Guild Wars 2

(Please note, I posted this thread in all the forums.. I wasn’t going to do it for Thieves, but that would be discrimination. It was more my own fear of responses like “Thieves don’t support gtfo trolololo” that stopped me. But last thread I made here got a lot of very useful info, so for the sake of gathering constructive information, here goes…)

Hey guys,

Guardians and Elementalists have been lauded as the best support classes in the game, and I was curious as to what makes them so special? This isn’t really a challenge as much as a comparison of what support these classes bring to a group and what makes them so valuable compared to other classes’ supportive abilities.

In case you don’t know, support Mesmers can bring:

- Up to 25x Might / Fury (AltruismRunes, Signet) / Perma Swiftness / Perma Regen / Perma Vigor / Aegis / Protection (a bit unreliably) / Perma Retaliation / 2.9k AoE burst heals every 3 seconds.

In addition to the usual Portals, Reflects, Rezz, blah blah… (If we kitten damage, we can do all of the above. If not, a lot of the above)

Would anyone knowledgeable on support mechanics of Thieves be able to enlighten me a bit? Examples of different builds, traits, abilities? Perhaps pros and cons? I’d like to work on making a comparison of all the different classes’ support abilities.

Lol, I just went down every profession just to see if you posted this everywhere. Cba answering on the question right now though. (too much thinking, head hurts)

Well my Thief support build used to be able to keep up almost perma regeneration on himself and high regen uptime for the party, while putting out almost perma poison and weakness on enemies, in addition to interrupts, stealth and removing boons from enemies… but apparently Anet thought that was OP for a Thief to focus on support and nerfed it into oblivion.

yea the lotus poison trait was gutted

That’s really a shame. Thief shouldn’t be the only class unable to take a supportive role if so desired. How are the thief’s control abilities? I know lots of blinds, but other than that?

Mesmer is 10x better

Theif is a wasted charslot in pve and is replaceable with every class

Black Teagan.9215:

Mesmer is 10x better

Theif is a wasted charslot in pve and is replaceable with every class

it is really not replaceable, i always bring a thief to FOTM (50+) and he is excellent, area stability, weakness, stealth runs and great dps, i would never go to FOTM without one.

Guard
Mes
Thief
Engineer
Ranger/Necro/Ele/War

thats normally the class combo i take and it works wonders.

DrixTrix.7168:

Black Teagan.9215:

Mesmer is 10x better

Theif is a wasted charslot in pve and is replaceable with every class

it is really not replaceable, i always bring a thief to FOTM (50+) and he is excellent, area stability, weakness, stealth runs and great dps, i would never go to FOTM without one.

Guard
Mes
Thief
Engineer
Ranger/Necro/Ele/War

thats normally the class combo i take and it works wonders.

Am I missing something? Area stability? When? How? Where?

DrixTrix.7168:

Black Teagan.9215:

Mesmer is 10x better

Theif is a wasted charslot in pve and is replaceable with every class

it is really not replaceable, i always bring a thief to FOTM (50+) and he is excellent, area stability, weakness, stealth runs and great dps, i would never go to FOTM without one.

Guard
Mes
Thief
Engineer
Ranger/Necro/Ele/War

thats normally the class combo i take and it works wonders.

I cant write something about the fractals, because I never was there, but in the rest of the game they aren’t helpful

thief support-
stealth to save allies on low health and stealth res
with trait, stealth grants regen.
with traits, stealing can give 10s fury/swiftness/might in aoe and gives vigor and strips/shares two boons on steal (min 21 second cd)
blast finishers from shortbow are spammable, thief can’t put out the fields, but they are the best at blasting them. Thief + staff ele = might stacking/swift stacking / aoe heals.
venom share – thief venoms are shared with 5 ppl in small aoe with traits they can give might, chill/immobilize/poison/torment/stone on attack, steal health on attack (this is fairly strong).

I think thats about it…note they are all not easy to achieve in one build.

bobross.5034:

thief support-
stealth to save allies on low health and stealth res
with trait, stealth grants regen.
with traits, stealing can give 10s fury/swiftness/might in aoe and gives vigor and strips/shares two boons on steal (min 21 second cd)
blast finishers from shortbow are spammable, thief can’t put out the fields, but they are the best at blasting them. Thief + staff ele = might stacking/swift stacking / aoe heals.
venom share – thief venoms are shared with 5 ppl in small aoe with traits they can give might, chill/immobilize/poison/torment/stone on attack, steal health on attack (this is fairly strong).
I think thats about it…note they are all not easy to achieve in one build.

This pretty much sums it all up. Only thing you left out was a poison field from the SB and area weakness with use of a blast finisher.

Thiefs can also do area stealth, both with shadow refuge, Blinding Powder or/and shortbow’s cluster bomb and a smoke field (usually pistol#5), which helps avoiding a lot of enemies in dungeons, surprise attacks in WvW groups and as bobross mentioned stealth rez and healing/regen. Aside from engineer, thiefs are the only ones with a smoke field, and the only one without a cooldown on it.

Venom share is also really powerful, mostly because of immobilize and stone beeing one of the strongest status in game ( all status that make you unable to do anything for a period of time are overpowered, including terror, daze and stun ), and having 5 people at the same time applying those conditions is very powerful.

Basilisk venom (which is a thief elite skill with a 3X second cooldown when traited that gives stone status) is basically a stun but has the benefit of bypassing defiant status, which means it works on champions and legendary (but its duration doesnt stack, so if using on the same enemy people need to coordinate their attacks).

Black Powder (pistol#5) can also be used defensively by beeing laid on top of other players in order to blind enemies and mitigate damage. It only works with melee enemies since it has a small radius, but can be consistently used during a fight

Moving on to pros and cons:
Pro: It has very useful unique status which can be shared, such as stone and stealth
Pro: As far as i know, thief is the only class with a spammable area blast skill, allowing it to do very nice combo stacking such as healings, stealth, swiftness, might and so on. Venom share with stealth makes up for a very powerful group opener. If you add an elementalist (to lay fields) and a mesmer, you have yourself a portal bomb

Con: a support thief needs coordination with other players. It cant lay down area fields (besides poison, smoke and dark), so it needs another player in order to combo blast them. If using blinds, other players should enter the field in order to gather more enemies together. A support thief loses a lot of its value on a Pug
Con: In order to benefit from venom sharing you need to trait it up. You need venomous aura for sharing, and leeching venoms to steal life on hit

On another note, i dont believe in this “best support class” thing. I believe the best group is made up by different classes in order to have different abilities available, such as healing, aegis, protection, stealth, etc.

Basilisk venom is 4xs cooldown
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Basilisk_Venom

Excalibur.9748:

Basilisk venom is 4xs cooldown
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Basilisk_Venom

I forgot to mention there’s a trait that reduces 20% venom skill’s cooldown called Quick Venom, which makes it a 36s cooldown

One big advantage you’re all leaving out for standard thief builds is misdirection. In WvW you can stealth and flank, hit the squishies on the back line really quite hard and while the enemy is scrambling to figure out where you’re coming from, your zerg has time to counter and push back the front lines. I would call this indirect support, but creating chaos amongst the ranks of your enemies is a form of support nonetheless.

Zunhar.4079:

bobross.5034:

thief support-
stealth to save allies on low health and stealth res
with trait, stealth grants regen.
with traits, stealing can give 10s fury/swiftness/might in aoe and gives vigor and strips/shares two boons on steal (min 21 second cd)
blast finishers from shortbow are spammable, thief can’t put out the fields, but they are the best at blasting them. Thief + staff ele = might stacking/swift stacking / aoe heals.
venom share – thief venoms are shared with 5 ppl in small aoe with traits they can give might, chill/immobilize/poison/torment/stone on attack, steal health on attack (this is fairly strong).
I think thats about it…note they are all not easy to achieve in one build.

This pretty much sums it all up. Only thing you left out was a poison field from the SB and area weakness with use of a blast finisher.

let me sum that up. he made it look long.

Steal gives AOE fury might swiftness.
Blast finishers pre battle
Venom share withing like 400 range.

thats it folks. :P srry bountiful theft is RARELY run…but i guess youCOULD count it.

Thieves have the ability to supply boons. Swiftness/Might/ Fury/ Vigor. And if you run the right kind of boon duration you will be able to supply an overlapping supply of boons. Having a 2nd thief in party running the same build will just be another perk, because you yourself would be able to supply enough alone.
~Anyone care to challenge me on this?