Guild Wars 2

I personally think this would fit very well with the assassin archetype plus it would be nice to have something with 1200 range on a thief. Main issue I see is that it doesn’t really fit well with the whole initiative thing.

I made a sample skill set, it probably has some balance problems but you get the idea. Numbers on damage is just to show contrast between skill damage. Usage time means how much time the skill takes to use. Note the numbers are all relative and are my best shot at balance, they clearly aren’t well balanced but are solely there for comparison. Having good numbers without being able to test it is hard.

Feel free to suggest your own skills/skillset, if I like it I’ll add it to the OP and make a list out of them.

Skill 1: Fire!
Range: 900
Usage Time: .5 Seconds
Initiative: 0
Damage: 800
Hit your target with a rifle shot.

Skill 2: Mark Your Target
Range: 900
Usage time: .75 seconds
Initiative: 6
Fire a shot applying 5 stacks of vulnerability and weakness for 7 seconds.

Skill 3: Explosive Shot
Range: 900
Damage: 1200
Usage time: .5 seconds
Initative: 4
Fire an explosive shot applying burning for 8 seconds

Skill 4: Snipe
Range: 1200
Damage: 1200/1600/2000
Usage time: 2 Seconds
Initiative: 4/8/12
Use up all available initiative and deal heavy damage according to the number of initiative used. Guarantees a critical hit.

Skill 5: Take Aim
Range: N/a
Damage: N/a
Cool Down: 5 Seconds (toggle)
Usage Time: 2 seconds
Initiative: None
All skills gain a 300 Range bonus as well as giving a 10 seconds buff of 10 stacks of might. During the entire period the user is immobilized and takes 30% increased damage.

Skill 5: Environmental Refuge (Alternative)
Range: N/a
Damage: N/a
Cool Down: 2 seconds (cool down starts after the skill has been fully activated)
Usage time: 1 second
Initiative: 3 per 4 seconds. Initially costs 2
Binding roots hold you for the entire duration of the skill. All skills gain a 300 range bonus and inflict bleeding on every attack. You also take 30% increased damage and gaine 5 stacks of might for 3 seconds.

How much damage is #4 going to do exactly? What kinds of criticals are we looking at here?

I’d like to see a rifle for the thief, as it sits in WvW thieves have a hard time zerging because their effective combat range is 900, 1200 with clusterbombs which is so slow traveling it barely counts.

I like all of them except explosive shot, we already have horrible synergized weapons, last thing we need is another weapon set where only 1 ability is designed for condition builds.
I suggest having Snipe be the stealth attack.
I also suggest have “Take Aim”, renamed to “Environmental Refuge” just be an toggle that drains init while it is active. That roots the thief for the duration, with the increased damage taken, that allows the thief to use the stealth attack but not actually stealth the thief. But have snipe be the only stealth attack that actually costs init

Doomdesire.9365:

How much damage is #4 going to do exactly? What kinds of criticals are we looking at here?

The damage numbers I wrote down weren’t actual numbers I suggest. I just put them there to show contrast between the different skills and because I don’t think they are too outlandish. The max damage skill 4 should do is 2000 if you have all initiative available. This is before applying the crit so skill 4 will end up dealing 4000 damage with base crit damage which is 5 times the amount of damage as the first skill.

John Lucier.5486:

I like all of them except explosive shot, we already have horrible synergized weapons, last thing we need is another weapon set where only 1 ability is designed for condition builds.
I suggest having Snipe be the stealth attack.
I also suggest have “Take Aim”, renamed to “Environmental Refuge” just be an toggle that drains init while it is active. That roots the thief for the duration, with the increased damage taken, that allows the thief to use the stealth attack but not actually stealth the thief. But have snipe be the only stealth attack that actually costs init

Haha yeah… I kind of put skill 3 in there because the set was focused around crit damage and there was no condition in there. Possibly have skill 1 inflict burning, bleeding, or poison on every attack? I thought of a better way to do this.
I also like the toggle idea but not sure how well it would work with it draining init since the Snipe ability is based around using all initiative to unload a really powerful shot.

Skill number 3 would need a massive nerf. Burning is about comparable to 8 stacks of bleed in terms of damage.

Rottaran Owain.6789:

Skill number 3 would need a massive nerf. Burning is about comparable to 8 stacks of bleed in terms of damage.

The numbers are all relative, it is clear that they need balance changes but it’s hard for me to say since I can’t actually test it out.

I always thought a thief would make the best sniper class because of initiative. It’s perfect for something that does burst damage.

Plus on my warrior, only killshot can match the range of rangers or even engineer grenades. The hell?! Rifles deserve a class that can shoot as far as someone can throw a bloody grenade!

TheAmpca.1753:

Skill 1: Fire!
Range: 900
Usage Time: .5 Seconds
Initiative: 0
Damage: 800
Hit your target with a rifle shot.

Skill 2: Mark Your Target
Range: 900
Usage time: .75 seconds
Initiative: 6
Fire a shot applying 5 stacks of vulnerability and weakness for 7 seconds.

Skill 3: Explosive Shot
Range: 900
Damage: 1200
Usage time: .5 seconds
Initative: 4
Fire an explosive shot applying burning for 8 seconds

Skill 4: Snipe
Range: 1200
Damage: 1200/1600/2000
Usage time: 2 Seconds
Initiative: 4/8/12
Use up all available initiative and deal heavy damage according to the number of initiative used. Guarantees a critical hit.

Skill 5: Take Aim
Range: N/a
Damage: N/a
Cool Down: 5 Seconds (toggle)
Usage Time: 2 seconds
Initiative: None
All skills gain a 300 Range bonus as well as giving a 10 seconds buff of 10 stacks of might. During the entire period the user is immobilized and takes 30% increased damage.

Skill 5: Environmental Refuge (Alternative)
Range: N/a
Damage: N/a
Cool Down: 2 seconds (cool down starts after the skill has been fully activated)
Usage time: 1 second
Initiative: 3 per 4 seconds. Initially costs 2
Binding roots hold you for the entire duration of the skill. All skills gain a 300 range bonus and inflict bleeding on every attack. You also take 30% increased damage and gaine 5 stacks of might for 3 seconds.

lol..
Wanna play sniper rifle, play warrior

+1 for thieves using rifle at some point in the future.

TheAmpca.1753:

Doomdesire.9365:

How much damage is #4 going to do exactly? What kinds of criticals are we looking at here?

The damage numbers I wrote down weren’t actual numbers I suggest. I just put them there to show contrast between the different skills and because I don’t think they are too outlandish. The max damage skill 4 should do is 2000 if you have all initiative available. This is before applying the crit so skill 4 will end up dealing 4000 damage with base crit damage which is 5 times the amount of damage as the first skill.

John Lucier.5486:

I like all of them except explosive shot, we already have horrible synergized weapons, last thing we need is another weapon set where only 1 ability is designed for condition builds.
I suggest having Snipe be the stealth attack.
I also suggest have “Take Aim”, renamed to “Environmental Refuge” just be an toggle that drains init while it is active. That roots the thief for the duration, with the increased damage taken, that allows the thief to use the stealth attack but not actually stealth the thief. But have snipe be the only stealth attack that actually costs init

Haha yeah… I kind of put skill 3 in there because the set was focused around crit damage and there was no condition in there. Possibly have skill 1 inflict burning, bleeding, or poison on every attack? I thought of a better way to do this.
I also like the toggle idea but not sure how well it would work with it draining init since the Snipe ability is based around using all initiative to unload a really powerful shot.

You have the initiative cost on the ability set to 12 max in the description, we can trait for 15, and just because the toggle is draining init, does not mean it has to turn off our init regen (natural, talents and signet)