Guild Wars 2

I haven’t played in a long time, so I decided to come back, make a new char and try how things have changed. First thing I noticed is that I’ve forgotten much about playing thief.
So … where is survivability for a Thief?
Is it in traits, skills or play stile?

My Thief is only lvl 12 but I am already feeling the effects of his low HP and my lack of understanding this class. I haven’t decided what kind of Thief I want. I only know I would like to learn how not to die so often and/or fast. I must also admit I am a terrible kiter, so melee is where I have to find my footing.

I’ve watched few videos and while I understand they were made by lvl 80 chars, there have to be some things I could implement in my play style that would help me in staying alive. According to those videos (and the limitations of my observation), stealth is one of the biggest factors in survivability with it’s health regen. Am I wright? Or am I missing something? Certain boons, traits, skill combos?

Like with all squishy classes/specs you need to learn your enemies spells and animations to survive because you have to play reactive when you get preasured. The best way to survive an engagement with a bursty class cannon is to always force the enemy into defense.

Consider dagger/dagger Death Blossom condition spam (use Signet of Malice along with Caltrops and Trickery III – Uncatchable for AoE bleed, tons of healing and lots of dodges) or using pistol offhand for Black Powder’s AoE blind.

Stealth is a good survivability mechanic but you’ll need to trait heavily into Shadow Arts before it pays off. At level 12 you don’t have those traits and stealth is simply only a way to execute backstab.

Thief starts more glass than cannon until they can build the cannon portion.

rhelik.4876:

Consider dagger/dagger Death Blossom condition spam (use Signet of Malice along with Caltrops and Trickery III – Uncatchable for AoE bleed, tons of healing and lots of dodges) or using pistol offhand for Black Powder’s AoE blind.

Stealth is a good survivability mechanic but you’ll need to trait heavily into Shadow Arts before it pays off. At level 12 you don’t have those traits and stealth is simply only a way to execute backstab.

Thief starts more glass than cannon until they can build the cannon portion.

I played a bit over this weekend and found out that skills that blind my opponents are very good for prolonged survivability. I would never have imagined that a skill that prevents only one outgoing attack to miss, to be so effective. Especially when used against a group.
I’ve also been using Signet of Malice, but I must admit I haven’t been focusing on it’s effectiveness, so I can’t say if I find it more useful than other healing skills.

I can see there is a lot of work ahead of me as I am getting better at staying alive, but there are still some fights (vets and champs) where I get my health vacuumed away before I get to use my recently learned, “superior” tactics.