Guild Wars 2

1) Two stealing mechanics for a class that works with two range levels.

F1 key: Steal. 900 range. Shadowstep to your foe and steal from them. Prioritizes stealing melee objects from the stealing pool.
F2 key: Grappling hook. 900 range. Throw a grappling hook to your foe and steal from them. Prioritizes stealing ranged objects from the stealing pool. Ranged projectile combo finisher.

Each have an independent cooldown, but succesfully using one would set the other on a 15-20 sec. cooldown. This means that you could potentially store two objects for you to use, given that you wait long enough.

2) When steal fails, don’t give it its full cooldown.

I know of no other class mechanic that can go on full cooldown without doing anything. Too often steal just doesn’t do anything, doesn’t shadowstep, mug, thrill or recuperate initiative only to go on its 45s cooldown. This just sucks.

I must add as a personal comment that steal is quite uninteresting in design compared to all other profession mechanics. It’s far from useless, but also far from necessary to play the class – I use it because “it’s there”, not because it’s core to how the class plays like Eles or Mesmers, to name these.

I strongly support the f2 idea… really sucks trying to steal from anti-melee bosses in my ranged build then having to blow an evade, or a wad of init on getting back out to range.

Lol, so your suggestion is to have a second steal? What about items like plasma, or feathers? Are they ranged or melee?

And your second point, what are you talking about? If you’re out of range when using steal you get like 3 seconds of cooldown, not the whole 30. Also every skill activates the full cooldown when it’s blocked, dodged or missed. Check the mesmers ilusions summons for example…

Steal is just fine, maybe even OP a little. If you use it just to gain an ability you don’t understand it’s full potential. A huge INSTANT gap closer dealing massive damage while stealthing you and blinding everyone around WHILE getting an aditional ability is not enough for you??

you have to trait for it to do half of that
compare it to other classes’ after they’re beefed theirs out as well, and it may even look UP. Guardian can stun break and give aegis to the entire party with a mere 1/3 of its profession skills

but yeah I think steal is fine

I’m onboard with giving steal an F2 ranged option. I think changing the steal results is overthinking it a bit though. The main problem as it stands is steal forcing you to close range even when you’re not trying to attain melee range. Giving it the ability to work at a range would open up more synergy without really making it any more powerful.

I think its too late for changes to steal, if they were going to change it it would have happened by now. Perhaps some change via modified traits, dunno. It is mostly useful for melee and i think you just have to work with that when deciding on your build/options

that being said the cooldown does need to be fixed on “steal failed” with only 1 possible ability every 45 sec or whatever, i kinda feel like i barely have a class mechanic on thief.

Lol, missing the steal and having the cooldown isn’t really all that bad, just don’t mess up which is quite easy to do… I used to play a banner warrior. If you tried to summon your elite banner anything canceled the animation and made the banner go on full cd.

Stealing is really useful. I use it as a gap closer+buff alongside an extra additional item. I hardly fail and when I’m in range mode all I do is either wait for enough Ini to steal and use 3 on bow twice or roll for ini (in case I stole w/o ini), or shadow step. All those skills are meant for moving back. & Even w/o traits it’s still like a mobility skill, sure it doesn’t break stun but lets say you’re fighting a ranged mob (you think that’s great right?) you get stunned and you have an aoe. You think to yourself.. ooo dodge or shadowstep but neither of them work… now what? You’re taking serious damage just by being in that aoe… STEAL!. It’ll move you to that person, sure you’re still immobile but no longer in the AOE.

Personally I don’t see the reason behind a Grapple. In fact, if given the choice I’d still use other one because for a short moment I can switch to a melee and deal a quite a bit of burst damage and then move back and switch to range.

supergica.8652:

And your second point, what are you talking about? If you’re out of range when using steal you get like 3 seconds of cooldown, not the whole 30. Also every skill activates the full cooldown when it’s blocked, dodged or missed. Check the mesmers ilusions summons for example…

Sometimes you get the full cooldown. I’m not sure of the conditions, but it happens. Sometimes it’ll be 5 seconds. It’s a strange thing.

supergica.8652:

Steal is just fine, maybe even OP a little. If you use it just to gain an ability you don’t understand it’s full potential. A huge INSTANT gap closer dealing massive damage while stealthing you and blinding everyone around WHILE getting an aditional ability is not enough for you??

I’m not discussing its state in balance, I’m discussing its design as a class mechanic. Half of the thief weapon sets are ranged, so from a design standpoint, it makes little sense to be limited to a melee class defining mechanic.

Psikerlord.2569:

I think its too late for changes to steal, if they were going to change it it would have happened by now.

That’s a really lame way of looking at things, you fatalistic you.

xyger.7349:

Lol, missing the steal and having the cooldown isn’t really all that bad, just don’t mess up which is quite easy to do… I used to play a banner warrior. If you tried to summon your elite banner anything canceled the animation and made the banner go on full cd.

It’s not about “messing up” or “not”. It’s about a skill going on cooldown when it seemingly shouldn’t. Period. I literally feel like the skill is broken due to this. Imagine using a warrior adrenal skill, but losing all of your adrenaline for no effect. And a cooldown. Imagine switching attunement with your elementalist. But staying in the same attunement for no apparent reason.

Do these examples feel far stretched to you? I hope not, because this is what happens with Steal.

xyger.7349:

Stealing is really useful. (+ boring anecdotes)

I’m not questioning its usefulness. I’m questioning its design and working aspect.

xyger.7349:

Personally I don’t see the reason behind a Grapple. In fact, if given the choice I’d still use other one because for a short moment I can switch to a melee and deal a quite a bit of burst damage and then move back and switch to range.

The reason is that the thief has a choice of playstyle, and not all of them involve being in melee range.

Once again, the warrior’s mechanic, adrenal skills, don’t lose their value when they pick up a ranged weapon. Nor do the mechanics of elementalists, necromancers, mesmers, engineers, rangers or guardians.

If you’re using a SB or P/P, you typically want to avoid melee range outside finishers, and basically 100% of the time while in PvE. Why should I have to waste dodge rolls to make use of my mechanic? This makes no sense.

supergica.8652:

Lol, so your suggestion is to have a second steal? What about items like plasma, or feathers? Are they ranged or melee?

And your second point, what are you talking about? If you’re out of range when using steal you get like 3 seconds of cooldown, not the whole 30. Also every skill activates the full cooldown when it’s blocked, dodged or missed. Check the mesmers ilusions summons for example…

Steal is just fine, maybe even OP a little. If you use it just to gain an ability you don’t understand it’s full potential. A huge INSTANT gap closer dealing massive damage while stealthing you and blinding everyone around WHILE getting an aditional ability is not enough for you??

I get the feeling you’re trolling, or you, yourself don’t understand steal…perhaps, you don’t even play thief.

All steal really provides is an instant gap closer (unless interrupted)…and depending on what you steal from, a mediocre skill. Everything else you mentioned is all from traits. Just because the traits are available, doesn’t mean they’re being used. There’s no “massive damage” from steal. It’s perfectly fine damage wise when traited with Mug. I get tired of repeating myself, but it seems like people will never understand that WvW numbers are irrelevant.

Personally, I feel steal is, and always have been underwhelming as a class specific skill. I only end up using it in PvE as a gap closer, or to trigger a 10s swiftness while blowing through jumping puzzles, or traversing across maps. As for PvP, again, I use it as a gap closer, stomping teleporting thieves, or to trigger a 10s fury and swiftness when needed. As for those swiftness and fury, I have to go out of my way to trait them to have access to thief’s one and only on demand swiftness/fury.

Literally, AFTER traiting it, I feel like it’s simply another utility skill that provides me 2~4 useful buffs. It feels nothing like how the other class’s class specific skills feel like.