Guild Wars 2

I realized I posted on the wrong forum, Staff please delete my thread on the Player Helping Player section.

I have just started Guild Wars 2 not even 2 hours ago, going good so far, but one thing has been bothering me ever since I created my Human Thief.
I get to choose at times after certain quests, between 3 types of stats, Power, Vitality, Precision, I’m puzzled which one should I go for each time I get to choose between.
Should I go for Power OR Precision? Because I think Vitality is out of the choice. Please do guide me along my question, and I will really appreciate it.
PS – How can I add my stats of my character and how do I open up my character screen?
Thank you.

You can view stats of your character by pressing H (as in Hero), or clicking on the icon in the upper left corner that looks like a sword and shield.

I mostly used power stats. At lower levels your crit chance and crit damage won’t be that great, so you get more out of power. Most PvE content is trivialized when you get to know the tells (visual indication of using some special skills) of mobs. Sword/pistol and shortbow are great for leveling. Mobs attack slowly, so you can just stand in the blind field applied by pitsol #5 and use sword autoattack to kill most mob types out of water. As opposed to dagger, swords cleaves (you can damage up to 3 mobs in a frontal cone range). You can also go all condition damage, but thief weapons don’t have that many sources of condition damage.

nagymbear.5280:

You can view stats of your character by pressing H (as in Hero), or clicking on the icon in the upper left corner that looks like a sword and shield.

I mostly used power stats. At lower levels your crit chance and crit damage won’t be that great, so you get more out of power. Most PvE content is trivialized when you get to know the tells (visual indication of using some special skills) of mobs. Sword/pistol and shortbow are great for leveling. Mobs attack slowly, so you can just stand in the blind field applied by pitsol #5 and use sword autoattack to kill most mob types out of water. As opposed to dagger, swords cleaves (you can damage up to 3 mobs in a frontal cone range). You can also go all condition damage, but thief weapons don’t have that many sources of condition damage.

Hi, first of all thanks for all your useful information, I really appreciate it, but at the same time, my mind is fill with so much more new things and terms after reading your passage.

I’m using Dagger / Dagger now, is it wise and good? I personally really prefer that set despite anything else. Secondly, so I assume what you’re saying is, go for Power now? Oh and, what’s Condition ? Is it AKA Critical ?

Sorry and I hope you’ll be able to spend the short amount of time answering my doubts, very new here.

Weapons can deal direct damage and/or condition damage. The damage included under the dagger auto attack for example is an indication of how much direct damage you will deal. This is modified by the power you have, and by crit damage. Condition damage raises damage dealt by bleeding, poison, burning, torment and confusion. D/D can be good single target damage if you use the backstab attack (i.e. your autoattack changes when in stealth, this is ture for all weapons on thief). If you stand behind the mobs this is nice damage, but there are restrictions to using stealth. If you attack when in stealth, you get a debuff which doesn’t allow you to stealth for another 3 seconds. So you can stealth with dagger #5, get behind mob and hit #1. If you go contition damage, your best bet is getting caltrops as a utility skill, and using d/d #3 to stack bleeds (25 max).

Caltrops? How do I get Caltrops? What’s a ultility skill? Sorry, don’t get either of that, but for the rest I do. Please tell me more about Caltrops utility skill. And what’s the d/d #3 that you’re mentioning about?

Dualwielding weapons on thieves works differently than other classes. Main hand and off hand wepons only have fixed skills on 1, 2 and 4, 5 on your hotbar. 3 is determined by their combination. For other classes #3 skill would be determined by the main hand weapon. So your dagger, dagger #3 skill will be different than dagger, pistol #3. Skills 1-5 are weapon skills, #6 is your heal skill, skills 7-9 are your utility skills. You will unlock these by leveling up, and the skill points you get by beating skill challanges, and leveling you can spend on utility skills. Than you can choose which utility skill to use on your 7-9 skills. Caltrops is an area of effect skill (AoE) which poisons and bleeds monsters, and dagger, dagger #3 also deals bleeding. So you can apply lots of damaging conditions with these. The higher your condition damage stat, the more damage you deal with bleeding and poison. Poison has lower damage than a few stacks of bleeds, its main advantage is that it reduces healing. Most monsters won’t heal, but scalks regenerate, so its great against them. Poison only stacks in duration though, not like bleed where you can have more bleeds at the same type.

Edit: Sorry, caltrops don’t apply poison, only cripple.

Ahhh I get it, so right now I’m using Dagger and Dagger, my #3 skills is a skill that cause condition damage to monsters ? Oh and now I get it about the Caltrops utility skills, what you mean is I’ll get them eventually as I level up, yeah?

Daniel Lee.8164:

Ahhh I get it, so right now I’m using Dagger and Dagger, my #3 skills is a skill that cause condition damage to monsters ? Oh and now I get it about the Caltrops utility skills, what you mean is I’ll get them eventually as I level up, yeah?

If you move your mouse over your #3 skill. You can see some useful info. The first line says how much direct damage it will deal. The second line says how much condition damage it will deal (the amount is included for 3 stacks of bleeding over 10 seconds). The third line indicates that you will evade. When you evade, you don’t get hit, so no direct damge if you time it right, and no conditions applied by targeted skills. The fourth line says its a whirl finisher. When you use a combo finisher together with a combo field you get some additional effects. You can find out more here http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Combo. So a skill may do many things.

Wow, ok thanks. I’ll look into my #3 skills. Are there any helpful tips you could give out to me as a beginner Thief getting on my journey ?

Thief is squishy in pve, so you need some skill for leveling. But when you get the hang of things, it will be easy. Keep a pistol for big guys you can’t deal with, standing in a blind field makes life a lot easier. And learn to use dodge/evades. Its crucial in this game, you can’t just stand around and hit stuff to death, unless you stand in a blind field of course.

Will do, yep I understand the dodge/ attack thingy, getting used to it in some MMORPGs. Anyway, how do I obtain a Pistol / Shortbow ? And which combination would be better ? Shortbow / Dagger or Pistol / Dagger?

From level 11 I think you will have the option to equip 2 weaponsets, and you can switch between them in combat. You will get a cooldown on weaopnswap though. Shortbow is 2handed, so when I wrote sword/pistol shortbow, I meant s/p in one set and shortbow in the other. You can buy a cheap one from the Black lion trading post so you can unlock the skills with that too.

I see, so which means now if I get shortbow, I will get a completely whole set of skills to unlock from 1 – etc? Oh and also, can I add attributes at H ? Or it’s automated as I level up?

Daniel Lee.8164:

I see, so which means now if I get shortbow, I will get a completely whole set of skills to unlock from 1 – etc? Oh and also, can I add attributes at H ? Or it’s automated as I level up?

Stats are gained automatically as you level up. The only way of changing your stats is by equipping gear with different sets of stats.

Use Sword/Pistol to level up, use the pistol #5 to avoid most damage and go for all offensive stats and traits (power, precision, crit damage)

Velcome to da ranks of da Thieves!

To start with, your base amount of stats are automatically increased when you level up, to a total of 918 in Power, Precision, Toughness and Vitality at level 80. You artificially increase these stats through spending points in specific trait lines and equiping armor, weapons, and trinkets.
- Trait lines provide benefits as well as the aforementioned stat boost, so choose wisely. (Trait points can also be refunded if you want to try something new or make a mistake.)
- Depending on what build you want to run, you’ll choose from several sets of equipment with differing combinations of stats. Some of the more common ones you’ll hear about are Berserker’s, Assassin’s, Soldier’s, and Knight’s.

As for leveling up, go with what you like! Figuring out what weapon sets, equipment builds, and trait builds is what makes it fun. Personally, I stick to melee on my thief, and was switching between Dagger/Dagger, Sword/Dagger, and Sword/Pistol while leveling.

To clear up some information:
- You unlock the ability to swap between two different sets of equipped weapons at level 7.
- At levels 5, 10, and 20, you unlock the three utility skill slots.
- At level 30, you unlock the elite skill slot.
- When you first start using a weapon, only the first skill will be unlocked. To unlock the rest of the weapon skills, you earn experience from killing mobs with that weapon. The more experience per kill, the faster the skills unlock.
-Tooltips:
— Any damage listed on a tooltip is direct damage applied to the target.
— Tooltips will list conditions, and the duration/overall damage of the condition, seperately.
— Tooltips will also list information like skill range, number of targets, buffs you gain, etc.

Hope this helps!

Diak Atoli.2085:

Velcome to da ranks of da Thieves!

To start with, your base amount of stats are automatically increased when you level up, to a total of 918 in Power, Precision, Toughness and Vitality at level 80. You artificially increase these stats through spending points in specific trait lines and equiping armor, weapons, and trinkets.
- Trait lines provide benefits as well as the aforementioned stat boost, so choose wisely. (Trait points can also be refunded if you want to try something new or make a mistake.)
- Depending on what build you want to run, you’ll choose from several sets of equipment with differing combinations of stats. Some of the more common ones you’ll hear about are Berserker’s, Assassin’s, Soldier’s, and Knight’s.

As for leveling up, go with what you like! Figuring out what weapon sets, equipment builds, and trait builds is what makes it fun. Personally, I stick to melee on my thief, and was switching between Dagger/Dagger, Sword/Dagger, and Sword/Pistol while leveling.

To clear up some information:
- You unlock the ability to swap between two different sets of equipped weapons at level 7.
- At levels 5, 10, and 20, you unlock the three utility skill slots.
- At level 30, you unlock the elite skill slot.
- When you first start using a weapon, only the first skill will be unlocked. To unlock the rest of the weapon skills, you earn experience from killing mobs with that weapon. The more experience per kill, the faster the skills unlock.
-Tooltips:
— Any damage listed on a tooltip is direct damage applied to the target.
— Tooltips will list conditions, and the duration/overall damage of the condition, seperately.
— Tooltips will also list information like skill range, number of targets, buffs you gain, etc.

Hope this helps!

Hi , thanks a lot for your reply and I really appreciate it. After looking at what you wrote, I believe you have a huge experience regarding the job Thief.

I have a few doubts before I move on, how could I use finisher, or how could I use combo? They say that a skill can do a lot of things, but that is the part I do not understand.

Second thing would be, if I wear Sword / Dagger, would I get a completely whole new set of skills of the skills will be the one that I’m having as Dagger / Dagger ? I’m currently using Dagger / Dagger, and I prefer this set and I think it’s great, your opinion?

Sorry for taking up your time and I appreciate and awaits your reply!

Wonders if Daniel Lee is talking to someone behind him.

Before I answer your questions, and I’m quite happy to, might I suggest [url]wiki.guildwars2.com[url]? Aside from some mechanical misinformation, the rest is quite good!

Now, onwards!

Combos are interactions between a Finisher and a Combo Field. You generate a combo by using the finisher inside the field, which produces some kind of effect.
Finishers: Blast, Leap, Projectile, Whirl
Combo Fields: Dark, Ethereal, Fire, Ice, Water, Smoke, Lightning, Poison, Light
— Example: A whirl finisher inside a fire field produces bolts that set nearby foes on fire.

As for your second question… Welcome to thieves. One of their main mechanics is called the Dual Skill. The first two and last two weapon skills are determined by the weapon in that hand. The third skill, or dual skill, is determined by the combination of weapons. Note: two-handed weapons don’t have a dual skill, merely a third skill.
— For example, your dagger/dagger setup has two main-hand dagger skills, Double Strike (Chain) and Heartseeker, two off-hand dagger skills, Dancing Dagger and Cloak & Dagger, and the dual skill, Death Blossom.
— If you switch your main-hand weapon to Sword, you would gain the main-hand skills Slice (Chain) and Infiltrator’s Strike, and the dual skill would change to Flanking Strike. You would skill keep Dancing Dagger and Cloak & Dagger, because those are tied to your off-hand, and not the entire dagger/dagger setup.

As for my opinion on dagger/dagger? Well, I do run both sword/dagger and dagger/dagger.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Combo

At low level you probably want to keep your tactics and gear quite simple. Sword+pistol and pistol+dagger are two simple weapon sets that can be used without any traits or utilities. As a thief you don’t want to stand toe to toe with enemies without some defenses. Those weapon pairings give you smoke, dazes, and cripple for simple defense.

Diak Atoli.2085:

Wonders if Daniel Lee is talking to someone behind him.

Before I answer your questions, and I’m quite happy to, might I suggest [url]wiki.guildwars2.com[url]? Aside from some mechanical misinformation, the rest is quite good!

Now, onwards!

Combos are interactions between a Finisher and a Combo Field. You generate a combo by using the finisher inside the field, which produces some kind of effect.
Finishers: Blast, Leap, Projectile, Whirl
Combo Fields: Dark, Ethereal, Fire, Ice, Water, Smoke, Lightning, Poison, Light
— Example: A whirl finisher inside a fire field produces bolts that set nearby foes on fire.

As for your second question… Welcome to thieves. One of their main mechanics is called the Dual Skill. The first two and last two weapon skills are determined by the weapon in that hand. The third skill, or dual skill, is determined by the combination of weapons. Note: two-handed weapons don’t have a dual skill, merely a third skill.
— For example, your dagger/dagger setup has two main-hand dagger skills, Double Strike (Chain) and Heartseeker, two off-hand dagger skills, Dancing Dagger and Cloak & Dagger, and the dual skill, Death Blossom.
— If you switch your main-hand weapon to Sword, you would gain the main-hand skills Slice (Chain) and Infiltrator’s Strike, and the dual skill would change to Flanking Strike. You would skill keep Dancing Dagger and Cloak & Dagger, because those are tied to your off-hand, and not the entire dagger/dagger setup.

As for my opinion on dagger/dagger? Well, I do run both sword/dagger and dagger/dagger.

Ok, I got most of the part, but still, not the combo. How do I generate a Finisher inside a field, and what’s a field? Since you said by using a combo, I need to generate it by a Finisher, so.. Heh, mind explaining?

I read the link that Stooperdale gave, I went into the Combos table for Thief, and I went through it, can I say that the reason I can’t use combo now is that because I don’t have the skills that it mentions? Like Dancing Dagger, Heartseeker, Death Blossom, this 3.

Here you go, Daniel Lee.

For the most part, yes. Aside from Choking Gas and Black Powder, which are shortbow and pistol skills respectively, you won’t have many field-generating skills this early. However, you can combo off of other players’ fields, and they can do the same with yours.

The easiest way to tell if a skill will generate a combo field or finisher is by looking at the tooltip. That will tell you if it produces a finisher or combo field, and what specific type.

Ok, so basically am I correct to say before I get those skills that I mentioned above, I won’t be able to use any combo?

Oh and, I have 1 more question, I can only use different combination of weapon like Sword / Dagger only after when I reach level 7 ? Is there a way to tell it ?

Yes, you would be correct.

Daniel Lee.8164:

Oh and, I have 1 more question, I can only use different combination of weapon like Sword / Dagger only after when I reach level 7 ? Is there a way to tell it ?

No. At level 7 you gain the ability to equip a second weapon set, which you can then switch to in combat. You can use any of the different weapon combinations right from the start, merely needing to unlock the weapon skills as explained earlier.

Ahhh, I see. So right now I have a Sword in my inventory, and 2 daggers that I’m wearing atm, so can I use the sword / dagger combination now ? If I were to use it, should I put sword in main hand or dagger in main hand or it doesn’t matter ?

Add-On ; For the unlocking the weapon, do I have to press H and unlock it from the left side of the panel before I can wear Sword / Dagger ?

At the moment, thieves can only use swords in the main-hand, but yes, you can use sword/dagger right now.

Ahh ok, so now I believe you mentioned it before, now when I change to Sword / Dagger, my skills that are hotkeyed below will be change to a different set ? Or at least, some of it?

Which would be ideal for leveling for now ? Sword / Dagger or D/D ?

Yes, the skills will change. As for what’s best for leveling I haven’t the faintest clue. I kept switching ’em out and using the ones I liked.

Alright, will do. I hope to keep you posted on what’s going on with my progress and my doubts if I have any, hopefully I would be able to leave you a PM from time to time.

Thanks for being so helpful!

You unlock weapon set skills by using them, so if you have D/D equipped, for example, each time you kill an enemy you gain a small amount of progress towards unlocking the next skill in the set.

As for your questions regarding stats, I know that most of them have already been answered, but if you want the fastest and most efficient stats for leveling then get as many stats that boost condition damage/toughness/vitality as you can and spam Death Blossom (D/D #3) on your enemies.

Make sure that you unlock Signet of Malice (heal), Caltrops (utility), and Roll for Initiative (utility) as soon as you possibly can, this will allow you to bleed your opponents to death in an AoE while gaining health back for every single hit that you do with your daggers (imagine DB dealing 3 hits on each of 6 opponents, healing for a small amount each time, that’s a LOT of healing), as well as for every second that each enemy is standing on your Caltrops field.

Trait wise, you want to put 15 intro Trickery straight away, followed by 10 in Deadly Arts for Mug, another 5 into Trickery for Trickster (grab the caltrops on dodge trait), 15 into Acrobatics for extra dodging (grab the might on dodge trait at 10), then whatever you think has synergy with your build at that point (I go for 15 more in Acro for Quick Pockets and Quick Recovery, followed by 10 more in Trickery for Daze on steal).

The reason to do all of this is that each and every one of the traits that you gain will benefit your DB spam and switching to Shortbow off-hand when you’re out of initiative.

You should also get Infiltrator’s Signet for the extra initiative regeneration and Dagger Storm or Thieves Guild for taking out large groups/big targets (like champions, which you can solo with this build).

Last of all, have fun! The Thief class is by far one of the most enjoyable, so don’t rush!