Guild Wars 2

I would give a large amount of money to see Hihey , who I know is good, beat Amonatory using only a sword. All the golds to see that.

If s/d isn’t easier than it’s just overpowered. Takes a fraction of the reflexes of d/p with less risk and way more versatility. Maybe its just the STR rune fire/air sigil setup though

ens.9854:

If s/d isn’t easier than it’s just overpowered. Takes a fraction of the reflexes of d/p with less risk and way more versatility. Maybe its just the STR rune fire/air sigil setup though

Once again. It’s not S/D it’s sigil procs and acrobatics S/D has nothing to do with “evade spamming”. D/P requires less skill and IMO more boring to play.

What do you mean sigil procs? How often are you triggering energy in a typical fight? I don’t thief anymore but I don’t see s/d thieves leaving s/d so often as to maximize energy sigil, but that might just be me.

Not saying you are wrong, just curious what you mean.

Hackuuna.4085:

What do you mean sigil procs? How often are you triggering energy in a typical fight? I don’t thief anymore but I don’t see s/d thieves leaving s/d so often as to maximize energy sigil, but that might just be me.

Not saying you are wrong, just curious what you mean.

Air and Fire sigils proc around every 8-10 seconds or so. Fire has kitten CD and Air has a 3 making them proc a lot makes acrobatics work well because its more damage with still having a lot of evades.

have to agree with amon here it’s the acro trait line that makes s/d such a good build with amount of dodge spam and might on dodge with str runes and fire/air sigil procs for your dmg.. watching sizer play this build and beat any class 1v1 shows how strong it is. but its not due to the spamming 3 its the traits he is using that work so well with s/d.
try spamming 3 without acro you wont live that long

fabz.4736:

have to agree with amon here it’s the acro trait line that makes s/d such a good build with amount of dodge spam and might on dodge with str runes and fire/air sigil procs for your dmg.. watching sizer play this build and beat any class 1v1 shows how strong it is. but its not due to the spamming 3 its the traits he is using that work so well with s/d.
try spamming 3 without acro you wont live that long

Right but playing s/d with CS is still viable but this nerf will destroy that spec as well. Tbh you’ll probably see d/p Acro after this patch since Acro wasn’t nerfed it’ll be usable still

Amonatory.2453:

hihey.1075:

Amonatory.2453:

Warlord of Chaos.7845:

The thing is, S/D thief right now has almost zero counterplay. I don’t mind that the skill cap is getting higher, as it really needed to not be so easy to play. Now that it has counterplay and you can actually play against it, s/d can maybe finally be balanced and fun to fight against.

First off S/D actually takes skill in general, second legit like everything the blocks/invulns will counter it how is that fair counterplay? Once again S/D is balanced Acro is not this is what I made the post for….. S/D does not need a nerf its kittening acrobatics.

S/D takes skill?
It took me a week to beat “veteran” S/D thieves using ONLY a Sword. Guess what could have happened if I equipped a Dagger, too!
Sword/anything is incredibly easy to play. You just cannot die.
I like all the changes. And I think I will see a lot of QQ from people saying “That guy is spamming LS forever permaevade noob lol”

You killing scrubs with sword is your argument? Congratulations, honestly S/D takes more skill than d/p lolol.

If people in the Top100 are scrubs…
Not saying I am good or anything, because I am not (there are a lot more things to consider when evaluating a player than only 1v1 capability), just that Sword/x does not require any skill. What EXACTLY is skillful in S/x builds?
I am assuming a sPvP environment, so do not consider SA builds. D/P is 100 times harder and gets hardcountered by so many things that it’s hard to believe it is still played. Heck, even P/D (power) is harder than S/x, because unless there is a lot of AIs on which you can land CnD reliably, it is very difficult to land your burst.
With S/x you have pretty much anything you want: damage, safe escape, stealth, cc, (soft)condition removal, evades, cleave.

Really, I regularly watch Sizer’s play and there is not any skill involved in how he FIGHTS (and I emphasize the word “fight”, because if we consider Sizer’s ability to understand what’s happening around the map he is unmatched).
What is hard in chaning FS→Infiltrator Strike to immob→LS? Or LS→Steal/LS→Infiltrator Signet? And if things go dire, port back with #2.
If D/x or P/x user messes up and engages a fight he should not have engaged in, he is dead. A S/x, unless CCed, will always have a way out.

S/D on thief isn’t the problem like Amon is saying, feline grace is the issue. Instead of nerfing flanking strike I think they should rework feline grace to either give a short amount of vigor maybe? or move it to a major trait. I definitely think they should leave sword as is and fix the broken acro trait line.

You know quite a Bit for being bad
D/p has-
Damage (much more)
Safe escape with shadow step
Much more stealth
Much more cc with headshot
Slightly less condi removal with HiS and SS
Limited evades
More blinds (extremely more and utterly insane amount )
Cleave (more)
Spike (at least 2x more)
Omfg dp is so easy op

Booms.2594:

You know quite a Bit for being bad
D/p has-
Damage (much more)
Safe escape with shadow step
Much more stealth
Much more cc with headshot
Slightly less condi removal with HiS and SS
Limited evades
More blinds (extremely more and utterly insane amount )
Cleave (more)
Spike (at least 2x more)
Omfg dp is so easy op

Of course D/P has more cleave than S/D.
“Slightly” less condi removal? rofl
Evades>>>>>>Blinds, especially when the blinds are a 100radius field that only a noob would stand in, and costs 6 Initiative.
Safe Escape with Shadowstep: on 50s cooldown (SS is often slotted on S/x builds too).
More CC with headshot—> which is mostly used for utility (hint: requires SKILLFUL play)

Please tell me again how S/x is more skillful than D/P, I’m all ears.
Haters gonna hate.

Back in topic, they should have nerfed Feline Grace and kept everything as it is now. The set is not destroyed, people will just have to change playstyle to get used to the new FS→LS. It will still be the safest build to 1v1 with in PvP, people will still get mad at thieves and the hate for this class will not decrease.

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

(perma evade never took skills anyways)

Cant disagree. But that’s acrobatics not S/D like im explaining I think If anything should get nerfed it should be feline grace not S/D.

It’s the fact that s/d is a synergy with acrobatics and SoA, making it “perma evade”. s/d evade has always been an issue since launch whether it was 20066, 26060, 02066 because of how frequently a thief can evade than any other class. Evading is already the most broken mechanic in the game giving it an almost 2 second “invulnerability” to physical damage/condition damage applications.

My personal opinion was to change SoA to give half your endurance back rather 100%, and make Flanking Strike a 1/4 evade, but again; I don’t really care what Anet does because I still play the game and adjust to whatever they “nerf” or “buff”.

Adjust to the game mechanics because you really don’t have any say in Anets changes, don’t make it a viral deal about it.

O I must’ve forgotten shadow shot doesn’t blind. Ya black powder is the only skill that does. And hitting headshot is so much more skillful than stealthing and dazing from behind. Btw most Acro thieves don’t slot SS. And you clearly use not played the class nor closely watched top thieves if you think this skill change won’t matter for 1v1.
But hey at least you’re smart enough to realize feline grace is the problem not sd.

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

(perma evade never took skills anyways)

Cant disagree. But that’s acrobatics not S/D like im explaining I think If anything should get nerfed it should be feline grace not S/D.

It’s the fact that s/d is a synergy with acrobatics and SoA, making it “perma evade”. s/d evade has always been an issue since launch whether it was 20066, 26060, 02066 because of how frequently a thief can evade than any other class. Evading is already the most broken mechanic in the game giving it an almost 2 second “invulnerability” to physical damage/condition damage applications.

My personal opinion was to change SoA to give half your endurance back rather 100%, and make Flanking Strike a 1/4 evade, but again; I don’t really care what Anet does because I still play the game and adjust to whatever they “nerf” or “buff”.

Adjust to the game mechanics because you really don’t have any say in Anets changes, don’t make it a viral deal about it.

Why adjust to something that shouldnt be happening anyways? You dont know what youre talking about bro, stick to d/p plz.

2 pages already, wow. This guy is kittened off for sure :/

I’ll agree the change wasn’t necessary but it doesn’t exactly change anything towards the “good” thieves who were using s/d. It adds a little counterplay to the “perma evade” but really s/d and acrobatics wasn’t the issue. It’s those kitten double sigil proc’s that make up for any loss damage for not going into a dps trait line. When I can add ~1.4k extra every so and so seconds and focus my traits into my defenses you get what people cry over.

Overall this patched really didn’t move thief anywhere. They made some efforts and I know this game is against wac-a-mole patches but they should of taken the same approach on thief as they did ranger to pull them out of the stale build diversity we’ve fallen into. I’m just getting bored of thief, its hard to enjoy it anymore when nothing changes.

Amon is arguably the best sd thief NA so clearly this will affect “good” thieves

^^
I can’t post threads because I’ve been infracted too many times but someone should post a thread in profession balance forum, devs are more likely to see it and maybe they’ll actually do something for once.

On another note WTF are they doing with D/P?!?!? They kill S/D AND D/P, the only two viable pvp weapon sets in ONE balance update!!! Are they trying to force a P/D condi meta??? That’s the only other option I see at this point.

-Ele Ele Ele Ele Ele, already at level 76 from tomes. Im also gonna start playing more league, GG ANet.

Oh no, they added counter play to a build with still less counter play than most builds in the game. The sky is falling.

EDIT: LOL I just read the title and posted, but now I read these comments. How the hell could S/D be more skill when its literally just keeping your evade frame uptime until your get an air/fire proc. It is the most unskillful pile of worthless crap in this game.

Seriously, just dodging through literally everything spamming or not, (I could care less what you call it its reality) just to get to a target. Let’s not forget sword 2. It requires so much skill to use. Like I can’t even say positioning matters on S/D because you have a heal that has 0 counter play and you can use when immobed, and lets be honest with all those dodges you won’t get stunned because you are so good at the game.

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

(perma evade never took skills anyways)

Cant disagree. But that’s acrobatics not S/D like im explaining I think If anything should get nerfed it should be feline grace not S/D.

It’s the fact that s/d is a synergy with acrobatics and SoA, making it “perma evade”. s/d evade has always been an issue since launch whether it was 20066, 26060, 02066 because of how frequently a thief can evade than any other class. Evading is already the most broken mechanic in the game giving it an almost 2 second “invulnerability” to physical damage/condition damage applications.

My personal opinion was to change SoA to give half your endurance back rather 100%, and make Flanking Strike a 1/4 evade, but again; I don’t really care what Anet does because I still play the game and adjust to whatever they “nerf” or “buff”.

Adjust to the game mechanics because you really don’t have any say in Anets changes, don’t make it a viral deal about it.

Why adjust to something that shouldnt be happening anyways? You dont know what youre talking about bro, stick to d/p plz.

I mean, I will lmao. I find s/d fairly easy so I don’t play it. Evades carry the game and what do you mean “shouldnt be happening anyways”, it doesn’t matter if it shouldnt be happening. I agree a lot of nerfs and buffs should not be happening, but what I’m saying is you should find a way around the nerf. At least people gave you intel about what’s changing in order for you to have time to adjust, otherwise you would whine more if you found out there were no intel on it, and a new patch came out unexpectedly with changes.

I’m not here to start crap, but you’re the one insanely kitten about the changes. Live with it. It’s the reason why not all of the other popular players have quit yet; they adjust.

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

(perma evade never took skills anyways)

Cant disagree. But that’s acrobatics not S/D like im explaining I think If anything should get nerfed it should be feline grace not S/D.

It’s the fact that s/d is a synergy with acrobatics and SoA, making it “perma evade”. s/d evade has always been an issue since launch whether it was 20066, 26060, 02066 because of how frequently a thief can evade than any other class. Evading is already the most broken mechanic in the game giving it an almost 2 second “invulnerability” to physical damage/condition damage applications.

My personal opinion was to change SoA to give half your endurance back rather 100%, and make Flanking Strike a 1/4 evade, but again; I don’t really care what Anet does because I still play the game and adjust to whatever they “nerf” or “buff”.

Adjust to the game mechanics because you really don’t have any say in Anets changes, don’t make it a viral deal about it.

Why adjust to something that shouldnt be happening anyways? You dont know what youre talking about bro, stick to d/p plz.

I mean, I will lmao. I find s/d fairly easy so I don’t play it. Evades carry the game and what do you mean “shouldnt be happening anyways”, it doesn’t matter if it shouldnt be happening. I agree a lot of nerfs and buffs should not be happening, but what I’m saying is you should find a way around the nerf. At least people gave you intel about what’s changing in order for you to have time to adjust, otherwise you would whine more if you found out there were no intel on it, and a new patch came out unexpectedly with changes.

I’m not here to start crap, but you’re the one insanely kitten about the changes. Live with it. It’s the reason why not all of the other popular players have quit yet; they adjust.

Uhuh, D/P is the easiest weapon set imo. I’ve went through every single S/D nerf time and time again and frankly it gets old as kitten. This nerf is just going to make S/D blow which you probably want because you play D/P anyways. I didnt want to start anything against anyone im putting it out there that this nerf is literally pointless and not thought out at all and should not happen, if they read it cool if they dont thats their fault for ruining a weaponset.

hihey.1075:

Amonatory.2453:

Warlord of Chaos.7845:

The thing is, S/D thief right now has almost zero counterplay. I don’t mind that the skill cap is getting higher, as it really needed to not be so easy to play. Now that it has counterplay and you can actually play against it, s/d can maybe finally be balanced and fun to fight against.

First off S/D actually takes skill in general, second legit like everything the blocks/invulns will counter it how is that fair counterplay? Once again S/D is balanced Acro is not this is what I made the post for….. S/D does not need a nerf its kittening acrobatics.

S/D takes skill?
It took me a week to beat “veteran” S/D thieves using ONLY a Sword. Guess what could have happened if I equipped a Dagger, too!
Sword/anything is incredibly easy to play. You just cannot die.
I like all the changes. And I think I will see a lot of QQ from people saying “That guy is spamming LS forever permaevade noob lol”

<3 <3

my thoughts exactly…

though Sb gets nerfed hard in wvw

Jhughes.8341:

I would give a large amount of money to see Hihey , who I know is good, beat Amonatory using only a sword. All the golds to see that.

I would up the ante and contribute to the pot on that…

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

(perma evade never took skills anyways)

Cant disagree. But that’s acrobatics not S/D like im explaining I think If anything should get nerfed it should be feline grace not S/D.

It’s the fact that s/d is a synergy with acrobatics and SoA, making it “perma evade”. s/d evade has always been an issue since launch whether it was 20066, 26060, 02066 because of how frequently a thief can evade than any other class. Evading is already the most broken mechanic in the game giving it an almost 2 second “invulnerability” to physical damage/condition damage applications.

My personal opinion was to change SoA to give half your endurance back rather 100%, and make Flanking Strike a 1/4 evade, but again; I don’t really care what Anet does because I still play the game and adjust to whatever they “nerf” or “buff”.

Adjust to the game mechanics because you really don’t have any say in Anets changes, don’t make it a viral deal about it.

Why adjust to something that shouldnt be happening anyways? You dont know what youre talking about bro, stick to d/p plz.

I mean, I will lmao. I find s/d fairly easy so I don’t play it. Evades carry the game and what do you mean “shouldnt be happening anyways”, it doesn’t matter if it shouldnt be happening. I agree a lot of nerfs and buffs should not be happening, but what I’m saying is you should find a way around the nerf. At least people gave you intel about what’s changing in order for you to have time to adjust, otherwise you would whine more if you found out there were no intel on it, and a new patch came out unexpectedly with changes.

I’m not here to start crap, but you’re the one insanely kitten about the changes. Live with it. It’s the reason why not all of the other popular players have quit yet; they adjust.

Uhuh, D/P is the easiest weapon set imo. I’ve went through every single S/D nerf time and time again and frankly it gets old as kitten. This nerf is just going to make S/D blow which you probably want because you play D/P anyways. I didnt want to start anything against anyone im putting it out there that this nerf is literally pointless and not thought out at all and should not happen, if they read it cool if they dont thats their fault for ruining a weaponset.

Define “easiest”.
It is widely known that DP Trickery is one of the hardest specs to play effectively in sPvP(par Shatter Mesmer), while SD gets constantly a lot of hate because of how easy it is to stay alive with it.
Not sure what you’re going to prove here. I think you’re complaining too much, as the nerfs that SD is getting serve the purpose of adding some sort of counter play to it. In the hands of a good thief, this set will still outperform every other thief set.
And I play every thief spec from time to time, so I don’t take any sides. Merely staking what a lot of people think.

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

Amonatory.2453:

Crucify.1649:

looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

(perma evade never took skills anyways)

Cant disagree. But that’s acrobatics not S/D like im explaining I think If anything should get nerfed it should be feline grace not S/D.

It’s the fact that s/d is a synergy with acrobatics and SoA, making it “perma evade”. s/d evade has always been an issue since launch whether it was 20066, 26060, 02066 because of how frequently a thief can evade than any other class. Evading is already the most broken mechanic in the game giving it an almost 2 second “invulnerability” to physical damage/condition damage applications.

My personal opinion was to change SoA to give half your endurance back rather 100%, and make Flanking Strike a 1/4 evade, but again; I don’t really care what Anet does because I still play the game and adjust to whatever they “nerf” or “buff”.

Adjust to the game mechanics because you really don’t have any say in Anets changes, don’t make it a viral deal about it.

Why adjust to something that shouldnt be happening anyways? You dont know what youre talking about bro, stick to d/p plz.

I mean, I will lmao. I find s/d fairly easy so I don’t play it. Evades carry the game and what do you mean “shouldnt be happening anyways”, it doesn’t matter if it shouldnt be happening. I agree a lot of nerfs and buffs should not be happening, but what I’m saying is you should find a way around the nerf. At least people gave you intel about what’s changing in order for you to have time to adjust, otherwise you would whine more if you found out there were no intel on it, and a new patch came out unexpectedly with changes.

I’m not here to start crap, but you’re the one insanely kitten about the changes. Live with it. It’s the reason why not all of the other popular players have quit yet; they adjust.

Uhuh, D/P is the easiest weapon set imo. I’ve went through every single S/D nerf time and time again and frankly it gets old as kitten. This nerf is just going to make S/D blow which you probably want because you play D/P anyways. I didnt want to start anything against anyone im putting it out there that this nerf is literally pointless and not thought out at all and should not happen, if they read it cool if they dont thats their fault for ruining a weaponset.

“This nerf is just going to make S/D blow which you probably want because you play D/P anyways.” I didn’t argue that s/d was the easiest, I’m just saying it is too easy to play, d/p is easy too, that’s why they are the most popular specs in pvp. I play d/p because d/p and s/d have the highest sustain and burst in pvp. I chose d/p. I’ve only started to play pvp again because WvW is boring, which I always play d/d. If there was a sustainable d/d build in pvp + 3 second reveal, I would play it.

“In the hands of a good thief, this set will still outperform every other thief set. "
btw guys d/p thief actually beats s/d thief lololol

Disregarding the infighting between our S/D and D/P brethren, this change to me seems rather neutral overall. I look at it this way: before you had to spend 5 initiative on the FS/LS combo or wait for it to roll back over. Mow you can chain FS together until you hit. This basically allows you to sustain longer until you make a successful hit. Numerically speaking, you get 5 FS now for the price of the old 4 which is a 25% increase in the evasion uptime assuming they are skilled enough to dodge/block all of your FS in which case you would probably need the extra evade frame uptime. I think we might see more complaints after this change rather than less. Let’s wait to see how this shakes out before we throw in the towel on the weapon set

Maugetarr.6823:

Disregarding the infighting between our S/D and D/P brethren, this change to me seems rather neutral overall. I look at it this way: before you had to spend 5 initiative on the FS/LS combo or wait for it to roll back over. Mow you can chain FS together until you hit. This basically allows you to sustain longer until you make a successful hit. Numerically speaking, you get 5 FS now for the price of the old 4 which is a 25% increase in the evasion uptime assuming they are skilled enough to dodge/block all of your FS in which case you would probably need the extra evade frame uptime. I think we might see more complaints after this change rather than less. Let’s wait to see how this shakes out before we throw in the towel on the weapon set

Unfortunately its more than just the costs. Previously you would use three early at nothing so that you could use your preload your LS and then initiate by casting it and immediately steal for a guaranteed boon rip and possibly a nice damage spike.

eh more nerf huh? This when in doubt nerf thief crap continues.

I for one was hoping that considering that all professions are getting cool new stuff we might actually get something to be excited about i guess i was naive.

S/D didn’t a nerf the only thief skill that could have been looked at is d/p’s shadow shot , if anything they should have looked at reverting the change to inf return , make it instant cast again when you aren’t stunned but nope as always they took the easy way out , they are idiots to be honest and i should have seen this coming.

S/D wasn’t really talked about since the april 10th patch but then all the suddens the sigils get buffed , strength runes get buffed , we start hearing " ACRO OP O MY GOSH NUUUUURF" " S/D TOO STRONG NURF" did it occur to Anet’s dumb kitten that what might be making the set strong are the changes to the runes and sigils ? nope they go ahead and nerf the set because their tiny brains cannot add 2 and 2 together …….g kittening g……….zzzzzzzz.

Thieves aren’t the only class to get nerfs that aren’t needed. Do we all remember the totally random iLeap nerf for a recent example. You all need to open your eyes and realise that this game isn’t good and ArenaNet aren’t sure how to make it so.

Amon, take your own advice and stop wasting your time on this game.

Amonatory.2453:

If they nerf S/D again, im outtie.

LS should be activated when a thief successfully evaded something, not just hit with FS, but it’s still way better than nothing. S/D is so easy and forgiving combined with feline grace that makes me wonder why people ever protect it. 1 out of 10 thieves I encounter actually try to time the evade, the rest just uses it to upkeep high evade uptime, hoping their enemy is clumsy.

It’s absolutely fine to make S/D the ultimate dueling set, but let’s make it a bit_challengeing to play with risk/reward factor, not only reward all along the way.

S/D is easy and unforgiving? No way. S/D is the hardest set to play (after D/D of course). if you die to someone spamming their evades, you need to have a better look at how S/d actually works. Every FS has a window of opportunity which is not an evade. That is as long as the actual evade portion. And once FS is used, a thief has LS up, thus cannot FS again. Do you even realize how many build/class compositions out there actually make dogfood stew out of S/D? The set received nerf after nerf after nerf and yet its still not enough? S/D is anything but forgiving. You sure have a ton of evades, but the are needed. You kitten up once, and its mostly over. And regarding your suggestion, Dagins – if a thief has to evade something with FS in order to proc LS, then you have to make it activate instantly. Currently you cannot time it properly because of cast / aftercast priorities.

a shame they rely on nerfing thieves again when there are so many specs you cannot touch as a S/D acrobatics thief. great stuff. maybe i should go for cheesemode PU mesmer or Axe/shield GS warrior as well. THEY are forgiving. S/D is not.

Amonatory, i feel your pain. As someone who started the game with S/D (remember those good times where you actually got laughed at for doing so…) its a shame to see S/D becoming more and more of a joke. but lets see the good side. if the Meta shifts again, it shifts away from us. I still just rofl at anyone telling me i´m just copycatting Sizer or whoever gets credit for “inventing” 20066 S/D while i experimented with it right after the changes to the trickery line. That was a time where 26060 still was meta set in stone. Don´t give up yet, Amonatory!

Don’t know how you can say they are not forgiving… Free teleports out of LOS, lowest CD heal that is uninterruptible evades and creates gap… Half your larc strikes are invulnerable because you use them with a 20s cooldown dazing steal anyway that heals you even more (unless you spam it like a newb).

Compared to the stress of having <1 second to pull a shadow step out of my kitten when I am in trouble on d/p, I have never felt safer. Not to mention the d/p crutch of black powder is getting nerfed

Is Anyone Surprised?

….didn’t think so.

A lot of you are missing the point and arguing for the sake of arguing.

FS/LS did not need a nerf. – point, that’s it, there is no argument against that.

If you think you could somehow spam dodge from FS then you are sorely mistaken, it has delay in casting that is hard to time in PvP (in PvE its not hard, but PvE doesn’t matter when talking about Balance).

The main culprit for all the dodges is Feline Grace in the Acro tree and the Sigil of Agility refilling endurance all the way, and the main culprit for all the damage of a lot of survival specs with heavy damage (not just talking about thieves here), are the air and fire sigil procs.

Im not going to say S/D or D/P is better or worse than one or the other, I am a thief, and I love playing the thief, and in fact I love playing both the S/D and D/P sets. We shouldn’t be turning on each other here, rather, we should notice the unneeded change(s) and say “Hey, ANet, wtf are you smoking?”

A simple solution that would make this change to S/D acceptable (just talking about S/D since its the topic, the other changes I could go into in another thread), would be to make FS unblockable as well. People could still easily dodge it, but at least the skill wouldn’t be shut down by passive play like aegis.

My 2 c,
~Momekic

I actually don’t think this will effect my play-style too much, but yeah as people mentioned – it’s the strength runes and duo Air/Fire Sigils that make that certain build seem like it’s OP.

CrimsonNeonite.1048:

I actually don’t think this will effect my play-style too much, but yeah as people mentioned – it’s the strength runes and duo Air/Fire Sigils that make that certain build seem like it’s OP.

I dont want to be a kitten but to people like amon it really doesnt matter that it wont affect lowlevel thieves, this change will hurt thieves immensely at top level pvp

Why do you guys are talking about nerf acrobatics lol . Acro is what is it for almost 2 years , then suddenly BOOM it’s OP ? Feline grace and Power of inertia never changed . So why do you want to nerf them now ? .

I will not arg about who is harder between d/p and s/d but s/d is a lot more safer than d/p to play . Please don’t take as reference d/p shadows arts BS . D/P trickery may be a bit over the top because of BP atm but its really more Yolo than s/d acro . Keep in mind d/p trick don’t use any of the thief’s defensive tree . Because imo trickery is not what we call a defensive tree

Booms.2594:

CrimsonNeonite.1048:

I actually don’t think this will effect my play-style too much, but yeah as people mentioned – it’s the strength runes and duo Air/Fire Sigils that make that certain build seem like it’s OP.

I dont want to be a kitten but to people like amon it really doesnt matter that it wont affect lowlevel thieves, this change will hurt thieves immensely at top level pvp

So you are saying that everyone else is below them in perceived skill level, it means that their opinion is invalid? I don’t even play D/P that often myself, that together with SA is what makes it as if it’s on ‘Training Wheels’, but as mentioned Trickery is a different story.

S/D is hard to master, although now there’s a meta build that has less risk and more reward. I am just saying adapt or reroll another class otherwise, as usual.

Booms.2594:

CrimsonNeonite.1048:

I actually don’t think this will effect my play-style too much, but yeah as people mentioned – it’s the strength runes and duo Air/Fire Sigils that make that certain build seem like it’s OP.

I dont want to be a kitten but to people like amon it really doesnt matter that it wont affect lowlevel thieves, this change will hurt thieves immensely at top level pvp

Do you get paid for fanboyism?

Zord.6130:

Booms.2594:

CrimsonNeonite.1048:

I actually don’t think this will effect my play-style too much, but yeah as people mentioned – it’s the strength runes and duo Air/Fire Sigils that make that certain build seem like it’s OP.

I dont want to be a kitten but to people like amon it really doesnt matter that it wont affect lowlevel thieves, this change will hurt thieves immensely at top level pvp

Do you get paid for fanboyism?

yes

Can I have my 2 Boon steal back?

panicbutton.1053:

I for one love the flanking strike changes. I almost always use flanking strike to dodge, when I run out of endurance. Now I can afford another dodge on top of my dodges, while i dodge.

Dodge-ception.

I’m in the same boat. For those that remember the old FS, which didn’t have a second skill portion, the skill was an unbelievably powerful tool used to prevent taking damage and force an opponent onto their cooldowns. Simply, I think this change allows for the evasion thief to make a new presence, and also gives such a thief a boon strip and source of on-demand damage for when they don’t need to dodge. If anything, I suspect that the particularly skilled S/D players will conceive this as a buff.

I will agree, however, that 2 boon strip should return as compensation.

DeceiverX.8361:

panicbutton.1053:

I for one love the flanking strike changes. I almost always use flanking strike to dodge, when I run out of endurance. Now I can afford another dodge on top of my dodges, while i dodge.

Dodge-ception.

I’m in the same boat. For those that remember the old FS, which didn’t have a second skill portion, the skill was an unbelievably powerful tool used to prevent taking damage and force an opponent onto their cooldowns. Simply, I think this change allows for the evasion thief to make a new presence, and also gives such a thief a boon strip and source of on-demand damage for when they don’t need to dodge. If anything, I suspect that the particularly skilled S/D players will conceive this as a buff.

I will agree, however, that 2 boon strip should return as compensation.

Even if people see it as a buff its really not going to do anything but cause more QQ and lead it to another nerf….. So my question is why go through the trouble remaking something that didnt need remade into something people may possibly wine about more than they already do? “UGHH 3 SPAM CHEESE L2P BADDIE” basically the same thing many people already see now…. So the point in the nerf is???

Amonatory.2453:

Even if people see it as a buff its really not going to do anything but cause more QQ and lead it to another nerf….. So my question is why go through the trouble remaking something that didnt need remade into something people may possibly wine about more than they already do? “UGHH 3 SPAM CHEESE L2P BADDIE” basically the same thing many people already see now…. So the point in the nerf is???

I was thinking, they literally re-introduced a mechanic they were trying to get rid of on shortbow. The #3 spam. This is only going to get worse. I see the aftercast butchering already incoming.

FeelsAlright.5860:

Amonatory.2453:

Even if people see it as a buff its really not going to do anything but cause more QQ and lead it to another nerf….. So my question is why go through the trouble remaking something that didnt need remade into something people may possibly wine about more than they already do? “UGHH 3 SPAM CHEESE L2P BADDIE” basically the same thing many people already see now…. So the point in the nerf is???

I was thinking, they literally re-introduced a mechanic they were trying to get rid of on shortbow. The #3 spam. This is only going to get worse. I see the aftercast butchering already incoming.

The problems they had with SB3 wasn’t about dodge spamming but the combination of dodge spamming + range + reposition to further increase range + added cripple/cripple spam which couldn’t be cleansed due to the re-application of it. Simply, this design made the skill stronger when spammed and didn’t carry much reward for not using it only once or twice.

So this revamped S/D allows for an evasive style but prevents really any damage or huge repositions from being performed/condis applied/boons being stripped during the process of just dodging. The old FS was the same thing as the part 1 of the new skill, and it had no problems. They simply just wanted to make the skill have more depth to it, which is what they now have, seeing as it can act as a chain evade source – or – a source of damage and boon stripping.

DeceiverX.8361:

FeelsAlright.5860:

Amonatory.2453:

Even if people see it as a buff its really not going to do anything but cause more QQ and lead it to another nerf….. So my question is why go through the trouble remaking something that didnt need remade into something people may possibly wine about more than they already do? “UGHH 3 SPAM CHEESE L2P BADDIE” basically the same thing many people already see now…. So the point in the nerf is???

I was thinking, they literally re-introduced a mechanic they were trying to get rid of on shortbow. The #3 spam. This is only going to get worse. I see the aftercast butchering already incoming.

The problems they had with SB3 wasn’t about dodge spamming but the combination of dodge spamming + range + reposition to further increase range + added cripple/cripple spam which couldn’t be cleansed due to the re-application of it. Simply, this design made the skill stronger when spammed and didn’t carry much reward for not using it only once or twice.

So this revamped S/D allows for an evasive style but prevents really any damage or huge repositions from being performed/condis applied/boons being stripped during the process of just dodging. The old FS was the same thing as the part 1 of the new skill, and it had no problems. They simply just wanted to make the skill have more depth to it, which is what they now have, seeing as it can act as a chain evade source – or – a source of damage and boon stripping.

S/D will literally be pointless in a tpvp match, thief is supposed to be able to burst quick, which with S/D sigil procs you could and steal boons but now if this goes through you will literally be worthless and just be pressing 3 hoping for it to connect and spamming it just for evades causing more QQ and thus getting S/D nerfed again and as I said…. Whats the point??

Burst doesn’t exist in sPvP. Like really, especially compared to WvW where the crit damage scaling cap doesn’t exist.. If you want burst, I suggest looking into dagger mainhand or P/P. S/D was designed as the more attrition-based set. Frankly, I’ve had pretty fair luck with P/P in sPvP for bursting. What S/D can now do is play a substantially better defense if it chooses to while still tactically cutting away boons and ultimately grinding an opponent down through multiple forms of counterplay and lockdown while remaining mobile.

I’m sorry that you can’t use #3 for your dodge and damage anymore, but I think this change is designed to do exactly that, while re-enabling the attrition S/D evasion builds but simply giving them extra utility and more depth as the split on FS was designed to do to begin with rather than just giving S/D spammable burst damage.

I can understand what anet is trying to address: the 100% probability of hitting (at a cost of 5 ini) with the highest damaging (+boon stealing) skill in the S/D set. Imo it’s not really at all a problem related to the amount of evades that we get from S/D + Acro.

I can understand less how they’re addressing it (as usual with anet). The solution should have been this:

- Ini cost of FS+LS: same as now.
- FS: it opens no matter what the LS, as it is now.
- LS: leave it as it is now, but remove the unblockable part of the skill (or maybe lessen the ini cost to 1 instead of 2).

I say this because FS is a kitten long and telegraphed skill, which can blocked/dodged very easily, so I can see Amo point regarding the fact that S/D dps will get down the drain against almost everyone.

Sure, with the actual proposed change, we’ll have more dodge uptime, but even on a cap point in the end we’ll have ini problems and with a lot less damage done on the other player, and this is bad, since evading a lot but not putting pressure (as in: make damage) will let us give the cap to the oppo.

Granted, this nerf will more than likely go through, I wish they would at least compensate it by giving the double boon rip back to LS.

I completely agree with you Amon. S/D isn’t OP and didn’t need a nerf, it’s the Acrobatics tree that needs to be changed.