Guild Wars 2

First of all, don’t really get rid of flanking strike, remove “Slash” from “1”, and put Flanking Strike as the 4th “1” in the chain.

So S/D’s new “1” is.

Slice (33% chance to randomly use slashes animation for flavor.)
Crippling Strike
Tactical Strike
Flanking Strike (the new 4, its now free.).

Make “3” a new ability called “Ravage” Which hits 8 times, causes 3 stacks of bleeding.

An auto attack that displaces you passively wouldn’t work. Character movement should be a voluntary action.

Depends, I would love doing an autoattack, it places me right where I want to be, behind the mob.

It’s cool that you want that but please try to think about the pvp’ers aswell. I hate most of the skills that place me somewhere. I mean, i know what they do so i can take certain steps to land where i want but it’s stupid and requires less skill. I hope they remove this skill. I love the idea of s/d. I love all of the skills eccept Flanking Strike. I really hope they replace it and make it a viable weaponset.

IDarko.4709:

It’s cool that you want that but please try to think about the pvp’ers aswell. I hate most of the skills that place me somewhere. I mean, i know what they do so i can take certain steps to land where i want but it’s stupid and requires less skill. I hope they remove this skill. I love the idea of s/d. I love all of the skills eccept Flanking Strike. I really hope they replace it and make it a viable weaponset.

Totally agree. S/D is the perfect high skill set for the thief, the most difficult and rewarding playstyle, if you know how to play.

But FS is totally worthless in this set, making Inf strike + C&D the only real reason to use this set.

It’s horrible from a PvP perspective.

I agree that sword should have a skill that causes bleed, all other weapons of the thief have good ways to cause bleeding(Death Blossom: 3 stacks for 11s, Detonate Cluster: 3~9 stacks for 4.25s and Sneak Attack: 5 stacks for 4.25s).

However, falking on #1 skill chain would not work very well. Maybe a replacement for the Stab. (which is almost useless)

I don’t like this idea. I love flanking strike as it is, it is my primary dodging ability. I love having the ability to dodge on command, without a cooldown (as long as I’m smart about my initiative).

leonardoraele.3725:

I agree that sword should have a skill that causes bleed, all other weapons of the thief have good ways to cause bleeding

What is wrong with not every weapon following the same scheme? Weapon choice is the major diversifying attribute, it is good to be different.

Tulisin.6945:

leonardoraele.3725:

I agree that sword should have a skill that causes bleed, all other weapons of the thief have good ways to cause bleeding

What is wrong with not every weapon following the same scheme? Weapon choice is the major diversifying attribute, it is good to be different.

All the weapons of the thief that causes bleeding, do it in very different ways. But yeah, you have a point; I agree.

I think flanking strike would be better if the first strike occurred before the evasion and the second strike had an additional element to it. This way you are far more likely to remove a boon from the first strike, because the skill has a tendency to move you out of the way, while providing an additional bonus for hitting the second time other than just mediocre damage.

Alternatively, split it into two skills. Flanking strike, which strikes then evades behind and then a separate skill with an additional effect if you hit from behind or to the sides. Giving you the chance to activate the second strike would make it more likely to hit IMO.

Source of bleed on sword+dagger?
Lemme see: you will have no CD 1200 range shadowstep+immobilize ,also no CD condition removal,also 2 sec daze+blind,nice white damage and stealth hit?
Add bleeds to this and you will have the deadliest most OP rotation IS+C&D+TS,while
dots are ticking….don’t know….

I’m gonna have to say no. Upon using S/P after maining S/D since BWE2, I’ve gotta say S/P is feels clunky as all heck. I don’t want S/D to be another S/P. I don’t mind that S/D’s main source of damage is its basic attack, its trade off is it’s more survivable when used properly, much better mobility and the utility of ridding foes of boons. Moving Flanking Strike to the 1 combo is a bad idea because it gets rid of main point of Flanking Strike. It’s meant to be used to evade attacks, you can’t use it in this way with it locked away at the end of your attack combo. People should stop trying to turn S/D into D/D and S/P. S/D has a different focus and purpose then those two.

Not to be a wet noodle, but S/P is Direct Damage, S/D should be a mix between Condition/Direct Damage, a little between both worlds since it lacks tools.

Maybe a powerful strike that DOES direct damage, then flips the target around and stabs him in the back for bleeding damage.

((Basicly, you slash him with your sword, turning him around, then stab, if your target is already turned around it will face him infront of you, so you have to be careful how you use it, if you SPAM it it will just flip the target around multiple times and you won’t get a bleeding effect unless your flanking the target.))

So basicly, as a rotation…

3 = Ravage the target, turning him around and stabbing him, immediately after “5” for cloak and dagger and then 1 for back stab.

If you just spammed Ravage, you would do less damage each time you did it, because the secondary attack of ravage only damages the target if your behind it, but it flips the target around whatever hes facing, but this attack does ALOT of damage if executed correctly.

Daecollo.9578:

3 = Ravage the target, turning him around and stabbing him

You make “Ravage” sound pretty suggestive.

rav·age? ?[rav-ij] Show IPA verb, rav·aged, rav·ag·ing, noun
verb (used with object)
1.
to work havoc upon; damage or mar by ravages: a face ravaged by grief.

1. ruin, despoil, plunder, pillage, sack. Ravage, devastate, lay waste all refer, in their literal application, to the wholesale

Thiefish

Sword and Dagger seems great as is, I don’t understand why people are trying to change it.
Yes, it needs a little tweaking, the pathing for example. But that’s about it.
I’m only 70 atm but I’ve spent at least levels 40 – 70 in WvW. I can manage to take 2-3 enemies at a time. It’s a free evade that damages! And traited into Acrobatic it’s practically free when you mix it up with your regular dodging.
Sometimes I have too much initiative / endurance than I know what to do with, and the enemy can barely lay a hand on me.

Make it a whirling dervish attack that removes boons and deals damage or evadesreflects damage and I’d be happy

I wish they gave Pistol Whip to S/D instead S/P.

The dagger throw + Pistol Whip are two of my favorite abilities, I wish I could have them together

enenion.8127

I think flanking strike would be better if the first strike occurred before the evasion and the second strike had an additional element to it. This way you are far more likely to remove a boon from the first strike, because the skill has a tendency to move you out of the way, while providing an additional bonus for hitting the second time other than just mediocre damage.

Alternatively, split it into two skills. Flanking strike, which strikes then evades behind and then a separate skill with an additional effect if you hit from behind or to the sides. Giving you the chance to activate the second strike would make it more likely to hit IMO.

That… that would actually be an incredible idea. I really like this. It would make FS feel more reactive (because it doesn’t lock you down into a long animation), make it far more likely to hit, and just generally make the skill better. I already use S/D, but this would make me much happier about it ^^