Guild Wars 2

I am playing a DD/thief for the first time EVER, and I am really enjoying the class. I have seen thieves use prolonged stealth skills to skip themselves and groups past trash mobs (Arah for example) but i’m not sure how they do it (keep stealth up). Is there any good guides out there that explain the intricacies of the thieves stealth capabilities. Or simply any advise from vetrans of this class on how to do it.
Thanks!

D/P with Black Powder and Heartseeker for the leap finisher, it’s an unconditional stealth on-demand without relying on an existing target or utility skills. Detonating Blinding Powder inside the Black Powder while heartseeking can also net you quite a duration.

Bit ini-costly though… Something Shadow Arts helps mitigate.

If D/D can do the same as D/P can, then I don’t know how… Mostly due to never having run the set, really.

Wait is this PvE? Oh.

Offhand pistol with shortbow 2 and any other blast finishers group has in black powder (pistol 5) will grant lots of stealth. Even more if you use Shadow Arts.

Two thieves can perma stealth a group with one putting up powder and the other blasting it with shortbow. Not that I’ve done that because dungeons aren’t really what I tend to run.

Here are two very good instructional videos. These are the ones I learned from.

1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=deJy6EjU26s
2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0rR6MgFsps

I know that a lot of people like to throw pistol into the mix with the shortbow. Personally, I never saw the point. It doesn’t add much extra stealth, and leaves you with sub-optimal weapons if you get caught.. My favorite method gives 26 seconds of continuous stealth, and leaves you with staff (or dagger/dagger) in primary:

Staff in primary
Shortbow in secondary
Smokescreen ready
Shadow Refuge ready
options > show skill recharge (so you have a numerical timer on your cooldowns)

1) Hit smokescreen, and blast it 5 times with your number 2 Shortbow skill (Cluster bomb). This will give you ~8 seconds of stealth.
2) As you run, keep your mouse on the stealth icon to watch the timer.
3) When you’re down to the last second, hit Shadow Refuge and target yourself.
4) Wait for the house icon over your head to disappear before you leave the circle. This will give you another ~10 seconds of stealth.
5) As you run, watch your cooldown on smokescreen. It will refresh a couple seconds before shadow refuge runs out.
6) As soon as smokescreen refreshes, hit it and reapeat step1. This will give you another ~8 seconds of stealth.

You could equip pistol/dagger with shortbow and blast your number 5 pistol skill for an extra ~4 seconds of stealth. But I find it awkward as hell to do. It’s an inconsequential extra bit of stealth. And then I don’t have access to my strongest weapon. So, personally, I don’t bother. 26 seconds is an eternity of stealth. Good enough.

D/P with Heart Seeker or Bound is far superior to D/D as stealth is on demand rather than having to time it. D/P is also more efficient and has zero wasted weapon attacks. Shadow Shot alone is worth taking it over D/D.

If you switch trait lines and skills it’s super easy to maintain perma personal stealth, and makes providing group stealth a lot easier, but you get stuck with kittenty dps traits. Check the “wvw skirmishing” builds on metabattle.

It’s really diffucult to provide high group stealth solo with a meta dps build UNLESS your group is coordinated and stacks on you and uses blast finishers on your fields which is basically not going to happen in a pug.

My theory is some people are just really quick at switching trait lines and skills at the right times when stealth or dps is needed, which I personally can’t stand doing it’s a PITA and you need a solid memory / reflex action for it.