Guild Wars 2

The main problem with thieves is that it’s too easy to be able to kill everything with them. I’m not another thief QQer, just check my video and you’ll see that I don’t spare anyone or anything.
However I would like this class to reward you the better YOU are, not to be noob-friendly as it is now, and that is because stealth is too overpowered at the moment.

I do know that everything we have comes from stealth (The best condition removals? Stealth. Our best attack? Stealth. Our best buffs? Stealth. And the list could go on) but I would like to see it changed somehow, in order to make GOOD thieves to be better rewarded and not to be blamed for playing a stupid class.

So here’s how I would change stealth: let us be visible while we are in stealth. I think we all know the “invisible effect” we have on our character when we enter stealth, well, let the enemies see that too instead of seeing.. nothing. Please keep in mind that it’s still pretty hard to see us, plus we would still be untargettable.

NOTE: this is probably an unnecessary nerf in SPVP, but in wvwvw I feel like it’s needed.

TL;DR
Make us visibile (with the same stealth effect we have when we NOW enter in stealth) while in stealth, but still untargettable.

While I applaud you for admitting stealth is a bit EZ mode, making you visible while stealthed is not the way to go. With all due respect, it defeats the purpose of stealth itself. But yes, there needs to be changes within the shadow arts lines.

i want to be able to see the thieves in stealth too !
all they do is spam 2-2-2-2, 3-3-3-3,
or 5-1-1-1-5-1-1-5-1-1
they are like robots/bots !

Thats not how stealth is supposed to work. If your opponent is any good, u’ll never be able to land a backstab this way. I’d be willing to trade some stealth for more mobility (+damage), but as long as that doesn’t happen, I think stealth itself is balanced, theres just one particular weaponset that is being abused for excessive stealth access.

TL;DR
Try to play something different to d/p and you might realize that the class offers something different to easy mode.

laquito.5269:

Thats not how stealth is supposed to work. If your opponent is any good, u’ll never be able to land a backstab this way. I’d be willing to trade some stealth for more mobility (+damage), but as long as that doesn’t happen, I think stealth itself is balanced, theres just one particular weaponset that is being abused for extensive stealth access.

TL;DR
Try to play something different to d/p and you might realize that the class offers something different to easy mode.

I played all thieves spec. D/D condi, P/D condi, D/D bers, S/D pre and after buff, D/P and S/P. The only one I haven’t played is P/P.

I still don’t understand how we can convince ourselves that “if someone is good he can avoi being backstabbed”. No. He can’t. You know why? Because I’m not stupid enough to backstab when he expects me to backastab him. Also, 2 evades can’t save anyone from getting backstabbed.

Frenk.5917:

I played all thieves spec. D/D condi, P/D condi, D/D bers, S/D pre and after buff, D/P and S/P. The only one I haven’t played is P/P.

I still don’t understand how we can convince ourselves that “if someone is good he can avoi being backstabbed”. No. He can’t. You know why? Because I’m not stupid enough to backstab when he expects me to backastab him. Also, 2 evades can’t save anyone from getting backstabbed.

Being visible to the enemy is counterproductive to the thief class as a whole. If enemy thieves were visible to me, I’m pretty sure I could dodge up to 80% of their backstabs, all you need is a higher endurance regeneration. We’re already the most obvious class in terms of skill prediction. 70% of the time stealth leads into a backstab, but I somehow still see people just standing still, waiting to be roflstomped.

Your suggestion just leads to massive AoE spam on us, which we are already quite vulnerable to. We might not be targetable, but as we all know that doesn’t matter for AoE damage. I honestly don’t know how you can think this is a good idea, it would totally neglect our defensive abilities through stealth. Just imagine a warrior knowing when and where to use his 100B, whirlwind etc. despite being in stealth. In my opinion just use your autoattack and watch the animation, this gives you a clue whether he is close or not.

All this whine on stealth just derives from the kittening d/p specs that are all over WvW, which are indeed overpowered and broken, but as GW2 is balanced around PVP, where thieves are subpar, I don’t see any fix for it soon.

No offense mate, but despite having played every weaponset, you obviously prefered to stick to the easymode d/p spec (based on your signature). Makes you look like a hypocrite a little. Change your weaponset and your perspective MIGHT change aswell.

And how exactly will you land a backstab when you are visible Mr. Make-Us-Visible-To-Promote-Better-Play-Because-I-Find-Playing-This-Class-Too-Easy?

Moreover, you do know that even when you are stealthed, you are vulnerable to attacks, so why the heck even bother going into stealth if they can see you? Untargettable? That doesn’t mean that AOE can’t kill you… Unless you mean we are totally invulnerable, but if that’s the case, then screw BS, ill just do a front stab every 4 seconds, while regenerating, and will use Stealth to absorb whatever burst damage against me. Which is stupid, totally stupid.

Your suggestion is just half-baked and bad.

i still WANT to see stealthed thieves !
please make it so, i give free cookies

yours truly,
a bad wvw/pvp player

What this game needs more is noobs complaining about stealth…

@Frenk

I dont knw what you mean, for a few days I fight with my guardian against 3 Thiefs at the same time and defeat two of them, before the last, with ~15% health, downed me.

swinsk.6410:

What this game needs more is noobs complaining about stealth…

yes, more complain = more nerfs …. yeah !!!
now if i swing backstab in mid air i get revealed LOL =))))

I recommend watching the extra-credit video about stealth game mechanics on youtube.
It might help understand why people love/hate stealth and what stealth gameplay is about.

lLobo.7960:

I recommend watching the extra-credit video about stealth game mechanics on youtube.
It might help understand why people love/hate stealth and what stealth gameplay is about.

And, what is your result?

I play a thief amongst other classes like engineer, elementalist and mesmer. While I can kill any class on any of mine if I’m better, I do have to admit that no one can blow up someone like a thief can. My mesmer has strong burst but it has a higher cooldown compared to thief. If my attacks fail I can still stealth up and reset the fight.

If I die on my thief it’s only because of a few reasons:
a) very strong burst damage
b) CC chaining when Shadowstep is on cooldown
c) Group CC’s and immobs.

That’s generally the only thing I die to. Other classes don’t kill me unless I overcommit which I often do because I don’t like running that much.

When playing my other classes I know how to counter thieves because I have 500 hours on mine but yet they can almost always escape unless I can burst them on my mesmer or they kill themselves on confusion on my engineer.

I feel like some classes their escape mechanics are too much. Especially stealth, which is the strongest of all. I have talked to my friend about this and he says the same. I think there should be a nerf to stealth, I just don’t know what. Making us slightly visible would kill the class so that’s out of the question.

On another note, stealth is not that easy to counter. I can spam aoe’s effectively on my engineer but I still don’t know if he is right behind me, or has he shadowstepped and permastealthed? That’s the broken aspect. Too much chaining of stealth. Not in combat but rather with escaping/entering combat.

Frenk.5917:

laquito.5269:

Thats not how stealth is supposed to work. If your opponent is any good, u’ll never be able to land a backstab this way. I’d be willing to trade some stealth for more mobility (+damage), but as long as that doesn’t happen, I think stealth itself is balanced, theres just one particular weaponset that is being abused for extensive stealth access.

TL;DR
Try to play something different to d/p and you might realize that the class offers something different to easy mode.

I played all thieves spec. D/D condi, P/D condi, D/D bers, S/D pre and after buff, D/P and S/P. The only one I haven’t played is P/P.

I still don’t understand how we can convince ourselves that “if someone is good he can avoid being backstabbed”. No. He can’t. You know why? Because I’m not stupid enough to backstab when he expects me to backastab him. Also, 2 evades can’t save anyone from getting backstabbed.

Im right with you I actually stealth and make you use up all your endurance before i go for the backstab. My 50% movement speed while stealthed and other traits makes my backstabs almost unavoidable. the only profession I come in to even the slightest problem with landing a backstab is mesmers with all their clones, but even with them you just have to wait a little while longer and then go in for the kill.

i would like that change but the thief shouldnt be completely visible to the enemy. Visibility should come in pulses every sec for like 0,1 secs

I’d like to see an ability to de-stealth players given to another class.

Perhaps Ranger could do it with a new Elite option. As an Elite it wouldn’t be overpowered as it would have a high cooldown and force a choice over the other Elites.

Frenk.5917:

Please keep in mind that it’s still pretty hard to see us, plus we would still be untargettable.

The problem is that “untargetable” is everything vs. unskilled opponents, and nearly nothing against skilled opponents. A lot of people still don’t know how to fight in GW2 without a locked target and that is the main reason stealth is considered so powerful. The change you propose would do little to fix the “issue” of stealth destroying poorly played opponents, but would make stealth useless against the people that already do well against it (those who know how to track, hit, and kill stealthed targets without a target lock).

Why in the world would you change stealth in this manner?

The thief is hardly the ‘facerolliest’ of classes. I will agree that stealth is overpowered, but for an entirely different reason: too much up time. The best way to ‘balance’ stealth is to limit the amount of time a Thief can use it. Most games that offer a rogue/thief/assassin class limit stealth so it’s immensly powerful for starting a fight (perma stealth to get in location, high burst when you are revealed, high burst on demand) also limit the class so once you’re out of stealth, you had better win.

I see the problem with this class revolving almost entirely around how the initiative system works. If we were limited to 10 initiative, and that initiative could only regen at one every second instead of having upwards of 15 skills and abilities to improve this amount, the class would be much more even-leveled and real efforts to balance it could be made.

If you change the initiative regen you nerf the thief’s survivability, burst, regen, and condition removal. You could then improve these areas accordingly depending on where the class should be.

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You just removed all of the Thief’s burst and defense and didn’t give them any survivability in return. While I somewhat agree with your approach (there’s nothing wrong with thief burst for example), you need to actually play the class to know how the removal/adjustment of stealth will affect it.

While I feel changing the initiative regen will do much of what you’re asking, I’m not foolish enough to think that the thief would be playable after those adjustments and would need drastic improvements. But I know this because I play the class…

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesnt require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

Shemsu.8721:

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesn’t require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

Your argument is void till said skills are placed on an 4 sec CD.

TheOneNOnlyGeneralBama.9586:

Shemsu.8721:

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesn’t require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

Your argument is void till said skills are placed on an 4 sec CD.

You want warriors autoattacks to be on a 4 second cd?
And if you want other classes cd reduced, then those attacks should also require stealth an also require position behind enemy, currently only thief has such reqs on attacks and STILL does less damage than many classes. ie Kill shot, axe triple chop etc

TheOneNOnlyGeneralBama.9586:

Shemsu.8721:

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesn’t require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

Your argument is void till said skills are placed on an 4 sec CD.

Backstab is on a 4 second cooldown….

Thief skills are weak / poorly designed and stealth is overpowered. There is no shame in saying it, I’m amongst the first ones wishing that Thief wasn’t pigeonholed into stealth. So much potential, so few amounts of care.

Shemsu.8721:

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesnt require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

False, i have a thief and a warrior, and axe auto attack its not even close to what you can burst with a single skill in 1 second.

Axe auto attack its divided in 3 attacks and even if you add the damage together the damage its not even close to a 1 backstab, that is why the thives can One hit KO someone from stealth and its not balanced.

You can achieve even more damage with dagger auto attack than with axe autoattack.
———————————————————————————————————————————-

I will add to this:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

-Stealth duration its increased 60%, so thieves have more chance of run or to do something else while in stealth.

Fenrir.5493:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

-Stealth duration its increased 60%, so thieves have more chance of run or to do something else while in stealth.

In conclusion: Take away stealth as a combat asset and give thieves access to non-combat permastealth like most games.

It is easier to balance, I’ll give you that. It is also terrible, which is why GW2 was trying not to have it.

You’ve got some valid concerns, mainly in the area of TTK, but thieves have received plenty of nerfs in that area with little to compensate and they’re far from the only profession able to kill a no-defense opponent in less than three seconds. In June 2013 TTK remains an issue only in WvW, and even then only for people whose sole defensive consideration is “I sure hope no one attacks me while I go full-zerker”.

I can get on board with this, as long as they completely remove the revealed debuff. Hows that sound to you? Also, QQ moar.

Frenk.5917:

Make us visibile (with the same stealth effect we have when we NOW enter in stealth) while in stealth, but still untargettable.

while I like the general concept of this, being always visible kinda defeats the purpose. I’d propose one-half-second flicker on hit when in stealth, and if afflicted with certain conditions that come with particle affects (fire, immobile, daze, etc) the particle effects remain visible as long as you have that condition when you are in stealth.

Ideally this change would come with additional options for utilities/traits to remove conditions in stealth, beyond the shadow’s embrace trait

wish.1027:

I can get on board with this, as long as they completely remove the revealed debuff. Hows that sound to you? Also, QQ moar.

While I agree that Revealed is a poor implementation, complete removal would be… silly.

Perhaps (INSTEAD of revealed) a 1 second in, one second out mechanic- stealth entry requires one second cloaking time, (with the exception of cloak and dagger, which enters instantly), during which you are visible but not targetable, and doesn’t count towards the time left on stealth boon. Exiting stealth would include a similar decloaking time, visible but not targetable, (except exiting in stealth attacks IE backstab, which fire straight from stealth, then play the decloak animation.) This cloaking/decloak time would disable skill use other than stun breaks for the 1 second duration.

Fenrir.5493:

Shemsu.8721:

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesnt require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

False, i have a thief and a warrior, and axe auto attack its not even close to what you can burst with a single skill in 1 second.

Axe auto attack its divided in 3 attacks and even if you add the damage together the damage its not even close to a 1 backstab, that is why the thives can One hit KO someone from stealth and its not balanced.

You can achieve even more damage with dagger auto attack than with axe autoattack.
———————————————————————————————————————————-

I will add to this:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

-Stealth duration its increased 60%, so thieves have more chance of run or to do something else while in stealth.

Damage listings from wiki, without modifiers, base stats etc
Backstab
Front damage: 403
Back damage: 806
Range: 130

Triple Chop
Damage (3x): 858
Range: 130

One key pressed, 3 hits, more damage than backstab, no need for stealth, no need to be behind enemy.

As to your other points, the entire shadows arts traitline is based around in combat stealth, whats the point of a 5 second regen out of combat? or a blind on stealth when not in combat? The idea of no combat stealth just doesnt work at all sorry.

Damage and blocks reveal thief? with the revealed debuff this would nullify in combat stealth, considering half of our stealth attacks are melee based, again the idea is just a complete fail sorry.

So after completely ruining thief stealth your single idea to improve thief is 60% duration on stealth? so a 3 second stealth becomes 4 seconds? Thats gonna make the viable when they are already one of the weakest spvp and pve classes? Again, horrible idea sorry.

Try again or QQ somewhere else

Fenrir.5493:

Shemsu.8721:

Fenrir.5493:

This is not the way to solve the problem, to solve this problem there are things that are needed:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

And this will balance the things, and now the thieves are fixed.

You do realize that warriors axe autoattack does MORE damage than backstab right?? Every class has a number of skills that do more damage than thieves, doesnt require stealth, doesnt require position behind enemy. You need to be more informed how things work before making suggestions as silly as this

False, i have a thief and a warrior, and axe auto attack its not even close to what you can burst with a single skill in 1 second.

Axe auto attack its divided in 3 attacks and even if you add the damage together the damage its not even close to a 1 backstab, that is why the thives can One hit KO someone from stealth and its not balanced.

You can achieve even more damage with dagger auto attack than with axe autoattack.
———————————————————————————————————————————-

I will add to this:

-Thieves cant enter stealth while in combat unless using special utility skills with high CD

-Abilities that let you enter stealth while in combat, like cloak and dagger should let you enter stealth without the need to hit anyone

-Stealth has a longer CD

-All kind of damage and blocks should reveal the thief

-Reduce draastically the burst damage of abilities like backstab, its not balaced to practically OHKO someone from stealth, its OP.

-Stealth duration its increased 60%, so thieves have more chance of run or to do something else while in stealth.

Triple Chop has a higher damage rating then Backstab.
Backstab is 806 and Triplechop is 858.

Also, Dagger mainhand’s total auto attack has a lower damage rating then Triple Chop, so what the heck are talking about?

DanH.5879:

i want to be able to see the thieves in stealth too !
all they do is spam 2-2-2-2, 3-3-3-3,
or 5-1-1-1-5-1-1-5-1-1
they are like robots/bots !

are there other skills? lol. head shot. 400 dmg for 1/4 sec daze and 4 init? dancing daggers 4 initiative for 600 dmg? both of these are 33% of our attack pool initiative :P dagger auto attack is horrendous…literally . not only this thieves are made to be able to choose which is best for the situation. nobody really spams hs anyway. if they do u should thank them for wasting their intiative. if u low on health and one meets u…then its just bad luck for you. if they get you low on HP then they are low on init. simple as that. you are tired of 5 1 1 5 1 1 or 3 3 3 3 3 or 5 1 2 5 1 2 etc? let me tell you what a guardian or another class does. 5 3 2 4 1 swap 5 4 2 3 1 swap. rins repeat. every class has a rotation :P so whats the difference? there is none other than a thief can make his using 1 attack. even if a guardian used his 2 attack 3 times over then waited 15 secs to do it again….that would help me out when fighting one really to be honest. keep things in perspective too when u dig at a class. thieves are mediocre. if u other guys think stealth is easy mode….. try getting your brains out of the 1 v 1 sense bc 1 v 1 has NO place in this game….yet. laterz

Those who keep telling that axe auto attack damage its greater than backstab are liying, because either they dont have a warrior and a thief or they are like i said lying, because every backstab does more damage than the actual axe auto attack added together, even dagger auto attacks does more damare than axe auto attack, im am talking about real stuff here not just stupid paper numbers that does not represent the reality.

Thief dagger auto-attack chain: 2×168 – 286 – 286+2s poison
backstab: 403(front)/806(back)
HS: 336/504/672 (>50%/25%/<25%)

Warrior Axe auto-attack chain: 252 – 538 – 858
Eviscerate: 672/840/1008 (1/2/3 adrenaline)

Dmg mods of “GC” builds
Thief (25/30/0/0/15): 10% (tgt has cond) + 5% (daggers) + 10% (>6 ini) + 5% (behind)
Warrior (10/30/0/0/30): 3-12% (adren level) + 10% (tgt has bleed) + 3-9% (tgt has buffs) (+3% for burst skill) (or you can go 20/30/0/0/20 for more 10% dmg with axe)

The problem with thieves is that our “in-stealth” abilities are by far stronger than our “out of stealth” abilities..

1- raise our base stealth duration to 4 secs (5 when traited)
2- then add the 3 seconds revealed debuff anytime a thief goes out of stealth (3 seconds also for tPvP) even when the thief do not attack anything

this would prevent us from chain stealth abilities without any attack (aka perma stealth) that is the main reason for all those whining in WvW

3- then if we could have some rework on our “out of stealth” combat it could be nice for seeing more builds that do not rely on stealth exclusively.

At the moment we see just 2 kind of thieves spec around:
d\p hiders and s\d dodgers (there are few exceptions of course), and in WvW d\p hiders is far better than dodgers spec just because of stealth chain.
Remove the stealth chain and you will see far less d\p spec around.

4- also remove from WvW all mobs, with the exception of Champions, kraits, ogres, arpies and thos kind of mobs. But just remove every other mob so that thieves cannot anymore stealth on stupid AI using C&D and they actually need to hit other players properly

Kolly.9872:

The problem with thieves is that our “in-stealth” abilities are by far stronger than our “out of stealth” abilities..

1- raise our base stealth duration to 4 secs (5 when traited)
2- then add the 3 seconds revealed debuff anytime a thief goes out of stealth (3 seconds also for tPvP) even when the thief do not attack anything

this would prevent us from chain stealth abilities without any attack (aka perma stealth) that is the main reason for all those whining in WvW

3- then if we could have some rework on our “out of stealth” combat it could be nice for seeing more builds that do not rely on stealth exclusively.

At the moment we see just 2 kind of thieves spec around:
d\p hiders and s\d dodgers (there are few exceptions of course), and in WvW d\p hiders is far better than dodgers spec just because of stealth chain.
Remove the stealth chain and you will see far less d\p spec around.

4- also remove from WvW all mobs, with the exception of Champions, kraits, ogres, arpies and thos kind of mobs. But just remove every other mob so that thieves cannot anymore stealth on stupid AI using C&D and they actually need to hit other players properly

Please don’t use the word “our”, any sane thief who cares about his class doesn’t suggest such dumb changes.

1- 5 seconds will not mend the rest of the suggestions.
2- This will not only punish you for failing to land a backstab, but will also end with getting you killed. You used your hide in shadow heal skill? Guess what, you won’t stealth for another 4 seconds. Good luck!
3- Thanks, but I didn’t level a thief to end up having two warriors.
4- There are some people who actually finish their dailies in WvW, so they need the mobs. Not to mention this isn’t a stupid instanced PvP, it needs to feel like it is an open world.

You aren’t “fixing” anything with these changes, only breaking a whole class and making this game even less diverse. The purpose of revealed is actually to put a “cooldown” on backstab to prevent any excessive burst.

The only thing they could do is prevent stealth from stacking when HS over smoke field. This way they won’t stealth for long, and would become too expensive, initiative wise, to spam.

Stealth should end and “revealed” should be applied if one of your attacks gets blocked or evaded, maybe even if you just miss an attack.
Why? Because players should be rewarded for dodging or blocking the stealth attack skill as it is with any other attack skill. On the other hand players should be punished for failing their backstab etc.
If you miss fire grab on your ele it is on cooldown and this should be the same with stealth. Yes thief attack skills generally have no cd but revealed should act as something similar for stealth attack skills.

Erzian.5218:

Stealth should end and “revealed” should be applied if one of your attacks gets blocked or evaded, maybe even if you just miss an attack.
Why? Because players should be rewarded for dodging or blocking the stealth attack skill as it is with any other attack skill. On the other hand players should be punished for failing their backstab etc.
If you miss fire grab on your ele it is on cooldown and this should be the same with stealth. Yes thief attack skills generally have no cd but revealed should act as something similar for stealth attack skills.

This brings up an excellent point.

I’ve just started playing my thief more lately and this is one of those things that makes me laugh. I can be in stealth trying to use my stealth opener on someone, it gets blocked, I stay in stealth and am able to basically SPAM the stealth attack until it actually lands – or my stealth ends due to timer.

That is some real easy-mode stuff that should be changed. A failed stealth attack should remove your stealth and give you the stealth debuff.

It’s like this for other skills. If they change it for backstab they’ll change the mechanic for everyone.

Haven’t you guys ever used a skill and it ‘misses’ so the cooldown isn’t fully activated it’s only set to 4 seconds and/or doesn’t use resources?

the ~4 seconds cd is as far as I know if your skill gets interrupted either by an opponent or by canceling it, not if you use and finish the skill but miss it.
And yes it should be changed for all the stealth attack skills not only backstab.

Oh yeah, the same thing goes for Warriors and their burst skill.

They use it, if it misses it gets a short CD but no adrenaline is dumped allowing the full burst ability to be tried again seconds later.

Again, this is a safety net mechanic and has no place in PVP that’s supposed to reward skillful play.

stealth attack is not comparable to normal skill use. its apples and oranges. this has been discussed to death already, and it hasnt changed. Warriors use a burst skill and miss they keep the adrenaline, can swap weapons and use another burst skill instantly. Thieves miss a stealth attack, they are not revealed, and can attempt to stealth attack again. this is how it works.

Yeah, we know how it works Shemsu lol.

Some of us just feel that it is a crappy mechanic that rewards poor play and spamming abilities.

Velron.3729:

Some of us just feel that it is a crappy mechanic that rewards poor play and spamming abilities.

Welcome to playing a thief. Every other profession has cooldown weapon skills that do a bit of damage + miscellaneous other stuff. They’re going to use all their skills, they’re going to get damage from each one as well as all sorts of utility. Thief skills, due to the way initiative works, are very quickly segmented into specific roles and spammed to effect whichever role needs doing at the time. As a result, thieves can’t really pull much utility while doing damage and vice versa. This has very little to do with stealth mechanics and everything to do with thief weapon skills being designed much differently from every other profession.

With skill choice pretty much thrown out the window, thieves can feel like they’re spammy and have “poor play”, but “good play” simply has to be represented by timing, positioning, and initiative management instead.

That’s fine, I don’t really spam. But I don’t play D/D or D/P.

This has nothing to do with being able to just spam your powerful ability until it lands with no regards to if the opponent is blocking, has aegis, is invuln, is dodging, etc…it rewards a low skill level of play. Anet said they want an esport – this crap has no place in an esport.

It would be different if they added an initiative cost to the stealth attack ability, so spamming it at least cost you initiative.

Velron.3729:

That’s fine, I don’t really spam. But I don’t play D/D or D/P.

This has nothing to do with being able to just spam your powerful ability until it lands with no regards to if the opponent is blocking, has aegis, is invuln, is dodging, etc…it rewards a low skill level of play. Anet said they want an esport – this crap has no place in an esport.

It would be different if they added an initiative cost to the stealth attack ability, so spamming it at least cost you initiative.

So long as they add that amount to base init and/or lower the cost of every other weapon skill on all sets. that would be fine then

Interesting thread Op but I don’t agree with your last paragraph of
“Make us visibile (with the same stealth effect we have when we NOW enter in stealth) while in stealth, but still untargettable”

Anyhow

Arena net designing a class which Instantly rewards you in every way for just choosing a stealth thief class, clearly fits the profile of “Favoritism”. The Favorite is given everything, every reward instantly without any work, effort whatsoever.

In other word, they are given Unearned Rewards Free.

Stealth is rewarded to thief class at no cost, cool down, penalty or counter.

A cheap design altruism elitist favorite class indeed.

That is why this class doesn’t require any effort or skill whatsoever; everything is given to it at no cost.

Like someone had mentioned how a 12 year old was able to kill and down many players in WvW as a thief by just spamming 2 skills; such Shame.

What I find Ludicrous is that the majority of stealth thief players acknowledges that Stealth thief is Overpowered, cheap and bad design; self-centered, lazy, insecure which requires Zero-O skills and learning curves.

The only one who chooses to remain In Denial is Arena net..

In the name of Balance.

(They re the only Nerf-Rewarding Class)

Again,

At Free Cost

At Free Effort

Whatsoever

The Only *Unearned, Undeserving Rewarding Class in Guild Wars 2*

Stealth Thief.

Stop whining like little girls and go roll a thief. This should be our reply from now on.

So many Ignorant fools trying to sound intelligent when they didn’t even try to play a thief.

Just like there are lot of losers nagging when they get killed by thieves, there are a lot of other classes laughing when they see a thief.

Stealth has to reward you the better YOU are?

How you dare you infidel !!!