to convince anyone that it is the profession that is weak instead of your inability to figure out how to make it work well in PvE.

Those are your options, either “help, I want to get better”, or “sorry, I’m bad at this”, there’s no “the profession is bad” because most people here have been there, done that, and found ways to make thief extremely effective in PvE.

Well said Tulisin, well said…

If you are having trouble questing/exploring, try either a sword/pistol build using critical strikes with either acrobatics or shadow arts. Such a build will allow you to cleave down multiple enemies with ease, while also keeping your HP high because black powder can keep groups of enemies blinded, and sword auto attack weakens.

If sword isnt your style, try a trickery build with either deadly arts, acrobatics, or critical strikes as your other tree. You can spec for very high initiative regen from signet usage, or on attacks, and with some condition damage gear, mow down 3-6 enemies with death blossom while evading all their damage. This is the spec I chose to level with.

Gather up 3-6 mobs, death blossom x3, roll for initiave, dodge in, death blossom x2, pop signets for initiative, death blossom x2, dead mobs. If they still breath, finish them with some kiting with the shortbow.

Add caltrops to Stx’s rotation FTW… It’s not just for the insane bleed, but the huge aoe cripple

To add to Stx post throw in a Steal for 3 extra initiative too

I forgot to mention steal, i did use that on cooldown for the initiative boost.

I never liked caltrops, its not my style, but a ton of thieves love it and it seems like it would work perfect with a death blossom spam build!

Caltrops is mostly nice because

A) In the case of dodgetrops it basically gives you an attack when you dodge, which is very nice, especially with extra dodge. Creating an AE bleed/cripple field for 4 seconds is basically an entire viable skill on its own, and you do it by dodging.
B) Utility caltrops last a pretty long time on the ground and take effect per-second per-mob for that entire duration, multiplying that small bleed/cripple effect by literally >50 applications. Also unmatched for event tagging for thieves since you can drop it before mobs become attackable.
C) Signet of Malice fully benefits from both types, turning your dodge into a >100 per second per mob per dodge heal, if you can dodge three times in the same spot where 5 mobs are, you can and will pull over 1500 hp/second out of your dodges. With the utility version, you can lay it down on a group and keep yourself healed fairly easily over a decently long period.

The caltrops abilities don’t look like much upfront, but their hit-per-second AE potential has incredible synergy.

What is your build/gear? I leveled to 80 solo with a thief with 0 problems. Give P/D a try and run with Carrion gear and SB for multiple mobs.

CnD then 1, dodge/autoattack for 2-3 seconds then repeat it’s very simple and effective. I really don’t understand how you cannot prevail in pve with a thief. Clusterbomb is a killer if you draw to many mobs and stealth is a free getaway if things go south. Last but not least (if this pertains to you like it does so many others) stop traiting glass cannon and expect to survive!

SockpuppetSamurai.9210:

stop traiting glass cannon and expect to survive!

I don’t believe this is entirely correct either. Gearing and traiting heavily towards offense is extremely effective in open-world PvE where the vast majority of damage can be avoided by simply not standing still and killing all of your targets in a few seconds. I found my PvE effectiveness went way up when I ditched toughness/vit gear in favor of berserker/rampager.

The trick here is that you can still trait towards offense without going 30/30/x/x/x.

Maybe, if they decide to make the class stealthy, survivable and with actual DPS that doesn’t require a math major to discover how to make it work, I bring her out again. It’s a sad sad day.

Ok, play something else. Why should we care what class you play? I’ve played rogues in dozens of other games and the GW2 Thief is my absolute favorite one yet. If you don’t enjoy the class, that’s fine, there are seven others.

I am using S/D, full knight set, and valkyrie jewels, berserker weapons.

I find S/D is way more effective than S/P if you want to kill multiple mobs at the same time. For me, Dancing Dagger is better than Pistol whip.

First, it does decent dmg against up to 4 targets. It works best on 2 targets though because it bounces twice on each target (the best case happens with x2 3+k crit + 1.5k from lightning strike on each target at the same time).

Secondly, It does not root you like piston whip plus it also slows targets.

Thirdly, It hits all mobs nearby the main target which means you only need to face the main target.

Finally, It costs only 4 initiatives.

Further more, if you screw up within the melee range, you can CnD and run away. With 10 pt in Toughness trait, CnD only costs 4 ini so that you can actually spam it every few seconds (to wait for stealth debuff to wear off and initiatives regen).

Why knight armors and valkyrie jewels? Toughness + vit helps you not die every pull in dungeons. Sure, glass cannon spec kills mobs in open-world pve faster but running dungeons is a different story. Mobs inside dungeons have huge hp pool and they hit insanely hard. Remember dead corpses does no damage.

I’m shocked and horrified to read the OP’s post about the thief class!

All I’d like to say is – work towards Trickery, Acrobatics and Crit strikes.
As for gear aim for rampager’s set (power, prec, cond)
The secret behind the thief is simple – you’re useless without good initiative regen, so make sure you can keep regaining as much as you can while hitting as hard as you can.

Death blossom and cloak & dagger are your best friends.
When needed, switch to pistols for safe ranged damage (I find the stealth #1 of pistols better than backstab, but that’s just me).

Stack tons of bleed along with caltrops for both utility and traited on dodges, while you’re at it have some good endurance regen for even further caltrops spam.

The thief class is quite fun, and sometimes I feel like a circus performer spreading death amongst my enemies.

Yeah, there are SO many ways to differently configure and play thief.. it’s the thing that hooked me into this game though i’ve played a lot of the professions into pve and structured game. My favorite builds have always been beefy playstyles, with heavy use of stealths that heal me up significantly. I am also REALLY enjoying shortbow condition damage – cluster bomb, detonate, as I just got 40 in pve and went 15 acrobatics 15 trickery. i’m able to scoot around bleeding up many enemies or a stronger enemy and some adds. i always win. liking the profession better than ever after some buildcrafting growing pains

Just replace your sword with a dagger of air and work on timing your black powder and heartseeker→ backstab combo to get as much safety as possible. The sword/pistol set was never that great for sustained pve even before the nerf. It’s too slow. I do agree that that nerf was unjustified, especially in pve, but there are other options.

@Tulsin, good point, 20/30/0/20/0 is a good spec, or even shifting to 20/20/0/20/10, you do want at least 15 in deadly arts and 15 in acrobatics and 15 in critical strikes though, unless you’re going a full shadow arts stealth build.

I’ve only just now started thinking about PvP with my thief and I’m completely stumped about how I should spec it. I’ve only just now figured it out for PvE but now wondering how I can spec for both or if that’s even possible.

I’ll give you some pointers if you like. PM me.

I find S/D is way more effective than S/P if you want to kill multiple mobs at the same time. For me, Dancing Dagger is better than Pistol whip.

First, it does decent dmg against up to 4 targets. It works best on 2 targets though because it bounces twice on each target (the best case happens with x2 3+k crit + 1.5k from lightning strike on each target at the same time).

Yeah, I didn’t use Dancing Dagger a lot until high levels, but it’s really great. It does awesome damage against two enemies, and also if you have Venoms up it can drop it on up to four enemies per use. In a purely selfish sense, it’s great for “tagging” a bunch of enemies in a mass battle event.

I’m Condition-built so it’s not my best primary attack, but I think it’d be devastating if I was power-overloaded and facing two opponents or more.

Typical for this kind of OP to remain absent when faced with overwhelming evidence to the contrary of his/her post.

With non-exotic gear, some vit/toughness, and specced in toughness/heal 20p + using the crit/hp conversion trait, I did 2 story mode dungeons today on my fresh 80 Thief. I got oneshot or close to it on many occasions when using D/P, no matter the blind spam. If I didn’t dodge half a second after incoming dmg I was often immediately downed, forcing me to switch to P/P or Short Bow to do mediocre but relatively safe DPS most of the time. IMO melees are totally screwed in this game compared to ranged damage dealers. It’s absurd how easily and quickly you die in STORY mode dungeons with a build that has not the best, but some defense nonetheless. If melees should not dare entering new dungeons without bringing 50% more life and armor than normal, then the frustrations many have are justified.

Xolo.3580:

With non-exotic gear, some vit/toughness, and specced in toughness/heal 20p + using the crit/hp conversion trait, I did 2 story mode dungeons today on my fresh 80 Thief. I got oneshot or close to it on many occasions when using D/P, no matter the blind spam. If I didn’t dodge half a second after incoming dmg I was often immediately downed, forcing me to switch to P/P or Short Bow to do mediocre but relatively safe DPS most of the time. IMO melees are totally screwed in this game compared to ranged damage dealers. It’s absurd how easily and quickly you die in STORY mode dungeons with a build that has not the best, but some defense nonetheless. If melees should not dare entering new dungeons without bringing 50% more life and armor than normal, then the frustrations many have are justified.

1. That is how dungeons are built. There are some attacks that absolutely everyone has to dodge every time, regardless of gear or skill setup.
2. Having subpar gear for your level and getting downleveled for a lower-level explorable can actually be detrimental.
3. You’re capitalizing STORY like it is a big deal that storymode had difficult parts, but many story modes are harder than some of their explorable paths.
4. You aren’t a “melee”, and nobody else is strictly “a ranged damage dealer”, you’re whatever you choose to be at the moment. If you choose to be inflexible in flexible content, expect to be punished for it. Because the game is built so that professions aren’t highly restricted in engagement range it is perfectly viable to build content that punishes a certain engagement range.

Try putting some points into acrobatics, it isn’t too difficult to avoid the vast majority of dungeon damage by movement and dodges.

I’m a D/D-Shortbow thief. When I’m farming in Orr I usually never have a problem with my setup. Nor did I have one when I was leveling.

I use LDB+Caltrops+spider venom. I can kill many normal mobs or even a few vet mobs in one exchange. Kiting thru caltrops, applying bleeds from LDB and posions from spider venom.

Heres my build. Mind you its not really for pvp. Although I do use it for wvw.
http://www.guildhead.com/skill-calc#mzkzzc0z0MMrvoMMrvoxx9MacmRMcqV

Basically I get 7 stacks of might, reduced CD on posions and signets which allow me to keep applying the might quicker. I use steal ALL the time. Its one of our best skills imo. Having it apply dmg/posion/buffs is really key and it hits like a truck.

Keep putting time into your thief, it will pay off. Only issue I have with our class is the low health vs others. But it just means you have to be quicker to react then others.

The death blossom build is great for solo. In dungeons though, I find the 25 bleed stack limit is hit too often. After that, your damage is greatly reduced.

Direct damage (backstab build), your damage is never reduced.

I like the Thief class a lot, but I don’t like the Shortbow’s main attack, it should be a single target attack in my opinion. At least we do have Pistols for pulling single targets from a distance (although that distance is quite short, I would expect a better range from a pistol).

Thief feels squishy in PvE when you don’t have close to level gear. You can buy blues for your level like every 5 levels or so on the cheap. Can do greens every 10 if you want to try PvP. Full even level greens when upleveld to 80 perform ok.

PvE is a joke at 80 in just rares. The level of your gear really matters in this game.

I’ve read through all the replies an even being a satisfied Thief player I’ve picked up some very helpful suggestions that I’m itching to try.

PVE content in this game is Dodge/Evade/Stay Alive>Work the mechanics of the fight>DPS in that order.

I like D/D and SB for a weapon loadout. Watch the fight, run in and DB 3 to 6 times, run out and keep yourself alive until your Initiative re-gens and run back in. You can put 3 DB down in the time it takes to do 1 Pistol Whip and even if you stand in melee and autoattack1 your ahead on damage.

I recently spec’d 0/0/25/25/20 and I feel much less squishy with Vit gear. Kept the AC E2 2nd boss(iirc, the guy that sucks everyone in and whirlwinds them to death) busy the whole fight while my group was dieing and running back. It can be done, we don’t have to be glass cannons to dps and live.

If you’re in a group with too many bleeds just switch to CnD and BS+HS them.

I got fed up with dieing, started a guardian, reassessed my thief and am back to playing it full time.

Blood~

I actually fidgeted with my thief on my own, and found that I could survive with either D/D with the SB on the side, there were times where I switched to S/P coz I got a cool sword skin, but that was it. Though I will admit there were rough patches along the way, but upon discovering all I can about the thief, I fell in love with the class for the 2nd time, even after the nerf.

Right now I’m leveling a guardian just to know how it feels like to soak everything that comes at me. xD (I’m on exotic CoF set on thief already so whenever I cant find a party to raid dungeons I level my sexy guardian.)

@OP, Reroll to warrior.

Stiv.1820:

Thief feels squishy in PvE when you don’t have close to level gear. You can buy blues for your level like every 5 levels or so on the cheap.

I’d agree with this fully. With any character I’m playing if I have a hard time with something I end up checking my gear to find that it’s a few levels behind me. Upgrading to the proper level made everything smooth again. Every five levels seems to work well.

Most of you have been VERY helpful. To those who just wanted to slam me with snark…go kitten yourself. I was very frustrated likely because I have always played thief a certain way in game up until this one and I was darned good at it (PvE and PvP) thank-you-very-much, lol. But for some reason, I’m just having this big issue and I think it’s because in other games I could rely on stealth much more than I can in this game because stealth has no real longevity. I was really unbalanced by the nerf because it was a bread-n-butter build I had been using and I felt like I had the rug yanked out from beneath me when they nerfed it.

I REALLY appreciate all the helpful and non-judgmental suggestions very much and am going to start again from scratch (since my current thief is totally storage space now, lol) and learn from the bottom up at how to play this class and not being able to rely so much on long amounts of stealthing times so heavily as I had in other games. After years of playing that way, it’s been a hard learning curve for me to change this play style and I think, after much introspection, that is my problem.

So…I do NOT want a glass cannon build and I’m looking for a PvE build to level from the beginning. Suggestions on what traits, specials, weapon combos to concentrate on for PvE leveling purposes for a hardy build still capable of getting the job done of killing the mobs at a decent pace a lower to mid levels? I ask because most builds being discussed on various forums etc concentrate on PvP and are all by high levels or level 80’s which I’m obviously not going to be for quite some time.

Again, I so appreciate all the motivation and help you guys are giving.

Leveling, hrmm…

I’d suggest trying out everything. I forget what levels the trait books open to you but I’d pick 2 weapon sets and just try some different talents. Switch up weapon loadout every 5 levels or so and see what you get. D/D Backstab and S/D or S/P are less initiative intensive so would be good to start off with. D/D Deathblossom will take out a group of 3 easily, just evade/dodge/run away after you apply the bleeds. I don’t use P/D and D/P much but I want to get better with them. Any build can do fine leveling if you keep your gear in blues every couple of levels. Mess around and see what you like. I’m respecing my 80 every few days to try out new things.

GL
Blood~

Watching this one since at PvE @lvl 15, it’s feeling like I get squishier with every level (instead of feeling more powerful). D/D main, SB backup mainly, but I’m trying to learn (and love) P/D, P/P, or anything else. So far I’m having… difficulty… figuring out what I like about them, though. Definitely wondering how to play better at lower-levels, without tons of lvl80 gear – it must be in the Traits?

I have no idea what on earth you are talking about. If you think pve is hard for a thief you must literally have never equipped pistols.

Use dagger/ pistol. You can use 3 to endlessly jump out of range of a single enemy, or if you just want to play it lazy, drop the smokebomb continually for perma blind on the enemy.

Like…I can kill veterans two levels above me without getting hit once.

Really the thief starts to play well with the tier 2 traits. I got into P/D for a while but the Sneak Attack has low damage even coupled with the bleeds. P/P isn’t bad for single target ranged but it does just as much as Pistol Whip now and less than Deathblossom or a Dagger Backstab.

Thief ‘squishy-ness’ can be mitigated a number of ways. Vitality and Toughness help along with Shadow Arts and Acrobatics trait trees. Pistol Whip and Deathblossom give you evasion as they are going off, you can time this to evade attacks. Stealth is like your shield, throw some damage and stealth to drop agro. Dancing Daggers lets you do some kiting..

Try focusing on staying alive and taking the least amount of damage other than killing stuff quickly. We do have a lot of tricks to work with. Shadow Arts VI with CnD is great for blinding the enemy and Backstab/Sneakattack. My bar is usually Blinding Powder, Shadow Refuge and Roll for Initiative or Signet of Shadows.

Bloodgruve.6038:

Try focusing on staying alive and taking the least amount of damage other than killing stuff quickly.

I think this may be the trick – I’ve been focusing on getting them dead ASAP… I’ll try it. thanks for the advice and tips.

The PVE thief is great. Sure all the professions have gotten some nerfs but overall check the other prof forums and its the same old (new) story. Tell me a much better prof and i might switch too.. but thieves are just so awesome in style. Ouch, now they’ll get nerf’d in looks and animations haha..

Sadly I am going to shelve my thief also, my Ranger simply out damages, out survives, and has more utility right now. Even with the Ranger nerfs, it still out-performs my thief in WvW and PVE. I have tried every build, most of the gear setups and weapon sets, even made myself 5 exotic weeps (D,D,P,P S) to no avail. Yeah I can kill stuff, rather quickly, but I can’t survive if there are more than 3 mobs (PVE), or if my zerg leaves my kitten hanging out there, slim chance of me getting back to group with thief. Until the survivability is changed/fixed, I will only bring out my thief, for situational reasons in Dungeons orWvW.

I will keep on this and other thief forums for the changes.

tl;dr

pve player should shelf GW2 altogether.
and install it when he becomes a pvp player.

:P

Again, thanks so much for the helpful input everyone. It’s also nice to know I’m not the only one who’s had problems with playing my thief. So far, and I’m only level 16-ish on my new restarted thief toon, I’ve been doing much better and focusing on mobility, keeping my initiative replenished so I can stay mobile, stealth in and out, etc. I’m not focusing on leveling as much as I am only learning how different things work together.

I find I really wish I had a third weapon swap available, lol. I dislike having my SB equipped all the time all but whenever an event pops up out of the blue I need to have it to even make a dent before other classes with AOE’s kill everything.

I’m really liking S/P and D/D and I swap back and forth when engaging mobs one after another. I still find that I am terribly squishy even with being so mobile when taking on mobs my own level (especially if there is more than one on me) but do much better with ones a level (or two) lower. I’m hoping this becomes less the case as I increase trait points etc. Until then, I will simply be experimenting on how to incorporate different weapon combos for maximum result.

I find I can do pretty well with SB as long as I have enough room, and not too many adds, to kite. The thing I dislike intensely about SB is the auto attack is set up to hit as many mobs in an area as it can by default. So, even if I wanted to just pull one mob…or need to pull a certain mob for quest purposes etc, I am stuck aggroing the entire bunch. I should like to see a differentiation in having an auto attack that is single mob attack and a separate attack that bounces the arrow to all mobs in the area.

Trismegistos.3046:

tl;dr

pve player should shelf GW2 altogether.
and install it when he becomes a pvp player.

:P

PvP is not the only type of play style nor the ONLY one people enjoy. I very much dislike the attitude of PvP’rs who seem to think that all games should or do revolve around them and them alone and PvE’rs are nothing but second class players. Take that elitist attitude elsewhere, thanks. I have the utmost respect for PvP’rs and the skills required for that style of play. I can do it and have, I simply don’t enjoy it. What I don’t respect is the idea that ONLY PvP’rs exist in a game or that only PvP is worthy of time or consideration by gamers or game developers.

I don’t care about PVP at all. This game really does PVE right, so why not enjoy that?

I enjoyed my Thief but kept comparing her to my Guardian, who can wade into anything and almost always come out alive and victorious, even though it might take a while. My Thief has to be more cautious about what to engage, especially when no other players are around as helpful distractions (and rescuers if need be).

But I decided to take someone’s advice above and just try different weapons — I had been using DP/SB — and now I’ve settled on SP/PP with Trickery, caltrops and healing signet, and am really loving it. It’s starting to synergize and I’ve found my groove.

mrsrachelm.7618:

I find I can do pretty well with SB as long as I have enough room, and not too many adds, to kite. The thing I dislike intensely about SB is the auto attack is set up to hit as many mobs in an area as it can by default. So, even if I wanted to just pull one mob…or need to pull a certain mob for quest purposes etc, I am stuck aggroing the entire bunch. I should like to see a differentiation in having an auto attack that is single mob attack and a separate attack that bounces the arrow to all mobs in the area.

If you use Dagger/Pistol or Sword/Pistol as your main weapon set, you can pull single targets with #4 [Headshot] while still having Shortbow ready to go for events as secondary.

Dagger/Pistol is far better when you’re in any area where the mobs are spread out far enough that you can fight single mobs at a time. Against a single mob you can pretty much just use #3 [Shadow Shot] over and over and never take any damage.

Sword/Pistol is better when you’re constantly fighting groups of mobs. Just use #5 [Smokescreen] as often as possible and let your cleaving auto-attack do the work.

Of course other players have listed plenty of other setups that work just fine as well, but they all involve some sort of kiting and/or waiting for bleeds to tick which doesn’t feel very Rogue-like to me.