Guild Wars 2

So in preparation for Tuesdays patch I’m sitting here trying to pick out which of the new traits will fit best into a new D/D build, and that’s when i started looking at the new Shadow Arts line, currently this line is the go-to line for many D/D thieves due to the weapon sets reliance on stealth for survival and back-stabs for damage.

While the current master tier traits are lacking in this line; that isn’t so much of a problem because you can just use 2 of the adept traits instead, but with the coming patch you are forced to pick one of three (IMO) lackluster traits (for D/D) if you choose to take this line.

For reference here are the post-patch master traits:

Shadow Protector: When you grant stealth to an ally, they gain 3 seconds of
regeneration. No longer has an internal cool down.

Hidden Thief: Gain stealth for 2 seconds when stealing from an enemy. (Actually 3 seconds because of MwS)

Leeching Venoms: Siphon life from your foes when triggering a venom. This can only occur once per strike. Gain 2 stacks of might for 20 seconds when activating a venom.

So bearing in mind this is for a classic power based D/D (mostly WvW) build I’m having a hard time picking which of these will actually be the most useful.

First is Shadow Protector, currently this is actually a pretty decent trait that is seldom used due to it sharing slots with Shadow’s Embrace and Cloaked in Shadow, it gives 10 seconds of regeneration to you and allies every time you use a stealth ability which currently doesn’t stack if you already have Regen on you.

My problem with this one is twofold, firstly it’s been nerfed in duration by 70% which is pretty huge, however it now stacks if you have Regen (no ICD). The second problem with this is that SA no longer gives any healing power leaving thieves with a whopping 0 outside of gear choices meaning that 3 seconds of Regen will only end up healing for around 260-300 which is really weak and outside of Shadow Refuge you can’t really stack it anyways due to Revealed .

Second is Hidden Thief, another trait that seems good on the surface but is actually pretty useless to D/D for 2 reasons, first if you run the Mug trait currently any damage cause by mug will immediately cancel out the stealth caused by HT leaving you with nothing but 3 seconds of revealed.
Second is a D/D staple and one of the main reasons this isn’t used; the CnD/Steal combo which is universally better to use for stealth due to its high damage and synergy with Mug, running this trait would cause the combo to reveal you instantly.

Lastly is Leeching Venoms, Nothing wrong with this trait, overall it’s good however it’s only ever really useful with a primary venom build, which D/D – S/D are not, only potential use I can see is if you run Basilisk Venom which would really depend on how much the life siphon is.

TLDR; So i guess what I’m asking for are other opinions on what a good choice for this particular tier would actually be given that all 3 seem rather meh atm.

From what you’ve described, I think you’re stuck with Shadow Protector. Given that you’ll be in and out of stealth frequently during a fight, you might get some mileage out of it.

The only way I can see it go differently is if you either replace Mug, or decide to carry venoms on your build. I’ve heard many a horror story about devourer venom (delicious instant immobilize), and basilisk venom could be useful in WvW as well, but I think you’d know better than me if you want to use those.

Mug could be replaced with Dagger Training (Could help proc the Weakness from Lotus poison?) which would let you use Steal as a seperate stealth skill from C&D. The biggest benefit I see there is being able to stealth one more time even when low on initiative, but I don’t know how often you find yourself in that situation.

I always use d/d and s/d https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0E_aRXJSjA

Softspoken.2410:

From what you’ve described, I think you’re stuck with Shadow Protector. Given that you’ll be in and out of stealth frequently during a fight, you might get some mileage out of it.

Yeah this is what I was afraid of, with Shadow Arts we’re already pigeonholed into taking Shadow’s Embrace in the adept tier due to the overall lack of a reliable condi cleanse (not to mention SR in the GM slot) and now a measly 3 seconds of regen with 0 Healing power amounting to a whopping ~300 healing per stealth seems the best option.

I was looking at the possibility of running Devourer/Basilisk venom last night but then I recalled another line from the patch notes:

Basilisk Venom: Stun duration reduced from 1.5 seconds to 1 second.
Devourer Venom: Immobilize duration reduced from 2 seconds to 1 second.

With both of these nerfed by 50% baseline and the removal of condition duration from traits, they will be much less useful outside of a venom build (which boosts duration by 33%). I realize that venoms now get an extra stack baseline but since basilisk doesn’t stack and 3 stacks of Devourer at 1 second is still 1 second less then it was before; taking this trait would entirely depend on how much the “life siphon” damage/healing will be.

Shadow Protector honestly wouldn’t be such a bad option if it wasn’t nerfed so hard, IMO they should have taken the duration down to 6-8 seconds and placed a cap on the max duration you can get from stealth (like guardians and symbol of swiftness) so you can’t get 30+ seconds using just Shadow Refuge.

This would hardly be “powerful” since we still have 0 healing power but it would at least be a little less meh; it’s not like we have boon duration anymore either.

Isn’t mug supposed to not reveal you with hidden thief? Isn’t that a bug they’re supposed to be picking?

That would be my goto trait, and I tend to run my d/d build without mug, so I probably wont run into the bug if it’s still around. Allows for an initiative-less backstab initiation.

OP, I don’t mean to bust your bubble about Hidden Thief, but Arenanet was going to blend that with descent of shadows, which basically would have been using blinding powder on steal. I imagine they had trouble coding it and making it work right though, so they reverted the change.

So they then listed Hidden Thief and stated (Automatically works with Meld with Shadows) Well … I just want to spread awareness on this … because I’ve always played Shadow Arts, and this is like a slap in the face.

THAT IS EXACTLY HOW HIDDEN THIEF CURRENTLY WORKS. In other words they listed a trait as if it’s being changed when it’s not even being changed / buffed at all. Seriously, go try Shadow Arts now, grab hidden thief, and mouse over steal.

Arenanet screwed us out of that change and then tried to cover it up by saying it “automatically works with Meld with Shadows” as if it’s something new, when it is not something new, it has ALWAYS been this way.

I seriously hate Arenanet all over again. :l

Hidden thief doesn’t look that great offensively because it’s a defensive tool. Eat an earthshaker? Confuse the kitten out of that warrior because you already popped blinding powder.

Nomad.4301:

Second is Hidden Thief, another trait that seems good on the surface but is actually pretty useless to D/D for 2 reasons, first if you run the Mug trait currently any damage cause by mug will immediately cancel out the stealth caused by HT leaving you with nothing but 3 seconds of revealed.
Second is a D/D staple and one of the main reasons this isn’t used; the CnD/Steal combo which is universally better to use for stealth due to its high damage and synergy with Mug, running this trait would cause the combo to reveal you instantly.

No it does the stealth after the damage proc.

Shadow.1345:

No it does the stealth after the damage proc.

I just used it in-game and mug does indeed interfere with Hidden Thief giving 3 seconds of reveal instead of 3 seconds of stealth, I believe at one point this “bug” was fixed but a recent patch re-introduced it, and while it might be fixed again by Tuesday; they never said anything about fixing it in the posted patch notes.

bringing back cloaked in shadows and/or infusion of shadows to master tier would make things more manageable