Guild Wars 2

Moises.2196:

Flanking Strike- deal more damage and be unblockable. (s/d should be the “unblockable” set)

larcenous Strike- should be accessible whether you landed flanking strike or not. (give us more access to dps if you’re going to take feline grace away.)

Completely disagree. It’s fine as is, except for the cost.

What needs to happen with FS/LS is for their cost to be swapped. FS should cost 1-init and LS should cost 4-init. The current cost for each skill is mind-bogglingly stupid.

Moises.2196:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Moises.2196:

Flanking Strike- deal more damage and be unblockable. (s/d should be the “unblockable” set)

larcenous Strike- should be accessible whether you landed flanking strike or not. (give us more access to dps if you’re going to take feline grace away.)

Completely disagree. It’s fine as is, except for the cost.

What needs to happen with FS/LS is for their cost to be swapped. FS should cost 1-init and LS should cost 4-init. The current cost for each skill is mind-bogglingly stupid.

I thought about that but noticed that all thief weapon skill 3 are 4 initiative or more.

You can’t really base the value of this skill on other skills in other weapon sets, otherwise you won’t even consider buffing this skill when compared to Unload.

Instead, you need to look at the entire set and decide what is appropriate. Having a cost of 4-init to an evade skill with low damage is stupid. Either they buff the skill or reduce the cost — I vote on reduced cost. Reducing the cost will make this weapon set to go up to almost the same level as the Staff currently. Allocating the high cost to the skill that deals more damage and is unblockable makes more sense.

They do this to prevent over spamming a good skill that tends to deal a good amount of damage that evades or blinds.

I disagree. The damage is so minimal to make it worth spamming. Reducing the cost will make it a mistake-friendly-skill. Since you have to hit in order to trigger LS, FS shouldn’t be punishing — that’s just stupid in many ways.

I think that if you use 4 initiative for an evade you should be provided with a strong attack on your next move. If not this, then simply combine both skills into one and balance that out however appropriate.

Exactly! High cost should mean high damage, thus the cost needs to be swapped.

Some of these changes are interesting. Others are awful. Potent poison and venomous aura as GMs in DA destroys poison DPS as you need to have both. Why remove condi cleanse from S2? Why remove might from shadow trap? Totally unnecessary.

Moises.2196:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Moises.2196:

Sir Vincent III.1286:

Moises.2196:

Flanking Strike- deal more damage and be unblockable. (s/d should be the “unblockable” set)

larcenous Strike- should be accessible whether you landed flanking strike or not. (give us more access to dps if you’re going to take feline grace away.)

Completely disagree. It’s fine as is, except for the cost.

What needs to happen with FS/LS is for their cost to be swapped. FS should cost 1-init and LS should cost 4-init. The current cost for each skill is mind-bogglingly stupid.

I thought about that but noticed that all thief weapon skill 3 are 4 initiative or more.

You can’t really base the value of this skill on other skills in other weapon sets, otherwise you won’t even consider buffing this skill when compared to Unload.

Instead, you need to look at the entire set and decide what is appropriate. Having a cost of 4-init to an evade skill with low damage is stupid. Either they buff the skill or reduce the cost — I vote on reduced cost. Reducing the cost will make this weapon set to go up to almost the same level as the Staff currently. Allocating the high cost to the skill that deals more damage and is unblockable makes more sense.

They do this to prevent over spamming a good skill that tends to deal a good amount of damage that evades or blinds.

I disagree. The damage is so minimal to make it worth spamming. Reducing the cost will make it a mistake-friendly-skill. Since you have to hit in order to trigger LS, FS shouldn’t be punishing — that’s just stupid in many ways.

I think that if you use 4 initiative for an evade you should be provided with a strong attack on your next move. If not this, then simply combine both skills into one and balance that out however appropriate.

Exactly! High cost should mean high damage, thus the cost needs to be swapped.

The 4 initiative is there because it has an evade. An evade at the cost of 1 initiative is ridiculous.

A cost of 1-init for evade is very appropriate for a profession in dire need for survivability. S/D has no defensive utility other than this skill.

Even so, you have no justification to keep FS at 4-init — 4-init for an evade is what’s ridiculous. Keep in mind that 4-init is 1/3 of our resources — no skill should cost that much for a lousy evade.

Let’s put it in perspective. Let’s use your method, let’s compare skills.

Pistol Whip costs 6 init that deals 1000 damage, that’s 166dmg per init. FS costs 4 init that deals 280dmg, which is 70dmg per init.

That’s one expensive evade.

Now let’s compare LS with PW if LS would costs 4. LS costs 4 init that deals 560dmg, which is 140 dmg per init — which is appropriate given that it is unblockable and strips boon. The damage is inline with PW’s damage per init.

If you think FS costing 1-init is ridiculous, LS costing 1-init is even more so.

If you think that FS should cost 4-init, LS should also cost 4-init making the skill as a whole costs 8 init. >.<’

The value of FS is worth 1-initiative and the value of LS is worth 4-initiative.

SB’s Disabling shot is weak but is still 4 initiatives because it has an evade. You have to compare it to the other weapon sets to make sure its balanced in comparison.

That’s your problem there, you’re using other weapon set as your basis instead of looking at the weaponset on its own.

If you look at unload that deals a massive amount of damage from range and that’s balanced out by the lack of an evade or blind. If you look at shadow shot that provides an unblockable blind and a shadowstep that deals a good amount of damage. This is okay too since it doesn’t provide an evade and you are vulnerable to aoe or other enemies attacks. The same logic is applied to all weapon sets.

This argument is irrelevant because each weapon set does its own thing which are completely different from other weapon set so trying to compare them to each other is like comparing an apple to a tomato.

Giving an evade skill 1 initiative is so broken and way too forgiving. You made the point that having them keep the current initiative cost would be too punishing since they have to land FS and that is why I suggested that you shouldn’t have to land the skill. This way, if you decide to use 4 initiative on an evade skill that does little damage to gain access to a strong skill, there is some fair game to it.

Removing the required hit will make it broken and we’ve already seen why — FS will not be used as intended. There’s no way it will go back to that and since that is more likely the case, swapping the cost is the only reasonable and smart solution.

Nobody will use a skill for the evade if it will cost 4-init. Lowering it to 1-init will encourage the use as both evade and granting access to LS.

This would reward good players that don’t waste an evade for a skill that isn’t the easiest to land.

Not requiring a hit will guarantee that FS will be wasted, because it will be precasted so that the next attack will be LS.

No way it’s going back to that.

As I said earlier, they should make it so that you don’t have to land FS to gain access to LC or combine the 2 skills into 1 and balance that out accordingly. Having an evade at the cost of 1 initiative is just too much. Also, if you looked at all the suggestions I made you would see that there is plenty of initiative replenishment to cover this.

I don’t agree sorry.

I have posted my opinion, so good luck with your endeavors.

Not trying to be rude but a lot of this is no.

Infiltrator’s return needs to keep its condi clear or the set DIES. Pistol Whip needs to stay one skill, it just needs to be cleaned and sped up. The value of Body Shot’s root is indescribable- DO NOT TAKE THIS. Ever. NO. How do you think pistol/pistol users keep Reapers and Scrappers off of our squishy bodies? Good looks? Signet of Shadow’s used to root and blind, I’d prefer that over a stun break- that’s ele’s signet. I want Thief’s signet. Shadow Trap gives you Might and Fury for deciding to engage, taking this away means the trap is used as a tool to flee not engage- don’t touch that. I’m honestly scared to take a look at your trait changes after the rage inducing changes to my pistols and traps.

Still, you are right that each auto needs to do something at this point- Daggers double tap, then regen endurance, then poison. Pistols bleed. Shortbow bounces. Staff applies vuln/reflects projectiles and is aoe. Sword is aoe with cripple/weakness on last strike. The loss of value is intense. Traps being an X is yes. Venoms need a change, but not that way. Venoms should (imo) act as specific condi removals and gain charges that then ofc max out. Activating Venoms (cost-benefit, risk-reward) removes the condi clear, but lets you apply the charges of absorbed conditions.

Etc, etc. I don’t think you did poorly, I just think you missed some concepts- like the change to unload in my thread I made. I tried discussing, but its impossible for Thief players to agree on anything. I thought Preparedness baseline was a bloody given, but someone said “maybe”. So…ye. Gl, I’m gonna hit up my Mesmer for a bit probably =/

Preparedness is mandatory. Have you tried to play a build without trickery? Any build? And it might, but I was thinking similar to Glint but more…sustainy? 60 seconds is too much. When was the last time you got trapped? And I prefer sword/pistols current version. I can proc Critical hits apply vulnerability (I play multi-hit builds. not one shot wonders). Your change sounded like less hits?

Things that so very MANY Thief players agree on is Preparedness is absolutely mandatory. I say it because (and wtf btw) Mesmer gets Illusionary Persona, but Thief can’t get Persona? What is this prejudice? Why can’t Graves have a Cigar?

Anywho, thanks for responding. I’m more than willing to debate, but Prep is the ONLY reason I ever take Trickery. I hate the whole line, but I’m drilled to use it because any (imo ofc) good Thief player mixes autos and abilities, and all abilities are pricey.

I never said I use s/p. My guild buddy does, and his s/p build and my p/p build make for really fun roaming (spvp and roaming. no longer care to win, won’t happen lol). I don’t want to have to take a skill to cover a trait. A trait takes less space. I don’t want to be forced to choose a gm over a minor trait. I ran ST for giggles. One shot unload mode was engaged.

Venoms (so you could see):
Skelk Venom- Passive pulse per 3 seconds to remove 1 random condition. Active heals same as now, and applies 5 stacks of randomized condition (see chaos storm and chaos armor for ideas)+siphon to maintain the justification of a 1 second cast time (reason why so few take HiS).
Devourer Venom- Passive pulse per 3 seconds to remove Cripple and Immobilize. Active applies 1 second of cripple/immobilize per strike up to 4 strikes.
Drake Venom- Passive pulse per 3 seconds to remove Chill and Burning. Active applies 2 seconds chill and 1 second burning for 3 strikes.
Spider Venom- Passive pulse per 3 seconds to remove Poison and Bleeding. Active applies 3 seconds of Poison/Bleeding for 6 strikes.
Skale Venom- Passive pulse per 3 seconds to remove Confusion, Torment, and Vulnerability. Active applies 3 seconds of Confusion/Torment/Vulnerability for 3 strikes.
Basilisk Venom- Passive pulse per 3 seconds to remove Slow. Active applies 1 second of stun for 2 strikes.

Rough idea, can of course be tuned.

Edit: Also pretty sure you don’t play Thief much. Preparedness baseline is basically a singular pivotal change that Anet can do (and never will, cuz reroll,drop thief, its garbage, we wanna delete #forever) and it’d be such a HUGE change. It’s not a massive power boost, it makes players like myself not forced to take Trickery or unnecessary and less effective options (RoI and Upper Hand).