Guild Wars 2

For a D/D DD condi thief. Sinister seems to be more of a hybrid dmg while Dire gives a lot of tankiness. We’ll have a kitten-load of evades so maybe having extra tankiness is not so useful? Worth noting I’ve been maining a power backstab built since I made my thief so this entire playstyle will be new to me.

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Gray.9041:

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

reinforever.8902:

Gray.9041:

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

Cuz every tiger lily that posts here is a top teir super thief…. Every word is accepted doctrine… Like duh, everyone knows this

Efface.8460:

reinforever.8902:

Gray.9041:

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

Cuz every tiger lily that posts here is a top teir super thief…. Every word is accepted doctrine… Like duh, everyone knows this

Helpful
/15chars

reinforever.8902:

Gray.9041:

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

I’ve done it in more detail elsewhere, but the short version is, in my opinion:

• not enough damaging conditions (no more than 2 from any weapon, not many on utilities)
• not enough damaging conditions to match burning
• conditions are to long – usually quite easy to cleanse (burn can do most/all damage in a few seconds. bleeds/poisons can last 20s easily. if you take 2-3s to get a cleanse off, then you take most of the burn damage, but only 10-20% of the bleed/poison)
• damage in to damage out (conditions take time to work, and in that time you’ll be taken down long before you take them down, between the weaker condition damage and incredible squishiness thieves have.)

reinforever.8902:

Efface.8460:

reinforever.8902:

Gray.9041:

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

Cuz every tiger lily that posts here is a top teir super thief…. Every word is accepted doctrine… Like duh, everyone knows this

Helpful
/15chars

That was code language for complete viability…. Just takes a flexible playstyle, and plenty of cover conditions…. Knowing how to stay alive without stealth is a skill most folks never care to proficient themselves with, unfortunately, hence the dated dogma

Efface.8460:

reinforever.8902:

Efface.8460:

reinforever.8902:

Gray.9041:

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

Cuz every tiger lily that posts here is a top teir super thief…. Every word is accepted doctrine… Like duh, everyone knows this

Helpful
/15chars

That was code language for complete viability…. Just takes a flexible playstyle, and plenty of cover conditions…. Knowing how to stay alive without stealth is a skill most folks never care to proficient themselves with, unfortunately, hence the dated dogma

it’s less dated dogma and more personal experience – despite all the issues I’ve listed, I’ve been running a D/D condi thief more or less since launch.

Gray.9041:

Efface.8460:

reinforever.8902:

Efface.8460:

reinforever.8902:

Gray.9041:

I’d say dire, but I’d also say that condi thief’s not really doable.

with sinisters, you take advantage of the power on the daredevil, but even with all those evades, it’ll only take a couple of slip ups, a few moments without endurance, and you’ll be dead.

with dire, you’ll be tankier, but won’t do much damage – thief just can’t dump the amount of Damaging Conditions it needs to.

if you’re looking for something in between though, maybe try carrion? it give CD, power and vitality, so it’s a bit of damage and a bit of tankiness.

Curious, but why is condi thief not viable?

Cuz every tiger lily that posts here is a top teir super thief…. Every word is accepted doctrine… Like duh, everyone knows this

Helpful
/15chars

That was code language for complete viability…. Just takes a flexible playstyle, and plenty of cover conditions…. Knowing how to stay alive without stealth is a skill most folks never care to proficient themselves with, unfortunately, hence the dated dogma

it’s less dated dogma and more personal experience – despite all the issues I’ve listed, I’ve been running a D/D condi thief more or less since launch.

Cool…. The dated dogma comment wasn’t directly referring to any of your comments, just the general ambient feelings most folk around here have against any build other than d/p…. As if nothing else works in the entire thief lineup…..and of course burn is the best damaging condition at the moment, but condi-stacking is far from a kitten alternative, specially considering all the duration reductions for burning…. And since few skills can cleanse more than 3 icons at a time without noticeable cool downs, my experience is different…..
Most of the stuff I’ve seen from the “recognized” meta comes off as more troll builds than anything else… Team support is minimal, effectiveness is situation at best and relies mostly on the inexperience of the targets…. Imo condi builds bring way more to the table than disengagement builds…. To each their own tho… Glad ur still making d/d work for u, I commend you

Cough https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsulkt11rDw Cough

Thief can seriously dump condi’s on someone to kill them in less than 4 seconds.

The problem is sustained condition damage, not the conditions in the first place. Once they’re cleansed, you’ve gotta rely on your mobility and dodge skills until you’re cooldowns are ready.

I can confirm from personal experience that, unfortunately, Thief condition builds are not viable in SPvP. Despite this truth, I still spend a vast majority of my time in SPvP TRYING to make Thief condition builds work, because it is overwhelmingly my preferred playstyle… P/D especially.

Gray summed it up pretty well above (and elsewhere), but gist of it is that Thief just can’t output enough damaging conditions over time for conditions to be a viable playstyle in SPvP. Thief weapons are generally bad at applying damaging conditions, leaving us to rely on high cooldown utility skills. Once you’ve blown your utilities and your opponent cleanses off that stack of Bleed/Poison, you’re boned.

Another big reason is our lacking durability and weird/non-existent scaling from defensive stats. This makes it very hard to find a stat package in SPvP that works for both doing damage and not instantly dying to it.

You have more freedom in WvW, where you can mix and match your gear and you aren’t constrained to the “five-man teams holding control points on a small map” SPvP meta. Even then, you still have to use conditions in a specific way (trap setups mostly) to achieve a remotely viable condition build.

Essentially, Thief’s ability to apply damaging conditions needs a lot of work. The ball’s in your court on that one, Karl.

If you run a venom thief in a group just run dire. You won’t have to attack much and can instead focus on saving stupid allies. Different way to play. If you really wanna have a laughable time find a lb ranger friend who can stay alive. Just “spotter” for the ranger with venoms as they rapidfire piles of conditions and leeching dmg onto a helpless foe.

Justine.6351:

If you run a venom thief in a group just run dire.

Hello Justine,
I got here following your reply to my thread, so thank you for the information.

One more question:

Is the Dire only available from the Crucible of Eternity dungeon?
I checked the Temples and they do not seam to sell that for Karma…
What are my options?

I prefer shamans myself In Shamans If I venom share each strike of venom heals myself and those I share it wth by 526 per strike. With spider venom that is a total heal of over 3100 for myself and 5 teamates. They love me for it. They go OOOOOOH ahhhhhhh!

Dire can be bought at the TP.

maybe a mix of Shaman and Dire?
I saw that Shamans is available from Caudecus’s Manor.

rogerwilko.6895:

maybe a mix of Shaman and Dire?
I saw that Shamans is available from Caudecus’s Manor.

I mixed my own dire/shamans with most armor shamans and trinkets about an even split.

This can give you 900 plus heal 2800 armor and 18k base health. Very robust as the condition damge is right close to 2k.

Torment rune full Dire gear condi thief. I melt faces. Melted this necro so fast 17 torment stacks + poison, confusion, bleeds and god knows what else I’m surprised they didnt x-fer them back to me.

However, any DD ele, especially with DS, will rofl stomp your kitten seeing as condis can’t really be applied to them and you have to break past that thresh hold and oh look.. Should’ve mixed in some Carrion maybe. Ah well. It’s fun, still.

PvE: unless raids are actually difficult, full sinister.
WvW Roamer: Full dire, happy trolling
WvW Havoc/Zerg: Carrion so you can damage siege.

Spurrlock.3219:

PvE: unless raids are actually difficult, full sinister.
WvW Roamer: Full dire, happy trolling
WvW Havoc/Zerg: Carrion so you can damage siege.

When HoT launches you will need vita in zerg play most likely as they are removing guard stacks.

Carrion is condi / power / vitality

Spurrlock.3219:

Carrion is condi / power / vitality

Shhhh
you help me make me look dumb.

I run carrion armor/weps and ascended 6 stat crafted carrion + healing/tough/prec, toughness infusions on everything with assassin’s reward.

I also run mad king runes and signet of malice, as the mad king birds proc SoM, effectively turning BV in to a pretty good heal, or extending daggerstorm’s godmode healing after the end so you have some disengage. That ahs the added effect of basically making BV an untargeted ranged stun, but that stun becomes unreliable when more than one target is in range. I have used it to escape 1v1s, but you have to be hyper-aware of your environment as it’s just as likely to waste your stun on doors and rabbits, so it’s usually best to forget about the stun on BV and just treat it like a kitten cooldown heal with the occasional lucky stun.

I run a blight sigil on one dagger and a condi removal sigil on the other. Blight lets poison proc for weakness from deadly arts even without the auto, and helps keep the oison cover up over the bleeds. The prec from the jewelry puts crit at about 10%, which when combined with the multi-hits from deathblossom is generally enough to keep the sigil proccing around the 8s ICD. If it seems too low, you can swap out the ammy to get it up to around 14% Condi removal on hit helps keep you from getting too overloaded between clears from shadowstep, etc.

I run it in duo roaming with a necro usually, and in that setup it’s prety decent, as the necro buddy piles on more cover conditions and buffs up the life on hit even more, but it’s still not something I’ll call good for 1v1s.

It’s pretty beastly in pve though, generally outlives everyone else with the combination of evades and life on hit while slowly ticking all the bad guys to death with bleeds since mobs don’t condi clear like players do.

The daredevil’s extra dodge conditions for cover and 3x SoM hit procs from the daggers as well as the overall increased healing and condition removal should help it out a lot in wvw, but if I were going to the smaller arena game modes I’d still run something else due to the lack of the MK runes, which I feel are essential to making SoM worth putting on your bar, and I feel the build just isn’t viable without SoM due to the extra damage you’re going to take as a result of being locked in to deathblossom animations during the non-evade portion.

D/D condition isn’t a spec that’s going to give you alpha strike melt faces damage, and it’s probably not ever going to do that. It’s a bunker style spec more useful for wearing down opponents and limited small scale zerg diving or PvE tanking. if you want to kill people 1v1 with conditions as a thief I’d reccommend going for p/d stealth builds in stead, as you’re going to run a less risky and higher damage build. It’s going to be weaker in group fights due to the reliance on stealth chains, but overall better at 1v1.

I really like the build, which is why I play it, but it absolutely isn’t the best, or even a particularly good choice for 1v1 fighting compared to the thief’s other options.

I would go carrion. Still good base damage. around 20K hp. around 1400-1500 condition damage and 2K power. Right in between Dire and Sinister.