Guild Wars 2

Hey fellow theives and cutthroats!

For about 6 months ago I was my own shining light in the borderland fields. Now out from prison where most seemes to be new i am but rusty dagger.
I feel I must be even more careful with my iniaitive play, while I may lack the damage. At the same time theres no doubt I must master my playstyle once again.

Before I used to run a cheese D/P build which relied being able to stealth and pick on my enemy (have more control), and “tanky” in terms of stealth perks (regen, debuff removal, etc).

Im wondering if I could make a D/D or D/P build work that is pure glass, hit hard and get out to regain iniaitive. Like with pure zerk? We dont relay that much on armor/hp anyway.. Will I have enough upkeep or is there a meta build for such a play? I may end up going for a different set involving a dagger since Im a bit tired of the traditional D/P BS with HS “spam/mechanic”.

Anyway I appreciate all feedback I can get as pockets needs to be emptied.

nacario.9417:

Hey fellow theives and cutthroats!

…

Im wondering if I could make a D/D or D/P build work that is pure glass, hit hard and get out to regain iniaitive. Like with pure zerk? We dont relay that much on armor/hp anyway.. Will I have enough upkeep or is there a meta build for such a play? I may end up going for a different set involving a dagger since Im a bit tired of the traditional D/P BS with HS “spam/mechanic”.

Anyway I appreciate all feedback I can get as pockets needs to be emptied.

Hey! Welcome back to the shadows.

If you want highest possible burst, dagger is the way to go.

D/D is (arguably) the best damage set we have, but it lacks some utilities our D/P build has (interrupts etc), and death blossom (#3 on D/D) is nearly or never used.

I play D/D, because I like that playstyle, but sometimes it comes out short.

You have this D/P build which is a good all-rounder (carpboy posted it one time ago, but it’s really a standard “meta” build):

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fZEQNAoaVlsMp0pdOx7J8PNBNBtdFGeI4uGlYGaFAA-TFCFABCcKAeU9HkU+Vy+DZoJYD9AA8EAuSJYAAEAuZYzyAovFA-w

OK sustain, good damage. Cavaliers because of guard buffs.
Change out signet of shadows for infiltrators signet when you engage enemies (it’s for running around in WvW).

So there are two builds you should try with D/P

D/P Trickery:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQNAoaVlsMp0pVOx7J8PNBNhs9kHR8O83yaFA-TFCEABGcCAYS5HO7P0m+AAOEAE8EASU9ntUCSKgIWGB-w

D/P Burst (No one uses this anymore) :
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQNAoaVlsMp0pNOx7J8PNRLhsdnNf87tuPCA-TZBEwAGOBA42fAwhAIbZACPBAA

D/P Trick and D/P Burst has been given in the above.

D/P Panic Strike (not really sure what else to call it) is also quite strong and plays a bit different from the other two.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQNAoaVlsMp7plOxyJ8PNBMBxVP8ONnpNangdHAA-TpBFwACOQAI3fgwJAo9hAoaZAAPhAA

Not as popular on NA though, not sure about EU. I know Shad used to run this for a while.

Heal can be Hide in Shadows or Withdraw. Your pick.

Thanks alot! Ill be sure to try out this DP trickery build. I see you run with Air and Fire sigils, have they been buffed / are they that much better than 5% base dmg incr sigil? Or perhaps that % is too low since we wanna take down our target as quickly as pos, and air/fire sigil crits quite high?
Secondly, are there other runesets than Ogre that could give more power (since ogre is cheap?). Currently i use travelers which are quite nifty for the 25% travel speed.

Other than that yeah it feels like D/D comes short compared to D/P.

If you’re playing WvW travelers is fine.

The builds don’t rely too heavily on runes or sigils, so you can tweak those details yourself.

full zerker D/P is totally viable. you probably won’t be gaining initiative as fast as you used to, but it can still hit hard, and use blinds and stuff to defend yourself. shadow shot is also a better gap closer than heartseeker spam for longer distances, and you can combine it with backstab if steal is on recharge.

Could u guys be so kind to link the meta S/D build? Thanks

nacario.9417:

Could u guys be so kind to link the meta S/D build? Thanks

Are you thinking WvW or PvP?

For PvP, it’s something like this:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fZAQNAsYVl0MpwpdPxyJ8PNBNB5dY+SZ0KAdHl+eEA-TZBFwACOFAl2fYxRAoaZAAPAAA

For WvW, I personally use this:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fZUQNAsYVl0Mp0plPx3J8PRBNBxVN8OMfpMaFgOjSfB-T1CBABVqqyZKBl4UAglyLvUiAwDAwS1KyTTQR7PkieAGOCABAQACJOxADdiDdiDdiNxJOxJOxJWKgn2CA-w

It’s more personal preference than anything though, I find that this gives me more options for a range of situations than the signet build whilst still being able to kill stuff, and refuge more often than not just gets me killed. There’s no reason you can’t use the PvP meta build and just go full zerk if you know what you’re doing, and a thief using dual signets has a distinct advantage over a thief that uses shadowstep in a 1v1, so its up to you what you consider more important.